"Then prove it," I whispered. I lifted my gaze to his. "Help me end this."
His throat worked. He reached out, his thumb brushing a streak of blood from my cheekbone—claiming the violence on my skin as his own. His expression darkened, focusing entirely on me. Ignoring the war. Ignoring his own bleeding wound.
"Done," he rasped. He turned his head toward the mayhem, his body shielding mine completely. "Stay close. I carve the path. You walk it."
Eryndor's hand gripped mine. A silent promise. Then we moved.
The vanguard flooded around us, but I had eyes only for Kaelen.
He stood at the altar, contorted with fury, his inner circle closing ranks around him. Grey cloaks. Drawn blades. Fanatics who'd die for his vision of a burned-clean world.
Good, I thought.Let them try.
Eryndor struck first.
He moved like something unshackled—fluid, brutal, every motion costing him but none of it slowing him down. His longsword snared a loyalist's blade, scraped it aside, opened the male’s throat in one continuous arc.
I was a step behind him.
My daggers were back in my hands. Stars on my forearm. I strapped the rest on as we moved—elbows, knees, wrists, ankles,shoulders—fingers finding buckles and cinching them tight between strides, every blade slotting back into place. Cold hilts. Familiar weight. Every edge back where it belonged.
The Fury found a shape it recognized. A loyalist lunged. I slipped under his guard, drove my dagger into his gut, tore it loose before he hit the ground.
Another. And another.
We cut toward Kaelen.
Another loyalist with a pike came low. Eryndor caught the shaft, snapped it one-handed, drove the broken end back through his guard and into his hip. I was already past—sliding under the next blade, my knee catching his thigh on the way through and the strapped blade opening him up before my dagger finished the job in the soft gap between cuirass and belt. The body folded. I planted my boot on his shoulder and yanked the blade free.
Three more between us and the altar. Then two. Then one—a female with a short sword and dead-certain eyes who swung for my throat. Eryndor's longsword took her arm at the elbow before the stroke could land.
And then—there he was.
Kaelen. His loyalists were thinning but he was still standing. Still fighting.
Eryndor appeared at my side, blood on his blade, his breath ragged but his eyes clear.
We moved together. Toward the altar. Toward Kaelen.
We didn't make it.
Dreadscale cut through the madness like a frigid wind through mist. He stopped in front of Kaelen.
His hand shot out—gripping Kaelen's face, forcing his head up, forcing their eyes to meet.
His Mirrorheart Mark flared beneath his collar—a burst of white-hot light that bled through the fabric. Dreadscale’s powersurged between them, twisting Kaelen’s perception inward and forcing him to stare directly into the abyss of his own fanaticism.
"Look at what you've become. See if your sanity can withstand it."
His voice was gravel and iron. But it wasn't just words.
It was acommand.
Kaelen's eyes went wide—then wider. His pupils dilated until there was almost no color left. His body began convulsing. He was seeing something. Experiencing something. Something Dreadscale wasmakinghim see.
Himself.
His face morphed grotesquely. The expression of someone watching the ground open beneath his feet and realizing there was never any ground at all. That he'd been falling the whole time and calling it flying.
