Nor closed her eyes and took a deep breath. She felt his mind reaching for hers, and as their power collided, Nor was suddenly transported away from her seat on the couch and into the recesses of her own mind, into that mental tunnel that sat between them, a doorway at the opposite end.

It was there, through a crack in the door, that Nor sent the vision she’d once been given from her mother. The memory that Klaren had sent down to Xen Ptera, when Nor and her father were lying crushed beneath the palace rubble.

The Void was the only place lacking stars in the entire galaxy. A blanket of nothingness that spanned from one end of the Phelexos System to the other. But beyond the Void, unbeknownst to Mirabel, was the root of Nor’s and Valen’s true allegiance.

Exonia.

Nor pushed the vision deeper into Valen’s mind, and she heard him sigh longingly.

A galaxy that had once been full of light and grace, blessed by the mighty Godstars. Its inhabitants the chosen heirs of the Godstars’ mighty powers, like the compulsion Klaren had gifted to her children. A realm that had long been decaying, even more so than Xen Ptera, putting their mother’s people in danger of extinction. They clung to life by the thinnest of threads and dreamed of a savior, in the form of a mighty queen, a powerful brother at her side.

Soon, they would open the Void, using Nexus’s power to command all the weapons at once. And when they tore open that hole in the sky, the Exonians would enter Mirabel like a flood. Hundreds upon hundreds of thousands who would soon find deliverance here.

Nor’s vision ended, and she and Valen blinked at each other as they returned to the present. It was a sobering memory that Klaren had sent down to Nor so long ago. Each time Nor felt exhaustion weighing on her, each time she felt the fear of failure breathing down her neck, she remembered Exonia. She remembered the lifetime she’d spent fighting for Xen Ptera—only a small taste of what Exonia had been experiencing for untold years.

The door to the great room swung open, and Darai swept in, cloak billowing in his wake as Zahn and the orange-eyed analyst from earlier followed on his heels.

“We have news, Majesty.”

Valen looked away, wiping quickly at his nose again. Nor could have sworn she saw a glimpse of red there, but when she looked back, there was no trace of it.

“What is it?” Valen asked Darai with a deep sigh.