Before I could finish contemplating the Morgabeast's intentions, claws sliced toward me, and a stinger buzzed inches from my ear.

The lifeforce Isalio had given me activated a shield of energy. The claws slipped uselessly over the protective barrier, and this stinger sizzled out. I flung my mace around, hacking down a flying monster and a mole-beast in one blight. My next swing caught even more beasts, including another I hadn't even realized had joined the fight. But it also knocked me back, too many beasts to slice through in one go.

Isalio apparently faced the same problem because he soon dropped back next to me and reached for my hand.

As his fingers interlaced with mine, a light beamed overhead, and the beasts around us withdrew.

At first, I thought Isalio had blasted the beasts, a powerful strike of lightning. What else could have created this much light, and what else could have caused the beasts to fall to the sidelines in a circle around us?

Then I looked up.

The light was from the sun, pouring down through a gap in the trees. Intellectually, I knew that not much time had passed since we had woken up at the Mantle, so the sunlight made sense... but after the horror we had just experienced, the sunlight felt eerily out-of-place. Plus, the ground beneath me pulsed with the wrong energy, a foreign heartbeat that pushed my own heart out of rhythm. Chills shot up through my heels and prickled over my spine.

I glanced at Isalio, who looked equally perplexed; his eyes were wide, and his hand was stretched out to strike down a threat that wasn't coming. Drawing a breath, I forced myself to look down.

We stood in the middle of a giant circular plate of smooth rock.

The Center Stone.

For a few seconds, the beasts formed a living wall around us, weaving in and out without interrupting the circle. Then they fell down, pressing snouts, eyeballs, and slathering tongues to the dirt. It felt almost as if they were bowing to me and Isalio—except that the beasts' eyes were all fixated on the sun above us. Swallowing hard, I raised my gaze once more.

A dark shape devoured the sun.

Shadows licked up tree branches like fire. At the same time, the temperature plummeted, and that wrong heartbeat in the ground grew louder, weakening my legs and constricting my chest.

The Morgabeast was here.

Would it take its time, gauging our strengths and weaknesses? Or would it crush us unceremoniously, like an unwelcome pest at a picnic? If it hadn't killed Isalio yet, it either feared him or needed him, right? But now that we were exactly where it wanted us...

I was torn between wanting to see the beast and wanting to look away. No one who had caught a proper glimpse of the Morgabeast had ever lived to tell about it. Some childlike part of me felt that if I didn't see the beast, it might not see me—but standing in the beast's shadow surrounded by its army, I knew we had nowhere to hide.

I just didn't want this beast to be the last thing I saw.

So I turned back toward Isalio.

He was already looking at me, amber eyes bright. Without thinking, I reached for his hands. I sent lifeforce toward him, and he sent his own to me, a giddy rush of power, a whirlwind of warmth.

"I never should have let you come," he whispered, though his eyes remained bright.

"I would never let you do this alone."

"I hate that about you. But... I'm glad you're here."

His lips quirked—a strange moment for smiling, and yet my own lips curved up in response. Because he was looking at me as though I were more important than the beasts surrounding us, more important than the increasingly precarious pendulum of life and death. And if I was about to die, at least this would be the last sight I saw.

At least we would die together.

The Morgabeast descended.

Instinctively, I reached for my mace... but what good was a mace against an ancient beast of destruction? I had foolishly believed that Isalio and I combined could defeat anything: that our combined strength might match the powers only whispered about legends, but how could a mace and a few streaks of lightning stand a chance against a beast born from destruction—a monster that thrived on chaos? Maybe that would only make us into bigger bugs, a more satisfying squelch under the claw of the Morgabeast.

"What should we try first?" I whispered to Isalio.

"It's a little late for planning, isn't it?"

"Just give me something."

"Hit it in the eye," he suggested.

I knew it was an ironic reference to my earlier question, but it still gave me direction and confidence. Alright, hit it in the eye. It's like a Scout—only enormous and ridiculously powerful.

