Since eating the tillvine, a hollowness had filled Laira. It felt as if an unseen force had ripped out her innards, leaving nothing behind her ribs, only an empty cavern. All her life, Laira had suffered. She had fled the cruelty of her father in Eteer. She had suffered the fists of Zerra, cruel chieftain of Goldtusk. She had fought demons and watched those she loved die in fire. And throughout all her nightmares, she had clung to a dream of beauty, to a pillar of light within her, a twin to King's Column—to her magic. The magic of dragons.

"And now that magic is gone." She raised her chin, tightened her lips, and tasted her tears. "And so I will leave."

She took another step, her tears freezing on her cheeks. She turned around only once and gazed across the forest. The pillars of Requiem rose there, dwarfing the trees, white columns against a blue sky.

"Requiem," Laira whispered. "I leave your sky."

And my story ends here, she thought. After all my heartache, all the blood I spilled, all those I loved and hated . . . I am again alone.

She turned around. She took another step.

Farewell, Requiem.

"Laira."

The voice rose behind her, soft and deep. She turned around again and she saw him there. Jeid emerged from behind snowy birches, walking toward her. He wore thick bear pelts, and his hair and beard were growing back, still short, snow clinging to them.

"Why have you come here?" Laira said, voice hoarse. "Don't try to convince me to return. Don't even say goodbye, because parting from you will shatter what remains of my soul. Let me leave."

But he stepped closer to her, trudging through the snow. "I won't let you leave."

Her eyes stung with fresh tears. Her body shook. Her voice was barely a whisper. "I am broken."

She tried to keep walking, to escape him, but his stride was longer than hers, and he caught her, and he pulled her into his arms.

"Laira, where would you go?"

She tried to free herself from his embrace, but she felt too weak—too weak physically, too weak emotionally. "I don't know. Away. I'll travel north as far as I can go, into new exile."

His eyes softened. "You saved Requiem. And now you would leave it?"