LEGACY OF MOTH

THE MOTH SAGA, BOOK SIX

by

Daniel Arenson

Copyright © 2014 by Daniel Arenson

All rights reserved.

This novel is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places and incidents are either the product of the author's imagination, or, if real, used fictitiously.

No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by an electronic or mechanical means, including photocopying, recording or by any information storage and retrieval system, without the express written permission of the author.

FOREWORD

Legacy of Moth is the sixth volume of The Moth Saga, continuing the tale of a world torn in two—one half always in sunlight, the other always dark. If you're new to the series, you'll probably still get the gist of things here, though I do recommend reading the first five books first:

Moth

Empires of Moth

Secrets of Moth

Daughter of Moth

Shadows of Moth

Between chapters, you might like to visit the Moth website, where you can find: a large map (more detailed than the one in this ebook), original music, artwork, a Moth wiki, and more. Visit the website at: DanielArenson.com/Moth

And now . . . let us reenter a world of light and darkness . . . 

CHAPTER ONE:
THE WHALE AND THE DIAMOND

Prince Eris Grimgard, second son of King Bormund of Orida, stood at the prow of his longship and watched the sun rise over the water.

"Home." His voice nearly vanished in the wind. "After three years of darkness . . . sunlight." He turned around to face his men. "We are home!"

The Oringard sat in the long, narrow ship—a hundred warriors. Each man held an oar, propelling Orin's Blade forward. The ship was shaped as an orca, sigil of their kingdom, and more orcas appeared upon their banners and round wooden shields. Each of the Oringard, legendary warriors descended from the first king himself, wore a horned helm, a fur cloak, and a wide blade at his hip. Each man also carried a gilded horn around his neck, amulets to bless them in battle, then drink mead from in the halls of victorious afterlife. As they oared the ship forward, the men cried out Eris's name, blessing him.

"For three years," Eris said, "you've followed me through darkness. You defeated the undead of the crystal forests in Leen, the beasts of the watery chasm off the Qaelish coast, the bloodthirsty wolves of darkness, and many more enemies. Now we return home with our prize." He raised his own horn, larger than the others, older, holier. "We return with the Meadenhorn! With glory!"

The Oringard roared for that glory, and Eris turned back toward the west. The sun had fully emerged from the water now. The light reflected against his armor, his blade, and the Meadenhorn in his hand. The wind billowed his cloak and filled his nostrils, and after three years of cold, finally warmth filled him. The wind smelled like salt, like water, like sunlight—like Timandra, the lit half of the world, the realm Eris had begun to think he'd never see again.

"So this is the sun."

The voice that spoke beside him was soft, hesitant, almost afraid. Eris turned to his right, gazed upon his wife, and felt all his warrior's strength, his pride and glory, his haunting nightmares of bloodshed and darkness, all fade into a haze like veiled sunlight in the rain.

Yes, I return with the lost artifact of Orida . . . and with a treasure even greater.

Eris took her soft, pale hand, so small in his, a lily in the paw of a bear. "Does it burn you, my love?"

She stood wrapped in a white silk cloak and hood. The sunlight fell upon her pale face and large indigo eyes—Elorian eyes, the size and shape of chicken eggs, far larger than his. She was a small woman, no taller than his shoulder, so thin she was almost frail. Strands of her white hair escaped her hood and billowed as banners. Around her neck, rather than a mead horn, she wore a diamond, the stone of her people. She was Yiun Yee, a princess of Leen, a daughter of darkness, and his wife.

"The sunlight burns me no more than moonlight can burn a diamond," she replied. "No more than starlight upon the crystals of our forests. No more than the light of your love, my Eris, within my breast. The sunlight is no brighter than that love, and it can no more burn me than you can." She smiled—the fragile, hesitant smile which had first drawn Eris to her like a siren's song. "I've always wanted to see the sun. How beautiful it is."

How beautiful you are, Eris thought, gazing at her pale cheeks, her gleaming eyes, her silken hair. How brave you are. How noble. How precious to me.

He had defeated the undead in the icelands, the wolves in darkness, the great beasts of the chasm, and she had fought at his side. She had left her palace of crystal and moonlight, had traveled with him through blood and fire and shadow, and now into daylight. Now into his home. Now into a world that, to her, was as strange as a land beyond the stars.

"You've left a great palace," he said, holding her hand. "You've left the fabled city of Taenori—the Light of the North—in your empire of Leen, abandoning your birthright for a chance to live at my side. And I vow to you, Yiun Yee: You will become a great princess of daylight, a great jewel of the Orinhall upon our sunlit island, more precious than diamonds."

The Oringard, these stout one hundred men who had fought at his side for three years, kept rowing. The longship emerged from the dusk, and now the sun shone fully. A chill still lingered in the air, and a drizzle fell, but to Orin this light seemed as bright and warm as summer in the southern deserts of Eseer. The last shadows of Eloria faded behind them, and the blue sea—by Orin, he had almost forgotten the color blue!—spread ahead toward the horizon. Beyond that horizon lay Orida, his island, and upon it the great city of Grenstad. The city had lost its heart, lost the Meadenhorn, lost what he—Prince Eris, Hero of Orida—would return to its breast.

"I care not for palaces or royal titles." Yiun Yee gazed at the blue sea, then turned to look at him, her eyes bright. "I care only for a life at your side. I care only for you, Eris, the light of my heart, the love of my soul."

Eris held her hand as they sailed onward. He was a man of sunlight—his beard and hair long and golden as sunbeams, his eyes blue as the sky and water, his frame tall and strong like the mighty oaks of Orida. Yiun Yee was like the moon—softer, paler, a thing of fragile beauty. A Prince of Orida and a Princess of Leen. A son of light and a daughter of darkness. The great War of Day and Night had ended twenty years ago, and Eris had found the treasure his father had lost in that war, and he found a wife among the old enemies, a marriage of peace, of an old wound finally healed.

They kept rowing through the open sea for long turns. Fifty men rowed as fifty slept, cycling again and again. They ate the food they had collected in the night—mushrooms, bat and snake meat, and lanternfish that glowed with inner lights. For the first time, they caught the fish of Timandra in their nets, and Eris dreamed of the great feast that awaited them at the Orinhall.

Soon we'll feast on succulent boar, wild deer from the forests, and fresh breads and pies from the ovens. Soon we'll drink mead from Orin's horn. He caressed the Meadenhorn, this reclaimed treasure, admiring the gold and jewels inlaid upon it.

Finally, after ten full turns of rowing through the light, they saw it ahead.

Tears filled the Oringard's eyes. The men cried out in joy.

"Orida! The island of Orida!"

Eris raised the Meadenhorn, and it caught the sunlight. "The Sons of Orin return home!" He turned toward Yiun Yee. "And with us a treasure of the night. This will be your home too, Yiun Yee, my princess of darkness and light."

Orida was known by many names: Orca's Isle, Orin's Landing, The Meadenrock, and a hundred others. Eris stood at the prow, watching it grow nearer. It was a massive island, nearly as large as Leen in the night. Its shores were white, and great pine forests stretched across its hills and mountains. Above all other crests rose the great Berenhorn, the tallest mountain in Orida, named after Beren the Wise who had climbed its slopes and planted Orida's banner upon its crest.

As they rowed closer, the city of Grenstad appeared. A port of stone and wood spread across the coast, and many longships anchored here, shaped as orcas and lined with oars. Wooden halls rose on the hills beyond the shore, their roofs thatched. Above them all rose the mighty Orinhall. The great mead hall, home to Orida's king, stood in the shade of the Berenhorn, and it gazed upon the city below and the sea beyond. Its roof was thatched like the roofs of lesser halls, but gilt coated its wooden beams, and its banners rose high, displaying leaping orcas. True orcas, great killers of the sea, swam alongside the Orin's Blade, welcoming the heroes home.

They rowed into the port, docked at a pier, and for the first time in three years, Eris and his Oringard set foot upon their homeland. For the first time in all her twenty years, Yiun Yee, a princess of Leen, stepped onto sunlit land.

They walked through the city, heroes returning home. Men and women emerged from their houses, their hair long and golden. They wore fur and cotton, and silver rings were woven into the men's beards. They cheered for Eris, for he returned with the Meadenhorn, the kingdom's lost treasure, and they gazed in wonder at Yiun Yee, and she seemed to them as mystical as their reclaimed artifact. Yiun Yee in turn gazed upon the city with equal wonder, her Elorian eyes growing even larger than usual. She smiled at Eris.

"The city is smaller than Taenori." She spoke in his tongue, which he had taught her, her accent thick. "But it's just as fair. It is a wonder of sunlight." She wrapped her silk cloak tighter and pulled her hood low. "Though it will take me time to adjust to this great lantern in the sky."

They kept moving through the city and its crowds, and finally they made their way uphill toward the Orinhall. The great mead hall loomed above them, the crests of its giltwood beams carved as orcas. Guards in steel stood before its gates, their helmets horned, their cloaks black and white, their shields round and their swords wide. They raised the horns that hung around their necks on chains, and they trumpeted for the glory of Eris and the Oringard, and they opened the gates of the hall.

Eris stepped inside, a hero to enter legend, his wife at his side, his Oringard behind him . . . and found the hall changed.

All his pride, his joy, his glory seemed to crumble.

In some ways, the hall was the same. Oak columns still rose in two rows, engraved with sea monsters, orcas, and the faces of old gods. The wooden floor was still smoothed by the heels of many feet over many generations. Round wooden shields hung upon the walls, upon them the sigils of the great lords, and among them hung ancient swords of iron and bronze. Iron candelabra hung from the ceiling, and a fireplace roared at the back of the hall. Guards stood here, proud Sons of Orin, clad in fur and steel, their blond beards strewn with beads and golden rings.

The back of the hall, however, was not as Eris had left it. The old banner of Orida, an orca upon a white field, no longer hung here. Instead a great banner of gold and silver covered the wall, displaying a sunburst hiding the moon. Eris knew this sigil. He had seen the Radian ships sail in the darkness, raiding the coasts of both Leen and Qaelin. He had heard tales of Tirus Serin, a cruel Magerian lord, forging an empire in the sunlight, collecting other kings to serve him. But Eris had never imagined that this banner would hang here, that his own father—King Bormund Grimgard, a proud Son of Orin—would bend the knee to this southern sorcerer, would hoist Serin's banner in the Orinhall.

"Father!" Eris said, stepping forth.

As always, King Bormund sat upon his throne of giltwood, but he was not the man Eris had parted from three years ago. Bormund had once been a proud warrior, his shoulders wide, his chin always raised, his beard a deep gold, his eyes bright. Those wide shoulders stooped now. Silver strands invaded the gold of his beard. His eyes had darkened, and cunning now filled them, and beneath the cunning lurked fear like boulders hidden underwater. A horned helm still topped the king's head, and a gilded breastplate still shone upon his chest, but he seemed less a proud warrior now, more like an aging predator, grown too slow to hunt, devious and peering from the shadows of a den.

Eris's mother, Queen Tylgra, normally stood at the throne's right side. A new woman stood there now, a woman Eris did not know. She was fair and no older than Eris's thirty-five years. Her golden hair cascaded across her shoulders, and her eyes were blue and bright. She wore a green gown with a plunging neckline, and a golden chain hung around her neck, holding an amulet with the Radian sigil.

The woman stepped forth and raised her hand. A sunburst was tattooed onto her palm, hiding the moon. "Halt, Sons of Orin, and kneel before your king!" She spoke in Oridian with a thick Magerian accent. "You stand in the presence of Bormund Grimgard, son of Fengard, Slayer of Fen Shoo the Light of Leen, Defeater of Oshmog the White Bear of Verilon, King of all Orida." The woman turned to stare at Yiun Yee, and her eyes narrowed with hatred, and her lips peeled back. "You have brought evil into this hall, Sons of Orin. Kneel and beg for your lives, for you come here with a daughter of darkness."

Eris looked at his wife. Yiun Yee stared back with large, shocked eyes. Behind her, the Oringard—a hundred stalwart men—knelt before their king, but Eris would not bend the knee. He turned back toward his father and the strange woman and stepped closer toward them.

"I've returned, Father, to find a home less welcoming than before." He glanced at the tall Radian woman. "Who stands beside you where my mother once stood, and who cloaked your hall with the eclipse of a southern empire? You were once a proud king of Orida, not one to bend the knee to a foreign ruler."

King Bormund rose from his throne. His shoulders curled inwards, and his neck hung low as if barely supporting his head, but his eyes glittered with greed, and his lips twitched. He hobbled forth, reaching out thin fingers toward the Meadenhorn which hung around Eris's neck on a chain. The old king laughed, a sound like crackling ice.

"You've found it, my son! The Meadenhorn." Tears streamed from the king's eyes. "The great horn that Orin himself drank mead from two thousand years ago. The blessed artifact of our island, the horn lost in the darkness." He pawed at the heirloom. "Hand it to me, my son, so that we may drink mead from this holy vessel once more."

Eris took a step back, pulling the Meadenhorn out of the king's reach. The old man gasped.

Eris's heart pounded. "Father, I've been gone for three years from your hall. I fought for you. I slew men and beasts for you. Twenty-three of my Oringard lie dead under the dark waters of Eloria. I return here, and you offer me no welcome, only fingers greedy for your prize, like a starving dog reaching for a morsel. Who is this woman who stands where once my mother stood? Answer me!"

King Bormund stared from under his brows. His scraggly, graying hair—once thick and lustrous and golden—hung loosely around his weathered face. "A starving dog for a morsel? It seems to me that you here are the dog, a mere pup begging for approval from his master. Are you truly a warrior or a mere boy, desperate to impress his father?" Bormund snorted. His eyes narrowed shrewdly, and his lips twitched. "You call Serin a foreign ruler. That he was once, perhaps. Yet now Serin is more than some distant emperor. Now he is . . . a brother." The king stepped toward the Radian woman and wrapped his arm around her waist. "Here stands Iselda Serin, sister to Emperor Tirus Serin, and my new wife. Yes, my son. Your mother has fallen ill and died while you were away. You were not here by her side, even as she called to you. Iselda Serin is our new queen . . . and your new mother."

The news hit Eris more mightily than a war hammer. His mother, dead. His father, married to a Radian, the sister of the emperor whose tales of cruelty traveled across the night. Eris's grief exploded, and he tossed back his head and howled. His keen echoed across the hall.

Yiun Yee rushed toward him and placed a pale hand upon his arm. "I'm sorry, Eris," she whispered.

King Bormund stared at Yiun Yee, and loathing filled his eyes, and his lip curled up in disgust. "And who do you bring into my hall, son? A woman of Leen stands before me, a woman of the dark empire I fought twenty years ago, the empire that stole our Meadenhorn."

Eris took a deep breath, the grief shuddering in his chest. He had not expected giddy excitement from his father upon meeting Yiun Yee, but neither had he expected outright hostility. He held Yiun Yee's hand.

"Leen is the empire you invaded and sacked twenty years ago, Father," Eris said. "It is the empire where you dropped the Meadenhorn upon the coast, losing our heirloom in the heat of battle. You stand now before Yiun Yee, a princess of Leen, a brave woman who helped me scour the darkness, who helped me retrieve the Meadenhorn from the creatures who had guarded it. You've taken a foreign wife in my absence. As have I."

It was King Bormund's turn to roar. He cry echoed across the mead hall, a cry of fury and grief. "What dark times have come upon this hall, that a Prince of Orida should wed without his father's consent, and that he should take a daughter of darkness no less?" The king licked his lips and reached out his hands. "Hand me my Meadenhorn, and perhaps I will forgive your transgression. Hand me my prize."

But Iselda Serin stepped forth and raised her palm again, displaying the eclipse tattooed upon it. "There can be no forgiveness for marrying a nightcrawler." she said. "These creatures are utterly evil. My dearest Bormund, did you not send your eldest son to raid the nightcrawlers' coasts and slay them? And now you would allow your second born to bring one into your hall?" The new Queen of Orida shook her head. "The daughter of darkness must suffer the fate of all her kin, as commands my brother, the great Light of Radian, Emperor Tirus Serin. Like all other Elorians, she too must die. Slay her, King Bormund. Prove yourself a mighty king, worthy of sitting upon this throne and serving my brother." Her eyes narrowed. "Or would you show me your weakness, and would you have Emperor Serin hear of a nightcrawler in this court he has allowed you to keep?"

King Bormund's eyes flicked between her and Eris, and for a moment the old king seemed torn.

"Father . . ." Eris said. "What has happened to you? You were once a proud king! I remember. I left you here a proud king. Now your shoulders stoop, and your eyes turn to another for guidance, and you let this foreign sorceress command you, to order you to spill the blood of your own daughter-in-law." Eris drew his sword. "By my steel, I am sworn to protect my wife. You will not touch her. You will accept her as my wife, Father, or I will leave this place—with her and with the Meadenhorn."

The king's eyes lit with fury, and he snarled and leaped forward. "The Meadenhorn is mine! It is not yours to keep. Ever has it hung around the necks of Orida's kings, not the necks of second born sons, of lesser princes." Bormund drew his own sword, the pommel shaped as the sun. "You have disgraced my court! Your wife must leave."

"His wife must die," said Iselda, also stepping forward. She placed her hand on Bormund's shoulder. "Slay her here. Slay her before me." She leaned closer and whispered into the old king's ear. "Show your strength in your court, and you may show me your strength in your bed."

The king shook, his face red, and let out a hoarse, wordless cry. He lunged toward Yiun Yee, swinging his blade.

Eris roared and swung his own sword, parrying. The two blades clanged together.

"Father!" he cried.

Yiun Yee stepped back, eyes wide with fear. The old king lolloped toward her, blade swinging up and down, madness in his eyes. He seemed like a man possessed, and though old and frail, he shoved Eris aside with the strength of a great warrior. The king's sword swung downward like a comet, slashing through Yiun Yee's gown, tearing open the silk and her skin. The Elorian princess screamed and stumbled backwards, blood spilling.

Eris roared.

He leaped forward, blade arching.

"Yiun Yee!" he cried. "Father, no!"

The guards of the hall stepped forward, reaching for their swords, as did the Oringard, but Bormund waved them back. The old king leaped toward Eris, roaring in madness, swinging his blade. Eris held out his sword.

"Stand back, Father!"

Eris tried to parry, tried to stop this, but the old king was too given to his madness. Like a fish leaping mindlessly onto the hook, King Bormund drove onto his son's blade. Eris's sword crashed through the king's chest.

Blood showered.

King Bormund's sword clanged to the floor.

Yiun Yee screamed and stepped back, clutching her wounded chest.

Yet while her wound was skin-deep, King Bormund was hurt more gravely; Eris's sword emerged from the old man's back.

"My horn . . ." the king whispered, impaled upon the blade. "My treasure . . ."

The old man's fingers reached out, curling like talons, making a last attempt to grab the Meadenhorn from Eris's neck. Then blood filled the king's mouth, and he fell to the floor, his weight tugging the sword's hilt free from Eris's grip. King Bormund lay at his son's feet and rose no more.

Eris stood, shocked, silent, still. He stared down at his dead father—the father he himself had slain—then raised his eyes. Iselda stood before him. Clad in her lush gown, her jewels bright, she met his eyes and smiled—a hungry, predatory smile.

Before Eris could speak to the Radian sorceress, the doors to the hall slammed open behind him. Eris spun, his father's blood upon his hands, to see his older brother step into the Orinhall.

Prince Torumun was a tall man of noble bearing, his beard thick and golden, his arms wide. Eris had known his brother to be honorable, a brave warrior, yet now Eris saw grisly trophies hanging from Torumun's belt. Elorian skulls dangled there upon chains, the eye sockets twice the usual size—the trophies of enemies slain in battle, an old practice not seen in Orida for many years.

Prince Torumun stared at the scene: his father dead upon the floor, his brother's arms coated in blood, a wounded Elorian princess, and a smiling step-mother with cruelty in her eyes.

"Your younger brother has returned, Prince Torumun!" said Iselda. "He has returned with an Elorian to usurp the throne. He has slain your father. Will you not take up arms against him?" The Radian turned toward the soldiers lining the hall. "Guards of Orida, will you not strike down this traitorous brother?"

Across the hall, soldiers of Orida drew their swords and stepped forth. The Oringard—Eris's own men—drew blades and stepped around their prince, protecting Eris and Yiun Yee.

"Brother!" said Torumun, voice torn in pain. "What have you done? You've slain our father!" The heir of Orida tossed back his head and howled. "You've slain him!" Torumun drew his sword. "Murderer! Usurper! Guards of Orida, slay him, slay the traitor! For the Light of Radian, slay Prince Eris!"

The palace guards stepped forth, swinging blades. The Oringard, who had fought with Eris for three years and remained loyal even in this hall, parried and thrust back.

"Stop!" shouted Eris, and his voice echoed in the hall, so loud he knew even the city beyond could hear. His eyes burned. His breath shook in his chest. "Stop this madness! Too much blood has spilled here already." He pointed a bloody finger toward Iselda. "Evil has come into this hall. The cruelty of the Radian Order has driven this place to bloodshed, to madness, to hatred. Iselda Serin, I banish you from Orida. Leave this city, and leave this island, and never more return. Go now!"

The Radian Queen only smiled at him. She stepped between the soldiers toward Torumun. She placed an arm around the prince's shoulder.

"Prince Torumun is now King of Orida!" she announced. "He has slain many Elorians in battle while you, Prince Eris the Traitor, brought an Elorian into our holy hall. By the laws of Orida, it is Torumun who now rules, and Torumun who is now my lover." She stroked the prince's cheek. "For long years, we longed to love in the open, my prince, my sweet Torumun. And now the throne is yours, and now my love is yours for all to see."

The queen pressed herself against Prince Torumun and kissed him deeply, once his step-mother and now his lover. When the kiss ended, she pointed at Eris.

"And now, my sweet Torumun, slay him. Slay your murderous brother and his wife. Slay them and we will mount their skulls in our hall, and the Meadenhorn will be yours, as I am yours."

Torumun nodded, sword raised, and stepped forth.

Eris knelt, grabbed his sword, and pulled it free from his father's corpse. With his other hand, he held Yiun Yee. She leaned against him, clutching the tatters of her gown and her dripping wound.

"Brother!" Eris said. "How can you desecrate this hall? Turn aside this witch who seduces you."

Torumun raced forward, sword swinging. "I will have your Elorian's skull for my trophy. You slew our father, and I will bring you to justice."

The two princes locked swords. The blades clanged. Across the hall, the Oringard fought against the soldiers of the palace, and more men streamed in from the city. Blood washed the hall. One of the Oringard fell, chest pierced. Another cried out and tumbled. Men rushed into the hall, firing crossbows, and more of the Oringard fell. One bolt slammed into Eris's thigh, and he cried out in pain.

He fell to the floor, landing by the corpse of his father. As men fought around him, Eris gazed at the dead king. Bormund's eyes seemed to accuse him. You murdered me, son!

"I didn't mean to," Eris whispered.

You slew your father. You are forever cursed.

Eris rose to his feet, grimacing. He pulled his wife into his arms, and he raced across the hall, moving between the combatants, and burst out onto the hill. The city flowed across the slopes, many halls of wood and thatch leading to the sea.

"Slay him!" Torumun cried behind him from the hall. "Slay him and his wife!"

Eris made his way downhill, and his Oringard fought around him, carving a way through soldiers, suffering the wounds of swords and arrows, until they reached the sea and entered their longship. A great host flowed down the hills toward them, a thousand men or more, firing arrows, crying out for their blood. Prince Torumun ran among them, and his voice rang across the city.

"You are cursed, Eris! You murdered our father, and I will hunt you down!"

And above that voice rose a cruel, high laughter—the laughter of Iselda Serin. The Radian Queen stood upon the pier, chin raised, smiling as the Orca's Blade sailed away.

Eris had returned here as a hero, a proud son bearing an ancient prize. He fled the island as an exile, covered in blood—his own blood, the blood of his wife, and the blood of the father he himself had slain. His ancient gift, the Meadenhorn, still hung around his neck upon its chain.

The surviving Oringard rowed, and Eris lay upon the deck. Yiun Yee lay at his side, and their blood mingled. They fled into the open sea, a dozen ships in pursuit, and the sounds grew hazy. Eris could no longer hear the waves, the shouts of his men, or the whistles of arrows. All he could hear was that distant, echoing laughter, and all he could see were his father's accusing dead eyes.

CHAPTER TWO:
ASHES

Madori stood upon the ship's deck, the wind ruffling her short black hair, as the Ilari Armada emerged from the dusk into the ruin of her old home.

"Fairwool-by-Night," she whispered. "Our home is gone."

In the space of a blink, she saw a memory: Fairwool-by-Night as it had been in her childhood. Thirty cottages of clay and wood stood in a ring, their roofs thatched, their gardens blossoming with sunflowers, peonies, tulips, and other flowers her father grew. Old Maple rose between them, leaves shading the staircase that led to the village library. Fields of rye, wheat, and barley swayed in the wind, and beyond them sheep grazed in green pastures. Robins and blackbirds sang overhead, and wooden piers stretched into the river, shading the weedy homes of bass and sunfish. A place of lazy turns spent reading under the tree, racing through the fields in search of butterflies, and dreaming of distant adventures. Madori had grown up here lonely, a girl of mixed blood shunned by her peers, but in her long exile she had come to miss her old village, her dog-eared books, her warm quilt, her garden, her childhood, her home.

Now this home was gone.

She took a shaky breath, her memory vanishing. The fields had been trampled and cut down. The old maple tree was gone. The cottages and gardens had burned, and a great statue of Serin rose among them, gazing east toward the darkness. Only the library still stood, its columns sooty, but Radian banners now hung upon its walls. Serin's eastern garrison had mustered here before invading the night, and many soldiers still lingered. Radian archers stood in makeshift wooden forts and upon the Watchtower, the village's only stone fortification. Three warships swayed at the docks, lined with cannons, and more of the great buffalo guns lined the riverbanks. Hundreds of soldiers moved about the ruins of the village, and at the sight of the Ilari flagship emerging from the shadows, they cried out and raised their bows.

Koyee walked across the deck of the Tai Lar, flagship of the Ilari Armada. Clad in Ilari armor, she was almost unrecognizable. Steel plates, tasseled and lacquered, enclosed her slender form. A helmet hid her face, the visor shaped as a snarling demon with furry eyebrows. Madori could see only her mother's eyes, large and lavender.

"This turn we fight side by side, daughter," Koyee said and drew her sword.

Madori swung down her own visor; she too wore Ilari armor, its black plates making her feel like a great steel beetle. She drew her own katana, the blade that had once been Sheytusung but renamed Min Tey. The blade had been stolen from her in the darkness; she had found it among Lari's belongings in the iron mine, and now once more Madori carried it to battle.

"Side by side," Madori whispered. "For our home that was."

Tianlong, last dragon of the night, streamed above, emerging from the dusk into the full daylight. Jitomi sat on his back, and the young emperor blew into a horn, a great wail for blood and conquest.

Behind the Tai Lar, other Ilari warships emerged into the daylight, the vanguard of the Armada, a great fleet of five hundred vessels. For the first time in the history of Mythimna, this world frozen between day and night, an army of darkness emerged into the sunlight.

With whistling arrows, the roar of a dragon, and blasting cannons, the invasion of Timandra began.

"We are the night!" Koyee cried, and a sea of swords rose across the decks, thousands of warriors roaring for battle.

"We are the night!" Madori cried among them, sword held high, for this turn, emerging into the sunlight, she too was an Elorian. She had been born of a sunlit father, but in this war she was a daughter of darkness.

Enemy arrows rained from above, slamming against the Elorians' armor as they dropped anchor and lowered planks toward the docks. Cannons blasted from the riverside, slamming into the ship's iron hull, and the Elorian cannons answered from their decks, tearing into the enemy's lines. Madori screamed as she ran with the hosts, racing across a plank and onto the riverbank. She swung her sword, tearing into the Radians who stood upon the ruins of her village. Her mother fought at her side, and Jitomi flew overhead, and everywhere was smoke, blood, arrows, and steel.

Perhaps a thousand Radian troops garrisoned here; the bulk of Serin's Eastern Division was still crawling across the night. The Elorian invaders outnumbered them a hundred to one. Ilari warriors raced through the camp upon panthers, swinging katanas at the enemy. Cannons tore down tents and huts and wooden walls. At first the Timandrians tried to fight back. A soldier raced toward Madori, and she swung her blade, parrying his every thrust, and finally drove her katana through his shoulder and into his chest. Koyee slew another man, and around them, a hundred more Timandrians fell dead.

The rest turned to flee, but the Ilari—warriors bred in the light of the Red Flame for war and conquest—showed them no mercy. The blood of Timandra spilled upon the trampled fields and burnt remnants of Fairwool-by-Night. When the battle ended, all that remained of the Radian force were the dead.

With the enemy slain and its ships seized, the Ilari troops cheered for victory, and even Tianlong roared with triumph above, but Madori found no joy inside her, only digging pain like a dagger buried deep within her chest beyond the reach of any healer. She moved among the ruins, boots slogging through blood, her eyes wide and damp.

"Fairwool," she whispered.

She walked over a corpse, around an Ilari panther and its rider, and through a puddle of blood. She knelt by a severed arm and a cloven shield.

"The Shadowed Firkin rose here," she whispered, caressing the earth. Only piles of ash marked the place where the tavern had once stood. When Madori closed her eyes, she could see the place again: the chimneys belching out smoke, light glinting on the stained-glass windows, and the bronze statue of Hem Baker sitting inside by the hearth. She could hear the laughter of patrons, the songs Tera Brewer would sing upon the tables, and the crackling of the fire. She could smell the cooking beef stew and fresh bread, taste the cold ale, feel the oiled wooden bar beneath her palms. Yet when she opened her eyes, it was gone; only ash and blood and death.

Madori rose to her feet and walked around a group of laughing Ilari soldiers. She felt dizzy and nearly fell but dragged her feet onward. She knelt by a blackened stump and placed her hand upon it.

"Old Maple rose here," she whispered. She could see the tree in her memory again. She had spent many hours of her childhood climbing its branches, pretending to be Bailey Berin, the great heroine of the war whose statue had once stood in its shade. She was Madori Billy Greenmoat, her middle name given to her in honor of Bailey, yet now the heroine's statue was gone, and the tree both women would climb had been cut down.

Madori left the stump. Her boots squelched through blood as she walked forward to where her old house had stood.

Her childhood home—the old cottage where she had been born and raised—was gone. Upon the blackened earth where it had stood now rose a stone statue, taller than the fallen Old Maple, of Emperor Serin.

Rage filled Madori like the fire of a thousand cannons.

She roared, grabbed a stone from the ground, and drove it against the statue. She cried out, tears in her eyes, and pounded the statue again and again, chipping Serin's leg.

"You killed my friends at Teel!" she shouted, thinking of the Elorian students he had slain on the road. She pounded the statue. "You destroyed Pahmey!" Tears streamed down her cheeks. "You ruined my home. I am coming for you, Serin. I will find you and I will destroy you."

She kept pounding the statue with her rock, chipping bit by bit, until the stone cracked in her hand, and Madori fell to her knees, panting, chest heaving.

She felt a hand on her shoulder, and she spun around to see Koyee staring down at her, eyes solemn.

"Try this," Koyee said, handing Madori a chain.

Ilari troops stepped forward with more chains, which they wrapped around the statue and attached to their panthers. The beasts tugged and Madori tugged with them, straining as she gripped the iron links. The statue tilted, then crashed down and shattered. The Ilari soldiers cheered, but Madori remained silent, staring at the fallen colossus. The head lay at her feet, larger than her entire body. She looked into the stone eyes.

We will meet soon, Serin. You wanted to light the darkness, but now this darkness rises against you. And I rise with it.

A howl sounded behind her.

She spun toward the east and narrowed her eyes.

The howl rose again—the cry of a wolf.

Madori tilted her head, and her heart burst into a gallop.

A great beast, large as a horse, emerged from the dusk and raced across the battlefield. A nightwolf, she realized, a great hunter of the Qaelish plains. As it drew nearer, racing between the troops, Madori saw that its fur was gray, its frame lean, its eyes large and blue.

"It can't be," she whispered.

Yet as the nightwolf raced toward her, she knew it was him. Tears flooded her eyes anew, but this time they were tears of joy.

"Grayhem!" she cried.

He ran toward her, and Madori raced over the dead toward him, and she leaped onto her nightwolf and embraced him. The great beast nearly knocked her down, licking her cheeks and nuzzling her. He whimpered in pain and happiness to see her.

"Where were you?" she whispered, nearly choking on her joy. "By Xen Qae, boy! I haven't seen you for moons, not since Pahmey."

The nightwolf almost seemed to try and speak. Sounds almost like words rose from his throat, and he licked her again and again, pressing against her. He was so frail—by the stars, she could feel his ribs—and he must have traveled for countless leagues in the darkness before finding her.

She walked toward a toppled Timandrian tent where Ilari troops were digging through the enemy's supplies. She found a string of sausages and fed them to Grayhem; he swallowed them one by one, barely pausing to chew, and Madori laughed and rubbed the tears from her eyes.

Not all is lost, she thought. Not all was taken from me.

"You found me, boy," she whispered and kissed Grayhem. "I missed you. I love you."

He was still thin and frail but the meal seemed to give him strength. Madori climbed onto the nightwolf and straddled his back.

The Ilari Armada—five hundred ships bearing the banners of the night—sailed along the river, away from the dusk and into the sunlight. To war. To Markfir, capital of the Radian Empire. To Tirus Serin. Jitomi rode upon his dragon, and Koyee and thousands of other soldiers sailed upon the ships, but she, Madori, remained upon the riverbank, riding her wolf, her dearest friend.

As they headed into the west, Madori kept staring forward, imagining the turn she would meet Serin again. She did not look back once to the ruin of her home.

CHAPTER THREE:
THE FINCH AND THE RAT

A finch flew above, warbling, a lone beacon of song and beauty in the world. Hunkered down in ruins of broken stone and shattered wood, Torin gazed up at the bird, marveling at how life could still survive here, how a bird could still fly and sing when so much death had befallen the world.

At his side, Cam nocked an arrow and tugged back the bowstring, aiming at the bird. Then, with a sigh, he slowly released the bowstring's tension and returned the arrow to his quiver.

"Ah, to Inagon with it," Cam said. "Even if I hit, there's barely any meat on it. Looks like it's rat on the menu again, though the damn rats are as skinny as we are."

Cam, shepherd turned King of Arden, himself looked like a starving rat. He had always been slender, but now Cam looked downright cadaverous. His cheeks were sunken, his skin ashen, his hair limp. His eyes darted nervously and he licked his dry lips with an equally dry tongue. The king still wore his plate armor, but dents, cracks, and stains covered it.

Torin suspected that he himself looked no better. When he gazed down at his body, it seemed to drown inside his own armor. He had barely recovered from his captivity in the Radian dungeons—a nightmare of pain and darkness spanning eight months—when he had found himself here, fighting in the ruins of Orewood.

At least, this place had once been Orewood. The proud capital of Verilon, once among the largest cities in Moth, had crumbled. Half the city's log homes had burned down; they spread across the hills in charred remains like the sooty skeletons of oversized beetles. Most of the stone structures too had collapsed. Cannons had punched holes through walls. Towers had fallen, and their domes of bronze, tin, and silver lay upon cracked streets like the massive, discarded spinning tops of giants. Shards of walls, orphaned archways, and lone columns rose from ash and piles of bricks. The once-mighty city, bastion of the north, had become a graveyard.

It seemed to Torin that only the city smithies and foundries, great buildings of stone, still stood; neither side had dared destroy them. Orewood had been built around iron mines, giving the city its name. Its foundries produced half the iron and steel in Timandra. Most turns Torin wanted to smash those foundries to the ground and end this carnage in their name.

"We can't keep eating rats," Torin said softly. "Not while the enemy is feasting on salted pork, fresh bread, and ale. Every turn we grow weaker. We must advance. We must take the temple."

Cam's eyes darkened. "Tor, there must be hundreds of Radians between us and the temple. Their archers line the roofs. Their swordsmen patrol the street."

Torin gestured around him. A hundred Ardishmen huddled here in the shell of an old chandlery. One wall and the roof had collapsed. They crouched against the remaining walls, armed with bows and arrows. Across the road, several Ardish troops stood on the roof of an abandoned tannery. They were all thin. Ashen. Maybe dying. They had been fighting in Orewood for almost a month now; they had barely eaten since the battle had begun.

Torin looked below him. A trapdoor led to the chandlery's cellar, and a dozen eyes peered up from the shadows. Verilish children hid here, their parents slain in the war, and they too were hungry. They too were dying. The rats and beetles had sustained them at first, but now even those animals were going scarce.

"We must reach the temple," Torin repeated. "That's where the food is stored. That's where we'll survive."

They had smelled the food cooking in the temple before—roasted meats, breads, stews. When the wind was just right, and the smell wafted down to this hovel, it was almost intolerable. Some turns Torin could only sit against a wall between skirmishes and bloodshed, smelling that distant food, dreaming of biting into the feast.

Cam rose to his toes and peered through a hole in the wall. The temple lay down the street, only five blocks away. Normally it would be only a short walk. Now, with the enemy troops on the roofs, it seemed more distant than the southern deserts of Eseer.

"Do you think," Cam said, "that they might be in the northern quarters? Maybe . . . maybe even close to the temple?" He turned toward Torin, eyes desperate. "Do you remember the banner? We saw the Ardish banner fly from the north. It had risen beyond the temple. A pocket of Ardish survivors maybe." His fingers shook around his bow, and his voice dropped to a whisper. "Maybe Linee and Omry are there."

Torin lowered his head. "I don't know, my friend. There are pockets of survivors all over this city, both fighters of Verilon and Arden. They could be anywhere."

Cam stared out the window again, and this time his gaze did not go toward the distant temple. His eyes moved lower toward the bodies strewn across the street. Some were old, barely more than skeletons. Others were fresh, crows and rats picking at them. More than once Torin had wondered if the rats they had caught here in the chandlery—the rats they had eaten when no other food could be found—had contained the flesh of men in their little bellies.

"I want to tell you that they're still alive," Torin said softly. "I want to believe it myself. I want to tell you how Linee and Omry are strong and brave, and how if anyone can survive this slaughter, they can. But the truth is I don't know. I don't know if they live. I don't know if my own family has survived and fights somewhere in the darkness. I don't know if you and I will live come next turn. Some turns I don't know if I myself am alive or already dead, trapped in the eternal nightmare of Inagon, that cursed land of afterlife. But I do know that we must advance." He gripped Cam's arm. "We must take the temple, and we must retake this city, and if Linee and Omry are alive, we must find them. We must advance. We must fight."

Cam tightened his lips and nodded. "Like in the old turns, right, Tor, old boy?"

Torin felt a lump in his throat. In their first war, they had lost their dearest, oldest friends. They had left the bodies of Hem and Bailey buried in the killing fields. Four youths had left Fairwool-by-Night. Two had returned.

Will we be the last survivors now too? Torin thought. Will Cam and I emerge to fight, maybe even survive, to find ourselves alone again, our families slaughtered?

He lowered his head. Perhaps, he thought. But he would fight nonetheless.

Cam moved among the troops, giving the order in hushed tones. A hundred troops stared back grimly and nodded. Those who had bows nocked arrows. Others drew their swords. Even the children in the cellar, their parents slain in the war, grabbed knives, rocks, and sticks and emerged to stand among the soldiers. A warble sounded above, and Torin raised his eyes to see the finch again; it fluttered across the ashy sky and vanished among the distant ruins.

Fly far from here, friend, Torin thought. Fly and find a life away from the wars of men, for everything around us turns to ruin and rot.

Cam returned to him, sword drawn, and suddenly the short, slender king looked like a giant. His eyes burned with determination, and his sword shone in a beam of light that fled the clouds. Torin drew his own sword and hefted his shield. He met Cam's gaze. The king nodded.

"For Arden!" Cam shouted. He leaped over rubble, raced through a shattered doorway, and emerged into the street.

"Men of Arden, to the temple!" Torin shouted. "With me!"

The men roared. Torin ran, leaping over the ruins, and emerged onto the cobbled street. He ran alongside Cam, and a hundred soldiers ran behind him. Between the men, dressed in rags, ran the children from the cellar. A little girl clutched a rag doll, and a young boy ran with a knife, lips tightened and eyes flashing, ready to fight. One soldier raised the banner of Arden, a black raven upon a golden field. The finch had fled from the sky; the raven had emerged.

"For Arden!" Torin shouted hoarsely, running forward.

The cobbled street stretched before them, lined with ruin. Most of the houses alongside had burned or crumbled. Those that still stood looked ready to collapse, their walls full of holes. Radian troops stood behind their windows and on their roofs, and a great eclipse banner swung from a tilted statue. The temple rose in the distance, one of its domed towers fallen, its two remaining domes shining silver in the veiled sunlight.

For a moment, the Ardish force ran unopposed toward the temple.

Then, with whistles and the howls of men, a hundred Radian arrows flew toward them.

Torin kept running. One arrow slammed into his raised shield, and another glanced off his helmet. At his side, an arrow punched into an Ardishman and sent him tumbling. Grunts rose behind as more men fell. The running children screamed. As they ran, the surviving Ardishmen fired their own arrows at the roofs and windows. Most clattered harmlessly against stone and wood, but one arrow sank into a Radian archer. The man tumbled off a roof and slammed down onto the street.

"To the temple!" Cam shouted, running forward as more arrows rained.

The new volley slammed into them. Two arrows pierced Torin's shield. Another pierced his armor and nicked his chest, drawing blood. One arrow slammed into Cam's arm. Other Ardishmen fell, pierced by many shafts. An arrow sank into a girl's leg; her brother lifted her and kept running.

We're almost there, Torin thought. The world swayed around him. The temple rose and fell. There would be food there. Better shelter. A chance to find others. Hope.

They had run another block when, with battle cries, dozens of Radian troops burst out from side streets, swinging their swords.

Torin snarled and kept running. His fellow soldiers ran around him, brandishing their blades. With thuds and the ringing of metal, the two forces slammed together.

One man—a Magerian in dark armor—swung an axe. Torin blocked the blow on his shield, then swiped his sword low, slamming the blade into the man's leg. As the Magerian was forced to kneel, Torin swung his shield, knocking the axe aside, and thrust his sword into the man's neck. Another Magerian leaped at him, swinging a longsword in wide arcs. Torin parried, and the blades sparked together. The man fought in a fury, blade lashing again and again, until it slammed into Torin's breastplate and dented the steel. Torin grunted, his armor pressing into his skin, and slammed his sword down with all his strength. The blade cut deeply into the enemy's arm. Another thrust of Torin's sword knocked the man down.

All around him, the others fought. Cam was dueling two men at once. Even the children fought with rocks, knives, and sticks. More arrows rained from above, and men kept falling dead. One Radian soldier roared and raced toward them, and Torin winced. The man wore armor in the style of Arden; a raven was still visible upon the breastplate, chipped away and crudely painted over with an eclipse. He had the brown hair and dark eyes more common among Ardishmen than Magerians—a traitor to his kingdom joined to Serin's cause. A sword's thrust from Cam sent the man sprawling down. Torin drove down his own blade, piercing the traitor's chest, and he grieved for slaying a man of his home, grieved that a man of his home had fallen to evil.

In a lull, Torin looked around him. His head spun, and the world seemed hazy, slow, stuck in some transparent syrup. The dead lay everywhere, their eyes staring at him. The enemy. His comrades. Men and women, all the same in death.

The war eternal, Torin thought. The blood of Moth. The blood that will forever wash us.

More arrows rained. More men fell. Torin tightened his lips and kept running.

They raced through a hailstorm of more arrows, cut enemies down, and reached the temple. A stone staircase rose toward dark gates. The walls soared, peppered with holes, and one fallen tower lay across the street, its bricks strewn and its dome cracked. Two towers still rose, topped with silver domes. A Radian banner flew from one.

As Torin, Cam, and the other surviving Ardishmen raced up the stairs, three mages in black robes emerged from the gates.

Torin knelt, dropped his sword, and unslung his bow from across his shoulder. He fired an arrow and hit one mage. The man tumbled down the stairs. But the other two mages were already casting their magic. Smoky tendrils blasted downward, slamming into the climbing Ardishmen.

Torin dodged one astral strand and kept climbing. Other Ardishmen fell, the magic wrapping around them, crushing their armor and bones. One man screamed as the magic shattered his breastplate, cracked his chest, and tugged the ribs from his flesh. The magic raised another man in the air, crumpling him into a ball and dropping him back onto the stairs. Torin raced up the last steps when one of the remaining mages turned toward him.

Black magic slammed against Torin, a dozen shrieking snakes with white eyes that wrapped around him. He screamed as his armor dented, pushing inwards. He refused to fall. He raced forward, thrust his sword, and drove the blade into the mage's chest. Cam raced up at his side, and the king's sword swung into the second mage, sending him falling down the stairs.

The magic vanished. Torin fell to his knees, groaning as his dented armor cut into him. He tugged the straps free and pulled shards of metal from his skin. Cam grabbed him, and Torin slung his arm across his friend's shoulder. Perhaps fifty Ardishmen and twenty children had survived the dash from the chandlery, and they stumbled into the temple.

"Lale, Roen, guard the gates," Cam said to two archers. The men nodded, and the rest stepped deeper into the shadows. A handful of Magerians were scrambling up from makeshift beds and reaching for swords. The Ardishmen cut them down before they could swing a blade.

