I bank left, adjusting our angle. She can see the magical defenses in ways I can’t—her witch sight revealing the web ofinterlocking protections that surrounds the fortress. Warning wards that would alert Morrigan to approach. Confusion wards designed to make intruders lose their way. Pain wards that punish anyone who pushes too far. And at the center, something specifically designed to counter Fire-Bringer flame.
“The western face?” I ask through our temporary communication link.
“Thinner. She concentrated her defenses where she expects attack.” A pause. Her grip tightens on my spine. “She doesn’t know we’re coming from above.”
That’s the plan. Drayke draws her attention with the main assault while Tamsin and I drop directly into the heart of the stronghold. Surgical. Precise. The kind of strategy I’ve built my reputation on over six centuries.
The kind of strategy that puts Tamsin exactly where Morrigan wants her.
I force the thought aside. We’ve accounted for every variable. Planned for every contingency. This will work.
It has to work.
The assault begins with fire.
Drayke’s roar shakes the mountain as his bronze form crashes against Morrigan’s outer wards. Flame erupts from his chest and the first layer of protection shatters like glass. The sound echoes across the borderlands, a declaration of war that sends birds screaming from the twisted trees below.
Rurik follows half a second later, his chaotic flames spreading in all directions, setting the twisted forest ablaze. He hits the second ward layer with the enthusiasm of a dragon who’s been denied violence for too long, his fire burning hotterthan any of his brothers’. The wards hold for a moment—then crack, then shatter, Rurik’s wild power overwhelming precision with sheer intensity.
Zyphon materializes from shadow near the fortress gates, obsidian scales drinking in the light around him. The purple cracks in his form blaze with curse-enhanced power as he tears through shadow constructs that pour from the fortress entrance—creatures of pure dark magic given form and hunger. They recognize the same source that created them, hesitate for just an instant. It’s enough. Zyphon doesn’t hesitate. He never does anymore.
Below the dragons, the Fire-Bringers add their power to the assault. Selene’s gold fire creates a barrier against the constructs that slip past the main attack, her stance wide and determined as she holds the line. Aisling’s steady orange flame provides cover for the advancing forces, her movements precise and economical—the healer becoming a weapon when necessary. Nasyra’s shadow-touched darkness does something I don’t fully understand—consuming the dark magic that rises to meet them, turning Morrigan’s own defenses against her. Same source recognizes same source.
The noise is tremendous. Roars and screams and the crack of breaking wards. The ground itself shakes as magical forces collide. This is what the Brotherhood was built for—not politics, not guardianship, but war. Beautiful, terrible war.
And in the chaos, no one notices us descending from above.
I fold my wings and dive.
The wind screams past us as we plummet toward the fortress. Tamsin’s grip tightens on my spine, her thighs squeezing against my scales, but she doesn’t cry out—doesn’t show any fear despite the fact we’re falling at terminal velocity toward a witch’s stronghold. Her body moves with mine as I adjust ourangle, trusting me to know what I’m doing. I feel her fire flare, instinctive preparation for impact.
The western wall rushes up to meet us. I pull out of the dive at the last possible moment, spreading my wings to brake our descent, the impact jarring through my bones as I land on the narrow battlement. Tamsin releases before I’ve fully stopped, launching herself from my back with the kind of trust that makes my chest tight.
She lands on the wall in an explosion of white fire.
The wards that should have repelled her—should have caused pain, confusion, death—simply cease to exist where her flames touch. She burns through protections that took Morrigan decades to construct, her unprecedented power doing in seconds what the main assault would have taken hours to accomplish. The magic doesn’t just fail. It’s eradicated.
I shift as I land beside her, human form more practical for the close quarters fighting ahead. My sword is in my hand before my feet touch stone—centuries of combat reflexes don’t disappear just because I’m distracted by the woman standing beside me. Ice crackles along the blade, frost spreading from my grip.
“Show off,” I mutter, surveying the destroyed wards.
She grins—actually grins, in the middle of an assault on her murderous sister’s fortress. The copper highlights in her dark hair glow like embers as her power recedes. “Jealous?”
“Concerned about energy expenditure. You’ll need reserves for Morrigan.”
“That barely scratched my reserves.” Her grin fades into something sharper, more focused. The warrior replacing the woman who teased me. “Which way?”
I study the stronghold’s layout, comparing what I see to the intelligence we gathered. The architecture is wrong in ways that make my strategic mind itch—corridors that shouldn’t connect,doorways at impossible angles, shadows that fall in the wrong directions. But there’s a pattern beneath the chaos. There always is.
“Down.” I point to a staircase that descends into darkness.
Tamsin nods. She doesn’t question my assessment—trusts my decades of experience, my ability to see patterns where others see chaos. The weight of that trust settles heavily on my shoulders.
We move.
EIGHTEEN
AUREN
