Chapter 53
The ascent was beautiful but tough, my leg muscles straining.
We’d ridden our tygers at first, but then had dismounted, putting any extra weight the various dominions were carrying upon our tygers and climbing beside them.
Ire’s Wrath stayed at camp. Flame lent me her energy, like balm for my tired muscles, making them feel fresh, though I chided her to keep her strength. We’d all need it later.
It took hours. We rested when we needed, aware of what we would face, but continued to move together as one group with one goal.
And then the Starborn Peak loomed immediately above us.
We stopped a moment to take it in, the visible veins of metal running through the mountaintop’s face like a delicate filigree, hinting at the power and magic held there.
We caught our breath and took in the view, the Silver Dominion spread out around us.
To the west stretched the glittering Fang Sea, and to the east lay the calm expanse of the Argent Gulf.
Undulating hills rolled into the distance, showing signs of spring now that we were entering the fifth month.
The beauty of the land and seas caught me by surprise.
My heart filled, determination invigorating my tired body.
We would protect this magnificence. We would destroy the Starved, save Edith, and repair this Anchor.
“There.” Blake pointed at an opening just a bit farther up the mountain pass: a jagged opening carved into the stone. Shadows pooled at its entrance. “I can feel a great source of metal magic there. It’s…pulsing.”
Malissa’s eyes gleamed, her fingers twitching as if the magic called to her. “I feel it, too.”
A sharp whistle cut through the air. Quinn jerked his chin back down the path we had ascended, his voice tight. “What is that?”
I turned. And my stomach dropped.
A shifting white wave crested, maybe a half mile behind us, spilling toward us with unnatural speed.
Demons.
Blake swore, stepping closer to me instinctually.
“So much for stealth.” Jace shook his head with a deep sigh.
“Stay safe, ribbon girl,” Quinn said, looking at me, his slate blue hair falling in his eyes. “Get ready to party.”
I gave him a shaky smile. “You, too, my friend.”
“All riders on their tygers! Everyone, get to that cave as quickly as you can. Now!” Blake shouted the commands.
Now, Rubi, Flame said, taut with urgency. Get on!
With a fluid leap, I swung onto her back. Blake vaulted onto Kingsolver, who let out a thunderous snarl.
Malissa climbed onto Venom, and Jace onto Xane, his brown eyes scanning the swarm.
The ground rumbled beneath us when the tygers sprang into motion, their powerful strides devouring the distance between us and the cave.
The firens were a blur of red and gold. They didn’t run.
It was more like they glided over the ground, flames sparking at their heels.
Every stride they took seemed to propel them forward like an arrow fired from a bow.
Lian and Auron took off, flames bursting forth from their backs. Wings, they had wings of fire. I gaped, breathless. They shot upward and flew toward the crack. Streams of phoenix phire poured from their palms, scorching the earth in their wake.
“Rubi,” Blake shouted. “Focus!”
Flame took off beside Kingsolver.
With a snarl, Quinn shifted mid-stride into his giant tan wolf, his body rippling.
Calla exploded into an enormous bear, towering over the others, a behemoth of muscle and fury that tore up the ground as she ran.
Another Azure became an eagle, one a leopard, all of us heading toward the cave.
Vidor and the other male Onyx moved forward as if riding on water, Una and the other two women in tow.
The wind howled, carrying the eerie susurration of the approaching swarm.
We were running out of time.
The tygers pounded across the ground side by side, their enormous paws hammering against the earth. The ground shook under their force, and for a moment, I believed they might outrun the wind itself.
A blur of bone white launched itself at Xane, its clawed limbs latching onto the tyger’s powerful legs.
Xane roared, staggering under the sudden weight. The Thirst demon was all dense bone and writhing tendrils, its face splitting into a gaping maw lined with needle-thin teeth. A horrible, wet rasping filled the air as it wrapped around Xane’s limbs, dragging him down.
Jace cursed, still atop Xane, his bow snapping up, but there was no clean shot. The demon was too close.
Malissa reacted first. With a sharp flick of her wrist, she threw one of her thundervein knives, hitting it square in the eyes.
The demon screeched. With a spasmodic lurch, it uncoiled, shriveling back into itself. Blake’s magic returned the knife to Malissa.
Jace gave Malissa a sharp nod before turning his attention back to the cave ahead.
