The Herald moved.
But didn't look to the gathered Kalandir, nor to the council, the mourners, Qualtagh's army, or Qualtagh himself.
It turned away, to its horse's saddle.
Strapped beneath a layer of worn black leather on the saddle, barely visible until now, was a horn.
It bore no decorative markings, but it was old and stained with age and seemed to be made of some kind of bone.
It was no horn for music, war, or warning.
It was not for communication.
It was for announcements.
The Herald's robed fingers moved swiftly and unfastened it.
The crowd was silent, staring at the held-high horn.
Vell saw it, and his eyes widened. Not in surprise. In recognition.
For a moment, his breath was caught still.
"No, it couldn't be," he thought, but it was far too late.
The Herald raised the horn to the slit in its mask, where a mouth should not exist.
And it blew.
The sound was not sound.
It was anguish made audible, a scream so primal and loud it tore through layers of consciousness.
Mothers clutching their children a last time, warriors dropping their weapons before being torn down, spells faltering in the minds of wizards a moment before their doom.
It heralded destruction.
The artifacts of destruction, the ones Qualtagh had boasted about so smugly and proudly, answered the call.
They had been hidden everywhere: beneath ceremonial platforms, within the crystal trees, and inside braids and stitches of robes of the servants.
Sparks of violet lightning burst into being, not striking down but lashing out, carving jagged arcs across the sky like an angry god.
The first sign of devastation came not with fire nor thunder, but with absence.
A full row of the seating gallery vanished, erased without a trace. One moment it was there, and then nothing.
Where it had been, only heat lingered. A faint distortion, and the burned outlines of those seated, scorched into the remaining crystal like shadows caught mid-scream.
The blast caught the left wing of the gathering.
Everything to the left of Vell and Sonder's seat—
Gone.
Pale-helmed warriors of Qualtagh's army were hit. In an instant, they were transformed, not destroyed, but converted.
Their flesh stiffened and crystallized; their armored forms stood like statues made of glass.
It took only a second to cause near-total destruction, too fast for most guests to even react.
And so Vell thought.
He had one second.
One second to act, to decide:
Who to save.
What to save.
Or whether he would save anything at all.