The Autumn King went on, “I’ve looked. I’ve spent centuries looking. Thousands of people throughout the ages have attempted to go past their own intended levels through artificial means. None of them ever made it back to life.”

One minute remained, the seconds flying off the countdown clock.

Bryce had still not Ascended. Was still making the Search, facing whatever lay within her. The timer would have halted if she had begun her attempt at the Ascent, marking her entrance into the Between—the liminal place between death and life. But the timer kept going. Winding down.

It didn’t matter, though. Bryce would die whether she attempted it or not.

Thirty seconds left. The remaining dignitaries in the room bowed their heads.

Ten seconds. The Autumn King rubbed at his face, then watched the clock count down. The remainder of Bryce’s life.

Five. Four. Three. Two.

One. The milliseconds raced toward zero. True death.

The clock stopped at 0.003.

A red line shot across the bottom of the Eleusian system’s graph, along the runway toward oblivion.

Declan whispered, “She’s running.”

“Faster, Bryce!” Danika raced at her heels.

Step after step after step, Bryce barreled down that mental runway. Toward the ever-nearing end of it.

“Faster!” Danika roared.

One shot. She had one shot at this.

Bryce ran. Ran and ran and ran, arms pumping, gritting her teeth.

The odds were impossible, the likelihood slim.

But she tried. With Danika beside her, this last time, she could try.

She had made the Drop solo, but she was not alone.

She had never been alone. She never would be.

Not with Danika in her heart, and not with Hunt beside her.

The end of the runway neared. She had to get airborne. Had to start the Ascent, or she’d fall into nothingness. Forever.

“Don’t stop!” Danika screamed.

So Bryce didn’t.

She charged onward. Toward that very final, deadly end point.

She used every foot of the runway. Every last inch.

And then blasted upward.

Declan couldn’t believe what he was seeing as the Autumn King fell to his knees. As Bryce rose, lifted on a surge of power.

She cleared the deepest levels.

“It’s not …,” the Autumn King breathed. “It’s not possible. She is alone.”

Tears streamed down Sabine’s harsh face as she whispered, “No, she isn’t.”

The force that was Danika Fendyr, the force that had given Bryce that boost upward, faded away into nothing.

Declan knew it would never return, in this world or on a mist-veiled isle.

It might still have been too long for Bryce’s brain to be without oxygen, even if she could make it the entire way back to life. But his princess fought for every bit of progress upward, her power shifting, traces of everyone who’d given it to her coming through: mer, shifter, draki, human, angel, sprite, Fae …

“How,” the Autumn King asked no one in particular. “How?”