"There might be . . ." Torin gasped for breath. "Might be bandages here. Healing herbs. Food. Oh stars, there will be food. Let's look."

Cam glanced down at Torin's wounds. "You need to lie down."

"We need bandages. We need food. We'll rest later."

They stumbled through the temple between piles of bricks and shards of wood. Finally they found the kitchen and pantry, and Torin felt more pain than the bites of arrows or swords.

The kitchen was empty. The pantry shelves held only a single sack of flour, a single jar of preserves, and a few rats.

"More rats," Cam said. "Rats and raspberry jam. Lovely."

Torin fell to his knees.

There is no hope. We will die here. We will die in the ruins of Orewood and I'll never see you again, Madori. I'll never hold you again, Koyee.

Suddenly the pain was too great to bear—of his wounds, of his worry, of those he had lost. How many Ardishmen had died on the street to claim this temple? All for this. He lifted the jar of jam, closed his eyes, and lowered his head. A rat gazed up at him curiously, as if contemplating this miserable creature who looked even hungrier and more ragged than itself.

CHAPTER FOUR:
THE LEPER OF KETEN

Breathing heavily, her armor smeared with mud and moss, Neekeya stumbled out of the marshlands and onto the coast of her fallen homeland.

The beach stretched ahead of her, sloping down toward the blue water. A few palm trees and mangroves grew above the sand, and the air smelled of salt. Neekeya had been traveling through the marshes for twenty turns now, nearly a whole month, crossing the fallen kingdom of Daenor. Here, at the edge of the world, she fell to her knees and gazed at the sea.

When she had been a girl, Neekeya had come here once with her father, and she had walked toward the water, gazed at the blue horizon, and announced that here was the edge of the world. Her father had laughed. Neekeya had grown up and studied the maps of Mythimna, this world shaped as a great moth split between day and night, and she knew that more of this world lay beyond the sea. South from here lay the island of Sania, a land of vast savannahs, roaming herds of elephants, and noble people related to her own race.

"There will be aid there for me," she whispered. "There will be hope."

She struggled to her feet, weak with hunger, and took several steps along the sand toward the sea. Five distant ships sailed northward on the horizon, and when Neekeya squinted, she could see great scorpions painted on their sails. Here were Eseerian ships from the southeastern desert—followers of the Radian Order. They would be sailing north toward the pyramids of Eetek, pouring more soldiers into Neekeya's homeland.

She turned in the sand and gazed at the marshlands. Mangroves rose here, their roots nearly as tall as her, leading to shadows. Mist floated between the branches, and herons waded through a delta. Neekeya clenched her fists and lowered her head.

"Daenor," she whispered. "My home. I will return. I will not forget you, Denetek." Tears stung her eyes. "And I will not forget you either, Tam."

The loss of her husband clawed inside her, nearly too great to bear. She had traveled into these marshlands with him, to wed him here, to rule this land alongside him. Now she stumbled out from the swamps, a widow, both her home and her husband fallen to the enemy.

"I cannot bring you back, Tam," she whispered. "But I can keep fighting. I will stay alive for you. For your memory. I will keep fighting the enemy so long as breath fills my lungs."

She caressed her wedding ring, which Tam had forged himself with magic—a strand of gold containing one of her hairs, a strand of silver containing one of his. She turned away and walked along the beach, and she did not look back to the marshes.

She walked southward for several hours, perhaps a full turn, until she saw the port ahead. Here lay the city of Keten, the Gates of the Sea. For centuries, Keten had connected Daenor to its neighbors, the desert realm of Eseer and the more distant, southern island of Sania. For centuries, the ships of those realms—their people sharing old bonds of kinship, language, and gods with Daenor—had found safe harbor here, bringing spices, wines, jewels, fabrics, and even pets from exotic lands. In her old chambers in the pyramid, Neekeya had owned jeweled rings, bottles of colored sand, scarves of silks inlaid with coins, richly illuminated books, and many other treasures brought into Daenor through this port. This turn she would welcome no treasure here from distant lands; she herself would sail away to find those lands of her childhood dreams.

She had fuzzy memories of the port from her childhood: the ringing of bells on ships, the smells of fish and oil, the creaking of ropes, the swaying of ships, the song of sailors and the caws of gulls. She remembered a place of warmth and wonder.

This turn she saw a nightmare.

Radian banners rose from the stone towers of Keten and draped across the columns of its temple. A great statue of Cetela had once stood here upon a breakwater, gazing at the sea, a man with the head of a crocodile. The head had been knocked off; it lay at the statue's feet like a bloated whale, its eyes shattered. The enemy ships filled the port—the long, narrow boats of Eseer, scorpions painted onto their sails. Radian soldiers from many lands stood on the walls and patrolled the piers. Neekeya saw Magerians in black plate steel, their hair golden and their eyes blue, their swords wide and long; Eseerians in white robes, desert warriors armed with scimitars fashioned as scorpion tails; and even Nayan warriors of the northern rainforest, tiger pelts hanging around their shoulders, their long red beards strewn with bones and beads. All these troops now hoisted the Radian banners. All served Lord Serin.

"But I will never serve you," Neekeya whispered. "Though you crushed my home, I still live, a latani of Eetek, a princess of the marshlands. And I will still fight you with every breath, Serin." She clutched the hilt of her sword. "Your people slew my husband. And I will avenge him. I will avenge Tam."

Standing in the sand outside the city, Neekeya could almost see Tam again. She imagined that he stood beside her, and her eyes dampened. She gazed upon his apparition: a young man of nineteen years, the same age as her, his hair brown, his skin tanned gold, his eyes bright and warm. A memory shot through her: Tam racing across the bridge toward Felsar in the underground, then crashing down into the lava, giving his life to save hers.

She tightened her lips and raised her chin. Dwelling on her pain would not bring him back, would not liberate her fallen homeland. The desert of Eseer had joined the Radian Order. So had the rainforest of Naya. But Sania, the southern savannah, still stood tall and free; she had seen none of its soldiers in the swamps, and none of its ships sailed here. In Sania she would find allies. She would find a hope to fight again.

"And to reach Sania, I need a ship," she said.

She could not wander into the port looking like she did, she knew. She still wore her crocodile armor—the breastplate shaped like crocodile skin, the helmet sharp with iron teeth—clearly denoting her a warrior of Daenor. Even should she doff her armor, her deep brown skin marked her a South Daenorian, an enemy to the Radian Order. Yet perhaps, entering the city as a simple marshlands girl come seeking a meal, the Radians would let her live. Serin sought to slay all Elorians; with Daenorians, at least, he sought only subjugation, not yet genocide.

For the first time in many turns, she removed her armor—the armor she had worn at Teel University, in the wastelands of Arden, and throughout the war in Daenor—the armor that had protected her body and soul for years. Like her home and husband, it too would leave her. She buried it in the sand and rolled a boulder atop it, vowing to return. She could not bear to part from her sword. She used the blade to cut down a thick bamboo stalk along the border of the marshes. She split the stem down the middle, hid her sword within it, then reattached the halved stem with vines. She hid the protruding crossguard within a garland of leaves and vines. She walked on, holding her makeshift he'tak—the holy staff of a Cetela priestess, a ring upon a rod. He'taki were items of divinity and healing; hers hid her sting within.

She walked along the sand toward the town, the mangroves to her left, the sea whispering to her right. Finally she reached the northern gates of Keten. The city walls rose above her, built of tan bricks. Flowering weeds grew between the cracks, and an eclipse banner hung from the battlements. Eseerians archers stood above, arrows knocked in their bows. More of the desert warriors stood guarding the gates, their scimitars—shaped as scorpion stingers—drawn and gleaming.

"Turn back, swamp dweller!" said one of the guards, a tall man with olive skin and dark eyes. "This city is forbidden to your kind."

Neekeya stepped closer. She spoke the language of Eseer; it was similar to her own tongue, for the two peoples—of the southern desert and the northern marshlands—shared a common ancestry.

"I'm a daughter of this city," she said, speaking in flawless Eseerian. "My father was an Eseerian sailor; my mother is a child of Daenor." She knew that, with her darker skin, she could not pass for a pure Eseerian, but perhaps they would believe her to be mixed like Madori. "I've heard that Eseer captured this city, and . . ." She allowed tears to fill her eyes. "I've come seeking my father. Please, sir. Allow me to enter the city, so that I may seek him. I've not seen him in many years, not since he sailed back to the desert, leaving me in the marshlands with my Daenorian mother. Please let me find him. My mother is dead."

She let tears stream down her cheeks. It didn't take much effort; she simply had to think of her true father, the fallen Lord Kee'an, for her eyes to water. For extra effect she added a wobble to her lips and a heave to her breasts.

The guard's eyes softened. He spoke gently. "My father too left me as a child. He too was a sailor." He glanced around him, then back at Neekeya. "What's your name?"

"Asai," she said, using the name of an Eseerian lady who had visited Daenor years ago and had been Neekeya's friend for a summer.

"I am Jatef," the guard said. "My emperor perhaps hates Daenorians; you'll find that few of his soldiers do. If you don't find your father, seek me at the gates or the tavern by the docks, the one with two chimneys. I'll buy you a bottle of wine and shelter you for the night in a warm bed."

She nodded, wondering if he cared less for her safety and more for her company in said bed. "I will seek you," she lied. "Thank you, Jatef."

Leaving him at the gates, Neekeya—now Asai the bastard daughter—entered the city of Keten.

The lively streets and markets were gone. No more children ran upon the cobblestones, spinning metal hoops. No more peddlers shouted out their wares. No more sailors swayed between the taverns and pleasure houses, seeking games of dice, bottles of wine, or women to warm their beds. That old city of sound and sin had died; a military camp awaited Neekeya here. Soldiers of the enemy stood everywhere: Eseerian archers upon the roofs, Magerians in dark steel at every street corner, and Nayan warriors along the docks. Some Daenorians still lived here, but they were frightened, meek; she saw their eyes peering from within boarded windows, a people conquered.

And she saw the dead.

Cages hung from trees and walls, and within languished the bones of dead Daenorians. She knew they were her people; the skeletons still wore the armor of Daenor, and strings of crocodile teeth hung around their necks. Neekeya covered her mouth and nose; the stench spun her head.

I'm in danger here, she thought. Even without her armor, even with her sword hidden. Already she saw soldiers staring at her, eyes cruel.

"Off the streets, swamp rat!" shouted one man, a Magerian brute with sandy stubble on his cheeks. "We don't let you vermin scamper about anymore. Run home to your mama, or I'll stick my sword in your gut."

Neekeya nodded and shuffled along. Walking like this, her dusky Daenorian countenance revealed to all, would not get her past this block, let alone to the piers where she could hope to book passage on a ship. A plan began to formulate in her mind. She hurried down the road until she spotted a fabric shop, rolls of cotton and canvas and wool hanging in its windows. She stepped into the dusty brick house, finding herself surrounded by reels of fabric, cloaks on hangers, and many scarves. An elderly Daenorian woman sat here on a wooden chair, wrapped in a cloak and tasseled scarves.

"Priestess of Cetela," the woman whispered in awe, gazing at her bamboo he'tak.

Neekeya was no true priestess, but perhaps this turn Daenor needed blessings more than warriors or mages. She nodded at the fabric merchant.

"May Cetela bless you, Wise Mother." Neekeya reached into her pocket and produced an emerald ring, one of her last mementos from home. She had once thought this ring enchanted; these turns it was hard to believe in enchanted jewels. "I have no coin to give you, but would you accept this ring for a cloak and scarf?"

"I would not," said the merchant. "All coins and jewels have lost their meaning; all that matters now is our people, our memory of freedom. Take what cloak and scarf you need, and let them be gifts to you, as your blessing is a gift to me."

As Neekeya donned a heavy woolen cloak and a seeken scarf, guilt filled her, for she was only a priestess in disguise. As she left the shop, she secretly placed the ring onto the windowsill. Neekeya would need no ring in the open sea, but perhaps this woman would still find use for it—a bribe for a soldier or perhaps just a thing of beauty, a memory of kinship.

Wrapped in her white cloak and hood, a scarf hiding her face, Neekeya walked back onto the street. Only her eyes were now uncovered, and though she still held her bamboo staff, she doubted that the Radian invaders would know its significance to Daenor—or what she hid inside it. Cloaked and hidden in white, she hoped she looked like an Eseerian woman, perhaps a camp follower, the wife of a soldier, a healer, or peddler come to hawk charms to the soldiers.

She walked along the street, head bowed low. She passed by a temple to Cetela. The statues of the crocodile god had been smashed, and the banners of the enemy draped across the walls. She walked down a narrow, sloping street between brick houses and palm trees until she reached the port.

Several stone towers rose here, airy and pierced with narrow windows, weeds and flowers growing between their bricks. Two breakwaters stretched into the harbor, lined with columns, and a hundred vessels nestled within their embrace—fishermen's boats, merchant cogs, and the warships of the invaders.

Neekeya paused and closed her eyes, thinking back to the memory of the great mural in Eetek Pyramid, showing this southern port. She had spent much of her childhood standing before that mural, admiring the details of merchants bringing in cages of parrots, leashed tigers, exotic spices, and baskets of jewels from distant lands, and she had often wished she could step into the painting and sail off herself on adventures. The port she faced now was no place of magic, for enemy soldiers stood upon its boardwalk, and the ships of a cruel empire filled its cove.

She walked toward the boardwalk, trying to formulate a plan as she approached. Could she book passage on a ship, paying with her labor, scrubbing the deck and peeling potatoes? She doubted that many merchant ships would be sailing back and forth during the war, and what Radian warship would hire a Daenorian? Did she dare, then, to steal one of the Radians' rowboats, to try and make her way to Sania alone? That seemed just as impossible. Could such a small vessel, built for navigating between the boardwalk and the towering brigantines with their many sails, truly cross the open sea?

As a child, Neekeya had read stories of sailors abandoned at sea, building rafts, and finding their way home. If those castaways had survived on rafts, surely she could survive in an actual boat . . . couldn't she? Neekeya sighed. Perhaps not. Perhaps death awaited her in the sea. But death lay on the land too; maybe only on the water could she find a sliver of hope.

As she took another step closer, five Magerian soldiers on the boardwalk turned toward her. One drew his sword.

"Halt!" the man said. "The boardwalk is closed. Leave this place now or the fish will feed on your body."

Neekeya kept hobbling forward, wrapped in her cloak, hood, and scarf and leaning on her staff. She coughed. "Please, kind sirs! I was told to come here." She reached the soldiers on the boardwalk, coughed again, and stooped over. "I was told to leave the city."

The soldiers muttered. "Did you hear me, rat? The port is—"

Neekeya coughed wildly and spoke in a hoarse voice. "But the city guards! They said that Keten is closed to lepers. They said that before I infect anyone else, I'm to get on a boat, to—"

"Idar damn it!" one soldier shouted. The men stepped back, eyes wide, and covered their mouths and noses.

Neekeya took two more steps toward them, coughing violently. "Dear sirs, a boat. Is there a boat for me? I need to leave. I already made three men sick, and—"

The soldiers turned tail and fled across the boardwalk, cursing. Neekeya smiled behind her veil and walked onto a pier that stretched into the water. A rowboat was tethered here, a humble fishing vessel; a net, a bucket, and a fishing rod lay within it. Neekeya guessed that it had belonged to a Daenorian, a fisherman banished from the port, perhaps killed. She climbed inside, untied the rope off its peg, and grabbed the oars. She began to navigate away from the pier and across the cove.

Raised voices sounded behind her on the boardwalk. Neekeya turned her head to see the soldiers—those who had stopped her—exchanging heated words with a Magerian knight, his golden pauldrons denoting his nobility. One soldier pointed at Neekeya, and the knight cursed.

"Stop that boat!" shouted the knight and waved his sword.

Neekeya grimaced and rowed with more vigor.

Upon the walls and towers that surrounded the port, soldiers raised their bows. Neekeya ducked as arrows sailed down toward her. Most sank into the water. Two pierced the hull of the boat, and one scraped across Neekeya's arm. She kept rowing, her belly tight, navigating her boat between two towering brigantines. The massive vessels, each the size of a castle, shielded her from the barrage of arrows. A handful of sailors stood upon them, pointing down at her and shouting.

"Stop the boat!" rose the knight's voice. "I'll be damned if I let a filthy leper steal one of the empire's vessels."

When Neekeya looked over her shoulder, she saw several rowboats following her, soldiers within them. She rowed with all the strength in her arms, emerging from between the brigantines. She had nearly reached the edge of the cove. The breakwaters ended ahead of her, curving inward like embracing arms, leaving only a small exit to the open sea. An archer stood upon the tip of each breakwater.

Neekeya grabbed the fishing rod and swung it. The string sailed through the air and the hook grabbed one archer's bow, yanking it free. The second archer fired, and Neekeya ducked; the arrow sailed over her head and sank into the water. With a few more strokes of the oars, she cleared the breakwaters and shot into the open sea.

Men shouted behind her and more arrows flew, sinking into the water. The waves were rough here outside the cove, tossing her boat up and down.

"You fool!" shouted the knight from his boat, still within the port. "A rowboat can't survive in the open sea."

Neekeya ignored him and kept rowing, leaving the port behind, heading into the deep waters. The soldiers in the other boats cursed and turned back toward the boardwalk. She heard them muttering about how no damn leper was worth this much trouble. Then she heard nothing but the waves and the gulls above.

As the port grew distant behind her, a chill flooded Neekeya, and suddenly she felt trapped within this small vessel. She had felt no fear during the chase, only cold determination, but now the fear filled her. When she leaned over the boat, the water seemed endlessly deep, the waves endlessly powerful; she was a mere insect on a leaf, floating in an ocean.

She squared her shoulders.

"I will survive here," she whispered to herself. "I survived traveling for months across occupied Arden and the Magerian plains. I survived war in the marshlands. I will survive the sea, and I will make it to Sania. I have a net. I have a rod and hooks. I will live. I will see you again some turn, Tam, but not yet. Not yet."

She rowed on, leaving her homeland of Daenor . . . and heading into the endless blue.

CHAPTER FIVE:
WINGLESS

Eris Grimgarg stood upon the tor, a rocky outcrop that rose from the gray sea like a bone from a wound, and he stared across the water toward his home.

Orida was but a faded line on the horizon, a shore forbidden to him. For three years in the darkness, Eris had dreamed of returning to his homeland, the island which his ancestor, the legendary King Orin, had conquered from the wraiths of the underworld. And now . . . here he stood. Upon a barren rock. A refugee and outcast, the blood of his own father on his hands.

Yiun Yee walked up to him and placed a hand on his shoulder. The wind streamed her white hair and silken gown, and her large Elorian eyes—made for seeing in the darkness of night—shone with love for him, a love that had given him the strength to search for the Meadenhorn in caverns and forests and dungeons, a love that gave him strength even here upon the tor, upon this rock far from any land or hope for glory.

"I am sorry, Yiun Yee," Eris said. The wind ruffled his beard and tossed strands of his blond hair across his face. "I wanted more for you. I wanted my father to embrace you, to call you a daughter. I wanted a feast in our honor, to sing old songs of glory, to drink mead from the horn we fought for." He caressed the horn which hung around his neck, passing his fingers over its golden filigree—the horn Orin himself had drunk from. "Instead, we stand here now, your chest cut by my father's sword, my hands stained with the blood of that father, a man I slew." Eris lowered his head. "I did not bring you out of darkness for this."

She touched her chest, where he could see the outline of bandages beneath her silken gown, and stood on her tiptoes. She kissed the corner of his mouth, and she spoke softly in his tongue, her accent thick. "Your father's blade nearly pierced my heart, but this heart will forever beat for you. I need no palaces, no feasts, no songs or tales of old lore, no golden mead from legendary horns. I would rather stand here on this desolate rock with the man that I love, free to love him."

The waves broke against the rocks below, splashing up to dampen her gown and spray salt against Eris's armor. His longship swayed madly below. Carved into the shape of an orca, it looked like a struggling whale about to drown. Somewhere in the open sea, his brother led a hundred other longships on the hunt, seeking him.

If they find us, Eris knew, they will slay my Oringard, but they will not slay Yiun Yee and me, not at first. Not before they bring us home, before they display us to the city, then cut off our heads for all to see. Eris gripped the hilt of his sword.

"The sorceress has taken over our land," he said, "spilling poison first in the ears of my father, then in the ears of my brother. Prince Torumun has fallen under the Radian curse." He turned away from the sea and faced his Oringard. Ninety men—the survivors of the slaughter in the mead hall—crowded upon the boulders and rocky slopes of the tor. "Torumun has fallen to madness. We, bearers of the Meadenhorn, must resist him. We must dethrone him."

One of the Oringard detached from the others and approached Eris. He was a stocky man, his yellow mustache curling upwards to connect to his sideburns. A horned helm topped his head, its gilt chipping and old, and a painted boar reared upon his shield. His face was leathery, his eyes small and blue and hard. He was Halgyr, Chief of the Oringard and greatest among its warriors.

"Torumun is king by right," said Halgyr. "He is your elder brother, Eris. He is a serpent that crawls among weeds. He is a coward who would hide behind others in a fight. But he is eldest son of your father. How will you claim the throne by right?"

Eris raised the Meadenhorn. "With this. The gods have led me to the Horn of Orin. I still bear our greatest treasure. I am second born but first in Orin's eyes. Back in our city of Grenstad, in our great mead hall, an evil lurks. Iselda, sister to Serin, a witch of Radian, cannot be tolerated within our realm. We must cleanse the Orinhall."

Halgyr glanced at Yiun Yee, then back at Eris. The gruff old warrior lowered his voice. "My lord, there are those in Orida who would speak similarly of you. As your father wed a Radian, and as your brother took the same Radian for his own bride, you have married a woman of Eloria. To many in Orida, the Elorians seem stranger than Radians, creatures of darkness."

Rage crackled inside of Eris. "Yet you and I know that's not true, that Leen—which our ships so often attacked—is home to noble, strong people. The Radians are not noble; they're cruel and cowardly. We've seen their ships slay women and children upon the coasts of Leen and Qaelin. We've heard tales of Serin's forces attacking lands of sunlight too, bringing all under his dominion. I cannot let Orida fall into the clutches of that empire. Two thousand years ago, it was Orida that first overthrew the yoke of the Riyonan Empire, who led to its collapse. Now it will be Orida that stands strong against the Radian Empire. My father joined the monk Ferius, shaming our island; I refuse to let Orida serve another foreign ruler." He looked at the Meadenhorn, and his voice softened. "For years, I thought that finding this horn would be my greatest glory, my life's quest. But now I know that this horn is a symbol, leading me to my true battle." He raised his eyes and looked at his Oringard, ninety stalwart men. "To free Orida."

They stared at him and raised their own horns. "Strength and freedom!" they cried, the old words of their isle.

"Strength and freedom!" Eris repeated, raising the Meadenhorn. "Torumun has forgotten both words, but we—true Sons of Orin—do not forget. Oringard! For three years, you traveled the darkness with me, and we now hold a treasure, a symbol of our old realm, of our strength and freedom. Will you fight with me again? Will you fight with me for the throne, and will you see me sit upon it?"

They raised their horns high, and they roared their approval.

"We will reclaim our land!" Eris shouted. "We will drive out Torumun and his sorceress, and we will cleanse the isle of the Radian curse. We will restore the true glory of Orin, our greatest hero, and we will drink mead in free halls."

As the Oringard chanted for war, Yiun Yee approached Eris, her brow furrowed with concern. She placed her small, pale hand against his wide sun-bronzed arm, a gentle lily growing by a lion.

"Eris, the Oringard are mighty; I do not doubt their strength or courage. Yet I've seen your brother command a thousand soldiers, and many more must fill his kingdom." As the wind billowed her hair and the waves splashed the hem of her gown, she looked upon the Oringard. "How can so few, brave though they might be, defeat so many?" She tightened her lips and turned to stare east. "Let us return to Leen, to my homeland, a dark twin to Orida. I will speak to my father. He will send his armies into the sunlight, for he fought in the war twenty years ago, and he remembers the ships of Orida raiding our coasts. They flew under the Sailith banners then, back when my father was only a soldier, when we had no true king. My father will not allow another banner of sunlit domination to threaten our home in the shadows."

Eris cupped his wife's cheek and kissed her lips. She was everything he was not—small while he was hulking, soft while he was rough, pale while his skin was bronzed, a woman of purity while his hands were stained with patricide.

"The people of Leen are noble and brave, no less than my Oringard," he said. "I've seen their archers clad in white steel, their arrows flying true. I've seen their glittering halls of crystal and glass, wonders of their empire's beauty and strength. But I cannot be seen returning to Orida with another's army. If the hosts of Leen help me reclaim my throne, forever will the children of Orin see me as a usurper, a foreign invader, a man no more noble than Torumun. No." Eris shook his head. "I cannot rededicate Orida with the hosts of Leen."

Gruff Halgyr raised his wide sword, its blade shaped as an orca about to strike. "One of the Oringard is worth a hundred of Torumun's men. We will recover our strength. We will return. We will cleanse the isle of the enemy."

Again Eris shook his head. "No, Halgyr, for Yiun Yee spoke truth. She sees us with the eyes of an outsider, and she judges us true—strong, noble, yet deeply outnumbered, unable to win this fight alone." A great wave crashed against the tor, spraying him with water and salt. He stepped higher upon the islet, rising to stand above his men. "We've all read the Saga of Orin. We've all sung its song. Two thousand years ago, demons and ghosts lived upon our island, and they drank the blood of the ancients, and they built their lairs from bones. It was Orin, a wandering warrior, who woke the giants of the icy north. Creatures of rock and ice and snow, they rose from the water, and they challenged him, yet Orin defeated their chief in battle. The giants followed him then, a first Oringard, and they cleansed the island of the creatures that infested it. He named that island Orida." Eris raised his horn. "I hold the very horn that Orin drank mead from in the first hall at Grenstad. Now a new evil infests our home, not ghosts or demons but a sorceress in crimson, a cruelty called Radian. So I will do as our forebear did. I, Eris Grimgard, will wake the giants of the north again. I will cleanse our island."

Most of the Oringard cheered and sang. All but Halgyr. The gruff captain frowned and tightened his cloak around him. He leaned close to Eris and spoke in a low voice. "The giants are but a myth, Eris. An old story, existing only in song and on parchment."

"A myth?" said Eris. "Once we thought Elorians a myth, yet I found a wife among them. Once we thought dragons a myth, yet my father fought the dragon Pirilin in the great War of Day and Night. If Elorians and dragons live in Mythimna, so do giants. Will you sail north with me, Halgyr? Will you fight at my side?"

The squat, leathery man raised his chin and puffed out his chest. "Always, my king. To the edge of the world and back." He raised his sword. "Drink mead, Oringard! Drink for Eris, true King of Orida!"

They stood upon a desolate rock in exile, but they opened a cask of mead from their longship, their last one. They poured the drink into their horns, and they drank and sang as if back in the Orinhall upon their homeland. Eris drank from the Meadenhorn, the artifact he had fought for, the artifact which would name him king.

Yiun Yee leaned against him, and he held her close. They stared into the north as the wind whipped their hair and the waves splashed against them.

* * * * *

He is a hero, Yiun Yee told herself, staring at her husband. She clutched the wound on her chest. He was defending me, that was all. Defending my life.

Eris stood at the prow of the longship, staring north, his sword raised. He looked almost like a statue, a noble Son of Orin, a legendary warrior from an epic poem. The wind streamed through his golden hair and ruffled his thick beard. His eyes shone blue—small Timandrian eyes but no less beautiful than large Elorian orbs. The sunlight gleamed upon his armor, his shield, and the horn that hung around his chest.

A hero, Yiun Yee thought, eyes stinging. Yet she could not stop seeing it—the blood on Eris's hands . . . the blood of his own father. Again and again, whenever she closed her eyes, Yiun Yee saw her husband stab King Bormund, tug the blade free, shout for war.

Pain flared on her chest, and she touched her bandage again. King Bormund had given her this wound. Eris had saved her life. Saved her! That was all. He was no killer. No murderer.

I fought by his side for two years in the darkness, she told herself. I know him. He's noble and kind. She lowered her head, and her eyes stung. Yet here in the sunlight, do I see a different man?

The Oringard chanted as they rowed, an old song of heroes battling sea serpents, dragons, and trolls, a hearty song sung with pride, with deep voices, with raised chins. Standing here in the sunlight of a foreign sea, Yiun Yee closed her eyes, and she tried to remember the songs of her homeland. She remembered soft tunes of haunting beauty played on harps and flutes. In her mind, she could still hear "The Light of the North," the great song of her people, a song sung for Taenori, the city of crystals and moonlight.

As a child, Yiun Yee had stood in the halls of Leen's palace, surrounded by crystal columns, marble tiles, and vaulted ceilings painted with stars, and she had listened to priests play the old songs of Eloria, and she had pretended to be Koyee of Qaelin. In the stories, Koyee was a musician and a great heroine, and Yiun Yee had tried to master the flute, to emulate her heroine, but she could never remember the right notes to play. She had tried to learn swordplay instead, to become a warrior like Koyee, but she could never master the blade either.

She had begun to see herself as one with no talents, an ordinary woman who could never become great like those she admired. Her father, the king, praised her beauty, and suitors from across Leen, Qaelin, and even distant Ilar had come to court her. She was Yiun Yee, Princess of Leen, her indigo eyes and fair countenance legendary, and yet she had turned down all those men. For Yiun Yee never forgot those old books, the stories of adventure and war, and she wanted to be like her heroines—like Koyee of Qaelin, like Suntai the Wolfrider, like Bailey Berin of the sunlit lands—not just a fair face but a woman of substance.

And so she had left.

With only her silk cloak and her diamond pendant, Yiun Yee had abandoned her palace, her father, her home, the very darkness of night. She had fallen in love with a man from the day, a sunlit demon, and for two years she had fought at his side. For two years she had thought herself a heroine like in the old tales. She could still not play the flute, still not swing a sword, but she had found love, and she had helped her love reclaim his treasure. She had traveled with her lover into the sunlight itself and to a foreign palace—one smaller than the one she had abandoned in the darkness—only to see him . . .

The image pierced her again. Her husband, strong and noble Eris, slaying his own father.

"Saving me," she whispered. "For me."

He turned toward her, perhaps hearing her words, and his face split into a smile—the confident, toothy smile that she loved, that even now could melt her heart.

"Will you sing with us, Yiun Yee?" he said.

She smiled too and shook her head. "I would scare the fish away from the sea, and we would have no more meals to catch."

Eris had spent the past few turns brooding, his eyes dark, and often Yiun Yee had seen him stare at his hands, contemplating the lines upon his palms, perhaps still seeing the old blood. But now Eris wrapped his arm around her, his chin raised and his smile bright, and pointed ahead across the water.

"Do you see them ahead? Icebergs. We're far north now. That means we're getting closer. Orida still lies in the west just beyond the horizon, but in a few turns, we'll have left that island far behind, heading to the great ice lands of the uncharted north."

She squinted, barely able to see it. Her eyes were still weak here in the daylight, the way Timandrian eyes were weak in the darkness. Yet as they oared closer, the icebergs came into view—towering islands larger than castles.

"Are they made of salt water or fresh water?" she asked, turning to eye their dwindling supplies of water, wine, and mead.

Eris opened his mouth and seemed about to reply when a deep cry rolled across the ocean.

The Oringard's song died. The warriors reached for their swords. Yiun Yee narrowed her eyes, staring around at the sea.

The sound rose again, a keen from the depths. It rippled the water, and to her left she saw something breach, a spine bristly with spikes. The cry rose a third time, and then the creature vanished.

She stared at her husband, then back to the water. A few of the men drew swords, but it seemed to Yiun Yee that the creature's cry had been mournful, more a dirge than a battle cry.

Then it leaped out of the water only feet away from their prow, and it bellowed so loudly it blew back their hair.

The serpent was as long as their ship, maybe longer, and covered with gleaming, turquoise scales. Its mouth opened wide, full of sharp teeth, and blue horns grew from its head, wrapped with seaweed. Barnacles grew upon its belly, and its eyes stared at Yiun Yee, the color of the sea. Many spikes, each as long as a katana, grew upon its back.

"A jormungand!" shouted Halgyr. The old warrior raised sword and shield. "Sea serpent!"

The creature bucked, and while most of it still lay underwater, Yiun Yee could see its tail far away; the creature was massive.

With battle cries, men of the Oringard raised their bows and fired. Arrows slammed into the serpent, shattering against its scales.

The creature howled. Its head swung and slammed into the longship.

Horns punched through the hull. The Orin's Blade tilted madly. The creature sank under the water, and for a moment silence fell.

The waves settled.

"What . . . what was that?" Yiun Yee whispered.

Eris stared around with narrowed eyes. The Oringard stood behind him across the ship, some with drawn swords, others with nocked arrows. The creature did not reemerge.

"Jormungand—a fabled serpent of the northern sea." Eris turned toward Halgyr and smiled wryly. "Another myth come to life for you. A live jo—"

Before he could complete his sentence, the beast burst out from the sea again, dripping seaweed and water and roaring with rage. It swam furiously, wrapping around the longship like an anaconda constricting its prey.

The Orin's Blade began to creak.

The Oringard rained down arrows, but they shattered uselessly against the creature's scales. Eris snarled, ran across the deck, and leaped overboard. He landed on the serpent, small as a mouse upon a python, and drove down his sword.

The blade crashed through scales and into the creature's flesh.

The serpent squealed. Its grip on the ship loosened, and it rose high from the water like a trained cobra from a basket. Eris clung to its back, lashing his blade, a dozen feet in the air.

"Eris!" Yiun Yee cried.

At the sound of her voice, the serpent flicked its head toward her. It met her gaze, and pain filled its eyes. Then it flailed its neck wildly, flinging Eris off its back.

The Prince of Orida sailed through the air and crashed into the ocean many feet away.

With battle cries, a dozen other warriors leaped from the ship onto the serpent, driving down their swords. The blades crashed through its scales.

The serpent howled, a cry of agony, rage, fear. The Oringard kept firing their arrows and lashing their blades. The creature loosened its grip on the boat and its body began to sink.

Tears filled Yiun Yee's eyes.

"Stop!" she cried. "Stop hurting it. It's leaving us! Let it swim away."

Yet the serpent would not swim, perhaps too weak. Its blood filled the water, and it laid its scaly head upon the ship's deck. Its eyes stared at Yiun Yee, large orbs like crystal balls, the lashes long and white and feathery. It whimpered and Yiun Yee approached it. She laid her hand upon its scales. They were cold and smooth like mother of pearl, and the animal seemed to calm as she stroked it.

"It's all right," Yiun Yee whispered, caressing its snout, "you're safe."

When she had been very young, a mere toddler, she had seen Pirilin the dragon in the court of Leen. The white dragon had fallen in the War of Day and Night, and this serpent reminded Yiun Yee of that legendary beast. All this serpent needed to look like a dragon were wings, and—

She gasped. When she looked at the creature's back, she saw two long scars.

"You had wings once," she whispered. She turned toward the Oringard who had paused their assault. "It had wings!"

A deep, rumbling voice drew her gaze back toward the serpent. It stared into her eyes, and it spoke in her language, the tongue of Leen, though its dialect was ancient like the oldest books in Leen's libraries.

"I was a brother to Pirilin," the creature said. "I flew above the dark mountains of Leen long before palaces rose there, long before Elorians had built cities and ports. The wild men of the mountains cut off my wings, leaving me to crawl in the dust. I found my way to the sea." Tears streamed from his eyes. "I've been swimming here for so many years, feeding on fish and seaweed, and I have forgotten my name."

Yiun Yee gasped. "But I remember. You are Imoogi, the Sky Serpent! Our books tell of a dragon who was lost. They say the men of the mountains slew you. That they built sails from your wings for their ships. But you lived." She wept. "I will bring you home, Imoogi. I will return you to Leen, and you will no longer crawl there in the dust like a snake. You will live in the palace of my father, wrapped around his throne, a being worshiped, adored, forever a symbol of our land."

"Imoogi . . ." said the dragon. "Yes. I remember my name. I remember. I—"

The dragon gasped.

Blood spurted from his mouth.

Eris rose upon the dragon's head, grunting as he drove his sword deep between Imoogi's horns.

Yiun Yee screamed.

Eris twisted the blade, tugged it free, and leaped back into the ship. With a last gasp, Imoogi's head slid off the deck and into the water. Blood spread across the ocean. Imoogi rose no more.

"Yiun Yee, are you all right?" Eris said, walking toward her. "Did it hurt you? Did—"

She screamed and shoved him.

"Why did you slay him?" Tears poured down her cheeks. "He was tamed. He could have lived." She shook with sobs. "He was a dragon of Leen."

Eris stared at her, eyes pained. He reached out to her. "Yiun Yee, my love! It was a jormungand, a cruel beast. It could have hurt you. It could have bitten right into you and—"

She shoved him again, slapped him, and spun around. She walked across the deck, stood at the stern, and hugged herself. As the Oringard kept rowing, the grief of Imoogi's death filled Yiun Yee, and along it a deep, cold fear.

Who is my husband? She lowered her head, and her hair streamed in the wind. Who is the killer that I married?

The longship sailed on, leaving the blood behind, heading into the cold, icy north.

CHAPTER SIX:
LOVE AND SHADOW

Jitomi stood in the belly of the Tai Lar, flagship of the Ilari Armada, and stared out the porthole. The wilderness of Arden spread north of the riverbank, lit with the endless sunlight of this land. They had left the ruins of Oshy and Fairwool-by-Night behind, and they sailed on toward Kingswall, the great Radian stronghold of East Timandra.

Oshy and Fairwool . . . two homes to Madori. Two villages burned to the ground. Jitomi narrowed his eyes in sudden pain. His home, Hashido Castle upon the peninsula, still stood in the darkness, awaiting him. How must it feel to lose not one home but two, to have every part of your past effaced?

He turned around from the porthole and faced his cabin. The captain's quarters of the Tai Lar, a mighty atakebune ship, was a place of splendor. Scrolls hung from the walls, illuminated with colorful warriors, maidens, and dragons. Suits of gilded, decorative armor stood in silent vigil, tassels hanging from their breastplates, and katanas with jeweled scabbards hung above them. Porcelain plates and cups stood on a stone table, their surfaces painted with birds and fish. A large bed stood beyond the table, topped with pillows, silk blankets, and Madori.

She sat at the edge of the mattress, wearing indigo silk robes, silent. She stared at him with her large, lavender eyes. Her hair, shaved off in the Radian camp, had grown an inch; the black strands fell across her brow and the tops of her ears. She had small ears, Jitomi noticed. Timandrian ears, smaller than Elorian ones. He had never noticed this before.

He stepped toward her, sat on the bed beside her, and touched one of those small ears. "Your hair is growing out. It almost covers your ears."

She nodded and lowered her head. Still she was silent, and her hands bunched up together on her lap.

Jitomi felt the pain in his chest grow. "I'm sorry," he whispered, the words he had wanted to whisper since leaving the darkness. "I'm sorry about what happened to Oshy. To Fairwool-by-Night. I'm sorry about what happened in the iron mine. By the Red Flame . . ." Jitomi held her hand. "I cannot even imagine such pain, and I don't know how to comfort you. But know this: I'm always here for you, Madori. I will always look after you now. With an armada. With an army. With every beat of my heart, I vow to you, I will protect you."

Finally she met his gaze, and her eyes flashed, and some anger overshadowed her pain. "I've never needed anyone to protect me. I am a mage. I am a warrior of Yin Shi. I am the bearer of Min Tey, a sword of legend, and a great nightwolf awaits me upon the deck, a wild beast that I tamed. I'm no weak damsel needing a warrior to save me."

Jitomi laughed softly. "I'm not much of a warrior. I had never fought in a battle until this mess began. And I'm not much of a mage." He lifted his hands and tried to summon enough magic to levitate a pillow, but it quickly thumped back onto the bed. He sighed. "Madori, do you think that once the war is won, once we cleanse Timandra of the Radian Order, we could return to Teel? I'd go back there. I miss it sometimes."

She looked at him as if he'd just announced he's marrying a frog and moving into a swamp. "Miss it?" She groaned. "Jitomi, it was a miserable time. Don't you remember Atratus torturing us, Lari mocking us, how everyone treated us as vermin?"

"Radians did," Jitomi said. "And now we're sailing back into the sunlight with an army at our backs." He smiled wryly. "I bet old Atratus never expected that from us. But no, I don't miss that vulture or Lari. You rid the world of a monster when you thrust your dagger into Lari Serin, and I hope I get to do the same to Atratus. But I miss . . . well, I miss being a child." He sighed. "Look at me. I'm wearing silk embroidered with gold, and priceless armor hangs on my wall. Treasures covered my table, and every sheet on this bed probably costs more than most panthers."

Madori nodded. "Yes, I can see why that would be intolerable."

He rolled his eyes. "What I mean is: I miss not having all this responsibility, the treasures, the ships, the people who look to me for leadership, and the fear. I'm always afraid, Madori. That I make a wrong move. That we lose a battle. That I lead my men to death. That one of those men tries to overthrow me. Already I had to quell three revolts against my rule, and Tianlong says that my sisters will challenge this rule as soon as I return. Dealing with Atratus back then was a nightmare, but it seemed somehow simpler. And it wasn't all bad." He smiled thinly. "Do you remember the night you summoned a magical moon in your chamber, and Tam and Neekeya were with us? And do you remember those times we walked in the northern forest, the four of us, collecting berries and talking about our homelands?" He sighed. "But I suppose those turns are over for good. Too much has changed. Too much has burned."

"Perhaps we'll go back some turn." Madori stared ahead, face blank. "I swore to become a healer. It was a few years ago. My mother was pregnant, and she was so happy, telling me over and over about how I'll have a little brother or sister. Then one turn she wasn't pregnant anymore, and she spent many turns in her bed, weak and mourning. Her babe died, and I swore then—I swore that I would learn how to heal people, to make sure nobody ever got ill again, ever lost a babe, ever lost a family member to disease, ever lost a limb to rot or life to a roaming plague. My mother had been a Sister of Harmony once, tasked with guiding the terminally ill into the afterlife, but I didn't want to work in a hospice. I wanted to heal people, to bring the ill back to life. And on my journey, I became a soldier." She looked at him, eyes damp. "That's never what I wanted. So yes, Jitomi. Let's go kill Serin, and let's go back to Teel, and let's become what we wanted to become. Two mages. Not an emperor and a soldier. Just Madori and Jitomi."

His hand returned to stroking her hair, and he leaned closer and kissed her cheek. Her skin was soft, the tanned, golden hue of a Timandrian, dark by his milky-white skin. She turned her head toward him, gazing at him with those lavender eyes, and those were the eyes of her Elorian side, huge and endlessly deep. He kissed her lips.

She lowered her head, and her hair brushed against him. When she raised her eyes again, he kissed her a second time, and this was a deeper kiss, and now the walls around her broke. She kissed him back, and it felt like melting into each other. He held her in his arms, and she slung her legs across his lap. She felt so soft, so fragile, a little bird fallen from a nest, and her arms wrapped around him, and still they kissed.

"I love you, Madori," he said. "I have for a long time. I would make love to you if you'd allow it."

She smiled thinly. "I've traveled the world. I've fought battles. I've faced armies. But . . ." She lowered her eyes, suddenly shy. "I've never done that. But I want to." She bit her lip. "I want to try."

She stood up and doffed her cloak, remaining naked before him, and grabbed his own clothes and tugged at the silk. Soon they lay on the bed beneath the silken covers, holding each other close. He kissed her mouth, then trailed his lips down to kiss her neck, her small breasts, her flat belly, her soft thighs, then back to her mouth. He had slept with a woman before—his father had insisted, demanding it was time to become a man—but this felt different. Warmer. Softer. A thing not of cold mechanics but of heat and passion and love.

And I love you, Madori, he thought as he lay above her, as his body flowed into hers, as she gasped and closed her eyes beneath him. I love you always. I will never let you go again.

She nestled against him and kissed his chin. "Now don't think I'm going to marry you or anything now, Jitomi Hashido, or that I'll do this with you every turn. I just wanted to try it. Not that I'm disappointed. I . . ." She bit her lip and her cheeks flushed. "I'll be quiet. I don't know what to say. I feel awkward sometimes, and I'm a little shy, and—"

He kissed her lips, and she gratefully kissed him back.

They were putting their clothes back on when shouts rose from above the deck.

Jitomi froze, his shirt only halfway laced.

"Where's the boy?" rose a shrill cry above. "Where's the little pup. Bring him to me, so he may grovel for his life."

Jitomi felt queasy. "Oh by the Red Flame." He quickly laced up his shirt, grabbed his sword, and headed to the door.

"What's wrong?" Madori cried after him. She raced in pursuit, clad in only her silken robes, her feet bare.

"My sister," he said, heart sinking.

He began racing upstairs toward the deck. Madori ran after him.

"You mean Nitomi?" she said. "The little dojai, the one who talks a lot?"

"We are not so lucky." Jitomi's words tasted like ash. "I have several older sisters. Most . . . I don't talk about."

He reached the deck, wishing he'd had time to strap on his armor. He blinked for a moment in the full sunlight, his eyes slowly adjusting; with his large Elorian eyes, the sunlight always stung. Slowly the world came into focus. Fields swayed north of the Sern River, and forests sprawled to the south. The deck of the Tai Lar stretched before him, and five hundred other ships sailed behind the flagship, each lined with cannons and raising banners of the Red Flame, the Armada in all its glory.

