Ashton turns to me. “Alette, you’re first.”
“What?” I shake my head instinctively.
“You’re the only one of us who has to make it out,” he pushes, urgency cutting through his usual ease. “You get up there, you don’t stop. If something happens?—”
“No,” I snap, the word coming out sharper than I expect. “I’m not leaving you.”
“Alette—”
“I’m not leaving you,” I repeat, louder this time, my chest tight, my pulse racing. “We go together. Or not at all.”
They don’t say more, but I can see it in their eyes, they disagree. I plant my foot on the first step and push upward just as another spider slams into the wall near me, its legs scraping against stone as it lunges after us.
Too fast.
They’re too fast.
“Go!” Sylvian shouts.
Above us, the opening waits. With so many spiders between it and us, it might as well be a million miles away. The staircase winds upward, a steep, uneven path clawing its way toward the light, each step rough and barely formed as Sylvian forces the earth to obey him. I don’t hesitate. I go first, grabbing for the next rise and hauling myself up, my boots slipping slightly as I scramble higher.
Behind me, the others follow immediately.
The spiders are already in motion. They drop from above in a sickening cascade, bodies slamming into stone, legs skittering and scraping as they surge toward us. The webs cling to everything, dragging at my arms, catching in my hair, sticking to my clothes like they’re alive, like they’re trying to pull me back down.
“Faster!” Oberon roars.
Fire explodes behind me, heat blasting up the staircase as he hurls it into the swarm. Flames race across the silk, devouringit, filling the chamber with sharp, choking smoke and the high, piercing screeches of spiders burning alive.
It buys us seconds.
Nothing more.
A spider lunges from the wall beside me, its legs slamming into the stone inches from my hand. I swing on instinct, the sword flashing blue as it cuts clean through one of its limbs. The resistance is nothing. So easy. It shrieks, recoiling, but another is already coming.
Wind tears past me a heartbeat later.
Ashton’s power slams into a cluster of them, ripping bodies from the wall, shredding them apart mid-air and sending the pieces crashing down through burning webs.
“Keep climbing!” he shouts.
I don’t stop.
“Protect Sylvian!” he snaps. “He’s concentrating. If he breaks, we fall!”
My muscles burn, my breath tearing in and out of my chest as I drag myself upward, step after step, the light above growing closer, brighter. Behind me, Cassius moves with terrifying precision. Water slams into a spider that gets too close to Sylvian. The impact caves its body in, sending it crashing back, but more take its place immediately.
I risk a glance down.
Sylvian is right behind the others, his hand dragging along the stone mixed with earth that makes up the staircase as he climbs, never breaking contact with the earth. His jaw is locked tight, muscles straining, his focus absolute. I can feel the pull of his magic in every step, the staircase shifting and groaning beneath us as he forces it to hold.
They don’t let anything get close. Not to him. Not to the staircase. They’re holding the line.
I don’t stop.
I can’t.
I turn back and climb faster. “We’re almost there,” I whisper, though my voice shakes, though I don’t know if it’s true.
