Violet wakes from a recurring nightmare: in a rain-soaked field near Draithus, the Sage levitates her, threatens to make her bring someone to him, and promises Draithus will fall. She snaps awake beside Xaden in their room in Riorson House, realizing he is also trapped in a nightmare. She rouses him, and they comfort each other as the storm tapers outside.

Discussing the dreams, Violet describes the consistent elements: the Sage, Draithus’s walls and spiraling tower, Andarna’s distant scream, and the powerlessness she feels. Xaden grows intense as she mentions seeing a relic-like mark on her left wrist and a hand that looked like his. He reveals the dreams are his nightmares, recurring since Resson and increasing since Basgiath, and that Violet was in them—he recognizes the perspective and details from his own fight with the Sage.

They piece together that Violet has been entering Xaden’s dreams without realizing it. Violet recalls another vivid dream in Samara about Cliffsbane: refusing to leave without a family portrait and telling Cat she had to live because she was the future queen of Tyrrendor, which suggests Violet may have been inside Maren’s nightmare. Xaden proposes that Violet’s second signet—granted through her bond with Andarna—is dream-walking, a passive but highly dangerous form of inntinnsic that lets her enter minds during sleep.

Violet reaches for Andarna, who admits Violet tends to wander while dreaming and is usually drawn to Xaden, though Andarna insists she did not choose the ability any more than Tairn chose lightning. Xaden warns that no one can shield while asleep, making Violet exceptionally dangerous; if the leadership discovered this, they would kill her despite her value against the venin.

To confirm, Violet and Xaden dress and wake Maren. Violet asks about a family portrait; Maren produces it, and Violet recognizes it from the Samara dream, aligning with Maren’s former worst nightmare of losing that portrait before she lost her family. This corroborates that Violet walked into Maren’s dream.

Before they can discuss further, Tairn bellows a warning that a horde approaches from the east. Bells begin to peal overhead, signaling an attack as Violet, Xaden, and Maren react to the imminent threat.