The Priestess didn’t need the orcs to understand our language.
She only needed them to understand the threat.
The ground beneath my feet trembled again, but this time it wasn’t from marching.
It was the Hollows waking.
A low groan rolled through the valley, deep enough that my bones shook, and the air temperature dropped so suddenly my breath came out in a sharp white cloud. At the far edge of the valley, beyond where the orc line had halted, the earth cracked open with a sound like splitting stone.
Ice rose toward the sky.
It wasn’t in a gentle drift or a slow creep, but in jagged walls thrusting upward, translucent blue-white slabs that climbed toward the sky as if the land were throwing up barricades. They didn’t form a neat perimeter. They stabbed up in uneven bursts, cutting off paths, redirecting movement, forcing both orcs and shadows into tighter, more frantic collisions.
The Northern Luminary had been cold. The Glacial Hollows were something else entirely. They knew how to protect their sacred grounds.
“What is that?” Stella snapped, her voice sharp with disbelief as she dodged a falling spray of frost that burst from a crack in the ground.
“The threshold,” Nova answered tightly. “We’re too close. It’s reacting.”
“To what?” I demanded, but the answer was already thrumming against my skin.
To power. To conflict. To masses moving with intent.
A mondo boar bellowed and reared as an ice wall surged up right in front of it, forcing it to skid sideways. An orc stumbled, caught between boar and wall, then recovered with a furious roar, swinging his club at the ice as if he could beat the Hollows into submission. The blow rang out like a bell, and the ice didn’t crack. It sang.
The sound made my birthmark flare so hot I nearly lost my breath. My grandmother liked what she saw.
I staggered a step, pressing my hand to my hip, and in that instant, one of the shadow creatures took its chance. It dove low, not at me, but at the edge of our formation, clawing at the ground and flinging a spray of dark residue across the grass.
The residue didn’t burn. It didn’t smoke.
It looked like spilled ink, and wherever it touched, the grass darkened as if bruised.
The orcs saw it.
A shout went up from their line, and heads turned sharply toward us. Their eyes locked onto the stain, onto our cluster, onto me standing at the front with my hands glowing.
They didn’t see the shadow creature deposit it.
They saw the darkness appear on the ground while we stood there with magic.
“Maeve,” Keegan warned, voice low.
“I know,” I whispered.
The orcs began to advance, not rushing, but moving with that heavy inevitability of bodies built for battle. The ones in the front were taller than the rest, their armor layered and scarred, their expressions hard. Their focus was no longer on the shadow beasts. It was on us.
On me.
The shadows had done their job.
My panic tried to rise again, but I forced it down, the way I’d learned to do since Stonewick cracked open and my life pouredinto magic. Panic was wasted energy. Anxiety led to bad choices. I didn’t have room for either.
I needed a choice that told the truth faster than words could.
“Nova,” I said, keeping my eyes on the orcs, “can you show them?”
Nova didn’t ask what I meant. She flicked her wrist and drove the tip of her staff into the ground.
