It was like bursting through a skin.

She and the Flicker went flying, trailing corkscrewing currents of brilliance and stars, of Shadows filled with sparks and will-o’-the-wisps of light and uncountable other beings, all of them shrieking and squealing and spilling free.

Sami landed, thumping and rolling across the cool tiled floor. She leapt up, scanning and blinking. The room was illuminated with stripes and banners of light, like an aquarium crammed with deep-sea fish. All around her, Sami heard the liberated creatures crying out in joyful voices and thoughts: Free, free, WE ARE FREE.

Then both Dorsom and Natala were there, flinging their arms around her. “You did it,” Dorsom whispered intensely, over and over. “Entirely, you did it.”

Oh, Sami, you’re alive, Natala thought. Really and truly alive.

Sami wrapped her arms around both of them at once, hugging them fiercely. We all are.

Dorsom grinned. “You pierced through the gloaming, Sami. Don’t you realize? Nothing like that has ever been done before.”

“You saved Ashrafieh,” Natala added. “And you broke through the gray matrix, exploding its skin. Now the Nixie no longer has any power to hold or confine. The Shadow spells are broken.”

Sami lifted her head toward the top of the castle, blinking at all the colorful beings and in-between wisps twirling sparkling trails of joy. She laughed, waving at the creatures who sent out showers of brilliance.

Natala helped Ashrafieh to her feet, then bowed before the Flicker and touched the back of Ashrafieh’s hand to her forehead. Dorsom turned and did the same.

“Most Venerable Flicker,” Dorsom said. “We are most honored.”

“Daughter of Worlds Beyond Worlds,” Natala said. “Hybridity Most Exalted.”

Renowned is Ashrafieh through all the Silverworld—a master Reflector of many generations, with royal bloodlines to the Ifrit, Dorsom thought to Sami.

Sami watched as the older woman’s hair grew lush and long, her eyes began to shine, jingling silver hoops appeared on her ears, a heavy silver necklace circled her throat, and ribbons of Bedouin tattoos emerged, twining around her wrists and hands. This was the Teta of fifty or more years ago, fresh from the desert, a scent of jasmine, sand, and lemons still on her skin. Ashrafieh glowed faintly sea green and her hair glinted blue, but she looked like one of the old black-and-white photographs of Teta restored to vivid, powerful life. In Ashrafieh, Sami now saw an essence of that wind and sand that Teta must have missed when she moved away from the desert. These things were always a part of Teta, but they’d faded from her life in the city.

Ashrafieh laughed, a girlish, tinkling sound, and waved away their admiration. “Here is the one to be honoring.” She kissed Sami’s cheeks, three times on each side, then placed an arm around her shoulders. “After being imprisoned—” Her voice rose sharply, as if about to crack. She took a breath, went on. “For years imprisoned, in a void of despair, lost to the Worlds, I was hope-drained, washed bare. Then this child—this Silverwalker—came to do exactly what I’d secretly believed was impossible. Now, I and multitudes of Silver Beings are freed.”

Behind the group of friends, the thick, old gloaming layers of the void began cracking apart, breaking up into rubbery spurts of dust and ash. Sami turned in time to see darkness surge up from the opening, then collapse back in a hissing rain. At the same time, a noise began growing from outside the castle walls. It sounded like a gathering crowd: there were voices and shouts. Natala looked out through one of the high arched windows and gestured to the others. “Come look!”

The soft Silverworld night was lit up with pinwheels of colors, shooting sparks, and squiggles of brightness. Standing by an open archway, Sami felt tiny airborne Flicker and Shadow creatures, newly released, their colored trails shimmering over her, circling her wrists, ankles, and waist, each of them like a burst of sweetness.

“They are thanking you,” Ashrafieh said. “All those many who were once imprisoned, now freed.”

Across the lawns, mauve hedges trembled and opened into shrubbery that glistened with flowers like tiny cups and bells. “The vapor plants bloom,” Natala breathed. “There is a language tree!” She pointed to an immense gold-trunked tree, its branches unfolding like the spines of an umbrella. The night itself seemed to glisten more brightly through the open windows and archways, the air fresher, and filled with life.

“The Great Balance is restored,” Dorsom said, stepping back to take in the sweeping view.

We shall open all the cages and boxes, Ashrafieh added, spreading her arms wide. The Castle Shadow is filled with them. We shall burst all the strongholds. Every Shadow and light being must live free.

The topiaries lining the courtyard began to dissolve or burst into showers of brilliance, releasing all sorts of creatures—lions, elephants, a great beaked griffin, each shaking out their limbs, stretching, squawking, or roaring. Row after row of columns started to dissolve as well—a deep groan emerged from all around the castle and trembled in the walls.

“No need to open cages,” Natala said, looking around. “The confinements are exploding open like the void itself.”

“I think it’s time to make haste,” Dorsom said, pointing out cracks racing across the ceiling.

Ashrafieh agreed. “Half this palace was constructed of imprisoned Flickers and Shadows. Soon there will be pillars and windows and railings falling everywhere.”

Sami and the others had to thread their way back through the palace rooms to the grand entrance, as none of the windows or doors opened to anything but more enclosed courtyards. Sami wished there were time to linger over some of the marvelous things she saw piled in the halls—mosaics, fountains, libraries filled with fluorescent books and paintings that seemed to shiver as they passed. But more than that, she wished she knew where Bat had gone. Picking up on her worry, Dorsom tried to reassure her: A Shadow bat as wise and old as she would surely evade the Nixie.

Sami wasn’t so sure. She remembered the vicious way the Nixie had swung and swiped at the tiny bat. But there wasn’t time to discuss their next move: pieces of tile kept smashing from the ceilings in spouts of dust and stones. Open cracks sped through the walls. They had to keep moving, faster and faster. Suddenly, a tremendous groan issued from the ground and the marble floor seized up, shattering, and thrusting out enormous jagged shards. Soon they were no longer walking swiftly, but running with all their might.