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“That’s not what we called it,” I grit, throwing a pulse of my magic outward, forcing Orin back a step as his drain falters under the weight of fractured time.

“What? It’s better than what you wanted to name it,” he calls, sliding beside me, breathless, eyes wild. “You wanted to call itOperation Clockblock.”

“Because that’s what it is,” I shoot back, smirking despite myself as we circle Orin.

Lucien lunges toward us, but he’s caught in my dragnet—he’ll never get here in time. For one glittering second, it’s just me, Silas, and Orin, locked in a waltz of violence and bad decisions.

Silas winks at me. “Ready for the finale?”

“Do it.”

He snaps his fingers, and half a dozen versions of himself bloom across the cathedral—laughing, dancing, flipping each other off. Orin’s focus fractures, and the clones move, darting around him, pulling him away from the pillar, from Branwen.

I throw time itself like a dagger at the gap they leave behind.

“Go,” I say under my breath, casting a glance toward Riven and Caspian already charging in, toward Luna poised to move.

The opening is there. All we need is one shot.

And Silas, panting beside me, grins like he’s won the whole damn world.

Ambrose

I don’t run. That’s not my style. Running is reckless. Uncontrolled.

But Imove.

With Caspian’s whips cracking beside me like violent promises, I cut through the chaos. The war behind us rages—Elias’ fractured time bends the room into layers, and Silas has multiplied into a dozen versions of disaster—but it’s her I see. Her throne. Her smirk. Branwen.

The bitch who tookeverythingand tried to wear it like it belonged to her.

She sees me coming, and for the first time since we stepped into this realm, she looks—afraid. Not of death. No. Of me. Of what I carry in my bones. My magic. My promise.

Because I don’t bluff.

“You should’ve died with your lies in your mouth,” I say, voice calm, steady, every syllable honed to a blade. “Instead, you made the mistake of touching what’s mine.”

Her gaze flicks to Caspian, then to the others in the distance. “Oh, Ambrose,” she purrs, the rot in her voice masquerading as seduction. “Still so righteous. Even now, after everything Igaveyou.”

“You didn’t give me shit.” I reach out—not to her, not yet—but to the ground beneath her throne. The marble shivers. Cracks.My magic spreads like ink in water, coiling up the legs of her pedestal, turning possession into weapon.

Caspian’s whip lashes out beside me, catching the armrest of her throne andtearingit off with a satisfying crunch of stone. His face is unreadable, save for the rage in his eyes. Lust incarnate—twisted now, bruised with betrayal—but deadly when focused. And right now, he’s focused entirely on her.

“Do you know what it cost me tonottouch you?” I ask, stepping closer, my fingers flexing. “Do you know how hard I fought to stay unbound to you?”

She laughs—ragged, thin. “Oh, Ambrose. You were already mine. You just didn’t know it yet.”

“I’m not yours,” I snap, grabbing one of the splintered throne arms and turning it in my hand until the stone glows with the heat of my magic. “But you? You’ve been mine since the moment you took Lucien.”

Ithrowthe shard at her. Not to kill—yet—but toclaim.It lands beside her with a resounding crack, and the power in itspreads, crawling up the floor toward her like creeping vines, seeking to tether, toown.

Caspian follows it with a flick of his wrist, and the floor shatters beneath her throne, unbalancing it. Branwen stumbles. Unsteady. Weak.

And Ismile.

“You took Orin. You turned Lucien into your fucking puppet. You laid hands on Caspian.” My voice drops, cold and lethal. “But you still don’t understand. We’re not your monsters. We were never meant to be yours.”

She snarls, pushing up from the throne with a snarl of energy, a whip of black smoke curling around her fingers, ready to lash out.