As the Morgabeast hovered closer, hot breath gusted us, and each flap of its wings ripped leaves from the trees. Clenching the mace in front of me, I steeled myself. Look for the eyes, look for the eyes.

But when the beast reached the treeline, I saw nothing.

I swung my mace, and Isalio lashed out with lightning, illuminating the forest in a blinding flash. Then teeth and claws obliterated everything within a few yards of it, vibrant blue electricity singed the treetops, and venom slopped down to burn holes in the stone.

Somehow, the forcefield from Isalio's lifeforce held it back; the beast's claws raked over the shield with a screech. Even more surprisingly, when I lashed out, my mace sank into flesh. Meanwhile, Isalio blasted out rays of electricity, sizzling against the treetops and licking up over the giant beast above us. Wind blasted us, and the dark blob moved up.

With less of the beast covering the sunlight, I caught my first real look at the ancient monster.

I thought the wind had come from its wings, but the shadow splintering the sun had no wings. Instead, a hundred spiny legs beat back the air, all lined with razor-sharp feathers. The legs flanked an impossibly long bone-plated torso, like an armored snake. A dozen rows of teeth bigger than my mace gnashed together... and its eyes locked on mine.

I had seen these eyes before, through Isalio's vision: the blazing amber irises streaked with crimson lightning, framed by undulating gills. But this time, it wasn't just a vision.

This was it. This was the moment no one survived.

I had seen the Morgabeast.

With its next attack, it came even closer. The beast's numerous claws ripped through the trees nearest the circle, obliterating leaves, branches, and tree trunks as though carving butter. Isalio emanated electricity once more, a hemisphere of throbbing light that surrounded us. The Morgabeast's sharp feathers skittered along the surface of the hemisphere with the kind of bone-chilling eeek of blades against metal.

When the monster retreated again, Isalio panted beside me. I stepped closer and grabbed his hand, pushing lifeforce toward him. Here in the Forest of Lost Beasts, I couldn't draw lifeforce through the ground, but I had plenty left from the last time Isalio had given lifeforce to me. However, there wasn't enough time to give him sufficient lifeforce—I had barely started when the next attack came.

Isalio sent up another forcefield of electricity, but it was weaker this time. The beast's claws scraped the surface—and pierced through.

When Isalio's barrier of electricity diminished, so did my vision. I swiveled wildly, blinking through the darkness, whipping my mace around to meet whichever razor-covered-leg came toward us first—

The beast retreated once more.

I stared at the beast's silhouette, which was once again illuminated by sunlight. This time it had us, so why had it retreated?

The Morgabeast swiped through the trees around us, lower to the ground this time. The beasts bowing there retreated in a panic, mingled screeches and bellows accompanying the clean slice of claws through wood.

My heart thumped my ribcage like a sledgehammer. Instinctively, I edged toward Isalio and grabbed his hand once more. I pumped lifeforce toward him, and his own lifeforce rush toward me—but not soon enough.

The beast's next strike obliterated my weakened forcefield, thrusting toward us. Zeroing in on the nearest claw, I gave another supercharged swing.

My mace met empty air.

The Morgabeast retreated once more, to the sound of charred branches crashing to the ground. But why did it leave this time, when we had barely posed a threat? Was it just taunting us?

I glanced at Isalio—and dropped a step back. He stared at me with wide-open amber eyes, blazing with intensity but void of real emotion.

Eyes streaked with crimson.

Fear raked down my spine like a rusty nail. "Isalio, are you still here?"

He opened his mouth, but the voice that came out was not his own. "We're all here, Remgar. We're all waiting for your decision."

"We're all here?" I choked out. "What do you mean? Who are you talking about?"

"All of us." His lips moved, but the voice was not his own, and another beast flickered across the scorched treeline in time to each syllable he uttered. "We want you both to lead us. Together, we'll cleanse the world. They'll all bow to us, or they'll all die."

