Morath, it seemed, did not think to surrender. Only to inflict destruction, to break into the keep and slaughter as many as they could before meeting their end.

His shield bloodied and dented, his horse a raging demon herself beneath him, Chaol kept swinging his sword. His wife lay within the keep behind him. He would not fail her.

Nesryn ran out of arrows too soon.

Morath did not flee, even with the might of the Darghan riders and the foot soldiers upon them. So they slowly advanced, leaving bodies clad in black as well as gold armor in their wake. More Morath soldiers than their own, but it was hard—near-unbearable—to see so many go down. To see the beautiful horses of the Darghan riderless. Or felled themselves.

The rukhin took losses, but not as many. Not now that an army fought beneath them.

Sartaq led the center, and from where Nesryn commanded the left flank, she kept an eye on him and Kadara. An eye on Borte and Yeran, leading the right flank to the far western side of the battle, Falkan Ennar in ruk form with them. Perhaps she imagined it, but Nesryn could have sworn the shifter fought with renewed vigor. As if the years returned to him aided his strength.

Nesryn nudged Salkhi, and they dove again, the riders behind her following suit. Arrows and spears rose to meet them, some Morath soldiers fleeing. Nesryn and Salkhi rose back into the air coated in more black blood.

High overhead, twin rukhin scout patrols monitored the battle. As Nesryn wiped the black blood from her face, one rider dove—right for Sartaq.

Sartaq was soaring away a heartbeat later.

Nesryn knew he’d kick her ass for it, but she shouted to the rukhin captain behind her to hold formation, and steered Salkhi after the prince.

“Get back in line,” Sartaq ordered over the wind, his skin unusually ashen.

“What’s wrong?” she called. Salkhi flapped harder, falling into line with the prince’s ruk.

Sartaq pointed ahead. To the wall of mountains just beyond the lake and city.

To the dam that he’d so casually mentioned breaking to wipe away Morath’s army.

With each flap of Salkhi’s wings, it became clearer. What had sent him into a mad dash.

A group of Morath soldiers had taken the night not to rest, but to sneak through the abandoned city. To scale the foothills, then the mountain wall. To the dam itself.

Where they now, with battering rams and wicked cunning, sought to unleash it.

Salkhi swept closer. Nesryn reached for an arrow. Her fingers curled around air.

Sartaq, however, had two arrows left, and fired both upon the thirty or so Morath soldiers heaving a mammoth battering ram into the center of the dam. Wood, and stone, and iron, ancient and foreboding. A few cracks, and it would come down.

And then the upper lake and river penned up behind it would rage across the plain.

Morath did not care if its own forces were washed away. They would lose today anyway.

They would not allow the khagan’s army to walk off the plain, either.

Both of Sartaq’s arrows found their marks, but the two soldiers who went down did not cause the others to drop the battering ram. Again, they heaved the ram back—and swung it forward.

The boom of wood on wood echoed up to them.

They soared near enough that the iron enforcements at the tip of the battering ram became clear. Thick iron casing, capped with spikes meant to shred and pierce. If Salkhi and Kadara could reach it, they could rip the ram from their hands—

Metal groaned and clanked, and Sartaq’s warning cry shattered across the air.

Salkhi banked on instinct, spying the massive iron bolt before Nesryn did. A bolt fired from a heavy-looking device they must have rolled up here. To keep ruks away.

The bolt went wide, slamming through the mountain rock.

It would have pierced Salkhi’s chest, straight into his heart.

Stomach churning, Nesryn soared up again, assessing the soldiers below.

Sartaq signaled from nearby, Weave in through two different directions. Meet in the center.

The winds screamed in her ears, but Nesryn tugged on the reins, and Salkhi banked in a wide arc. Sartaq turned Kadara, the mirror image to Nesryn’s maneuver.

“Fast as you can, Salkhi!” Nesryn shouted to her ruk.

Gaining on the dam, on the soldiers, Salkhi and Kadara soared toward each other, crossed paths, and arced outward again. Weaving fast as the wind itself. Denying the archers an easy target.

An iron bolt fired for Sartaq and ripped through air above him, nearly grazing his head.

The battering ram slammed into the wood again.

A splintering crack sounded this time. A deep groan, like some terrible beast awakening from a long slumber.

Another iron bolt shot for them and missed. Nesryn and Sartaq wove past each other, flying so fast her eyes streamed. The wind sang, full of the voices of the dying and injured.

And then they were there, Salkhi’s talons outstretched as he slammed into the iron machine that had launched those bolts, ripping it apart. Soldiers screamed as the ruk fell upon them, too.

Those at the battering ram got in another thundering boom against the dam before Sartaq and Kadara slashed into them. Men went flying, some hitting the dam. Some landing in pieces.

Kadara hurled the battering ram onto the nearby mountain face, wood splintering with the impact. It rolled away into the rocks and vanished.

Heart thundering, the battle on the plain below still raging, Nesryn wheeled Salkhi around and took stock of the dam wall, Sartaq doing the same beside her.

What they saw made them soar back to the keep as swiftly as the winds could carry them.

Lorcan had battled his way down the first siege tower’s dim, cramped interior, slaughtering the soldiers in his path. Gavriel followed behind him, soon catching up as Lorcan found himself holding the entrance to the tower against the countless soldiers trying to get in.

The two of them stemmed the tide, even as a few of the Morath grunts got past their swords. Whitethorn and the queen would be waiting to pick them off.

Lorcan lost track of how long he and Gavriel held the entrance to the siege tower—how long it took until their forces were able to dislodge it.

Their magic would be useless. The entire damn thing was built of iron. The ladders, too. As if Morath had anticipated their presence.

Only the groaning of collapsing metal warned them the tower was coming down, and sent them racing onto the battlefield.

Where they’d found themselves outside the gates. Fenrys and Lord Chaol had appeared at the battlement walls with archers, and fired at the soldiers who’d rushed for Lorcan and Gavriel.

But he and the Lion had already marked their next target: the battering ram still slamming into those ever-weakening gates. And with the archers covering from above, they’d begun slaughtering their way to it. And then slaughtering their way along the ram itself, until it thudded to the ground, then was forgotten in the wave of Morath soldiers who came for them.

Lorcan’s breath had been a steady beat, a grounding force as the bodies piled around them.

They need only hold the gate long enough for the khagan’s army to overrun the Morath host.

From above, a swift, brutal wind added to the dance of death, ripping the air from the lungs of soldiers charging at them, even as he knew Whitethorn kept fighting on the battlements.

Lorcan again lost track of time. Only vaguely knew the sun was arcing across the sky.

But the khagan’s army was gaining the field, inch by inch.