After another nightmare about her father’s death, Nesta wakes shaken and makes it only partway down the House of Wind’s stairs before collapsing. The House brings her water and then offers stones and bones for scrying, but Nesta refuses because her last attempt led to Elain being taken and because the Cauldron’s attention terrified her. Meanwhile, at a late-night dinner, Amren presses for immediate action on the Dread Trove, Rhys agrees that Nesta has delayed too long, and Cassian defends her trauma and hesitancy. Amren gives Nesta one week to find the Trove by other means before they turn to alternatives, including asking Elain to help.

Over the next three days, Emerie keeps attending training, and Nesta, Gwyn, and Emerie grow closer through exercise and shared talk about books. In the library, Gwyn warns Nesta that Merrill has discovered the switched book, but Nesta refuses to back down. Merrill publicly insults both of them, reveals she knows Nesta’s bloody wartime reputation, and belittles Gwyn as a "nymph." Nesta answers with cold defiance and briefly lets some of her own power show, forcing Merrill to retreat. Afterward, Gwyn explains her river-nymph ancestry, her upbringing at Sangravah, and hints at deep losses connected to her mother and twin.

Nesta’s defense of Gwyn has consequences. The next training session brings three new priestesses—Roslin, Deirdre, and Ananke—into the ring, all nervous but willing to try. Deirdre’s severe scars make clear the violence she survived, and the sight of these women confronting their fear affects Nesta deeply. Their courage makes her feel that asking others to be brave while she avoids scrying would make her a hypocrite.

That evening, Nesta privately asks the House for the scrying tools and brings Cassian to witness the attempt in case something goes wrong. She explains that the priestesses’ effort changed her mind, and she tries to locate the Mask on a map of Prythian. But as she reaches toward the Dread Trove through thoughts of the Cauldron, she is overwhelmed by memories of entering it and by fear that she no longer has the power to do this. The attempt fails, and Nesta retreats to bed, ashamed and emotionally wrecked.

During the night, those memories turn into a devastating nightmare in which the Cauldron’s darkness comes for her. Cassian wakes in alarm as the House signals danger, and he and Azriel race to Nesta’s room to find her engulfed in freezing silver fire. Rhys smothers the blast with his darkness and enters her mind, while Cassian’s voice helps break through to her long enough for Rhys to bank the power. Once Nesta finally falls unconscious, Rhys reveals that the failed scrying triggered her buried memories of the Cauldron. What he witnesses leaves him horrified: Nesta stole something from the Cauldron, but it also took something from her, and the power remaining in her is pure death.