"There he is! There's the pup who calls himself an emperor."

Jitomi blinked again. Several Ilari soldiers in lacquered armor moved aside, tugging back leashed panthers, forming a path of open deck. She stood there by the prow, hands on her hips.

"Naiko," Jitomi said, the word tasting foul.

She wore the armor of an Ilari noblewoman—heavy steel plates painted crimson, their edges tasseled. Two katanas hung from her belt, and a spear hung across her back. Her helmet was horned, the visor shaped as a sneering panther. When she raised that visor, she revealed a face no less vicious. Her lips smiled, baring sharp teeth, and her indigo eyes shone with cruelly.

"Little Jitomi," she said, her smile growing larger. She sauntered toward him. "When you were a child, you used to play with toy soldiers. Do you remember? Little things carved of metal and bone. You'd pretend to command them in great battles until I smashed the toys, making you cry." She snorted. "I told you then that you were no military ruler. Father had insisted mother bear him a boy. He kept pumping her full of babes, girl after girl, until finally he had the object of his desire." She stared at him in disgust. "You. A boy who's so frail, so weak, who cried when I slapped him instead of fighting back, who fled from the spiders I placed in his bed instead of crushing them. A sniveling weakling, and yet when you played with those toy soldiers, you thought yourself an emperor. And so I smashed those toys. And I smashed your face until you bled. And now, Jitomi . . . now I've come to end another one of your games."

Feeling queasy, Jitomi stared off the starboard bow. Her panther ship sailed alongside—a small black vessel shaped like the cat of Ilar. A dozen of her personal soldiers stood upon the smaller ship's deck, clad in black armor and armed with katanas. Here on the deck of the Tai Lar, seven female dojai stood behind Naiko, assassins in black silk and leather, daggers and throwing stars strapped to their belts.

Naiko was the deadliest killer Jitomi had ever known. Back in his youth, he had often seen her order prisoners and slaves into the arena, then fight and slay them for sport, laughing as their blood splashed her. Each of her soldiers, Jitomi knew, was a vicious killer, allowed to defend her only after defeating a hundred enemies in battle. Here facing him were perhaps the twenty most dangerous people in Moth.

And yet I command an army, he thought. And no twenty, no matter how deadly, can defeat the might of Ilar's military.

"Captain Han Gao," he said to a mustached warrior who stood to his left. "Disarm my sister, her dojai, and the soldiers in her ship. Escort them into the brig."

Naiko shook her head. "No, Jitomi. Your men will no longer obey you. You are the youngest child of Emperor Hashido, our father whom you murdered. Our eldest sister, Nitomi, is a prattle-mouthed fool who can't tell apart a soup bowl from a chamber pot. I am next in line, and these soldiers are mine to command." She turned toward the mustached captain. "Han Gao! Place my little brother in irons. Toss him into the brig. I'm taking command of this armada."

Before the soldiers could choose sides, Madori whipped around Jitomi and marched forward. Clad in only her robe and standing only five feet tall, she hardly made an intimidating figure, but she balled her hands into fists and gave Naiko her best glare.

"Listen to me very carefully, Naiko Hashido," Madori said. "I am Madori Greenmoat, daughter of Koyee, slayer of Lari Serin. You are nothing. Not here on this ship. Not here in Arden, my kingdom. So get into your little kitty boat and sail away, and if you don't, I'm going downstairs to fetch my sword and slice off your damn head."

Naiko raised her eyebrows, examined Madori as one would a newborn pup, and laughed. "I like this one," the Ilari said. "I'll keep her around as a court jester." Then her face changed, scowling and rabid, and she raised her voice to a shout. "Now move, men! Imprison the boy or I'll flay your hides and weave sails from your skin!"

Soldiers rushed toward Jitomi.

He shouted. He drew his sword and swung it. He kicked as they grabbed him, barked out for order, cried out for Tianlong the dragon.

"Release me!" he roared. "Release me or—"

His sister approached, smiling crookedly, and swung her fist into his face.

Stars exploded and Jitomi went limp. Manacles clanked shut around his wrists, and his soldiers dragged him into the hull. The last thing he saw was Madori kicking in a soldier's grip, trying to reach him. Then a door slammed shut, sealing him in the belly of his ship, alone and chained in darkness.

CHAPTER SEVEN:
IN BLUE

The ocean stretched on, an eternal dreamscape of blue and gray. Neekeya lay in her rowboat, the sun baking her skin and hair, her lips parched, her belly so tight she thought it could touch her back.

"Get up," she whispered. Her tongue felt like a strip of parchment in her mouth. "Get up, Neekeya. You have to row."

She blinked weakly. The sea stretched endlessly above her. Or was that the sky? All was blue here, heaven and water blending together. Timandra lay in endless sunlight, Eloria in endless night, but here was a new realm. Here was eternal blue, a different world, one she was trapped in, a single speck in eternity.

She forced herself onto her elbows. Blinking feebly in the light, she looked around her. The little rowboat swayed, and the water whispered all around her, rising and falling, spreading into all horizons. Judging by the position of the sun, she had not made much progress south.

She lifted a fish hook and scratched a rough map onto the boat floor.

"The desert of Eseer is to my left, far in the east." She sketched the Eseerian coast. "Daenor is in the northeast, and here in the south, many miles away, lies Sania."

She drew the island as she remembered it, a great land shaped as a horseshoe. As a child, she had read the book "Sari of Sania" many times; it told the stories of a young Sanian girl and her adventures, describing a world of sprawling savannahs, proud lions, lofty giraffes, and cities of gold and gems and wonder. Neekeya crawled toward the prow, leaned forward, and squinted at the southern horizon, trying to catch a glimpse of that distant land. She saw only blue. Sometimes she wondered if Sania were only a myth, a place from a storybook, no more.

"I should turn back," she whispered. "I can find a home in Eseer. I speak the language. Or I can even return to Daenor, live hidden in the swamps, feeding on frogs and crayfish, and—"

She shook her head wildly. No. Both Eseer and Daenor had fallen to the enemy, had been annexed to the Radian Empire.

"I will never live under Serin's banner," she swore. "I would sail to the end of the earth to escape him. I would rather drown than live under Serin's rule."

She grabbed the oars. She kept rowing.

The water stretched on.

The oars splashed.

The sun baked her.

Neekeya did not know how long she rowed. An hourglass was attached to boat's hull, but during her escape from the port, an enemy arrow had smashed it. Madori had once told her that in the darkness of Eloria, there were ways to calculate the passage of time by the movement of the stars, but here in the daylight, with the sun frozen in the same place, there was no way to tell. She could have been rowing for an hour, and she could have been rowing for a whole turn.

And still she saw no land.

Finally her arms felt too weak to continue. She gazed at them. Long ago, her arms had been strong and muscular, the arms of a warrior; she had often felt self-conscious about their width. Since leaving Teel University—by Cetela, it had been over a year ago—her body had grown slim and hard like the roots of mangroves. Her arms were now wiry, thin, still strong but growing weaker every turn. Without her armor—it still lay buried in the sand back in Daenor—her entire body seemed too fragile to her, withering away.

"I need to eat."

She placed down her oars and pulled her net up from the water; it had been dragging behind her. She sighed. The net had caught only a single panfish; it was no larger than her fist. She lifted the knife she had found on the boat, a gift from its previous owner, and gutted the fish. When she stabbed herself on its fins, she cursed and raised her bleeding finger to her lips. At least sucking the blood dampened her dry mouth.

She ate the paltry meal. The fish meat was raw and rubbery, and it barely subdued her hunger, but perhaps it would keep her alive for a few more strokes of the oars. What she really craved, more than a thousand panfish, was water—sweet, delicious water to heal her body. Yet until it rained, she had best push that thought out of her mind.

She placed the net back in the water, and she rowed on.

The boat rose and fell.

A distant fish breached the water, then vanished before she could catch it.

The sun baked her hair and limbs.

The endless blue stretched into the horizons.

Finally she could row no more; all the strength the panfish had given her was gone. She needed water. She craved water with every beat of her heart, every dry breath, every sway of the boat. She tugged the net back into the boat, and she found two panfish. She cut one open, drank its sweet blood, and chewed its meat. She saved the second in the tin bucket she had found in the boat.

She slept then, and in her sleep feverish dreams rose.

"Tam!" she cried, again and again.

And he kept falling, plunging into the lava, only to rise, burning and screaming and fall again into the molten rock. She kept trying to save him, but he died endlessly in her dreams, and Neekeya woke weeping.

"Why did you leave me, Tam?" she whispered. Her lips cracked and she sucked greedily at the blood. "Why?"

Her arms shook when she tried to grab the oars. When she touched her forehead, it felt so hot, and sweat beaded there. That was bad. She could not afford to lose any more moisture. She collected the sweat on her fingers and licked the droplets.

"Why did you let me fall?" Tam asked, sitting before her in the boat.

Neekeya shed tears, losing more moisture. Tam glared at her, his skin burned away, his bones showing through tatters in his muscles.

"Tam!"

"Why did you leave me in the lava?" he said. "I came back to you. I'm back. You let me burn." He pointed at her with a charred finger. "Why did you let me burn?"

"No!" she screamed. "You're not real."

She raised her sword, her only remnant from home, and swung the blade at him, weeping.

The sword cut through air.

He was gone.

Neekeya curled up on the boat floor, trembling.

"Visions," she whispered. "Visions of a feverish mind."

She was ill. Perhaps the raw fish had given her this fever, perhaps only her thirst and exhaustion. With shaky fingers, she reached for her waterskin, the old vessel she had carried with her through this past year of war. Empty again. Empty every time. Perhaps if she tried again later, she would find a forgotten drop. She checked the old tin bucket the fisherman had left in the boat, hoping for some rain water. Dry as a bone. Again.

The deep, mournful keen of her heart sounded across the sea.

It was the sound of a shattering soul. She was surprised she could emit a sound so sad.

Arms wobbling, she pushed herself onto her elbows and gazed off the starboard side. And there she saw him. A white creature, larger than her, a scar along his snout. His eye stared at her, large and round and wise, and water blasted from his spout, a fountain soaring, and he sang again. A beautiful dirge. A dolphin song.

"A spirit of the sea," she whispered. "A god of the blue." She smiled tremulously and reached out to it. "Thank you for blessing me."

She had heard of dolphins before; they were blessed, holy creatures in the lore of her land. And this one was special, pure white like an Elorian, an albino or perhaps a deity of the sea. Neekeya took her last remaining fish from her bucket. She did not know if she'd catch another, but this god of the water had blessed her with its presence. She would give him an offering.

She tossed the fish into his mouth. The albino dolphin accepted the meal, gave her a last look, then sank into the water.

And finally it began to rain.

Neekeya laughed. "Thank you, King Dolphin." She did not know why she thought him a king, but now he seemed a great king to her, wise and all powerful. "Thank you."

The rain fell, and she lay on her back, mouth open, drinking drop by drop.

The rain grew stronger.

The drops pattered against her, and the wind shrieked. The waves tossed the boat up and down. Lightning flashed and thunder boomed.

Neekeya clung to the boat. The rain drenched her and now sea water splashed into the boat too. The vessel rose and fell, and one oar spilled overboard. She managed to grab it just before it could sink, then stuffed both oars under the seat.

A great wave tossed the boat clear into the air. It crashed down with a clatter of fishing gear. Her bucket of rainwater overturned. The net tore free and sailed into the wind. The storm roared and the rain kept falling.

Neekeya clung to the boat. "Please, Cetela," she whispered. "Don't let me drown here. Let the rain stop."

The boat rose and fell again. Her knife and sword slid across the floor. The bucket rolled overboard and sank. Why had she ever come here? She had been a fool. The rain crashed down and lightning rent the sky, a demon of light.

Neekeya closed her eyes, trying to imagine she was back home in Daenor, snug in her bed, a storm raging harmlessly outside her window onto the marshlands.

The wind rose to a deafening shriek, and thunder boomed so loudly it shook the boat. A great wave tossed Neekeya into the air. The boat overturned beneath her. She crashed down into the water.

She sank. Salty water filled her mouth and stung through her nostrils. She floundered, feeling too weak to swim. The water tugged her down, yanked her sideways, and she kicked madly and thrashed and her face emerged over the surface. She gulped down air and swallowed water.

"Dolphin!" she shouted, knowing the animal was gone, knowing she would drown here.

The water tugged her back down.

She sank into the darkness.

All was shadows and mottles of fading light.

It seemed to her, as the darkness swirled and tugged at her feet, that was back in the dungeons under Eetek pyramid. She was fleeing the Magerians again through the mines, with Tam who had fallen. Again she saw him plunge into the pit, leaving her so soon after their wedding.

I cannot fall too.

She kicked.

She rose in the water.

Be like the dolphin.

She swam upwards, breached the surface, and gulped down air. She stayed afloat.

The boat was gone, and the waves tossed her up and down, and her head kept sinking, but she kept swimming. She laughed because the hosts of Serin could not kill her, and neither would this storm. She would stay alive for Tam. She would keep fighting. Even if all others fell, and the Radian fires burned all across the world, she would live.

I'm in the water and I'm safe from the fire.

When the storm died down, she floated on the salty water. She was alone in an ocean, the water stretching to the horizons. She had lost everything—her armor, her sword, her boat, her husband, her father. But she was still alive.

The rain had died to a drizzle when she saw the first shark fin.

Fresh fear filled her.

The shark swam closer, circling her. Two more emerged from the depths. Each was as large as her missing boat.

"Oh Cetela," she whispered.

Desperately, she scanned the sea for her boat and could not find it. The sharks circled nearer, and panic began to flood Neekeya. She panted and her limbs shook. A wave rose, Neekeya bobbed higher in the sea, and she saw it there. Her boat, overturned, still floated. It seemed about a mile away, a mere speck in the distance.

A shark drew so close it brushed against her.

Neekeya began to swim. I'll never make it, she thought. Oh by the gods of sea and swamp, I'll never make it. Please, if there is any goodness to you, Idar, Cetela, and any other gods who might listen, save me this turn.

She swam, grimacing, as the sharks drove in toward her.

With a song that brought tears to her eyes, a dolphin leaped from the water—an albino dolphin with a scarred snout—and slammed into one of the sharks.

An instant later, a dozen more dolphins emerged.

Their long noses slammed into the sharks. The dolphins were smaller, but they fought in a fury. The sharks swam away, turned back once toward Neekeya, seemed to decide her lanky frame more trouble than it was worth, and finally turned to flee.

The dolphin with the scarred nose, the one she had fed, swam up beneath her, gently lifting her from the water. She wrapped her arms around him.

"Thank you, friend." She kissed him. "Thank you."

The dolphins swam, returning her to her boat. When she struggled to turn it upright, the dolphins helped her push, and it seemed to her that they were as wise as men, perhaps wiser, surely kinder. When she had finally righted the boat and climbed back in, they swam alongside her, leaping from the water.

She had lost her oars and her sword. She leaned over the side and rowed with her hand. She could only move a few inches at a time this way, and she had to keep alternating sides. But she kept moving.

Her chin was raised, her lips tightened, when she saw land ahead.

CHAPTER EIGHT:
REBORN

Tirus Serin, Sovereign of the Radian Empire, stood in his bedchamber, building a new daughter.

"Excellent," he said, strapping on her last piece of armor. He caressed the girl's cheek. "You are Lari Serin. You are returned to me."

She stood trembling before him, a young woman, perhaps twenty years old. Her hair was long and golden, her eyes blue, her face fair and soft. He had found her on the city streets, a milkmaid in the dregs of Markfir, a poor peasant girl with a little brother at her heels. A woman who looked like Lari. A woman who was Lari now.

Serin had torn off and burned her old clothes, a humble woolen skirt, apron, and kerchief. He had torn off her brother too and tossed the screaming urchin into the dungeon. Now she stood before him, clad in gilded armor, a sword at her waist. Now his daughter had returned from the dead.

You killed her, Serin thought. You killed her, Madori. I will find you. I will break you. I will shatter every segment of your spine and keep you alive in a box, broken and screaming and begging for death.

He found himself trembling with rage. The new Lari recoiled, and her lip wobbled.

"Please, my lord," the girl whispered. A tear streamed down her cheek. "Please let me see my brother."

Serin snarled and grabbed her shoulders. "You have no brother. I never had a son. You are Lari Serin, returned from the dead." He raised his fist. "Do you understand?"

She flinched. "Yes, my lord. But . . . the boy who was with me, is he—"

"Stop flinching! Lari is strong. Lari is a soldier, heir to an empire." He grabbed her arm, dragged her across the chamber, and stood her by the window. "Look! Look out the tower, Lari. Look at your domain."

They stood in the tallest tower of Solgrad Castle, pinnacle of Markfir. The chamber was lavish. Tapestries hung across the walls, depicting proud, golden-haired Radians slaying twisted nightcrawlers. Suits of filigreed armor stood at the room's corners, and many jeweled swords rose on stands, Radian eclipses upon their pommels. A great eclipse six feet in diameter, worked in gold and silver, hung above a plush bed. Serin's greatest treasure—his collection of Elorian skulls—stood upon shelves. Hundreds of the skulls stood here, all those he had personally slain. Upon each forehead he had engraved an eclipse, a symbol of his dominion. Countless more skulls—the victims of his soldiers—lay buried and burnt across the night; they too were his legacy.

When Serin had first moved into the capital, this chamber had been bare of any such trophies. Mageria's old, drunken king had lived here before Professor Atratus had slipped poison into his mug. Now this was a home to Serin, a great emperor, a slayer of nightcrawlers. From this tower, he could gaze over the city of Markfir and the landscape beyond.

Markfir, ancient capital of Mageria and now capital of the Radian Empire, was among the largest cities in the world, home to half a million souls. It rose across the foothills of Markshade Mountains—which in foreign lands men still called Teekat—sloping downward toward the plains. Solgrad Castle rose upon the city crest, perched like an eagle overlooking its territory. Avenues flared out from the palace grounds like rays from a sunburst, lined with buildings: homes of wood and clay with tiled roofs, stone barracks topped with Radian banners, Idarith temples whose domes sported the half-sun of their faith, and many inns, workshops, and silos of brick.

Three layers of walls spread out in three semi-circles from the mountains. The first contained the Old City, home to many historic buildings—some of them thousands of years old—the place where Mageria's very first people had lived. The city's oldest, richest families lived within this inner shell, some tracing their ancestry millennia back.

Since those ancient years, the city had expanded, and a second layer of wall contained newer buildings, these ones several hundred years old. Within this second layer lived wealthy merchants and tradesmen. Their family names were not as ancient, not as noble, but their coffers were deep, their manors large, their blood newer but still pure.

The third wall had been raised only recently to contain the city's expanding waistline. Within the past twenty years, many undesirables had clogged this third layer: peasants who thought they could live as city folk, travelers from Arden and Naya and other foreign kingdoms, and even Elorians who had moved to Mageria to seek a new life after the first great war. Those undesirables were gone now; Serin could still see the mounds of their mass graves outside the wall. Now his soldiers, many brought here all the way from Sunmotte Citadel in the north, occupied the third layer of Markfir: myriads of troops in steel, armed with swords, pikes, and bows. They stood on the walls. They mustered in the courtyards. They manned the turrets and gatehouses. They were waiting. Waiting for Madori to arrive.

"Look at the plains beyond the walls," Serin said, gripping Lari's arm. "The grasslands spread into the east, fabled for their herds of buffalo. The old banner of our kingdom displayed a buffalo, did you know? The buffaloes are nearly gone now, perhaps already extinct, hunted into nothingness . . . and this too will be the fate of the nightcrawlers. Beyond those plains, she's approaching. Madori. The woman who slew you before I resurrected you. She's coming here with a great army of nightcrawlers." Serin laughed. "I've allowed them to sail into the daylight; I left only a few hundred men at Fairwool-by-Night, knowing the nightcrawlers could make it through. Do you know why, Lari?"

The girl—his new daughter—shook her head silently. A fresh tear streamed down her cheek.

"I let Madori enter the daylight because I want her to come here. I want to watch it myself from this tower—the extinction of their race. And you will watch it with me. Thousands of nightcrawlers will have to crawl across the plains, weak in the sunlight, as my forces plague them along every mile. Madori will finally make it here with her ragtag army . . . and then, Lari, she will see our glory. Then her army will smash against our walls, and I will ride out to capture her myself." His breath quickened. "And it will be glorious."

"But . . . my lord, they say these Elorians are from Ilar, a cruel empire of bloodthirsty warriors." Lari shuddered. "They say they flay their enemies and drink blood from their skulls. They say . . ." Her voice dropped to a whisper. "They say that a dragon flies above them, the black beast Tianlong, that he can fly above walls and lay cities to waste."

Serin struck her.

He struck her so hard she fell to the floor.

"They are nightcrawlers," he said. "Before you died, you scorned them. You did not fear them." He stepped onto the joints of armor behind her knee, painfully bending her leg. "You will not speak of them in fear or awe. A dragon?" He scoffed. "I have creatures far greater growing in my dungeons. I created the beast Gehena and his monstrous steed; they are fighting in the north now, crushing Orewood and capturing its mines. And creatures even fouler now fester in the shadows. The nightcrawlers will see them soon. So will you. Come with me."

He tugged her across the chamber. They stepped through the doorway and walked down a staircase, coiling down the tower. Guards stood at attention along the steps, armed with swords and spears. Serin dragged his daughter through the halls and chambers of Solgrad Castle, this behemoth in the mountain's shadow: corridors lined with soldiers, porticoes overlooking lush gardens, a wall of battlements armed with catapults and ballistae, solariums full of summer flowers, and finally down stairs into the dungeons.

As large as its towers and halls were, most of Solgrad Castle lay underground. Stairways and tunnels burrowed deep like a hive of ants. They passed by smithies where burly men forged swords and spearheads, past chambers full of barrels of gunpowder, and by narrow hallways lined with prison cells where chained, beaten men screamed upon the walls.

Lari glanced around nervously, jumping whenever a prisoner screamed. Serin tightened his grip on her arm. The girl would have to learn some strength. He would temper her like a smith tempers steel.

A horrible shriek rose, echoing through the dungeons—not the cry of a prisoner but a louder, inhuman sound. A second cry answered, a sound like a dying horse. Lari gasped and whimpered.

"Do you hear them, Lari?" Serin whispered. "They call for blood. Come, we will visit them."

"But . . . please, my lord." Tears streamed down her cheeks. "My name is Ariana, not Lari. I think I saw my brother in one of these cells. Please, my lord, let me see him. Let—"

"Hush, Lari." He pulled her onward. "We're almost there."

Leaving the prison cells above, they plunged down a staircase and entered a massive chamber, a chasm large enough for armies to muster in. A ledge of stone thrust out, overlooking the pit.

The creatures waited there.

"Behold the avalerions," Serin said softly.

Lari screamed and tried to run back. Serin grabbed her and manhandled her onto the ledge of stone.

The creatures below snapped their beaks, beat their wings, and soared. Only feet away from reaching Serin and Lari, their massive chains tugged back their necks. The creatures crashed back down into the pit, clawing at one another, shrieking, begging to feed.

"Not yet, my children!" Serin cried down to them. He laughed. "You will hunger for a while longer. When the nightcrawlers come, you'll have all the flesh of the night."

The avalerions wailed—horrible, high-pitched sounds like cracking palaces of glass. The crumbling city of Pahmey, with its smashing towers and screaming nightcrawlers, had made this sound when Serin had destroyed it. The avalerions were ugly things, great vultures the size of whales. Black, oily feathers covered their wings, but their bodies were naked and covered with goose bumps like the skin of plucked chickens. Beaks of rusted iron grew from their bloated faces.

"They were humans once, do you know?" Serin said, holding Lari close. "Look at them. Look into their eyes. Do you see the bloodlust? The hatred? Only humans have such hatred in their hearts; no animal is as cruel as man. I found them in my army, hulking brutes, murderers. And I changed them. Grew them. Made them my children." He stroked Lari's hair. "And you too are my child. Who are you, daughter? Say your name."

She was trembling. "I am Aria—"

He gripped her and shoved her close to the edge, holding her just above the pit. The creatures inside went mad. They leaped upwards, snapping their teeth, reaching out their talons. Their chains pulled taut, keeping them only several feet away from the girl.

"Who are you?" Serin shouted, his voice so loud she started.

"I am Lari," she whispered, tears streaming down her cheeks. "I am Lari Serin. Your daughter."

He pulled her back from the edge. Good. The girl would learn. Serin would let none in his empire say that nightcrawlers slew his child. That would mean he was weak, that his family was weak. But he was strong. His daughter had survived the darkness. She stood here before him, noble and beautiful and proud.

"Very good," he said. "Very good, Lari. You're learning. You— ah! Look! It's lunch time."

The man emerged from behind them and stepped onto the ledge. He wore a leather apron, and he held a pole across his shoulders. A bucket hung on each edge of the pole, full of dank meat. When the man saw Serin, he knelt and bowed his head.

"My lord Serin! I've brought them their meal. As you said, my lord—just enough to keep 'em alive but still 'ungry."

"Rise, friend!" Serin said. "My daughter Lari would like to see the creatures feed."

The man rose and stepped closer, and when Lari got a closer look at the buckets, she gasped and covered her mouth. It was no ordinary meat inside those buckets; here were the severed hands of city thieves, bustling with flies.

"Your daughter?" said the man. "I . . . my lord! I thought that Princess Lari . . . I mean, begging your pardon, my lord, they're saying she died in the war. That the mongrel slew her. A horrible tragedy. I . . ." He glanced at Lari, his face twisting with confusion.

Serin sighed. He shook his head sadly. "Friend, I really did want them to eat only a snack to whet their appetite, a couple buckets of hands before they feast upon the nightcrawler army. Yet now they'll have to enjoy a larger meal."

The creatures in the pit squealed and tugged their chains. Their caretaker tilted his head, only seeming more confused. "My lord?"

Serin stepped forward. He grabbed the pole the man carried across his shoulders, knocking the buckets off its ends. The hands spilled onto the stone ledge. As the caretaker gasped, Serin dragged him toward the edge of the pit, then shoved him over.

Just as the man fell, Serin thrust out the pole, letting the caretaker grab one end.

The man screamed, dangling over the pit. His toes still touched the stone ledge. His sweaty hands gripped the wooden pole. Serin smiled, holding the other end of the staff. All he had to do was let go.

"My lord!" the caregiver cried. The avalerions below screeched and leaped up, snapping their beaks, rattling their chains. The dangling man hung only several inches above their reach.

"Step forward, Lari," Serin said calmly.

Shaking, she obeyed.

"Hold the pole," Serin said. "Hold it tightly so he doesn't fall."

Tears flowed down her cheeks, but she obeyed. Slowly, Serin released his grip of the pole, leaving Lari to hold it alone. The man tilted over the edge, feet scraping for purchase against the stone, holding his end of the stick.

"You hold his life in your hands, Lari," Serin said. "And now you have a choice. You can save him, proving yourself weak. Or you can let go, letting him fall . . . and you will prove yourself truly my daughter. And perhaps some turn, Lari . . . some turn I can have a son. Perhaps some turn your little brother will be freed from the dungeon, and he can join our family. Chose."

Lari wept.

She let go.

The caregiver tumbled into the pit. The avalerions cried out with joy and blood splattered as they fed. Serin stood over the ledge, watching, smiling, imagining the beasts flying over the fields and feeding upon Madori.

CHAPTER NINE:
A SHADOW IN KINGSWALL

Thirteen turns since emerging into the sunlight, the Ilari Armada reached the occupied city of Kingswall, former capital of Arden and now a bastion of the enemy.

Madori stood upon the deck of the Tai Lar. She had doffed the heavy steel plates she had worn at Fairwool-by-Night, and she now wore the armor of a Qaelish warrior: a shirt of silvery scales and a simple, curving helm of bright steel. She held a shield in one arm, her katana in the other. Every other soldier around her wore Ilari armor—lacquered plates and faced visors that made them look like demonic isopods. Most of the Ilari fleet was comprised of heavy, iron-clad Ilari vessels, floating fortresses topped with pagodas. But among the fleet, Madori had found several ships seized from other forces: seven carracks of Arden taken only months ago upon the Inaro, a creaky old Leenish cog captured from smugglers, and a single Qaelish junk. She had scoured this ship, trying not to think of her kinsmen who had died here, and finally found the armor in its bowels.

I am a child of Qaelin, she thought as she stood here, back on the deck of the Armada's flagship. And I will wear Qaelin's armor to battle.

She turned to look at Koyee. Her mother stood at her side, also armored in Qaelish scales salvaged from the junk, and she too held a shield and katana.

"Mother," Madori said, "when you faced great battles when you were young, were you afraid?"

Koyee raised an eyebrow. "When I was young? Oh you little scoundrel. I'm not yet forty, you know." She frowned for a moment, seeming deep in thought, then nodded. "Yes, not yet forty."

"But were you afraid?" Madori insisted.

Koyee sighed. "I could speak some platitude about how courage is doing what's right even when you're afraid, how only the frightened can be brave, or some other such nugget of wisdom. But you'd still be terrified. And you'd still do what you need to do. Because you're my daughter. And you're like me."

Madori stuck out her tongue with a gagging sound. "I am nothing like you. You're so proper and prim." She growled. "I'm a rebel."

"When I fought my first battle, I was a filthy urchin off the streets, hardly proper and prim." Koyee narrowed her eyes. "Just stay near me, Madori, and fight well. We will slay Radians together."

Madori glanced toward the hatch leading under the deck.

"I wish he were here with us," she said softly. "Jitomi."

Her cheeks heated to remember that turn they had made love. She was not sure how she felt about Jitomi. Did she love him as he loved her? Or had she simply been afraid, lost, lonely, maybe simply curious, wanting to experience sex before she went to battle and perhaps died? She did not know, but now she missed him dearly. Since Naiko had taken command of the Armada, Madori had not seen her friend; Naiko kept Jitomi chained in the brig.

"He'll be safe down there," Koyee said softly and touched Madori's arm. "Perhaps the ship's prison is the safest place right now in Moth."

Madori nodded. "I know. But I wish Jitomi could be here with us, a sword in his hand, fighting with us to liberate Kingswall." She lowered her voice to a whisper. "I'd rather he led this host. I don't trust his sister."

Koyee sighed. "Nor do I."

Both turned to stare across the deck. Past hundreds of Ilari soldiers and panthers ready for war, Naiko stood at the prow. The wind streamed the empress's long white hair, and she raised her sword high. She was a figure in black and red, resplendent in the sun, all steel and might. She might as well have been the ship's figurehead. And yet Madori also saw cruelty in her, a passion for power rather than righteousness.

She seeks to conquer rather than liberate, Madori thought, to crush rather than save. But I sailed into the daylight for freedom, not for conquest.

Madori looked past the new empress toward the distant city. As the fleet sailed on, Kingswall grew larger. A pinch of nostalgia twisted her heart. She had spent her childhood summers in this city, the capital of Arden, sunlit land of her father. She still counted those summers among her most precious memories: long sunny turns running through the palace gardens with Tam, countless hours exploring bookshops and libraries along cobbled streets, the taste of sweet lemon cakes in the city bakeries, and the frosty ale Father had once bought her in a tavern here, her first taste of the wonderful drink.

The haven of her childhood had become a city of nightmares.

The raven banners of Arden no longer rose here, but real ravens flocked outside the walls, bustling over cages that hung from the battlements. Corpses rotted inside. New banners now rose from the towers, displaying a sun hiding the moon. Upon the city ramparts stood hundreds of Radian troops in black armor, armed with longbows. Madori knew that thousands more waited in the city. Kingswall had become a garrison to Serin's empire.

Madori took a deep, shuddering breath. She walked toward Grayhem, her dearest friend, and climbed onto his back. Around her the Ilari warriors, enclosed within black steel plates, sat astride panthers just as black. But she, Madori, was a warrior of silver scales, of a great gray wolf, of mixed blood, a woman of darkness fighting for her homeland of sunlight.

As the Armada sailed nearer, distant horns blared upon the city walls. Each blast of the horns made Madori shiver; they sounded like wailing men. More Radian troops raced into position on the walls, and a dozen warships left the piers and came sailing toward the invaders. Distant war drums boomed, and banners rose high, and the Radians cried out for war, for bloodshed.

"Drums!" Naiko howled upon the prow, and within an instant, a war drum beat upon each Ilari ship—five hundred drums all booming for war. Horns joined them from the decks, hundreds of deep, metallic cries. One of the hornblowers stood only a dozen feet away from Madori, and the sound nearly deafened her. All across the decks of Ilar, the soldiers brandished their katanas. Each of the ships held hundreds of warriors. They all now roared together.

The Radian warships sailed closer, great caravels and carracks and brigantines of wood and canvas, their hulls painted with eclipses. Cannons and archers lined their bulwarks.

"Cannons!" Naiko roared.

Across the Ilari ships, men lit fuses. The smell of gunpowder flared. Smoke blasted and fire lit the world. The deck shook beneath Madori. The guns of a dozen ships fired their cannonballs, and archers followed with arrows.

The hull of one enemy caravel shattered. The ship listed and another volley of cannon fire sent it sinking. The river was already won, Madori knew; the enemy had but a dozen ships to ward off hundreds.

Naiko placed her fingers in her mouth and whistled. "Tianlong! Tianlong, bear me on your back!" The great black dragon swooped, and Naiko climbed upon him and soared into the sky. "To the docks! Warriors of Ilar, to the walls! Tai Lar! Daroma Min! Taroshi Dai! With me!"

While most of Ilar's ships kept battling the Radian fleet, the three vessels Naiko had named—all towering atakebune ships, their hulls clad with iron and their decks bearing pagodas—turned toward the city, positioning themselves so their figureheads faced the heavy oak gates set into the walls.

Madori gripped her sword as the Tai Lar's deck swayed beneath her. She stared at the city ahead, gritting her teeth. Her ship was only a few feet away from the boardwalk. Only a few feet beyond that, the city walls towered, topped with merlons and turrets. The gatehouse loomed ahead across the water. Its doors were carved of oak, banded with iron grills shaped as ravens.

"Burn them down!" shouted a Radian captain above the gatehouse.

A hundred Radian archers raised their bows. A hundred arrows sailed through the air, tipped with flame, to slam into the Elorian ships. Some arrows shattered against the iron-clad hulls. Others drove into the pagodas that rose upon the atakebunes' decks. A few arrows punched though Elorian armor; the men fell, gripping their wounds. Madori grunted as one arrow glanced off her side, cracking a scale in her armor.

"Fire!" cried another Radian upon the walls. A dozen cannons rose to appear between the merlons. Their fuses crackled.

Before the guns could fire, Naiko streamed above upon her dragon. "Ilar, cannons!" she roared.

Small bronze cannons, barely larger than men, lined the hulls of the three atakebunes—the Tai Lar, the Daroma Min, and the Taroshi Dai—guns for sinking enemy ships. But their greatest weapons hid within their iron figureheads. Men now rushed forth to light the fire.

The Radian cannonballs came flying down from the walls. One slammed into the Daroma Min—the atakebune sailed just east of Madori—and smashed its pagoda. Roof tiles rained. Another cannonball flew over Madori's head, missed her ship, and smashed into an Ilari geobukseon ship behind her. A third cannonball slammed into the Tai Lar's hull, denting the iron. The ship swayed madly and Madori clung to her wolf.

An instant later, the Elorian guns fired.

The three atakebunes—each large as a fortress—hid massive cannons within their dragon figureheads, the muzzles so large Madori could have climbed into them. The great cannonballs, painted with demon faces, flew toward the city gates.

The ancient, oaken doors of Kingswall—doors sung of in legends and epic poems—shattered.

For a moment, the battle seemed to freeze.

As chips of wood and iron scattered, exposing the city beyond the walls, both Elorians and Timandrians stared in silence and awe.

Then Naiko swooped upon her dragon, sword raised high. "Ilar—into the city! For the glory of the Red Flame!"

The Elorian army roared for victory, thousands of voices rising in a storm.

"Be strong," Koyee said softly, climbing onto a panther.

Madori nodded upon her wolf. "Always."

As more cannons blasted and arrows flew, the three atakebunes sailed closer toward the boardwalk. They lowered their planks. With battle cries, the warriors of Ilar raced—some afoot, others astride panthers—onto the city boardwalk.

Madori and Koyee raised their swords, and their mounts burst into a run.

As soon as they leaped onto the boardwalk, a rain of arrows clattered down.

Madori raised her shield. Arrows slammed into the steel disk, so powerful they nearly knocked Madori off the saddle. One arrow punched right through the shield and scraped across her cheek. More arrows clattered against Grayhem; the nightwolf wore steel plates, the armor of panthers outfitted to his shape. Madori's nightwolf and Koyee's panther kept racing toward the shattered gates, hundreds of Elorian troops around them.

The walls towered above Madori, topped with parapets. The city's wooden doors had shattered, but its brick gatehouse still stood, a fortified archway within two towers. More archers fired from these battlements. The arrows rained down, tipped with flame. One arrow took down a panther to Madori's right. Another arrow slammed through an Ilari warrior's breastplate; he fell dead. The other Elorians kept racing forward, and more kept joining them, thousands of troops emerging from the ships.

Ahead of Madori, the first Elorians began to race through the shattered gates.

Upon the gatehouse battlements, Radians tilted barrels.

Bubbling oil spilled through murder holes in a sizzling rain.

Elorians screamed, the oil seeping through their armor, burning their skin. Radians cheered above and fired more arrows, taking down the invaders as they burned. As the lit arrows hit the oil, fire blasted out, rising like new gates, burning through men.

Grayhem bucked and yowled, freezing a dozen feet away from the flaming gatehouse. Raised in the wilderness and not trained for battle, he dared not run closer to the inferno. Upon his back, Madori stared in terror at the death, the blood. More oil spilled down. More Elorians screamed and fell, and more Timandrians cheered, and at that moment that was all they were to her—Madori no longer knew Ilar from Qaelin, Magerians from Ardishmen or Nayans, for all were simply children of darkness or children of light.

My two halves battling.

Her eyes stung, her heart hammered, and her breath quickened. The world seemed hazy. An arrow slammed into her armor, cracking a scale and cutting her skin. Her blood spilled. She looked up and Koyee was shouting her name, calling to her, caught in a current of invaders. Madori could barely hear. All sounds faded, and more oil spilled, and an arrow slammed into her helmet. Her head rang. Her wolf reared beneath her, an arrow in his flank, daring not advance.

I'm going to die, Madori thought, her breath turning into a panicked pant. I'm going to die here far from home. I won't even make it through the gates. More Elorians were screaming ahead of her. Three men ran past her, burning, living torches, and leaped into the river. So much death. So much blood. So much—

A new voice spoke in her mind.

Breathe.

Madori sucked in air.

Breathe. Slowly. Feel the breath. Be aware. Be here.

It was Master Lan Tao speaking in her mind, she knew. As Grayhem whimpered, daring not enter the gauntlet of oil and flame, Madori forced herself to breathe, to feel the air entering her lungs, healing her, to exhale, to let all the fear flow away. She cleared her mind, becoming aware of all around her, no longer trapped within her terror. She was mindful of every arrow flying above. Every blast of a cannon. Every ship behind her. Every corpse ahead.

She stroked Grayhem's fur. "Go on, boy. Before they spill more oil." She pointed to the gates. "Run!"

Grayhem leaped forward, snarling as he raced. Flaming arrows flew down. One slammed into Grayhem's armor; the steel slowed the arrow enough that it only nicked his skin. Another arrow pierced Madori's shield.

A barrel of oil tilted above.

Grayhem leaped over Elorian corpses and through the gates.

The oil spilled down.

They landed inside the city.

The oil splashed against the ground behind them, spraying up to bite at Grayhem's heels. The nightwolf kept racing forward.

Burnt and bleeding, their armor bristly with arrows, they had entered the city of Kingswall.

* * * * *

A hundred other Elorians had made it into Kingswall; Madori breathed a sigh of relief to see Koyee among them. But hundreds of Timandrians stood here too—a mixture of Magerians in black armor and Ardishmen and Nayans who had joined their cause. Swords rang across the courtyard. Elorians swung katanas and fired arrows from atop panthers. Timandrian knights galloped forward on warhorses, thrusting lances.

Madori raised her blade. The time for fear is ended. It's time to fight.

She held the battle in her awareness, perfectly calm, moonlight upon a still pond. And she fought. And she killed.

Grayhem was perhaps a wild beast, not a trained nightwolf like those her uncle Okado and aunt Suntai had ridden in the last war, but he still fought in a fury, a wild beast of the moonlit plains slaying the sunlit enemies. Upon his back, Madori swung her katana. When a knight galloped toward her, Grayhem leaped into the air, dodging the lance, and Madori sliced into the knight's helm. They landed among a crowd of Radian swordsmen, and Madori swung her blade again and again, severing arms, cutting deep into men's chests and heads. Another knight galloped toward her, and Madori spun, summoned a crackling ball of magic, and lobbed the projectile at him. The knight fell, clutching his chest.

Behind Madori, more and more Elorians kept streaming into the city. They raced through the shattered gates. Their cannonballs sailed overhead, slamming into buildings in the city center. Their arrows flew everywhere.

Soon the Radian defenders lay dead, strewn across the courtyard and walls.

"To the palace!" Koyee shouted ahead upon her panther. She pointed her blade toward a boulevard. "With me!"

Madori rode after her mother. A thousand Elorians rode with her. The Palace of Kingswall rose a mile away upon a hill, overlooking the city—the place where Madori had spent her summers with Tam. Radian flags flew from its towers.

As Koyee shouted of liberating the city, and as Naiko flew above, roaring for conquest, Madori only thought: This is my home. She rode forth, lips tightened. This is where she had chased butterflies, where Tam and she had tried to fish in the koi pond using shoelaces for fishing lines, where she had once picked a bouquet of flowers for her mother, where she would spend hours under a tree, reading books of adventure. And this is where I will bleed, where I will spill the blood of my enemies.

More Radian forces rode down the boulevard to meet them, hundreds of horses and pikemen and swordsmen. The streets of Kingswall ran red with blood. Every heartbeat, another man fell dead. Cannonballs blazed overhead, smashing into buildings. Kindled arrows covered the sky, and houses burned. Madori kept driving forth, cutting men down. Her wolf fought beneath her, clawing at the enemies, ripping out throats.

It seemed a full turn of blood, death, and fire before they reached the palace grounds.

With battle cries, the Elorians raced through the gardens, the place of Madori's lazy childhood summers. Where she had once chased a dragonfly, she now chased a man and sliced his throat. Where she had once lain upon grass, imagining shapes in the clouds, she now sent soldiers crashing down, imagining shapes in their blood. Where she had once learned the names of flowers from her father, she now learned all the ways to kill a man. A place of childhood. A place of death. A liberation in fire, a libation of blood.

When the Elorians reached the gates of the palace and burst into its hall, they found the lord of the city kneeling.

General Velmore was a burly man, his yellow mustache thick, his shoulders wide. An eclipse shone upon his breastplate, formed of many gemstones. His captains emerged to kneel around him, similarly clad in black steel. In the hall of Kingswall, the Radian high command placed down their swords before the Elorian army.

Madori dismounted her nightwolf. At her side, Koyee dismounted her panther. With a hundred other Elorians, they stared at the Radian overlords.

"As Lord of Kingswall," said General Velmore, bowing his head, "I surrender this city. Spare our lives and we will fight you no longer."

Madori found herself trembling with rage. She took a step closer, sword raised. "Spare your lives?" Tears burned her eyes. "Spare your lives?" she repeated, voice rising to a shout. "Like you Radians spared the lives of Pahmey's people? The lives of Elorians across Qaelin?" She took another step closer and placed the tip of her sword against the general's neck. "You slew millions! I watched them die." Her voice shook and tears streamed down her cheeks. "I watched as mountains of bodies burned. As wheelbarrows dumped thousands into pits. I watched as my land bled, as its people fell to the swarm of your master. Now you beg for mercy?"

The general stared up at her, and his eyes narrowed. "You are not fully Elorian."

Madori snarled. "No. I'm only half of the night. My father is a man of Arden, this kingdom you bled. This kingdom you conquered. This kingdom I will cleanse." She looked over the general's shoulder toward his throne. The skulls of Elorians lay at its feet, eye sockets wide and staring, trophies from this war or the last one. "You sat above those you slew, and now you beg for life!"

Madori raised her sword, prepared to strike, and felt a hand on her shoulder.

"Daughter, wait."

Panting, tears on her cheeks, Madori turned toward her mother. Koyee gazed her, eyes full of pity and fear.

"Madori, don't," Koyee whispered.

Madori trembled and still snarled. "Why not?"

"Because it hurts me to see you like this." Koyee gently pulled her back. "Because I cannot live in a world where my daughter is a killer, where she's consumed with vengeance. Don't let them turn you into monsters. An enemy can take your treasure, take your land, take the lives of those you love, but if he takes your soul, if he fills you with hatred, then he has truly won. So please, Madori. Do not let him turn you into a monster, though he himself is monstrous. Show him mercy."

Madori shook with rage. She thought back to the iron mine, to all those who had died there—the pit of bodies she had fallen into, the death all around her, disease, starvation. Suddenly she felt that pain again; the brand burned anew upon her shoulder, and the hunger clawed at her belly, and the whips of the overseers tore into her back. She raised her blade higher, throat burning, ready to slay the man . . . and let the sword drop.

