Lore’s scent engulfs me, lighting a fire of craving in my throat,

At the same time, my stomach somersaults so hard I almost throw up all the water I’d just guzzled.

“What…the h-ell..are you doing h-ere?

“I’m here to help,” she says simply. But the king’s presence eclipses her as he steps forward.

“Daughter. Ashwyn. This must all be so strange and confusing for you. Please, come with us and eat. And we will explain everything.”

“E-everything?” I croak.

“Everything,” he confirms, beaming.

Lore fixes me with an intense look from behind him.

“She only just got back into her body,” protests Maljha.

The bone-crowned king waves a hand.

“We will dine in this suite, just a few of us. But first, daughter,” he turns to look down on me, golden eyes radiating warmth. “You must feed. Do you have a preference? Whichever Type you desire is but a summons away.”

Whichever Type only? Are there no ordinary humans here?

“Um—“

I hear doors opening and closing in adjoining chambers, soft chatter and the clatter of dishes.

“I can feed her,” offers Lore. The king’s eye’s narrow briefly as he regards her, but he turns back to me, awaiting my answer.

I hesitate, and again, Lore gives me that significant look. I bite into my dry lower lip and immediately regret it.

“Yes, I’ll—“ my voice cracks. “I’ll feed from Lore.”

The seated Crimson smiles, looking from the king to Maljha.

“If you could leave us alone for a moment, please?”

But the one who claims to be my cousin edges closer to me, squeezing my shoulder.

“Oh no,” they say, shaking their head.

“You may be a daughter of a great house, but not of this house,” adds my supposed father. “Not yet.”

Not yet?

“Forgive me, Majesty. I meant no offense. But as I told you, your daughter’s and my relationship is an…intimate one. I’m sure she’d prefer the witness of guards to such a moment over her own father and cousin?”

Again, she looks to me. I frown. What the spirits is she on about? But I’m curious, and really would rather have something that at least vaguely passes for privacy while feeding on and questioning her. So I nod.

“Y-yes. I would.”

“Very well.” The bone-crown king calls for more guards, then—with a final, loving glance my way, leaves Lore and I under their supervision. The silence after the door shuts behind them is so thick I could choke on it.

“Well?” I cough up a word at last, taking a step closer to Lore where she sits, smiling up at me. “What the spirits is h-happening?” My voice breaks, as much in desperation as weakness. “H-how are you here? Why am I here?”

“Three questions with a thousand different answers,” sighs Lore, stretching a languid arm in my direction. “Come, now. Feed, and I’ll tell you a story.”

The movement wafts her scent in my direction, and my throat burns with thirst. I’m on my knees before her in a heartbeat, my body reacting before my mind can object. As my fangs pierce the soft flesh of her upper arm, her other hand comes up to stroke my hair as she begins to talk.

“Once, a long time ago,” she begins, her voice a lyrical whisper, “there was a people in this world who sought understanding in all things, and who often found it. A very clever people. They explored and spread themselves far across the world, where no others had gone before. And though their lands and clans were so far from one another that no two were entirely alike, they were always one, in their own way.”

My vision goes dark as my eyes roll back, my world reduced to the ecstasy of her blood flowing into me, the music of her voice.

“And when they had seen all there was to see of this world, they built great gates to carry them into the next, and as each traveler passed through the gate, one of the five Primal Spirits bonded with them, transformed them. These people were the Avdayari, their gate-travelers the first to become Umbrans.” Her fingers lock in my hair, pulling me from her arm. “That should be enough.”

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For a moment, I fight back—straining toward the still-bleeding wound. Then I stop cold, a sudden memory of the last time I violated Lore’s will flashing through my mind.

“Good girl,” she purrs, releasing me and watching smugly as I struggle to right and compose myself. “Now, the Avdayari were a great power in the world for a long time. Until one day they knew the eye of the Oros Empire had turned upon them. Many escaped from the gates, and those who couldn’t—those who were still able—dispersed into hiding. Then the Avdayari beyond the gates shut them down, hoping to halt the Empire’s spread from the first world to the next.”

“What does this have to do with—“

“But when the Oros conquered the Avdayari lands in the first realm, they tortured or coerced those they captured to learn what they could of the Gates. They learned enough to activate them, but never enough to make them work properly again. A very long time passed, and as the power of the Oros Empire began to fade, certain among the great Avdayari families grew to share an ambition. A very great ambition: to make a sixth gate.”

She pauses then, her eyes fixed on mine, but this time I just wait. There’s a twisted sort of understanding blossoming at the back of my mind—and a hundred new questions along with it.

“You see, there can only be five at once. Any more than that, and the Umbral balance is upset.”

“What would happen if there were a sixth?”

