“Holly,” I managed to say, opening my eyelids with all of my remaining strength. Had I really survived that onslaught?

I needed to see Holly. With extreme effort, I craned my neck, my gaze landing on her. Her hair covered her face as she lay on her side. The only sign that she was still alive was the occasional twitch of her forefinger. A tiny spark of light tried to come alive in her hand, then died.

Was this my fault?

A scream pierced my skull. The agonized shriek of a dying shadow angel, perhaps, or my own?

My blurry vision began to clear, and I focused more clearly on Holly. Her chest rose and fell slowly. Apart from that, she wasn’t moving.

Before I could expend too much energy searching for answers, a movement of shadows turned my head.

A dark form, a pale face slammed down to the earth. It took me a moment to recognize Ragnar, now twisted into something almost more hellish than the shadow angels. His fangs glinted in the moonlight as he sank them into one of the angels.

Adrenaline raced through my veins at the sight. Ragnar’s victim unleashed a strangled cry as the vampire tore out its throat. The angel’s head lolled.

Slowly I pushed myself up onto my elbows, surveying the scene around me. Dozens of shadow angels, their throats torn out, blood staining the grass.

My my. Ragnar had been busy.

“Ra-Rag—” I tried my best, but my voice wouldn’t come out. He locked eyes with me, his pupils blazing red. Blood dripped from his fangs, and my heart skipped a beat. It seemed like he’d killed everyone around us. Never in my life would I have imagined I’d feel such relief at the sight of a blood-streaked monster.

A flutter of dark wings broke our gaze, and Ragnar launched himself at the twitching body of another shadow angel. He ignored its shrieking, its beating wings. He reared back and head-butted it in the nose. Bone crunched. I could barely muster the willpower to look away from the violence. My vision blurred as Ragnar bit into the angel’s jugular. Blood soaked his clothes.

When he’d wrenched the last bit of life from the final shadow angel, he stood, panting. His body, thickly corded with muscle, looked rigid with tension, and his white shirt was soaked with gore. Dead angels littered the ground around him, their wings splayed, blood glistening in the light of the stars.

Ragnar wiped the back of his hand across his mouth. “Dawn.” His fangs receded, and concern shone in his eyes—now that familiar ice blue instead of red. “Holly. What happened?”

“You were right,” I rasped. “Not about kidnapping me. But you were right that the shadow angels were coming for me.”

A dim battle drum still beat through my body, even as more and more strength left me by the second. I must have lost a lot of blood because dizziness overwhelmed me, and my head landed in the wet grass again. I could feel Ragnar’s hands on me, distantly heard him speaking to me, but I couldn’t quite keep my eyes open or understand what he was saying. As the blood left my body, nausea and a deep chill rose in my gut.

In every iteration of the past, Warrior Dawn had always been stronger than I was now. I knew it deep in my heart at that moment.

She would never have rolled over and let herself die.

What has been giving you strength since this all began?

I tried so hard to think about it.

Why could you read the astrolabe? Why could you use your powers? When did this all start?

My men. My star-tattooed mystery men. We all drew strength from each other—me from them, and them from me. Our strength came from our unity. Even if I hated some of the bastards.

I reached out, touching Ragnar’s arm until I found his hand. I threaded my fingers into his.

His deep voice curled around me like a blanket of night. “You’re going to be all right, Dawn. I’m here. You’re not alone.”

Warmth and power from his hand pulled into mine, filling the empty void in my chest. His soothing, warm magic pulsed over my skin, assuaging the sharp ache inside me. Slowly, strength filled my cold veins, buzzing through my leaden limbs, energizing me once again until I gasped with relief. The bleeding began to stop.

Looking into his pale eyes, mesmerized, I sat up. I gripped his hands, my body trembling but alive.

The night breeze kissing my skin had never felt so good.

* * *

“I feel better now,” I said, my voice coming out more clearly.

Ragnar stared at me. “We’re still in danger. We’re all in danger this time.”

“Why?”

