CHAPTER 28
The flames were visible even from the far ridge—violent, hungry, rising in great orange pillars that licked at the sky. Faelith froze mid-draw, her breath catching as the distant roar of battle rolled across the forest.
For a heartbeat, she stood still, her bow arm relaxed as she waited, the cacophony of battle still raging around her.
There it was again, another spurt of fire followed by another, like they were fighting each other.
Faelith’s pulse spiked.
Cian was fighting Damon,
She whistled sharply; the sound piercing the din. Moments later Lleuad burst through the trees, the moon-white mare tossing her head, sensing Faelith’s urgency. She swung onto her back in one fluid motion, gripping her reins.
“Dos!” she urged as she tapped her heels to Lleuad’s flanks.
Lleuad launched forward, hooves pounding the earth as they raced toward the firelit horizon. Trees whipped past. The forest blurred. Her heart hammered in her chest, each beat echoing the memory of kind grey eyes.
As she neared the area where she saw the flames rise, the scene sharpened into brutal clarity.
Elves were retreating—organized but strained—falling back toward the Tree of Life. Tyr stood at the forefront, shouting orders, blade flashing as he cut down a soldier lunging for one of their wounded. His face was streaked with soot, jaw clenched, eyes burning with determination.
“Tyr!” she called, but her voice was swallowed by the chaos. He couldn’t hear her.
Then she saw him.
Cian—on his knees, chest heaving, blood dripping down his arm. His sword lay half-buried in the dirt beside him. Damon advanced with predatory calm, each step deliberate, his silhouette framed by fire. His blade glinted, raised for the killing blow.
Faelith didn’t think. She acted.
From horseback, she drew an arrow, nocked it, and released it in one seamless motion.
The arrow screamed through the air.
Damon’s reflexes were inhumanly fast—he leaned aside as the arrow sailed past his cheek, but it was enough of a distraction. His stride faltered, his sword lowered as his attention snapped toward her.
Faelith was already moving.
She slid off Lleuad, boots lightly skidding across scorched earth as she dropped to one knee beside Cian, her sword drawn in a single fluid sweep, the blade angled between her and Damon.
Smoke curled around them. Cian’s breath shuddered. Damon’s eyes narrowed, a cruel smile forming.
Faelith planted herself firmly, shoulders squared, voice low and lethal.
“Step away from him.”
Damon’s laughter echoed among the trees, sounding empty and devoid of joy. “Ah. little elf, you finally decided to join us.”
Cian tried to rise, but failed. “Faelith, run. Leave me.”
She kept her eyes on Damon, blade unwavering.
“I’m not letting you die today.”
Damon’s forces closed in like a tightening noose; Faelith, Cian, and Tyr were cut off, a small island of resistance swallowed by a sea of enemy soldiers. Damon stood at the center of it all, basking in the moment as though victory were a crown settling onto his brow.
“It’s time to end this,” he said as he took a step forward. An arrow hissed past him from behind.
Faelith remained motionless as the tip grazed across her cheek. A thin line of blood welled, warm against the cool evening air. Droplets fell to the soil, darkening the ash-coated earth.
The hum of the grove—normally a soft, ancient whisper—surged into a deafening roar that everyone could hear.
The ground trembled beneath their feet, a deep quake that rattled armor and sent Damon’s soldiers stumbling.
Even Damon’s confident smirk faltered as he looked down, knowing the ancient magic that surrounded this place had fully awakened.
The soil split.
Roots erupted upward in a violent surge, thick as serpents and fast as striking vipers. They twisted together, forming a towering wall between Faelith’s group and Damon’s forces. The roots pulsed with life, glowing faintly with the grove’s magic—ancient, protective, and furious.
Damon raged behind the wall and struck it with fire. Sparks flew. The roots didn’t budge. The only way was to burn through it or find a way around. Either would take time.
More roots burst from the ground, sweeping through Damon’s ranks. Soldiers were thrown aside, tangled, dragged, or pinned. The grove was fighting—truly fighting—its wrath unleashed in a way Faelith had never seen.
Tyr stared, wide-eyed, as he took advantage of the situation. “Move!”
Faelith didn’t waste the moment.
She grabbed Cian’s arm, hauling him upright. He winced but didn’t resist, leaning heavily against her. Lleuad galloped toward them, responding to her whistle even through the chaos.
Faelith mounted up first and held her hand out to him.
“Up,” she ordered.
Cian managed a breathless laugh as he reached for her. “You’re bossy when I’m injured.”
“Shut up and climb.” She tried to hide the grin that was forming.
