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I turn to face my father’s army. Is he watching somewhere? Does he have a way to see into other worlds from his home in Hell?

The sheer scale of his army is suffocating. Directly in front is a legion of shadowguard. Rows upon rows of them, their black forms insubstantial and wraithlike. My first job is to change that—to draw their corporeal bodies from Hell so at least we won’t have to face them again. Behind them, monstrous creatures shift and prowl, too many shapes to count. Some slither, some stalk, all wrong. I’ve been thinking what these shadow creatures could be, where they came from. I have an idea but it’s not good. And my mind turns fleetingly to Earth and Killian and his little group. Maybe all Lucifer’s attention is on Valandria right now, and they’re getting a respite from the shadowguard and the shadow creatures. I hope so.

If Lucifer wins here, there’s no doubt he will turn his attention to Earth. And then maybe Astrali. But I doubt I will be alive to see it.

On either side of the shadowguard are the mortals who’ve chosen to fight for Lucifer. I want to call them cowards and traitors. But what do I know of the things that drove them to this?

Khaosti moves closer, his voice low.“We’ll hold.”

I don’t answer. I don’t know if it’s true. But we have to try.

I look upwards into the dawn sky where Zayne and Thanouq circle overhead, waiting for someone to make the first move. I’m just about to do that when the ranks of the shadowguard part and a single figure rides out—a woman in black robes, a staff gripped tight in one hand. I can feel her power before she speaks, the oily caress of dark magic sliding through the air.

The sorceress reins in her warhorse, its breath curling in unnatural tendrils. She raises her staff, her voice cold and commanding.

“Bow before the true king, and you will be spared.”

Does she mean my dad? I guess so. I snort. Like hell.

Her gaze rakes across us all. I fight the urge to glide back and lose myself in the masses. Therion steps forward, his voice booming across the battlefield.“We do not bow to traitors.”

The sorceress smiles—slow, knowing, wrong.“Then kneel before your end.”

And all at once, chaos erupts.

“Come on,” I say to Khaosti. “Let’s go get that bitch.” And I’m off and running. But the opposition has the same idea and we’re running toward each other. I lose sight of the sorceress as the shadowguard close ranks around her. As we close in on them, I whisper the spell to draw them from Hell.

“Through veils of darkness, spirits rend, shadows of Hell, to me ascend.”

I see the change as their bodies become real. Then we reach them. I swing Nightfall at the first, severing its head from its body. And then we’re in the thick of it. Khaosti and I stand back-to-back, swinging and slicing and stabbing. I’ve trained for this all my life, but there’s only so many I can kill like this. All around I can hear the battle raging. And above our heads Zayne and Thanouq dive and swoop, tearing through the enemy lines, then rising again. Driving groups of soldiers towards where the archers wait.

But I have my job to do and that’s neutralizing the sorceress.

“Cover me,” I yell to Khaos. I lower my sword and raise my other hand, seeing the celestial fire leap from my fingertips. It engulfs the shadowguard closest to me, and their screams fill my ears as they burn. Then I’m racing through the pillars of flame until I take out the next group, and the next. The power fills me, raw and seemingly infinite.

Finally, I spot her through the last of the shadowguard. She locks her gaze with mine and her eyes widen. She’s young, not much older than me, her skin pale, her hair dark. As she chants,dark tendrils rise from the ground, reaching toward me. I send out the fire and they burn.

Then something changes. I feel it in the air, a quiet falling over the battlefield. I glance around me. The fighting continues but it’s as though I’m cut off from the rest of the world. Just Khaosti and me and the sorceress. I stare harder and can make out a thin line of crimson circling us and beyond that, the world is darkening at the edges. I have no clue what’s happening, but I suspect nothing good. I throw out more flames, but they flicker and die as though the encroaching darkness is feeding off them.

“What the hell?” I look at Khaosti, but he shakes his head.

I need to focus on the sorceress. Is this her doing? But when I look at her, she’s a statue, her body devoid of movement, her face free of expression, her eyes glow like burning emeralds.

A cold, clawing pressure wraps around my mind. Then the sorceress speaks with a voice that’s clearly not her own. Low and dark, it slithers across the space between us.

“Daughter. We meet at last.”

Well, I wasn’t expecting that. I stagger back, gasping.

“What the hell,” Khaosti mutters. “Kill her, Amber.”

But I can’t. I need to hear what he has to say.

“What do you want?” I ask.

“What I’ve always wanted. My daughter, where she belongs, at my side.”

“You want the mirror,” I reply.