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“And those pieces likely represent her army.”

As I expected. The longer we stood there, the more the map hypnotized me. I tracked circles through the dirt around it as I tried to work out the Endasi language.

“Do you think she’s using it to track Ophelia? Is this how she’s been finding her?”

Dax considered, but shook his head. “No, see there,” he said, gesturing to the deserts west of the mountains, “you all weren’t in Soulguider territory, and she has a number of spots alight there.”

I nodded in agreement. “Hang on.”

Jogging back through the trees, I found Astania and pulled a notebook from my pack. When I returned to the clearing, she and Dax’s horse followed, evaluating the space with those equine minds. Quickly, I scribbled a messy rendition of Kakias’s map as Dax searched for a route we could use to cross the river and get to Thorentil.

“I’m no cartographer,” I mumbled, striking her ‘X’s through the mountains about where they appeared on the larger scale. “This will do, though, since we can’t transport the larger one.”

Anything we knew about the Engrossian Queen’s plans was helpful, regardless of if we knew what it meant. We could figure that out later. Angels willing, she’d be dead tonight anyway.

At that thought, I shoved my journal into a pocket of my leathers and lifted my sword from where it leaned against the marble. Flipping it in my hand, I said, “All right, let’s chart a route back to our partners before?—”

My words were cut off by a scuffle over leaves and a grunt.

Whirling, I found Dax, his ax buried deep in the thigh of an Engrossian. A small dagger followed shortly into his neck, and the warrior crumpled to the dirt.

“Company?” I drawled, tightening my grip and picking apart the spaces between the branches. My heart pounded against my ribs.

“Appears so.” Dax rubbed a hand across his neck where a deep red line was fading. “Jumped me from behind. Wasn’t quick enough.”

His voice was stonier than before. Flicking a glance over my shoulder, I caught his hooded eyes narrowing. A general’s brain ticked away in his head, looking between the warrior bleeding on the floor and the rest of the clearing.

“Behind you!” he shouted.

I spun, raising my sword before I even saw the warrior. Two jagged blades crossed against my own. Mindshaper weapons.

Quickly, I slammed up every mental defense I could think to employ. Dragged up every memory with Ophelia or my friends, every sensation of calm serenity rather than the adrenaline I normally fed off during battle.

Mindshapers fought with different weapons, and I refused to be their prisoner again.

I leaned my weight against the stout warrior, pushing him back a step. My arms strained under the force of his knives, but this wasn’t the grueling kind of pain—it was the kind that settled along my muscles and spurred me on. The kind that had me smiling wickedly down at this incompetent match of a fighter and knowing he wouldn’t win. It was the spirit that awoke within all of our hearts as warriors, and I used it to meet my opponent’s daggers again and again.

He spun them above his head as I swung to his left and dragged them in an X less than an inch from my face. He knew fancy maneuvers with the twin set—I’d give him that.

Frustration bubbled in my chest at fighting him with different weapons. That was the nature of a war among clans—within our own kind—but it was out of balance, unnatural.

Metal clashed repeatedly. Dax fought off his own warrior, and Astania reared up between the low-hanging branches, knocking some clean to the forest floor to trip up the man. That’s my girl.

I ducked my opponent’s blade and swung out, aiming for the sensitive back of his knee. A bit of a cheap shot, but when the opportunity was presented so carelessly, who was I to deny it?

He roared and lifted one of those over-sized daggers again. As it arched through the air, the map’s glow fell on his vambrace—highlighted a series of broken buckles along his forearm.

Driving up hard as his arm dropped, I slashed my sword across his wrist. The clang of metal against metal rang through the forest, and the vambrace clattered to the ground.

My next strike went straight through his flesh, a satisfying grind of bone against blade. The Mindshaper’s scream pierced the clearing as he fell to his knees, his hand severed beside him.

Dax and his own opponent did not stop their fight, but it was obvious who was winning. Our general had earned his title, anticipating every movement of an enemy and beating them to it.

As my own opponent cowered on the ground, clutching the bleeding stump of his hand to his chest, Dax took advantage of his other’s slowed movement. He pinned him to a cypher with an ax through the shoulder.

When the tree took the impact, the whole forest seemed to rock. I shook my head, turning back to the bleeding warrior at my feet.

“This isn’t usually how people end up on their knees before me.” I circled him, tugging his hair to the side to force his gaze on Dax. “I wish you would have asked before your friend attacked mine.”