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K ANTHE HAD NEVER thought he’d get lost in his own home. Even Frell had to consult his map to discern the correct route down to the Shrivenkeep. While Highmount was not as impossibly large as Kysalimri’s imperial citadel, the castle still sprawled across wings, courtyards, chapels, kitchens, and through hall after hall.

Their group’s path had led up as often as it headed down. Reaching the Shrivenkeep required a circuitous course through the castle. Those they encountered gave them a wide berth, noting nothing beyond the clatter of silver armor, likely believing they were a clutch of knights rallying to the castle’s defense.

All the while, the battle reached them through the brick and mortar. Muffled cannon blasts echoed. Or maybe it was thunder. By now, it was impossible to discern between the two. Each boom set Kanthe’s heart to beating faster.

Frell paused again. They were buried far under the castle, deeper than its dungeons. They had crossed through a labyrinth of dank cellars, hurried past abandoned cisterns that smelled of mold and rat droppings, and now gathered in a bricked chamber filled with wine casks, each so dusty that this place had surely been long forgotten.

The heady aroma of fermenting fumes hung in the air, sweet and musky. Kanthe wondered how well the wine had aged. Even Rami eyed a barrel longingly. Fear and exhaustion had certainly dried Kanthe’s mouth.

“It should be somewhere around here,” Frell muttered, running a palm along one wall.

Cassta helped him, bowing up and down, then she straightened and dragged a finger along a thin line barely discernible between the bricks.

“Here,” she hissed.

Frell moved over, searched, and pushed each brick. Finally, one gave way, releasing a hidden latch, and a door swung inward. Dark stairs wound downward.

“This should lead to the Shrivenkeep’s antechamber,” Frell said.

Gheel—the grand cross of their Shield contingent—lifted a lantern and took the lead. “We’ve lost too much time. We must move quickly.”

Kanthe glanced back. Despite the tortuous route, their rushed pace had gotten them here in less than half a bell. Though stress had made it seem far longer.

Still, Gheel was correct.

We’ve wasted too much time as it is.

The team hurried down the steps, traveling one behind the other due to the narrowness of the winding stairs. Kanthe quickly grew dizzy. The sounds of battle faded behind him. All he could hear was the pounding of his heart and their many boots.

With Gheel holding aloft their only lantern, Kanthe noted the blue glow suffusing from under the drape of Tykhan’s cloak. It flared brighter with each step that the ta’wyn took, as if blinking out a warning. Kanthe prayed the beacon continued to mask their approach.

Finally, they reached a door at the bottom of the stairs and bunched up in a row behind it.

Gheel looked for confirmation from Frell.

The alchymist pointed to a sigil inscribed in the door, of a book held in the fangs of the viper, the symbol of the Shrivenkeep. “The antechamber should be past this door.”

Gheel tested the latch, found it unlocked, and eked the door open. He peered out the crack, then nodded. “All clear.”

He led the way out into the domed obsidian chamber, its surfaces cut into thousands of facets. A pair of lowly lanterns lit the dark space, reflecting a wan glow across the room. A score of other doors lined the walls. To the right and left, Kanthe noted five or six entries had iron bars welded across them, marking those that must lead up to Kepenhill, closing off the path to the school.

Mikaen had clearly strangled access to the Shrivenkeep. In fact, Kanthe was surprised Mikaen hadn’t sealed more doors.

Still, only one mattered. It lay directly ahead of them, flanked by those two lanterns. Frell fished out a large key and headed there.

“Hurry,” Gheel urged, waving his men into a cordon around them.

Frell inserted his key, turned it, then frowned. He twisted it again. “The lock’s been altered. The key won’t work.”

Gheel turned to one of his men. “Bring up your ax.”

Kanthe shook his head. He knew this ironwood door, constructed of timbers, was far thicker than the one into the cookery. It would take forever to hack their way inside.

Mikaen had clearly taken this extra precaution.

