The wind shifted.
And with it came wings.
Seina stood at the cliff’s edge, the Hollow Stone behind her, the world stretching wide before her. But it wasn’t the ocean she watched.
It was the sky.
Something was coming.
Kaydence joined her, eyes scanning the clouds. “
You feel that?”
“I hear it,” she whispered. “It’s singing.”
High above, fire kissed the sky. Wings of ember and light tore through the clouds like a blade through silk. A massive shape descended, not falling—rising down.
The Phoenix.
Not a myth.
Not anymore.
The Phoenix landed with a thunderous cry, its feathers burning but never consumed, its eyes ageless and infinite. It folded its wings and looked at Seina as though it had been waiting lifetimes.
She didn’t flinch. “You came.”
The creature nodded—once, solemnly.
Kaydence stepped back. “I thought they were extinct.”
“No,” the Phoenix said in a voice that wasn’t a voice, but flame itself.
“We were hiding. Waiting for the one who’d break the cycle.”
Seina stepped forward.
“You knew about the Bone Crown?”
“I was there when it was made. My fire was stolen to fuel it.”
A sharp pain lanced through her chest.
“I’m sorry.”
The Phoenix bowed its head.
“You undid what was never meant to exist. For that, we owe you a choice.”
“A choice?”
“To bind yourself to fire. To become more than heir. More than queen. A keeper of endings and beginnings.”
Kaydence tensed. “What’s the cost?”
The Phoenix turned its gaze on him.
‘’She will rise. But you… may burn.”
The wind whipped harder. The sea howled below. The sky darkened as the sun bowed behind the cliffs.
Seina looked at Kaydence. “I have to do this.”
He didn’t try to stop her. “I know.”
She took his hand and kissed his palm. “Whatever happens, hold on to who I was.”
“Always,” he said.
The Phoenix opened its wings.
“Step into the flame.”
Seina closed her eyes—and walked forward.
Fire wrapped around her like silk and storm.
She screamed—but not in pain.
In release.
The flame consumed every wound, every lie, every curse. And when it cleared—
She stood reborn.
Hair like wildfire. Eyes like coals. Magic thrumming through every cell.
Not a queen.
Not a weapon.
Something new.
The Phoenix lowered its head.
“Your oath is sealed. Your soul reforged. You are the flame that cannot be caged.”
“What now?” Seina asked.
The Phoenix’s wings stretched wide.
“Now you wake the others.”
It took to the skies, trailing fire and light.
Seina turned to Kaydence.
He was staring at her like it was the first time.
“Seina,” he whispered.
She smiled, power humming in her voice.
“Let’s set the world free.”
 The fire hadn’t left her.
Even as Seina walked through the ruins of the Eastern Reach—once a stronghold of the Vultures, now a graveyard of broken towers—she could feel it flickering under her skin. Power. Wild. Untamed. Alive.
She wasn’t the same.
She hadn’t just changed.
She had become.
Behind her, Kaydence followed, hand on his sword but eyes on her. He hadn’t said much since the Phoenix pact. And she understood why.
She was no longer just his queen. Or his curse.
She was something else entirely.
At the center of the ruins, a tree had grown—impossibly fast. Thick roots split the stone, vines wrapping around fallen statues like shackles. It wasn’t dead. It wasn’t even asleep.
It was watching.
Kaydence stopped beside her. “This wasn’t here before.”
“No. It grew from where the last blood was spilled.” She knelt, touching the roots. “It's listening.”
“To us?”
“To me.”
The roots pulsed under her fingers, like a second heartbeat.
A whisper wound through her mind: The rootless rise. The crownless reign. The flame will fall if the soil claims you.
Across the continent, they were waking up.
Children who had never spoken now chanted names older than the empires.
The sea pulled backward, revealing ruins etched with prophecies.
In the North, the last of the Boneguard broke their own blades.
In the West, blackbirds burst into flame.
In the South, temples crumbled—revealing altars buried beneath altars.
The world was remembering what it had been made to forget.
And it was angry.
Seina sat before the tree until the moon rose.
The roots moved—reached for her, curling around her wrists, her ankles. Not to trap her.
To test her.
Kaydence flinched, ready to cut them away.
“No,” she said. “Let it.”
The roots pulled her into a vision—not of the past, but of every possible future.
A child with white hair, holding a book made of shadows.
A throne built of glass, shattering with a scream.
Kaydence dead in her arms, a dagger in his back.
Her reflection in a mirror of fire, smiling—but her eyes were not her own.
And then—
A field of wildflowers.
Peace.
A world remade.
If she could survive the rest.
She snapped back with a gasp.
Kaydence caught her.
“What did it show you?”
She couldn’t find the words.
Instead, she asked, “Do you believe in destiny?”
“I believe in you.”
She took a breath.
Then she looked at the tree.
“I need to speak to the others.”
“What others?”
“The ones like me. The ones waking up. The ones the world forgot.”
She stepped into the clearing.
The wind shifted.
The earth groaned.
And in cities, forests, deserts, and ruins—eyes opened.
Eyes glowing with emberlight.
The Rootless had heard their queen.
And they were coming.