I spun around just as Maddie’s barricade exploded in a burst of lightning and shattered wood. The force flung bodies across the beach—some ours, some not. A few of the vines still writhed, twitching, scorched and smoking.
Sentinels and Shattered Crown soldiers poured through the breach, their faces half-hidden behind helms, weapons gleaming.
We were being overrun.
“Maddie!” I shouted, reaching for her.
“I’m fine!” she gasped, blood running from a cut on her temple. Her hands trembled, but she lifted them again. “I can hold it!”
“Not alone,” I said, stepping in front of her.
I raised my arms, and the shadows rose with me—roaredwith me. They met the incoming soldiers like a wall of midnight, smashing into the first wave anddraggingthem down, tendrils snapping like whips.
More were coming. Too many.
Leo skidded back into human form, his chest heaving. “We have to push through. Get to the inner garrison!”
“I’ll clear the way,” Phoenix called out, already conjuring another inferno in his palms.
And just as he stepped forward, a shadow moved at the edge of the smoke.
Not mine.
Tall. Familiar.
He didn’t charge.
He watched.
Thorne.
A sentinel helm in one hand. Blood on the blade at his side. His eyes—still black.
Waiting.
Watching.
Not attacking.
Not yet.
“Run, Elira!”Caelen shouted in my ear.
I didn’t think. I ran.
My legs moved before my mind caught up—down the slope, straight into the fray.
The first wave of soldiers surged toward us, crimson-armoured and brutal. I didn’t stop. Didn’t flinch.
I blasted them.
Shadows erupted from me in thick, lashing arcs—tearing through their ranks, flinging bodies aside like kindling. I felt everything and nothing. The weight of every life. The burn of every scream. The fire behind my ribs driving me forward.
The garrison wouldn’t hold. Not like this. Not with this many.
But we had a plan.
And by the gods—we were going to see it through.
