Bryce arrives in Prythian and is interrogated by Night Court ruler Rhysand and Azriel, who discover she carries the lost Starsword.

Bryce follows a glowing eight-pointed star through ancient tunnels beneath the Night Court alongside Nesta and Azriel.

Silene's hologram reveals the shared ancient history of Midgard and Prythian and the Asteri's true vampiric nature.

Bryce absorbs Silene's magical power from the Prison's floor and traps Nesta and Azriel inside the transformed fortress.

Bryce and her allies combine their powers to defeat Vesperus, the Asteri hidden in a sarcophagus beneath the Prison.

Bryce opens a portal back to Midgard, taking both Starsword and Truth-Teller with her from the Night Court.

Lidia shoots the Hawk dead in a prison elevator and drives Hunt, Ruhn, and Baxian out of the Eternal City.

Bryce reunites with her friends on the Depth Charger and reveals what she discovered during her time in the Night Court.

Ruhn stabs the Autumn King through the heart and Bryce kills King Morven, making Bryce the Queen of the Valbaran Fae.

Bryce inserts Starsword and Truth-Teller into the star carved in the cave floor, unlocking the final third of Theia's power.

Hunt uses Helfire to remove his enslaving halo, and Bryce and Hunt open a portal letting Hel's armies into Midgard.

Ithan visits the Under-King's realm, speaks with his dead brother Connor, and receives a bullet filled with secondlight.

Bryce shoots the secondlight bullet into the firstlight core and opens a black hole that swallows the remaining Asteri.

Hunt enters the black hole to save Bryce while their friends pool their combined magic to hold the portal open.

Jesiba sacrifices her immortality to revive the dead Bryce; Bryce then abolishes the Fae monarchy and establishes a democratic Senate.

Bryce accidentally lands in the Night Court on Prythian, where she uncovers the ancient shared history of her world and the Fae homeland through Silene's hologram. After absorbing Silene's power and defeating a hidden Asteri named Vesperus, Bryce returns to Midgard with both magical daggers. While Lidia engineers a daring prison rescue to free Hunt and Ruhn, Bryce's group travels to Avallen, where she claims the final piece of Theia's Starborn power and becomes Queen of the Valbaran Fae. Armed with Theia's full magic and the armies of Hel, Bryce destroys the Asteri's firstlight core and sacrifices herself to create a black hole that consumes the conquerors. Hunt pulls Bryce back from the void, and Jesiba's final sacrifice revives her, after which Bryce dismantles the Fae monarchy and builds a freer Midgard.

The headline events of Bryce's war against the Asteri.

The Autumn King renounces both Bryce and Ruhn as his children after the Asteri inform him Bryce has vanished from Midgard.

Tharion enslaves himself as a pit-fighter for the Viper Queen to avoid execution or imprisonment at the River Queen's hands.

Ithan discovers Tharion's enslavement to the Viper Queen in the Meat Market and promises to free him.

Princes of Hel Aidas and Apollion appear as shadows to imprisoned Hunt and reveal that Bryce never reached Hel.

The Viper Queen forces Ithan to fight Sigrid in her pit; Ithan unintentionally kills Sigrid by beheading her.

Lidia uses a captive hag to free Sprite Queen Irithys from magical enslavement, then asks Irithys to burn her as cover.

Lidia shifts into a hind to delay her pursuers after the prison break, then jumps off a cliffside and is shot.

Jesiba reveals to Ithan that she is a 15,000-year-old Parthos Priestess cursed to immortality by the Prince of Hel Apollion.

Bryce's group arrives in Avallen and Tharion impulsively marries Sathia to free her from the Murder Twins' control.

Hypaxia attempts to resurrect Sigrid but fails; Sigrid rises as a Reaper loyal to the Under-King instead.

The Asteri launch a brimstone missile attack that destroys the human district of Asphodel Meadows, killing many innocent residents.