He swung onto Lleuad’s back behind her, his arms instinctively wrapping around her waist for balance. Tyr mounted his own horse in one fluid motion, still glancing back at the writhing wall of roots that kept Damon at bay.
“We need to regroup with the rest at the tree, go!” Tyr urged.
Faelith kicked Lleuad into motion.
They burst through the smoke, racing toward the Tree of Life where the remaining warriors were regrouping. Behind them, Damon roared in fury, his voice muffled by the living barricade that refused to let him pass.
The forest quaked. The grove was alive, fighting against an army. It had chosen a side.
Faelith didn’t look back.
She held the reins tight, Cian’s arm secured around her, Tyr riding hard at her side. They didn’t have much time before Damon caught back up, but they would use every second they had.
The Tree of Life rose ahead, its roots glowing like veins of molten silver beneath the soil. Warriors clustered beneath its canopy, battered but alive, forming a defensive ring as Tyr shouted orders, pulling the scattered fighters back into formation.
The moment they crossed into the grove’s heart, Tyr swung off his horse, shouting commands to the remaining forces.
“Shield line, front and center! Archers to the inner ring! March!”
Lleuad skidded to a halt through the commotion of warriors scrambling to get into place. Cian dismounted first; he turned immediately, reaching up to help Faelith down, his hands steady and sure.
She reached for him—her feet barely hit the ground when something flickered at the edge of her vision.
A glint of metal. A streak of motion slicing through the grove’s glow.
An arrow.
It tore through the air, aimed straight for Cian’s chest.
Faelith moved, grabbing Cian by the forearms as she tried to cover most of his body with hers. Placing herself between him and the incoming shot.
The arrow struck her back with brutal force.
Pain detonated through her ribs and shoulder blades, sharp enough to steal her breath. Her knees buckled, the world tilting as the Tree’s glow blurred into streaks of silver and green.
Cian caught her before she hit the ground.
“Faelith...Faelith!” His voice cracked, raw panic shredding through it.
The grove roared again, louder, angrier. Roots surged upward in a violent wave, ripping through soil and stone. Damon’s forces were swallowed—cut off, entangled, thrown back as the earth itself rose to defend the wounded beneath its branches.
Tyr spun toward them, eyes widening when he saw the arrow lodged deep between Faelith’s shoulder blades.
“Get her near the tree!” he shouted. “Now!”
Warriors shifted instantly, forming a protective line as the grove continued its assault—roots slamming into Damon’s soldiers, branches whipping like living blades, the earth shaking with every strike.
Cian lifted Faelith carefully, cradling her against him as he carried her toward the Tree’s base. His heartbeat thundered beneath her ear, frantic and uneven.
“You shouldn’t have done that,” he whispered, voice breaking.
Her breath trembled, pain radiating through her spine. “You’d have done the same.”
Behind them, Tyr rallied the warriors, shouting commands over the roar of battle.
Cian shook his head, a dry laugh escaping his lips. “I should be the only one making stupid decisions.”
He tried to make it sound light, but his voice wavered—thin, frayed, terrified.
Carefully, he lowered himself to one knee and eased Faelith down beside the Tree of Life.
Its roots pulsed faintly beneath her, warm and steady, as though the ancient magic were trying to soothe her trembling body.
Cian’s hands hovered for a moment, unsure where to touch, afraid of hurting her more.
Determined, he grabbed her uninjured arm as he gently leaned her forward, his other hand examining the area around the arrow protruding from her back.
His brow furrowed, lips pressed into a thin line.
He didn’t dare touch the arrow itself.
If I pull it out now…” he muttered, voice low, "you’ll lose too much blood.”
“We have to wait,” he said, more to himself than her. “We wait until we get a physician who can control the bleeding.”
Faelith’s breath hitched, pain radiating through her spine with every inhale. She tried to shift, but Cian’s hand gently pressed her still.
“Don’t,” he whispered. “Just… stay still.”
His thumb brushed her cheek—right where the first arrow had grazed her—wiping away a thin line of dried blood with a tenderness that didn’t match the battlefield around them.
“You’re supposed to be the careful one,” he murmured. “The smart one.”
Faelith managed a faint, pained smile. “And you’re supposed to be the hardened, reckless one.”
He huffed a quiet laugh, but his eyes were filled with sadness.
“Not with this,” he said. “Never with this.”
Blood slid down her arm in slow, warm rivulets, dripping onto her hand before falling to the moss below. Cian’s gaze followed every drop, jaw clenched so tightly it looked painful. The arrow was lodged deep near her shoulder blade, the shaft quivering with each shallow breath she took.
