The blast should’ve incinerated it.
But the razorwing blurred and folded midair. Wings sheathed tight to its slender body as it streaked beneath the strike.
Fire seared empty sky and its wings snapped back open. The razorwing climbed—reorienting, circling, poising for another attack. Then it dropped from sight, disappearing into the churn of smoke below.
Vesryn cursed and wheeled Naru around just in time to see the creature slam upward beneath another dracovae. It hit like a blade swinging. Six hooked limbs clamped into feathers and scales as its serrated mandibles sawed at soft flesh.
Serenna felt the jolt rip through Vesryn’s body, shock and fury lancing down the bond. Then the sky darkened as more razorwings poured out of the clouds in a rising insect whir.
The battle raged as the storm coiled and struck, the elements showing no mercy. Razorwings and dracovae alike went up in flames. The great beasts fell in burning arcs, smashing into the lake below in plumes of steam and smoke.
When Naru circled, Serenna saw the mountain’s summit. Ringing the sheared peak, Cinderax and Fenn held the sky, now joined by Daeryn’s forces on the surface. Kaedryn’s druids soared overhead, a living barricade of wings beating back the storm.
They all moved as one, desperation hammered into rhythm. With every scream of wind and crack of light, they seized the storm by its throat. They hurled the elements downward, turning lightning into weapons that rained onto the invading fleet below.
Vesryn dropped through the chaos on Naru, skimming between shrieking razorwings, dodging bursts of fire as he led a squadron of rangers straight toward the ships. Flame roared from his palms, cleaving a vessel from prow to stern in a single burning stroke.
“Whatever you’re about to do,”Vesryn said as Naru climbed back into the air,“do it now. Before we lose the sky.”
Serenna reeled—wrenched back too fast as the vision dispersed. She staggered, the echo of battle still thundering through her bones. The air felt too thin, her ears ringing while her mind caught up.
Steadying her breath, she refocused on Skylash chained in crystal and tightened her grip on the Heart of Stars. Drawing more sunfire would only summon the storm, but there was no other option. Not with the sky collapsing and her task the fulcrum on which the battle turned.
A part of her wanted to call for the prince. He was supposed to be at her side for this. But the battlefield needed him more than her doubts did.
Fingers clenched around the Heart, Serenna met Jassyn’s eyes. No words passed between them, just a nod. She could tell he’d seen Vesryn’s vision too.
With a slow inhale, she drew her scales more firmly into place, locking them like living armor. Reaching for Essence, she guided her power through the Starshard at her throat, coaxing sunfire carefully toward the Heart of Stars.
The Heart didn’t wait.
Itpounced, yanking Essence through her in a breathless torrent.
Serenna flinched as the pull spiked, magic racing beyond what she channeled. She gasped as the Starshard flared once, then the power tore past the gem as if it weren’t there at all.
For one suspended heartbeat she felt herself opening—nothing but a conduit without boundary, power ripping through her before she could brace.
Sunfire erupted, a genesis clawing through the vessel of her body like a star forcing its way into form. The Heart seared against her hands, its light coursing through her.
Serenna’s knees slammed into stone, though the impact barely registered as power screamed through her. Radiant andunmoored, Essence burned her in a river of power that flayed as it flowed. The world collapsed into light and vibration, until only the blaze remained.
She couldn’t hold it.
She couldn’t contain it.
This was the Bramblemaw den all over again. The same unraveling. The same terror.
Somewhere inside the tempest, Serenna blindly reached, fumbling through the flood of sunfire. Her voice barely rose above the roaring in her skull, but she forced a desperate thought down the bond.
“Vesryn—”
His name dispersed, shattered by panic.
No answer followed as the mounting pressure of something ancient rose inside her.
Then the stars descended. Spiraling and familiar, the same pattern that had reached for her in the den, beckoning as if they’d never truly let her go.
Not again,Serenna pleaded, the thought fraying as it formed.
