Kylar looked with new eyes, stunned. The city was completely restored, and it was a marvel. The streets were straight, perfectly paved. The houses were immaculate, from the largest manse to the tightly packed row houses in the artisans’ quarter. Fountains pumped sparkling clean water in squares throughout the city. Hanging gardens flowed over white marble walls. The dome of the Hall of Winds was covered with beaten gold. Nearby, the castle shone white and red. The fields below the city were carpeted with the green shoots of growing crops. The docks on the lake and the locks on the river were restored. The dam was closed and the water level rising. Every sign of war and death was gone.

“The krul’s very bodies were turned into vegetation,” Ezra said. “It’s a better trick than anything Jorsin or I ever managed.”

Flowers were budding everywhere, at every corner, bordering every field, rows of beautiful red flowers bursting from bulbs. Kylar had never seen their like, or known any flower to bloom so early in spring.

“How did Elene trap Khali?” Kylar asked. “I’m certain that she isn’t Talented.” Kylar paused. “Wasn’t, I guess.”

“There’s more to magic than the Talent, Kylar. You’ve seen that yourself. When have you been most powerful? When you’ve acted in harmony with the deepest parts of your own spirit. Elene trapped Khali through love. It was a love that said I love you too much to let you do more evil—not for the sake of your victims only, but for your own sake. If it had been a rejection, Khali could have escaped and become disembodied once more. It was only Elene’s love that made your justice possible. If I hadn’t seen it, I wouldn’t have thought such a thing could be done. Obviously, Khali didn’t either.”

Kylar had felt rejected when Elene had left him without telling him where she was going or that she was pregnant. This cast her in a different light. It hadn’t been a rejection. She had simply seen that he wasn’t mature enough or selfless enough to let her do what she needed to do. Elene had taken Khali not out of a rejection of Kylar, but out of a profound acceptance for who he was not only as a man, but as the Night Angel. Her only purpose in trapping Khali was so that Kylar could kill her. Elene had believed Kylar would do the right thing in the end so much that she had bet her very soul on it. For if he’d faltered, unable to give Elene up, Khali would have taken her over completely.

“What happens now?” Kylar asked, tears coursing down his cheeks.