The Domini saga

The violet dust on Kynes’s palm flares again, but this time it is sharp, deliberate light. Twilight on the river terrace turns cold as ozone and old decay rolls over the stone.

Amber veins in the terrace shriek in resonance. Above Kynes, the hovering violet knot quivers, as if something far away has just found its thread.

Mara stiffens beside the broken channel, her eyes snapping to Kynes’s hand as the light punches brighter through the dusk.

The answer arrives in the stone itself, a distant, hungry pressure pressing through the terrace. The Domini Liche Lords are locking onto him, and the dust on his skin is the bridge.

Kynes lowers the scarred hand and taps Mara’s sleeve with one finger, a dry little poke meant more to prove control than to ask permission.

Mara huffs a laugh despite herself, then angles closer over the broken channel, her shoulders easing a fraction.

The violet knot hangs above them, trembling but contained, while the amber veins underfoot keep a low, watchful glow.

Kynes draws Soul-Cutter across the scarred palm in one clean motion. The violet mark snaps bright, then goes slack as the severed hand falls away into shadow and ash instead of blood.

At once, the terrace drinks the spill. Black shadow pours over the stump like surf, knitting around bone and skin with a cold, steady pulse.

The hovering violet knot flares above them, searching, but the glow on Kynes’s arm blurs under the new shadow-skin before it can lock on.

The new hand finishes forming, dark and whole, fingers flexing once beneath the amber glare. Below, the terrace’s veins dim to a wary simmer, and the violet knot loses its sharp edge.