When I wake, my head still throbs, and my bones are hollow as a gourd scraped of its flesh. Slowly, I push up. My shirt sticks to my back, adhered to my skin by the blood of a countryman. My eyes close as I gather myself.

Above, shouting still resounds, and I wonder how Reyan is faring. Belatedly, it occurs to me that he would have died if I hadn't been there. For all I know, he could be dead now. I grip the edge of the bed. A swell of fear threatens to drown me—fear for my family, my friends, my country. Myself. For a moment, my eyes tighten, as if I can shut out reality along with sight. A growing certainty says I won't make it out of this war alive.

I grit my teeth, throw back the sheet, and stand. Morineaux will.

I push through the door into the hall, wondering how much of my sickness right now is from casting and how much... isn't. I glance at the stairs up to the wall, and my lips twist in regret. My rest was only refreshing enough to get me back on my feet, and even standing here, fatigue drags at my limbs and twists my balance. If I go up now, I'll only get myself killed.

I need to check on my wizards inside the castle. If the battle still rages tonight, I'll come back then. Perhaps I'll be in better shape.

I catch an officer in the hall and ask if she's seen Reyan.

"I believe he just went up a few minutes ago, my lord."

I nod, hopes dropping. "Alright. If you see him, please let him know I'm in the castle."

"Yes, sire."

I make my way to my new bedroom, glad to find Riszev is out. I step into the connected bathroom and strip off yesterday's clothes. As I wet a washcloth in the sink, my reflection glares back at me. Mottled discoloration tendrils across the left side of my chest. I scrub at it, but no dirt falls away. The rest of my skin is unnaturally pale, and I itch to somehow snap my fingers and make the effects of the poison disappear. Angry, I turn away from the mirror and fight with the blood dried on my hands, my face, my hair. I leave the sullied cloth on the sink and dress.

As I head to the Mage Room, the violence of the morning dully plays and replays in the back of my mind. If I had cast a second faster in that moment, the axe wouldn't have slammed against that soldier. Or if I had looked this direction a second earlier, the sword wouldn't have taken my wizard. Guilt pricks me, and for a moment, I want to forget it all. Let them win, just to end the bloodshed.

My lips curl, and I berate myself for even thinking it. Surrender is unacceptable. If we give in now, everyone's deaths are in vain.

Even so, tendrils of regret and nausea chase me while I gather reports and overview maps of the city. In the quiet moments, I have to fight to keep my eyes open, and I despise myself for that too. After a couple hours, Reyan pushes into my office. I look up sharply, and my head swims. I force my eyes to stay open as I focus on him. He didn't bother changing, and covered in blood spatter and gore, he looks like a body animated from the mass pyre.

"Our men are being slaughtered."

The same words from a dark, windy night flash into my mind, and I rise, guilty. "I'll come, but I don't know how much difference I'll make, Reyan. I haven't rested much." And I'm sick.

His hand waves. "That's not what I'm saying."

I stare blankly.

"We need to call the reinforcements to come now."

My teeth find my lip, and pain shoots through it. I stop. "This is exactly what the vision showed."

"Your vision might be about other soldiers. We don't even know what's supposedly going to happen to them."

"They could all die."

He steps closer. "And we will die if we can't get some help!" Sharply, he points. "I've got men up there that are tripping over themselves because they haven't taken a rest in three shifts! Half our archers are dead and their arrow-lighters with them. I'm going to tell Selenia we need to do this. I just didn't want you blindsided by it."

I watch him, sick that he's right. "Let me talk to her. That way there's no argument about the vision."

He nods once and stalks out. I hold my head high as I stop by my room, but my limbs feel like crumbling stone. I pick up my rapier in its belt and my staff. As I step out of my bedroom, Riszev also comes into the living area from hers. A strangely cut cloth wraps tight around her, and its hood falls close around her face. In the doorway behind her, Leavi stands, eyes averted.

"Thank Eri." Riszev comes forward to take my free hand in hers. It takes all I have not to pull away. "How long have you been back from the wall?"

"A couple hours. I'll be returning shortly."

Worry darkens her face. "Is there a plan?"

"Yes." I draw my hand out. "I need to go."

She pulls off her coat and hands it to Leavi, murmuring something short to herself. "If Aunt Varziy asks, the Morineause Ladies stole me again." She turns to me, fingering her hilt. "I'm coming with you."

"You're welcome to fight. Our soldiers need the relief. If you can convince your guards to follow you too, I won't stop them either, but I have something to do first."

She clips a nod, and I leave her talking in low tones with her women.

