Page 240 of The Dryad Storm

As the surrounding Mages and Alfsigr awaken.

Appearing dazed, the Mages feel the points on their ears and stare at their hands, clearly marveling at their skin’s heightened green glow and the absence of fastlinesaround their hands and wrists. The Alfsigr Elf soldiers look around blankly, seeming stunned by the sudden freeing of their minds from the Zalyn’or’s cruel hold, all of them—the whole sea of them—seeming shocked into silence. And then, as one, they all look to us.

Almost every single Mage and Alfsigr holds up a III-marked palm, pain slashed across their faces. And remorse. Fierce remorse.

Remorse I feel burning in my own chest, tears stinging my eyes.

I meet the green gaze of one of the Mages kneeling only a few paces away, and realize I know him—Curren Dell, a fellow Mage scholar at Verpax University who was kind to me what seems like years ago.

“Elloren,” he stammers. “The Forest showed us...everything.”

I nod through my tears. Complicated tears. Because Curren willingly gave himself up to be part of thisnightmare.

“Shane!” Sage cries, rushing over the battlefield to her older brother. They fall into each other’s arms, sobbing, other allies calling out to transformed Mages and Alfsigr.

Curren blinks at the Shadow-destroyed land, a tortured look in his eyes, as if he’s remembering everything the Forest likely showed him. Tears slip down his cheeks as he meets my gaze once more with a stricken look of horror. “What have we done?” he rasps.

The same expression appears on almost every Mage and Alfsigr face, all of them in the process of waking up from a decades-long nightmare—a nightmare that might have permanently destroyed Erthia.

Watchers blink into view, perched on the shoulders of every Dryad’khin, including the newly III-bonded Mages and Alfsigr, and a collective gasp rises.

“Do you see them?” I breathe out to Yvan.

His hand comes to my shoulder, as Wynter and the others close in around us and I glance at the Watcher on my own shoulder, then his.

Yvan and Wynter nod, an astonished look on Yvan’s face as he takes in the ethereal birds, the Watchers’ message clear—

Align.

The Watchers blink out of sight, and the Verdyllion’s prismatic energy gives a pull toward Wynter.

I hold the glowing Wand out to her. “It wants to return to you.

“What can the Verdyllion do?” I ask her as she takes reverent hold of it, wantingto know, once and for all, what this Wand-Stylus I thought was so weak is truly capable of.

“It can break bonds,” Wynter answers. “It can link magic for the good. Create connections and portals via the path of love. And work to restore the Balance. Its power... it amplifies as more of us join with the power of Life.” Wynter breathes in deeply as she hugs the Verdyllion to her chest and closes her eyes, her green-tinted brow knotting. “I can sense a portion of its amplified magic breaking free.” She opens her eyes, meeting my gaze with a look of astonishment then determination as she murmurs several spells and thrusts the Wand upward.

Light rays out in every direction, a tingle racing down my spine.

“It sent me images of a large flow of Mages and Alfsigr...” Wynter falteringly says “...and others... fleeing from the Shadow destruction and famine in the Western Realm. The Verdyllion... it’s using our light power to conjure portals as we speak, to help the Mages and Alfsigr and other survivors in the West flee to the East. Including those trapped on the Fae and Pyrran Islands.”

“We need to aid everyone escaping from those islands,” Sparrow says as she and Thierren approach, hand in hand, Sparrow’s violet Strafeling aura intensifying with an urgent glow, and I remember that she and Effrey were once imprisoned on the Fae Islands.

“I agree,” Thierren seconds, exchanging a decisive look with her.

I sense a pulse of gray stirring inside the Shadow Wand in Wynter’s pocket, and my every nerve springs alert.

“Wynter,” I caution. “The Shadow Wand...”

Wynter slides her hand toward her pocket, a stark expression tightening her gaze as she makes a sliver of contact with the evil thing’s hilt. “The Shadow Wand is waiting to renew its power,” she warns, “from the discord this huge migration of people will bring.”

Yvan’s power blazes to hotter life through our bond. “Which means we need to go east quickly to try to head off that conflict.”

I glance warily at Wynter’s pocket where the Shadow Wand is stirring. “The cycle of fracture throughout history has to endnow,” I agree as I lift my gaze to meet Wynter’s, gesturing toward the Shadow tool. “What can we do to subdue that Wand?”

Wynter tilts her head, her finger still touching the Shadow Wand’s hilt as she reads it once more. “We can’t destroy it outright. We can keep its power at bay onlyby being something much greater than we have ever been.Together.”

“Which means we need to unite the surviving people of Erthia,” Jules says from beside Lucretia, giving me a meaningful look, “messy as that might prove to be.”

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