FIFTY-TWO
FIGHTING SHADOWS
I translated this passage this evening. I believe it is about the bond.
It roughly reads as: When their wills move as one, their might is multiplied beyond measure.
A weapon in solitude is a worthy thing, yet wedded to their united power, it may become an instrument unstoppable, a harbinger of ruin to all who stand before it.
—VALEN’S JOURNAL
AMARA
Calryx roars, the sound ripping through the air as she tucks her wings and dives after Xaroth. Our descent is fast, furious, and unstoppable. Around us, fifteen other dragons fall into formation, a blazing storm of scale and power.
The wind screams past my ears. The ground surges toward us.
Below, chaos reigns. Soldiers battle through the rubble. Shadow-born tear through shattered walls.
And at the center of it all stands the Gorganthe.
Its body is stone and shadow, its limbs thick and gnarled, its eyes glowing like embers in a dying fire. The ground shudders beneath each step. Massive arms sweep through the battlefield, leaving broken bodies in their wake.
Calryx flies tight beside Xaroth, just as Thane ordered, her wingtip riding just beneath his and matching his altitude with disciplined precision. Their movements are instinctive and practiced, the kind of aerial coordination forged through months of flying together.
But I’m not watching the formation. My gaze is fixed on the Gorganthe below.
It moves like a force of nature, towering and grotesque, its limbs wrapped in shadow and stone. Molten veins glow beneath its cracked hide. Every strike sends bodies flying. Soldiers scatter. Wielders retreat. It is carving a path straight through the heart of Greythorne’s final line.
The power inside me rises in response.
Fire.
Wind.
Magics threaded with something deeper. Something older that stirs whenever darkness gathers in such force.
A sudden spike of emotion tears through the bond. Protective. Urgent.
“Amara, no!” Thane’s voice slams into my mind. “Stand down. That’s an order!”
My heart lurches, but I don’t stop gathering power. The Gorganthe is cutting down everyone in its path. We have to act.
“Thane,” I say through the bond, my voice calm despite the fear I know he feels in me. “You can’t protect me every time.”
A heartbeat passes.
“I have to be part of this. This is my purpose.”
The bond tightens.
Then his voice comes back, controlled and unwavering.
“You are part of this. You’re here. You’ve earned your place. But you do not take on the Gorganthe alone. You’ve done enough with the Kethraki.”
Xaroth adjusts his position in the air. Calryx mirrors the movement automatically, keeping our formation intact.
“That isn’t me protecting you, love. That’s me making the call that keeps my entire squadron alive.”
His words land with the weight of command.
“You are not a lone force. You are part of a unit.”
The lesson from training echoes through my mind.
Move as one.
Strike as one.
Survive as one.
“Act like it.”
The words feel like a slap across my knuckles.
He’s right. He’s not holding me back. He’s leading, and he’s thinking about everyone, not just me.
Shit.
The shame flares fast and hot, but I don’t let it linger. There isn’t time for that. The formation is already shifting around us, diving, banking, preparing to strike. I tighten my grip on the saddle horn, ready to fight with purpose as part of something greater than myself.
The wind tears past us as the battlefield spreads below, chaos and fire consuming every direction.
Thane raises his arm. To the riders on his right, he signals two fingers forward, then down in a cutting arc.
Flank the Gorganthe from the right.
Rian and four dragon riders break formation immediately, wings angling into a sharp descent. They dive low and fast, disappearing into the smoke trailing along the edge of the keep.
Thane turns to his left and mirrors the signal.
Strike from the left.
Another cluster peels away, banking hard toward the ruined towers. Their dragons roar as they lose altitude, disappearing between fractured spires and crumbling battlements.
Then he raises his hand again, directing the remaining dragons behind the central line. His arm sweeps toward the far end of the battlefield, where the fighting is thickest and the soldiers are barely holding.
Reinforce the eastern front.
Support the outer line.
Jarek and three more riders break away and angle toward the last wall of defense, where the enemy is pressing hardest.
They go without hesitation.
Then he turns to me.
A sharp flick of his hand pulls two fingers toward his chest before casting them outward again.
Stay with me.
Before we descend, I glance upward one last time.
Garrick and the other three riders still hold the line above, clashing with the Kethraki that continue to rise from the horizon like a tide of wings and shadow. Fire streaks across the sky. Dragons wheel and dive through smoke and blood and motion so fast it blurs together.
