The nine realms are about to prove her wrong.
Dark elves are still moving through Earthrealm, humans are being dragged away and remade into soldiers, and the giant Morvane is preparing for a conflict that could reach the people Lena has sacrificed everything to protect. Her little brother is safer only as long as she keeps the gates between realms closed.
But every gate Lena seals raises a worse question:
Why are the other realms failing at all?
The answers do not fit the story the gods have always told.
As Lena travels beside Caelan, Darius, Evander, and Roran, her bond with all four deepens from dangerous attraction into something she can no longer dismiss as temporary. At the same time, old fractures between the immortals begin to show. Caelan carries secrets. Valdrin avoids questions. Former enemies know pieces of history the gods would rather forget.
Lena has never been good at accepting orders without explanations.
Now that instinct may be the only thing standing between the realms and a war built on the wrong truth.
To save Earthrealm, she may have to challenge the very gods she is falling for.
Because if the nine realms are collapsing, defeating Morvane will not matter unless Lena discovers who—or what—broke the balance in the first place.