The Final Ward

Rishi and Maeril return from Sigil to find a boy Rishi once saved murdered as a message.

Lantern Hall endured weeks of threats while they were gone. Its doors are watched, its wards have been tested, and fear has entered the habits of the people who once found safety there. The killing reaches back to the beginning of Rishi’s mercy—and proves that someone knows exactly where to cut.

Kethra, Rishi’s sister, is not simply hunting him. She is staging bloodshed to study him. Around her, the Scions of the Dead Three turn murder, grief, and domination into a machine built from Manshoon’s shadow. They do not need to defeat Rishi in battle. They need him to answer suffering as he always has.

Every rescue reveals who runs toward danger. Every safe room exposes who will defend it. Every victory teaches the enemy how Lantern Hall survives.

Rishi has spent his life placing one merciful body between violence and everyone else. This enemy has built its entire revenge around that beautiful reflex.

To keep Lantern Hall alive, The Monk and the Witch must make mercy impossible to predict, impossible to own, and strong enough to survive without a single protector at its center.