Though, knowing my brother—

Kanthe stiffened and grabbed Frell and shoved Rami, trying to get everyone back to the door they had used to enter the antechamber.

But he was too late.

A resounding clang of a bell burst from behind the locked door, then was carried outward, reaching doors to either side. Alarms rang out from there, too, as those doors burst open. Knights—in silver armor that matched their own—poured into the room.

Kanthe now understood why Mikaen hadn’t sealed all the doors. His brother had hoped to lure someone down there.

Into a trap.

Gheel and his men formed a shield around their group. But the Hálendiian legions were the least of their problems.

Behind the last knight, a tall shape bowed into the room, carrying a cape over his shoulders that did nothing to hide his nakedness—or his bronze.

In a breath, the figure blew brighter, shining like a lantern in the gloom.

F ROM BEHIND THE Shields’ cordon, Frell gaped at the sight before him.

Eligor strode into the room as royally as any sire. He stood a head taller than Tykhan. The curls of his hair and beard danced with fire. Cascading shimmers washed across his bronze, parting over a seam that split his chest, which shone even brighter, blindingly so. It appeared to be a peek at the very heart of this creation.

If Frell had known nothing about the ta’wyn, he still would have recognized a true sovereign of their kind. Frell quailed from the sheer majesty and power of this Kryst. His knees weakened, as if ready to bow in submission before this king.

Still, he forced down his awe, clinging to his scholarship, his curiosity troubled by a question.

Why is he here?

Eligor’s presence made no sense.

Frell remembered the dispatch from Llyra’s spies, how a golden sun had burst above the tourney yard. They had all thought that Eligor would have returned to the Shrivenkeep to rest and restoke his reserves after that dramatic blaze. But upon learning of the incursion by Klashean forces, Mikaen must have feared another attempt to breach the Shrivenkeep, so he had fortified this ambush.

But Frell believed this decision had not come solely from the king.

This became clearer as Eligor stepped forward and pointed at their group, one in particular. “Subdue the others. But the Root is mine.”

Frell glanced at Tykhan. He remembered how Tykhan had feared his body and the strange alchymies within could be used as raw material to fully restore the Kryst to his full power.

That fiery desire still shone in Eligor’s eyes.

Earlier, the Kryst must have sensed the flare of the beacon sweeping toward Highmount. While he could not discern the source’s exact location, he—like Mikaen—knew any trespass would end up here. So, Eligor must have folded himself into this ambush in hopes of collecting the means to his resurrection.

To ensure this happened, the Hálendiian knights closed upon their group from all sides. In desperation, Gheel tossed his lantern at the nearest knight. It smashed against armor, flared brighter, then went dark. This rash act made the closest attackers pause, but that was not its true purpose. Two of Gheel’s men swung their swords and shattered the remaining two lanterns on the wall.

Darkness swamped the space.

None of the ambushers had come with lamps, only with weapons in hand. A door had been left ajar, letting in some light. The only other source of brightness shone from the bronze lantern in their midst.

As broken glass tinkled on stone, Gheel and the others lunged forward. They used the darkness and momentary surprise to slash into the closest, dropping several. But their group was still outnumbered five to one. This ploy would only buy them time, not a means of escape.

Frell turned to Tykhan, praying it proved to be enough time.

Tykhan stepped forward, throwing aside his cloak, exposing the azure-violet glow of his crystal beacon. With one hand, he twisted a valve near his shoulder. With the other, he flipped up a copper shield across the front of the crystal cube. At the screen’s center, a prismed crystal brightened.

As Tykhan kept turning the valve, the cube flared to a brilliant violet. The small tank strapped to his back bubbled fiercely with a golden hue. Eligor—who had been shoving forward, knocking combatants aside—paused warily.

And with good reason.

Out of the prism, a concentrated beam of violet fire burst forth from the beacon. It struck Eligor in the chest, at that rift down its center.

Eligor staggered back, a bellow of pain ripping from his throat.