Icy terror flooded my veins. I struggled to breathe, struggled to think. So this was what made the Morgabeast so indomitable—and so horrific. No purely physical beast could live up to the sheer terror from the fearsome legends. Above, the Morgabeast swung circles up and down through the clouds, and around me, the beasts of the forest weaved in and out through the trees, but none of that horrified me as much as the Morgabeast controlling Isalio.

I sucked in a shuddering breath and steeled my nerves. If the beast was fighting me through Isalio, my only option was to do the same.

"Isalio, come back to me," I commanded, as steadily as I could manage.

"Isalio is here with us." Isalio's mouth said the words, but his eyes were still vacant. "He's waiting for you."

"No, you're still here with me. You won't serve the Morgabeast because you don't want everyone to die—not anymore."

My desperation was painfully clear to my own ears, and it must have been even clearer to the Morgabeast. I bit my tongue, frustrated by my own abysmal effort. But just when I thought all hope was gone, Isalio's face contorted between several expressions very quickly, and the red streaks in his eyes faded a little.

"Rem, I'm trying," he said, panicked, rasping, "But it's so strong, I can't—" His face contorted once more, settling into a sneer. "So that's your answer? That's too bad... we wanted you on our side. But if you don't want to join us, we can rule without you."

I swallowed hard before finding my voice. "I know you're still there, Isalio. Come back to me."

"You don't know when to give up, do you?" Isalio—or rather, the Morgabeast who now possessed his body—threw his head back and chuckled. "You should have died fourteen years ago."

The voice talking to me was still the Morgabeast, which meant that it had control over Isalio—but the voice was still talking, which meant that it didn't have complete control. Plus, why would this beast want me to join its side? Maybe it knew it would be much harder to control Isalio without me.

"You couldn't kill me fourteen years ago," I whispered. "And you won't kill me now."

"You can't know that." The voice still came from the Morgabeast—but this time, I thought I heard a hint of Isalio in it, too.

"Isalio," I said, looking him in the eyes, praying he could still hear me. "I'm not afraid of you."

It was true. I was terrified, but not of Isalio. As long as Isalio retained even a tiny bit of control, I knew he wouldn't let the beast hurt me.

His next response was choked, half angry and half desperate. "Why?"

"Because I know you, and I know that you—" You love me. But that was only my hope, and it wasn't a hope I wanted to share with the beast, so I chose a certainty instead. "You lashed out fourteen years ago because you felt you had no other choice. Now that I'm here with you, there's another choice."

"What other choice is there? What else can I do?"

That answer was purely Isalio, and hearing his real voice gave me the confidence to try something bold: stepping forward, I raised my palm. "You can take my hand."

His eyes drilled me, but I kept my shoulders back and my expression firm. In several jerky movements, he lifted his hand.

I had no idea what would happen next, but I knew that there was no point fighting or running. If I couldn't free Isalio from the Morgabeast's influence, the ancient beast of destruction would simultaneously destroy its only worthy opponent and gain the most powerful weapon possible; if the Morgabeast controlled the Lord of the Night, no one would survive.

Our hands touched.

The moment his skin brushed mine, he stumbled toward me. Maybe I should have been worried that he was weak enough to stumble, but instead, relief thawed my frozen lungs.

The Morgabeast would never stumble.

I caught him in both arms and tucked him into my chest. "Isalio, are you with me?"

He twitched against me. "I can't... you need to run."

"Never."

"You don't understand." He released a sigh that was almost a sob. "It still has me."

"I have you, too."

"But I'm not fully here."

"Then show me where you are." The plea came fast, inspired by instinct rather than logic.

Even faster, he complied.

His lifeforce flooded me, and I responded by pushing mine toward him. This time, I could see the exchange: violet, crimson, and indigo whirled around us in a torrential storm. Then he slumped against my chest, and the rush of colors converged, flowing into me and obscuring my vision until the storm was the only thing I saw.

When the colors faded, I was no longer in the forest.