Chapter 32

At dawn in the forest, Raker carries Aris until she wakes. After she apologizes for attacking him, he turns it into training, ordering her to try again. In their duel, Aris anticipates his moves, reverses a favored pin, and briefly holds her blade to Raker’s throat. He goads her to follow through, guiding the edge until it draws blood—a deliberate “memory of his weakness.”

Daily sparring follows as they choose a northern route to avoid the desert, traveling longer under her starlight. Aris wrestles with guilt over the immortals they didn’t save, while Raker’s steady training treats her as a worthy opponent. One night she pries at his past: he grew up by the sea and killed a sword’s former wielder to claim it. He calls out her tactic of feigned weakness, and their barbed exchange is cut short by a sudden storm and approaching cavalry.

Raker rips away Aris’s glowing necklace to mislead pursuers and sprints off with it, sending Aris to a cave. She waits through the night until a demon slips in; entranced by her blade, it nearly kills her before Raker returns, yanks it back by the spine, and executes it. Noticing rents at Aris’s collar, he demands answers. Cornered, Aris reveals silver, lightning-shaped scars; she recounts being struck as a child while saving her sister.

Raker, stunned, traces the markings, then abruptly withdraws. The next day he avoids her gaze, provoking Aris to accuse him of planning to deliver her to the king. He denies serving anyone and claims his quest is his own. She confesses lifelong shame and vulnerability; he answers that he is nothing but rage and vengeance, offering no self beyond the blade, and walks on.

As they cross a shining grassland, a silver-scaled serpent with red-rimmed silver eyes rises before Aris. Raker shouts a warning, but the serpent strikes, biting between her neck and shoulder. Pain explodes through Aris before everything goes silent, leaving her collapsed as dawn nears the Land of the Gods.