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She had no choice.

Blood squelched with every hand she clasped, but when one hand vanished, another took its place.

The world was nothing but a maelstrom of cold and heat, fire and ice, the swell and flux of Nina’s strange gift diverting and warping, ripping swaths through the swarm.

Alessa saw sky, briefly, a glint of sun that told her time was passing, then darkness and wings and claws closed in again. But she’d seen the sky and she’d fight to see it again.

A silver blade slashed past, proof Dante was alive and still fighting.

Across the hillside behind Finestra’s Peak and the beach before it, soldiers battled, stumbling through the waves, stabbing half-submerged scarabeo. The orderly rows of warriors following commands had disintegrated, commanders shouting orders to ranks who couldn’t hear them over the screams, or were too terrified to listen.

And all the while, the swarm above swooped and regrouped, communicating without words, a hive mind that didn’t need directions or plans to work in tandem.

Two scarabeo dove at Dante.

He stabbed and slashed, hidden by a tangle of claws and mandibles, and she sent a burst of flame to assist.

The scarabeo fell, screaming, over the cliff’s edge.

Dante dropped to his knees, clutching his bloodied side, his sword abandoned beside him.

Dante could heal himself. Hewouldheal himself. He had to.

But while soldiers battled around her and the Fontes, keeping the area around them clear, Dante was unprotected.

The roiling darkness coalesced as another wave of scarabeo saw easy prey.

Alessa snatched a scythe from the ground and ran, slashing it toward the scarabeo bent on reaching Dante. The curved blade at the end of the staff lopped off every leg on one side, and the bulk crashed down on the peak, nearly crushing Dante.

“Help him,” she shouted at the nearest soldiers. “Keep them away until he’s healed.”

Fontes waited, hands at the ready, for Alessa to resume the fight, but everywhere she looked, there was nothing but chaos.

She was doing her best, but it wasn’t enough. Too many scarabeo got past her, descending on an army lost to panic. She flinchedas two soldiers, fighting beside each other, were ambushed and snapped in half.

If only her army could communicate without words, too.

A desperate idea lodged in her mind.

Time to break all the rules.

Fifty-Two

Alla fine del gioco, re e pedone finiscono nella stessa scatola.

When the game is over, the king and the pawn go in the same box.

The dying scarabeo twitched violently, legs curling in like a dead spider.

Alessa lunged, her bare hand closing over one smooth claw.

She retched as an oily power flowed into her, but she didn’t let go until it reached the core of her gift.

Like falling out of bed mid-dream, something inside her came awake with a lurch.

“Regroup,” she ordered, but the word wasn’t merely spoken aloud. It was an order, a mental compelling, a dozen thoughts condensed into one, like a brain signaling a body to stand.

The army—her army—snapped to attention, thousands of warriors tuned as one. Through her eyes, through each other’seyes, they saw the fight from every angle, countless minds woven together into one.