“The Judge wants to keep us apart this time. When you broke his rules all those centuries ago—when you manipulated me into letting you live—you ignited his wrath, and it’s never been quenched.”

My stomach clenched, and silence fell over us.

Unexpectedly, from the darkness, Holly’s voice interrupted the lull. “Okay, but right now, we need to go.”

I stared, stunned, as she got up and brushed herself off, her body glowing with silver light.

“You look amazingly unharmed,” I said. With a grunt, I pushed myself to my feet, then pulled her into a tight hug. My injuries had all but stopped bothering me, and I wondered if, somehow, my recovery had aided hers in some way. Like we were linked. I squeezed her as gently as I could, just in case.

“We kicked ass,” she mumbled into my hair. “Hello Ragnar. Please tell me you’re done locking us in rooms with no TV.” Her voice had cooled.

“Holly.”

Dark forms swarmed above us, wings silhouetted by the moonlight, and I pointed upward. “We have to get running.”

Ragnar’s icy gaze followed my finger. My pulse raced as I saw his pupils dilate at the sight.

Holly inhaled sharply. “Are you kidding me? I just want a bath and a fucking cocktail.”

“They’re coming for Dawn first,” said Ragnar. “She’s the easiest to kill.”

Holly scowled. “I know what kind of danger she’s in. Why don’t you just work on getting back into beast mode, and we can talk later.”

More winged shapes swarmed beneath the moon, and my throat went dry. “I’m not liking our chances,” I whispered. “Ragnar was able to finish them off because we’d weakened them with magic. Now I can hardly feel it. There are at least… twenty of them.” As the winged forms in the sky grew larger, the knot in my stomach did too.

“We take down as many as we can,” said Holly, looking to me for confirmation.

I nodded once. “Okay.”

I surveyed the bodies around me, plucking another sword from an angel. Maybe I’d nearly run out of magic, but Warrior Dawn wanted to come out to play. Already, battle rage pulsed through my blood, hot and angry.

When I glanced up at the sky again, the shadow angels were nearly upon us. My heart stopped.

They slammed into us with the force of a tornado, swarming around us—wings beating, swords cutting the air. An ancient, familiar power flowed through me—the power of Warrior Dawn—and I began moving among them. Somehow I knew how to put every foot in the right place, knew how to cut every careful arc of my blade.

My magic had begun to run out, but Warrior Dawn still wanted blood, and she knew how to get it. My sword sparked in the air as it clashed against the angels’.

“Don’t show weakness!” Ragnar snarled, slashing out with a jagged blade.

As I moved with surety, whirling and ducking with the slashes of my sword, I summoned what magic I could. I let out a blast of light energy, feeble compared to before, but enough to knock the closest angel into the grass.

“Dawn!” A deep Scottish voice rumbled through my gut, and I whirled to see Balthazar moving in the distance, body glowing with pale light. Beside him were Raphael and Sebastos. Their bodies seemed to pulse with some kind of golden aura.

And then, behind them, an angel. Only this one gleamed with that same golden aura, his wings a shimmering copper. It took me a moment to realize who he was—the man they called Death. Samael.

Maybe he was an angel of death, but in that moment, I could see he was on our side.

I loosed a relieved breath, feeling almost whole. Together.

Still, I didn’t have long to bask in the sudden good fortune, because a blade was swinging for my head. I managed to deflect it, casting another glance at the men from the Academy. They sprinted over the bloody, scorched earth, swords raised, bodies gleaming like stars.

“You know what to do!” Balthazar barked.

Raphael bolted toward me while Sebastos launched himself right into the center of the fray, his blade arcing through the air like a master swordsman. Samael soared above us at the angels in the air, a sword in his hand.

I turned just in time to see one of the shadow angels swooping lower toward me, teeth bared and bloodlust in his cold, empty eyes. I summoned a surge of light, shooting it through my blade. It slammed him in the chest but didn’t take him down.

I gritted my teeth. Not enough power anymore to do any real damage.

The angel lunged again, his blade swinging close to my face, and I dodged backward, losing my footing. I braced for a blow, but the angel’s back arched, his face contorting with a grimace.

