The frozen Mère breaks apart after Kiara shatters it, forcing Gabriel, Celene, and Lachlan to flee toward the bank. Gabriel reaches safety injured, but Dior remains on the collapsing river because the meatwagon full of captive children is sinking through the ice.

Because Celene cannot cross the running water, Gabriel races back onto the broken river to save Dior and the children. Dior tries to pick the cage lock while Gabriel tears the door from its hinges, and together they free the terrified captives. Dior leads the children toward shore as Gabriel stays behind to pull out the last prisoners, including an older Ossian girl who refuses to leave before the others.

Gabriel falls through the ice while trying to escape, but a huge russet lioness drags Gabriel from the water by the arm. Dior and Lachlan help Gabriel reach shore, though Kiara and Kane are nowhere to be seen. Celene attacks the lioness, Lachlan nearly attacks Celene, and Dior stops the standoff by recognizing the beast as Phoebe, the lioness believed killed at San Guillaume.

Phoebe transforms from lioness into a scarred, tattooed woman with talons, catlike features, and a lioness shadow. Phoebe reveals that she is a wealdling, or duskdancer, able to shift between woman and beast at dusk, and explains that only silver, magik, or age can kill her. Phoebe confirms that Saoirse truly died and reacts with fierce satisfaction when Gabriel says Dior killed Danton Voss.

Phoebe kneels before Dior and swears herself to Dior’s service, saying Saoirse’s augur had already bound Phoebe to Dior and that Danton’s death deepens that bond. Phoebe cuts her own breast, recites a prophecy about the dead rising, stars falling, and the Godling’s heart, and vows to be Dior’s “talon and tooth” as night falls over Nordlund.