The Hollows roared again, the ice walls surging higher, closing in, trapping all of us in a narrowing corridor of frost and fury.
Above us, the shadows twisted, no longer hesitant, no longer subtle.
The Priestess had lost control of the narrative.
So she’d chosen cruelty instead.
And as the orcs raised their weapons with renewed certainty, grief sharpening into vengeance, I realized with sickening clarity that whatever came next would define more than this battle.
It would define who I was allowed to be.
Whether I could still stand between worlds or whether the Priestess had finally succeeded in proving that I was too dangerous to trust.
The older orc let out a final, guttural command.
The orcs surged forward.
And the Hollows screamed their warning too late.
The charge hit like a breaking wave.
Orcs surged forward in a roar of grief and fury, feet pounding the frozen ground hard enough to rattle my bones. The sound was an overwhelming mix of ice, voices colliding, and the deep bellow of a mondo boar, forced into motion by panic. The Hollows answered with a violent tremor, ice walls cracking and reforming as if the land itself couldn’t decide whether to contain the chaos or be torn apart by it.
“Hold the line!” Caleb shouted, his voice carrying over the din as the shifters shifted—not fully, not into beasts, but into something between, shoulders broadening, teeth sharpening, eyes glowing with feral light. They braced themselves in front of us, not charging, not retreating, but meeting the oncoming force with planted feet and raised arms.
The first impact was brutal.
An orc slammed into a shifter, the collision knocking both sideways as frost exploded beneath them. Another orc swung a massive club that cracked against a raised barrier of vampire magic, the impact sending a ripple through the elegant formation behind us. Stella darted forward in a blur, deflecting a blade with one hand while snarling something sharp and unrepeatable in a language that sounded older than teeth.
“Maeve, stay back!” Keegan barked, his hands firm on my shoulders as he pulled me behind him.
“I can help them!” I shouted back, my gaze locked on the fallen orc leader still lying motionless on the ground. “If I can just—”
A shadow creature screamed overhead, diving low and fast. Keegan spun, dragging me down with him as dark wings clipped the air where my head had been a second earlier. The creature slammed into the ice wall behind us, its form splattering and reforming, leaving streaks of black residue that hissed against the frozen surface.
Nova stood her ground, staff blazing now, not with dominance but precision. She carved sigils into the air that snapped into place like locking gears, barriers flaring just long enough to deflect blows without turning into weapons. Every movement she made was deliberate, economical, as if she were solving an equation under fire.
“This is exactly what she wanted,” Nova called out, her voice tight. “She’s feeding on the confusion!”
The orcs didn’t hear her.
They saw blood—orc blood now, spilled when one of their own collided with a shifter’s reinforced shoulder and went down hard. They heard the roar of battle echoing off ice and stone. They felt the betrayal burn fresh and immediate.
And they answered it.
An axe cleaved downward, missing a vampire by inches and embedding itself in the ice. Lady Limora stepped forward, finally letting a fraction of her power show. The air around her darkened, not in shadow, but in gravity, a crushing presence that forced several orcs to stumble as if walking through deep water.
“Enough,” she said calmly.
No one listened.
The Hollows groaned again, louder this time, and one of the ice walls finally gave way. It wasn’t collapsing, butsliding.
The massive slab shifted sideways and slammed into the valley floor with a thunderous crack. The impact sent shards flying, forcing both sides to scatter.
I lost sight of Keegan.
Panic flared hot and sharp in my chest.
