The Eclipsed found us before we found the Crystal.
We were moving through a narrow canyon, the combined Solarian and Umbran forces strung out in an uneasy line. My squad walked ahead. Dorian's people brought up the rear. And Dorian himself walked beside me, close enough that our arms brushed with every step.
The bond hummed between us. Steady. Waiting.
"Something's wrong," I muttered.
"Define wrong. The fact that we're walking into enemy territory with soldiers who wanted each other dead yesterday? Or the fact that—"
The arrow hit his shoulder before he finished the sentence.
"Dorian!"
He staggered. I caught him. Blood—his blood—poured through my fingers as I pressed down on the wound. Through the bond, pain lanced through me too. Not echo. Shared. His pain was my pain.
"AMBUSH!" someone screamed.
Then chaos.
They came from everywhere—grey-cloaked figures pouring from the canyon walls, their weapons glowing with that sickly twilight light. The Eclipsed. Dozens of them. Maybe more.
Dorian's shadows exploded outward, knocking back three attackers before they could reach us. I dragged him behind a boulder, my Ember blazing to life around us both.
"Stay down," I ordered.
"Not a chance." He ripped the arrow from his shoulder with a grunt. The wound was already closing—his shadows knitting flesh back together. "Told you. I heal fast."
"You heal fast?"
"Shadow magic. Emotion powers regeneration. And right now, I'm feeling very emotional." He grinned, bloodstained and wild. "Let's kill some cultists."
We moved together like we'd been fighting side by side for years.
His shadows lashed out, blinding and binding. My fire followed, searing and cleansing. Where he created openings, I exploited them. Where I pushed forward, he covered my back.
The first wave fell. Then the second. Then the third.
"They keep coming!" Corin shouted from somewhere to my left. "How many are there?"
"Too many!" Vex's voice. "Fall back! Fall back to—"
She never finished.
A figure dropped from the cliffs above, landing directly in front of me. Tall. Grey cloak. Mask that gleamed like polished bone.
And in its hands—the Crystal.
"The bonded ones," the figure said. Its voice was distorted, hollow, like wind through dead trees. "We've been waiting for you."
Dorian stepped up beside me, shadows writhing. "Sorry to keep you waiting. Traffic was terrible."
The figure tilted its head. "The Crystal recognizes you. It chose you. But it can un-choose as well."
"Pretty sure that's not how bonding works."
"Pretty sure you don't know what you're talking about."
The figure raised the Crystal. Light exploded outward—not gold, not silver, but that sickly twilight, burning through shadow and flame alike. I threw up my Ember, but it wasn't enough. The light pushed through, searing my skin, stealing my breath—
Dorian's arms wrapped around me. His shadows cocooned us both, absorbing the blast, shielding me from the worst.
"Together," he gasped. "We have to do it together."
I understood.
I reached for my Ember. He reached for his Shadow. And we pushed—not separately, but together. Fire and darkness merging, swirling, becoming something neither of us had ever seen.
Twilight. Not day. Not night. Something in between. Something new.
The light hit the Crystal and changed.
The sickly glow flickered. The Eclipsed figure staggered, dropping the artifact. It rolled across the stone, pulsing with gold and silver light—clean light, true light.
"No," the figure hissed. "It can't—"
"Can and did." Dorian's grin was fierce. "Now get out of our canyon."
The Eclipsed didn't retreat. They disintegrated—grey cloaks collapsing, masks clattering to the ground, nothing inside them at all.
Puppets. They'd been puppets the whole time.
And somewhere, their master was watching.
The silence after battle was always the worst.
I stood at the canyon's edge, looking down at the empty cloaks, the fallen masks. Dorian was beside me, his hand on my arm, grounding me.
"What were they?" I asked.
"I don't know. But whoever made them—they're still out there."
"The Crystal. They wanted the Crystal."
"And they know about us. About the bond." He turned me to face him. "Lyra. This isn't over."
"I know."
"If anything happens to me—"
"Nothing's going to happen to you."
"Listen to me." His hands framed my face, forcing me to meet his eyes. "If anything happens, you survive. Promise me."
"I can't promise that. If you die—"
"The bond changes things. We don't know how much. Maybe when one of us dies, the other lives. Maybe the Crystal protects us. Maybe—"
"Maybe. Maybe. Maybe." I grabbed his wrists. "I can't survive without you. I just found you. I just learned to feel again. I can't—"
I stopped. The words stuck in my throat.
But he heard them anyway. Through the bond, he heard everything.
"I know," he whispered. "Me too."
He kissed me then. Right there, in front of both our armies, in the middle of a battlefield still warm with enemy blood.
I kissed him back.
And for one perfect moment, there was no war. No Eclipsed. No Crystal. Just us. Just fire and shadow, finally finding balance.
When we pulled apart, both our commanders were staring at us.
Corin was grinning. Lysandra was pretending she hadn't seen anything. The rest of the soldiers were pointedly looking elsewhere.
"We should, uh," Dorian cleared his throat, "go get that Crystal."
"Good idea." I grabbed his hand. "Together."
"Together."