The first thing the grace took was the smell of his own rot.

  Ashaf stood at the threshold of the First High Palace, and the world suddenly tasted of honey and clean linen. The scent of copper, the stagnant reek of the Carrion Fields, and the bitter almond-dust of Malacrest—all of it vanished. It was replaced by a sterile, blinding sweetness that felt like a thick layer of wax coating his lungs.

  The golden bridge didn't lead to a castle. It led to a cathedral of light so pure that shadows were physically impossible. There were no corners here, only soft, white curves of marble that felt like frozen skin.

  "My eyes," Reina whispered. Her voice was no longer a jagged rattle. The bloody slit that had replaced her mouth was smoothing over, the scar tissue turning into soft, pink lips. "Ashaf, I can see... but the colors are wrong. They’re too bright. They’re erasing the edges."

  "Don't look at the light," Ashaf commanded. His voice sounded muffled behind the porcelain mask.

  He looked down at his right arm. The obsidian thorns were still there, but they were turning translucent, like glass beginning to melt. The green rot in his veins was fading into a pale, golden glow. The "Thorn of Divinity" in his hand vibrated, a low, warning hum that resonated in his teeth.

  "It’s beautiful," Morrigan murmured. She was standing upright for the first time in weeks. The grey, hollow look was leaving her skin. Her amber eyes were widening, the fire returning—but it wasn't the fire of a wolf. It was the dull, placid glow of a lamp. "The weight is gone, Ashaf. I don't feel the hunger. I don't feel... anything."

  "That’s the trap," Ashaf hissed.

  "Why is it a trap to be whole?"

  The voice came from everywhere. It was a melody without a singer, a sound that felt like it was being played directly on their spinal columns.

  Aethelgard of Grace descended from the white dome above. He was not a monster of flesh or shadow. He was a being of liquid light, draped in robes of woven silk that seemed to be made of distilled morning. His face was a masterpiece of symmetry—eyes the color of a summer sky, a smile that promised an end to every secret.

  "You have carried such heavy things, Ashaf," Aethelgard said, his voice a gentle caress. "The bird. The knife. The brothers and sisters you couldn't save. Why hold onto the grit when I can give you the pearl?"

  Aethelgard reached out a hand. He didn't strike. He simply gestured toward the air between them.

  The air shimmered, and a window opened into the past.

  Ashaf saw himself as a young boy. He was sitting in a garden, and the bird he had dissected was perched on his finger. It wasn't dead. It was singing. In this version of the memory, the knife had never existed. Ashaf’s hands were clean. His father was standing behind him, his hand on Ashaf’s shoulder, a look of pure, uncomplicated pride on his face.

  "See?" Aethelgard whispered. "It was all just a nightmare. You were always a good boy, Ashaf. You were always loved. Let me fix the rest of the story."

  Ashaf felt a terrifying surge of relief. It hit him like a physical blow. The porcelain mask began to crack. He wanted to believe it. He wanted to drop the Thorn of Divinity and step into that sunlit garden. He felt the black root in his chest begin to dissolve, the obsidian glass turning back into soft, human muscle.

  Beside him, Reina was laughing. She was staring into her own window. "The books," she breathed. "They all have answers. There are no holes in the maps, Ashaf. My father... he’s telling me I was right all along."

  Morrigan was weeping—soft, happy tears. She saw herself in a nursery, the child in her arms healthy and laughing. The wolf was gone. The iron was gone. She was just a woman, safe and warm.

  Even Guideau—predatory, starving Guideau—was stilling. Her red hair-stitches were turning to gold thread. She looked at her porcelain hands, and the cracks were vanishing. She looked at Ashaf, and her eyes weren't wine-colored anymore. They were blue. Clear, empty, "perfect" blue.

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  "Isn't it better?" Guideau asked. She didn't click her teeth. She didn't wink. She was just... nice.

  "No," Ashaf growled.

  He felt his own identity slipping away. The "Unpicked" chaos he had harvested from the four gods was being "sanitized." If Aethelgard erased the trauma, he would erase the power. If he erased the power, he would erase the only truth that could kill a god.

