Kingdom of Ash

Blood rained over the battlefield.

Blood and arrows, so many that as they found marks in Lysandra’s flank, her wings, it barely registered.

Morath had been reserving its arsenal. Until today.

With the dawn, they had unleashed such a torrent of arrows that getting into the skies had been a lethal gauntlet. She had not wanted to know how many Crochans had fallen, despite the best efforts of the rebel Ironteeth to shield them with their wyverns’ bodies.

But most had made it into the air—and right into the onslaught of the Ironteeth legion.

Below, Morath swarmed with an urgency she had not yet witnessed. A black sea that crashed against the city walls, breaking over it every now and then.

Siege ladders went up faster than they could be taken down, and now, the sun barely cresting, siege towers inched forward.

Lysandra barreled into an Ironteeth witch—a Blackbeak, from the dyed leather band on her brow—and tore her from the saddle before ripping out the throat of her wyvern.

One. Only one out of the mass in the skies.

She dove, picking another target.

Then another. And another. It would not be enough.

And where the Ironteeth legion had been content to engage them in battle these past few weeks, today they pushed. Drove them back foot by foot toward Orynth.

And there was nothing Lysandra, nor any of the Crochans or rebel Ironteeth, could do to stop it.

So witches died.

And below them, on the city walls, soldiers from so many kingdoms died as well.

The final stand, the last few hours, of their desperate alliance.

Manon’s breath was a rasp in her throat, her sword arm aching.

Again and again, they rallied and drove against the Ironteeth legion.

Again and again, they were shoved back. Back toward Orynth. Toward the walls.

The Crochan lines were foundering. Even the Ironteeth rebels had begun to fly sloppily.

How had they fought and fought and still come to this? The Thirteen had given up their lives; her chest was hollowed out, the din of battle still a distant roar over the silence in her head. And yet it had come to this.

If they kept it up, they would be overrun by nightfall. If they did not reconfigure their plan of attack, they would have nothing left by dawn. Enough remained of her shredded spirit to find that unacceptable. To rage against that end.

They had to retreat to the city walls. To regroup and use Orynth, the mountains behind it, to their advantage. The longer they lingered in the open air, the deadlier it would become.

Manon freed the horn from her side and blew twice.

Crochan and Ironteeth whirled toward her, eyes wide in shock. Manon blew the horn again.

Fall back, the horn bleated. Fall back to the city.

The western gate to the city shuddered.

Where intricate, ancient carvings had once graced the towering iron plates, now only dents and splattered blood remained.

A thunderous boom echoed throughout the city, the mountains, and Aedion, panting as he fought atop the battlements above the gates, dared to look away from his latest opponent. Dared to survey the wake of the battering ram’s latest blow.

Soldiers filled the passageway to the gate, more lining the streets beyond it. As many as could be spared from the walls.

Soon now. Soon the western gate would yield. After thousands of years, it would finally sunder.

The Sword of Orynth was slick in his bloodied hand, his ancient shield coated with gore.

Already, people were fleeing to the castle. The brave souls who had lingered in the city all this time, hoping against hope that they might survive. Now they ran, children in their arms, for the castle that would be the final bastion against Morath’s hordes. For however long that would be.

Hours, perhaps.

Manon had given the order to pull back, and Crochans and Ironteeth landed upon the wall by the still-steady southern gate, some joining the battle, others holding the line against the enemy aerial legion on their tails.

The western gate shuddered again, rocking inward, the wood and metal and chains they’d reinforced it with buckling.

Aedion sensed the enemy rushing at his exposed left and lifted his shield, so infinitely heavy. But a riderless wyvern intercepted the soldier, ripping the man in two before hurling his remains off the battlements.

With a flash of light, Lysandra was there, snatching up clothes, sword, and shield from a fallen Silent Assassin. “Tell me where to order Manon and the others stationed in the city,” she said, panting hard. A gash ran down her arm, blood leaking everywhere, but she didn’t seem to notice it.

Aedion tried to sink into that cool, calculating place that had guided him through other battles, other near-defeats. But this was no near-defeat.

This would be a defeat, pure and brutal. A slaughter.

“Aedion.” His name was a frantic plea.

A Valg soldier rushed them, and Aedion split the man from navel to nose with a swipe of the Sword of Orynth. Lysandra barely blinked at the black blood that sprayed onto her face.

The western gate buckled, iron screaming as it began to peel apart.

He had to go—had to go down there to lead the fight at the gate.

Where he’d make his last stand. Where he’d meet his end, defending the place he’d loved most. It was the least he could do, with all the warriors who had fallen thanks to him, to his choices. To fall himself for Terrasen.

A death worthy of a song. An end worthy of being told around a fire.

If in Erawan’s new world of darkness, flames would be allowed to exist.

The Morath Ironteeth legion barreled into their rebel kin; the exhausted Crochans alit on the stones as they guzzled down water, checked injuries. A breath before their final push.

Along the wall, Valg soldiers surged and surged and surged over the battlements.

So Aedion leaned in, and kissed Lysandra, kissed the woman who should have been his wife, his mate, one last time. “I love you.”

Sorrow filled her beautiful face. “And I you.” She gestured to the western gate, to the soldiers waiting for its final cleaving. “Until the end?”

Aedion hefted his shield, flipping the Sword of Orynth in his hand, freeing the stiffness that had seized his fingers. “I will find you again,” he promised her. “In whatever life comes after this.”

Lysandra nodded. “In every lifetime.”

Together, they turned toward the stairs that would take them down to the gates. To death’s awaiting embrace.

A horn cleaved through the air, through the battle, through the world.

Aedion went still.

Whirled toward the direction of that horn, to the south. Beyond Morath’s teeming ranks. Beyond the sea of blackness, to the foothills that bordered the edge of Theralis’s sprawling plain.

Again, that horn blared, a roar of defiance.

“That’s no horn of Morath,” Lysandra breathed.

And then they appeared. Along the edge of the foothills. A line of golden-armored warriors, foot soldiers and cavalry alike. More and more and more, a great line spreading across the crest of the final hill.

Filling the skies, stretching into the horizon, flew mighty, armored birds with riders. Ruks.

And before them all, sword raised to the sky as that horn blew one last time, the ruby in the blade’s pommel smoldering like a small sun …

Before them all, riding on the Lord of the North, was Aelin.