When I tell Selenia to send the reinforcements in, my voice is flat and somber. She looks over me, and I hate that it's me she's worried about when our countrymen are dead on the wall. But then her eyes flick over my staff. Nodding, she raises her pen to write the letter. I turn. She calls my name, but I don't stop because I know what she's going to ask. Yes, I am going to the wall. No, you can't stop me. I don't want to go—I don't want to face the shouts of pain, the feeling of blood on my hands, the anger and the gore and the hate and the peril. But I am more desperate not to leave any effort wasted. I am my people's leader and can't sit idly by while they perish. Scaling the stairs of the tower, I store the unwieldy staff just inside the door and push onto the wall.

The world is blood.

Death.

Violence.

Screaming.

Stabbing, casting, shoving, shouting, maiming, killing. The sun drops low in the sky.

A Kadranian grips the top of my left arm, busting open my stitches, and I scream. He pushes me down, and I land on my right arm. Unable to force my left to move and laying on my right, I can't cast to push him away. His sword plunges toward my undefended side.

At least it won't be the poison that kills me.

The blade's tip breaks my skin, pain blossoming. But then the sword's gone, the man's gone, and hands grab under my shoulders and drag me back, sending fire through my left arm again. I call out. Someone—a girl—Riszev—stands over me, checking my side.

"How badly are you—"

"I—I think I'm fine."

She pulls me up by my right arm and steadies me when I sway. Her eyes drill into me, but I turn away, casting again, and she fights beside me. Weariness slows my motions, but I'm not going to fall yet. I can't.

I don't know how many of our men have died, but I can feel the energy of the wall failing. My side burns, but it hurts less than my arm did when it was first injured. I look along the wall for somewhere else that needs me, but then shouts of alarm ring from the ground, and all eyes that can turn toward them.

Soldiers waving blue and silver pour out from between buildings, falling upon the back lines of the Kadranians. A cheer goes up among our men as unprepared barbarians fall under the reinforcements' swords. The savages at the wall let out a warcry and attack with renewed vigor. It's only a matter of time before they call a retreat, though—they can't fight this on two fronts.

I knock one man down and look out toward the reinforcements again. Sickening déjà vu overcomes me. The angle I'm at, the way they're colliding with the barbarians—

"Reyan!" I scream, desperate. He has to signal for them to retreat; we'll come up with some other solution. "Reyan!"

He turns to me, but below, the horde of ravens that covers their camp rises into the air all at once, draping the sky in undulating blackness. As one, they dive at the soldiers, covering them in a hateful blanket of claws and beaks, and the ranks disintegrate. The reinforcements scream, a bloodcurdling discord more horrifying than the darkest nightmare.

On the Kadranian back lines, blackrobed figures around a shining boulder crumple, but the victorious savages don't seem to notice. Instead, they cheer a bloodthirsty cry, and their attack comes more viciously than before. One of the few wizards beside me casts desperately, and a knife plunges into a savage's head. The two men's screams are short and simultaneous, and the wizard falls at my feet, a bloody hole marring his own forehead. Sick and terrified, I stumble back. I know it's his own botched spell that killed him, but the world feels like it's unravelling. Our soldiers lie torn apart in the streets, my wizard lies dead in his own spell, and suddenly, countless Kadranians stand on the wall, stepping over bodies, dropping more. I scramble until I hit the back of the wall.

Bodies litter the stone. Those few still up fight back more savages, and a couple wizards hold a losing battle to keep them out of the far guard tower. With our left line broken and disarrayed, a Kadranian makes for the door to that tower. One wizard casts, and a knife flies into the invader's throat. Another savage just takes the creature's place.

My head swims. We're done. This is going to be it.

Anger bubbles up inside the fear. I won't let this happen. I won't let these savages kill my people, take my wall, conquer my castle. Furious, I flick fallen blade after fallen blade at the stream that fights for my tower. Still, one of the beasts darts for the door, dodging my weakening attacks. This isn't good enough.

I lunge for the nearer tower, snatching the staff from inside. This has to be. I whirl to face the star-forsaken beasts and scream Agraund's spell. "Evae vard'aya!"

The gem starts to glow, and magic like fire roars through me. The effort of the spell builds, tearing at the remaining flecks of my strength, and floods my mind with pain. The glow brightens. I need this spell to be as powerful as it can be, so I hold it, deadly pressure expanding in my chest. My surroundings blur, but I can't focus on them—the spell is everything right now, the spell is all that matters. I lean on the staff. The magic squeezes my mind, black closes in, and I slide to my knees.

