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Xerxes.

Xerxes was in trouble.

His division was in ruins.

Ryn’s gaze dragged up to the desert where a dark, smoky cloud appeared, flickering in her spirit eyes. She suddenly remembered where she’d seen that Weylin symbol before—the one on the messenger’s flag. It had been on banners in the palace. It was the royal family’s symbol. It was Xerxes’s symbol.

Even after all the long days in the sand, Ryn hadn’t fully acknowledged that Xerxes was out here, fighting for his life, fighting for Per-Siana. That same boy who was stuck on the island in the palace, had begged her to play her harp so he could sleep, had asked for her help at the ballroom dance to rid him of his voices, had saved her from Damon and kissed her in the garden.

Burn Division Twelve was going to aid Division One.

Ryn was going to Xerxes.

13

XERXES

Xerxes had spent too many years sitting through useless lessons in the North Teaching Halls in the palace. Professors of various subjects shoved all sorts of information at him, but he rarely paid attention. Instead, he’d studied maps and had read strategy books hidden beneath his desk, finding them far more interesting. It was how he knew this desert’s secrets. It was how he understood it like a person he’d spent much time getting to know. It was why it had been easy in the beginning to evade the B’rei Mira traps and stay hidden from the enemy for so long.

Now, time blended into a series of twists and turns Xerxes couldn’t navigate. No map could help, no strategy book could solve it, no desert secret could untangle the snare.

The wave of red had scorched the camp, leaving most tents in cinders. The Vafat slew Xerxes’s men before his eyes, driving them into the cliffs where escape was impossible. Men wouldn’t fight them; they ran. They hid. They cried. They huddled together in rocky hiding places until they were discovered and dragged out. Even when Xerxes shouted at them to fight, they cowered, fear crippling them from the inside out, destroying their minds.

Xerxes hardly kept track of the hours or days. He knew a long night had passed over, the next day had come and gone, and he was fighting late into a fresh, dark sea of madness beneath a glowing moon. Shouts of tactics and warnings rang in his ears, and he shouted back, giving orders, driving the swell of B’rei Mira warriors off the edges of the camp, only to have them infiltrate somewhere else. There were so many bodies—Xerxes couldn’t count them anymore. He saw navy and scarlet alike. He saw faces he knew, Division One soldiers, and other Per-Siana division commanders lying in the sand.

Xerxes had secured more armour pieces as time passed, but it wasn’t enough.

The icy air slipped away and before Xerxes knew it, he was back out of the cold nighttime darkness, shouting for Reza to hold the right side of the cliff while he held the left with his soldiers. He yelled for hours as the black sky crept to pale gray, threatening a second day of restless battle to come over the mountainous skyline.

Commander Malore’s scarf-mask and armour had made it difficult for the Vafat to identify the King in their midst. They fixated on fighting in duos, pulling helmets off unsuspecting soldiers and trying to find Xerxes’s ink.

Someone grabbed him.

Xerxes's skull cracked against the cliffside, stars exploding behind his eyes as his feet scrambled for purchase on a shifting slope of rocks. Blood trickled into his mouth as he rammed his boot into the soldier's gut, blinking against the eye-scathing sand and exhaustion threatening to drag him under. A crimson tide engulfed Reza at his left—the General’s anguished bellow pierced the chaos as his green cape vanished beneath a mass of enemies. Xerxes lunged forward and seized a bronze pectoral, his nails scratching metal as he hurled the warrior down the jagged slope. Before he could turn around, a curved sword ripped through his flesh, and a growl tore from him as he clutched his abdomen. A boot slammed into his chest next, and Xerxes careened down the slope, limbs colliding with angled rocks when he crashed at the bottom, the rough texture of sand coating his tongue, his vision blurry.

For a moment, all battle sounds ceased. Only a ringing was left in his ears.

When Xerxes lifted his head, he hardly knew what he was looking at anymore. Colours whisked by, lights and shadows, dim in the early almost-morning. His lashes fluttered, his ears muting the shouts around him. It was like his head was buried beneath the sand again. Everything moved like sludge, an echoey blend of noises.

And then they came.

Old voices itching at the corners of his mind. It was a muddy, despicable ring of sound. And for the first time, Xerxes felt regret for casting out his voices. He wished he was stronger. He wished he was beastly. He wished he could tear all these B’rei Mira men apart, and do unspeakable, despicable things.

“Let us in!!”

Xerxes shook his head. His hand patted the sand around him for his sword as he blinked away the blur, willing his eyes to work. Forcing himself back into this fight.

But was it still a fight? Or was this a massacre now?

Pain fired down Xerxes’s neck as he craned to look at what had become of General Reza.

As soon as his vision sharpened, he saw the General holding on by a thread beyond the camp, his thick, ill body tipping back and forth, his weapon drooping in his hand. Xerxes closed his dry lips as he reached again for his sword. He dragged it toward himself, his weary eyelids sliding closed against his will.

This was a lost battle. Any moment, the Vafat would discover him. He would be taken or killed. And Per-Siana…

His kingdom.

He was a young king. He was a lonely king.