She fell to her knees.

"No," she whispered. "No, I will not kill you. Because I saw cruelty. I saw too much death." She turned toward the Ilari soldiers who stood behind her, katanas raised. "Chain these men up. They will become our prisoners. They—"

A shard whistled through the air.

General Velmore clutched his chest. A crossbow bolt had driven through his armor and pierced his heart. He fell forward, dead before he hit the floor.

Madori gasped and looked toward the palace gates. Empress Naiko came walking into the hall, holding a crossbow. Her dojai assassins walked at her sides, women clad in black silk; they swung their arms, lobbing throwing stars, and the other Radian commanders clutched their throats, and they too fell down dead.

"Naiko, damn it!" Madori shouted. "They were surrendering."

The new empress snorted, already reloading her crossbow. "Watch your tongue, pup, lest my second bolt finds your heart. You've slain many sunlit demons in this battle; that's the only reason I now forgive your insolence." Naiko turned toward her soldiers in the hall. "Warriors of Ilar, we are victorious! Kingswall is ours! Go and claim your treasures."

The soldiers roared. With their visors shaped as snarling faces, the blood on their armor, and the blades in their hands, they seemed to Madori like demons. The troops moved across the throne room, tugging gems off statues, rummaging through dead men's pockets for coins, tearing rings off fingers and bracelets off arms. They banged down doors and marched through other corridors and chambers, crying out for loot.

"Naiko!" Madori shouted. "For pity's sake. We came to liberate this palace, not loot it. Call your men back!"

Yet Naiko only gave Madori a small, satisfied smile. With a groan, Madori raced out of the throne room into a corridor. Elorian troops were busy smashing statues and ripping off tapestries. They banged down doors, rushed into chambers, and overturned dressers and drawers, crying out in joy whenever they found coins. Palace servants screamed and fled from them. One old steward tried to hold the Elorians back from an Idarith charity box; the Elorians shoved him down, smashed the box open, and claimed the coins within. A few young women in livery tried to flee down a staircase; the Elorian troops grabbed them, slung them across their shoulders, and carried them off as if they too were spoils of war.

"Stop this!" Madori said and grabbed one of the Ilari soldiers. "We are liberators, not conquerors."

The man shoved her aside and returned to rummaging through an oak dresser. Madori raced down a corridor into another chamber. Two Elorians were inside, laughing as they tossed a weeping serving girl back and forth.

"Enough!" Madori roared and raced forward. She shoved the Elorians aside, allowing the girl to flee the chamber. "Back to your ships. Back!" She left the chamber and ran along the palace corridor. "Soldiers of Ilar—back to your ships! We've freed this city. Now . . ."

When she passed by a window, her breath died.

Below her, the city of Kingswall was crumbling.

Countless Ilari troops—a hundred thousand or more—were flowing through the city streets, kicking down doors, smashing windows, looting, laughing, killing. The blood of the city flowed. As Madori watched, Ilari troops dragged Idarith priests out of a columned temple and slit their throats on the street. Other Ilari were tugging young women out of homes, tossing them over their shoulders, and carrying them back to their ships. When their husbands and brothers tried to resist, the Ilari answered with swords. The corpses of the city's people—cobblers, tanners, monks, bakers, simple and humble people—piled up.

Madori stood at the window, frozen in terror.

"No," she whispered. "By the stars, no."

A soft voice answered at her side. "It is their reward, child. The spoils of their victory."

Madori turned to see Naiko standing at her side. The older woman stared out at the city, the wind streaming her long white hair, and a smile touched her lips.

"But . . . we came here as liberators," Madori whispered. "We are the heroes. We're on the good side! We are Elorians, warriors of justice. But I see monsters before me."

Naiko stroked Madori's cheek. "Heroes? Liberators? We are invaders, child. When your mother was your age, the sunlit demons invaded her lands. She stood upon the walls of Pahmey, fighting them off, slaying them as they marched through her gates. Her city fell then. And now you, her daughter, are the invader. Now you are the strong one, the conqueror." Naiko's eyes filled with cruel light. "Now the sunlit demons are those who are afraid, who perish. Look at them die, child."

Madori shook her head in horror. "My mother and I are Qaelish! Our empire is peaceful. We're not bloodthirsty like warriors of Ilar. Do you think the Timandrians know the difference between our nations? To them we're all Elorians, all the same, and now you stain my people with your bloodlust. You're no better than Serin."

Madori trembled. What have we done? We've woken a panther to fight with us . . . and now that panther has gone rabid and cannot be tamed.

Madori whistled and Grayhem approached her. She climbed onto his back, and she rode.

She rode out of the palace and into the bloody streets. All around her, the Ilari—no, she could not simply think of them as Ilari, as fighters of another land, for they were Elorians like her—the Elorians burned, plundered, murdered. Homes burned. Corpses covered the streets.

"Soldiers of darkness!" Madori cried. "Return to your ships!"

A flash of darkness streamed above. Madori raised her eyes and saw Koyee leaping from roof to roof upon her panther. She too cried out to the soldiers.

"Warriors of the Red Flame, to your ships!" Koyee was shouting.

Few seemed to listen. Madori rode her nightwolf up a temple's staircase, and they leaped onto the balcony, then across an alleyway and onto a home's roof. She stared south across the city toward the river, and new terror flooded her.

The Tai Lar, flagship of the Ilari Armada, was sinking.

Madori's heart seemed to freeze. The ship must have suffered cannonfire while she had charged toward the gates; its pagoda was smashed, and one of its masts had fallen. A crack split its deck, and each half of the ship was slowly submerging. The last of its soldiers and sailors were abandoning the wreckage in rowboats.

"Jitomi," Madori whispered.

Even her Yin Shi training could not calm her now.

"Jitomi!" she cried out.

Was he still chained in the brig? Had one of the sailors thought to free him? Madori kneed her nightwolf.

"To the boardwalk, Grayhem! To the ship!"

With a growl, the nightwolf leaped off the roof, vaulted across an alley, and landed atop a tavern. He kept running from roof to roof, traveling south through the city. All around them, Elorians were looting from shops and homes, and the ship kept sinking ahead.

* * * * *

Finally Madori rode out the smashed gates, leaving the city. Grayhem's paws pattered upon corpses. They raced across the boardwalk, and Grayhem leaped into the water. They swam toward the sinking ship, and Madori climbed onto the shattered deck.

"Jitomi!" she shouted.

The deck had split in half, and water gushed within the crack like river in a canyon. The ship's halves tilted inward, and Madori swayed. The battened sails blazed. The remains of the ship's pagoda rained roof tiles. A bronze dragon statue, once perched atop the pagoda, clanged down. Madori stumbled toward the staircase leading into the hull. She raced downstairs toward a torrent of gushing water.

"Jitomi!"

As Grayhem wailed upon the deck, Madori shrugged off her armor. Keeping only her sword, she held her breath and plunged underwater.

She swam down the rest of the staircase, along a corridor, and into the brig. A fish shot by before her eyes. Her lungs ached for air. She saw nothing, only murky water thick with blood and ash. Her chest felt ready to burst, and she swam upwards toward the ceiling. A pocket of air remained here, and when Madori emerged above the water, she gulped that air down. She looked around her. Most of the chamber was flooded; only these few inches of air remained, and—

"Madori!" The voice rose behind her. "Madori, over here!"

She spun around in the water, and she saw him there.

Thank Xen Qae.

Jitomi floated in the water, only his face above the surface. She swam toward him.

"My foot's still chained!" Jitomi said. "Chained to the damn wall."

"Where are the keys?" Madori shouted.

"I don't know! On Naiko."

Madori cursed. The empress was back in the city; if Madori raced to retrieve the keys, Jitomi would drown by the time she returned. Even as Madori swam here now, the water kept rising. Her head pressed against the ceiling; her chin touched the water.

She took a deep breath.

She sank under the water again.

She landed on the floor, her head underwater. Jitomi was standing on a chest, the chain running from his ankle to a metal pole. Her heart sank; the chain was thick, too thick for her sword to cut.

Madori had been chained before; once when led out of Teel, then in Serin's iron mine. She had tried to claim the chains then, to shatter them with her magic, and could not; the metal had been too thick, her power too weak. Yet this turn, she would have to do what she could not then.

She chose the metal links.

She claimed them.

She tried to shatter them . . . and could not.

Her lungs blazed with pain. She rose above the water and gulped air.

"Madori, hurry!" Jitomi said.

She plunged underwater again. She stared at the chains.

Use your Yin Shi! she thought. Yet how could she? Yin Shi relied on breathing, and she couldn't breathe underwater.

Yin Shi is not about breathing, Master Lan Tao seemed to speak in her mind. It is about awareness. Be aware of the air in your lungs. Be aware of the water, the chains, the battle above, all sounds, all mottles of light.

Exhaling slowly, Madori made her mind a clear pond, bringing the flooded brig into her awareness, bringing herself into a state of pure Yin Shi.

She chose the chains again.

She claimed then.

Full awareness. Full Yin Shi.

I can't do it! I've tried before!

You were weaker then, younger, afraid. Now you are Yin Shi.

She stared at the metal links.

They shattered.

She rose back up, gulped down air, and grabbed Jitomi's arm. "Swim!"

They swam up the stairs. Just as they emerged above the deck, the water overflowed it, and the ship finally sank beneath them.

The water swallowed the remains of the pagoda, then the masts. Bubbles rose as the last air trapped in the ship escaped, and the river churned. The froth tugged at Madori's feet, and she kicked and floundered, struggling to stay afloat. It felt like sea serpents were grabbing at her feet and tugging her down, and she had a sudden flashback of Pahmey vanishing into the sinkhole. Jitomi too struggled to stay afloat, and then the water gave such a tug that they both sank.

Under the surface, Madori kicked and beat her arms. Her sword tore free from her grasp, and she barely grabbed it before it could sink. Below her, she caught a glimpse of the ship shattering against the riverbed and sliding down into a murky grave of reeds.

She and Jitomi kicked and finally rose back above the water. They swam toward the bank and climbed onto the boardwalk.

Empress Naiko awaited them there, her hands on her hips, a crooked smile on her face. Her dojai stood around her, throwing stars in their hands.

"Growing up," Naiko said, "my father often spoke of the Qaelish in scorn. He said that our northern neighbors were hardly Elorians at all; he called them weaker than pups who beg for a treat. Sometimes, when he was particularly disgusted with Jitomi's weakness, he would call the boy a Qaelish worm—the ultimate insult." Naiko nodded. "Now, seeing a Qaelish woman—even one mixed with the blood of sunlight—I truly see this weakness my father spoke of. You had the chance to raise your banners upon a conquered city, Madori. And yet you chose to save a drowning rat." Naiko raised her crossbow. "The weak deserve to perish. Ilar has grown strong by culling the cowards among us. Jitomi was meant to die in that river, but so be it; he will die at my crossbow instead."

Madori claimed the crossbow bolt.

It fired, whistling through the air.

Before it could hit Jitomi, Madori shattered the quarrel into a thousand shards. They slammed into Jitomi, drawing blood, but the wounds were skin deep.

As Naiko loaded another quarrel, Madori lunged forward with her sword.

Naiko fired.

Madori swung her blade, knocking the bolt aside. The dojai tossed their throwing stars; Madori claimed them all and froze them in midair. She kept charging. With a curse, Naiko dropped her crossbow and drew her sword.

The two blades slammed together.

Naiko laughed. "Do you think you can defeat me in swordplay? I've slain hundreds of men!" She swung her blade, forcing Madori back. "From childhood, my father would send me prisoners. I would fight them in our courtyard. I would slay them for sport." She swung again, and Madori parried. "No man or woman can defeat me."

The empress's dojai watched, thin smiles on their lips, not approaching; perhaps they knew their mistress enjoyed slaying her enemies herself.

Madori growled and swung her blade. "I am no prisoner. I am a warrior of Yin Shi. I bear Min Tey, Sheytusung renamed, a sword of legend."

With a laugh, Naiko parried and thrust, slicing Madori's arm. Blood spilled.

A growl rose, and Grayhem came racing toward the fray. The nightwolf leaped toward Naiko. With a thin smile, the empress tossed a throwing star. The shard of metal flew and slammed into Grayhem's neck.

The nightwolf yowled and crashed down.

Madori roared with rage. "Damn you!" She leaped toward Naiko, all her Yin Shi training forgotten, surrendering to her rage. She slammed her blade down again and again, as if she were swinging an ax at wooden logs. Naiko parried each attack, her smile growing.

"Good!" the empress said. "Good. Now I see strength. Now I see rage and hatred. Now I see the spirit you lacked in the city. If only you could show such hatred toward our enemies!"

Naiko swung her blade, slicing Madori's fingers.

Madori screamed, blood spurting, her fingers cut down to the bone. Her sword flew from her grasp and clattered against the cobblestones.

Naiko raised her blade above Madori.

"Sweet, innocent mongrel," Naiko whispered, head tilted. "I will gladly slay you first. I'd like my brother to see you die before I kill him too."

Naiko raised her katana further, prepared to swing it down.

Her blade melted.

Hot, molten metal dripped across Naiko's arm, and she screamed in pain.

Jitomi came walking forward. He lifted Min Tey and handed the katana back to Madori.

"Enough of this," Jitomi said. "Enough with violence, with bloodshed, with—"

Naiko dropped her molten sword and reached for a throwing star.

Madori lunged forward and drove Min Tey into the empress's face.

The blade crashed through Naiko's mouth and clattered against the back of her helmet.

"She should have worn her visor down," Madori said and tugged her sword back. The blade emerged, red and dripping. Naiko fell dead to the ground.

Madori knelt by Grayhem. The nightwolf lay on his belly, mewling, and licked her fingers. He yelped when Madori tugged the throwing star free from him; it had sunk deep. Madori sucked in breath, chose his wound, and healed it like she had learned in Magical Healing class. She turned her attention to her fingers next; they were still bleeding heavily. She healed the cuts, leaving white scars.

As poor as I was at Offensive Magic, I was good at Healing, she thought with a small smile, flexing her fingers.

She turned around to see Jitomi kneeling by his fallen sister, his head lowered. The dojai stared down at their fallen mistress, faces blank. One among them muttered about Naiko's weakness; the others nodded.

Jitomi looked up at Madori. "It's strange," he said softly. "She tried to kill us, but still I grieve for her. Despite her cruelty, she was still my sister."

And the Serins are cousins to the Greenmoats, Madori thought. And yet I slew Lari, and I will slay her father if I can. She thought of Ferius, the cruel monk her mother had fought twenty years ago—Madori's uncle. Koyee had slain her own brother in battle. Perhaps in the seas of war, blood was not thicker than water.

Madori and Jitomi turned toward the city. Smoke rose from Kingswall, and the screams of the dying and the cheers of the invaders rose in a sickly symphony. A great black serpent shot through the smoke, and Tianlong came coiling down toward them.

"The city burns!" the dragon said.

Jitomi nodded and climbed onto his back. "My sister has fallen, Tianlong. I rule this army again, and we will withdraw it from the city." Sitting in the saddle, he reached down to Madori. "Fly with me."

She shook her head. "I stay with Grayhem. Bring them back, Jitomi. Bring them back under your rule. We leave this place."

He nodded. The dragon shot into the air and vanished back into the smoke.

Madori had sailed into this city a proud warrior, a liberator, a heroine, her chin raised and her chest puffed out with pride. As the Ilari Armada sailed away, they left behind a smoldering ruin, and Madori could only stand slumped upon their new flagship, head lowered.

"I thought we could save them," she whispered to her mother. "I thought that when Eloria invaded the daylight, we would come here as heroes."

Koyee embraced her and kissed her cheek. Mother and daughter stood together on the deck, staring westward. Past many leagues, deep in sunlight, rose Markfir, capital of the Radian Empire. Serin's home. The end of this war, an end of victory or ruin.

The Armada sailed on.

CHAPTER TEN:
FALLEN GOD

Torin ran through the ruins with his ragtag band of fighters. Their armor was dented and cracked. Mud and blood caked them. Their beards had grown long, and their hair lay matted across their faces. They scurried over piles of bricks, through holes in walls, under lone archways and over fallen columns, mere rats in desolation, barely men.

"Radians!" Torin shouted hoarsely, pointing.

The enemies came racing down a pile of rubble, firing arrows. Torin ran toward them. The arrows whistled around him, but Torin no longer cared. He had not slept or eaten for turns. He no longer cared if he lived or died. Why should he? So many thousands died around him every turn. Screaming, he swung his sword at the men. Around him the others fought. Covered in grime, Cam swung down his sword, cleaving a boy's skull; they were fighting mere boys now, soldiers barely old enough to shave.

Within moments, the battle ended. Dozens of bodies covered the debris.

Hogash, once a guardian of Orewood's gates, plunged his war hammer down onto a wounded man. Blood splattered. Hogash spat.

"Good work, boys," he said. "Wish we had some ale to celebrate."

Torin looked around him. He counted thirteen Magerian corpses, seventeen Verilish ones. He saw no Ardish bodies. There were no more Ardishmen left to fight, he supposed. Ten thousand had marched here several months ago; most probably lay under the rubble now. Torin doubted if any Ardishmen other than him and Cam lived anywhere in Orewood; sometimes he doubted that any lived anywhere in the world.

"I'd even go for rat's blood now," Torin said softly. "Ale? You have lofty dreams."

Hogash laughed. He had once been a bluff man, proud and strong and wide of belly. He looked haggard now, eyes sunken, his laughter sounding more like a hoarse croak.

"More troops will come," Hogash said. He said the same every turn. "The great clans of the northern forests will muster. They'll march here. They'll bring aid."

Cam approached them. Torin had been seeking rats to eat all turn, and Cam looked much like a rat now himself, scrawny and ragged and hairy. "The northern clans did muster," the King of Arden said—or at least, the king of what had once been Arden. "They marched here, Hogash. You remember, don't you? Thousands of them, howling for war." Cam looked around him. "All dead. All under the rubble."

Cam climbed onto a piece of wall that still rose from ruins. It was rare to find walls that still stood in Orewood; most of the city had been leveled. Torin joined him, and they stood together, watching the landscape. Clouds covered the sky, allowing through only several beams of light. The rays fell upon nothing but devastation. The city's outer walls had fallen, taken down with magic and cannons. The city innards were in scarcely better shape. Of the palace only a single tower remained. Some turns the tower held the Radian banner, other turns the Verilish one. It seemed that every few hours, one force reclaimed the tower, only to lose it after another battle. Around that tower spread ruins: fallen temples, burnt homes, collapsed fortresses, and piles of corpses . . . everywhere corpses and the stench of death. Even the city's foundries stood in ruin, and the fabled iron mines lay buried. Without these prizes, Torin didn't even know why they kept fighting.

Orewood, capital of Verilon, had become a graveyard.

But no. Some still lived here. Hundreds, maybe thousands, still arrived every turn. Even now, as Torin looked south, he could see more Radian forces marching to Orewood, lines and lines of troops and wagons and chariots and riders. When he looked north, Torin could see more of Verilon's people traveling toward the ruins: men and women on bears, war hammers across their backs, and lines of children behind them. The children were barely older than twelve or thirteen, but they too held hammers, and they too would fight here. They too would die. Torin had seen enough reinforcements arriving in Orewood to know: They will not last more than a turn.

"A Verilish soldier will only live for a turn on average," he said softly, looking at the line of bears and children. He turned back toward the southern Radian convoy. "A Radian with better armor, with more supplies—he'll last two or three turns, it seems. Idar, Cam. We've lived long, long past the average lifespan in this place."

Cam nodded. "This is the world now, my friend. A world of war. But I would not abandon this city, this pile of rubble. This is where we make our final stand." He gasped suddenly, raced off the wall, and leaped onto a pile of bricks. He grabbed something, laughed, and raised it over his head. "A beetle, Tor! A real beetle."

Torin frowned. "Cockroach. Those spread disease."

Cam shook his head. "Not a cockroach. Beetle. I'll split it with you. I—"

A dozen Verilish soldiers, Hogash among them, heard the young king. They began to advance, raising their hammers and licking their lips. Cam quickly stuffed the beetle into his mouth and swallowed. The Verilish soldiers cursed.

"Sorry, Tor, old boy," Cam said. "Had to eat it all myself. Couldn't let this greedy lot take a bite." He turned toward the north. "We should meet the new arrivals. They might have some food on them—real food."

Torin sighed. "The new arrivals will emerge into the northern quarters. That's a mile away. We'd never make it that way. Ruins are crawling with Radians. One under every brick."

"We've got to die some turn," Cam said with a wry smile. "I say we finally make our way north."

Torin turned to look at the Verilish soldiers. A few more were emerging from the ruins, little pockets of resistance. Every turn, the units fell apart and regrouped, gangs forming and disbanding and forming again. Every turn, most of them died, only for new groups to form. Fifty or more collected around Torin and Cam, weary souls, gaunt, haggard, clad in rags, bleeding, dying, starving.

Torin nodded. "North. We'll give the fresh meat a nice welcome." He grimaced to hear the Radian war drums in the south. "Will get us farther from that nasty lot of Radians too."

They scurried onward.

They raced through the shell of a building, perhaps once a temple, charred bones rising among the bricks. Arrows rained upon them from the walls. They fired back. They hacked with swords. A few of them died. They killed. They kept running.

They scuttled over a pile of collapsed, charred pieces of wood, the homes of the city's denizens. Charred skeletons of children lay around them. Smashed dolls tumbled beneath their feet. A cannon rolled toward them and fired, and the sound nearly deafened them, and three among them collapsed. The survivors kept running. Others joined them. More died. More emerged from the ruins to replace the fallen. They scurried onward.

It felt like they raced for hours, for turns. They found a cellar once; the home around it had fallen. Torin and Cam plunged down into the darkness. They found themselves around bodies, arrows in their chests. Maggots bustled, and the stench was like a living thing, but Torin and Cam slept here for a while. When they woke, they were tempted to eat the corpses, rotted as they were, but thankfully Cam found moldy bread under a fallen shelf. They feasted. They raced onward.

Finally—it could have been turns, it could have been years later—they reached the northern fringe of the city, and they greeted the new Verilish arrivals.

So did thousands of Radian troops.

The Radians raced forth to meet the northerners, to cut into the fresh meat. The Verilish screamed. They were humble foresters, loggers, fishermen, boys, girls. The Radians had been fighting this war for over a year now; they were hardened, survivors, and they slew with every breath, and they laughed as the blood sprayed them.

Torin and Cam watched as the new Verilish recruits fell.

"I thought you said they would last a turn on average," Cam said. Arrows sailed overhead, sinking into a group of charging Verilish bears; the riders upon them were already dead. "Has it been a turn already?"

Torin sighed. "A turn of life seems generous lately."

A group of Verilish boys, perhaps thirteen years old, charged into battle. They wore ragtag pieces of armor. They fought not with swords but with pointed sticks; all the swords of Verilon had been buried. A Radian cannon tore into them, scattering the boys apart. A couple of Radian troops, laughing and spitting, moved between the fallen and speared them, making sure none survived.

"Feel like killing a bit?" Torin asked.

Cam shook his head. "No. But there's nothing better to do here. Onward."

They raced forward. They slew the Radians before them. A few Verilish survivors joined them—a mixture of hardened old men, some of them veterans of the last war, and new recruits. Torin was surprised to see King Ashmog among them. The burly King of Verilon, the man who had once sentenced Torin to be mauled by a bear, was barely recognizable. He was thin now, cadaverous, and his beard had been ripped off, leaving raw cheeks. When he saw Torin, the ruin of a king limped toward him.

"My beard," he said, raising a tattered piece of hair like some old toupee. "I tore it off myself. With my old hands." His voice shook and tears filled his eyes. "They slew so many. My wives. My children. All dead. All dead, Torin." The king fell to his knees, chest heaving with sobs.

Torin patted the man on the shoulder. The clouds parted above, and a golden sunbeam fell upon the ruins. Torin looked and saw that in its light lay the corpse of a great bear, a creature large as a whale. He approached slowly, solemnly, and climbed onto a pile of rubble to stare down at the beast.

"Gashdov," Torin whispered. "The god of Verilon. He has fallen."

King Ashmog came to stand at his side. "You were supposed to save us, Kava Or," he said to Torin. His tears streamed. "You tamed Gashdov. You were prophesied to lead us to victory. And now my kingdom has fallen. Now my god lies dead while I, a man, linger on."

A deep, haunting pain filled Ashmog's eyes, and he tossed back his head and raised his arms, and he roared, a roar that shook the ruins, the roar of a bear.

"And I will die with him!" Ashmog cried. "I will die as he died."

The king tossed down his war hammer. With bare hands, he raced across the ruins toward a fragment of wall where Radians archers stood. Arrows flew, piercing King Ashmog, but still he ran. More arrows slammed into him. He ran onward, howling as if he himself were a bear, and reached the wall.

The Radians cursed and drew their swords. Ashmog scaled the crumbling wall, pierced with many arrows, bellowing with rage. He reached the top and crashed into the Radians, knocking them down, snapping their necks, biting into their throats, roaring as a wild beast until one man finally cut him down, cleaving his skull with a sword.

Ashmog fell from the wall and lay upon ruins, one more corpse, one among the countless.

Torin and Cam looked away. And they scurried on. Always. Live as rats. Hunt the rats. Survive another hour. Another turn. Until more troops arrived and maybe they had food, maybe they had more arrows, maybe they would die instead.

There was no more city to defend, only a nightmare, an afterlife of terror and endless pain.

Until they found hope.

Until they found a family.

It was snowing that turn. It was not yet winter, and yet it was snowing; perhaps the sky had collected so much ash it rained down, flakes of the dead. As the skies seemed to fall, it was under a burrow—a little hovel between two collapsed walls—that they found them.

It was Torin who entered first, seeking food, perhaps wafers from the pocket of a dead man, perhaps mice or beetles, perhaps—and some turn he knew it might come to that—a corpse not yet rotted. And there he saw them. Two figures huddled together, clad in robes, gaunt, eyes huge and haunted.

"Linee," Torin whispered. "Omry."

The Queen of Arden stared at him silently. Her face was pale. She tried to speak but nothing left her lips. Prince Omry reached out a frail hand as if begging for food.

"Linee?" rose Cam's voice behind. "Omry?"

They turned toward him and the king's eyes watered. Cam raced forward and embraced them.

"My wife!" Cam cried out, tears falling. "My son! My son!"

As they embraced, rage filled Torin, and jealousy, and hatred, and he trembled. Why was his wife not here? Why not his daughter? Where were Koyee and Madori?

But then they pulled him into their embrace, and he wept for them too, and he held them close.

"Come," Linee whispered. "We have a tunnel. We wait here sometimes for rain. Worms sometimes come out here in the rain, and they're good to eat. Come deeper."

They followed Linee down a crude crawlway and into a chamber. It was barely larger than a carriage. Two other souls huddled here: little Nitomi and towering Qato, the dojai of Ilar.

The Elorians stared at Torin with huge, glowing eyes.

"Torin," Nitomi whispered. The little woman sat wrapped in a cloak, shivering. For the first time since Torin had known her, the loquacious dojai had spoken only one word.

"Qato scared," whispered her giant companion.

Torin reached into his pockets and pulled out the loaf of bread. He had found it on the corpse of a new Verilish arrival. He had hoped to savor it, to save it for a special occasion; he supposed that occasion was now. They split the bread between them, and they ate silently. There was nothing to drink.

"What do we do?" Linee asked. "The men stay and fight for the smithies, for the smelters, for the mines. At least they did at first. I think now they stay for pride, for desperation, for fear . . . maybe simply because after so much bloodshed, they've forgotten another life. Do we stay and fight, Torin? Do we surrender? Do we flee?"

Torin look at her. He thought back to the first time he had met Linee—a beautiful young queen in Kingswall, silly and flighty, a girl who chased butterflies and loved talking of cupcakes and rainbows. Now her face was ashen, her eyes sunken, her hair scraggly, a ragged survivor. He could scarcely believe this was the same carefree girl he had known.

"The woods are swarming with Radians," Torin said. "Even if we made it south to Kingswall, that city is fallen. The Sern River must be rife with their ships. Perhaps there's nowhere left to go." Torin looked at a hole in the ceiling. A single ray of light fell through, and he saw a single patch of blue sky. A finch fluttered across it, a speck of gold, a symbol of life and hope. His eyes dampened. "There is still hope here. There is still life. We're still alive. I would have us stay and fight. And live. And see birds again, and smell flowers, and eat fresh bread, and live as we once did."

"Can there ever be such life again?" Linee asked.

"I didn't think so many times," Torin replied. "When I fought in Pahmey and saw that city fall to Ferius, I didn't think life could ever rise again. When I watched Yintao burn to the ground, and we fought along the Red Mile, I didn't think there could be more joy or light in the world. Yet we found new life, even after all that death, even after Bailey and Hem fell." His throat tightened. "We survived that war, and we found new life. And we planted new flowers and watched them bloom. And we brought new life into this world. Madori. Tam. Omry." He smiled at the young prince. "And we learned something: There is always hope."

"There is always hope," Linee whispered.

Clouds covered the sky outside. The ray of light vanished. Boots marched above and they heard the screams of a thousand more dying men.

CHAPTER ELEVEN:
THE LOST HARP

North of Orida and all other lands of Moth, the Orin's Blade drove into ice and would sail no more. The longship had reached the top of the world.

Eris gazed at the wilderness before him. Sheets of ice stretched into the horizon, leading to distant mountains. White hills and boulders spread for miles, and gusts of wind raised swirls of snow. Behind him lay the ocean; before him the arctic.

"The land of giants," he said.

He was thankful for his thick fur cloak; through sheer willpower he stopped his teeth from chattering. His men looked just as cold; frost clung to their mustaches and beards, their faces were pale, and they tightened their furs around them.

Only Yiun Yee, a daughter of the endless night, seemed unaffected by the chill; her homeland was always frigid, and she still only wore her white silk gown. While her body was perhaps not cold, her demeanor was. Eris tried to meet her gaze, but she refused to look at him. For the past few turns, she had barely spoken to him, had shifted aside when he drew near.

She's still upset about the beast I slew, Eris thought. Why would Yiun Yee not understand that he had tried to save her? The serpent had nearly crushed their ship. It had tossed him into the waters and turned toward Yiun Yee. Yet when he had plunged his blade into the creature, saving her life, Yiun Yee had wept, had struck him, pitying the dead beast.

He sighed. He was a warrior. What did he know of pity? He believed in strength. In justice. In noble deeds. His father had cut Yiun Yee, so he had cut his father down. The sea serpent had risen to strike, so he had slain it. And it seemed Yiun Yee still begrudged him both acts.

Eris looked at his hands. They were calloused, blood-stained hands. The hands of a killer, yes, for he had killed with them many times. But they were also warm hands. Hands that longed to hold Yiun Yee, to caress her, to love her. They were hands that had claimed the Meadenhorn, that he would see cleanse Orida of evil.

Yet she only sees the bloodstains.

He strapped his shield across his back, climbed out of the longship, and landed on the ice. He looked back to his wife and his Oringard. "We walk from here. We're close."

They followed, taking with them their meager supplies: the last few skins of ale, a few fur blankets, what bundles of firewood remained, and what fish they had caught in the sea. Eris left two men to guard the longship—both had been wounded in the battle with Torumun, and the trek through the ice would only weaken them. The rest trudged northward into the endless white.

They walked for hours, their fur cloaks soon coated with frost and snow. A single banner rose above them, displaying an orca upon a white field. The arctic spread on. Drifts of snow. Great pillars and plains of ice. A bright white sun that would not warm them. The longship vanished behind them; the white would not end. Eris felt so small here; him and his men, such doughty men, were but specks here, lost in the wild.

But they were not the only life here. A turn into their march, they saw polar bears ahead, creatures that no longer lived in Orida; old pelts of their fur were all that remained of them back home. They shot one down with his arrows, and they camped for a short while, built a fire from their remaining logs, and ate the animal's meat. They walked on.

Ice.

Snow.

Shivering cold and endless white light.

As he trudged forward, covered in frost, the visions keep appearing before him; the arctic was a blank canvas for his memories. He kept seeing it again and again: returning home as a hero, only to see the Radian banner in his hall, to find his mother dead, to find Iselda, sister of a tyrant, in her place; his father swinging his sword and cutting Yiun Yee; Eris's own sword impaling the king, the blood that washed his hands, the terrible guilt, the sin of patricide he would never be cleansed of. It was a white land but his memories were red.

He looked toward Yiun Yee. Throughout his long years in shadow, seeking the lost horn of Orin, he had found comfort in her, a love and light that had guided him even in the darkness of endless night. And now, more than ever, he needed that comfort from her. He was tall and strong, among the mightiest fighters in his realm, but he needed her. And perhaps more than the blood on his hands, more even than the fall of his kingdom, he grieved for the coldness he now saw in her eyes.

"Yiun Yee," he said softly and drew nearer to her. "For long turns you've walked in silence, alone, no longer at my side. I cannot bring the wingless dragon back to life, but please do not let your love die too. Will you forgive a foolish warrior? I'm a man of the sword, not the heart; that you knew when we wed. Please, Yiun Yee, be my heart. Be the soul that I lack. Don't walk without me."

She lowered her head, and when she looked back up, tears filled her large indigo eyes. She stepped closer to him, and she held his hand. "You do not lack a soul, my husband," she whispered. "And you do not lack a heart. They call the cruel heartless. They call killers soulless. It is not so. Those whose hearts hurt, whose souls suffer— they shed more blood than heartless or soulless men."

"Will you then heal this heart, mend this soul?"

She nodded silently, a tear on her cheek, and squeezed his hand. They walked onward together, hands clasped.

They had walked for another turn, maybe two, before they reached the city of giants.

Had Eris not read about this place in countless epic tales, he might have thought it simply part of the wilderness. There were no buildings here, no roads, not even any tents or caves. But here was a city nonetheless, the place he had read about as a wide-eyed child, dreaming of adventure. Great henges of blue ice rose upon hills, each shard taller than the palace of Grenstad back home. Though the ocean was many miles away, the skeletons of whales rose from the ice, half-submerged, their ribs forming archways like the naves of temples. A great animal's skull, large as a mead hall, stared at the approaching Oridians, its fangs thrust into the ice like two columns. Chunks of ice and stone lay strewn here in a field, and mountains rose all around like the walls of a great fort.

"Jotunheimr," Eris whispered in awe. "The land of giants."

Yiun Yee tightened her silk robe around her. "I see no one."

The Oringard glanced around with darting eyes and hefted their shields. Their hands strayed near their swords and axes. The old tales spoke of Orin taming the giants to his cause, leading them to cleanse Orida of spirits and ghosts, but in even older tales the jotnar—giants of the arctic—were vicious beasts who crushed the villages of men and fed upon the bones of children. Even under Orin's command, they were said to have gone into great rages, as likely to slay their allies as their enemies.

Eris took a step closer. He passed under the ribs of a whale, walking deeper into this land of bones and ice. The crystals of a henge rose to his left. Shards of shattered ice lay ahead like felled trees.

He raised the Meadenhorn above his head. "Jotnar! Hear me. I am Eris Grimgard, son of Bormund, defeater of Veniran the Half-Troll, slayer of the dragon Imoogi, descendant of Orin himself. I bear the Meadenhorn. Rise and meet me!"

Only a breeze and rustling snow replied.

No giants.

A dead city.

"This is a graveyard," said Halgyr. The beefy captain of the Oringard stared around with narrowed eyes. "Nothing but bones. The jotnar have left this place, if ever they lived here."

Eris shook his head. "They're here."

He took a step deeper into the jagged landscape, and before him he beheld a great pillar of ice, twice the height of a man, and within it shone a golden harp. Light gleamed through the crystal and gilded the harp strings like sunlight upon dewy cobwebs.

"The Harp of Lin Shai!" Yiun Yee whispered in awe. "It once was played in the halls of Leen, but it was lost to us many years ago. They say that only the royal family of Leen could play its music, and that any other musician, gifted as he or she may be, would produce only jarring notes." Her eyes watered. "It was a great heirloom of my family. And here it is, frozen in the northern sunlight."

She placed a hand upon the ice.

Trapped within the pillar, the harp glowed. The crystal emitted a single note, high and pure.

Yiun Yee gasped and withdrew her hand.

The landscape began to shake. Cracks appeared in the ice. Snow shifted. Rocks flowed down rising slopes. The henges of icy shards creaked and tilted. The landscape groaned like a creature awakening from slumber.

"What happened?" Yiun Yee whispered.

"I think you just rang the bell over their front door," Eris said.

The land trembled. Cracks raced across the ice, and the skeletons of whales shifted, their spines clattering and rising as if still alive. The icy shards forming the henges began to rise, growing taller, tilting and clinging together, taking new forms. Rocks rose into the air, flying toward the shards and snapping into place. Snow swirled and bones drove through ice like knives into flesh.

Eris gasped. The Oringard drew their swords. Before them, the ice, bones, and rocks clumped together, forming a score of giants.

The jotnar were craggy, weathered creatures. The bones of whales creaked within them, visible through their cracked, icy flesh. Frosted beards hung from their stony cheeks, and rocks shifted and grumbled within their bellies. Icicles formed their claws and teeth, and their faces were long, ugly things like ice grown over corpses. They drew nearer, hulking, staring down at Eris and his companions.

One among them wore a crown of icy crystals, and within each crystal rose the bones of a man's arm and hand. This jotun was taller than the others, and frosted hair fell across his rocky shoulders. A small heart, no larger than a man's fist, beat within his opaque chest, a pulsing red clump that spread out swirls of blood. Here stood Ymir, King of Frost, Lord of the Jotnar.

"Who has played the Harp of Shadow?" rumbled the giant, his voice like avalanches, like cracking boulders. "Who has woken us from our long sleep?"

Eris stepped closer to the frosted king. The jotun towered above him, thrice his height, the blood of his heart trickling down through his frozen limbs, red serpents trapped in ice. "Hear me, Ymir, King of Frost! I am Eris, son of Bormund, descended of Orin who once led you to battle. I—"

"Who led us?" King Ymir's voice rose in a thunder, a sound so loud cracks raced along the ground, and Yiun Yee covered her ears with a grimace. "No mortal born of woman's womb has ever led the jotnar, for we are gods of the north, deities of ice. We answered Orin's plea for aid, for he was a noble man with god's blood."

"His blood flows within me," said Eris, remembering again how he had stabbed his father, how the blood of Grimgard, his royal house, had covered his hands.

"The blood of Orin has been diluted," said Ymir. "It is like a sculpture of ice, once grand, chipped away year after year, left to the mercy of the wind and winters, until it grows so small it becomes but a forgotten lump in an unforgiving hinterland. Thus has the House of Grimgarg fallen from glory, remaining but a band of islanders who'd sooner guzzle mead in thatch-roofed huts than ride to glorious battles or heed the council of their gods."

"I would heed your council were you to give it," said Eris, "were you to sit in our halls as you did of old, sharing your wisdom. If you would aid me now, as you aided Orin, I would see you returned to the Orinhall, honored guests, and would share our mead with you from the fabled horn which I bear." He raised the Meadenhorn again. "But the Orinhall has fallen to evil. Iselda, the Witch of Radian, has tempted my father, and then my brother after him. You spoke of Orin's blood diluted; she would pump that blood full of poison, forever vanquishing any hope of House Grimgarg's return to its old glory. If you still care for the blood of my house, for the descendants of Orin whom you've aided before, return with me now to my isle. Orin called upon you at his hour of greatest need, and you rid his land of the spirits that tormented men. Return with me now! Help me fight, jotun. Help me cleanse my hall of the sorceress, of the eclipse banner that hangs upon its walls."

"And rid it of your brother, of Prince Torumun?" said Ymir. "Yes, son of Orin, I know of your brother, your elder. With one hand, you would cleanse the hall of its foreign banners. With the other, you would strike your brother down, seeking to usurp him and claim his rightful throne."

Eris felt rage flare within him. He took a step closer to the giant. "My brother forfeited his throne when he aligned himself with the Magerian witch."

"And you forfeited all your bonds of family when you slew your father." Fresh, bright blood pumped through Ymir's icy body. "I know of your sin, and I will not aid you, lesser son of a house long fallen from glory. You may bear his horn, but you are not the hero Orin was."

Eris felt the old rage rise in him, the rage that had led him to slay so many enemies, to slay his own father, to slay the wingless dragon as it lay meekly upon his ship. He wanted to charge at the giant, to swing his sword, to cut through its heart. Yet he stilled his hand. Perhaps Yiun Yee had weakened him. Perhaps she had made him wiser.

A harp's note sounded again.

Eris turned his head.

Yiun Yee had placed her hands upon the icy crystal that contained the harp. Her hands did not touch the strings, for they were embedded deep within the ice, yet as she moved her fingers upon that ice, the harp sang. It sounded to Eris almost like a human voice, as if the harp were alive and crying out mournfully, a song beautiful yet sad.

"Harps are made to sing," she said softly as she played, moving her hands across the ice. "It's a saying in our land. I was never skillful at music, no matter how many times I wished to be a musician like the heroine Koyee. But here is the harp of my family. Here is the song of my home. Harps are made to sing, and mead is made for drinking, and homes cannot be lost." She looked at the giant. "This I know. Here is the song of my home, and that home awaits me in the darkness. Do not let my husband's home fall to ruin."

Her music continued, the harp strings trembling inside their icy prison, and the song was so beautiful, so mournful, that even the Oringard fell to their knees and wept to hear it. The giants gathered close, forming a ring around Yiun Yee and her music, and they too wept, their tears flowing down their icy cheeks.

"Harps are made to sing," whispered Ymir, King of the Jotnar. "For many years, we tried to play this harp, yet it sounded like a wounded animal, broken, afraid. We feared for it. We placed it in an altar of ice to protect its beauty." The giant fell to his knees, cracking the ice beneath him, and his tears flowed. "Yet the beauty of its song is one greater than I had ever imagined. Here is the song of a home, of a family."

Yiun Yee's fingers fluttered against the ice, playing her music. "And I have a new family now, Lord of Frost. For I am wed to Eris, and his hall is now my home too. Will you help us reclaim it? Not for glory. Not for the memory of old heroes long buried. But for the music of a home, for the light that can still fill frozen hearts."

The giants looked at one another, then down at Eris and Yiun Yee. She lowered her hands, and her song faded with a last quivering note.

For long moments, Ymir was silent. Then, slow as the beats of a frozen heart, the giant raised his hand, and he pointed southward. To the sea. To Orida beyond. He spoke in a voice deep as the oceans and unforgiving as the plains of ice upon which he lived.

"The jotnar will march."

CHAPTER TWELVE:
THE ELEPHANTS OF SANIA

Neekeya no longer had the strength to row. She let the waves wash her boat ashore. When finally her boat rested in the sand, she stumbled out, took a few steps forward, and fell face down onto the beach. She kissed the sand, laughing weakly, her eyes too dry to shed tears. The shore was grainy, salty, filling her mouth. She lay prostrated, too weak to rise. A wave rushed over her, pushing her a few inches forward, then tugging her back toward the ocean.

Neekeya crawled. She dragged herself a foot forward. Then another. The water tugged at her feet, and she stared down at the beach, and she realized for the first time that universes existed within sand. These were not simply faceless grains but tiny rocks, each one a unique world, exoskeletons no larger than specks of dust, tiny seashells of all shapes, countless creatures and structures, an entire cosmos.

Do you too struggle and bleed? she thought, the sand on her lips. Do you too fight and die and hope?

Her eyes fluttered shut. Her cheek hit the shore, and the sun baked her, and she slept.

When she woke, she found seaweed tangled around her limbs. She chewed the long, rubbery leaves and the beads of fruit, finding some new vigor in the meal. A mollusk washed ashore, a little creature with a swirling shell. She cracked the shell open and drank the gooey saltiness within. This gave her enough strength to rise to her feet and look around.

Palm trees rose across the shore. The beach stretched out east and west. In the distance, she saw a hut built of wood and straw. Perhaps there would be aid there. Fresh water. Medicine for her feverish brow. She took a step across the sand. Her head spun. When she gazed down her body, she saw thin limbs caked with sand and salt, peeking through rents in her ragged cloak. She kept walking toward the hut, each step a battle.

The hut grew nearer, shaded under palms, and Neekeya saw a garden outside full of squash, beans, and bell peppers. Strings of fish hung outside to dry. An elderly man knelt in the garden, tending to the plants, and raised his head as Neekeya approached.

Neekeya took one more step closer, then fell again.

Once more she slept.

When finally she woke, she found herself lying in a hammock. She blinked feebly. Reed walls rose around her and a straw roof stretched overhead. Gourds stood on a windowsill, and outside she could see the ocean. An empty, dusty crib stood in the corner. Neekeya's eyes widened to see a ewer of water at her side. She drank greedily. The water was cold and infused with berries, sweet and wonderful. It dripped down her chin and neck and flowed down her throat, filling her with healing energy.

She climbed out of the hammock, opened a reed door, and stumbled out of the hut into the sunlight. The old man was back in his garden, watering a trellis of beans. He turned toward her and smiled.

"Are you ready for a meal?"

He had a brown, leathery face, and his eyes were kind, though Neekeya thought there was sadness in them too. Most of his teeth were missing, and his hair was white as snow. He wore a cotton tunic and a necklace of clay beads. He spoke Sanian, which Neekeya spoke well; the language was similar to the tongue of Daenor, for both people were from the same southern family of nations.

