Stranger Skies

Baz Brysden begins the story evading Regulator scrutiny after the failed attempt to hold the Selenic Order and Institute accountable. With Jae Ahn’s illusion magic, he avoids surveillance and reaches Henry Ainsleif’s hidden lighthouse, where Theodore Brysden, Anise Brysden, Kai Salonga, and other allies have found temporary refuge. Safety is fragile: Kai’s Collapsed nightmare magic is worsening, pulling dreams into waking life, while unnatural tides suggest that Dovermere’s opened door has disturbed the world itself.

Meanwhile, Emory Ainsleif and Rosemarie “Romie” Brysden are trapped in the Wychwood under Hazel Amberyl’s guarded hospitality. They witness Bryony Amberyl’s witch ascension, possession, and the coven’s fear of “hellwraiths,” while the woods rot around them. Romie senses the sleepscape changing and encounters Aspen Amberyl’s strange bond to a fiery beast. Emory’s many magics grow stronger and more dangerous: she can heal, Glamour, ward, unravel, and touch ley-line power, but when she purges Bryony’s possessor, she unknowingly drains Romie, revealing herself as a Tidethief.

Baz returns to Aldryn for the Quadricentennial as Regulators escalate their campaign. Captain Drutten publicly brands Emory a Tidecaller and orders interrogations of Eclipse-born. Nisha’s Sower magic helps Baz flee to Obscura Hall, where Professor Beatrix Selandyn explains Cornus Clover’s prophecy: the world-doors were closed when the Tides and Shadow vanished, unbalancing magic and weakening Eclipse-born. Baz and Kai open Dovermere’s Hourglass door, but the sleepscape is already compromised by a crowned umbra commanding Kai to “Open the door.” Artem Orlov then forces Freyia Lündt to reanimate Keiran Thornby; a shadow entity inhabits Keiran’s corpse, kills Artem, and unleashes chaos. Baz’s time magic backfires, casting him and Kai two centuries into the past.

In the past, Baz and Kai enter Aldryn during the Bicentennial. They befriend Cordelia “Cordie” Clover, Polina, and Thameson “Thames” Caine, another Nightmare Weaver, and meet Cornus Clover, a charismatic Eclipse-rights activist and secret Tidecaller. Baz partners with Clover in deadly Vault games and publicly saves a student with time magic. Clover’s knowledge of hidden doors, the Selenic Order, and dream-linked worlds makes him seem like their best hope. They also discover Luce Meraude is really Adriana Kazan, Emory’s time-displaced mother, who came back seeking to prevent prophecies of Emory’s world-destroying power.

As Baz and Kai investigate Aldryn’s Vault, their relationship deepens from guarded loyalty into open love. But Clover’s charm conceals escalating crimes. Thames experiments with a Tidecaller synthesis made from his own Collapsed silver blood and Clover’s blood, briefly accessing new magic before dying in a catastrophic eruption. Later, Polina’s Enshriner lockets reveal the truth: Cornus murdered students, drowned Louka, manipulated Thames, staged deaths as ward accidents, and pursued godlike power under the excuse of protecting Eclipse-born and Cordie. Baz is cleared but stranded when the Hourglass rejects him. Cordie rejects the Clover name, chooses Louka Kazan’s surname, and reveals that the illustrations tied to Song of the Drowned Gods came through her Seer magic. Baz realizes Clover, not Emory, is the true Tidecaller threat.

Across the worlds, Emory’s group passes from the Wychwood into the Heartland, where draconic warriors serve the Fellowship of the Light. Aspen learns her beloved Tol, or Anatolius, is condemned. The group uncovers the Fellowship’s secret: dragons are chained and harvested for heart-flame to make draconics. They rescue Tol, free the dragon Gwenhael, and learn that Romie, Aspen, and Tol are not merely companions but keys carrying pieces of the splintered goddess Atheia—the Tides, Sculptress, and Sun Forger in different forms. Romie bears blood, Aspen bone, and Tol heart, while a fourth piece waits beyond another door.

Emory, seeking control over her dangerous Tidecaller magic, bargains with the Shadow inhabiting Keiran’s body. He reveals his true name, Sidraeus, and recounts his history with Atheia: their union created Tidecallers, but the gods slaughtered them, sealed the world-doors with their blood, and dammed the ley lines. Sidraeus wants Emory to break the dams and siphon the divine fountain’s power to him. Emory learns from him but ultimately betrays him, helping the Golden Helm capture and collar him at the Sunforge after he admits sacrificing Tidecallers. Still, she rejects fatal sacrifice: when the Sunforge door seems to demand Tol’s heart, she combines ley-line power, her own darkness, and the keys’ willing consent to blast it open.

The opened way brings Cornus Clover back into the story. He has survived for centuries in the godsworld, where time moves differently, and has drained the gods’ fountain, corrupted the ley lines, and pursued divinity for himself. He declares that the keys must die to re-form Atheia, abducts Romie, Aspen, and Tol with ash-and-bone creatures, and clashes with Emory. She frees Sidraeus from his collar, but Clover wounds Keiran’s body. Sidraeus escapes as a formless umbra into the sleepscape, while Keiran, finally separated from him, dies asking Emory to let him go.

Emory gathers Virgil, Nisha, Vera, and the Golden Helm allies in the sleepscape and vows to rescue the abducted keys, stop Clover, and storm the godsworld. In the past, Baz rejects Clover’s corrupted legacy by writing Song of the Drowned Gods himself from memory and Clover’s journals, preserving the story that must reach the future. The epilogue page becomes a portal, drawing Baz to the sleepscape’s center, where an ancient loom spins time. There he meets the god of balance, who has summoned him and names him the Timespinner, leaving Baz poised to take his place in the cosmic struggle over time, gods, and the fate of the worlds.