  Ashaf raised the Thorn of Divinity. It felt impossibly heavy, like a mountain made of lead.

  "You're a lie, Aethelgard," Ashaf wheezed, the mask falling away from his face in white, ceramic shards.

  "I am the only truth that doesn't hurt," the God replied. "Why choose the knife when you can have the song?"

  "Because the song doesn't have a heartbeat!"

  Ashaf did the only thing he could to save himself. He didn't attack the God.

  He stabbed the Thorn of Divinity into his own thigh.

  The pain was a vertical lightning bolt. It shattered the grace. The golden light in the room curdled into a sickly, bruised purple as the "Rot" of the dead gods surged back into Ashaf’s nervous system.

  The sunlit garden in the window withered. The bird’s song turned into a wet, dying rattle. Ashaf’s father's face melted into the faceless blur of Vaelen.

  "Ashaf!" Guideau screamed.

  The sound was music to his ears. It was jagged. It was terrified. It was real.

  The gold threads in her hair snapped, turning back into bloody, red stitches. Her eyes flared with that wine-colored hunger. She lunged forward, her claws catching Ashaf before he hit the ground.

  "Don't touch the light!" Ashaf roared, his voice a choir of dead birds again.

  He used the pain to anchor himself. He projected the visceral reality of his own bleeding leg into the Bond, flooding Reina and Morrigan’s minds with the "Unpicked" truth.

  The visions shattered.

  Reina let out a choked sob as her father’s face turned back into the rotting mask of the Carrion Fields. Morrigan’s nursery turned back into a cage of iron and fur.

  "You would choose the wound over the healing?" Aethelgard’s face shifted. The symmetry remained, but the beauty was now a weapon—sharp, cold, and utterly devoid of empathy. "You are an infection, Ashaf. You are a smudge on the masterpiece."

  "I’m the artist," Ashaf said, pulling the Thorn from his leg. He stood up, his right side a ruin of obsidian and blood. "And I’m not finished with the gristle."

  He lunged at Aethelgard, not with a strike, but with a hug.

  He wrapped his rotting, obsidian arms around the God of Grace. He didn't want to kill him with a blade. He wanted to pollute him. He channeled every ounce of the suppressed trauma, the empty bottles of medicine, the smell of lye and lilies, and the cold logic of the bird-dissector.

  "Taste the cost," Ashaf hissed.

  The liquid light of Aethelgard’s body began to dim. The golden robes turned to grey vellum. The beautiful face began to crack, revealing a hollow void beneath. The "Grace" was being overwritten by the "Truth."

  Aethelgard screamed. It wasn't a melody anymore. It was the sound of a million forgotten screams finally being heard.

  The Palace of Gold began to melt. The white marble turned to slush, the ceiling dripping like hot wax.

  "Move!" Ashaf shouted to the others.

  They scrambled toward the far end of the hall, where a set of heavy, iron doors was beginning to materialize through the golden fog.

  As they ran, Ashaf looked back. Aethelgard was no longer a god. He was a puddle of shimmering, grey fluid, his liquid light extinguished by the sheer weight of Ashaf’s rot.

  But as the God died, a new window opened.

  It wasn't a memory. It was a vision of the next palace.

  In the center of a room made of mirrors, a man was sitting. He looked exactly like Ashaf. But he wasn't wearing a mask. And he was holding a knife.

  "Five down," Ashaf whispered, his vision spotting with black.

  He collapsed against the iron doors, his hand still clutching the Thorn.

  Guideau knelt beside him, her face a mask of predatory concern. She reached out and clicked her teeth twice—a small, frantic habit that grounded them both in the dirt.

  "We're still here, Brother," she whispered.

  "Yeah," Ashaf said, his eyes closing. "But the light... it took something else."

  He reached for his belt. The silver coins—Reina's logic—were gone.

  The Grace hadn't erased the trauma. It had erased their defenses.

  They were now standing at the door to the Second High Palace, and they had nothing left but the rot.