Page 120 of Stars in Mist

Riv rose to his feet and looked at Zane. ‘So? What now, brother.’

Zane took a breath. ‘We summon the Lost Shard and entreat it.’

He nodded at Killen, and the pair tracked towards the nebula’s touch point.

Riv reached a hand for Élisa, and she wrapped her hands around his waist as the group followed. Leaving Ki’Remi behind, monitoring Kisan.

Zane and Killen stopped and stood close to the whirling celestial tornado.

The Rider’s glowing blue eyes flashed as his psionic vision extended into the sky. Wild sapphire arcs shot out of them. He tipped his head further back as the lightning-like bolts arched into the air, searching an unseen realm.

His mind traveled between dimensions and crossed different planes of existence.

The bands reached into the nebula roiling above them.

Killen reached a hand toward the nebula, and his action amplified the energy Zane was sending into the entity.

For a moment, the nebula boiled and raged. Luminous flares emitted from it, and thunder roared over the white brine lake.

With a roar, a mighty wave of dissonance burst through the nebula and over the plain.

‘No need to duck.’ Zane raised a hand to throw up a shield as the surge went over the party.

Élisa, who’d thrown her face into Riv’s chest, opened her gaze to a vision like nothing she’d ever seen.

The storm had disappeared.

The view was clear to the stars and skies beyond for the first time in years.

In its place, high above the white lake, floated a ragged-edged, mirror-like entity with mist trails dancing over it.

Within the transparent veneer were slowly shifting scenes like passing ships through time.

The group gasped as they spotted the most bleak panoramas flickering across the entity’s surface.

From otherworldly glacial valleys to uncommon, sulfuric pools to a coastline littered with shipwrecks lost in an ever-present fog.

Unmoved, Zane extended his hand as if clutching the entity’s energy and pulling it toward him, psionically plucking it from the sky.

It descended at his will, settling on the surface. It shimmered in vibrations and ripples, indicating a squall was still flowing through it.

Zane was using enormous power, and his head was thrown back, revealing his powerfully corded neck. Élisa also caught a flash of wild, luminous colors churning over his skin.

He turned his glowing eyes to the Shard.

His pulsing bands shot through the surface, where more vicious ripples skated.

After a beat, the agitation abated.

‘What do you want from me?’

The group started as a translucent silhouette stepped out of the Shard and onto the salt pan.

Before them was a disheveled creature, tiny and winged.

Their gossamer silver skin was scaled, smudged, and filthy, cheeks red and blotchy.

Dull red, weary eyes crusted with muddiness and roiling with angst stared out from an indignant face. Its dark hair was stringy, matted, and knotted, its unruly waves with a mind of their own.

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