“And he will get none of it,” Alaric says.
“For Nightfall,” Kael murmurs, rolling his shoulders, water coiling around his fists.
“For all the worlds,” Thorne adds, his fire burning white-hot.
I straighten, wings unfurling to their full span, stone dust cascading from their edges.
“For our viyellas,” I say, voice like thunder rolling over mountains. “And for every dream he’s already stolen.”
We move.
The Lords of Nightfall, together.
Into the dark.
Where Idris waits.
Chapter 24
Alina
Jules’ Chamber, The Barrow
The Barrow feels too small.
Which is insane, because this place is enormous—endless halls and shifting staircases and roots that go down forever.
But here, in Jules and Alaric’s chamber, with the door sealed and the wards humming, it feels like the walls are pressing in.
We’re all huddled together in the sitting area.
Jules is propped up in bed with Marcel at her breast. Phoebe is perched on the edge of a chair like she’s ready to launch at any second. And Delia is pacing a groove in the rug.
Clarisse moves between us with a tray of tea and little honey cakes no one is really eating.
The air is heavy.
Taste of stone dust. Ozone.
That weird metallic tang that means magic is being pushed to the limit somewhere deeper in the castle.
Somewhere our men—our viyens—are fighting.
I feel Dagan’s power at the edges of my awareness, muffled by distance and wards and whatever Idris is throwing at them.
It comes in pulses.
Steady, steady, hit, recover, steady, hit again.
Each time the impact lands, something in my chest clenches.
Like my ribs are fault lines and someone’s taking a sledgehammer to them.
“God, sit down before I duct-tape you to a chair,” Jules mutters at Delia, wincing as another contraction of someone else’s pain goes through her.
“Can’t.” Delia scrubs her hands over her face, fingers trembling. “Every time Thorne gets hit, my stomach drops like I’m on a bad roller coaster. Not exactly conducive to chilling.”
Phoebe wraps her arms around herself and stares at the door. “Kael keeps slipping. I can feel him surge and then—” She shakes her head. “It’s like he hits a wall. Over and over.”