Hypaxia successfully creates a water-parasite antidote using stored lightning; Ithan tests it and gains exponential strength and ice magic.

The wolf Prime Apparent names Ithan his successor; Sabine kills her own father and Ithan kills Sabine in response.

Lidia unleashes her hidden fire magic to burn Pollux to ashes protecting her sons, who call her 'mom' for the first time.

Ruhn and Lidia reunite her twin sons with their adoptive fathers; Bryce permanently closes the Northern Rift.

As Bryce fights her battles in Prythian, those left behind in Midgard each face their own crises. Tharion's self-imposed enslavement to the Viper Queen and Ithan's accidental killing of Sigrid mark the lowest points of their respective arcs before redemption becomes possible. Lidia's dangerous double life reaches a climax when she rescues the prisoners at tremendous personal cost, while Ithan's journey to resurrect Sigrid leads him to Jesiba Roga and the shocking secrets of her ancient identity. In Avallen, an impulsive marriage by Tharion and a failed resurrection by Hypaxia complicate the group's plans, even as the Asteri's brutal assault on Asphodel Meadows makes the stakes devastatingly clear. The group's final victory is forged through Ithan claiming the Prime role by defeating Sabine and Lidia at last protecting her sons from Pollux, with the Northern Rift sealed as the war's closing act.

The supporting storylines that shaped Midgard's liberation.

The Asteri deploy armies of unmanned mech-suits and assign 1,000 mystics to search every world for the missing Bryce.

Bryce and Azriel discover that Starsword and Truth-Teller are twin daggers both carved from the same fallen meteor.

Nesta puts on the Mask to reanimate the dead and destroy the Middengard Wyrm attacking Bryce's group in the tunnels.

Silene's hologram reveals that Theia murdered Fionn, was later defeated by the Asteri on Midgard, and split her power between her daughters.

Rigelus extracts a portion of Hunt's lightning into quartz crystals while Hunt is imprisoned, revealing interest in its resurrection potential.

Bryce restrains the Autumn King with his own gorsian shackles after he confirms the twin daggers can open a black hole portal.

Ruhn breaks his silence and contacts Lidia telepathically for the first time since capture, confirming Bryce is a threat to the Asteri.

In a Hel dreamscape, the Princes of Hel reveal that Hunt was intentionally bred by them as a weapon whose lightning is actually Helfire.

The Murder Twins force Sathia to hold a dagger to Bryce's throat; Bryce defeats them by melting their minds with starfire.

Bryce absorbs the final third of Theia's Starborn power in Avallen's cave; long-lost islands burst up from the surrounding sea.

At the Northern Rift, Bryce opens a portal to Prythian to send her parents to safety and retrieve the Mask from Nesta.

Bryce uses the Mask to kill the reanimated Harpy and then spares Governor Celestina's life against Hunt's wishes.

Bryce and Hunt have sex in a safe house and experience an unprecedented merging of their magic and souls.

Bryce dons the Mask to reanimate the Fallen dead and place their spirits inside empty Mech-Suits to fight the Asteri.

Ithan and Hypaxia kill the Under-King; Hypaxia is named the new leader of the House of Flame and Shadow.

The novel turns on a series of explosive revelations and pivotal decisions that rewrite what every character believes about themselves and their world. In the Night Court tunnels, the true history of Theia, the Asteri, and the twin daggers is uncovered, fundamentally altering Bryce's understanding of her ancestry and mission. The revelation that Hunt was bred by the Princes of Hel as a weapon ultimately frees him from his enslaving halo and gives him the power to act decisively. Key emotional turning points — Ruhn and Lidia's fragile telepathic reconnection, Bryce's choice to spare Celestina, the merging of Bryce and Hunt's souls — transform personal relationships into sources of strength. When Bryce finally claims the last of Theia's power and Hel's armies are unleashed, every thread converges in the battle for Midgard, culminating in the Under-King's death and Hypaxia's ascension to lead the House of Flame and Shadow.