Neekeya nodded. "Thank you, elder."

He led her toward a table in the garden in the shade of palms. A little path, lined with flowers, led toward the beach, and the waves whispered. She sat in a wicker chair, and the elder brought out two plates. Upon each rested a fried fish, diced bell peppers, and spiced beans mixed with chilies. Neekeya wanted to be polite, to nibble her meal like a proper latani, but she was too famished. She bolted it down.

"Slow down!" the elder said, laughing. "You will choke on a fish bone."

"I thank you again," she said.

He bowed his head. "I am grateful for company. For many years I've lived here alone." That sadness returned to his eyes. "You are a child of Daenor. I hear it in your accent."

She nodded. "I sailed here alone from across the sea."

His eyes widened. "You are brave! That is a great journey even for large ships manned by many sailors."

"Brave or foolish," she said softly. She thought back to those turns before leaving into the sea—a widow consumed with grief, stumbling weak out of the marshes, desperate for any aid she could find, perhaps courting death. Perhaps yes, more foolish than brave, but at least she was a living fool.

She stayed with the kind old man for several turns, slowly recovering her strength. In payment for food, water, and shelter, she helped work in his gardens, patched his roof, and sang to him many old songs of Daenor which soothed him. Neekeya wished she could have stayed here forever, but she knew she must go on, to seek the city of Nhor in the Sanian savannah. As a child, Neekeya had met the royal family of Sania; they had visited her father in his pyramid. She remembered little of that visit, for she had been very young, but if they remembered her, and if they still held love for her family, perhaps they would aid her.

Finally, on her seventh turn with the old man, she felt strong enough to continue her journey.

"I'm sad to see you leave," said the old man. "Please take this with you, a parting gift." He handed her a tunic made from zebra fur, a garment finer than the tattered woolen tunic she wore. "It belonged to my wife . . . many years ago."

She accepted the gift, stepped into the hut, and donned the tunic. It fit her snugly, soft and warm and comforting.

"I will return here some turn," she said when she stepped back outside. "I will return with coins and gemstones to repay you."

"What use have I for coins or gemstones?" said the old man, laughing. "They are pretty things, perhaps, but with your company, you paid me a far greater treasure. Return not with gems and coins but with more songs, with more smiles. Return to warm an old man's heart in his final years alone upon the shore."

She nodded. "I will return." She kissed his leathery cheek.

She left the hut.

She walked south, heading between the trees, leaving the coast behind.

Across her back, she carried a leather pouch full of vegetables and fish. The palm trees gave way to pines, then to groves of acacia trees. She walked for what felt like a turn before she slept, then walked again. She navigated by the sun, keeping it at her back. Here in the deep southern hemisphere of Mythimna, the sun always hung a little lower in the sky, bright and hot but casting long shadows. On her second turn of walking, she reached the savannah.

The grasslands spread into the horizon, rustling in the wind. The grass was knee-high and golden, a second sea. Acacia trees rose in clumps like leafy islands, and distant yellow mountains rose from haze. In the maps Neekeya had seen, the fabled city of Nhon, capital of Sania, lay south from here by a great lake. Her books back home claimed that all Daenorians had come from Sania, immigrating north across the sea thousands of years ago, perhaps to escape famine or war, settling in the swamps and building great pyramids. Perhaps finding Nhon would feel like coming home.

As she kept walking, she saw tall, mottled animals ahead, stretching up their long necks to feed from the acacias.

Giraffes, she realized. She had heard of such animals, even had a wooden doll of one as a child. Her father had often called her a giraffe, for she had sprouted up tall at a young age. She smiled and approached them, hoping to see one close. Her father would never believe she actually saw one, he—

Her smile died.

She lowered her head.

My father is dead, she thought. And so is my husband. It was funny how the pain of losing them never left her, and yet she so easily still thought of them as alive.

She tightened her lips and kept walking. The priests of Cetela back home claimed that dead souls could reincarnate, returning to life as animals. Perhaps the giraffes ahead, these gentle giants, had once been men and women. Perhaps her father and husband would return, maybe even to this place, to roam the savannah. Neekeya did not know if those stories were true or simply tales to comfort the grieving, but perhaps now she needed comfort more than truth.

She kept walking, drawing closer to the mountains. The sun seemed to grow warmer with every step, and Neekeya soon ran out of water. A river flowed in the distance, and she saw animals approaching to drink—herds of wildebeests, antelopes, and hyenas. Pelicans and finches flocked above in great clouds. Mouth dry, Neekeya walked through the grasslands toward the water, seeking a clear spot on the bank.

She was only a few steps away when the growls rose behind her.

She spun around and hissed.

A lion crouched in the grass, staring at her, ready to pounce. The grass rustled around her, and Neekeya whipped her head from side to side. Several more lions padded closer, eyes golden and gleaming. They surrounded her, and they were hungry. They snarled, fangs bare.

Neekeya bared her own teeth right back at them.

I wrestled crocodiles in the swamps, she thought. I faced down hordes of soldiers and dark mages. I will not cower from lions.

Her sword was gone to the sea; instead, she lifted a branch and swung it in wide arcs. "Back! Back, beasts! Back or I'll hit you."

The lions growled and their fur bristled. Neekeya growled right back.

"Get back!" She stamped her feet, swinging her branch madly.

The lions hissed, then turned tail and fled.

Neekeya nodded in satisfaction and lowered her branch.

"Keep on running!" she called after them, pride welling inside her. "I beat crocodiles, and I can beat you. Get lost, cats! Get—"

Roars rose behind her, drowning her words.

Neekeya spun around, and her heart leaped into her throat.

Oh Cetela . . .

A dozen hippopotamuses, each quite a bit larger and angrier than a lion, were emerging from the river, rage in their eyes.

Neekeya did not bother swinging her branch this time. She ran after the lions. Behind her, the earth rumbled as the hippopotamuses chased. When she glanced over her shoulder, she felt the blood drain from her face. For such large, rounded beasts, they ran at a ferocious speed. Their mouths opened wide, revealing fangs like swords and gullets that Neekeya thought could swallow her whole. They were quickly gaining on her.

Had she survived battling Serin on the road, facing armies on the mountains and in the swamps, and crossing the sea to die here like this, a hunted beast, a death no nobler than that of a hunted antelope?

Her ankle twisted on a hidden rock and Neekeya fell. She flipped onto her back to see the hippopotamuses trundling toward her, and she raised her fists, prepared to fight before they trampled her and tore her apart.

Shards whistled above her.

Yipping battle cries rose.

Shadows fell upon her, and Neekeya leaped aside. A herd of elephants raced across the grasslands, beasts even larger than those chasing her. On their backs rode men and women clad in fur and feathers, and they fired bows with red fletching. The arrows sank into the hippopotamuses, drawing blood. The great river-beasts roared in pain, turned, and fled back into the water.

Neekeya leaped to her feet. The lions and hippopotamuses were gone. Now fifty elephants, each topped with an archer, surrounded her, and those arrows were pointed right at her chest.

"Sania just keeps getting better all the time," she muttered.

She had seen elephants before—Nayan warriors, bearing Serin's banners, had ridden them across Teekat Mountains into Daenor. These beasts were even larger, a breed with wider ears and longer tusks, creatures of the savannah rather than the jungle, symbols of Sania. Red and yellow rings were painted onto their tusks, and tasseled saddle bags hung across their wrinkly hides. Headdresses of gold and gemstones lay upon their lumpy brows. The riders on their backs sported just as much splendor. Red and white paint covered their bare chests, and many necklaces of beads, silver, gold, and gemstones hung around their necks. They wore skirts of colorful patches, and their hair hung in many braids, each braid tipped with a ring of precious metal. Arrows and spears hung across their backs, and they held bows engraved with holy runes.

One of the riders dismounted and landed in the grass before Neekeya. He walked toward her and frowned. Neekeya was a tall woman, but this man towered over her. His chest was bare and wide, and golden rings were painted around his arms. A golden amulet hung around his neck, engraved with an elephant's head, and he bore a feathered spear and wicker shield.

"Are you lost, wanderer?" the man said. "You are many leagues from Nhon, Atan Nor, or the plains where the wild tribes roam."

"I'm seeking Nhon," she replied. "I'm not lost but a traveler from across the sea. I am Neekeya, daughter of Kee'an, a latani of Daenor."

The man's eyes widened. "Neekeya?" he whispered.

She tilted her head and narrowed her eyes. "That's my name. Would you give me yours?"

He laughed and rubbed his eyes. "By the gods! It is you. I am Kota, son of King Odiga."

Now Neekeya's eyes were those to widen. "Kota! By Cetela, you've grown. You were a scrawny boy last time I saw you."

He laughed again. "And you were a little girl with scraped knees, speaking of magical artifacts, swamp monsters, and old spellbooks. It was many years ago, but I still have fond memories of my visit to Daenor." His smile faded, and he lowered his head. "I grieved to hear of the marshlands falling to the Radian enemy. We've just returned from the port of Atan Nor where Radian ships have been attacking. We repelled them but they muster still, flowing south from the marshlands that they claimed."

"Kota!" rose a voice from behind him. "She doesn't need to hear about our wars and the movements of troops. She's weary and thirsty and far from home, and you're regaling her with dull tales of your heroics."

A second rider leaped off an elephant and came walking toward them. She was slender and bore a spear bedecked with many feathers. Like Kota, she wore her hair braided. Her skin was dark and bared to the sun, aside from a beaded loincloth and many beaded necklaces that hid her chest. Arrows fletched with wide, red feathers peeked above her shoulder. She smiled at Neekeya, a smile of kindness and warmth.

"Adisa?" Neekeya whispered. "It is you."

The young Princess of Sania nodded. "I was only a little one when we last met. As were you." She approached Neekeya, hugged her, then handed her a water gourd. "Drink, Neekeya, then ride with me. We return to Nhon."

They refilled their gourds in the river, let their elephants drink, and then headed south through the savannah. Neekeya shared a saddle with Princess Adisa. She had never ridden on an animal before, not even a horse, and here upon the elephant she felt powerful as if she too were a princess of Sania.

They traveled for long hours through the grasslands until finally Neekeya saw the city ahead.

Forested hills rose in the distance, encircling a great shimmering lake. Mist hovered between the trees, and flocks of birds flew above in great clouds. From the forest rose many stone buildings, grand structures with many arches, thin towers, and steeples. The bricks were painted red and gold, the colors faded as if centuries old. Neekeya had never seen a grander city; this place would dwarf even Kingswall, the largest city she had seen in the mainland of Timandra.

Princess Adisa, who sat in front of Neekeya in the saddle, twisted around to face her. "Behold Nhon, capital of Sania. My home."

They rode on, leaving the grasslands and traveling across the forested hills. The trees grew so densely Neekeya didn't see the city walls until they were upon them. Those walls soared above them, craggy and mossy, weeds growing between their bricks. Two massive statues of elephants rose here, hundreds of feet high, robed in lichen and vines. Between these stone sentinels rose an archway that led into the city. The fifty elephants and their riders rode through the gates, entering Nhon.

They rode down a cobbled boulevard between palisades of baobab trees. Many buildings rose at their sides, constructed of heavy bricks, their arches lofty, their windows tall and thin. Monkeys leaped upon roofs and branches, and parrots flocked overhead, singing. As the procession made its way down the road, the city people came out to cheer for the heroes' return. They wore bright garments of stripes and checkers, and rings of many metals hung around their necks and arms.

Kota rode his elephant up beside Neekeya. The Prince of Sania—the boy she had known grown into a man—smiled at her. "What do you think of our home, Neekeya?"

She forced herself to smile back at him. "A place of wonder."

His smile widened, and pride in his city swelled his chest. But Neekeya's own smile was feigned. This was a city of wonder, it was true; its towers of painted bricks, palisades of trees, and wildlife were things of beauty. Yet as Neekeya rode the elephant through the city, she saw Kingswall fallen to the enemy, its gates smashed. She saw the pyramids of Eetek crumble. She saw the Radian rallies in Teel University, simmering cauldrons of hate that now spilled across Moth. As she looked around her, Neekeya could only imagine this place too crashing to the ground.

I must find aid here, she thought. I must convince the king of this realm to sail north with me, to fight back . . . or even this distant island will burn.

A cliff rose ahead, leafy with vines, and a waterfall crashed down the stone facade into the lake. Between stone and water rose the Palace of Sania, built of gray bricks and topped with three silver domes. Many guards stood here, clad in feathers, beads, and bronze-tipped spears. The elephant procession made its way toward the palace gates, and the riders dismounted. The waterfall crashed down at their side, spraying them with mist, and the palace archway loomed above, its keystone carved into the face of an elephant.

"You will speak with my father," Kota said to Neekeya, suddenly solemn. "We've been fighting the Radians along our coast ever since Eseer and Daenor fell. He would very much like to hear your tale, I believe."

"And I would very much like to tell it," Neekeya said.

Princess Adisa clasped Neekeya's hand. The princess gazed at her with soft eyes. "I'm with you, my friend. You're safe here."

The three entered the palace together—a tall prince, a young princess, and a latani of the northern marshlands. Neekeya found herself in a wide stone hall, its floor a great mosaic depicting many animals of the savannah; she saw lions, zebras, giraffes, and many elephants. Tall narrow windows broke the walls, letting in beams of sunlight. Trees grew inside the hall from stone pots, reaching toward the ceiling, and birds flitted between them. At the back of the hall, upon a stone throne, sat the king.

King Odiga was a large man, long of limbs and wide of belly, and he wore a lavish tunic of red cloth, a golden elephant upon the chest. Chains of gold hung around his neck and arms, and a crown inlaid with turquoise and sapphire topped his balding head.

He rose as his children entered the hall. "Kota! Adisa!"

The tall prince approached his father. He upended a sack, spilling out small metal eclipses—Radian pins.

"Ten of the enemy's ships assaulted the port of Atan Nor," Kota said. "A thousand men emerged from them, bearing the Radian banners. The commanders were Magerians, but most of the fighters were from Eseer and Naya. The city's defenses stood."

King Odiga's laughter rolled across the hall, and he clasped his son's shoulders. "We have repelled the enemy!"

Kota's eyes remained dark. "They struck with a thousand men. Perhaps they underestimated the strength of Sania. Perhaps they were testing that strength. But . . . father, many more gather in Eseer and Daenor. With me is Neekeya, daughter of Kee'an, who fled the devastation in Daenor. She speaks of great armies that muster there." He turned toward Neekeya. "Step forth, friend, and speak of what you saw."

Adisa squeezed Neekeya's hand. The princess whispered, "Be strong. I'm with you."

The two women stepped forward—a swamp warrior and a savannah princess. King Odiga approached Neekeya and examined her with narrowed eyes.

"Neekeya," he said. "I've not seen you in many years. Your father is a dear friend of mine. Hunting with him in the savannah and visiting his northern pyramids are among my dearest memories. I grieved to hear of Daenor's fall. Your father, is he . . ."

"Fallen as well," Neekeya said.

Odiga lowered his head. "I mourn him. Across the city, we will lower the banners of Sania in his memory, and I will host a vigil in his honor."

"I thank you, my king, and you deeply honor my father," Neekeya said, "but we have little time for ceremony, little time for grief. Sania is not safe, despite one assault repelled. Many thousands of Radians invaded my land, and I saw many of their ships mustering in our fallen port. I fear that more will sail here, a great armada, an army far larger than the one you've repelled. I've come here to bring you these tidings and to seek aid."

The corpulent king nodded. "You will find aid here, Neekeya, my friend. We will shelter you in this palace, and I will treat you as a daughter." He turned toward his son. "Kota, we must further defend the coast. I will send you back with a thousand men, and we will raise more among the southern tribes. I'll send masons and builders too; we will raise walls. Our island will not fall."

Neekeya took a deep breath and raised her head. "My king, when I warned my father about the Radian menace, I urged him to attack Markfir, capital of the Radian Empire. My father chose to stay in the marshlands, hoping Teeket Mountains defend us. Our land fell, and Teeket is greater than any wall. I would urge you to do what my father would not. Sail north! I will lead you through the swamps of Daenor and to the mountain pass. Fall upon Markfir and besiege its walls! Strike the snake's head rather than build walls and hope he does not slither over them."

The king's eyes darkened. "A sea guards a realm better than a mountain. Serin might have a mighty army on land, but his fleet is weak; men speak of the Elorians smashing many of his ships in the darkness of night. Neekeya, your father was a dear friend, and I mourn him, but I will not allow you to speak of war in my hall. War is a game for men, too harsh for women to play."

Princess Adisa snorted and spoke for the first time. "Yet you've sent me to war, Father, and I return to you a champion. I slew a dozen Radians upon the coast, and women fight among them too. Neekeya is wise. And you would be wise to listen to her."

King Odiga's face twisted, and a spark of rage filled his eyes. "What have I done to have my command questioned in my own hall! I offered Neekeya shelter. I could have easily sold her to Serin; he would pay greatly to possess the daughter of his marshland enemy. I could sell her still."

Neekeya gasped. She had thought to find shelter here, thought the king was wise and kind, yet now she saw a beast, a man who'd sell her for coin. She balled up her fists, prepared to fight, but Adisa placed a hand on her shoulder. The princess stared at Neekeya as if to say, Leave him to me.

"If you speak of such matters again, Father," Adisa said, turning back toward the king, "I would leave your hall and never more return. So would my brother." She turned toward Kota. "Wouldn't you?"

The tall warrior nodded, face stern. "I would. Neekeya is a friend of ours. Father, show her respect, I urge you. And I urge you to heed to her counsel."

Odiga roared, spraying saliva. "Heed her counsel? Sail north with an army, bog ourselves down in a swamp, die upon the mountains? For what, to save the mainland? When has Timandra's mainland ever cared about us?" He pointed a shaky finger at Neekeya. "Forever have the northern lands, the left wing of the world's moth, gazed down upon Sania in contempt. An island. A benighted wasteland, they think us. Why should I not let that mainland burn?"

Neekeya steeled herself. Perhaps this king was too brazen to fear a Radian invasion, but if she judged him right, she could tempt him with treasures.

"You wanted to sell me for coins," Neekeya said, meeting and holding his gaze. "Perhaps treasure is what you care for. So I will give you treasure." She looked toward Kota, and her eyes stung, and her belly twisted, but she knew she must do this. She looked back at the king. "Sail north with me, liberate my land . . . and I will give you that land. I will marry your son, so that your family rules the marshlands with me."

For a moment silence filled the hall. Prince Kota stared at her with wide eyes. Princess Adisa covered her mouth. King Odiga, meanwhile, narrowed his eyes shrewdly and tapped his chin.

Finally the king spoke, "You are not only a warrior and survivor, Neekeya. You are also a stateswoman."

She nodded. "Many suitors knocked on my father's door. I turned them all back. But I would wed now, and I would share the marshlands with your family, with your heir. But first you must reclaim those marshlands from the enemy. You spoke of the mainland scorning you." She smiled shakily. "So claim a piece of that mainland."

To her surprise, Kota knelt before her, and he held her hands. "Latani, you are wise, beautiful, and strong. But would you not ask me first how I feel about this marriage?"

"I don't have to," she whispered. "I saw how you gazed at me on our journey here."

Kota smiled, a smile blending embarrassment and mirth. "Then if my father approves, I vow to you: I will fight for you. I will reclaim your homeland from the enemy, and I will cross the mountains and attack that enemy at his doorstep."

They all looked at the king. Odiga stepped toward them and placed his hand on Neekeya's shoulder. "I told you that I would shelter you as a daughter, but now you will become a true daughter of Sania. We will form an alliance, Neekeya of Daenor, and we will celebrate the betrothal with a great feast. And then we will march to war."

Kota cried out in approval, and even Princess Adisa nodded and grinned. But Neekeya only closed her eyes, feeling the tears gather, and her chest shook.

Forgive me, Tam, she thought. Forgive me. I love you and I'm sorry.

CHAPTER THIRTEEN:
THE MARCH OF GIANTS

In her dreams, even so many years later, Koyee still walked along the streets of Pahmey.

As she lay in her hammock in the belly of an Ilari ship, she found herself standing in Bluefeather Corner, covered in grime. She wore only a tattered old tunic of nightwolf fur, and she played a flute of bone. Ahead of her, the towering bluefeathers stood in their corral, clacking their beaks and beating their eyelids. The old soothsayer slumbered in the corner, while the delicious scents of mushroom soup wafted from the Fat Philosopher tavern. The city folk walked by as Koyee played her music: young women in silk dresses, their sashes embroidered, their jewels trapping the light of angler fish; urchin children in rags, racing along the cobblestones and laughing, clutching stolen fish and spiced bat wings from the city markets; weavers, glass-makers, chandlers, and other workers trudging toward their homes after long turns of labor; and even a wealthy merchant upon a palanquin, hands folded across his wide belly. Some people tossed coins her way. Others ignored her. She played on, and she slept in the alleyway, and she fought thieves with her katana, and she fought poverty with her flute.

In other dreams Koyee sat upon the sloping roof of a pagoda, gazing up at the sky as ten thousand lanterns floated toward the moon. The great wooden doll of Xen Qae moved down the street, taller than three men, its operators hidden within its robes, and fireworks rose to burst across the sky. Koyee watched and wept for the beauty, an invisible urchin who glimpsed the light of a nation, the hope of a people.

A people now gone.

Koyee grimaced, the pain clutching at her. She had fought in this city. She had stood upon its walls, firing arrows at the sunlit demons who invaded from the daylight. She had vaulted from roof to roof, firing down at the enemy, and she had lived in an occupied city, a yezyana in a mask, hiding in the Green Geode as the enemy forces drank wine and reached to grab at her.

And she had watched that city fall into darkness.

She had stood with Serin, his captive, chained and beaten, watching cracks and sinkholes greedily swallow her city, guzzling down its towers, shops, streets, homes, her memories, all those she loved and had fought for. Madori would perhaps never fully understand, nor would any of the Ilari she sailed with. But to Koyee this was not merely the loss of life, the loss of a great city; it was the loss of her youth, of her very soul.

"Pahmey," she whispered, unable to breathe, unable to stop those memories. Little Maniko, kind and gentle, teaching her to play "Sailing Alone" on the flute—fallen. Minlao Palace, the great Glow of the Moon, a crest of hope and light in a dark city—gone. Bluefeather Corner, her home in the shadows; the Green Geode, home to the yezyani who had become her sisters; the old graveyard, haven for the Dust Face Ghosts—all gone into shadows. The light of lanterns. The smells of the market. The laughter of children and the heat of the great public fireplaces. Forever silenced, forever darkened.

The pain was too great. Koyee thrashed in her hammock, feeling trapped in the web of some great spider. Finally she could bear it no longer. She stepped onto the floor. The ship's belly was a dark place, its windows curtained to keep out the searing, eternal light of Timandra. Several more hammocks hung in the shadows, their occupants deep in slumber.

Koyee padded toward the hammock at the back, the one where Madori lay sleeping.

She stood for a moment, looking down at her daughter, and some comfort filled Koyee but a new fear too.

Madori is the most precious thing in my life, she thought. A beautiful child. Madori had inherited Koyee's large eyes, delicate frame, and gentle features, but she had Torin's dark hair and tanned skin. A precious child. So fragile.

And I'm so scared, Koyee thought. She reached out and caressed Madori's short black hair. I'm so scared for your father. I'm so scared that my sweet Torin is gone from us. And I'm so scared to lose you. I'm so scared for you to lose others, for you to feel pain like I feel, to never sleep without nightmares, to never know true peace because the pain can never fully heal.

Madori mumbled in her sleep, roused by Koyee's touch, and opened her eyes to glowing, lavender slits. "Mother? Why are you crying?

Because you are pure and they hurt you, Koyee thought. Because I cannot bear the thought of you suffering like I suffer.

Madori was small, the hammock large, and Koyee climbed inside and lay beside her daughter. Madori's eyes closed again and she nestled close to Koyee, arms wrapped around her, as if she were again very young, a little girl scared of monsters in the closet and seeking the comfort of her mother.

Only now it's me, the mother, who is scared, who seeks comfort, Koyee thought.

She held her daughter close and kissed her forehead.

"You were so small when you were born," Koyee whispered. "You were born early, did you know? And I promised then to protect you. To make this world safe for you, a better world than the one I grew up in. I'm sorry, Billygoat. I'm sorry I failed you."

Madori mumbled in her half-sleep, wriggling and cuddling closer. "We'll win, Mother. We'll win."

Koyee closed her eyes, her daughter in her arms, and she knew something that Madori was too young to understand. There is no victory in war. Even should you slay your enemy, you have not won. The memories of war will forever scar you. The pain of loss and the lingering terror will forever fill your sleep.

But I can still fight, she thought. For more times like this, holding my daughter close. For the hope of seeing Torin again. For the dream that some turn we all sit together in a garden, a family united, and find shapes in the clouds or the stars, seek brief moments of joy in a world of so much pain. For that I will fight on. Always.

Finally sleep found her, and with her daughter held close, Koyee did not dream.

* * * * *

As in the years of old, the jotnar—giants of the arctic—walked onto the island of Orida.

They had swum through the sea like icebergs, and they emerged onto the shores like early winter sending up shards of frost. Beasts of stone and ice, of frosted beards and cold blue eyes, of beating hearts deep within crystallized rib cages, they lumbered across the rocky slopes, between the pines, and into the city of Grenstad. They moved between houses of clay and thatched roofs, long mead halls with beams carved as orcas, and between stone temples to the old gods. Lumbering beasts risen from myth, their jagged heads rose above roofs, and their feet sent fingers of frost across cobblestones.

Eris walked at their lead, clad in armor and fur, holding his horn high. Yiun Yee walked at his side, a princess in white silk, her skin pale, her eyes large and glowing. The people of the city gazed in awe, and many knelt, and many sang old songs. Soldiers raced toward them, sent from the palace to slay the outcast prince, but they too bowed and laid down their weapons, for here before them it seemed that Orin himself had returned from the ancient years, risen from legend to lead them again and restore their land to glory.

The Orinhall rose ahead in the shade of the mountains, a great mead hall with towering beams of giltwood. When Eris entered the hall, he found his brother upon the throne. Torumun held a drawn sword across his lap, and his father's crown topped his head. At his side stood Iselda, sister to Tirus Serin, clad in a burgundy gown.

"You are not welcome here, Eris the Kingslayer!" Iselda said. She pointed an accusing finger at him. "Last you entered this hall, you slew my husband—your own father. Now you come trying to usurp the throne. Your elder brother is true King of Orida, and he has taken me as a wife. As queen of this land, I charge you with regicide and patricide." The Radian queen turned toward the soldiers who lined the hall. "Men of Orida, place this man in chains. He will stand trial for his crime, and he will burn in a great pyre before our people."

Yet the first of the jotnar were now entering the hall behind Eris. Their joints of stone and ice creaked, their heads brushed the ceiling, and frost spread out from their feet. At the sight of the giants, the soldiers in the hall gasped. A few still held their swords; others placed down their weapons and knelt.

"Orin returns!" whispered one man.

"Orin returns with Ymir, king of the jotnar!" said another, voice awed, and tears streamed down his cheeks.

Eris took a step closer to the throne. Ignoring Iselda, he stared at his brother.

"Torumun," he said, "when you banished me from this hall, when you raised arms against me, I thought to return here and slay you, to claim the throne." He looked at Yiun Yee who stood at his side, seeking comfort from her soft gaze, then back toward Torumun. "But Yiun Yee taught me to be more than a warrior, more than a slayer of enemies. She taught me mercy. I should never have slain our father, even as he attacked my wife, and I don' wish to slay you. But I must cleanse this hall. Orida must remove the Radian banners and raise the orca flag again. Please, brother. Cast aside this woman who has bewitched you. Return to the ways of righteousness."

Torumun rose from his seat. He seemed to have aged since Eris had last seen him. White streaked his temples and yellow beard. His eyes were sunken and simmering with malice. Rather than the old armor of Orida, he wore a suit of black plates, and an eclipse sigil burned upon the breastplate, formed of rubies.

"Banish my wife?" Torumun said and laughed.

Eris narrowed his eyes. "Your wife? She is your stepmother!"

"No longer." Torumun's laughter was bitter. "You saw to that. You slew our father. You murdered him in this hall, all because he tried to rid us of your nightcrawler wife. Iselda is mine now. My wife. My prize." He pulled her close to him. "And she has shown me the true meaning of glory, and that glory lies under the Radian banners. Father was right to join Serin. Leave this place, brother! Your creatures of ancient stories cannot help you now. The jotnar perhaps are impressive for fools to look upon, but they are beasts of the old world. A new order rises. A new world begins. The hosts of Orida already muster, and our fleet gathers for assault. We will soon begin the invasion of darkness, and we will burn the isle of Leen and the northern coast of Qaelin." He sneered. "And your wife will be the first nightcrawler to die."

Eris shook his head. "You speak as father spoke. I slew him, it is true, but I will spare you." He looked at the soldiers who knelt before him—his brother's soldiers. "Sons of Orin, our old years of glory need not be mere legends. They can return. Remove the foreign banners that hang on these walls. Together we will cleanse the city. Escort Torumun and Iselda to the port, and give them a ship, and let them sail into exile. Let no more blood spill in this hall." He looked at Yiun Yee and held her hand. "May blood never spill here again."

Iselda stared at the kneeling soldiers in disgust, then back at Eris. Her face twisted, hatred blazed in her eyes, and she seemed more like a rabid beast than a woman.

"Exile? No, usurper. We will not go into exile." The sorceress spat toward the soldiers who knelt before Eris. "These men are weak. The blood of Orin is weak. But true soldiers muster to your south in Verilon. Very soon my brother's hosts will crush the resistance in Orewood, and then they will come here. Then true men will hold this hall, not the sons of farmers and shepherds who quake at the sight of some summoned goblins of ice. Torumun and I will return, Eris . . . return with an army of fire to melt your giants, burn your wife, and bring you back to Markfir so the emperor may see your bones shattered."

She wrapped her arms around Torumun and gave him a long, deep kiss, her body pressed against him. Then she turned toward Eris, glared, and spat toward him. Serpents of black smoke rose around her feet, coiling and hissing, wrapping around her and Torumun like a cocoon.

"Men, grab them!" Eris shouted.

His soldiers rushed forth and reached into the smoke, only to scream and pull back burnt hands. When finally the astral serpents dispersed, no sign of Iselda or Torumun remained, only a great eclipse charred into the floor.

CHAPTER FOURTEEN:
THE HORNS OF ORIDA

Horns blared across the ruins of Orewood—loud, horrible, jarring banshee cries heralding death. Ravens took flight from the rubble, startled by the sound, leaving the corpses they had fed upon and vanishing into the clouds.

"Radian horns," Torin muttered. He crouched in the ruins, tending to a young soldier's wounded leg. The Verilish man groaned, face ashen. The leg would have to be amputated, Torin knew, though he wasn't sure he had the resolve to swing his sword and do the job.

"Lots of the bastards this time, by the sound of it," Cam said. The King of Arden himself had a wounded leg; a bandage wrapped around it, soaked red, and Cam winced when he shifted his weight. "Torin, old boy, my leg's in no shape for climbing. Be a good lad and go take a look."

Torin nodded and looked toward Linee. "Would you take over?"

Crouched among the ruins, the queen nodded and wiped her bloody forehead. More old blood stained her patches of dented armor, most of it not her own. She was better at healing than Torin anyway; she had already amputated and stitched up the limbs of several soldiers, including her own son's. Omry sat at her side, pale and shivering, his left leg ending below the knee.

"Go, Torin," Linee said. She approached the wounded soldier and winced at the sight of the man's wounded leg. She drew a long, curved knife.

The horns sounded again, metallic, cruel. Perhaps, at least, they would drown the screams of the wounded man. Grateful for his task, Torin rose with the creak of armor and joints; both had seen far too much wear. Pocked walls rose around them, a shell of crumbling stone, and thirty other soldiers hunkered here, all of them Verilish; Torin had not seen any other Ardishmen for many turns. He climbed the wall, walked along its jagged top, then made his way up the staircase of a tower. The tower's northern wall had fallen, affording a view of the Verilish camp: dozens of burrows between the ruins, each full of soldiers in bloody, dusty armor. Through the arrowslits on the tower's southern wall, Torin could see the sprawling, smoldering no man's land, a field of rubble and bones. To wander into that field, he knew, was death. The ravens had returned to the ruin, pecking at thousands of corpses.

Finally Torin made it to the top of the tower. Two tattered banners rose upon it: the bear of Verilon and the raven of Arden. Both banners seemed lurid to Torin now; the bear Gashdov had fallen, and the only true ravens here were feeding upon their dead. He stepped behind a merlon, crouched, and gazed south.

No man's land spread a mile long, nearly all its buildings fallen. Little more than a few arches, the stubs of columns, and chunks of wall rose here; the rest had fallen. Past this field of rubble rose the Radian side of the city, a great hive of crumbling forts, makeshift barracks, trenches, and the tattered standards of the enemy. The horns blared again, and the forest south of the city rustled. Fresh Radian forces began to emerge. Torin cursed.

"This might be the end," he muttered.

Throughout the past month or two, Radian reinforcements had arrived every few turns: a few wagons of food, a couple hundred frightened recruits pulled from southern villagers and towns, and sometimes even a knight or two with their footmen. But now, for the first time since the battle began, Torin saw a true new army arrive. Thousands of troops marched here, covered in black steel. Hundreds rode upon armored horses. Cannons rolled forth among them, shaped as buffaloes. On one banner Torin saw the sigil of a yellow citadel upon a crimson field.

These soldiers came from Sunmotte itself, Torin thought. From Serin's own home.

The Radians already in the city cheered as their comrades approached. The new arrivals did not even bother to set camp; at once they advanced toward no man's land, many swordsmen and horses and cannons, and began to travel across the rubble . . . toward Torin and his comrades.

"Oh Idar's beard," Torin whispered. He raced back down the tower and burst into the burrow he shared with Cam, Linee, and the others. "We're going to have company. Lots of company. Radians are arriving."

Cam cursed. "How many?"

"All of them, I think," Torin said. "They're entering the killing field and moving our way."

Cam grumbled and drew his sword. "This might be it, Tor."

Linee paled and moved toward her son. She hugged the prince close, her cheeks pale. Torin looked at them. His friends. His new family. They would die now, he knew. All of them would.

I'll never see Koyee and Madori again.

He drew his old chipped sword. "I don't have much to say." His voice was soft, weak with hunger and the long fight. "You all know what this means. Linee, I want you to take Omry and flee north of the city. Sneak into the forests. Try to survive, perhaps find a village, take a new name."

The queen shook her head, and tears filled her eyes. "I never ran from a fight. Not even when I was very young and afraid, when Camlin and I traveled Sage's Road through the night, when we fought in the deserts of Eseer, when we fixed the clock on the mountain. And I won't run now." She raised her knife. "This is my home now. And I'll die defending it if I must. Better to die here in battle, with my family around me, than in some forest in the cold of winter." She wiped her eyes and embraced Cam. "I love you, my Camlin. I love you so much."

Cam kissed her lips and held her close. "I love you too, Linee. Always. In this life and the next, my queen." He smiled tremulously. "I fell in love with you somewhere in the darkness of Eloria, and I've not stopped loving you since then, not for one instant." The horns blared again, and Linee started. Cam caressed her cheek. "We still fight together."

Torin moved toward the hole in the wall that served as their doorway. He waited. The horns wailed again. They would be here soon.

He frowned.

"The horns," he said. "They're . . . different."

He heard it again. He frowned. These horns were lighter, more melodious, and they sounded from the north, not the south where the enemy marched.

"Those aren't Radian horns," Cam said.

Distant voices rose in the north, chanting and deep. "Forward, Sons of Orin! For Orida! For King Eris! For glory and our northern isle!"

Torin gasped, raced back up the tower, and stared south. Hope and wonder blazed inside him like a great fire in the cold of winter. Thousands of horses came galloping from the northern forests into the city. Atop them sat thousands of men in bright armor and fur cloaks, their helmets horned, their wooden shields round. Their banners streamed, showing orcas. Behind the riders marched many soldiers on foot, rows and rows of them, a great army of metal and wood and fur.

"Orida brings aid," Torin whispered.

He turned back south. The Radians had already crossed half the city, moving closer. Their cannons crackled and fired. The great balls of iron flew through the air toward the Oridian host. The missiles tore through horses, but the rest of the cavalry kept charging, the riders calling out for battle. The city shook as the two forces crashed together.

Torin raced down the tower as the armies flowed across their hideouts.

And he fought.

And he laughed.

He was so weak, so thin, so weary and haunted, but he laughed as the hosts of Orida tore through the enemy, as the bright swords of the north cut down Serin's forces, as for the first time in many turns of death, hope kindled in Orewood. The warriors of the orca swept through the city like a wave cleaning debris off a beach.

When thousands of Radian troops had fallen dead, and the city defenders and the warriors of Orida charged against the enemy, Lord Gehena finally emerged to fight.

Three months ago, the towering mage had ridden toward the city walls, holding a severed head in each of his four hands. Gehena had tossed his grisly gifts toward the city, signaling the start of the assault, but since then the hooded creature had remained hidden in shadows. Now he emerged, the field commander of the Radians' northern front, a towering mage—he stood eight feet tall. He wore robes darker than the night, the hems burnt, and an iron helmet hid his face, revealing only blazing red eyes like forge fires. The creature walked afoot through the devastation, his four arms raised, and in each hand he held a weapon: a spear, an axe, a sword, and a hammer.

Watching from a ruined wall, Torin grimaced with sudden pain, blinded, nearly doubling over. Gehena had kept him imprisoned for eight months in a dungeon, then later a cart, and for most of those turns the mage had hurt him—sometimes by ordering his brutes to beat Torin, sometimes by casting magic himself, driving shards of pain through Torin's flesh. Now that pain flared in Torin's memory, so intense it felt real, and the scars of his imprisonment—they covered his body beneath his armor—blazed anew.

"Tor!" Cam said, clutching him. "Are you hurt? What's wrong?"

Torin could not reply, only stare in terror. If hope had kindled inside him with Orida's arrival, now, seeing Gehena, that hope seemed foolish, the hope of a starving prisoner as a guard taunts him with a meal he'd never serve.

"Archers, fire!" shouted an Oridian upon a tower, his long yellow hair billowing from under his horned helmet.

A hundred Oridian archers crouched among the ruins, tugged back bowstrings, and fired their arrows toward Gehena. The towering mage merely raised his eyes, and though Torin could not see Gehena's face—he never had, not even during his months of imprisonment—it seemed to Torin that the demonic mage sneered. Three feet away from Gehena, the arrows shriveled in midair and rained down as ash.

"Sons of Orin, charge!" cried an Oridian knight. The man thundered forth upon his horse, and twenty other riders rode with him, their horses armored, their banners fluttering in the smoky wind. Lances thrust. Torin crouched behind rubble, watching.

Gehena swung his four weapons. Lances shattered with fountains of wooden shards. The demonic mage's spear thrust, impaling a rider. His axe swung, cutting down a horse. His sword sliced through a knight, and his hammer sent another man crashing down. The horses kept charging, the riders aiming their lances, and the mage spun from side to side, blades spraying blood.

A lone horse, its rider dead, fled the carnage. The other riders lay dead around the demon-mage, torn apart.

Gehena tossed back his head and shrieked to the sky. It was a horrible sound, ear-splitting, its pitch higher than steam from a kettle, it volume louder than thunder. The ruins shook. A wall collapsed. The shriek coalesced into words that pounded Torin's ears.

"Will you hide as others fight for you, Torin the Gardener?" the towering mage cried. "Will you rely on saviors from afar, or will you face me yourself, man to man?"

Torin grimaced. The pain still blazed through him, the pain of his wounds, of his memories. Of Kingswall falling. Of his long months in the dungeon, worried for his family. Of the carnage in this city.

Slowly, clutching his sword, Torin emerged from behind the rubble and faced the mage.

"Torin, what are you doing?" Cam whispered, trying to tug Torin down. But it was too late. Gehena had seen him.

As thousands of men still fought across the ruins, Torin took a step across the debris toward the demon.

"I'm here, Gehena," he said. His heart thudded, sweat soaked him, but he kept walking. "I do not cower. I come to face you again, a sword in my hand."

He was being foolish, he knew. Feverish. Suicidal. But he kept walking. He kept thinking of the severed heads Gehena had tossed at him—the heads of his neighbors from Fairwool-by-Night. He kept thinking of the long months in Gehena's dungeon. And he thought of what else this demon might do if left free, of the pain Gehena could inflict upon Koyee, upon Madori, upon all other good souls in Moth.

And so I must stop him. I must do what I could not last time I fought him. I must kill him.

"I can see the fear in you, Torin Greenmoat," said the creature, "and you are right to be afraid. I see the doubt in you, and you are right to feel doubt." The demon raised his hand, and a ring of fire burst out around them, trapping them within walls of inferno. "You should have stayed hidden."

Torin shook his head. "No, Gehena. No magic. You want to face me? Face me in a fair fight. As you said, man to man, if indeed a man you are. No magical fires, serpents, bolts of lightning. Blade to blade. Doff your wizard's robes, let me see your form, and duel me."

The towering mage nodded . . . and removed his cloak. He let the garment drop to the ground.

Torin felt the blood drain from his face. Lord Gehena was not just thin; he was skeletal, his skin clinging to bones. That skin was red and raw as if burnt. Two of the mage's four arms were sewn on, the stitches dripping pus, and his legs seemed surgically extended, grafted onto goat hooves. But worst of all was Gehena's face. It was a withered face, the cheeks sunken, the mouth lip-less, the teeth sharp and yellow. It was a pained face. The face of a man who had felt too much agony, seen too much terror, heard too many screams, a face that hid a shattered mind.

Torin recognized that face. He had seen it upon every soldier after the fall of Yintao. Upon every survivor here in Orewood who fed on rats and waited for death. Many times, Torin had seen it when staring at his own reflection. It was the face of lost hope, of a cruelty born from lack of belief that any goodness could exist in this world. It was the face that, perhaps, Torin had always been fighting within himself.

Then Lord Gehena opened that shriveled mouth, shrieked again, and charged toward him.

The demon—for that was how Torin thought of Gehena now—swung his sword toward him. Torin parried, but the creature's spear thrust too. Torin raised his shield, blocking the blow, only for the axe and hammer to swing down. He leaped aside, and both weapons slammed into fallen bricks, shattering them.

A battle cry sounded, and Cam leaped through the ring of fire to fight.

"He has four hands," Cam said. "Figured I'd join to make the fight fair."

The shepherd-turned-king ran toward Gehena, sword swinging. The demon parried with his own sword. Torin swung his blade, only for Gehena to block the blow with his axe. The weapons swung in a fury, sparking together, clashing, chipping.

"Fools," hissed Gehena. "You cannot kill me. I was trained in the pits of Serin's forts. I was augmented with his magic, broken, rebuilt, formed to slay men." His blades swung again and again, slamming into Torin and Cam's weapons and armor. "You should have run."

A blow from Gehena's hammer slammed into Cam's breastplate, knocking the slender man down. Before Cam could rise, Gehena lashed all four weapons down toward Torin.

Screaming, Torin raised his shield and sword overhead. His sword snapped in half. The blows kept raining, pounding against his shield, and Torin fell to his knees, then onto his back.

Gehena loomed above him, laughing, his ribs rising and falling and stretching his desiccated skin. Sores burst upon his body. His hooves, surgically stitched onto his legs, slammed down at Torin's sides. The demon leered down at him, saliva dripping between his fangs. Torin lay on his back, moaning, clutching a hilt with only half a blade.

"And now, Torin, I will finally let you die."

Torin had shied away from amputating the wounded soldier's leg, but he had seen it done enough times. He swung the stub of his blade, aiming toward the stitches where Gehena's hoof met leg.

The blade cut through rotted flesh. The hoof tore off. Gehena screamed. As the demon fell down toward him, Torin raised the broken blade. Gehena fell onto the shard of steel, impaling himself, then burying Torin under his weight.

"Tor!" Cam limped forward, grabbed Gehena, and tugged him off. "By Idar's soggy britches, this thing weighs more than a horse."

Torin coughed and helped push. They rolled Gehena onto his back, and Torin struggled to his feet, staring down at the slain creature. A gust of wind blew, and Gehena dispersed into ash. The broken blade clattered down to the ground.

The ring of fire faded around them, revealing a field of dead. No more enemy troops fought. Verilish men, clad in fur cloaks and cast iron breastplates, cheered and raised their war hammers. Oridians chanted for victory, their helmets horned, their swords painted red.

Through the carnage, a figure in white came walking toward Torin. In his pain and delirium, he almost thought her a deity, a goddess in white.

An Elorian, he realized.

The woman reached him. She was young and fair, her eyes large and blue. Her white hair and flowing robes streamed in the wind. With her walked an Oridian lord, gold upon his armor, a filigreed mead horn hanging around his neck on a chain.

"The demon called you Torin," said the Elorian woman. "Are you . . . Sir Torin Greenmoat, the hero of the first war?"

Torin rubbed his aching neck. "Well, after this battle, I better be remembered as a hero of the second war too."

The Elorian woman clasped his hand. "I am Yiun Yee, Princess of Leen and Queen of Orida. With me is Eris, King of Orida."

Torin smiled at them wanly. "You're late. But if you join us on the road to Markfir, all will be forgiven."

