By the time we arrived at the next open field, my legs were aching. Sadly, the astrolabe didn’t give me any indication of how far we had to go. I glanced up at the sky, where a few wispy clouds drifted over the moon.

As my bare feet padded over the damp blades of grass under the open sky, an uneasy sensation began crawling over my ribs—a sense that the shadows were thickening, curling through the air around me. I stopped walking, my heart rate speeding up.

“Holly? You said the Judge might send shadow angels after—”

“Duck!” she screamed from somewhere to my right, and before I could remember how to think, I flattened, and a terrifying winged creature swooped over my head.

Shadow angels.

“They found us,” said Holly, the words tearing from her in a haze of panic as she covered her head with her hands. “Dawn, they’re here for us.”

“What do we do?” I asked and dared to look up. Circling us were a half dozen dark winged shapes, pale eyes gleaming in the darkness. When I strained my eyes, I caught the gleam of metal at their waists. Swords.

My stomach dropped. Holly and I didn’t have a weapon between us, unless you counted my magical lighting effects… and even those seemed to only work about half the time.

I managed to roll onto my side as a curling blast of black energy pounded the grass beside me. Smoke lifted from the charred blades. I hopped to my feet, palms forward, my body ready for a fight before my mind was.

“Ready?”

When my gaze flicked to Holly, I caught the faint outline of ghostly white wings, and my breath caught in my throat.

“Ready?” she asked again.

“Not sure that I am, actually,” I croaked. Part of me wanted to blast all of them down from the sky and curb-stomp them one by one. The other part of me still reeled with the shock of everything that was happening to me.

“Fight now. Use your magic,” she snapped. “We can discuss your feelings over smoothies later.”

I took her point. It didn’t, of course, matter if I felt ready or not.

This was it.

The night wind rippled over my skin, raising goosebumps, and toyed with my pale hair. One of the shadow angels emitted a deafening noise like a trumpet and flicked his wrist at us. His black, feathered wings stretched out underneath the night sky. As my body started to glow with warm light, I couldn’t help but notice that some of the others looked uncertain, exchanging looks and grimacing.

Were they… a little afraid?

Their fear gave me the confidence I needed. The Dawn of this iteration and the Dawn of the past were not quite the same. Maybe I wasn’t the badass warrior from my flashbacks, but they thought I was. I couldn’t quite remember the bloodlust, the satisfied thrumming in my veins that came after taking their kind down, but they remembered it vividly enough for all of us.

And maybe Warrior Dawn still lived in me, somehow. Already I could feel a little of her battle fury humming in my blood, making my pulse race.

I stared up at the shadow angels, licking my lips, and a voice whispered in the back of my mind: you’re mine, you fucking vultures.

Okay. Warrior Dawn was coming back. My feet felt rooted in the earth, as though ancient magic flowed upward from the soil, electrifying my body.

I’ll tear your wings from your backs and leave you to bleed out in the grass.

Just as the dark angel tossed caution to the wind and swooped down at me, eyes locked on mine, I arched my back. Beaming, pearly magic roiled within my chest, an eruption of power. I punched outward with my two hands, sending a physical ripple through the air between us. A low boom rumbled over the horizon, and light surged from my chest.

The burst of light streamed through the air, and the shadow angel met it with a burst of darkness from his own body. The two energies collided and knocked me backward on my butt. But I stared up at the sky as my light magic sent the angel spiraling down to Earth on scorched wings. He slammed hard into the grass. The other shadow angels swarmed, the air filling with the sound of ancient curses, their fear intensifying.

One down. Five left.

I summoned another burst of light magic, and as I did, my gaze flicked to Holly. In her hand, I saw what looked like a gold coin, glinting in the light. She flicked it upward like she was tossing for heads or tails. As it spun, it grew outward until it looked like a javelin of blinding light. When it spun back toward her, she caught it in an outstretched hand. In one sweeping movement, she threw it with all her might.

I stared as her javelin impaled another angel. When she clapped her hands, it exploded, shattering into beautiful, glittering light that rose delicately into the sky. It would have been a breathtaking sight, honestly, if it hadn’t been for the fact that it had detached the shadow angel’s head from its body in an equally showy explosion of gore.

Two down, four left.

My legs felt weak. “How long have you been able to do that?”

No answer. Instead, she pointed upward. The other angels were hesitating, but they still swarmed above us, ready to attack with more inky magic, or maybe their swords. I could tell they weren’t planning on running away, which left them only one other option.

“The fight is only just beginning,” Holly reminded me under her breath.

A bloodlust that felt familiar surged in my veins, raising the hair on the back of my neck—a dark feeling I’d once known well. A feeling I’d lost.

Warrior Dawn really wanted to come out. “Come and get us, then, you spineless fucks!” I roared in a voice that wasn’t quite my own. Light beamed from my body. “What are you waiting for?”

