Diem tells Maura that she is leaving the healing center, and Maura responds with unexpected relief rather than anger. Maura seems glad that Diem is choosing her own path, even though losing Diem after Auralie will strain the center. They spend hours drinking tea, remembering Diem’s childhood at the center, laughing over old patient stories, mourning Auralie, and parting with a tearful promise to stay close.

Diem then goes to Henri’s house and struggles for nearly an hour to knock. Henri finds her on the porch, notices her Royal Guard clothes, and questions her about the fire, the palace, and why she fled the Guardians. Their conversation turns into a confrontation over the Benette raid: Diem condemns the deaths of guards and the Guardians’ violence, while Henri argues that violence is necessary against the Descended because ordinary appeals will never win mortals freedom.

Diem accuses the Guardians of poisoning the Benette child to create a reason for Diem to enter the house. Henri admits he knew, insisting the deathshade exposure was a calculated risk and that the raid recovered enough weapons to arm many rebel cells. Diem is horrified that he knowingly used a child and used her as part of the plan, but Henri presses Diem to admit that a war against the Descended cannot be won without bloodshed.

Henri tries to justify the Guardians by describing atrocities committed against mortals in other realms. He says Ignios forced mortals into the desert to die when it closed its borders, and that Sophos invites talented mortals to its institutes only to trap them and eventually experiment on them. Diem is shaken, especially because Teller has long hoped to study in Sophos, and she questions whether she has been blind to the true evil of the Descended.

When Diem says she needs time, Henri warns that the Guardians are angry and may demand assurance that she will not betray them. He tells her to lie low, avoid the Descended, and stay away from the palace. Diem then suggests that she and Henri leave Mortal City together, perhaps for Umbros or beyond Emarion, hoping to escape both the Guardians and the Descended and reclaim the simple future they once imagined.

Henri rejects the idea because he has a life and obligations in Mortal City, then reveals another secret: Andrei has been recalled to the army and has accepted an assignment to lead forces against the rebel cell in Meros. Diem refuses to believe her father would choose service to the Descended after Auralie’s disappearance, but Henri urges her to ask Andrei herself, clearly convinced the news is true.