"I'm sorry," I whisper. "I'm so sorry I wasn't here."
Coral nudges my leg gently.
Wyverns streak across the horizon above the carnage, their leathery wings cutting through the haze. They look nothing like Coral. These are war-bred monsters, their ash-gray scales camouflaging perfectly against the burning sky.
I count them. Twelve in the first group, eight in the second. More circling beyond the smoke. There are maybe fifty of them invading this part of town. I can see the efficiency in their black-armored riders. This is what the Night Herons do. They bring death and chaos.
Movement catches my eye near the eastern edge of the ruins. Three children flee toward the tree line, the youngest barely walking. The eldest clutches a cloth bundle that might be a baby or all they have left. They stumble through the rubble, desperate for safety. A wyvern spots them and begins its dive. The rider leans low in his saddle. He's letting his mount do the work. This is sport to him.
Gods please no.
My exhausted body moves on instinct. But I'm too slow, too far—
A wall of living darkness catches the creature mid-strike. Coinneach erupts from the ground between the children and the wyvern. Shadowy tendrils wrap around the beast's throat and wings. It shrieks as it slams into the earth. The wyvern thrashes once, twice against the ground before going still. Its rider tries to crawl free but shadows find him too. His screaming stops abruptly.
The children keep running. They don't look back.
Across the marketplace, another wyvern snatches up a knight and tears her in half mid-flight. Blood showers the remaining survivors below as they scatter. The rider makes another turn, leaning forward in his saddle with bow drawn and arrow nocked. He releases a volley toward the fleeing group.
The arrows never land.
Svenn's shadows surge upward, swallowing the projectiles into nothingness. The coiling darkness whips toward the mounted wyvern, hurling rider and beast from the sky.
They hit a collapsed building. The structure comes down on top of them. Neither moves after that.
A familiar chirping sound makes me spin around. Coral clicks anxiously, her head swiveling as she takes in the devastation. Soot settles on her hide, dulling her iridescent scales. She should have stayed in Völundr where it's safe.
"Stay behind me," I tell her.
Coral presses against my leg, trembling. She's never seen anything like this. Neither have I, really. Not on this scale.
I reach for the chalk in my pouch. My fingers are shaking so badly I drop it twice before I manage to grip it properly.
I try to trace the summoning lines. The circle needs to be perfect and precise. I reach toward the space between worlds.
Just one more string.
The burn starts in my chest. Before I can complete the ritual, Svenn's cold fingers wrap around my wrist.
"No." His voice carries that otherworldly echo it gets when the darkness stirs within him. "You've given enough of yourself today."
The power gutters like a candle in wind.
I want to protest and tell him that I can handle it. But the truth is my hand shakes so violently I can barely maintain the connection to the realm of the gods.
"The people are dying," I sob. "Children are—"
"I know," he says, releasing my hand. "I may not be able to stop the sea, but this? This I can do."
Svenn releases my wrist and steps away. He doesn't want me too close for what comes next.
The transformation starts in his bones. I hear it happening, the cracking and stretching. Claws burst from his hands and his legs reverse at the knee. Antlers spiral from his skull, sharp enough to pierce steel.
"Svenn?" I whisper, but the thing that was my husband doesn't seem to hear.
Wendy stands where Svenn knelt.
Twelve feet tall and gaunt as famine, skin like weathered leather stretched over bone. I've seen Svenn shift before. I've watched him become shadow and things that hunting parties whisper about around dying fires. But this... this is different.