The only response was the sound of wings beating the air, and a wordless show of pointed teeth.

With them all grouped together like that, I figured I’d get in a hit on all four. I rubbed my palms together as if to warm them, then thrust them outward. Energy sizzled over my body, up my ribcage. Another ripple exploded from me, but with less intensity than before. The burst petered out just short of the closest angel, who simply braced himself and shielded his face with an arm, feathers displaced by the gust.

Well crap.

When the angel lowered his arm, his eyes glinted with a cold rage. He unleashed a hideous trumpet noise, mouth to the sky, and the others all followed suit until we were listening to some kind of deafening orchestra of the underworld. The sound set my teeth on edge and sent nausea swirling through my stomach, and I clamped my hands over my ears.

A shadow demon swooped for me, and this time, I found no magic left in my reserves. The creature slammed into me, knocking me to the ground, and dark tendrils began to curl around me, filling me with a sense of gnawing emptiness. The angel ripped his sword from his scabbard, then pressed it to my neck.

Fear and a feeling of intense isolation, a void, ripped through my body.

The shadow angel leaned in close, his features at once beautiful and terrifying. “The Judge didn’t want you to remember this time.”

Screw that. I gritted my teeth, unleashing a sharp burst of light that knocked the bastard off of me. He fell to the ground, body smoking, and I rushed to my feet. A primal rage erupted in my mind. I began kicking the fallen angel, trying to break his bones.

Holly grabbed my arm, pulling me away. “Dawn! You need to conserve your energy better.” The tone of her voice sent a pang of anxiety through me. She already sounded so… defeated.

I pulled the sword off the fallen angel, slicing it through the air like it had always belonged to me.

“Easy, Dawn,” said Holly. “Easy.” She held another coin of light in her hand, flicking it upward with her thumb until it burst into a large disc in the air. She caught it on her arm and held it out like a medieval shield. Damn, she had some amazing powers. All I really had going for me were wild bursts of uncontrolled light that seemed to burn out awfully fast.

And, apparently, a primordial rage problem.

All at once, the trumpeting grew louder, loud enough that I needed to grit my teeth and press my hands against my ears for a second of relief, still trying to grip the sword. At that moment, another group of shadow angels swarmed into the air above us, their dark wings glinting like oil in the moonlight.

Dread coiled between my ribs. There were more of them than I’d realized. And from their frenzied swarming, I was sure they were about to attack.

Six—at least—dive-bombed, their flight too fast to track. Their swords glinted with silvery light, dark magic spooling off their powerful bodies. And yet more shadow angels gathered above us.

I lifted my sword; Holly lifted her shield. I wanted to drive my blade into one of the fuckers’ ribcages, but Holly pulled me behind her shield with her.

“Stay with me,” she whispered. She slipped her hand into my free one.

That simple act communicated so much to me: to be strong, to be graceful. She was glad I was here beside her. But it also sent a shock of fear through me that even Warrior Dawn registered. Something about the gesture felt like a goodbye, and my pulse raced out of control, grief welling in my chest. I had the sense that she wanted to go down swinging. But make no mistake, we were going to go down—together.

“I love you,” I said, trying not to let the wobble in my voice out.

“I love you too, girl.”

She let go just as the angels slammed into us, and with a collective roar, we fought back.

Light burned through my body and I burst into action, feeling my pilfered sword moving through the air as an extension of myself. From behind, something sharp nicked my shoulder blades, the pain sharpening my senses.

As fury and ancient knowledge imbued my limbs, my stolen sword clashed into the blades around me. Another angel’s sword sliced my thigh, and I screamed.

Shadowy magic swirled around me like smoke, and I summoned my light, letting Warrior Dawn take over. I will drive my blade into your putrid hearts.

Even as they closed in on me, I kept fighting, sending bursts of light from my body, swinging my blade. Every single winged freak I took down was a true victory, one important enough to die for.

A sharp blade cut into my arm. I screamed with everything I had in me, and torrents of white light rippled from me again and again, scorching feathers and lancing flesh around me. From the corner of my vision, I caught glimpses of Holly’s javelin.

I grappled with the sudden, dreadful realization that they were doing far more damage to us than we could ever hope to do to them. We were simply outnumbered.

The shadow angels pressed in, a writhing mass of burned feathers around us. The metallic stench of blood washed over me. Was it my own? My thigh and my arm gushed blood, crimson streaks cutting spider-web lines over my pale skin. My consciousness fought to leave me every second. Another blade sliced into my back, and I tried to summon my light, but I came up empty.

Nothing left in the chamber.

I felt myself fall onto the wet grass, and darkness began to claim my mind like the shadowy magic around me.

Coldness overtook my body. Nothing left to do but sleep.