A rider atop a molten bronze dragon cuts through a cluster of Kethraki. Shards of earth erupt from her outstretched hand, impaling one of the creatures in mid-dive. Her dragon follows with a roar, unleashing a stream of fire that consumes two more in a flash of molten light.
Their bodies tumble from the sky. One crashes into the battlefield below, crushing a knot of Fellborn beneath its ruined wings. Another slams into a shattered wall, sending stone and debris in every direction.
The battle in the sky continues.
But the fighting below needs us now.
Xaroth shifts left without warning, banking hard and low. Calryx follows instantly, wings tucking as she mirrors the movement, her body tight beside his. The two dragons sweep wide in perfect formation.
I blink, startled, turning my head as we veer away from the Gorganthe. Confusion flares in my chest. I thought we were driving straight through the center. I thought we were going after it together.
But Thane doesn’t signal, look back, or explain. The order has already been given.
My breath shudders as the magics inside me remain tightly coiled, searching for somewhere to go.
Then Calryx’s voice cuts through the uncertainty. “Trust the Warlord.”
I swallow hard and do exactly that.
The flanking dragons, led by Rian, close in now, diving hard from opposite sides of the keep in perfect formation.
Flame erupts.
Twin torrents of dragonfire crash into the Gorganthe, engulfing the titan in a roaring inferno.
Fire races over its immense body, swallowing the surrounding Fellborn in one searing wave of Elemental fury.
The air ripples with blistering heat, and the stone walls glow orange beneath the intensity of the flames.
For one hopeful heartbeat, I think it’s enough.
Then the creature steps through the fire.
Its obsidian hide glows a dull crimson where the flames cling to it. Great fissures split across its body, exposing molten seams beneath the surface, but instead of collapsing, the cracks begin closing before my eyes.
“Calryx! It’s healing!” I shout through our bond, panic flaring through me. “Valen never mentioned anything about a Gorganthe healing itself!”
“Neither did the Guardians,” Calryx says, disbelief rippling through our bond. “I’ve never seen one do this before, Virelya.”
More dragons dive. Another torrent of fire slams into the titan, forcing it back a single step, but still it refuses to fall.
Earth channelers answer next, driving massive pillars of stone upward around its legs.
Some barely pierce the monster’s thick skin.
The Gorganthe bellows and wrenches against them, shattering one column, then another, each impact shaking the battlefield beneath us.
Air channelers sweep their arms skyward, feeding the dragonfire until the flames burn hotter, brighter, roaring white at their core.
Water channelers seize the opening, driving razor-sharp spears of ice into every glowing fracture.
Steam explodes outward as fire and ice wage war across the titan’s armored hide, widening the cracks faster than they can mend.
The Gorganthe thrashes violently, its enormous arms tearing through the flames as though determined to drag the entire battlefield down with it.
Another wave of dragons descends with Rowena at the head, striking from above while the others circle back into position.
Fire pours into the widening fractures as the Earth channelers force fresh pillars around its legs, pinning it in place just long enough for the dragons to strike again.
This time the flames reach beneath its armor.
The monster convulses.
Then it screams.
But it isn’t one voice. It’s a chorus of anguish, rage, and torment. Countless voices layered atop one another, twisted and broken. The sound is ancient. Endless. A thousand souls crying out at once.
The molten fissures spread across its body faster now, racing from limb to limb until its obsidian shell can no longer contain the fire burning inside it.
Rian’s team unleashes five streams of fire one more time.
The titan collapses inward, great slabs of blackened armor crashing to the earth as flames burst through every crack.
Moments later, the screams cease altogether.
The silence that follows feels worse.
Because I know what I heard.
A thousand souls.
We continue sweeping wide across the battlefield, Xaroth and Calryx flying in tight formation, our path cutting a clean arc through the smoke-laced sky. The dragons who just took out the Gorganthe have returned to Xaroth’s side.
I’m still not sure where we’re headed, only that Thane is leading, and we are following.
He begins signaling. First to Rian—a firm hand gesture, two fingers angled back, then forward again in a hooked sweep.
Take two riders. Reinforce Garrick. Hold the skies.
Rian nods once and peels off without a word, two dragons veering with him as they adjust their elevation to rejoin the brutal fight above.
Next, Thane signals Jarek with a broader motion, his arm extending before sweeping downward.