Frell tried to imagine the strange alchymies being wrought inside. Tykhan had explained this design, one in which they had pinned all their hopes, one that had never been tested, only theorized.

Tykhan had carried his schysm across the world for millennia. During that time, he had not only tinkered with the design of new wyndships, he had also looked inward, to better understand himself.

How could he not?

He had a Root’s innate curiosity about all manner of design—including his own.

As the battle raged, Tykhan kept his beam focused on Eligor. Step by step, he drew closer to his target.

Cassta and Rami flanked him, wielding knives in a storm of silver. Some blades were thrown, others stabbed. Some were poisoned, others not. Kanthe had dropped to a knee after whipping his crossbow to his shoulder. He fired into the fray, somehow able to discern friend from foe.

Still, every sword, blade, and bolt had one aim.

To protect Tykhan.

But will this effort prove for naught?

Down in the Shrivenkeep, when Tykhan had removed his schysm, it had not been the first time. In the past, he had done so to study its intricacies. After this long span of introspection, he had grown to understand its power better than even a Kryst. He had come to know its strengths—as well as its weaknesses.

He had leaned upon the latter when he had retooled his beacon. It was intended to do more than simply emit a diffusing wash. When brought to full power and concentrated through the right prism, the signal became a weapon, one uniquely attuned to his schysm ’s faults. Tykhan’s goal here was not to reacquire what was stolen—but to destroy it.

The beam held the potential to shatter the schysm, hopefully doing more damage in the process. Either way, Tykhan was certain that the shock of such a sudden and violent obliteration would knock Eligor into a debilitating spell, hopefully long enough for them to abscond with him.

The plan had been foolhardy, reckless, but with moonfall threatening, it had to be risked.

One of the Hálendiian knights must have suspected this threat and raised a shield across that fiery beam, trying to protect their bronze king. But the beam was more vibration than light. It pierced through the steel as if it were not there.

Then a crossbow bolt struck the knight’s helm, knocking man and shield out of the beam’s path.

The two ta’wyn continued to wage a silent war. The effort took its toll on both. Eligor had fallen to a knee. The cleft in his chest had ripped wider, agony etched his face. Still, the Kryst’s body glowed even brighter, fiery in its fierceness. Where steel had failed, those flames appeared to be working.

While caught by surprise, Eligor clearly rallied.

Tykhan could no longer advance, but he still held his ground with his shoulders hunched, his head low, as if trying to forge through a stiff headwind. Under that strain, his bronze softened and lost its fine details. As it melted, this bronze fanned away from where Eligor crouched, as if blown back by that same headwind.

Still, both ta’wyn locked gazes on one another, neither blinking nor turning away.

Early on, Tykhan had expressed one additional hope, a thin one. In this battle, with the two tied together by energies and frequencies beyond Frell’s understanding, there might be a chance for Tykhan to commune with Eligor, to connect with the Kryst like Tykhan had done with the giant crystal arkada found hidden in the Abyssal Codex. With enough concentration, Tykhan believed he might gain some glancing knowledge of Eligor’s plans, maybe a way to thwart him.

Still, that did not seem to be working—none of it did—and time was running thin.

Gheel had lost four men. Kanthe and the others had been driven into a tight knot. All were bloodied and gasping. Even worse, Hálendiian reinforcements poured into the chamber.

Kanthe drew Frell lower. “If you’re going to act, now might be a good time.”

Frell winced and reached to the satchel at his waist. His chymical weapon wasn’t meant for close-quarter fighting. Still, he heeded Kanthe’s admonition and slipped out a fist-sized leather-bound ball. He squeezed it hard, causing a flint to spark, then tossed the ball toward the flow of knights. He made sure he threw it well clear of the silent battle between Tykhan and Eligor.

Still, as the chymical bomb exploded, the blast deafened. Its fiery burst blinded all. Knights got thrown into the hard obsidian walls. The shock momentarily paused the battle.

Frell snatched another bomb.

As he lifted it, Kanthe touched his arm. “Hold off. Something’s happening.”