We streaked forward. The Thirst demons were too close. Their shrieks clawed at my ears, their teeth flashing in the dim light.
I risked a glance over my shoulder. The creatures poured toward us like a tide, their skeletal hands reaching, their sunken eyes glowing with hunger.
Faster, I urged, though Flame hardly needed encouragement.
With a final surge, we shot through the cavern’s mouth. The others followed in a blur of fur and steel. The moment we were inside, the temperature dropped, the air thick with damp stone.
Blake reined Kingsolver to a sharp halt beside me, his bronze hair damp with sweat. His gaze flicked back to the mouth of the cave, then to the others.
“Calla, Auron, Vidor, you’re with me for the Anchor,” he ordered. “The rest of you, hold the entrance.”
A void of infinite darkness unfurled within the ranks of the Onyx Tortoise Dominion, a swirling vortex of power laced with shards of glittering ice. The force of it washed over us.
Vidor’s magic crackled in the air, and with a flick of his wrist, he corralled the three women into a tight circle.
The women gasped, fear flashing in their eyes as they were pulled together, helpless within his grasp.
The ground trembled beneath him, and from the floor, a cage of twisted bones emerged, glowing with an eerie black light.
The bones twisted and coiled around the women, forming an impenetrable prison, trapping them in place.
His yins secured, Vidor turned and followed Blake.
I stared in horror at Una, trapped in place, though the demons wouldn’t be able to reach her through the magic of the bone cage.
I realized the women’s yin magic would be used to feed the men’s yang powers.
Malissa drew her sword. Jace nocked an arrow, his eyes lethal.
The ravenous Thirst demons crashed toward us, but the line of warriors held them.
The cave entrance became a battlefield of fire and blood as the Azures clashed with the swarm of demons.
The eagle Azure flew at the creatures with his thundervein-tipped talons, while the leopard moved with powerful, fluid grace, every muscle rippling beneath his spotted hide.
Quinn fought in a frenzy of fangs. Amid the carnage, the male Onyx wove his magic with deadly precision, his water whips filled with ice shards edged in shadowsteel.
The Reds fought wreathed in a living inferno, carving a burning path through the horde, their fire licking up the walls.
I cracked my burning ribbons through the air, lashing them in wide, searing arcs that lit the demons ablaze on contact. Flames spiraled from each strike, the thundervein edges glowing white-hot as I drove them back.
Malissa and Venom moved like a single entity, a whirlwind of silver and darkness cutting through the chaos, her sword slicing at the Thirst demons with ruthless precision. Beside them, Jace fought, his bow a blur as he loosed arrow after arrow, each one tipped with thundervein.
I paused mid-strike, heart lurching as a sudden pull from the Pair bond yanked through my chest, sharp and urgent, dragging my thoughts toward Blake.
He says you’re needed, Flame relayed, her mental voice taut. Kingsolver says to come now, for Edith.
Flame and I shot forward, plunging deeper into the cavern, catching up to Calla, still in her bear form, and Auron and Vidor.
Blake’s eyes flared when he saw me, burning blue in the darkened light.
We both dismounted, then moved forward with as much speed as caution would allow.
The path twisted, jagged rocks jutting from the walls, moisture seeping from unseen crevices.
The farther we went, the more the air pulsed.
Not with heat but with power. Auron lit the way in the complete darkness, fire held between his palms.
Then I saw it.
Ahead, a glow pulsed like an off-kilter heartbeat, pale and crystalline, illuminating a farther cavern. Embedded in the stone was a gigantic diamond.
The Silver Anchor to the Demon Realm.
It must have been a thing of celestial beauty once: a diamond the size of a warhorse, its many facets cut with divine precision, refracting light in endless shimmering patterns that danced along the cavern walls.
But now it was dying.
Cracks spiderwebbed across its surface, jagged fissures leaking wisps of black smoke.
The pulsing light within it was erratic, its glow flickering one moment like a failing heartbeat.
The next, it surged with such force that the ground trembled beneath our feet.
The color had soured to a sickly, yellow-tinged pallor, as though the corruption of the Demon Realm had seeped into its very core.
With each throb of its unstable energy, the cave trembled, and the air thickened with the acrid scent of scorched stone and something older, something wrong.
Magic bled from it in uneven bursts, warping the shadows and making them seem to lurch and twist. It was failing.
And at its base—
“Edith,” I breathed, running to her.