Swaying weakly, he turned to look south. The ruins stretched ahead, and beyond them rose the pine forests of Verilon, but south from here, many leagues across forests and plains, lay the capital of the Radian Empire. That, Torin knew, was his destination. That, he knew, was where he'd meet Serin again.

CHAPTER FIFTEEN:
LANTERNS IN THE DARK

Jin, Emperor of Qaelin, sat on his nightwolf, gazing at the port of Eeshan.

Eeshan—the Gates to the North, the largest city along the northern coast of Qaelin. Eeshan—the fair city that had fallen to Verilon in the last war, that had risen from captivity into a great hub of trade and industry. Eeshan—the last city still standing in his empire, the last city not yet fallen to the sunlight.

Eeshan, Jin thought, the word like a prayer in his mind. Maybe our last hope in the darkness.

All around Jin, thousands of his soldiers mustered for war. In the port ahead, the lanterns of hundreds of ships swayed.

"For the first time," Jin whispered, "Qaelin will sail into the sunlight."

His nightwolf growled beneath him, a beautiful silver animal named Chon Bao. Born without arms and legs, Jin sat in a custom harness that held his torso upright. Some of his empire's philosophers had wanted to construct him limbs of gold, but why should Jin pretend to have limbs? Shenlai the dragon had been limbless, and he had been a great leader who had saved Qaelin in its last war.

Yet Shenlai, my dearest friend, has fallen. As a new fire burns, it is I who must save my empire.

Jin had been only a child in the last war, and great warriors had helped him: Shenlai the dragon, Koyee the heroine, and Torin and Bailey of the sunlight. Now, even as an adult, even with a great army, Jin felt alone, and he was scared.

He looked around him at the port city. Tall, narrow houses lined the streets, their tiled roofs curling up at the edges like scrolls. Lanterns hung from the eaves, the tin shaped as the mocking faces of spirits, candles within their eyes. Bats fluttered above, and a great public fireplace roared in a cobbled square, its iron grill shaped as coiling dragons and dancing maidens.

And everywhere Jin looked, he saw his army. Qaelin's soldiers lined the streets, standing still and solemn as statues. Scale armor shone upon them. Their helmets were simple, polished steel. Each man held a spear and shield, and katanas hung across their backs. Most stood afoot, but like Jin many rode upon nightwolves, the beasts armored and as well trained as their riders.

Jin leaned forward, then sideways, guiding his wolf with the tilt of his limbless body. Chon Bao climbed onto a bronze dragon statue, letting the troops see their emperor.

"Soldiers of Qaelin!" he said. "Serin has destroyed the city of Pahmey, plunging it into darkness. Serin has burned Yintao and plundered its treasures. From here in Eeshan, upon our northern coast, we will strike back. We will show the Radian Empire that Qaelin still fights. We are the night!"

Thousands of soldiers raised their spears. "We are the night!"

Jin tilted in his harness. His nightwolf, understanding the signal, turned to face the port. When Jin leaned forward, the nightwolf jumped off the statue and began walking toward the boardwalk. The soldiers marched behind him, their boots thumping as one. In the water floated hundreds of ships: the junk ships of Qaelin, moonstars upon their sails and cannons lining their decks, and the long, elegant dragon-ships of Leen, diamonds painted upon their white hulls.

On the boardwalk, Jin saw a group of Leenish soldiers clad in flowing white robes over silvery breastplates. Between them stood the Emperor of Leen, an old man with a long snowy beard. He wore silk robes embroidered with white dragons—images of Pirilin, fallen dragon of Leen—and a great diamond, symbol of his empire, hung around his neck. The old man turned sad, indigo eyes toward Jin.

"Leen is a land of philosophers, harpists, poets, stargazers." The fleet's swaying lanterns reflected in his eyes. "I never imagined that Leen would invade the sunlight, would march to war. I never imagined that my own daughter, the gentle Yiun Yee, would marry a man of the sun."

Jin brought his nightwolf close to the old king's side. "The people of Leen are wise and peaceful, yet I've seen them fight. I rode upon Pirilin in the last war, and I fought alongside Leenish warriors." Jin shuddered to remember that war, to remember Pirilin sinking into the sea, forever lost from the night. "And your daughter's husband, they say, is himself a wise man who fights against the Radians. Yiun Yee too sails to fight Serin with the Oridian fleet. We will defeat Serin. We will save the darkness." He lowered his head. "Perhaps there's not much left to save. So much of our land has burned. Even as we speak, Radian troops assault the coasts of Leen and Ilar. But so long as we live, we will fight, even if we die upon the walls of Markfir."

He turned to look at the sea. In Markfir, capital of Serin's empire, will I meet Koyee again? Jin had not seen his friend in many years, and he missed her. Orida sailed to war, and they said that the Ilari Armada was already sailing in the sunlight. Perhaps at Markfir all free people would meet.

And perhaps you'll be there too, Koyee, at the great battle of our time.

Jin rode his nightwolf along a plank and onto a junk ship with silver, battened sails. All across the port, his soldiers boarded many other ships. Most would see the sunlight for the first time. Most perhaps would never see the night again. Each soldier carried a silver lantern, thousands of lights crawling onto the ships. In the daylight, Jin knew, thousands of these lights would go out.

They set sail, the ships of Eloria, hundreds of vessels, myriads of lanterns, and an emperor with the hopes of a nation upon his armless shoulders. The lights flowed over the black waters, across the shadows . . . and toward the light of day.

CHAPTER SIXTEEN:
ELDMARK FIELDS

Torin had been riding across the plains for many turns when he finally saw Markfir in the distance.

After a summer of fire and blood, autumn had come to Moth, and cold wind ruffled Torin's hair and beard; both had grown long in the war, streaked with silver. His banner unfurled, revealing the black raven of Arden upon a golden field. He turned in the saddle, looking at the rest of his army. Only a dozen other raven banners rose here, a few last survivors of Arden come to join the assault.

But despite the scarcity of Ardishmen, the force—the Northern Alliance—sprawled across the grassy plains. Many of the soldiers were men and women of Verilon. They wore cast iron breastplates and pelts of bear fur, and their shaggy brown hair streamed in the wind. They carried massive war hammers—weapons too heavy for Torin to lift—and many among them rode bears instead of horses. The brown bear of Verilon appeared upon their green banners. Warriors of Orida comprised the rest of the Northern Alliance. They were large people, not as wide as the Verilish but just as tall, their hair golden, and the men sported long beards, and the women wore their hair in two braids; they reminded Torin of Bailey, and he missed his friend whenever he looked at these northern shieldmaidens. The Oridians too raised many banners, displaying a sea of orcas, and they rode many horses.

"Forty thousand warriors," Cam said, riding at Torin's side on a white courser. "There are more men than this defending Markfir, and they defend it from high walls." He looked at Torin. "Are we marching to an early death?"

Torin raised an eyebrow. "We've been doing that for years now. We're still alive."

"Some of us are," Cam said softly.

Torin looked back toward Markfir. The city lay across the flat wastelands men called Eldmark Fields, named after an ancient Riyonan emperor who had fallen here in some forgotten battle. No Radian force was marching forth to meet the invaders; the field was barren, flat, and empty, covered with only sparse grass. The city was still too far to see clearly, but even from this distance, Torin realized it was massive; hundreds of towers rose from it. This was a city even larger than Pahmey, its walls mighty and thick. Torin had seen Markfir embroidered onto a tapestry once—five or six cotton towers, maybe thirty soldiers upon its walls. The artist had been lazy; that tapestry would have to cover a city block just to depict the true might of Markfir.

Horse hoofs thundered, and Eris rode up to ride beside Torin. The King of Orida stared south, the wind in his golden hair, and his blue eyes narrowed. The autumn sun gleamed upon his bright armor and horned helmet.

"The bulk of Serin's forces linger in the darkness of Eloria," the northern king said. "He has spread himself too thin, launched too many fronts. His arrogance will be his downfall. We will slam through his gates, storm his palace, and hang him in the city square."

A shaggy bear padded forth, and upon the beast rose Hogash, burly and grumbling. Once Orewood's gatekeeper, the bearded man had risen to command Verilon's forces after his king had fallen. "Hang him?" Hogash spat across his saddle. "That death would be too kind for Serin. I will give him a better death. A slow one."

"We'll worry about Serin's fate later," said Cam, the third commander of the Northern Alliance. "High walls, tens of thousands of Radian soldiers, and probably hundreds of mages still separate us from the emperor. Let's cross those obstacles first."

Both Eris and Hogash nodded.

"The little king is wise," said Hogash.

And frightened, Torin thought, gazing at the three leaders. And I'm frightened too.

He looked back at the city; it was closer now, the sunlight gleaming upon the armor of its distant defenders. Torin had fought many battles, but here would be the greatest battle of his life, perhaps the greatest in Moth's history. Here the fate of this world torn between day and night would be decided. Here, upon Eldmark Fields, would all civilization burn in the Radian fire or rise to defeat it.

The Northern Alliance rode and marched onward, forty thousand soldiers and thousands of horses and bears, the free Timandrians of the north come south to strike at Serin's heart.

It must have taken hours, but it seemed to Torin that only moments passed before they reached Markfir.

The city lay in the shadow of the Teekat Mountains, which the Magerians called Markshade, the great range—once the western border of the fallen Riyonan Empire—that separated Mageria from Daenor in the west. To the north, east, and south of the city spread Eldmark Fields, the great grassy plains where buffaloes—sigil of the Magerian people—would roam in the turns of old, now hunted to extinction.

A moat surrounded Markfir, and beyond the water rose a ring of guard towers—well over a hundred of them—connected with walls of grayish-brown bricks. Each guard tower stared onto the fields with arrowslits like feline eyes, and red tiles covered their conical roofs. Beyond these fortifications rose a great hill, almost large enough to be called a mountain, covered with thousands of buildings. Most of the buildings rose several stories tall, all built of the same grayish-brown bricks, and their roofs too were tiled red. A hundred towers or more rose between homes and shops, all topped with battlements and archers. Even the Idarith temples, their steeples soaring hundreds of feet tall, had been converted into forts; archers stood in their belfries. At the city's crest, perched atop the hilltop, rose Solgrad Castle—Serin's imperial palace—a great complex with thick walls and four round towers overlooking the city below.

"By Idar," Torin whispered, sudden terror clutching him, so powerful that he winced and could barely look at the city.

Thousands of Radian troops manned the walls and towers, and they were all shouting for war. They beat drums. They blared horns. They waved swords and axes, and they chanted for victory.

"Radian rises!" boomed countless voices. "Radian rises!"

"A nice welcoming party they've set up," Cam muttered. The king's horse neighed and bucked.

Torin nodded. "We're honored guests. I say we ride up and make some trouble."

They advanced slowly toward the city gates, riders first. They had to move slowly, for the enemy had dug many hidden holes into the fields, each covered with a blanket of grass; several horses stepped into the traps to twist and even break their legs, and several men fell to crash down onto jagged spikes. Five hundred yards outside the city gates, the Northern Alliance halted.

"I'll go deliver our terms," Cam said.

Hogash snorted upon his bear. "Terms? The only term I have is to crush their skulls. Crush them. Like they did to Orewood."

"I thought we'd be gentlemanly about it," Cam said. "At least before we crush them."

The beefy Verilish commander sighed. "You Ardish are silly folk."

Cam rode forth, and Torin rode with him, until they stood just beyond the range of arrows. The gates and walls rose ahead, topped with thousands of troops.

Cam coned his palm around his mouth and cried out, "City of Markfir! Open your gates and send out your tyrant, the false emperor Tirus Serin. Send him forth and Markfir will be spared! Protect him and we will raze your city to the ground."

The soldiers upon the walls laughed. They banged their swords against their shields. They spat toward the field. They cried out obscenities, detailing various carnal acts Torin and Cam probably loved performing on nightcrawlers.

"Enough being gentlemanly for now?" Torin asked.

Cam nodded. "Quite enough."

The king looked over his shoulder at the rest of their troops, the forty thousand who waited in the field. He raised a silver horn and blew.

Torin raised his shield.

It begins.

Arrows flew. Catapults swung. The Battle of Eldmark Fields, the great battle for all of Moth, began.

* * * * *

Neekeya thrust her sword, slaying the last Radian defender of the pyramid. The corpse tumbled down the staircase that rose along the pyramid's southern slope, crashing down to the swamps below.

She looked around her, panting. Across the marshlands of Daenor, twelve other pyramids rose from the greenery, forming the shape of a great reptile. Across all thirteen peaks, soldiers climbed to tear down the Radian banners.

Kota, Prince of Sania, panted at Neekeya's side. He wiped his sweaty brow. "The air here in Daenor is so moist. I don't know how you can stand it."

The tall, dark-skinned man wore no armor as he fought; his bare chest gleamed with sweat, and he tugged off his helmet, letting his black braids spill down to his shoulders. The blood of his enemies coated his sword and arms.

My betrothed, Neekeya thought, staring at him, missing her fallen husband. The man I had to marry to win this battle.

Thousands of other Sanian soldiers were moving through the marshlands and climbing the pyramids, making sure all the Radian defenders were fallen. Elephants trudged through the marshlands, feeding upon the brush and drinking from the water; on their backs rode many Sanian archers.

"Thank you, Kota," Neekeya said softly. "Thank you for helping me reclaim my homeland."

She looked up the staircase. Only two steps above loomed the archway of Eetek Pyramid, leading into her old home. No more defenders emerged, and she heard no more enemy chants or taunts. Holding her sword before her, Neekeya climbed the last two steps, passed through the archway, and entered the hall.

She grimaced.

The Radian commander, governor of the occupied marshlands, lay dead on the floor, fallen onto his sword.

When Neekeya looked past the dead Radian, she gasped and covered her mouth. Tears leaped into her eyes.

Many smaller archways lined the hall, affording a view of the marshes. A skeleton was chained within one archway, arms and legs outstretched. The crows had picked the bones clean, but Neekeya recognized the skeleton's jeweled breastplate.

"Father," she whispered.

Kota entered the hall after her and winced. He pulled Neekeya into his arms and turned her head away.

"I'm sorry, Neekeya," the tall prince said, head lowered.

Princess Adisa, his sister, entered the hall next. The Sanian warrior-princess fought with a spear and a wicker shield, and her many braids chinked, strewn with beads of silver and gold. Behind her walked Sanian soldiers, armed with feathered spears. When Adisa gazed upon the scene, her eyes softened. The princess understood. She too approached Neekeya and joined the embrace.

As they walked down the staircase, back toward the swamps, the people of Daenor emerged from hiding—fishermen and farmers, a few thousand in all. At first they cheered; their land was liberated, the Radian forces slain. But when they saw Neekeya and Kota carrying the litter, the bones of their lord upon it, the people fell silent and lowered their heads.

Neekeya placed her father's bones into a sheh'an, the small reed boat of the marshlands, and covered them with a blanket of lichen. She waded alongside the sheh'an, the water rising to her waist, guiding the boat through the swamplands—her father's last journey. All around her, frogs trilled, herons hunted for fish, and the roots of mangroves rose in tangled webs. Dragonflies and fireflies flew above the water and between the branches. Mist floated.

She took her father to a stone platform that rose from the water, engraved with mossy birds and reptiles. Columns rose around the platform, supporting baskets of wilting flowers. Here was the place where Neekeya had married Tam, where her father had given her away to her sweet prince. Now here she would part from them.

She docked the boat with her father's bones, and she climbed out of the water onto the platform, lilies and moss clinging to her legs. Kota and Adisa rose to stand at her sides, and many others gathered upon fallen logs, boulders, and islets of grass—Daenorians and Sanian soldiers alike. All had come to pay their respects, to mourn with her.

Neekeya spoke softly. "The people of Daenor dig no graves, for our land is watery. We build no funeral pyres, for our wood is wet and will not easily burn. We do not entomb our dead in mausoleums of stone, for stones are things of life here, covered in moss and sheltering many small animals. To us in Daenor, life is precious, and our dead are given to the living, to the fish and birds and insects, so that our bodies may return into the land, become part of living things." She stared at the lichen blanket covering her father's bones. "The enemy chained my father in the air, letting birds feed upon him, and they meant it as a disgrace, but to a lord of Daenor to feed life, even in death, is an honor. And now I return my father's bones into the water, for from water all life has sprung, and to water all life must return." She tilted the boat over, letting the bones slide into the marshes. "From water to water. From life to life."

They all spoke around her, repeating the prayer. "From water to water. From life to life."

Tam's body was lost in the mines, and Neekeya's only memento from him was her wedding ring. Here upon this platform she had wed him, and so she lifted a stone that lay at her feet, and she placed it into the water.

Goodbye, Tam, she thought. May your spirit find rest here in the marshes and in the plains of your distant home. I will always remember you. I will always love you.

She did not wish to linger in the marshlands, not with her home desecrated, her family fallen. She turned and left.

Only a turn later, she was riding up Teekat Mountains upon the back of an elephant. Once more she wore armor of the marshes, the steel breastplate carved into the likeness of crocodile scales, the helmet shaped as a crocodile's mouth, and a necklace of crocodile teeth chinked around her neck. Before her in the saddle, Adisa sat armed with spear and bow. Behind them, all along the mountain pass, stretched a convoy of many elephants and warriors, both warriors of Sania and liberated Daenorians armed with whatever weapons they could spare.

Neekeya looked across this army and toward the distant pyramids rising from the haze. Again she was leaving her homeland, heading into danger. Perhaps this time she would never return.

She looked ahead. She kept riding. The army crested the mountains, and there in the distance she saw it—the plains of Mageria.

"Very soon, Serin, I'll knock on your door," Neekeya whispered, the cold wind fluttering her cloak. "Very soon we'll meet again."

CHAPTER SEVENTEEN:
THE WALLS OF MARKFIR

Like lumbering giants of wood and metal, the siege towers advanced toward Markfir through a hail of arrows, cannon fire, and hurtling boulders.

Torin stood atop one of the siege engines, firing arrows toward the city walls. Five stories tall, the tower moved on wooden wheels. A dozen men stood behind it, pushing it forward, and dozens more filled the structure, waiting to attack the city walls. When Torin peered between the wooden battlements, he saw a dozen other wheeled towers rolling forth across Eldmark Fields, their front facades coated with metal plates.

"Remember, boys," Torin said to the soldiers who stood around him. All wore armor and held swords. All stared back solemnly. "We race onto the city rampart. We find the courtyard. We open the city gates and let everyone else in. No matter what happens, we must reach the gates."

They nodded silently.

The siege tower shook as arrows peppered it. One arrow even drove through the metal plates and wooden planks, its tip stopping only an inch away from Torin. Several archers within the siege engine stood at arrowslits, firing back toward the walls.

"Catapults, fire!" rose a shout from the city ramparts.

Across the walls of Markfir, catapults swung, hurtling boulders into the air.

"Answer fire!" rose a cry from far behind—Cam's voice back in the Alliance's formations.

Boulders sailed through the air. From here inside the siege tower, Torin couldn't see much through the arrowslits, but he glimpsed one boulder slam into a wooden tower to their right. Beams snapped, iron plates dented, and men fell screaming to the ground.

"Hold on!" cried an archer in front of Torin.

A shadow fell.

Through the arrowslits, Torin glimpsed a boulder flying their way. He grimaced.

An instant later, a blast of sound pounded in his ears. The siege tower shook madly. Wooden beams snapped. The boulder crashed through metal and wood, scraped along Torin's arm, then plunged down the middle of the tower, crashing through each of the five stories. Men screamed. Blood sprayed. Torin clung to a piece of wood, dangling over the pit the boulder had left.

"Keep shoving us forward!" Torin shouted at the men below. He clung to the siege tower, feet upon a wooden beam. A great hole gaped ahead, and many of the tower's beams had snapped, but the shell of the structure still stood. "Keep going, we're still standing!"

One soldier, a Verilish youth of perhaps fifteen years, grabbed Torin's arm. "Sir Greenmoat, we . . . so many dead." He pointed at a man beside him; the soldier lay across a beam, crushed, lifeless.

"We keep going," Torin said. "Now fire! Fire at the walls!"

The boy swallowed, and Torin noticed liquid dripping down his leg, but the soldier dutifully raised his bow and nocked an arrow. Torin joined him, firing his own arrows through the gaping hole the boulder had left. He could see the city walls clearly now. They were only a hundred yards away, rising beyond the moat. Hundreds of Magerian troops stood atop the ramparts, breastplates emblazoned with the Radian eclipse. They were firing arrows and chanting for victory.

Torin aimed. He fired an arrow. But the defenders kept rushing to hide behind merlons, and Torin could not hit them.

A boulder sailed toward the city, thrown from the Northern Alliance host. It flew over Torin's siege tower and slammed into Markfir's walls. Defenders rained down. A merlon cracked and crumbled, revealing more enemy archers. Torin fired and hit a man. To his left, men screamed as an enemy boulder slammed into another siege tower, smashing through it, sending attackers plunging down. Arrows filled the sky, tipped with fire. Another boulder slammed into Torin's siege tower, denting a metal plate and cracking more wooden beams. They kept moving forward, tilted and smashed but still rolling.

Through a hailstorm of arrows and boulders, they reached the moat.

"Drop the gangplank!" Torin shouted.

Typical siege engines had short planks, only a few yards long, a quick passageway from tower to rampart. To attack moated Markfir, the Alliance had built gangplanks as long as bridges. Around Torin, soldiers began sliding out their plank; it expanded section by section, unfurling like the wooden tongue of some great chameleon, spanning the moat below. Arrows flew toward them. One soldier screamed, an arrow in his chest, and fell.

"Remember, boys," Torin said. "Onto the rampart. To the courtyard. And open the gates. Once the others are inside the city, the hard part's over."

They stared back and nodded solemnly.

The gangplank slammed down onto the city wall, crossing the moat. With battle cries, soldiers raced onto the makeshift bridge and began running toward the wall's battlements. Torin raised his shield, gripped his sword, and ran with them.

The gangplank was wide enough for only two men to run abreast. The moat spread below, and Torin could see the boulders buried under the water. The height made his head spin. He looked back ahead, concentrating on the city rampart. A dozen men ran with him, shields and swords ready.

A storm of arrows flew toward them. Most shattered against the attackers' shields. One arrow glanced off Torin's helmet, and another scraped across his greave. The man who ran beside Torin lost his balance, screamed, and plunged down toward the moat below. He splashed into the water and slammed against a submerged boulder. He did not rise.

Torin kept running. More arrows flew. More attackers fell.

"Keep going!" Torin shouted. "To the rampart!"

An arrow slammed into his shield. Another man fell. More replaced him, rising from the remains of the siege engine. When Torin glanced left and right, he saw a dozen more wooden towers drop their gangplanks onto the walls.

Hope sprang in Torin. We can do this. We can cross the wall. We can open the gates. And then forty thousand troops of the Northern Alliance will take this city.

He was only a dozen yards away from the wall when the Radians tilted over the cauldron of oil.

The sizzling liquid spilled against the edge of the gangplank, forcing Torin to leap back. He tilted, nearly falling, and windmilled his arms. Before he could steady himself, the Radians on the walls dropped a torch onto the gangplank.

The oil caught fire, exploding with heat and sound and fury. Torin leaped another step back, slamming into a man behind him. The gangplank ahead blazed, a great wall of fire. Torin could not cross. More arrows flew from the inferno, slamming into his shield and armor. One punched through the metal, scraping his chest, and he cried out.

Through the flames, he glimpsed the Radians swinging axes against the blazing gangplank. Torin's heart sank.

He spun around, facing the siege engine and the men behind him. "Back!" he shouted. "Back into the siege tower, go—"

The gangplank creaked and began to crack.

Torin cursed, stared down at the boulders in the water, and took two steps forward, one to the right.

It was all he had time for. The plank collapsed. Wooden slats rained down. Torin fell with them.

In his last couple seconds on the bridge, he had managed to move over a spot of clear water. He splashed down between boulders and plunged underwater. At his sides, men crashed onto boulders, breaking apart, their blood splashing. Guilt exploded through Torin, as painful as the wounds, to see his comrades die as he lived. He kicked underwater and tugged madly at the straps of his breastplate, finally tearing it off. He kicked, swam, and his head rose over the surface.

Arrows hailed down. Torin cursed, dived underwater again, and swam to the edge of the moat. He climbed out by the ruins of the siege engine and ran behind its wheels for cover. Arrows peppered the land around him.

Bleeding and cursing, he quickly surveyed the battle. The other siege towers all burned. The other gangplanks too had crumbled. A few of the attacking troops—a group of Oridian fighters—were raising great ladders across the moat and climbing, but arrows plucked them down, and soon fire and axes sent the ladders crashing down.

Torin's heart sank as surely as the men in the moat. Not one man of the Northern Alliance had managed to reach the city's ramparts, let alone cross them.

He stared back toward the east where most of their forces—swordsmen, elephants, and horses still stood, waiting to enter the gates, those gates Torin and his men had failed to open. Upon his horse, Cam raised a horn and gave two short blasts. Fall back.

"Fall back!" Torin shouted to the survivors around him. Men were hunkering behind burning debris, and some survivors crawled out from the moat, limbs shattered. Most of the attackers lay dead, and arrows kept flying. "Fall back!"

Torin lifted a wounded man, slung him across his shoulders, and began to run. Around him, a handful of others rallied and ran with him. Arrows plunged down like fiery comets. One slammed into Torin's back, and he cried out, hoping his armor shielded him. He kept running. Arrows pattered down around his feet. An Oridian fell dead before him. A Verilish woman screamed, three arrows thumping into her back, and fell. Torin kept racing, the last few survivors of the assault around him.

Finally he was out of range, and he reached the rest of his army. Only twenty others had returned with him.

Cam dismounted and rushed toward them. Torin placed down the wounded man he carried, then stumbled toward his friend, nearly collapsing.

"I hate war," Torin said miserably. "I'm a gardener, not a soldier. I don't know why you keep dragging me into these messes, Cam."

Back at the city walls, the remains of the siege towers burned, and the enemy cheered.

CHAPTER EIGHTEEN:
THE RED FLAME RISES

Serin stood upon the guard tower, gazing across the field toward the enemy forces.

"The raven flies back to its nest," he said. "The orca swims back into the depths. The bear retreats to his den. They were foolish to attack these walls."

Over a hundred towers surrounded the city of Markfir, walls stretching between them—the greatest fortification in the world. Serin stood on the tallest tower among them, the Sun's Eye. From these heights, hundreds of feet above the ground, he could see all of Eldmark Fields and the bleeding army from the north.

"Did you enjoy seeing that, Lari?" Serin asked, turning toward his daughter. "Did you enjoy seeing the bloodshed, the bodies burning, the arrows and boulders tearing into them? Look below, Lari. Do you see the corpses floating in the moat?"

His daughter trembled. She wore bright armor filigreed with gold, an eclipse upon the breastplate. A helmet topped her head, and she held both spear and sword. And yet her eyes still dampened, and her lips still shook.

"I enjoyed it, my lord," she whispered. "If you free my brother from the dungeon, I promise to enjoy every battle. I promise to be Lari, not Ariana anymore. My lord, please, I—"

He lifted his hand to strike, and she flinched and bit her lip. Instead of backhanding her, Serin caressed her cheek, his gauntlet scraping the skin like a razor.

"Call me 'Father,' my darling. I'm your father now."

She nodded, blinking tears away. "Yes, Father. But my brother, I saw him in the dungeon, I—"

"You have no brother, Lari!" He laughed. "But some turn you will bear me a grandson, a boy to become my heir."

A gagging, scraping sound rose behind Serin. He turned to see Headmaster Atratus clearing his throat; it sounded like a vulture regurgitating a mouse. The mage's bony fingers clutched the battlements like talons. The stooped, beak-nosed man stared off the tower, indeed seeming like some vulture gazing from an eyrie, waiting for a wounded animal to die before it swoops.

"Master," said the balding mage, "there are many powerful men who would marry the girl. The King of Eseer, a barbarian, perhaps would enjoy her. The Jungle King of Naya, barely more than an ape, would be glad to take her into his bed." He glanced toward Lari and licked his small, sharp teeth with a white tongue. "Yet it would be a shame to allow such a pure, beautiful daughter of Mageria be defiled by a lesser race. You've already sold your sister, the fair Iselda, to a foreign man from the Oridian backwater, and we saw how the Oridians repaid you. Your own daughter deserves a man of Mageria. Your grandson should be pure of blood."

Serin narrowed his eyes, staring at Atratus. "And I presume that you have such a man in mind."

Atratus bowed his head. "Master, you've named me your chief mage, and I've championed your cause for many years. I would gladly marry the girl Lari, even this . . . new Lari. I would give you a grandson of pure blood, strong of magic."

Serin stared at the headmaster, and a fire ignited inside him. How dared that twisted, bony creature crave his daughter, crave to steal Serin's precious prize? Serin had already lost his first Lari. He would keep his second Lari close. Precious. Safe. He glanced back toward his daughter, admiring her curved form, her large eyes, her pink lips.

She's not really my daughter, whispered a voice in his head. I can claim her as my own. I can impregnate her myself. I can father my own grandson and heir.

He turned back toward the battlements and gazed east. The alliance of rebels—those scum from the north—were setting camp across the field, raising tents and spreading out their forces.

"The enemy will not attempt to scale these walls again," Serin said, watching them. "They tested our strength. They failed. They will not be so foolish again. They will lay siege to our city, blocking the roads, cutting off our supplies. Half a million souls live in this city, and the enemy will attempt to starve us." He looked back at Atratus. "I will allow no siege. The mages of Markfir must ride out and crush the enemy. And you will lead them, Atratus."

Atratus inhaled sharply. "Master, I am an educator. A man of learning, a teacher of youths." He glanced toward the hosts of thousands, then back at his emperor. "Master, I would remain at your side, your adviser, not rush into the field like a common soldier, like—"

"You taught Offensive Magic at the university, did you not?" said Serin. "You taught the art of war. Does the great teacher of war dare not ride to one?"

Atratus licked his dry lips. He glanced at the field, and a bead of sweat appeared on his brow. Yet he straightened as far as he could and nodded. "I will lead the assault, Master. Three hundred mages protect this city. I will lead them out." His voice trembled only the slightest. "Three hundred should be more than sufficient for our task. But . . ." He cleared his throat and twisted his fingers. "I would suggest bringing the avalerions. To strike fear into their hearts."

Serin sighed. "And to offer you some protection. But yes. The avalerions will rise and fly. And the enemy will fall."

* * * * *

Torin stood in a tent pavilion, his wounds bandaged. The commanders of the Northern Alliance stood with him: King Camlin of Arden, Lord Hogash of Verilon, and King Eris of Orida. With them stood a host of other lords, and Eris's Elorian wife stood here too—Princess Yiun Yee of Leen, clad in silk robes and no armor. As they gathered here in the field, the Radians still chanted upon the city walls.

"Our siege towers are gone, and there's not enough wood in these barren plains to construct more," Eris said, face grim. "It's unnatural for a land to be so barren of trees. It chills me."

"And even if we built more siege towers, the walls are too well defended," Torin said, wincing with the pain of his wounds. "Thousands of soldiers man those walls."

Cam pointed at the table that lay before them. A map of Mageria was unrolled across it. "So we set siege to the city. Serin will find little aid. Much of his Sunmotte garrison fell in Orewood, and most of his men are still deep in Eloria. If we cannot enter the city, then no one will—no farmer bearing produce, no merchant with supplies, no shepherd with sheep or goats. We'll starve him out."

"That can take a year or longer," Tanin said. "The city must be stocked well enough to last a long time."

Cam nodded. "We've been fighting this war for two years already. So long as we keep our supply lines open, we'll be well fed here. So we wait. Another year and Serin will be forced to open the gates, or he'll starve. He—"

Horns blared from the city.

Torin spun around to stare. He felt the blood drain from his face.

"Has it been a year already?" A chill ran through his bones. "The city gates are opening."

They stepped out from the pavilion and stared across Eldmark Fields. Indeed the enemy had opened the city's thick oaken doors, and a drawbridge slammed down, spanning the moat. Black horses began emerging from the city, two by two, and soon three hundred rode across the field. On them rode men in black robes, hooded, carrying no weapons and wearing no armor. The enemy's horns blared again and again from the walls, signaling doom.

"Mages," Cam said. He raised his own horn and trumpeted over the enemy's wails. A single, long blast. Attack.

Torin mounted his horse, a brown stallion named Geranfon, a gift from King Eris. He gritted his teeth and galloped forth to meet the mages.

Cam blared the horn again. Attack! Attack!

The Northern Alliance raced toward the enemy: thousands of riders upon horses, bearing swords, and thousands of Verilish warriors upon bears, swinging their war hammers. Only three hundred mages rode toward them, but Torin knew that one mage could slay many soldiers.

When only a hundred yards separated the forces, the mages stretched out their arms and blasted forth their magic.

"Shields up!" Torin shouted.

Streams of black smoke shot toward the charging riders. One blast slammed into Torin's shield, cracked the wood in half, and crawled up his arm, tearing at his vambrace. Torin grunted, tossed the halved shield aside, and kept riding. A mage galloped toward him, casting more magic. Torin rode by, rose in his stirrups, and swung his sword.

The blade sank into a protective shield of air, doing the mage no harm.

Torin spun his horse around to see the mages tearing through the Northern Alliance. Smoke tugged down horses and bears, ripped off armor, and tugged bones out from flesh. A smoky strand grabbed an Oridian rider several feet away and squeezed, crushing the armor like a tin cup. Blood leaked from inside.

Horror clutched Torin. We were fools to ride here. We should have fled.

He gritted his teeth.

No fear. Not now.

He charged back toward the mages and swung his sword at one of the robed, hooded men. The mage blocked the blade with a blast of magic. The man's black hood fell back, and Torin gasped.

He knew that face! He had seen it before! The man was balding, a ring of oily black hair surrounding his head. His nose was hooked, his eyes dark and glittering. He reminded Torin of a vulture, and then he remembered.

"Professor Atratus," Torin said, the name tasting like ash. He had seen the man only briefly when bringing Madori to Teel University, but he hadn't forgotten the malice in that face.

Atratus sneered and raised his hands. He blasted forth magic.

The black energy slammed into Torin's breastplate. His horse reared beneath him, and Torin fell from the saddle. He hit the ground.

"Warriors of Verilon, slay them!" rose a cry, and a herd of bears came charging forth. Hogash rode at their lead, swinging a war hammer, and behind him a hundred other warriors of Verilon brandished their own hammers and roared for victory. With a sneer, Atratus turned away from Torin—perhaps thinking him dead already—and blasted his magic toward the Verilish assault.

Torin leaped to his feet. He tried to find Geranfon, but the horse had run off. All around him, mages, horsemen, and bears clashed in battle. Swords sliced at mages, struggling to tear through their shields of air. A Verilish man rode by and swung his hammer, knocking a mage off his horse. The young man—an albino mage with pink eyes—slammed down at Torin's feet. Torin growled and drove down his sword. The blade pierced through the mage's shield and into flesh, and the man gasped and reached out, struggling to summon more magic before Torin swung his sword again, finishing the job.

"I killed one!" Torin shouted. "They can be killed! Knock them off their horses, break their concentration, and slay them!"

All around him, the riders of the Northern Alliance—thousands of them—swung their weapons. King Eris thrust his lance forward, piercing a mage and knocking him off his horse. Another mage fell dead nearby, crushed by Verilon's hammers. Strands of magic shot out from the remaining mages, scattering corpses. Torin looked around for Atratus, but he could no longer see the mage. The dead covered the field; hundreds had already fallen.

But we're winning, Torin thought, panting as he moved through the battle, swinging his sword. We're slaying the mages.

He looked toward the city walls. "Is that all you've got, Serin? Only three hundred mages for us to crush?"

As if to answer him, shrieks louder than any horn rose from the city walls.

Torin looked up and froze. His hopes shattered and burned like the siege engines.

Great vultures were rising from the city, each as large as a dragon. Dank, oily feathers grew across their wings, though their bodies were naked as if plucked, their skin gray and bumpy. They opened their beaks and screeched again, revealing white tongues. Their claws were larger than swords, and their eyes shone red. Torin was instantly reminded of Gehena; these birds seemed molded from the same dark magic, stitched together, grown to monstrous size. An unholy cloud spread above them, shielding the sun, as if the sky offended them. Shadows fell across Eldmark Fields. The mages cheered at the sight of the beasts, crying out to them, "Avalerions! Avalerions!" Seven of the creatures flew toward the Northern Alliance . . . and swooped.

The oversized vultures plowed through the forces. Their talons slammed into bears, ripping them open. They scooped up horses and tossed them down. Their beaks tore through armor and bones.

"Shoot them down!" Cam was shouting somewhere in the distance. "Archers, fire!"

Archers rushed forth, knelt in the field, and fired their arrows skyward. The missiles slammed into the avalerions, seeming only to annoy them. The demonic vultures swooped again, driving through the hosts, tearing through the riders like wolves through a chicken coop.

Torin grabbed a horse, shoved off its dead rider, and climbed into the saddle. He raised his sword. "Men, rally here! Cut them when they swoop!"

The avalerions rose higher, circled beneath the clouds, and dived again. Claws drove through the army. Soldiers flew through the air, torn apart. Horses crumbled. Bears collapsed. The blood spilled everywhere. One of the avalerions flew toward Torin, screeching madly, rot dripping from its beak. Torin swung his sword. It clanged against the beast's talons, doing it no harm. The oversized vulture rose higher, dived again, and slammed into a host of charging horses—including Torin's. He flew through the air and crashed down hard. Men rained down around him.

The corpses of his comrades lay strewn around Torin, and the avalerions kept attacking, lifting men, tossing them down, and the remaining mages kept moving through the field, blasting out their magic. And Torin knew there was no hope.

Hope dies in Eldmark Fields, he thought, lying on his back, too weak to rise.

Horns.

More horns blared.

Not the shrieking horns of the enemy. Not the high, metallic calls of the Northern Alliance. Here were pure clarion calls, a sound like music.

Torin raised his head and stared to the east.

And there he saw it.

"Hope reborn," he whispered.

They marched across the plains, countless, covering the horizon. The dark clouds of magic parted as if driven back, and the sun emerged, its rays falling upon the new host. Their banners rose high, displaying a red flame upon a black field. A great serpent flew above them, a dragon of the night, his beard red, his scales black—the same dragon Torin had ridden as a young man.

"The army of Ilar," Torin whispered, tears in his eyes. "Elorians arrive. The night has fallen upon the lands of the day."

CHAPTER NINETEEN:
LAST OF THE DRAGONS

Sitting upon Grayhem's back, Madori stared at the battle ahead and felt the blood drain from her face.

"Shan dei," she cursed.

The city of Markfir, a massive hive of towers and walls as large as fallen Pahmey, rose a mile away beneath a mountain range. Before the city spread a great killing field.

"Others attack Markfir," said Koyee, sitting at Madori's side upon a shadow panther. "Orca banners—Orida from North Timandra. Bear banners—that's Verilon of the pine forests. And . . . raven banners. Only a few but rising proud."

"Arden," Madori whispered, and tears leaped into her eyes. "Arden fights. Maybe Father is here."

Shrieks sounded on the wind, and Madori grimaced. Massive vultures, the size of dragons, were tearing into the assaulting free forces. Here flew avalerions; she had learned about such creatures at Teel University, foul things created from dead flesh and fire. Beneath the avalerions, mages rode black horses across the field, casting their magic, tearing apart the attackers. Thousands of Magerians still stood upon the city walls, mere specks from this distance, a massive force. Thousands of dead already covered Eldmark Fields.

Madori stared, barely able to breathe. Her fingers tingled. Her skull felt too fight. She had spent the journey here eager for battle, eager to strike at Serin. Now, seeing the death and bloodshed, she was afraid.

Tianlong streamed above, and upon the dragon's back, Emperor Jitomi blew his horn and cried out, "Ilar, hear me! Warriors of the Red Flame, fear no sunlight! We will crush the enemy. We will smash the city gates and slay the cruel tyrant. We are Eloria. We are the night!"

Upon thousands of panthers, Ilari warriors raised their katanas. Their eyes were weak in the daylight, but clouds hid the sun. They spread across the fields, some mounted, some afoot, some bearing swords, others bows and arrows, the might of Ilar—a hundred thousand strong. They all cried out together.

"We are the night!"

And Madori shouted with them, her katana raised above her head. She was not Ilari; she was a child of Qaelin, a different land of darkness. She was not even fully Elorian; her father was a man of sunlight. Yet now, chanting here, none of that mattered. She was a warrior—not fighting for one kingdom, not even fighting for one half of Moth. She would fight against evil, against the cruelty of the Radian Empire. With Ilar. With the free Timandrians fighting ahead. With Jitomi, the man she loved. With her mother. With all who fought against tyranny.

I am Madori Billy Greenmoat, she thought as the army roared for the night. I was named after Bailey Berin, the great heroine of the first war. I will be brave like her.

Koyee stood in her stirrups, clad in silvery scales. "Eloria! Ride! Ride for the night. Ride for fire and for shadow. Ride with me! To war! To victory! To shattering swords and singing arrows! Ride!"

And they rode, an emperor upon a dragon, thousands of Elorians upon panthers, and a single half-breed woman upon a nightwolf.

They rode across the fields, through light and shadow, toward the enemy.

The mages in the field turned toward the Elorians and reached out their arms. Bolts of magic blasted forth.

"Ride!" Koyee shouted.

"Ride!" Madori cried with her.

The Elorian army thundered across the field, the panthers growling, their eyes glowing. The blasts of magic hit them. A ball of smoke and metal shards crashed into a panther at Madori's side. The beast collapsed and rolled, spilling its rider. Another blast of magic plunged down like a comet, slamming into another Elorian. The man and his panther fell, crushed and burnt.

"Ride!" Madori shouted, sword raised. "We are the night!"

The projectiles kept slamming into them, tearing down rider after rider, but the survivors kept racing forward, thousands of them. The great avalerions swooped forth, and above her, Madori glimpsed Tianlong battling the beasts, snapping his jaws and whipping his tail. One avalerion plunged down, its throat torn out, and slammed into the ground ahead of Madori. Grayhem raced over the corpse as if bounding over a hill. Panthers growled and followed. Another avalerion crashed down dead, and Elorians fired from their panthers, slamming their arrows into the remaining beasts.

"For Eloria!" Madori cried, riding toward the mages ahead.

She raced between free Timandrians now—Verilish riders on bears, Oridians on horses—and reached the dark mages of the enemy.

The mages did not retreat. One, hidden in his black robes, blasted out magic and tore down three panthers. Another mage ascended in the air and shot out electricity, tearing Elorians off their mounts. Grayhem weaved between the enemies, leaping over blasts of magic, and bounded toward a mage ahead.

The mage turned his horse around to face Madori.

She lost her breath.

She trembled.

The mage stared at her, and his face twisted into a cruel smile.

"Atratus," she whispered.

His smile widened, revealing his small, sharp teeth, his hooked nose drooping to hide his top two incisors. He began walking toward her, stepping over corpses. "Hello, mongrel." He raised his hands, the fingers crackling with energy. "You have returned to me for your final lesson."

Madori screamed and hurtled forth her magic.

Her former professor sneered and blasted forth his own foul spells.

The projectiles crashed in midair, exploding and showering sparks. Instantly, Madori raised a shield of protective air. Not a second later, Atratus's magic flared again, slamming into the force field. Madori screamed, her shield shattering, the blast knocking her down.

She leaped up at once. She levitated shards of broken steel and tossed them forward. He waved the projectiles aside, cast out a ball of air and hardened smoke, and knocked her down again. She yowled, blood dripping down her chest.

Atratus stepped closer toward her, moving through the battle. All around the combatants fought—mages tearing down men and beasts, avalerions and dragon battling above. Fires blazed across the field and smoke unfurled. The stooped headmaster leaned over Madori and licked his chops.

"Your death will not be quick," he said, sending down tendrils of smoke. The strands wrapped around her. "I will toy with you first."

She tried to claim the strands, to rip them off, but his magic was too strong. She tried claiming his flesh, to tear it open, but a shield of air surrounded him; she could not break through. Tears budded in her eyes as he levitated her, as his strands squeezed, constricting her breath.

"Atratus . . ." she whispered hoarsely. "You . . . you will fail. You cannot win this battle."

Atratus sighed. "Your band of nightcrawlers will not enter the city. They will be crushed here upon the field. Already they fall. But I won't let you live long enough to see their defeat."

He tightened the strands further. Her scale armor cracked. Hovering a foot above the ground, she couldn't even scream in pain. Stars floated before her eyes. Darkness began to spread, closing in, darkness like the night, like the shadows of the Desolation where Master Lan Tao had taught her to fight.

Breathe, he spoke in her mind. Breathe, Madori.

I can't! Her tears streamed, and she saw nothing but Atratus's face, sneering, mocking her, the shadows all around it. He won't let me breathe.

Focus on the air already inside you. Like you did underwater. Become aware. Become a warrior of Yin Shi. Begin with your toes.

Her toes? By the stars, how could she focus on her toes now as the magic crushed her ribs? Yet she obeyed. She moved all her awareness toward her toes, shifting her attention away from the pain in her torso. She felt the tightness of her boots around them. The sharpness of her toenails which she had not properly trimmed. The air around her feet as she floated.

And she no longer felt the pain.

Expand it.