A new tremor broke through the grove; heat rippled through— sharp, violent.
Faelith’s eyes widened. “Cian…”
She could tell he felt it too.
The air shifted, thickening with smoke. The glow of the Tree flickered as flames erupted along the outer ring of the grove. Fire crawled up the trunks, devouring leaves, turning the sacred forest into a battlefield of burning red and gold.
Damon stepped through the flames.
His cloak was torn, his blade scorched, but his smile—sharp and triumphant—was untouched. Flames curled behind him like obedient serpents, feeding on the grove’s magic with ravenous hunger.
“You think roots will stop me?” Damon snarled. “I’ll burn this forest to ash. Along with everything you love.”
Cian rose slowly, every movement deliberate, controlled. His hand slid from Faelith’s shoulder to the hilt of his sword. She tried to take his hand, to stop him from facing Damon. But he slipped through her fingers, gasping as the pain flared in her back.
He didn’t look back at her.
She watched as Tyr appeared at Cian’s side, breath ragged, blade already drawn. His eyes flicked to her, then to Damon, and hardened like steel.
“You won’t touch her,” Tyr said.
Flames surged higher, licking at the grove, casting the three of them in flickering orange light as both forces fought each other.
Cian stepped forward, sword raised, shoulders squared.
Tyr matched him, forming a united front.
Faelith shifted, trying to keep her eyes on the battle unfolding before her. The world swam in and out of focus, the pain in her back radiating down her spine with every breath. Her blood-soaked hand slipped against the Tree’s massive trunk, smearing a dark streak across the ancient bark.
The runes carved into the wood flared with recognition.
Magic surged up her arm, through her chest, into her mind. The grove’s hum deepened, vibrating through her bones until she could no longer hear the clash of steel or Damon’s fire roaring through the forest.
The world fell away. She stood on a cliff overlooking a vast valley—untouched, unmarred, impossibly new. Rivers shimmered like silver threads. Forests stretched endlessly, vibrant and young. The sky glowed with the soft gold of a world still forming.
Two elves stood at the cliff’s edge. Both held each other in their arms, the quiet tenderness radiating from them. Their faces were blurred, indistinct, as though the vision refused to reveal them fully.
Then the vision shifted.
The woman knelt in the grass, sobbing as she took the man’s lifeless body in her lap. His form lay still, pale, drained of essence. Her cries echoed across the valley, raw and breaking, the kind of grief that carved itself into the bones of the world.
Faelith reached toward her—
—but the vision distorted, warping like ripples in water.
The man appeared again.
But the world around him was dying.
A dark void consumed rivers and oceans, swallowing forests, mountains, entire horizons. The land cracked and withered, collapsing into nothingness as the void spread like a living hunger.
The man stood in a chamber underneath the Tree of Life—its roots younger, thinner, but still immense. He was shackled to its base, chains forged from fallen stars binding his wrists, ankles, and throat. He screamed for release, his voice shaking the roots, shaking the world.
The woman stood before him.
She wore armor over white robes, flowing like moonlight. Her face was turned from Faelith, yet she felt her anguish, her resolve, her love.
In her hands rested the amulet.
Dark metal. Shifting runes. Alive.
She lifted a dagger.
The ancient god—no longer elven, no longer the love the woman knew- looked at her with pleading eyes. Dark fire burned in them, desperate and terrified. He shook against the chains, reaching for her, begging without words.
She pressed the dagger to his palm.
Dark ichor spilled; thick, molten, shimmering like cosmic starlight. It dripped onto the amulet, each drop sending a shockwave through the roots beneath them.
The god cried out in torment. The woman’s hand trembled.
Then she turned the dagger on herself.
She sliced her palm, blood welling bright and luminous. Her blood mixed with his on the amulet’s surface. The metal glowed—first red, then gold, then a blinding white that swallowed everything. as elves started to chant in an ancient dialogue.
The Tree’s roots surged outward, spreading across the valley, across the world, encasing the god in an unbreakable prison. His screams echoed as the roots wrapped around him, sealing him beneath the earth forever.
The woman fell to her knees, her blood dripping onto the roots, her face still blurred—but her posture unmistakable.
Love turned into duty.
Sacrifice.
Faelith felt her heart twist.
The woman lifted her head and turned to look behind her, her dark hair spilling over her shoulder. Her hazel eyes didn’t look past Faelith; her ancestor looked directly at her, her expression solemn, grief-stricken, and unyielding.
Staring at Faelith with her own face.
The ancestor’s voice echoed through Faelith’s mind, ancient and resonant.
Don’t let the chains break.