I nearly collide into someone before realizing it’s me, the illusion sluicing right through me, and spot Malik casting doubles of us across the scene to confuse the seraphs. Draven’s suddenly at my side, and for a moment my heart leaps. Then I notice his cold eyes, the lack of a scar at his throat.
“We won’t be able to hold much longer. We need to distract Altair before he reaches the royal family.” Scorpius searches the crowd too nervously to be convincing as Draven. “There he is.”
I spot the seraph king across the melee. His gaze locks on mine, and he grips that heavenly sword, marching straight at me. I swallow my fear and refocus Judgment, aiming it all his way and he falters a step. For a moment I think it’s working, that I’m bending his will beneath mine, slowing him down, but then Fable steps into my view, wings shifting on her back, hand trembling as she presses the Hanged Man to stop the seraph king from advancing on me, commanding time itself.
I push harder to try to tear through Altair’s mind, but his will is walled away under pure steel. Nothing is breaking through.
I switch to channeling the Star, light burning beneath my skin as the card forges a sword made of light. Every instinct of survival within me hones its sharp edges, fire licking up the blade. Sweat beads my brow, but I’m not done—I draw the Sun, the next highest Arcana beside Judgment and the World.
My spare hand brims with lava, cracking across my skin. I likely look like a demon. I’m surely as angry as one. I don’t know how long I can maintain this, so I charge Altair just as Fable drops to a knee, forced to release him, Scorpius running to her side, still using the Moon Arcana to impersonate Draven.
Altair’s sword meets mine with such ease I immediately realize I’ve made a huge fucking mistake. Yet my blade holds. We break apart and Scorpius steps in, his hits stronger than mine, like a rabid bear, all brute strength with no grace. They exchange more blows, and I angle to find a way to attack without hitting Scorpius.
Suddenly Altair slams his sword against Scorpius and punches him across the face. The card at the druid’s waist blinks out and the king grasps Scorpius by the chin.
“I know how your prince fights. You will never be him—”
I grab Altair’s wrist with my blinding-hot hand. He drops Scorpius, who lies gasping for air, and swings his sword to meet mine. I barely block in time and he bends his full weight and strength against his steel. My feet slide back along the gravel path until I drop the Sun Arcana, forced to hold my sword with both hands.
Neither blade nor bone snap.
“You cannot win against me.” Altair grits his teeth, pressing his blade down harder against mine. “You will surrender. Then your mother is going to reverse this blight and your prince and his father are going to join our cause.” He takes one stepforward, then another, my feet sliding with ease. If I meet a single stone, I’m done for.
“You’re not exactly convincing,” I growl, spotting the crystal wand sticking out of a leather sheath at his waist.
“I think you’ll soon see reason.” He shoves hard, and I topple back, spinning. One knee scrapes the dirt before I’m up, retreating, the air parting as he swipes his sword where my neck was just moments before. He strikes so hard he’s likely to lift me from the ground. Each blow jolts up my arm, wearing me down.
“We wouldn’t have found her without you. The information you gave me, and then the curious interest the prince of Sedah took in an elven changeling … yes, I have my spies, Rune, even in elven courts. Even in druid ones. But I should thankyoufor leading me straight to her.”
My arms shake, blocking his next blow. My knees threaten to give out beneath the burden of it.
I’m losing. There’s no winning this.
My father battles his way through the illusions toward us, stopping just behind his king. I summon the High Priestess as I keep fighting, dropping my shields only enough to spear a thought toward my father.Dad, please help me.
His voice returns clear as day. The familiarity of it has me nearly breaking,Just keep him distracted, Ruru.
I jolt at the nickname. Ruru … that’s what my brother called me before he was taken. I haven’t thought of it in years.
Hope burns through me like a torch flaring to life inside my chest. I keep my chin up, then dodge another blow backward, spinning out of Altair’s strike range. He slows.
“Whoa, wait.” I put my hands up slowly.
His eyes narrow, and he lifts his sword unhurriedly, tapping it hard enough beneath my chin that my jaw clatters shut, leaving me clenching my teeth. I need to buy as much time as I can get.
“I knew you’d see sense.” His smile is a daggered thing, holding the arrogance of a life lived without hearingno.
“If I take you to my mother, you have to spare her, and Draven.”
“I don’thaveto do anything, but as I said, I need your mother,” King Altair growls. “Your smug little master though? Draven. Him, I’ll kill for fun if Silas does not submit.”
My father makes his move, darting forward, aiming his blade at King Altair’s throat. Before it can draw blood, he halts, as if invisible bonds freeze him in place. The seraph king’s eyes glow gold. He doesn’t hesitate, thrusting his sword through my father’s gut, running him through.
My sword drops from my hand. Time stills. Sound silences. All I see is blood blooming across my father’s tunic, the whites of his eyes growing in shock. He’s gasping at the air, as if the wind’s been knocked out of him.
Then a rage I’ve never known scorches through me. I grasp the crystal wand from Altair’s waist and jerk it upright, striking it through the king’s left eye. Blood gushes out as it splices inward, coating my arm. He throws me back, staggering.
A hair-raising scream unleashes from him. He slowly jerks the wand from his eye, hand trembling as it teeters in his palm. His fist strangles the Darkstone, though it doesn’t shatter, despite its fragile appearance. I run to my father who pants on the ground, hands shaking, pressed against the blood loss in his gut. Altair looks to me once, ruined eye bleeding, the span of it black as if the zenith hasinfectedhim. Then he shuts it tight, baring his teeth at me. He flicks my father’s blood off his sword and takes two steps toward us.