She expanded her awareness, taking in the battle around her, the smoke, the flames, the city beyond. She took all the world into her consciousness, became one with that world, living in the present, experiencing every instant. Time slowed to a crawl.

She was Yin Shi.

She chose and claimed the world.

She brought that world down upon Atratus.

Air slammed against him. A thousand shards of broken blades and armor and bone drove into him. The weight of the sky crushed him. Atratus screamed and fell, and his magic left her.

Madori crashed down to the ground, banging her knees. She did not waste an instant on the pain. She stretched out her arm, palm open, and shot out a blast of energy. The shard coalesced in midair, formed of smoke and debris, and drove into Atratus's chest.

He screamed and fell onto his back. Blood dampened his black robes.

Madori walked toward him, every step creaking with pain, the tip of her katana dragging across the ground. She stared down at the writhing, bleeding man. Suddenly he seemed pathetic to her, a frail, aging man in the mud.

"You call us worms," she whispered, "yet now you writhe in the dirt. Do you know where I learned my focus? In the night." She raised her sword. "Do you know where this blade was forged? In the darkness. You called Eloria weak, yet my Elorian half has always given me strength even in the sunlight. And now it spells your end."

She raised her sword high.

Lying on the ground, he screamed and summoned a shield of air.

Her katana drove through his magic and crashed into his chest.

He sputtered. Blood filled his mouth.

"I only wanted to be a healer," Madori whispered. "But you taught me to kill."

He gave a gasp, reaching toward her with his last breath, and then he breathed no more.

She tugged her sword free and looked around her at the battle. Her mother was fighting ahead upon a panther, leading a host of Elorian riders to slay another mage. Only two avalerions remained in the sky, and Tianlong flew between them, battling the pair. Bodies spread across Eldmark Field, fires burned, smoke rose in columns, and armies spread into the distance.

* * * * *

"Slay them and fly over the city walls, Tianlong!" Jitomi shouted, riding the dragon over the battlefield. "We must open the city gates!"

The armies fought below: mages on black horses, free Timandrians from the north, and a hundred thousand Elorians. Ahead, past smoke and flame and death, rose the walls of Markfir. The charred shells of siege towers lay before the moat, their shattered gangplanks sunken into the water. Upon the city walls, thousands of Radian defenders stood waiting for a new assault; they were armed with bows, catapults, ballistae, and cauldrons of sizzling oil, and the first assault had seemed to cause them no damage.

We must open the city gates and lower the drawbridge, Jitomi thought, or even a hundred thousand men will be unable to cross the moat and walls.

Tianlong roared and flew forth toward the walls, but two of the avalerions—rotting vultures the size of dragons—still lived, their bodies pierced with arrows. One was black and warty, the other gray and wrinkly. Both flew toward Tianlong, blood on their claws. They opened their beaks wide, revealing bits of human flesh.

Jitomi fired his crossbow, slamming a bolt into the wrinkly gray avalerion. The beast shrieked and dipped in the sky. The black avalerion soared, reached Tianlong, and lashed its talons.

Tianlong howled. The warty vulture's talons tore through him, and scales rained down toward the battlefield. The dragon's own claws were smaller, barely larger than human fingers, but his jaws were wide. He snapped his teeth, trying to grab the avalerion, to tear it open.

Jitomi loaded another quarrel and shot again. He hit the black avalerion's head, and the beast screeched. Tianlong plunged and closed his jaw around the warty creature's neck, biting deep.

The wrinkly gray avalerion, Jitomi's first quarrel still stuck in its chest, soared up and crashed against them.

Tianlong bellowed and spun through the sky. Jitomi gritted his teeth, clinging onto the saddle. The world turned upside down, and the crossbow fell, tumbling toward the ground.

"Fly, Tianlong!" Jitomi shouted and drew his katana. "Slay the avalerions! To the gates!"

Blood dripped from the dragon. Shreds of his skin hung loosely, revealing the cuts of talons. The black avalerion was still alive, its neck bleeding. It drew nearer, and Tianlong bellowed and shot toward it. The dragon rose higher, dodging the snapping beak, then plunged and drove his jaws into the avalerion's dark flesh. The dragon tugged back, ripping the beast open, and the rank vulture plunged down toward the battle.

Only the gray avalerion now remained, shrieking madly. Perhaps fearing to face Tianlong alone, it swooped toward a group of Elorian archers—easier prey.

"We must open the gates, Tianlong," Jitomi said, the wind nearly stealing his words. He stared at the city wall, fear driving through him. Catapults, archers, and cannons topped the ramparts. "We must fly high. We must open the gates and lower the bridge. Please, Tianlong."

The dragon nodded. He panted and his blood fell, and another one of his scales tore free and fell toward the battle. Yet still he flew onward.

Regaining some courage, the last avalerion soared, tossing aside dead Elorians. As Tianlong flew toward the city, the fetid bird rose to slam against the dragon's belly.

Talons lashed. The creature's beak closed around Tianlong's neck, cracking scales. The dragon tried to roar, to fight back, but only a whimper left his jaws.

Jitomi snarled, leaped from the saddle, and raced up Tianlong's neck. The dragon swayed, and Jitomi nearly fell but grabbed Tianlong's horn. He drove down his katana, slamming the blade into the avalerion's wrinkly head.

The great vulture opened its beak, gave a last cry, then plunged down toward the battle. It slammed against the earth. Elorians rode toward it and drove swords into its hide.

Tianlong dipped in the sky, panting, his blood raining. "Jitomi, I . . . I must rest."

"You have to keep flying, Tianlong." Jitomi pointed his red sword at the city. "We have to fly over the walls. We must open the gates."

The black dragon nodded and kept flying across Eldmark Fields. He dipped again in the sky. "We will open the gates."

"Higher, Tianlong!" Jitomi shouted. "Higher, out of the range of arrows. Fly!"

The dragon tried to soar. He rose a few feet in the sky. He streamed toward the city walls.

A storm of arrows flew toward them.

"Tianlong, higher!"

But the dragon was too weak. Arrows slammed into him, tipped with fire. They drove into the wounds the avalerions had left. One arrow slammed into his mouth, tearing the palate. Another arrow slammed into Jitomi's armor, denting the steel and scratching his skin.

"Tianlong!" he cried hoarsely. "Fly!"

The dragon kept flying. He raised his head, and he let out a great roar, a roar that shook the battlefield and city. It was the roar of a lost dragon, the last of his kind. It was the roar of Ilar, an empire of fire and shadow. It was the roar of a people risen from darkness, striking back at the burning light, a people fighting against all hope. It was the roar of the night.

He kept flying.

Through arrows and smoke, bleeding, hurting, Tianlong flew forward, body snaking across the sky, red beard fluttering like a banner, a creature of pride and strength and magic. In the battlefield below, Elorians chanted for their champion, and even upon the city walls, Radians gazed with awe, for a few moments transfixed by the beauty of Eloria and her warriors.

Then, upon the wall, a ballista moved.

The great crossbow, large as a catapult, turned toward the dragon. Upon it lay a massive harpoon, larger than a man, a spike of jagged iron. Soldiers at its sides turned winces, and gears and ropes creaked, and Jitomi could barely breathe with horror.

The ballistae fired.

Jitomi cried out.

The harpoon sailed toward them, and Tianlong tried to bank, to dodge it, but he was too weak. Too hurt.

The iron shard drove into him, and Tianlong, last dragon of Eloria, fell from the sky.

They crashed into Eldmark Fields with a shower of dirt.

Jitomi fell from the saddle and rolled across the field. He struggled to rise. He crawled toward Tianlong and embraced his great scaly head.

"Don't die," he whispered. "Don't leave me alone."

The dragon stared at him, eyes narrowed and glowing, and it seemed to Jitomi that Tianlong smiled. Then his eyes closed and would open no more.

Thus the last dragon falls, Jitomi thought. Thus an ancient wonder leaves Moth.

He was near the city walls now, close to the moat. When he looked up, he saw arrows flying down toward him from the ramparts. Jitomi dived behind Tianlong. Arrows slammed into the dragon. One scraped against Jitomi. Another slammed into his shoulder, and he cried out in pain.

When he looked up, he saw the archers nocking new arrows.

"Jitomi!"

The cry rose across the field, and he looked east. His vision was blurred, but he made out a gray shape leaping forward, zigzagging across the field. Arrows fell, missing the target.

"Madori!" he cried.

She raced toward him upon her nightwolf. More arrows flew, hitting Tianlong. The nightwolf leaped forward and reached Jitomi.

"Come on!" Madori cried, reaching down from the saddle. She grabbed him and tugged him onto the nightwolf.

Grayhem spun back east and burst into a run. He raced from side to side, arrows falling around him. One scraped along his side, slicing fur. The nightwolf kept running, faster than a galloping horse, until they emerged from the range of arrows and rejoined the rest of their army.

In a crowd of Elorians, Grayhem halted and panted. An arrow in his shoulder, Jitomi stumbled off the wolf and lay on the ground, weary, bleeding, grieving.

"He's fallen, Madori," he whispered. "The last dragon."

She knelt beside him, grabbed the arrow in his shoulder, and tugged it loose. He grunted and his blood flowed.

"But you're still alive," Madori said, eyes flashing. "And you're still the commander of this force. Go get your wounds tended to. The battle continues." Her eyes were red and damp, and she knuckled them dry. "Go!"

He nodded. He squared his jaw. "The battle continues."

I will not die here, Tianlong, he swore. I will win this war. For your memory. For all free people in both darkness and in light.

CHAPTER TWENTY:
MOONRISE AND SUNRISE

Serin stared down from the city walls at the corpses of his flying beasts and mages. The nightcrawlers were swarming across the field, cheering, staining his empire with their wretchedness.

And they were here. Serin saw them even from this distance. The mother and daughter. Koyee. Madori. The women he had vowed to break.

Rage.

Rage, white and blinding, flared in Serin.

"They slew my flying beasts," he whispered, voice trembling. "They slew my mages. They slew my servant Atratus." He clenched his fists, and a grin spread across his face. "They will feel so much pain."

"My lord," said Lari, "I'm frightened. Will the nightcrawlers hurt us? Will—"

He struck her.

He struck her with all his might, driving his gauntlet against her face. Blood showered. She yelped and would have fallen from the wall had Serin not grabbed her.

"I told you," he said. "Call me 'Father.'"

She is like an infant, he thought. She will learn. She will grow into a true Lari.

He dragged her off the wall and to a courtyard in the city. He mounted his horse and pulled her onto his saddle, seating her ahead of him. They rode through the city, many guards riding at their sides.

Markfir, one of the largest cities in Moth, was eerily silent this turn. Home to half a million souls, the city normally bustled with life: peddlers hawking every type of food from wheeled carts, urchins scuttling underfoot, buskers and fortune tellers standing at every street corner, and thousands of people walking the cobbled streets between shops and homes. This turn, with the enemy outside the walls, all those people were out of sight. The shops were closed. The people hid in their homes; many had boarded shut their windows. Soldiers stood everywhere, still and stern, their helmets hiding their faces.

Serin kept riding. They passed by many three-storied buildings of brown-gray bricks, their roofs tiled red. Barracks rose upon hills, their towers flying his banners. Temples rose above homes, their steeples scraping the clouds; archers now stood within their bell towers. The city had become a great fortress. Serin knew the nightcrawlers would never break through the walls, but even if they did, they would find only death.

He passed through the second layer of walls, then the third, finally entering the Old City. The buildings here were ancient; the very first people of Mageria had built them two thousand years ago. The bricks were old here, so old the mind could barely grasp their age, the craggy stone whispering of long-forgotten histories. Rather than having tiled roofs, these buildings were domed, their windows and doors arched. As the wind blew down alleyways, Serin imagined that he heard the ghosts of those lost generations.

They rode uphill toward Solgrad Castle, a massive structure whose foundations had been built thousands of years ago, expanded every generation. He dismounted, leaving the horse to his stable boy, and took Lari's hand. He pulled her past soldiers, through the gates, and into the palace hall.

His throne rose upon a dais beneath three draping banners; one showed the Radian eclipse, the second the buffalo of Old Mageria, and the third a tower beneath a mountain, sigil of the city. Guards stood between the columns, faces hidden in their helmets. Serin's sister stood by the throne, wearing a gown of the same crimson fabric, and a golden eclipse shone upon her throat. Iselda's hair cascaded across her shoulders, just as golden, and her blue eyes stared across the hall toward Serin and Lari.

The sorceress walked toward them across the dark tiles. When she reached them, she tilted her head, examining Lari's cut face. She caressed the trembling girl's cheek.

"Precious child," Iselda said. "You must learn not to disobey your father."

Serin ignored his sister and walked past her. Iselda had proven herself useless to him. He had sent her north to marry the King of Orida, to join their armies to his. And now the Oridians—those scum from the sea—lay siege to his city.

Past the throne, Serin saw him. He stood between two columns, clad in black steel, an eclipse upon his breast, as if he were a Magerian.

"Torumun," Serin said, not masking the disgust in his voice. "You stand here in my hall, dressed like us, my sigil upon your chest, husband to my sister . . . while your armies, the very armies I commanded you to lead into darkness, attack this great city of sunlight."

The Oridian prince was tall, almost as tall as Serin, his hair blond, his eyes blue. Clad in his black armor, he could almost pass for a true Magerian; both races were descended from the Old Riyonans, the people of northeastern Timandra. But rather than proving himself worthy of the Radian Order, this man had proven himself weak.

"It is my brother, the usurper named Eris Grimgarg, a craven and tyrant, who leads the hosts of Orida," said Torumun. The damn Oridians always spoke so formally.

"And who let him usurp Orida's throne?" Serin said.

Torumun stiffened. "He had giants with him, my lord. He—"

"I let you wed my sister!" Serin shouted. His voice was so loud Torumun started. "I let you wed her. I let you bed her. I took you into my hall as a brother. You vowed to align your army with mine. Now they attack my gates!"

Torumun had the grace to lower his head. "I am sorry, my lord. I am deeply ashamed." He looked up, and his eyes glittered. "I will find Eris and his wife, the nightcrawler he dragged back from the darkness. I will slay them both." He raised his chin. "I will prove myself worthy of the eclipse, my lord, I swear it. I will retake Orida and turn its armies against the nightcrawlers."

"And you will hand me your thumb," said Serin. "The left one."

Torumun frowned. "My lord?"

"You thumbed your nose at me, brother-in-law. So I think it only fair that you hand me that thumb."

The Oridian stiffened and glanced toward his wife. "Iselda, is—"

"Do as he says," said Iselda. She smiled thinly. "You don't want to cross him. If you don't give him your thumb, he'll ask for more."

Sweat beaded on Torumun's brow. "This is barbaric! I did not come here to play these games. I—"

"You came here seeking sanctuary," said Serin, "after you were banished from your own kingdom, a dog kicked away from his master's table. I took you in. I saved your life. I continue to save it every moment that I shelter you here. Your thumb! Draw your sword. Cut it off. Hand it to me now, here in this hall, or I will have your whole hand, then your arm, then your head."

The guards across the hall shifted, hands reaching toward their hilts. The blood drained from Torumun's face. Iselda approached him, placed a hand on his shoulder, and smiled.

When Serin left the hall, he smiled too. He returned to the city walls and gazed out at the enemy besieging him. He unfolded his handkerchief, grabbed the thumb within, and tossed it off the city walls as far as he could.

* * * * *

The last of the demonic vultures had fallen; so had Tianlong, last dragon of the night. The mages lay dead, and the surviving allies—a great coalition of free nations from both day and night—were searching for the wounded among the piles of dead. Upon the city walls, the Radian defenders shouted and jeered, awaiting another assault. For now, only death stretched between the forces, a no man's land of scattered flames and corpses. The battle lulled. As both sides nursed their wounds, crows descended to peck at the fallen.

Torin limped through the battlefield, aching, bleeding, cut and bruised a hundred times. But he did not care about his wounds, about the pain. He cared about only one thing now.

The Ilari might have news. His eyes stung. If they traveled through Qaelin on their way . . . Oh, Idar, they might have seen Koyee and Madori.

He walked between his comrades of the Northern Alliance, a collection of Timandrian warriors from three nations. He made his way past horses and bears, across a field of dead, and toward the Elorian army. The warriors of Ilar sat ahead upon great, black panthers the size of horses, the beasts' eyes glowing yellow. The riders seemed almost as beastly, clad in black steel plates, their helmets shaped as snarling demons; their large Elorian eyes glowed through holes in the visors, indigo and green and deep purple. Many katanas hung across their backs, and tassels hung from their shields.

Torin tried to remember the Ilari dialect—it was similar to Qaelish, a language he spoke well—to ask for news about his wife. And then he saw her.

He froze and lost his breath.

Koyee sat upon an Ilari panther, but she wore Qaelish armor—a suit of silvery scales and a simple, unadorned helmet of bright steel which left her face bare. She turned toward him and met his eyes, and Torin felt as if the pillars of creation tumbled around him.

He wanted to be strong. He wanted to be a soldier, a hero. But his eyes watered, and his body shook, and he could barely stay standing.

Koyee.

He had not seen his wife in over two years, not since that summer he had taken Madori to Teel University. Over two years of war, pain, fear. So many sleepless turns, worrying, not knowing if Koyee lived or died. So many turns in darkness, afraid, missing her, imagining her by his side.

Koyee.

The woman he had met over twenty years ago in the darkness of Eloria, returning her father's bones into the night. The woman he had fought in Pahmey, then loved, then protected, then married. His lantern in the darkness. The very beat of his heart. His reason to live. His love. His wife. His Koyee.

She dismounted and seemed almost hesitant, almost unsure. Perhaps, with his beard and dented armor, she was uncertain it was him. He reached out to her.

"Koyee."

Her eyes flooded with tears, and she ran toward him, and she crashed into his arms, and she wept, and he wept with her. They stood in blood, death all around them, embracing, kissing each other, trembling, laughing.

"Torin." She laughed through her tears, her body shaking with sobs. "Oh Torin. It's you. It's you."

He couldn't speak. He could only hold her. When words finally left his mouth, all he could say was, "I love you. Koyee, I love you."

She clung to him. "I love you too, Torin. I was so scared. Thank the stars, thank Idar, thank Xen Qae . . . oh Torin, I was so scared, and I love you so much."

He swept back strands of her hair. "Where's Madori? Is she . . . do you have news, is—"

"Father!"

He turned and saw her there. Madori ran toward him across the field, and she too wore Qaelish armor and bore a sword.

"Madori!"

His tears flowed anew, and Madori leaped into his arms and squeezed him, nearly crushing him, crying against him. "Father! I didn't know if you were dead. Oh, Father, thank Idar you're here." She frowned and tilted her head. "You look horrible."

He laughed weakly. "We all do. But we're together again."

Madori leaned her head against his chest, and the three of them held one another close, standing together in ruin, never wanting to break apart.

Horns.

Once more, horns blared across Eldmark Fields.

Torin turned toward the sound. From the north, great siege towers were rolling across the field. Torin narrowed his eyes. How could this be? All their siege towers had burned at the walls! Then Torin saw that here were greater structures, wider and taller, built of metal and leather. Many troops walked alongside the towers in neat rows, clad in scales and silvery cloaks, and they raised long standards bearing moonstars and diamonds. Thousands of the soldiers advanced toward the field. At their lead rode a man upon a nightwolf, armless and legless but proud and tall, a crown upon his head.

Torin had not thought he could shed more tears, but his eyes dampened again.

"The hosts of Qaelin and Leen," he whispered. "All of Eloria has risen."

* * * * *

The cannons fired for hours, blasting the walls of Markfir.

Torin stood in the field, covering his ears as the cannonballs kept flying. The projectiles shot across Eldmark Fields, slamming into the walls again and again, chipping off stones. Cracks spread across the ramparts. A turret crumbled and fell. Yet still the walls stood, for they were several feet thick, and even the guns of Eloria could not shatter them, no more than they could have shattered the mountains beyond.

"Keep firing at the gates!" Emperor Jin shouted, riding his nightwolf between the guns. "Smash them open!"

A cannon fired, rolling backwards in the field. Its cannonball flew across the field and moat and hit the city gates. The doors, carved of thick stone and reinforced with iron, withstood the attack.

Perhaps magic too reinforces them, Torin thought. Perhaps we—

Cannons fired from the city walls, great guns shaped as buffaloes, larger than the Elorian weapons. Cannonballs flew toward the Alliance. Torin cursed and raced for cover, diving into the ditch he had dug earlier that turn. More guns blasted. His head spun. Smoke covered the world. Men screamed. When Torin rose from the ditch, he found that an enemy cannonball had hit one Elorian fire team; the gunners lay dead, their corpses torn apart, little of them left to bury.

His ears ringing and his stomach churning, Torin turned away from the carnage. As healers rushed forth to scour the field for pieces of the dead, Torin walked toward Jin. The limbless emperor turned on his nightwolf. His face was sweaty, his eyes weary.

"How do you Timandrians stand this sunlight?" the Qaelish emperor said. "It's so bright and hot and burns the skin."

Torin looked up toward the veiled sky. "You're lucky it's overcast." He returned his eyes to the emperor. "Jin, the guns have done their work. We're already low on gunpowder. With your forces and siege towers, we have the might to assault the walls again." Torin sighed. "Our guns will be heard across Moth. Serin has more armies in this world, and they will be heading back home. We must slay him before he receives aid."

The young emperor nodded. "I'll summon the council."

As guns and catapults kept firing from both sides, the commanders of the Alliance met in the field. Several Elorians stood to one side: Emperor Jin, limbless, astride a nightwolf, leading the forces of Qaelin; Princess Yiun Yee and her father, the wise old Emperor of Leen; and Jitomi alongside several of his nobles, commanders of the Ilari host. With them gathered the commanders of the Timandrian forces opposing Serin: King Camlin and Queen Linee of Arden, and with them Torin; King Eris of Orida, tall and fair, his golden beard singed from enemy fire; and finally Lord Hogash, the bluff gatekeeper who now commanded Verilon's forces. After only a quick gathering, the guns blasting as they spoke, they parted.

The Alliance gathered for another assault. Nine Qaelish siege towers, constructed of metal sheets over iron beams, arranged themselves in a line. Men stood within them upon platforms, ready to turn levers and spin gears and wheels.

"Stay behind," Torin said to his daughter. He placed a helmet over his head. "Stay at the back of the battle where it's safe."

She glared and placed her hands on her hips. "Father, there's no way I'm staying behind. I fought for two years in this war, and I slew Professor Atratus myself, and I'm not staying behind now, and—"

"All right."

"—I refuse to just hide when the end is here, and I insist on killing Serin myself too, and—"

"All right, Madori." Torin scratched his chin.

"—and how dare you tell me to stay behind when . . ." She blinked. "Oh. All right." She grinned and leaped toward a siege engine. "I'll just climb in and—"

This time, it was not horns that rose across the field, interrupting her words. It was the sound of drums and the roar of countless men and beasts, a cry cruel and thirsty for blood.

Torin felt cold sweat trickle down his back.

Oh Idar . . . what fresh evil assaults us now?

The sound came from the south. He and Madori turned and stared, and both drew their swords.

With so many people already in Eldmark Fields, Torin could scarcely imagine more souls in one place. Yet now countless troops marched from the southern plains, swallowing the land. He dared not even estimate their numbers; he would not have been surprised if a hundred thousand marched here. Some rode camels and wore white robes, and they carried scimitars and spears. Others in this new host sported red, braided beards and wore tiger pelts, and they led living tigers upon leashes. All raised the Radian banners.

"The forces of Naya and Eseer," Torin said grimly. "Come to rescue Serin."

The new forces kept marching, no end to them. They beat their war drums, and they chanted for war.

"Radian rises! Radian rises!"

Horns blared across the Alliance camp. Men abandoned the siege towers and formed ranks, turning away from the city and toward the south. Torin mounted his horse, and Madori hopped onto her nightwolf. Koyee raced forward on her panther, her sword raised, charging toward the southern hosts.

"Alliance, attack! Fight!"

A heartbeat later, the alliance armies—a great gathering of free nations—charged after her, roaring and holding their weapons high. The hosts streamed across Eldmark Fields, banners high, horns blaring, countless troops covering the land, and slammed together in a great crash of metal and wood and screams.

Hope had begun to spring in Torin. He had thought that, with the Elorian hosts bolstering the Alliance, with the avalerions and the mages slain, they could scale the city walls, open the gates, storm the streets and slay Serin. Now he doubted they'd ever reach those walls again. The new enemies charged everywhere. Men and women rose upon camels, white robes flying in the wind, lashing scimitars. Tigers raced through the battle, tearing into soldiers. Jungle warriors fought in a wild horde, thrusting spears, laughing as they killed.

And everywhere, Alliance soldiers fell. The Elorians' eyes were weak in the sunlight, and when the clouds cleared, revealing the blazing sun, their eyesight grew even weaker. The enemy swarmed through their lines, cutting them down. The Timandrians of the Alliance were weary and wounded after long battles, and they too fell to the enemy swords and arrows.

We cannot defeat this new Radian army, Torin realized. They are too many, too strong.

A rainforest warrior raced toward him, swinging a sword. Torin parried from his horse and slew the man. At his side, more enemy soldiers swarmed toward Koyee, cutting into her panther. She fell off the beast, landed on her feet, and swung her katana in circles, holding them back. A crowd of men shoved forward, and Madori vanished into their ranks, crying out in fear and rage.

A tiger leaped toward Torin. His horse neighed and bucked, and the tiger lashed its claws, knocking the stallion down. Torin thumped down onto the ground. He swung his sword in mad arcs, struggling to hold back the enemy. He could no longer see his daughter and wife, no longer see any of his comrades. All he saw were the swords of the enemy and the dead around him.

CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE:
THE GATES OF SUNLIGHT

As Neekeya rode the elephant down the mountain pass, she beheld a nightmare of such terror that she lost her breath.

"By Cetela," she whispered, feeling the blood drain from her face.

The city of Markfir still stood, its walls cracked but its gates still closed. Armies from every nation covered Eldmark Fields outside the city walls, spreading as far as Neekeya could see. To the north spread a great alliance of free nations from both day and night. To the south, charging against them, sprawled a force of Radians from the rainforest and desert. The enemy seemed more numerous than trees in the swamps, than grains of sand upon a beach, than the stars in the night sky which Madori had described so often. The chants rose from below, again and again. Radian rises! Radian rises!

Neekeya could barely breathe. The fear seized her.

She looked behind her. The combined forces of Daenor and Sania spread across the mountain pass. The Daenorians had come here from both the marshlands and their northern plains, uniting under her leadership. They wore crocodile armor and bore longswords and shields. The hosts of Sania bore wicker shields, spears, and many arrows, and many among them rode the fabled elephants of their island kingdom.

Prince Kota sat with her upon their elephant, holding a bow. War paints coiled across his chest, and strings of beads hung around his neck. The Sanian warriors fought bare-chested, fast and light, letting no armor slow them down. Kota turned in the saddle toward her, reached out, and squeezed her arm.

"We will fight together again, Neekeya, my swamp warrior."

She stared down at the enemy, then back up at her betrothed. Her breath shook, but she nodded. "We will fight well."

Neekeya had fought in battles before, but this one dwarfed them. All her other conflicts, combined, would have formed but a small corner of the battle of Eldmark Fields. Her fingers shook. Her chest constricted. She wanted to turn back, to flee, to hide behind the mountains. She could hardly bare to look at the bloodshed below, the carnage of Mythimna.

Then she saw a single raven banner rising from the crowd.

The banner of Arden. Tam's kingdom.

Her eyes stung. Tam had fallen saving her life. She would not abandon this fight, not abandon his memory.

She rose upon the elephant. She raised her crocodile standard in one hand, her sword in the other, and she cried for her troops.

"Warriors of Daenor! Warriors of Sania!" They stared at her, many thousands upon the mountains. "The enemy musters in the fields. We fight now. We fight for truth, for life, for freedom. I am Neekeya, a free woman. Fight now—with me!"

They roared and raised their swords and spears. Their cries seemed to shake the mountain.

They charged into battle, weapons rising as a forest.

Below upon the field, the Radian forces turned toward them, trapped between two foes. Commanders barked orders. Pikemen arranged themselves in lines, weapons thrust out. Archers tugged back bowstrings. Swordsmen stood in formations, blades drawn.

Neekeya's elephant kept charging down the mountains. Many more of the animals charged with her, and thousands of soldiers afoot raced behind. They reached the fields. Arrows tore into their ranks, but they kept charging. They flowed across the field. They slammed into the enemy with screams, blood, and a song of arrows and spears.

Neekeya fought in a haze, firing arrows down upon the enemy. When her elephant fell to their pikes, she fought afoot, swinging her blade. She was fighting in Teel again against Lari and her friends. She was fighting in the marshlands against the invading enemy. She was fighting to save her father, her husband, those fallen, those she knew were beyond saving.

She fought, shouting hoarsely, until her armor was dented, her arms sore, her sword chipped.

"Victory!" Kota was shouting.

"Victory!" cried Princess Adisa.

But there would be no victory to Neekeya, even as the enemy surrendered, as they turned to flee, as they lay dead. Too many had fallen, and she could find no joy in the death around her.

She stumbled through Eldmark Fields, over corpses, between cheering victors and kneeling prisoners, through smoke and scattered flames, a woman alone in a crowd of myriads.

Finally she saw them ahead, visions from her youth, two figures she had dreamed of so often, whom she had never thought she'd see again.

"Neekeya!" Jitomi cried and ran toward her.

"By Idar's soggy old britches, it's her!" shouted Madori, running forward.

They ran toward her across the charred, bloody field, leaping over shattered blades and shattered men. Until they had grabbed her, shaken her, called her name again and again, Neekeya did not believe they were real, did not believe that she still lived while so many had fallen.

"She's hurt," Jitomi said.

Madori examined her. "Covered in more bruises and scrapes than a cat in a doghouse. But they're only flesh wounds." She shook Neekeya. "Can you hear me?"

Neekeya blinked, looked around her, and finally her eyes dampened. It was real. They were here. She was alive.

"Madori," she whispered. "Jitomi."

She pulled them into her arms, held them close, and wept.

* * * * *

Eldmark Fields lay in desolation, a plain of ash and shattered spears, and Madori's heart felt just as broken.

The Alliance surrounded Markfir, half a league away from the walls. For an hourglass turn, they were besieging the city. For an hourglass turn, none would die. It was a time for burying the dead, a time for mourning, a time for shedding tears instead of blood. The banners of many nations were lowered across the Alliance camp, and the only horns that played were horns of mourning, not war.

Madori stood beside her nightwolf, her hand in his fur, feeling so empty, so . . . blank, unfeeling, shocked, a piece of parchment with no runes upon it.

He's dead. Tam is dead.

Neekeya had shared the news, her voice fragile, her eyes red. But Madori did not weep. She did not tremble. She barely felt a thing, only this hollowness, this disbelief.

Tam, my best friend . . . fallen.

She thought of all those childhood summers she had spent with Tam: sneaking into the kitchens of Kingswall Palace to steal blueberry pies, digging for worms and fishing in the river with makeshift rods, riding ponies and imagining they were dragons, wrestling in the grass and pretending to be knights, and a thousand other memories with him, perhaps the best memories Madori had.

And now he's gone.

It seemed surreal. Impossible. She wanted to weep for him, for all the countless souls who had died in this war, for her own haunting pain, for the nightmares of the Radian iron mine, for the scars that would forever cover her body and heart. Yet she could only feel numb.

She turned away from the fields. She looked back toward the other soldiers of the Alliance. King Camlin and Queen Linee sat nearby, tears in their eyes, their son fallen. Between them sat Prince Omry, Tam's twin brother; his face was pale, his foot amputated, and seeing his face—identical to Tam's—only shot more pain through Madori. A string of visitors kept approaching, speaking their condolences. Mostly the king and queen kept silent, staring ahead, as if they too were numb, but every few moments—like a wave in the sea—their tears fell, and they trembled, and everyone around them, even the gruffest soldiers, shed tears with them.

Madori looked back toward the city of Markfir. It lay over a mile away across the field. Thousands of ditches had been dug into that field. Countless bodies filled them. Countless more bodies lay buried or burnt across the rest of Moth. The city of Orewood in the north—reduced to rubble. The city of Yintao in the night—fallen and plundered. The city of Pahmey—gone into the abyss. Oshy. Fairwool-by-Night. Gone.

Madori had heard tales of the first war, the great War of Day and Night in which her parents had fought, the war from whose ashes she'd been born. But this war seemed worse, a tragedy from which the world might never recover. How could Moth survive after so much had fallen? And even if Madori should live, how could she ever find joy in a world of so much pain?

She stared at the soldiers on the walls of Markfir, at the hundreds of towers that rose within the city, at Solgrad Castle upon its crest. He waited there. Emperor Tirus Serin.

"You caused this war," she whispered. "You killed these people. We will meet again, Serin. I will fight you again. And this time I will kill you."

Yet her words tasted bitter, meaningless, empty cliches. Could Serin, one man, have truly caused all this death? How could any one man burn a world? As she stared at the city and the graves, it seemed to Madori that no one tyrant could be blamed.

Perhaps it's the nature of humanity to elevate tyrants to power. Perhaps more than any tyrant can be blamed for death and destruction, it's the shoulders he stands on that bear the shame. One despot falls. Another rises. Even should we sever the snake's head, a new head will grow. For we—sons, daughters, husbands, wives, the rich, the poor, humans afraid and angry—are the body of the snake. Perhaps our hearts are the true tyrants, not the figureheads we raise or the banners we sew.

She tightened her lips and gripped her sword's hilt. She could not change human nature. She could not remove fear, greed, and hatred from the hearts of men. But at least she could cut off one snake's head. She could not bring eternal peace, but perhaps she could end one war. That would have to be enough. That was all, perhaps, she could hope for.

Koyee and several Qaelish soldiers, their armor chipped and their hair stained with ash and blood, rode nightwolves toward Madori. Koyee dismounted and approached her daughter.

"We've spoken to the survivors of Naya and Eseer," Koyee said. "We've taken thousands of Nayan prisoners. With their commanders dead, they've lost the will to fight. We'll let them return to the rainforest, defeated."

Madori nodded, saying nothing.

Koyee continued speaking. "The Eseerian king, a friend to Serin, has fallen in the field, slain by a Daenorian arrow. A new lord has taken command of the surviving Eseerian forces, a kind and noble man; he will join us in attacking the city. Few Eseerians have ever held Serin much love; with their old Radian king fallen, they will now fight with us." She smiled thinly. "Our enemy has turned into a powerful ally."

Madori nodded again, silent.

"Madori . . ." Koyee's voice softened, and she touched her daughter's arm. "Do you hear? Are you all right?"

No, Mother. I'm not all right. How can you ask me that? After all that happened, how can you think I'm all right? I'm hurt. I'm grieving. I'm so scared.

But Madori only nodded again. She forced herself to raise her chin. "That's good. Serin's old allies turn against him." She tightened her grip on her sword's hilt. "It's time to assault the city. It's time to break in."

Koyee nodded. "It's time."

The hourglasses emptied. The turn of mourning was done. Under dark clouds, through rain and mud, the Alliance returned to the walls of Markfir.

The Elorian siege towers, built of metal, rolled across the landscape. The Timandrians from west of the mountains—Sanians and Daenorians—raised great ladders, hundreds of feet tall. Dojai assassins, clad in black silk, scaled the walls like scurrying insects. Thousands of soldiers converged upon the city. With siege towers, with ladders, and with grapples, they reached the ramparts of Markfir.

The city walls bled.

Madori leaped out of a siege engine. A gangplank stretched ahead across the moat, protected with walls and doors of metal; she was safe from fire until she emerged, screaming and swinging her sword, onto the wall. And here, between the merlons, hundreds of feet above the ground, she fought with steel. She fought with magic. She fought with Yin Shi. Her blade swung in arcs, sending Radians falling down into the eastern moat and the western courtyards. Her magic melted armor, blasted out cones of air, and sent men screaming down to their deaths. All around her across the walls, thousands battled, soldiers of every nation in Moth swinging their weapons, a great song of steel, the song of a torn world.

A staircase stretched down before her, leading to a courtyard by the city gates. Madori fought her way onto the stairs, sending Radians crashing down with every step. More soldiers ran up toward her; she knocked them down with blasts of magic. Arrows flew from towers deeper in the city; she blocked them with shields of air. At her sides, dojai were scaling down the walls with grapples and ropes, descending into the city.

"To the gates!" Torin was shouting somewhere in the distance. "Take the gatehouse! Open the gates!"

Madori leaped down four stairs at once, swinging her sword and knocking men back. She landed in the city courtyard, raised her head, and stared around her. Hundreds of Radians were charging her way.

The gates will open. She sneered. They will open.

She screamed and charged toward the army, katana raised. Behind her, dozens of Alliance soldiers ran with her.

The battle exploded across the courtyard, a sea of arrows, swords, axes. Men fell, crushed to death. Survivors fought atop corpses. Madori kept moving through the crowd, knocking men back with magic, until she reached the inner side of the gatehouse.

Madori breathed. In. Out.

Be aware. Hold the world in your awareness.

She chose the enemy soldiers around the gatehouse. She inhaled deeply. She claimed them. She shoved them backwards; the soldiers flew several feet in the air, knocked aside as from an explosion of gunpowder.

Madori ran toward the doors. A heavy bar lay in their brackets. She knelt, placed her shoulder under the bar, and struggled to rise, too weak to lift the heavy beam, too drained for more magic.

"Father, a little help!" she shouted. "By Idar!"

Torin ran toward her, as did other soldiers. They lifted the beam and let it fall to the ground. Two great Verilish warriors, seven feet tall with arms the size of Madori's entire body, swung their hammers at the door's padlock.

The padlock shattered.

Men roared and tugged chains, pulling the stone doors open. Madori swung her sword, slicing ropes. The drawbridge slammed down across the moat.

The floodgates broke.

Myriads of Alliance troops waited outside the gates. Roaring for battle, they began to stream into the city of Markfir.

CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO:
THE QUEEN OF SUN AND STARS

As Eris charged into the city of Markfir, he kept glancing at his side. A short, slim soldier ran there, clad in the silvery breastplate, smooth helmet, and flowing white robes of Leen.

"Remember, Yiun Yee, stay near me!" he said as he ran into the courtyard. "Always."

She nodded, holding her katana high. "Always."

The battle raged ahead. Arrows flew from the rooftops. Radian and Alliance soldiers fought everywhere with swords and pikes. Eris had fought battles before; he knew of the blood, the terror, the noise, the weak knees, the thrashing heart. He had tried to convince Yiun Yee to stay behind, to await him outside the walls with the engineers, surgeons, and camp followers. She had refused. She had donned armor. She had drawn a sword. And now she fought at his side, charging into the city of the enemy.

Radians stormed toward him across the courtyard, and Eris fought.

He fought like he had never fought before. He had fought in battles, but none like this, the clash of nations, the world come to one city to shed the blood of Moth. And Eris Grimgard, son of Bormund, shed more blood this turn than in all his other battles combined. His sword sang. At his sides fought the Oringard, the legendary heroes who had traveled with him into the night, had helped him find the Meadenhorn which even now hung around his neck.

The Alliance moved through the city, street by street. And on every street the enemy awaited. From every building, archers sent down death. Eris had thought that all the enemy's mages had perished upon Eldmark Fields, but more now emerged, sending death from their fingertips. Men screamed as their hearts burst from the chests and thumped onto the ground, still beating. Others screamed as their bodies twisted, bones snapping. Eris charged toward the mages, swinging his sword, blocking their magic, cutting their flesh. Street by street. House by house. The streets ran red.

And always he stayed near Yiun Yee. Even as the battle flared, she remained in his shadow, shielded by his larger form. And she too killed. One Radian rushed toward her, axe swinging. She cut him down. Another man thrust a spear toward her; she parried, leaped forward, and drove her sword into his chest. Radian blood stained her white robes, and she would not flee even as her legs shook.

They were fighting their way up a narrow street, the brick walls of shops and homes at their sides, when Eris saw the sorceress ahead.

Iselda stood within a brick archway, clad in crimson, smiling. Several soldiers in black armor stood at her sides.

"Hello again, Eris," she said.

Eris froze from fighting. His armor was dented. His arms were bloody. He stared up at the woman—Serin's sister—the sorceress who had tempted his father, had corrupted his hall. The Oringard paused at his sides, panting. The sounds of battle rose from across the city, but for a moment this street was still.

Then Iselda pointed at Eris and his Oringard. "Slay them," she said to her soldiers.

Her Radians rushed forth.

Eris and the Oringard ran to meet them.

Here were no simple troops, Magerian boys drafted from city streets and farms. These Radians wore finer armor, and they fought like machines, every movement calculated; here were noble fighters trained from childhood. They did not simply swing swords wildly; they fenced with beautiful deadliness. Sweat beaded on Eris's forehead as he fought. He slew one man. At his side, one of the Oringard died. Another Radian fell.

Eris was so busy fighting he barely saw Iselda approach.

Her crimson robes fluttered as she walked toward Yiun Yee. A small smile played on her lips. Eris was forced to look away, to lock swords with a soldier. When he finally killed the man and looked back, he howled.

Iselda was smiling, magic flowing out from her fingers. The silvery, astral strands wrapped around Yiun Yee, pulling her close as if reeling in a fish. Magic muffled Yiun Yee; she couldn't even scream.

Eris raced forward and knocked into a Radian. He swung his sword, felling another man.

"Iselda!" he cried.

Before he could reach them, the witch pulled Yiun Yee close and wrapped her cloak around the two, a red cocoon. Eris leaped toward them. Smoke blasted out, and when he could see again, both Iselda and Yiun Yee were gone.

"Yiun Yee!" he shouted.

Around him, the Oringard slew the last of the enemies in the street. Eris ran. He ran through the city, calling for his wife. His men ran at his side. Radian troops ran toward them. The Oringard cut them down.

"Yiun Yee!" Eris cried.

His chest shook. His eyes stung. Iselda must have taken Yiun Yee to Solgrad Castle—to torture her, to kill her. He had to reach his wife. Why had he brought Yiun Yee here? Why had he placed her in danger? He ran, calling her name.

Yiun Yee. If he lost her, he would fall upon his sword. The woman who had met a beast, a mindless killer, and tamed him. The woman who had taught him mercy. The woman who had shown him he could be more than a warrior, that he could be a man of life as well as death.

And now, without her, all he brought was death, and the dead piled up before him as he fought.

He kept moving through the streets, calling for his wife. A burly soldier rushed toward him, all in black steel; Eris dueled the man and finally cut him down. Another man rushed toward him from behind a building, thrusting a spear. Eris knocked the spear down, leaped forward, and drove his sword into the soldier. Shadows swirled, and a mage came floating down the street toward him, black robes fluttering, a hood hiding his face. Eris roared in rage, leaped forward, and drove his sword through the mage's robes and into his chest.

The mage screamed.

It was a high scream, muffled.

Eris pulled back his sword. The magic holding the mage afloat shattered. The robed figure fell to the ground, reaching out to him. The hands, sticking out from the black sleeves, were pale and small.

Eris's breath froze.

Something cold and sharp broke inside him.

He knelt. His heart thrashed. His eyes stung. The fear would not let him breathe. He reached down, feeling numb, and pulled the mage's hood back.

Yiun Yee stared up at him, tears in her eyes, a cloth gagging her mouth. Blood spilled from her chest.

The world shattered.

More pain, more terror than Eris had ever known exploded inside him.

He tugged her gag free. She coughed, her lips shook, and she reached to him. "She . . . she put a robe on me, she . . ."

Tears flowed from Eris's eyes. His Oringard gathered around, staring silently. His chest shook. His fingers trembled as he pulled her robe back, revealing her wound, as he tried to bandage her, as he tried to save her life.

"Hold me," she whispered. She reached up a pale hand to touch his cheek. "Hold me as I leave."

He held her, shaking his head, tears flowing. "I'm sorry, Yiun Yee. I'm sorry. Don't leave me. I'm sorry." Sobs shook his body, and he held her close.

She kissed his cheek, and she smiled, and starlight filled her large indigo eyes.

"I forgive you," she whispered. "I love you, Eris. I love you always. I loved you on this earth, and I will love you from the stars. I travel to them now."

Her eyes closed.

He wept.

He held her lifeless body in his arms, and he tossed back his head, and Eris Grimgarg roared—a cry so loud that the entire city heard, a sound so discordant, so broken, a sound of something tearing inside him, something that could never heal.

"Yiun Yee! Yiun Yee! The stars have fallen. The moon has gone dark. Yiun Yee!" He rocked her in his arms, shaking, praying to see some spark of life, knowing it was gone. He kissed her forehead, and his voice dropped to a whisper. "You were brighter than moonlight. You were braver than dragons. I love you, my Yiun Yee."

Languid clapping sounded ahead.

"Lovely poetry, brother," rose a voice. "You should have become a bard, not a soldier."

He raised his eyes, still holding his dead wife, and saw Torumun ahead. Iselda stood at his side, smiling crookedly. A dozen Radian soldiers stood behind them.

Slowly, Eris placed his wife down and lifted his fallen sword.

"You did this," Eris whispered, voice hoarse. Blood dripped down his arms—his wife's blood.

Torumun tilted his head and frowned. "Dear brother, it does look like you are the one who slew her. I saw it. Your own hand drove your own sword into your nightcrawler's filthy heart."

Eris bellowed, a cry as much of rage as grief, and raced forward, sword swinging.

