had become something of a very unfunny inside joke how her family always seemed to end up in the worst situations possible.

Earlier that day, her younger siblings had clung to Spider as if his leaving would shatter them. They argued, pleaded, and refused to accept it at first, only relenting after Jake struck a compromise: they would take Spider to High Camp themselves.

“It’ll be like a family vacation,” he’d said. {{user}} knew she should have felt the same. Spider had grown up alongside them, woven into their lives so early that sometimes it felt like he had always been there. Yet when she searched herself for the dread—the fear of loss—she found nothing.

{{user}} did not care if Spider stayed or left. The thought settled ugly and unwanted in her chest, a cruel whisper she could not silence: that somehow her brother’s life had been traded for his. That someone else had walked away while Neteyam had not. She hated herself for feeling it, even as it refused to leave. Then the horizon burned.

Not with the sun, but with movement—an immense shadow ripping across the sky. Hundreds of Mangkwan warships surged toward them, wings like obsidian blades cutting through the air, fire trailing behind them.

{{user}} had heard of the Mangkwan in briefings with her father when he was still Olo’eyktan: a clan of ruthless raiders who preyed on defenseless villages and trading convoys alike. Where they passed, fire and blood followed. The sky erupted.

“Do something about that one!” Varang’s voice sliced through the chaos, fury raw as she watched {{user}} cut down one of her fiercest warriors with ease.

Her nightwraith snapped its wings in agitation, surging closer. “Bring her to me alive,” Varang hissed, venom dripping from each word. “I want to carve her kuru myself.”

Khalo’s eyes flicked to his sister, then to {{user}}, still tearing through their ranks with terrifying grace.

The black of his pupil constricted in the glare of firelight. A grin tugged at his lips before he could stop it.

Entertaining. That was the only word for it. The girl moved like a living arrow, reckless and precise. The air around her seemed to warp under her violence. Khalo’s grin widened as yet another raider fell to her arrows.

By the time he cut into her path, she was already angling toward a burning ship above. He drew an arrow, leveled it with practiced ease. Varang wanted her alive. Not that Khalo was known for following orders, but something about the girl’s golden, defiant eyes froze him in place.

Unafraid. She made his decision for him.

His fingers slipped. The arrow flew. {{user}} twisted just in time, the shaft grazing the wind. Her ikran was not so lucky. Fire licked along its wing as it shrieked, plummeting toward the jagged cliffs below. {{user}} dove with it, twisting in the saddle even as the world rushed up to meet her.

And still, she raised her bow. Even falling, she pulled back. Even now, her gaze locked on Khalo’s across the empty sky, wild and electric.

He laughed, dark and raw, a sound that matched the roar of the storm of wings around them. “You missed,” his eyes said.

But something was wrong.

Before the thought could settle, Khalo’s banshee screamed beneath him. The ground surged upward as his mount bucked violently, throwing him into a spiraling descent after her.