Chapter 59
What was once the most beautiful place I knew was now engulfed in flames.
The Shadow Glade’s protective wards had held just long enough to mask the destruction from us fire elementals. One moment, we were soaring beneath a clear blue sky. The next, we were swallowed by smoke.
Lakota nearly crash-landed into a burning dwelling.
We touched down in the center of a wide street, his wings arched high to avoid bringing more ruin to what was left. I slid down his leg and hit the ground in a roll, coming to a stop against a charred wall.
Tears streamed down my cheeks—not from emotion, but from the sting of smoke. I lifted my forearm to my mouth, trying to block out the air, but the burn had already seeped into my lungs.
“This is natural fire,” Lakota warned as he lifted into the smoke-choked sky.
Which meant one thing—fire elementals weren’t immune.
A window beside me shattered with a violent crack, shards exploding outward. I threw up my arms and channeled the air element, sending a gust to scatter the debris before it could slice into me.
Rhodes and Shayde dropped from the sky, landing with flawless motion. They sprinted toward me without hesitation, each grabbing an arm to pull me from the open. Then we ran—shoulders brushing, boots pounding scorched stone—as the Glade burned around us.
Water elementals fought to douse the flames, their efforts valiant but futile against the spreading inferno. Earth elementals heaped soil over the fire, trying desperately to smother it. But it wasn’t enough.
There were no Tyrian soldiers in sight. No battle.
Someone—somehow—had gotten past the Shadow Glade’s wards. And they hadn’t come to conquer.
They came to burn.
Doryan burst through the smoke, coughing and wild-eyed. “The fire started at the library!” he shouted.
No. No, no, no.
Cami.
All four of us pivoted, sprinting toward the library. Dragons flew low overhead, wings slicing through the smoke as they plucked civilians from rooftops, lifting them to safety. From the east, Drithan spotted Shayde running with us and let out a piercing trill as he swept a family into his talons.
We rounded a corner—
Boom.
An explosion tore through the library, hurling us back like rag dolls. I hit the ground hard. My vision blinked out.
“Up!” Lakota roared from above.
I groaned, pushing to my elbows, the world spinning. My ears rang.
“Ma!” Shayde’s voice cracked like lightning.
I turned, heart plummeting.
Rhodes had both hands on Shayde’s arms, holding him back—barely. The brothers were locked in a silent war of grief and panic.
Doryan appeared in the library’s shattered doorway, smoke curling behind him. He carried Cami over his shoulders, her body limp but intact. He made it to us and gently laid her down in the grass. We rushed to her side as she coughed—covered head to toe in soot, but, miraculously, no burns.
Footsteps pounded behind us. Elias Wylder pushed through the crowd, dropping to his knees beside her. His hands swept over her arms, her legs, her face—searching for injuries.
Cami swatted him away, scooting toward Shayde and Rhodes, who knelt just behind her. Her breaths came sharp and fast, but her eyes—her eyes were locked on me.
Her voice was hoarse, barely louder than the crackle of flame behind her. But I heard every word.
“The prophecy is gone.”
Tyria waited until Cami Wylder was locked inside the secret cellar to set the library ablaze. Their forces were waiting in the main cellar belowground, watching for her to recognize the signs of fire and reveal the door to make her escape.
That was when they knocked her unconscious, raided her archives, and left her for dead.
The four of us stayed with Cami until she scolded us for hovering and ordered us out. A dozen questions pressed against my tongue, but only one slipped free.
Shayde was holding his mother’s hand in the infirmary when I asked, “Why didn’t you use your element against the Tyrians?”
Cami’s mouth curved into a wolfish grin as she accepted a glass of water from Rhodes. Shayde dragged a hand down his soot-streaked face, only smearing it darker.
“I’m a mundane,” Cami said—proudly.
Rhodes dropped onto the stool beside her bed. “You remember what I told you about mundanes in this war? They’re outcast. Dismissed. Considered worthless. Why waste time on someone who can’t summon more than a flicker of power?” He scoffed.
Cami reached for his hand, her grip firm. “When Elias graduated from Mageia, he came back to the Glade and built me the library. So, knowledge became my power.” She lifted a shoulder almost carelessly.
And that was the end of our time with her.
With the flames in the Shadow Glade finally contained, its forces turned toward Mageia.
Joined with the Hollow’s, the Glade’s fire elementals filled the now-clear sky—dragons of every color and size soaring in formation.