I stared, open-mouthed, as Raphael tore one of my attacker’s wings off. The angel screamed in agony.

Another angel swung for me and I parried, shifting back over the grass until I slammed into the body of an enemy behind me. A powerful arm gripped me in a chokehold, strangling me until my lungs burned.

I managed to drive my heel into his shin, and he dropped me. I whirled, slicing through his throat with my blade. Blood poured from his neck. I stumbled, my mind swimming. My brain was becoming overwhelmed with everything happening around me, my body going into shock, and I no longer felt like my legs could hold me up. Dizzy, I started to fall, until a powerful set of arms scooped me up, lifting me back onto my feet. Balthazar.

Blood pulsed deep inside my core as he stared into my eyes with his trademark intensity. “I found you,” he breathed in his low voice, still keeping his arms around me.

“You found me,” I repeated, my breath coming fast.

He leaned forward and grazed my lower lip with his teeth, surprising me. The contradiction between his actions and the bloody violence around us made it all the more intense. Not quite a kiss, but enough to send heat shooting through my body. Somehow, it calmed me and energized me at the same time.

“Don’t run out of my sight again,” he said, sounding like he was scolding me, but with a sincerity that almost made him seem vulnerable. Almost, but not quite. Weirdly, the desperation with which he spoke just made him seem stronger to me. I wanted to be able to borrow that strength.

With the weight of his gaze on me, I felt like I was able to do just that. And in that split second, warm, sunlit power simmered in my belly, spreading up through my chest and moving through my limbs.

A low growl escaped my throat, and my lips curled in a dark smile. Balthazar was bringing out the animal in me, and the beast was scratching and clawing its way to the surface.

He flashed me a wicked smile. “Welcome back.”

I clenched my fists at my sides, stepping away from him. This time, the hot glow of my true power radiated from my ribs outward.

I dropped the sword. I didn’t need it.

Arching my back, I flung my arms out to the side, and light exploded from my body. It was almost as if the light knew where to go, who to hit. It slammed into the closest shadow angels, blasting them away from me and singeing their wings.

With that burst of power, my magic had depleted again. Still, it had helped to give us the upper hand.

Together, the way we were always meant to be.

My gaze flicked to Raphael, who sliced through an angel’s wings from behind. Nearby, Sebastos gripped a shadow angel by his head, snapping his neck with a loud crack. When I glanced at Holly, I found her leaping through the air and jamming her light javelin through an angel’s throat. I pivoted, searching for Ragnar, and gaped as he punched his fist through an angel’s chest, ripping out the creature’s still-beating heart.

Despite the carnage, I loosed a sigh of relief. As long as we fought together, we couldn’t be defeated easily.

With my bare feet planted in the earth, mud staining my dress, I drew power from my team around me. I closed my eyes, digging deeper within myself to summon light from the depths of my core.

I am the blazing inferno of a star’s surface, and I will burn you with my power.

My back arched as the magic flowed from me, a wild blaze of wrath. And when I opened my eyes again, I surveyed the battlefield. Sam—Death—landed gracefully on the bloodied earth by our sides.

The bodies of our enemies lay all around us, blood and burned feathers littering the grassy field. We stood in a tight formation, hardly realizing we’d fallen into one, spurred on by the roaring battle drums of our beating hearts.

This was how it was always meant to be.

“Let’s go home,” Balthazar said, breaking the heavy silence with his firm voice. “This is over.”

I hoped he was right—that nothing worse was going to happen here tonight. I gave a short nod.

“Yes,” Ragnar said. “It is.” He skulked off into the shadows. Probably back to his castle to brood by himself.

“Home,” I reiterated as I watched Ragnar go, feeling a slight pang at watching our group break up. Nobody made any effort to stop him, but I felt the air thin a little at his departure. He was one of us, whether he wanted to be or not.

“Home,” Holly said, with far more warmth than Balthazar or I had managed, a huge smile brightening her face.

When she hooked her arm into mine, I felt the power of the word like a magic spell.