Ashwood had whispered it in her ear when they first met, and then in her mind as an ugly, bloody future churned inside of her like a sickness. A vision of how the realms could turn out if they didn’t do something to stop it.

It was all she could see and taste and smell, even now, years on. The burnt bodies and slickness of Crafter blood on the ground, the skies raining red and the mad, mad humans—the magic-haters who were so scared of them—smiling as everything crumbled to ash and darkness.

It was all Zekia saw when she closed her eyes, or when she looked into the shadows that surrounded Dante Ashwood.

Dark and ash.

Dark and ash.

Zekia wasn’t mad. It was the rest of the realms who had lost their minds. They were mad for not being scared and for not dropping to their knees and begging her and Ashwood to stop it.

Mad, mad, all of them.

“What are you doing?” Aurelia asked, eyeing her.

Zekia swallowed and raised her hand in the air.

Just a little blood. It was what needed to be done.

She looked at Aurelia and when the woman met her gaze, her eyes widened.

“Don’t—”

Zekia brought her hand down and the air cut across Aurelia’s neck as though it were a knife.

The Kingpin of Volo grabbed at her wound, gargling as the blood spouted from her neck. She stumbled forward and Zekia almost shook her head to scream at her not to come near.

She didn’t want to get the blood on her dress. It would stain, like a memory, and she wanted to forget this moment as quickly as possible.

She couldn’t step back, though, because Ashwood was there and he was watching and she was his little warrior.

Zekia counted the seconds until Aurelia finally fell to the floor with a horrible thud and stopped making that stomach-churning gurgle sound.

She counted the seconds until Aurelia’s eyes went blank and her hands fell from her neck.

The blood was dark and quick.

Simran gulped and it was loud enough to draw Zekia’s attention away from the lifeless woman.

“And what of you?” Ashwood asked. “Stand by me, Simran, or I will replace you just like I will be replacing Aurelia. There is not a person in the realms who can stop this war.”

Simran kept his eyes on Aurelia’s body, and though he opened his mouth to speak, no words came. It took him a few moments to realize this and so he simply nodded, unblinking and unspeaking, watching Aurelia’s blood coat the train floor like spilled paint.

“Wonderful,” Ashwood said. “Then together we will go down in history as the makers of a new world.”

Simran blinked and turned slowly to face Ashwood. To face Zekia. His eyes held a look of fear that turned her heart to lead.