Luscia gathered her small handful of belongings, buckled her kuerre at her waist, and headed toward the tree line to join her men. When she noticed the absence of four paws, she looked back to find the lycran patiently sitting where she’d left him.

Blasted beast, Luscia cursed.

“I’m leaving with or without you,” she stated, continuing forward.

She heard a mass hit the earth and turned to see Aksel’s reclining outline among the tall grasses. His unblinking, glowing eyes fixated on where she stood at the edge of the clearing. With a quick yip, Aksel tilted his head and lowered it stubbornly over his outstretched legs.

“Really? You think now is a good time for this?”

Luscia knew what the lycran waited for. It was what they were all waiting for.

Pure Tiergan blood offered the Haidrens to Boreal an ability to experience what others could not. The higher gifts gave their Ascended Haidrens the sacred ability to hear and feel things not of this world, but of the hidden existing in and around it. That gifting manifested in various forms, but Luscia had deliberately postponed exploring them. She’d avoided attempting her initial Sight, the first sign of true Tiergan lineage, since the evening of her eighteenth birthday.

A vacancy or disturbance in the higher gifts was unacceptable in Boreal’s next spirit leader. Therefore, failing the Sight would only confirm Luscia’s silent fears—an uncertainty of self which could never be spoken aloud. Luscia feared something she could not endure. Something she’d witnessed Eoine, her late mother, bear until the day she disappeared. Her magical, tormented, beautiful, and strange mother.

Luscia stifled the thought of her. Now wasn’t the time to linger on such fears.

She regarded the unwavering lycran across the empty clearing. The wolx was right—she’d waited long enough, and time was running out. Submitting to the inevitable, Luscia closed her eyes and remembered Alora’s instructions. She imagined reaching past the blackness and felt for what her aunt described as a feather brushing the mind.

After a few absent heartbeats, Luscia’s eyes began to water. She lifted her face upright, refusing the outpouring of emotion. Keeping her eyes pressed shut, Luscia inaudibly begged, “Bolaeva. Bolaeva, Aniell, please let me see.”

A spark, then another, tingled up her spine and traveled down her arms. As with a tether, she tried to reach out and pull. Reopening her eyes, Luscia willed herself to see beyond the veil that masked the unseen.

In a flash of light, there they were.

Faint but present, as expected so far from the source, glittering threads of lumin danced with the breeze. The light energy snaked about her body and floated toward the night sky. Fleeting traces of it awoke in the striation of the nearest tree bark, the swaying blades of grass, even Aksel’s coat. Luscia’s breath caught at the beauty of the living luminescence. Hesitantly, she raised her forefinger toward a branch of leaves. The iridescent veining brightened at her touch, as if greeting an old friend.

The undiluted lumin, no longer sleeping in her Tiergan blood, pulsed beneath her skin. A nearly euphoric sensation lifted her upright, intensifying throughout her body. It was an awareness unlike any other. And though her Sight was gone with the next blink, she felt a magnetism to the threads as she hadn’t before.

Alora promised that once the veil was removed, it would never return. Thus, in its exodus, Luscia released all doubt, finally believing the potency of her inheritance.

“Tadöm, Aniell. Selah’Aurynth,” she whispered in a prayer of gratitude.

Suddenly a sharp, burning pain seared through her temples. Crying out, Luscia collapsed. Aksel ran to her side and with a wet muzzle, shoved her satchel toward her fingers. Gasping, she searched frantically for one of Alora’s glass vials and swallowed the prescribed tonic in a panic. Then Luscia cradled her head in her hands, pleading for the familiar pain to dissipate.

Disappointment drowned her agony. She’d taken her most recent dose just a few nights ago; it was far too soon for her to need another. Forcing herself off the ground, Luscia prayed for relief and quickly grabbed her things. She shook with remnant throbbing, but made way toward where her Najjan had assembled at the overlook, just a short walk through the trees.

Reaching their position, Luscia proceeded to one of the pack horses and stored her things inside a woven case. Head aching, she barely registered the clearing of a throat behind her at first, but when she turned around, all five men were staring at her in silence.

“Wem?” Luscia demanded, before noticing the collective pattern their gazes traced about her figure. Luscia may have chosen that particular surcoat for two reasons, for it fit rather well, and no one ever achieved anything by dressing like a sack of produce.

“Ana’Sere, you look…” Declan began, trailing off in consideration.

“Vicious!”

“And enticing!”

The pair of animated blondes nodded in unison. Marek grumbled something between Böwen and Creyvan, and their eyes doubled in size.

“I was going to say formidable, but I think their outburst will suffice,” Declan finished with a stiff nod, then returned to his horse.

Mounting her mare in a swinging vault, Luscia caught the grimace Marek gave the others. The captaen held his stern expression a moment longer to be certain some wordless message was understood before climbing into the saddle. Whatever it entailed, Luscia didn’t think Noxolo registered it, as he stalked in front of them and grinned at her with genuine regard.

Neither did Marek, by the way his brows merged in renewed aggravation with the alabaster Najjan. Tugging up the hood of his emerald cloak to hide the striking hue of his scarlet hair, Marek walked his horse beside Luscia’s mare. Starlight shone on his face when he leaned closer, highlighting the bristling along his jawline.

Marek’s unease was evident as he spoke in a low voice. “You dress as if we ride into battle, Luscia.”

She ignored his informality and settled her gaze on the city of Bastiion, alight in the distance below. “Aren’t we?” Luscia asked with conviction.

Marek studied her, as if he could sense the remnant pain within her skull. “Something’s changed. Ana’Sere, are you all right?”

Her stomach tightened. His al’Haidren should not be so frail, so susceptible to ordinary affliction. The lumin in her blood should have risen above the episode, especially after its awakening. Luscia’s brethren needed to see the al’Haidren they believed in: anointed, resilient, whole.

Luscia evaded the captaen’s scrutiny and shifted to address her men. “As discussed, we will hug the shoreline along the Vasil and enter the Proper at the northwest gate. Marketown does not slumber in the night, but rather wakens, so be on your guard. The streets should be quiet along the docks, which is why your captaen and I have selected this route.