At the front flew General Wylder, astride his massive blue dragon.
Mageia War College emerged through the thinning clouds, a familiar silhouette bathed in daylight for the first time since the All Hallows’ Eve Ball. But the once-comforting stone walls now felt distant—like a memory left out in the rain.
Tyrian and Aryan forces clashed across the battlefield—Tyria holding only the ground just outside the front entrance while Aryan fighters were scattered everywhere: swooping through the skies on dragon-back, lining the parapets, and battling fiercely below with elemental force.
I watched as the Tyrians fought with both weapons and elemental magic, while the Aryans wielded only their elements. The scene was chaos and artistry all at once—the four elements of the Mareki colliding in brilliant, brutal harmony.
Lakota barrel-rolled hard to the right, stealing the breath from my lungs.
As he leveled out, I caught sight of a gray dragon crashing into his underbelly.
With a roar, Lakota unleashed a torrent of flame—not to kill, but to distract.
Then he struck, clamping his jaws around the gray’s throat and thrashing it side to side.
He released it midair, and we climbed sharply as its lifeless body plummeted—right into the very dwelling where I’d been interrogated last season.
“Why did that dragon look so—”
“Corrupted?” Lakota finished for me. “Not sure. Left!”
Another gray surged upward, aiming for Lakota’s wing. I thrust out my hands, air tightening like a vise around its throat, and pulled. Its neck snapped midair before the body dropped to the ground. Lakota roared his victory to the skies.
“We have to get to the center courtyard to land. The others will be here soon!” I reminded him.
We pivoted in the air, angling downward toward the largest open courtyard within Mageia’s walls. I hit the ground before Lakota and took off running, weaving through the crowd of leadership until I reached the center.
Amid the chaos stood War Chief Kalluri and General Wylder locked in a furious debate. Rhodes and Shayde lingered just outside the circle, tense and alert. The clash of battle echoed so loudly through the courtyard that the argument had to be shouted to be heard.
From what I could gather, they were debating the entry of the Hollow’s forces now that Tyria was already at Mageia’s gates.
“They’ll have to fight their way through, Kalluri!” General Wylder bellowed. “Just like the Glade’s groundborne elementals!”
I couldn’t hold back. “Then send more troops to the front lines!” I snapped. “The Key can’t be unveiled if Fallon doesn’t survive long enough to reach the Tomb.”
Then Elias lunged at me, screaming inches from my face, “Can you not unveil it yourself?!”
Before I could react, Rhodes stepped between us, his arm shoving his father back.
My hands trembled, sparks crackling at my fingertips. Fury flared hot in my chest. I clenched my fists to contain it just as Kalluri stepped into view, his expression twisted in confusion and alarm.
“I’ll go,” Shayde announced, already turning on his heel. “Anyone who wants to help win this war—come with me.”
Rhodes and I took off after him, joined by a wave of familiar faces.
“He’s right, Kalluri.”
The voice that once haunted my nightmares brought me to a dead stop. We turned as one to see Captain Thorne striding across the courtyard. He wore full battle armor—no weapons in sight, but his presence was blade enough.
We barely had time to react before General Wylder shouted behind us. “Whose side are you on?!”
The question wasn’t for Thorne. The question aimed squarely at his sons.
Rhodes and Shayde froze mid-step, chests heaving. A beat passed. Then Rhodes whirled and closed the distance between him and his father in three furious strides.
“Aren’t we all supposed to be on the same side of this war, Father?!” he shouted.
Elias Wylder looked as if Rhodes had struck him.
His eyes flared with something—shock, maybe.
Or rage. Around us, the battlefield noise surged.
The hiss of clashing elements, steel against steel.
But all I could focus on was the fire now burning in General Wylder’s gray eyes—hotter and darker than I’d ever seen in anyone.
War Chief Kalluri stepped forward, his voice steady amid the chaos. “Take the western wall. Air and Earth, channel up and over. Fire, take flight and guard their descent. General, stay behind.”
I could feel Kalluri’s gaze burning into me, but I didn’t give him the satisfaction of a glance. I turned on my heel and walked away without a word.
Around us, the bonded dragons of the fire elementals landed wherever space allowed, wings folding tight as their riders climbed on. Within moments, we were airborne.
From this height, I could see the Hollow’s groundborne forces finally breaking through to the front lines. I relayed the update to Fallon just as Lakota banked hard, angling us toward a small cluster of Tyrian troops advancing along the western border.