Page 82 of The Reckoning of Starlight

A magus on an adjacent roof struck first.

Shadows hammered into the rocks before Fenn could free her.

The druid’s arm burst apart in a spray of bone and blood, rending obliterating the rest of her.

Fenn’s fingers closed on empty air.

With a snarl, he whirled and vanished. He reappeared on the roof behind the magus, fire spilling from his wing claws. The magus barely turned before Fenn wrenched his head hard to the side, breaking his neck.

Fenn warped again before the magus fell against the tiles.

Time blurred as they drove Centarya’s forces from the city, the stars crawling across the sky.

Serenna’s wings shook with every beat—the tremor spreading to her hands, her jaw, deep behind her eyes. Exhaustion should’ve wrung her dry. Instead, the linked current kept surging through her, bright and relentless, too much power for a body running out of places to hold it.

The city grew quieter with every strike. She stopped counting the dead somewhere over the canal and just kept flying.

No reinforcements came from the capital. Centarya’s lines were breaking—wielders fleeing through their own portals, formations scattering without anyone left to rally them. Asharyn’s defenders slowly began to outnumber what remained of the enemy.

When the druids thinned from the sky and Essence no longer thundered through the streets, Serenna circled back to the market district with Vesryn and Fenn.

Near the far edge of the courtyard, Lykor held the final evacuation portal open while the defenders withdrew, hauling their wounded through. When the last wraith vanished, he let it collapse.

Only then did the city go quiet, save for the low crackle of fires still feeding on Asharyn’s bones.

Serenna landed next to a shattered spire, where a guildmaster’s estate had burned to the ground.

Shifting, she dispelled her aching wings, scales receding from skin that felt too thin without them. She forced Essence down and the magic writhed—the current clinging to her veins, the Starshard humming in protest—as she smothered the power. Prismatic light flickered through her leathers, dimmed, and finally guttered out.

Fenn touched down beside her while Vesryn hovered a moment longer, scanning the sky before lowering to the stone.

For a moment, none of them spoke. Ash drifted between them while the city burned on.

Footsteps echoed behind them.

Lykor approached, blood-soaked and silent, one wing sagging lower with every step. His glaives were still sheathed, appearing unused, and soot streaked across his jaw. His gaze swept over them, then turned to the empty sky.

They’d driven Centarya out, broken its formations, but Galaeryn’s armies would return. Asharyn would never be a haven again. Not with its walls shattered, its location known.

They’d held the line, but the city had paid too much to call it victory.

Lykor’s eyes found them, flat with what he already knew. His voice, when it came, was hoarse. “We’re done here.”

He opened a portal, but Serenna couldn’t walk through it. Not with the truth still buried between them. She faced him, spine bracing for his wrath.

“I know where Jassyn is.”

CHAPTER 21

JASSYN

Everything smelled wrong.

Bruised flowers. Wet rot. The wild green of earth where the Starvault had been only marble, crystal, and control.

Moss pressed into Jassyn’s cheek, damp and cool against skin that burned. Air scraped through his throat, his mouth dry as dust. Cotton-thick fog clotted behind his eyes, familiar enough to name before thought fully returned.

Stardust.