My lips move to say the word that will release it, but my strength fails me. No sound comes out, too little air in my lungs to power it.

Panic rises. I pushed it too far. I thought I could do more than I can, and now it's going to be pointless.

Come on, come on! I know I have more force of will than this. Come on!

I will cast this spell.

I drag in a breath, fighting against the force of the magic. "Syvo'rí!"

The magic rushes out of me in a glorious, exhilarating flood of power like I've never felt before, and my eyes snap open.

This is magic.

My eyes flick around the scene in a flurry of awareness. A Kadranian stands in the door of my tower. You. A savage bears down on one of my men. You. A beast rears back to murder one of my wizards. You.

All around the wall, I pick out foreigners. You.

The glow of the gem spikes, and deafening pops slam my ears as air rushes to fill the places the Kadranians just were. My gaze snaps to the air above the Park. Dark triumph floods my veins. There.

The Kadranians appear exactly as they were on the wall but twenty feet over and up—fifty feet above the heads of their comrades. They fall, screaming, and crash mangled onto the army below.

The power drains out of me, the gem goes dark again, and I slump against the wall. My body is empty and spent. Black spots swim across my vision, and I can barely hold my head up.

Alarm still rings from the ground, but the wall stands frozen, all our enemies at its base. They'll keep coming, though. They'll keep coming until we're all dead.

A blurry, dark-skinned form wavers in front of my eyes, and she pulls me up.

"We need—" The words come out like a moan.

"Come," Riszev demands.

Weakly, I push away, and pain grips my bad arm. "No. We need—"

"Come!"

"Shut up!" I growl. "Reyan. Get—" My legs buckle, but she holds me up.

"Reyan!" she shouts across the wall. A savage grips the bottom of a ladder.

No one comes to us, and fear digs its claws into me. He's dead. He must be.

A wizard throws a ladder away from the wall.

"Get off," I try to yell, but my voice is too weak. I face Riszev. "Speak for me."

She stares, fear and determination coating her bloodspattered face.

"Everyone off the wall."

"What?" she demands.

"Say it!" The wizards keep working to throw the ladders off, but more just rise up.

She searches my face, then nods once. "Get off!" she screams. "Everyone off the wall!"

"Take the fallen."

She repeats me. A handful of our people stare at her. A ladder tips toward the wall again. A soldier steps forward and shoves it away.

I glare at our men. "Tell them again."

"Get off this wall!" With her words, I muster the strength to hit my staff on the ground, solidifying the message as my proclamation.

"Listen to the woman!" Reyan's pained voice calls. Near the other tower, he grips the wall as he leans against it. Blood covers one side of his head, and I hope to stars it looks worse than it is.

The soldiers and wizards scramble to move. Up in the towers, the telekinetics still summon the strength to topple the ladders, and people bleed through the doors, abandoning the walkway and dragging their fallen companions with them.

One of Riszev's guards helps Reyan out, and by my command, she calls to them, "Bar the door!"

My eyelids are fighting to close, but I push against them. My voice is weak. "Help me to the ground. Behind the wall."

My bad arm is screaming, stretched over her shoulders, and she bars the door behind us as she leads me down the crowded stairs. We break onto the grounds, and I look up at the wall. A handful of Kadranians have topped it and rush toward the doors.

Fumbling, I gesture at the middle of the wall, and she pulls me over to it. Dread pervades me. If I'm not fast enough, if I'm not strong enough, if the spell doesn't actually work—

A blackwood cylinder sits flush in the wall. Fear, dread, illness, exhaustion swirl together in my gut, constrict my throat. This might kill me, but it doesn't matter.

My eyes close, and I dig deep into my mind, forcing away the tension, forcing away the doubt. Give this to me, I beg. I don't know who I'm talking to—my magic, the staff, Jacqueline. Let me have this.

My eyes snap open as the noise of an axe splintering wood slams through the air. I touch the top of the staff to the blackwood. This has to work. Please.

Mustering the last of my strength, I whisper, "Et shaffa'ril." Agony and power burn like every strike of the caster's knife I've endured, like the Kadranian swords through my arm, like days of starvation in Amarris's dungeon. Every cut, every moment of weakness, every drop of blood, though, is worth it in this moment—because the staff glows.

A thrumm splits the air and rocks my chest, and above me, the Kadranians scream until suddenly they don't. The thrum intensifies and four massive crunches blast through the air. Blood and bits like ash expel from the top of the wall. The air shimmers between the two towers.

The magic flees my body, and I collapse. Riszev barely stops me from cracking my head on the stone.

The world is blood and chaos, and then we die. Darkness claims me.