“The others would destroy themselves, and quite explosively too—at least in the first realm. On this side, they just sort of disapear. But the sixth Gate would remain. A new start, somewhere secret in lands controlled by what’s left of the Avdayari in the first realm. Our people would have sole claim over the only Umbra Gate in the world, one which functions as it was meant to. It would be a new era.”

“Our people?”

“Yes, Ash. I’m Avdayari, and so are you. King Ejirad is truly your father.”

My throat’s suddenly dry again.

“How? How do you know?”

“Because I’ve spoken with your mother, and my family knows of her. And now, having been in the presence of both of you together, I sense the truth of it. I can smell it. Feel it.”

I take another step back, mouth working silently as I stare at her.

“I’m not on her side, Ash. My family—we’re opposed to the Allies’ plan. We’ve watched for Stormstruck Reapers and Shifters with Avdayari blood, the only ones capable of creating Gates. We’ve been watching for generations, because the other families have been watching, too…and so have the Gates.”

“What do you mean, the Gates—“ but my words drop away as I think of the heron woman and the dragon-stag back at the Nameless Isle, and my understanding begins to deepen.

“As long as the Gates exist, the Aravatras who created them live and are bound to them. But they are tired. They want freedom.”

I swallow, and my throat tenses with pain.

“And my mother? What’s her place in all this?”

Lore exhales in a brief, humorless laugh.

“She got involved in an Otherside Club. They were founded by Avdaryari who’d been cut off from this realm, trying to preserve something of their people’s other home, pieces of their various cultures. Over time, the clubs became more mainstream, and the true origins were concealed for all but the most invested members. Gwen gained the trust of some of those members, and when she learned the secrets of our people, her obsession with them consumed her. I’ve heard stories about her—the old her—from my aunts.”

There’s a rapid series of knocks at the door, and Maljha’s voice calls through.

“Will you be much longer? Is Ash alright?”

“I’m f-fine!” I try to call back to them, but my throat’s still little more than a raspy croak.

“She’s alright,” bellows one of the Petran guards.

“We’ll just be another moment, thank you,” adds Lore before turning back to me. “As I was saying, she was obsessed. She wanted a place in our world, a way to the other side. And of course, she wanted to be an Umbran, but couldn’t gain access to a school. She had all sorts of plans and projects towards these ends, and you, Ash, were one of them.”

For a moment I just stare at Lore as her words seem to echo in my head, becoming louder and more horrible with each repetition.

“Wh-what do you mean?”

“I mean she sought out an Avdayari man, a man of one of the great houses, to conceive a child with. He went on to cross over, while she used experimental sigilcraft on her body in the hopes of bearing a child that was not only more likely to get struck by Umbral lightning, but to survive it as well. A child that would be attractive to the Primal Spirit of Transformation and who—if she could only pass through a Gate—would become a Shifter. I mean that your mother designed you and gave birth to you with the express intent of using you to create a sixth Gate. So that she might gain a place among the allied Avdayari. And power. And everything she’s ever wanted. That’s what I mean.”

Cold creeps over my body. A film of ice over my skin, frigid water in my veins, cracked ice in my bones.

“She wasn’t entirely successful, of course. You turned out to be a Reaper, an outcome she surely feared and tried to avoid…but still useful as a Gate creator.”

There’s another barrage of knocks at the door.

“It’s been a moment!” calls my cousin.

“We’ll be needing another,” replies Lore, her gaze not leaving mine. “Let’s see, I think there was another question you had—oh yes. How I got here. As soon as I learned you’d been taken through a Gate, I crossed through ours back at the Nameless Isle. But if I hadn’t done that, I’d have been dragged through against my will by the dragon-stag anyway. Just like everyone else back at the school that was known to associate with you.”

“What?”

“Gwendolyn sees it as almost generous, I think. Protecting your friends from the devestation to come on the other side—so long as you’re good, of course. She allowed me to seek you out, not knowing which family I’m from, on the condition that I swear to pass her message on to you.”

I just wait for her to continue. I don’t have any words right now.

“But I think you already know what it is. Submit yourself to her, to the Allies, or the safety of your friends is forfeit. The usual. The Allies have hunters and spies tasked with bringing you in too, of course. But they will have some difficulty in getting past your father’s protection. He’s a powerful man, one of the Three Kings, and he does cherish you. And there’s also—“

A single, menacing rap at the door interrupts her.

“Time’s up. I’m coming in.”

The doors swing open at the hands of the sentries at the other side, and Maljha stalks through. They look from one to the other of us, their eyebrows flying upward as they hurry over to me.

“You’re paler than you were when we left you,” they tsk, shooting a sour glance at Lore. “Just how weak is her blood? It’s a good thing food is ready.”

They loop their arm through mine, supporting me as they guide us from the room. Lore trails behind us, the wheels of her chair clicking rhythmically as they turn. My mind is a vast field of white static. Just blurred chaos and that soft clicking sound. My thoughts, if I have any, are incomprehensible.