He was bleeding out and she’d only bought seconds.
As she panted through her nose, Serenna locked onto the key that glinted like salvation—their fragile chance at survival hanging at the druid’s wrist. Determination burned away the exhaustion that dragged at her limbs. Everything else faded as she focused on that shining lifeline.
Serenna seized the wind again, coiling the currents into a tight funnel. With a savage crack, she snapped the gale at the druid leader.
The female’s eyes were already bulging before the lash of air wrapped around the key. Serenna yanked on her power, ripping it free from the chain on her arm.
Stumbling forward, the druid’s composure faltered for the first time. Her lips parted as the key streaked through the air, plummeting like a shooting star before slapping straight into Lykor’s waiting palm.
His fingers clenched around it, strands of his matted hair whipped back from the gust.
Their eyes met.
Lykor’s flared with something fierce—approval, or, more likely, the same desperate hope.
But there was no time to bask in this small victory. The four of them were still fettered. And judging from the sound of rustling wings, the druids were stirring.
Lykor jammed the key into a shackle. Aclick, and the restraint snapped open, metal clattering against the pillar as itswung loose on its chain. He moved to the other manacle. The instant he tore his claw free, shadows detonated.
Darkness ruptured outward, a cataclysmic surge billowing like wildfire. But he didn’t strike. Serenna realized it the same moment he must have—the Starshard would only absorb his power and hurl it back at them.
Rather than obliterating the druids, he cast the rending wide. A bastion of shadows surrounded the four pillars, muting the sun, but allowing enough light to see. The air instantly cooled, providing a fleeting relief.
Serenna braced for the Starshard’s wail, the retaliation that would rip through Lykor’s defenses. But the world held its breath as he stumbled toward Jassyn, the key clutched tightly in his fist.
Beyond the veil of shadows, there was a muffled thud. Serenna’s heart lurched. Another followed. Then a cascade, like boulders dropping into the sand in relentless succession.
The druids landed, encircling them, close enough for Serenna to hear the grit shifting under their feet.
Lykor was fumbling, freeing Jassyn too slowly. He’d never reach her or the prince before the druids shattered his barrier.
She couldn’t wait on him—every second dragged them closer to ruin. She had to help.
Thoughts racing in frantic circles, Serenna turned to the chains that cascaded down Vesryn’s pillar, grasping for a solution. A memory surfaced from her time with the wraith—Fenn droning on about gold-plated weapons. How gold was pliable, weak for a metal. The links holding Vesryn weren’t invincible.
Nerves frayed with unbound fear, Serenna trembled, every muscle drawn taut. Summoning the wind once more, a tempest surged to life in the pocket of darkness. Sand churned as the currents collected it, spinning into a serrated storm.
One last time.
Serenna poured her remaining fury and defiance into it, twisting the cyclone tighter. The wind screamed with her, a spiraling force of destruction. With a desperate thrust, she flung the raging mass at the peak of Vesryn’s pillar, aiming for the chains.
The storm plunged downward. It slammed into the links, grinding, raking, devouring.
She drove the point of the tempest faster, a thousand relentless knives carving deep, peeling layers of gold. Metal shrieked as sand scoured its surface. A single link groaned—almost giving, almost breaking.
Pain splintered through Serenna’s skull and darkness crowded the edges of her vision. Swaying in her shackles, she shoved it back, holding on.
Not now. Not when she was so close. She wrenched on her magic harder.
With a deafeningcrack, the chains snapped and shattered. They crashed to the sand around the prince, billowing up a puff of dust. Vesryn toppled forward, crumpling into the blood-stained earth.
Jassyn—finally freed—stumbled past her, dropping to the prince’s side with mending light spilling from his hands in flickering bursts.
Serenna slumped against her bindings as the wind collapsed with her. She fought against the pull of unconsciousness, shaking her head to clear the haze as Lykor unlocked her shackles.
The moment the restraints fell away, her legs buckled. She staggered into him, slamming against his chest to catch herself.
Fenn’s presence reignited in her mind. He was alive—and nearby. He wasn’t tethered, but his awareness was dimmed, a candle flame struggling against the smothering dark.