Torumun raised his own blade, smiling thinly, and parried.

The two fought. They fought like fire and ice. They fought like day and night. Their blades clanged, sparking, banging against the walls of homes. Their boots thudded against the cobblestones.

Torumun laughed as he fought. "You've never been able to best me in swordplay, little brother! You won't best me now." He laughed. "I will slay you, and I will dump your body in the moat, and I will hang your wife's body in the halls of Orida."

Eris screamed, lunged forward, and thrust his sword madly. Torumun smiled, sidestepped, and lashed his sword along Eris's hip below the breastplate.

Eris gasped, pain exploding through him. Blood spilled down his thigh. He glanced at the wound. It was deep. He stared back up at his brother, snarled, and lunged forward again. He found an opening, thrust his sword, but the blade clanged against Torumun's armor, unable to pierce it.

Torumun swung again, cutting deep into Eris's shoulder.

Eris faltered. He wanted to cry for his Oringard for aid, but they were busy fighting their own duels.

He fell to his knees. He rose again. Torumun struck, and the blow rang against Eris's helmet, and Eris fell. His sword clattered across the cobblestones.

Torumun stood over him and shook his head sadly.

"And thus your life ends, brother. You could have served me. Now you die like a worm. Farewell."

Torumun raised his sword high and swung it down. With his last whisper of strength, Eris raised the Meadenhorn. Torumun's blade hit the artifact and shattered into many shards.

For an instant, Torumun stood frozen in shock, holding a blade-less hilt.

Eris grabbed one of the fallen steel shards, rose to his feet, and drove the metal deep into Torumun's throat.

His brother gasped. He tried to speak. He tried to pull the shard out. He fell, sprawled out, and would not rise.

Eris stood panting, bleeding, shaking. Around him, the Oringard defeated the last Radians in the street.

My father, Eris thought in a haze. My wife. My brother. I slew them all. What remains of me?

Iselda walked toward him through the carnage. Her eyes were sad, as if some spell had lifted from them. She seemed very fair, tall and pale, her golden hair shining, her eyes the deepest blue. The sorceress placed a hand on Eris's wounded shoulder.

"You fought bravely, Eris," she said. "You proved yourself stronger than your father. Stronger than your brother." Iselda caressed his cheek. "I will let you take me. I will be your wife. Return with me to Orida, and we will rule together, and the world will bow before—"

Eris lifted his fallen sword and drove it into Iselda's chest.

As she died, he wept.

He looked around him at all those he had killed, the death he brought wherever he went.

"All I wanted was to retrieve the Meadenhorn," he whispered, holding it up, gazing upon its beauty, the filigree and jewels that shone. "An heirloom. A blessed thing, the horn Orin drank from. It saved my life . . ." He lowered his head. "It saved me as I killed all others around me. It is a cursed thing."

He unslung the horn off his neck. He tossed it aside. His Oringard stared at him, silent.

"My lord," said Halgyr, the squat, bearded lord of the Oringard. "You are wounded and need healing."

Eris gazed at him with clouded eyes. "Halgyr, you are strong and wise. Lead them. Lead the Sons of Orin. Become more than a soldier. Become a king."

Halgyr raised his chin. "You lead us, Eris Grimgarg. You are our only king. You are Orin Reborn."

Eris shook his head. "I am Orin fallen."

He raised his brother's sword. And he fell upon it. He closed his eyes and he thought of his wife, of the stars in the night that he would gaze at so often, wondering at their distance and beauty. He oared toward them in a great longship, the waves black, sailing toward halls of mead and song, toward Yiun Yee.

The Oringard stood around him, staring down at their king, heads lowered.

Halgyr knelt and held the fallen king's hand. Head bowed, he spoke softly. "He fell with honor, though his heart was filled with shame. He died nobly, though he lived believing himself ignoble. He fought the enemy bravely, saving many lives, though he thought himself a murderer. We will carry on his name and the name of his fair wife, the wise daughter of the night. Forever will Orida remember Eris and Yiun Yee, the sun and moon of our island." He placed a hand upon his king's head, and his gruff face softened. "Farewell, my king of sunlight." He turned toward Yiun Yee and gazed at her calm, pale face, a countenance fair even in death, and at her eyes that stared toward the sky. "Farewell, my queen of shadow. May the sun and moon forever shine upon you."

With that, Halgyr rose, walked down the street, and lifted the Meadenhorn upon its chain. He hung it around his neck, and his fellow Sons of Orin gathered behind them. They lifted the bodies of their king and queen and bore them out of the battle and into legend.

CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE:
TORN

"To the castle!" Madori shouted, riding Grayhem through the city. "Friends, with me!"

Many soldiers of the Alliance ran with her, fighting for every step. His dragon fallen, Jitomi now rode a shadow panther, the beast clad in armor as black as its fur. Neekeya had lost her elephant in the battle; she now shared Grayhem's saddle, clinging to Madori with one hand, swinging her sword with the other. Thousands of other humans and animals battled around them, a great swarm covering the city.

"Onto the roofs, Grayhem!" Madori cried, pointing upwards. "The streets are too crowded."

The nightwolf seemed to understand. He leaped onto a building, jumping from window to spout, until he was racing across the tiled roof. Jitomi's panther followed, racing close behind. They vaulted off the roof, sailed over a street, and landed on the next house. They sailed across another street, then kept leaping from roof to roof. All around them, countless soldiers clogged the streets, battling over every cobblestone. Madori spotted her parents fighting a few blocks away, leading a host of Qaelish warriors through the city's third and final layer of walls.

She returned her eyes to the city crest. Solgrad Castle rose there upon the hill, the mountains rising behind it. That was where he lurked. She felt him, felt his eyes staring from the castle tower. She felt his sword cut her again, like it had cut her on the road outside of Teel. The scars of that battle remained. That battle would now resume.

"To the castle, Grayhem," Madori said, pointing ahead. "Take us there."

They vaulted across a wide street swarming with troops. Arrows flew from below, hitting their armor. They kept riding. Jitomi's panther leaped at Madori's side, a shadow darting forth. Soon they were only a few hundred yards away from Solgrad Castle. It loomed above, the greatest building Madori had ever seen. She could make out the gates ahead, several guards outside them.

Sitting behind her in the saddle, Neekeya tightened her grip around Madori's waist. "Only several men guard the doors, but he'll have many soldiers around him."

Madori nodded. "And we bring many with us. With magic. With wolf and panther. With swords and arrows. We end this now."

She looked behind her. The Alliance troops were storming forth. Many of their nightwolves and panthers had also taken to traveling the roofs; hundreds now rode behind Madori. Thousands more raced up the streets.

"With thousands of swords," she whispered. "We end this."

Leading the pack, Grayhem sailed across another street when the explosions rocked the city.

Sound slammed into Madori. She screamed, not even hearing herself, and grimaced, unable to cover her ears while holding shield and sword. Smoke blasted across her an instant later, and debris peppered her. The smell of gunpowder flared. Bricks flew through the air. Grayhem leaped through the explosion, landed upon a roof instants before it crumbled, then vaulted again and landed in a courtyard. Jitomi and his panther landed beside the nightwolf, coated with dust.

Grayhem turned around, and Madori felt the blood drain from her face.

Several city blocks were gone. The devastation spread in a ring. Ancient buildings, thousands of years old, had collapsed into rubble. Dust and smoke rose in clouds, and the smell of gunpowder joined the stench of death. A hundred Alliance troops lay upon the ruins, torn apart. Thousands more were buried.

"He surrounded the castle with barrels of gunpowder," Neekeya whispered. She dismounted and stared at the ruins, dust painting her gray. Her eyes reddened. "He . . . he must have killed thousands of his own people to stop us."

Madori stared past the rubble. A mile away, the rest of their forces were still battling Radians in the streets, advancing only foot by foot. She sneered and spun back toward the castle.

"And so I face him alone."

She began riding uphill toward the castle, eyes narrowed, her katana raised, leaving her friends behind.

Jitomi raced up toward her upon his panther. "Madori! We cannot storm the imperial palace without an army."

Neekeya ran alongside. "Madori, we must turn back."

She kept riding, ignoring them, staring ahead at the castle gates.

You're in there, Serin, she thought. You're watching me now, awaiting me. Her fingers tingled around the hilt of her sword. I'm coming to you.

"We won't need to storm the castle," she said softly. "He knows we're coming. He's waiting for us. And I will face him alone." She looked at her friends. "Go back. Go rejoin the others. I must do this now."

They kept advancing with her, moving away from the ruins toward the castle.

"We parted from you once," Jitomi said. "It took a long time to reunite."

Neekeya nodded. "We stick together from now on. Always."

Moans, screams, and clanging steel rose behind them in a chorus. Silence lurked ahead. They rode across a courtyard strewn with rubble and approached the castle gates. Only a dozen guards stood here, armed with pikes; they charged forward. The three young mages, summoning their training from Teel, cast forth blasts of dust and air. The magic slammed into the guards with the force of a typhoon, knocking them back against the castle walls. They slumped down, unconscious. Another blast of magic shoved the doors open.

Shadows loomed inside. Madori could see nothing but darkness, and cold air flowed from within. She felt as if she stood outside a tomb; she hoped it was not her own.

Madori halted her nightwolf and dismounted. She kissed Grayhem. "You've brought me this far, noble hunter of the moonlit plains. Return now to your comrades who fight beyond the rubble. Do not follow me into the shadows."

He stared into her eyes and bared his fangs. He growled as if to say, "I am a creature of shadows. I come with you."

Madori shook her head. "I will not bring you into danger. We fought in great battles, but here lies my greatest fight, the greatest danger. I cannot bear to see you face it, to lose you." Her eyes stung to remember how Naiko had wounded the nightwolf, and her voice dropped to a whisper. "I've lost too many friends already." She pointed east, away from the castle. "Go, Grayhem! Go!"

The nightwolf wouldn't budge. Eyes damp, Madori summoned her magic. Her tears fell as she thickened the air, as she magically shoved the wolf away, kept him shielded from the castle. His howl tore at her. He clawed at the wall of air, trying to reach her, wailing as she turned away.

I'm sorry, she thought. I cannot place you in more danger.

Katana raised, Madori stepped through the castle doorway and into shadows.

* * * * *

As Madori walked through the shadows, she imagined herself back in Eloria, traveling across the great lifeless plains of Qaelin toward the Desolation. She had felt so alone then, so afraid, seeking guidance, seeking a teacher of war. Now again she walked in darkness, seeking not training but the battle itself. And now again she felt afraid.

But I'm not alone.

She looked at her companions. Jitomi walked to her right, clad in dark armor, the dragon tattoo nearly invisible upon his pale face in the shadows. The Elorian boy who had approached her at Teel University two years ago. The Elorian man she had kissed, made love to, perhaps even loved.

Neekeya walked at her left side. Her dark skin and midnight hair nearly vanished into the shadows, but Madori knew that the marshland warrior held a great light inside her. The tall, awkward girl who had attracted so many snickers at Teel, speaking of magical artifacts, offering friends lint-covered toffees from her pockets, and smiling obliviously even as others tormented her. The warrior who had fought for the proud marshes of Daenor, who had returned home with the armies of Sania, who had led men in battle and fought against the horde of an empire.

And one among us is missing, Madori thought. Tam is not here. Our quartet is forever broken.

Torchlight blazed ahead, casting back the shadows. They found themselves in a grand hall, windowless, lined with columns. The tiles were black, the walls red. A throne rose ahead, and upon the wall behind it draped three great banners, long as dragons, of the Radian Order.

Serin sat upon the throne, legs splayed out, while Lari stood at his side.

Madori gasped and narrowed her eyes. She had killed Lari! She had stabbed her in the grave of skeletons, had—

This's not Lari, she realized. It's a lookalike. A trick.

"Welcome, friends!" Serin said, rising to his feet. He clapped languidly. "You've done well to come this far. I've been anxiously awaiting your arrival. Welcome!"

Madori wasted no time. She summoned particles of smoke and fire from the torches, tugged them down to form a hovering ball, and lobbed her projectile. The magic blasted forward, crackling and shrieking.

The flames and smoke shattered against Serin's shield of air.

Neekeya gave a wordless cry and raised her palms, and Serin's armor began to redden, to heat and creak. Jitomi snarled and blasted forth strands of smoke; they coiled around Serin and tightened, cracking the emperor's invisible shield, beginning to constrict him.

Serin only grinned and raised both palms.

Neekeya and Jitomi screamed, levitating a dozen feet in the air. Serin thrust his hands forward. The young Ilari emperor and the marshland warrior flew through the hall, slammed against columns, and slumped to the floor. Serin laughed, curled his right hand's fingers like a puppeteer, and a stone statue of himself tilted over and slammed down onto Jitomi, crushing the young man. When Neekeya tried to rise, Serin yanked down his left hand as if tugging a rope. A chunk of ceiling came loose and slammed onto Neekeya, burying her under rubble.

Madori screamed and ran toward the emperor, sword swinging.

Serin raised his palm, and Madori slammed into an invisible wall of air. She kicked, trying to break through, to cut her way forward with magic and steel, but she remained frozen.

"Poor little mongrel . . ." Serin said. "Struggling like a mouse between the cat's paws." He raised his hand, levitating her into the air. Madori thrashed, unable to free herself. "I want you to see something, mongrel. I have a little show for you. Do you enjoy theater? Behold, then, the theater of your life."

Holding her aloft with one hand, Serin swept his other hand to the left and right. The Radian banners behind the throne parted like curtains.

Madori stared between the banners . . . and screamed.

Behind the curtains lay a great chamber, its brick walls painted with sunbursts. The floor sloped inward like a bowl, and many writhing, squirming creatures filled the declivity. Their skin was pale gray and wrinkly, their eyes huge and red. Fangs stretched out from their mouths, and claws grew from their fingers. Naked and warty, they climbed above one another, snapping their teeth, mewling, whimpering. Their bones pushed against their skin; she could see the ribs clearly, even hints of red where the hearts beat.

They were Elorians.

Not Elorians like the ones Madori had always known, proud and noble people of the night. Here were Elorians like those the Radians drew in their books, sculpted as their gargoyles, and burned as effigies in their rallies—the twisted, evil creatures who hungered for the flesh of Timandrians, sub-humans with minds of shadow. True nightcrawlers. The creatures saw Madori and reached toward her. Some tried to climb out of the pit, only to slide back down onto their brethren.

"I made them myself," Serin said. "From the Elorians I captured in the night. I had to . . . modify them a bit, to coax out their true forms. Soon the world will see the evil of the nightcrawlers."

But it was not the creatures—these nightcrawlers in the pit—that made Madori shed tears, that made her heart ache, her belly twist, her soul crack. It was what she saw above the pit.

Her parents.

Torin and Koyee were wrapped in strands of magic, held afloat in the chamber like marionettes on strings. Gags of tar filled their mouths. The astral ropes bound their arms and legs, nearly tearing through the limbs. The creatures below kept leaping, reaching up their claws, snapping their teeth, trying to grab Torin and Koyee, to feed upon them.

Her parents stared at Madori, tears in their eyes, entreating her to flee.

Madori wept and tried to reach toward them, unable to break through Serin's magic.

"If they fall into the pit," Serin said, "they will not die. No. The nightcrawlers will infect them, turn them into fellow beasts. Only my magic now keeps Torin and Koyee afloat. I found them in the battle easily enough; they were not hard to recognize even in the crowd. But, sweet Madori . . . if I let them drop, they will become very, very hard to recognize."

Finally Madori found her voice. "Mother! Father!" Held in Serin's magic, she could not move forward, only stretch out her arm, trying to reach them.

Serin tsked. "You might consider calming yourself, sweetest mongrel. Only a slight lapse in my concentration, and my magic will falter. I will not be able to keep Torin and Koyee floating above the pit." He looked at her and tilted his head. "Fight me, and I'll have to dedicate more magic toward you, away from holding your parents above their fate. Kill me and they will certainly fall." He lowered Madori to the floor. "Now place down your sword . . . and we will talk."

Finally freed of his magic, Madori wanted to leap forward, to stab Serin, to end this war, to kill this tyrant. She took only half a step forward, and Serin smiled. Her parents dipped a few inches in the cavern. The creatures in the pit squealed with hunger, leaping up with more vigor. One scraped Koyee's foot, drawing blood. Serin only smiled wider, never removing his eyes from Madori.

Trembling, Madori took a step back.

"Now drop your sword," said Serin.

Never removing her eyes from her parents, Madori obeyed. Min Tey clattered onto the floor.

"Good!" said Serin. "Such an obedient cur. Now we shall negotiate your terms of surrender. It's quite simple. You will speak to the commanders of this so-called Alliance. Your parents being who they are, you're the closest this horde has to a figurehead. You will order the treacherous Timandrians who oppose me to return to their lands; they will have another chance to join my empire. You will then order the nightcrawler mobs to retreat back into the darkness; let them lurk again in shadows, far from my walls. Once their retreat is completed, and this city is safe from their aggression, I will release your parents."

"Only to kill us," Madori said, voice stiff. She stared at Torin and Koyee, and she wanted so badly to speak to them, to rush to them. She wanted so badly to rush toward her friends too, to Neekeya and Jitomi who lay hurt, buried under stone, perhaps dying. But she forced herself to stare into Serin's eyes.

The emperor sighed. "I do confess, mongrel, that for two years now, that has been one of my goals. Yes, to kill you. To kill your parents. I often delighted in the daydream of slaying you. But I think I will delight more in letting you live. Letting you escape. Withdraw your armies, and you will reunite with your parents. I will arrange to transport the three of you to a distant island of my choosing; I know of several beyond the coasts of Daenor. You'll be allowed to live out your lives there—under guard, of course, but otherwise free to enjoy the warm weather, blue waves, and the delights of coconut cuisine. From time to time, you may be tormented with memories, with guilt, with pain for all those I slew, for your cowardly escape from war while so many died. And I, while I sit here in my a palace, a great emperor, will in turn enjoy thinking of you living under my rule, knowing that you lost, that you will grow older and linger under my dominion."

Madori growled. "So that's your deal? I withdraw the Alliance assault, let you keep your throne, and my family and I get to live out our lives in exile?"

Serin raised his eyebrows. "You may also choose the alternative, of course. Attack me with your sword or magic. Maybe you will even slay me. Maybe you will die assaulting me, but in a few moments, your fellow Alliance troops will barge into this hall and finish the job. I doubt I could withstand all those nightcrawlers you brought here, even with my magic. I do confess, mongrel, that you have brought an army to my doors that I cannot defeat. But . . ." He sighed and looked back toward the pit. "Choose my death, and you know your parents' fate. It will be too late to save them." He looked back at her. "Choose, Madori Billy Greenmoat. Your life and the life of your parents . . . or my death. You may only choose one."

Madori stood, swordless, powerless. She looked behind her at her friends. Neekeya and Jitomi moaned, trapped under the fallen stones. She could save them, see them retreat back to their lands. She looked back toward her parents. Torin and Koyee hung above the creatures, eyes pleading with her to keep fighting, even if she let them die. She knew that was the choice they wanted her to make.

I have to save them, Madori thought. I can use my magic. I can hold them up myself! I can . . .

She knew she could not. She had never excelled at levitation; even when rested and healthy, she still struggled to hold afloat even small figurines. Weary and wounded, she could not hope to keep her parents levitated. She could not save them. If she slew Serin, she would watch them fall.

"Yet how can I let you die?" she whispered. "I love you."

They stared at her, eyes damp. Her father, Torin, the man she had once thought so foolish, so embarrassing—the man Madori loved more than anything, the man she knew was a great hero, a noble soul, the wisest and strongest man in the world. Her mother, Koyee, the woman Madori would clash with so often, the woman she had fled to Teel—the woman Madori wanted to be like, the woman she admired more than any storybook heroine, the greatest woman she knew.

"Father," she whispered. "Mother. I cannot let you fall."

The creatures in the pit screeched, leaping up, trying to reach the floating pair.

How can I watch you fall? How can I watch you become the creatures in the pit? Her body shook. How can I lose you?

"Choose, sweetling," Serin said, voice soft. "You must choose now."

Madori lowered her head. She closed her eyes. She thought back to the iron mine in the darkness, her most forbidden, dark memory. She thought of how the overseers had reduced her people to skeletal, dying things, consumed with disease and starvation, their bodies broken. And she thought of summer childhoods before the pain of youth, of working in the spring gardens with her father, of reading picture books with her mother while snow fell outside, of joyous years, of home, of family, of love.

And Madori knew what she had to do.

She knew the only choice she could make.

"I cannot see you fall, Father and Mother," she whispered, looking back up at them, and she saw the tears in their eyes. Her own tears fell. "I love you both so much. And I'm so sorry." She inhaled slowly, filling her lungs with calming air, with the awareness she had learned under the stars. "I am torn between day and night. I am a daughter of both worlds. The people of sunlight and the children of darkness must hear me, must learn to live in peace, must learn to end our endless wars. I love you, Mother, more than the stars love the night. I love you, Father, more than gardens love the sun. And I must bring stars and sun together. I must become who I was meant to be."

She lifted her sword.

She raced forward, perfectly calm, perfectly aware, one with light and shadow, one with Moth.

Serin gasped, eyes wide, as Madori shoved her blade through his chest and into his heart.

As the emperor collapsed, as his breath died and his body slumped to the floor, Madori wept and reached out to her parents, trying to race forward, to still save them, to hold them aloft, knowing she could not, knowing they would fall, knowing she had decided their fate.

Above the pit of screeching creatures, Torin and Koyee remained suspended.

Madori gasped and blinked tears from her eyes. Serin was dead! Her sword had pierced his heart! And yet her parents still floated above the writhing creatures, held up with magic. Madori laughed and her breath shook. Was this all only an illusion, a bluff?

"Mother! Father!"

No. They were real. Oh, by the stars, they were real. The gags left their mouths, and they cried out to her, calling her name again and again.

"How can this be?" Madori whispered.

Soft footsteps padded up toward her. Madori spun around and her eyes widened. The young woman in Lari's armor stood staring at her, smiling tremulously.

"I was never very good at Offensive Magic or Healing," the young woman whispered. "But I was always one of Teel's best students of levitation. My grandmother, Headmistress Egeria, always said so. I'll bring them to you."

The Lari lookalike curled her fingers inwards, gently pulling Torin and Koyee away from the pit. When they hovered above the solid floor again, the young woman released the magic. The smoky tendrils left Madori's parents, and they rushed toward her.

Madori wanted to hug them, to cry, to tell them she loved them, but she turned away. She raced toward her friends.

"Help me!" Madori said. "Help me free them! Lari—or whoever you are—help me lift the rocks off them!"

The young mage nodded and levitated the bricks off Neekeya and the fallen statue off Jitomi. The two lay on the floor, moaning. Blood covered them.

Madori knelt by Neekeya, examining her injuries. The Daenorian's leg was broken, but she seemed otherwise unharmed, and she even managed to smile weakly. Madori forced herself to breathe, to focus, to bring the shattered bone into her awareness. She had always been a good healer. She claimed the broken bone, guided it back into place, and molded it back together. Neekeya gasped, and her eyes closed, and she slept.

"She's all right," Madori said, relief flooding her, and raced toward Jitomi.

When she reached him, her heart sank.

"Oh . . . Jitomi." Her eyes dampened anew. "My Jitomi."

His injuries were worse. She saw that at once. She brought his body into her awareness, exploring his wounds in her mind, and the terror flooded her. His ribs had snapped, piercing his organs. Blood filled his insides. These were injuries beyond what she could heal.

"Jitomi," she whispered, her voice so high, so soft, fragile as a bird.

He blinked at her. He smiled softly. He reached out a trembling hand, and she clutched it.

"We'll find a better healer than me," she whispered. Her tears splashed his face, trailing down his dragon tattoo. "Just stay with me a little longer. Just a little longer."

He reached out his second hand and caressed her cheek. "You're beautiful, Madori, and strong and wise and good. You brought new light into my life. I loved you in the darkness and in the light, and I'll love you from whatever lands I travel."

She shook her head. "Don't you travel anywhere. Not without me. Don't you dare." She gently embraced him. "Please, Jitomi. Don't leave me." Through trembling lips, she spoke the secret inside her, the secret she had dared not reveal even to herself until now, the secret she knew was true, had known was true for moons now. "I carry your child with me. You must live. You must live to be a father."

His eyes widened. His lips curled into a smile, a smile of surprise, of awe, of joy. He breathed out shakily, and he did not breathe again.

Madori shook with sobs. She lowered her head, touched her forehead to his, and cradled him close and would not let go.

CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR:
THE SOLDIERS OF AUTUMN

Upon Eldmark Fields the cyclamens grew, a carpet of lavender and blue. Upon Eldmark Fields, the gravestones rose, row by row, the soldiers of autumn, soldiers of stone.

Koyee stood on the hill, overlooking the field. She had come here to a field of death, of screams; a field of boys dying in the mud, crying to their mothers as they tried, in vain, to hold their wounds from spilling; a field of daughters, torn from their homes, spears in their hands, weeping for a womanhood that would never come, for a new spring they would never see. Here in Eldmark Fields, under a carpet of stones and cyclamens, lay the soldiers of autumn. Here in Eldmark Fields lay sleeping a generation.

We betrayed them, Koyee thought, gazing upon the rows and rows of gravestones. We promised our children a better world. We promised them winters of snowmen and hot chocolate by fireplaces, not winters shivering in hovels, afraid and alone. We promised them summers of sun, not fire. We promised them autumns of warm quilts, of jumping in dry leaves, of roasting chestnuts and pumpkin pies; not an autumn of dying.

"Here, in Eldmark Fields, we buried a generation," she whispered. "Here, in Eldmark Fields, the youth of Moth shattered and wept. Goodbye, soldiers of autumn. Goodbye, children of Moth."

A cold breeze blew, and the field of cyclamens rustled, spreading for miles, a blanket for those sleeping beneath it.

Koyee had never been a composer, only the player of other people's songs—the songs she had learned in the night. Yet this turn, standing outside of Markfir before the field, she pulled out her flute, and she played a new song, a song she had composed. Her notes flowed down the hill, and all the survivors of the war—the children of every nation—turned to listen. It was a song of cyclamens in the breeze. A song of pale stones between the flowers, rows on rows. It was a song for lost children. A song for the cold autumn of her betrayal. A song for hope, for a new spring, for a dream of peace. It was the song of Moth.

Later that turn, Koyee stood with her daughter on the walls of Markfir. Before them spread the fields. Behind them sprawled the city streets where Idarith priests walked, swinging bowls of incense and chanting out prayers; their temple had taken charge of the city until an heir to Mageria would rise.

"Mother," Madori said softly, the wind ruffling her short black hair. "Before I was born, you fought in another war."

Koyee nodded. "I did."

"And you . . . you fixed a clock." Madori turned to look at her, her eyes soft and damp. "On Cabera Mountain. You made the world turn again, made day and night cycle. But then you decided to break the clock. To freeze the world again between day and night. Do you think . . . do you think we should fix the clock again?"

Koyee sighed and placed her arm around her daughter. "Often I had thought this. For long years, I wore a gear around my neck, taken from Cabera. Many times, I was tempted to return to the mountain, to fix the clock like I did during the last war. When the Radians invaded the dusk, I almost wanted to flee south, to return the gear to the clock."

"So why didn't you?" Madori whispered.

"Serin's forces overwhelmed us at Oshy. He stole the locket from my neck. But I would not let him steal the gear; it's too precious." She smiled thinly. "The Cabera gear lies somewhere in the Inaro River. Perhaps by now, it has reached the southern sea and is lost forever."

Madori bit her lip and nodded. "So Mythimna will forever remain Moth, split in two." Suddenly tears filled her eyes, and she trembled. "Mother, I'm sorry."

"For what, sweetness?" Koyee whispered, embracing her daughter.

"I was going to let you fall. You and Father." She clung to Koyee. "In the castle, I . . . Serin said I could save you. That I could flee with you and Father to an island. But . . . I had to kill him. I had to save Moth. I had to let you fall."

Koyee kissed her daughter's forehead. "We didn't fall."

"I didn't know you wouldn't. I made a choice. A choice to sacrifice you. Can you forgive me?" Madori stared at her with huge, damp eyes. "I love you."

Something seemed to break inside Koyee, and her own tears fell, and she held her daughter so tightly she nearly crushed her. "I love you too, Madori. There is nothing to forgive. You make me proud."

They looked back toward the fields. The gravestones spread in rows, and the carpet of cyclamens rustled in the wind.

CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE:
CHILDREN OF DUSK

Two and a half years after leaving Fairwool-by-Night to become a mage, Madori Greenmoat returned home.

She had left her home a young woman, only sixteen, wearing purple clothes she had sewn herself, sporting two black strands of hair that framed her face, the rest of her hair cropped short. She had left in a creaky old cart, heading into the unknown. She had left confused, angry, not knowing who she was. A youth, troubled and yet innocent.

She returned home a woman, a healer and a warrior. Instead of sitting in an old wooden cart, she rode upon Grayhem, a proud nightwolf. Instead of wearing old homemade clothes, she wore the polished scale armor of a Qaelish warrior, and a katana of legend hung across her back. Only one thing she kept from those old years; she was growing her two strands of hair again. After all, some things were not meant to change.

She looked to her right side. Ariana—Headmistress Egeria's granddaughter—rode there upon a black gelding. She no longer looked like Lari; she had removed her Radian armor, and instead she wore a gray tunic and dark leggings. Her little brother rode on the saddle before her, freed from the Radian dungeon.

"My grandmother often spoke of you, Madori," the young woman said with a smile. "The girl from the dusk, she called you. And here we are. At the dusk."

Ariana pointed ahead and smiled. A mile away, the sunlight of Timandra faded into shadow, and beyond lay the endless night.

A gasp sounded to her left, and Madori turned toward Neekeya. Her friend rode a white mare, her eyes wide, and a smile spread across her face.

"The night lies ahead," the Daenorian whispered. "A land of magic. I always dreamed of seeing the darkness. Well, at least since I met you, Madori. Do they have magical artifacts in the night?"

Madori smiled. "Maybe, Neekeya. If they do, I trust you to find them."

Madori gave Grayhem a soft tug on the reigns, and he slowed his pace, letting her two friends ride ahead. Two other travelers caught up with her, and soon Madori rode between her parents. The three stared together at the dusk, and sadness filled Madori.

"I miss Fairwool-by-Night," she said. "And I miss Oshy."

Torin leaned sideways in his saddle, reached out, and patted her arm. "We'll always miss all that we lost. We'll always mourn. And we'll build. A new home. A better home."

Madori looked behind her at the others. A hundred survivors of the war rode along the riverbank. Elorians. Timandrians. One people.

The river sang to their south, its surface glinting with sun beads, and grasslands rustled to their north, lush with wildflowers. They rode across where Fairwool-by-Night had once stood, a field of flowers and memories, only the old Watchtower still standing. The pain suddenly seemed too great to Madori, and she kept staring forward, lips tight, as they crossed the wilderness that had been her old home.

A hundred souls, they rode into the dusk and traveled through the soft light. Duskmoths rose to fly around them, and Madori felt some of her pain ease. The little creatures seemed to favor her, perhaps acknowledging the duskmoth tattooed onto her wrist. When she reached out her palm, one moth landed on her fingertips, its one wing black, the other white. A moth shaped like the world. A moth shaped like her heart. The little animal seemed to look at her, seemed to comfort her, to tell her that her pain had ended, that her new journey began. It tilted its antennae, then flew off into the sky.

"This is the place," Madori said softly. She halted her nightwolf. "Here."

A hundred horses halted in the soft light. The sun glowed behind them, half-hidden behind the horizon, a semicircle of gold casting out white rays between the trees. To the east the moon glowed in a deep blue sky. The river flowed to the south, and hills rose in the north, covered with soft grass. A place of shadows and light. Of day and night. Of peace after fire.

They all dismounted, and Madori stood at the place where the duskmoth had landed upon her fingertips. The center of her life, a mixed child, had always lain in the dusk. Here was her anchor. From the dusk she had come; to here she returned.

The others gathered around her, and Madori spoke to them. "Thousands of years ago, our world fell still. For thousands of years, our world has been as a duskmoth, one wing in darkness, the other in light. For too long, we fought—children of sunlight and children of darkness. For too long, we hated, feared, burned, killed. But I'm a child of both daylight and darkness. For most of my life, my two halves fought their own war, and I didn't know who I am. But I know now." She looked west toward the sunlight, then east toward the moon. "I'm a child of Moth. We are all children of Moth. Here in the dusk, there are no sunlit demons, no nightcrawlers. No Timandrians or Elorians. We're all the same here. People in a torn world, a people united." She turned toward Torin, cleared her throat, and whispered, "Father, the seed!"

He blinked at her, then seemed to remember his task. He nodded hurriedly, reached into his pocket, and pulled out an acorn. He spoke to the crowd as if reciting. "Here do I, Torin Greenmoat, a man born in sunlight, plant a seed from my land." He knelt, dug a little hold, and planted the acorn.

Madori turned toward her mother and frowned, urging her to speak.

Koyee smiled softly. She stepped forward, holding a silken lantern, and lit the candle inside. "And here do I, Koyee of the night, release a lantern from my land." She let go, allowing the lantern to float into the twilit sky.

Madori spoke again to the crowd. "Our village is founded. In Qaelish, my mother's language, the word for healing is: Lentai. I name this village Lentai-in-Dusk. And may it forever be a place of healing and peace."

For a few hours they rested, ate, and played soft songs on flutes and harps. Until they built houses they would live under the sky. Until they built beds they would sleep on the grass. It would be a while before this was a proper village, Madori knew. But it already felt like a home.

Soon after her speech, two of the war's survivors approached Madori. One was the short, slim Nitomi, clad as always in her black dojai silks. The second was the towering Qato, her cousin.

"It's time," whispered Nitomi.

Madori lowered her head. "So soon?"

Nitomi nodded. Once she had been a happy little thing, excitedly spouting out loud, bubbly words. Now the dojai spoke softly. "I've spent too long away. I lost my father in this war. And I lost my older sister. And I lost my brother." She looked around her, eyes damp. "This is a good place, but it's not my home. Hashido Castle awaits me back in Ilar, its hall empty. My inheritance. It's time to go home . . . and it's time to take my brother home."

Madori knew this was coming, but those last words still stabbed her with cold grief. She nodded, approached Grayhem, and pulled the urn from his saddlebag. She stared at the round granite box for a moment, passing her fingers again and again over its cold surface.

"Here, Nitomi," she finally whispered. "Take him home. Jitomi's ashes belong in the night."

Nitomi reached out, hesitant. Then her eyes flicked down to Madori's rounded belly. The dojai paused, then pulled her hands back. She shook her head.

"No," Nitomi whispered. "He belongs here. With you."

The diminutive dojai wiped her eyes, then turned away and mounted her panther. The towering Qato looked down at Madori, then nodded once.

"Goodbye, Madori," he said. "Qato will miss you."

Madori blinked. Well, I'll be.

"Goodbye, Qato," she managed to whisper.

He nodded again, then turned and mounted his own panther. The two dojai began riding east toward the shadows of night. Before vanishing from view, they turned back toward the camp, and Nitomi called out, "Come on, Neekeya! It's dark in the night, and you'll get lost without us, so you better hurry, because if you get lost we'd never find you, so come on!"

The tall Daenorian nodded and walked toward them, leading her horse. For once, Neekeya did not wear her crocodile armor; instead, a silk qipao dress hugged her body in the style of the night. When she passed by Madori, she paused and smiled.

"Are you sure you don't want to visit Ilar with us?" Neekeya asked.

Madori nodded. "I've been to the night before. Eloria is beautiful. Enjoy your journey, Neekeya. Gaze upon the face of the moon, the glowing fish of the dark rivers, the countless lights of the stars. And then return to us here. I'm not letting you be away from me for too long again!"

The two women embraced, and Neekeya plated a kiss on Madori's cheek. "The prince of Sania still expects me back on his island, you know. I did vow to wed Kota in return for his aid. But maybe if I linger a little longer in the darkness and shadows, he won't mind. It's a large world, and there's still so much to see."

"Neekeya, come on!" Nitomi cried, bouncing in her saddle. "I'm bored and I want to go!"

Neekeya laughed, smiled at Madori, then turned and walked into the shadows with the dojai.

For a few moments, Madori stood in silence, holding the urn to her chest. Then she sighed and turned back toward the others.

"Well," she said, "let's build some houses."

And they built.

And the turns went by, and Lintai-in-Dusk grew, the shells of houses rising in the soft light, a village shared between Timandrians and Elorians, a village for all of Moth.

Many more villages will rise in the dusk, Madori thought. Towns and cities, a great civilization of people like me . . . people not Timandrian or Elorian but simply children of Moth. She placed her hand on her belly. Like my child.

In early spring, when the first leaves budded from the trees, that child was born.

Madori lay in her bed, exhausted but smiling, and cradled her newborn son to her breast. The babe was beautiful, she thought—a little wrinkly, a little red, but beautiful nonetheless. She cuddled him close, and he nursed at her breast. His hair was black like hers, but his eyes were large and blue—his father's eyes.

"I name you Tom," she whispered and kissed his forehead. "Tom Greenmoat."

When she showed the boy to her parents, they looked happier than she'd ever seen them. Torin kept gazing at the baby in wonder, speaking of how he looked just like his own father. Koyee spoke less and smiled more.

"Can you believe it?" Madori said to her. "You're a grandmother."

Koyee, who was not yet forty and looked barely older than Madori, nodded. "It's strange. I often still feel like a child myself."

As Madori held her son, she wished Jitomi could have been here with her, could have raised Tom with her. But she knew that she had the help of her parents, of all her village. And she knew that Jitomi was with her, if not his spirit than his memory. Whenever she looked into her son's eyes, she would remember Jitomi.

And I will remember myself, she thought. Myself in Iron Mine Number One, hurt, afraid, dying. And I will remember the fall of Pahmey, the genocide of Qaelin. And I will remember the killing fields of Eldmark, the multitudes dying together, their blood feeding the plains. She winced and closed her eyes, even as she held her son close. The brand on her shoulder, given to her in the mine, still hurt some turns, and she knew that these memories would never leave her. She knew that the nightmares would forever fill her sleep. She knew that she'd never forget the wagons of dead, the pits of skeletons, the screams, the stench of the dying. She knew that even many years from now, happy in her new home, her joy would be a fragile thing, a delicate shell around a broken core. She knew that the nightmares—waking in cold sweat, unable to breathe, crying and begging for life—would forever fill her sleep.

She stroked her child's hair.

"My parents fought a war," she whispered to him, "and when I was born, they swore to protect me. They swore that I would know peace. And yet a new war blazed, a fire more destructive than any before it. And I don't know if I can protect you, Tom. I don't know if I can give you a better life, a life safe from such pain. But I promise that I'll try. I promise that I'll never let you go, that I'll always love you."

Her son gurgled and reached out a tiny hand to grab her hair. She smiled and kissed his fingertips.

* * * * *

On a chilly autumn turn, Madori and her son walked through the village of Lintai-in-Dusk. Many homes rose around them, built of white stone, their roofs tiled blue. Statues stood in twilit gardens, and lanterns hung from poles, glowing gold and silver. Many villagers walked around Madori down the cobbled road, heading toward the hill.

"Mama, why do we need a university?" Tom bit his lip, thinking for a moment. "What's a university?"

"A place of learning," Madori said.

"Like learning numbers and letters?"

She nodded and mussed the boy's hair. "Yes. A place for adults to learn things they don't know."

They kept walking through the village, dressed in white silk. All around, their fellow villagers wore their finest garments, and many held floating lanterns on strings. Madori and Tom walked around a copse of trees, and they saw the university ahead upon the hill. It was the largest building in the village, larger even than the old library in Fairwool-by-Night, and indeed many of its bricks had been taken from that fallen library.

Tom paused and stared at the building in wonder. The lanterns reflected in his large indigo eyes. "It's as big as a dragon!"

Feet shuffled, and Madori turned to see Professor Yovan approaching them. The elderly man stepped on his long white beard and wobbled for a moment, then grumbled, tossed the beard across his shoulder, and smiled at Tom.

"Indeed, my boy!" said the old professor. "I was quite surprised when your mother invited me to teach within its walls. Lovely building, indeed. Bit smaller than Teel, but the air here is cooler too, and I do quite enjoy the soft light of the dusk."

Madori smiled at her old teacher of Magical Healing. "Go, professor. Headmistress Ariana waits."

Yovan cleared his throat and nodded at her. "Yes, quite. Did you know, little boy, that Ariana is the granddaughter of Egeria, the former headmistress of Teel University?"

Madori smiled. "Yes, professor, I know. And I'm not a little boy, though my son is."

He blinked. "Yes, yes, of course. Well then. Carry on." With that he shuffled on, nearly tripping over his beard again.

The villagers gathered in a courtyard outside the university portico. Ariana spoke to the crowd, and Madori could scarcely believe that here stood the same woman kidnapped by Serin, forced to become his new daughter. Headmistress of Lintai University, Ariana now seemed as confident and wise as Egeria had been. She spoke of learning ways of peace, not war. Of learning wisdom, not hatred. She spoke of a great university for all people of Moth, a place of healing, a place not only of knowledge but of wisdom.

"What are you going to learn here, Mother?" Tom asked when the ceremony ended. They stood outside between the trees as villagers released their lanterns, letting the soft lights rise into the sky.

"Healing," Madori said.

"But you already know how to heal."

Madori thought of Jitomi, how she had held him as he lay dying.

I could not heal your father, my child, she thought, a lump in her throat.

"I will learn more," she said softly.

Tom thought for a moment, brow furrowed. "When you become a healer, will you be able to heal my father? To bring him back?"

The words stunned Madori into silence. For a moment she only stared at her son, and then she knelt and held his arms. "Sweetness, your father can never return. You know that, right? I won't be able to bring him back, even after studying here."

Tom lowered his head and nodded. "I thought so. I wanted to be sure."

She hugged him, then mussed his hair. "Now go to Grandpapa and Grandmama. Sing to them the new songs I taught you."

His face brightened and he ran off, already singing even before he reached Torin and Koyee in the crowd.

Madori smiled softly and looked back at the university. Perhaps, like the village she had founded, this university would become her legacy, the legacy of Moth. A place of healing. Of wisdom. Of peace.

"May the world know only healing," she said softly, gazing at the university, the village, the light in the west and the darkness in the east. "May we build a world not of warriors, not of conquerors, not of victors or emperors. May we build a world of musicians, of painters, of healers." She gazed at the duskmoth tattooed onto her wrist and her voice dropped to a whisper. "And may I be healed. May all souls torn in two find some healing."

She smiled, tasting tears on her lips, and raised her eyes. A single duskmoth flew above her, rising into the sky like one of the floating lanterns. Between the shadows and light, it seemed to Madori that the moth no longer had one black wing, the other white, but that it was painted all in gold, beautiful and whole.

The End

AFTERWORD

Thank you for reading Legacy of Moth, the sixth book in The Moth Saga. This novel concludes Madori's story, which began in Daughter of Moth, and it concludes an even longer story going all the way back to the first Moth book.

For now, Moth's story is told.

This has been the most complex, most challenging series I've written so far, and a series I'm quite proud of. I've immensely enjoyed exploring this world of many nations and heroes.

For the next while, I'll be focusing on other worlds. I'll be writing and releasing more novels set in Requiem (if you haven't read the existing Requiem books, you can find links to them on the next page). I'm also kick-starting a new series soon titled Alien Hunters--my first science fiction series.

But Moth will always be a special world, I think, and a world I'd love to return to someday. If you'd like to read more Moth novels, let me know! I'd love to hear from you, to hear what you thought of these books. Feel free to email me your thoughts at: Daniel@DanielArenson.com

Want to know when I release new books? Here are some ways to stay updated:

 * Join my mailing list at: DanielArenson.com/MailingList

 * Like me on Facebook: Facebook.com/DanielArenson

 * Follow me on Twitter: Twitter.com/DanielArenson

And if you have a moment, please review a Moth book online. Help other fantasy readers and tell them why you enjoyed reading. And please help spread the word! Lend Moth to a friend, talk about Moth online, and help others discover these books. You can review the first Moth book here.

Finally, remember to visit the Moth website, where you can find original Moth music, artwork, a wiki, and more: DanielArenson.com/Moth

Thank you again, dear reader, and I hope we meet again between the pages of another book.

Daniel

NOVELS BY DANIEL ARENSON

THE MOTH SAGA

Moth

Empires of Moth

Secrets of Moth

Daughter of Moth

Shadows of Moth

Legacy of Moth

REQUIEM

Dawn of Dragons

Requiem's Song

Requiem's Hope

Requiem's Prayer

The Complete Trilogy

Song of Dragons

Blood of Requiem

Tears of Requiem

Light of Requiem

The Complete Trilogy

Dragonlore

A Dawn of Dragonfire

A Day of Dragon Blood

A Night of Dragon Wings

The Complete Trilogy

The Dragon War

A Legacy of Light

A Birthright of Blood

A Memory of Fire

The Complete Trilogy

Requiem for Dragons

Dragons Lost

Dragons Reborn

Dragons Rising

The Complete Trilogy

OTHER WORLDS

Eye of the Wizard

Wand of the Witch

Firefly Island

The Gods of Dream

Flaming Dove

KEEP IN TOUCH

www.DanielArenson.com

Daniel@DanielArenson.com

Facebook.com/DanielArenson

Twitter.com/DanielArenson