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The initial wave hits hard. Flying snakes dart in like arrows, aiming for vulnerable eyes and throats, while ground snakes coil around the legs of the smaller Divhs, striking at weak spots in armor-like scales.

The open plain becomes a soup of twisting bodies, and the griffins take to the skies, raking the air with their talons, snatching up serpents and hurling them into the jagged rocks.

Led by Ayne, the dragons and other fire breathers unleash a torrent of flame, incinerating dozens of snakes at once.

The saber-toothed cat roars as it leaps into the fray, crushing serpents under its paws and snapping flying snakes out of the air with precision.

Gent tucks me against his chest as he dives into the next mass of snakes, crushing and scattering them so violently that they flow away from him in a shattered tide.

But that tide seems endless. For every snake crushed or burned, a hundred more slither forward and the night wears on with the growing certainty that this well of slithering death might never be exhausted.

Then, the air turns cold.

One of the griffins screams in outrage, and Gent wheels around to face the mountain range, giving me full view of the newest nightmare to beset us.

Three immense figures, built like men but practically dripping with snakes as big as a manor house, loom over the broken wall, their movements eerily smooth for beings nearly as tall as the mountain.

Their faces are masked with what look like metal faceplates, but they don’t seem to be wearing any clothes.

They don’t need to. Their forms are obscured by shifting masses of snakes that coil and writhe like living armor.

Where the snakes part, however, there’s no flesh, no bone—only an abyss of smoke, black and swirling.

The Sahktar.

The defenders falter. Whatever they hold in their collective memory of the Great Conflict all those centuries ago, it apparently didn’t include this.

One of the winged lizards, its emerald wings flapping furiously, roars and launches itself at the nearest masked figure.

The claws of its powerful front four sets of legs rip through the writhing armor of serpents, scattering them like leaves.

For a moment, it sems the Divh might succeed. Then the Sahktar moves.

Its snake-covered arm lashes out, and as the serpents part, a jet of deathly vapor strikes the lizard’s chest. The great beast’s roar becomes a gurgle as its emerald scales turn gray, its massive body decaying mid-flight.

In seconds, it crumples, plummeting to the ground—then winks out of this plane completely.

The defenders freeze for just a moment. Divhs have battled each other in the pageantry of the Tournament of Gold for centuries now—and some were injured, yes.

Sometimes badly enough that they, too, had to flee to the Blessed Plane.

Their enemies in those battles were their own kind, though, not this abomination.

The griffin lets out a mournful cry as the tide of skrill surges forward, emboldened by the death of their foe.

But the way of the warrior is death.

The ape-like colossus suddenly bellows, scooping up a massive shaled rock from the ground and swinging it like a club.

Snakes explode into bursts of gore and spitting poison as the massive weapon sweeps through their ranks.

The saber-toothed cats leap into action, their claws ripping through sinewy flesh.

Above me, Ayne and Tennet lead a formation of fire-breathing falcons, raining down fury on the flying snakes.

“What does Syril see?” I demand of Tennet.

“Only about a third of the snakes I do, I can tell you that. These bastards are putting on a show.”

I lean forward in Gent’s grip, forming the order in my mind as I vainly try to scream it over the wind— Fire!

From every corner of the battlefield, flame erupts.

Dragons spew torrents of fire, bulls snort burning embers, and the phoenix ignites its wings in a blazing dive, carving through the swarm like a fiery spear.

The snakes writhe and shriek, their numbers thinning under the relentless assault, even to our duped eyes.

But the Sahktar remain.

One of the colossal ape-like Divhs charges, hurling a boulder at the nearest sentinel.

The stone smashes into the snake-armored chest, scattering the slithering creatures.

The figure staggers but doesn’t fall. Another defender, a bull-like behemoth, follows up with a fiery charge, its horns blazing spears of flame.

The impact tears through the snake armor, exposing the roiling smoke beneath.

For a moment, we all see a flicker of vulnerability.

Then the bull disappears to the Blessed Plane, lost to the deadly vapor.

I scan the battlefield desperately. With this most recent attack, the Sahktar are retreating toward the mountains, their movements slow and deliberate.

But they aren’t defeated, I think—merely regrouping.

We’ve bought time, but the cost to the skrill has already been far too high.

The bodies of their fallen litter the pass, and the air is thick with smoke and the acrid stench of decay.

Prepare another surge— Fortiss begins his voice pounding in my mind.

The mountains explode with flying snakes.

The screeching cacophony takes us all by surprise, and the fighting begins anew, only now it’s taken on a breathless, desperate urgency.

For all that I know that way is certain death, I can’t do anything about it.

I urge my great goliath around, and Gent punches and pummels his way toward the Eighth House?—

Another scream rips through the air. A familiar one.

I look up, stunned to see the sky has been split anew, and Nazar’s mighty griffin soars into view followed by the windmilling Marsh, and fully a dozen more Divhs of all descriptions—some I remember from the tournament.

Reinforcements! They unleash fresh terror on the skrill while I resolutely turn Gent back toward the Meridian mountains.

The mountains, and the unholy blight that lies on the other side.

“Fortiss!” I shout and he’s there in my mind and in my sightline, Szonja racing forward as Gent lurches toward the mountains.

Gent flinches away from the wall as if the very nearness of it burns him, and Szonja banks away as well.

She screeches in indignation and flies close enough to Gent that I can see Fortiss clearly—and witness his startled expression as Gent plucks him from Szonja’s back and drops my beautiful warrior right next to me.

Gent throws his head back and roars with—not joy, certainly, not delight…but with resolute, unmistakable purpose.

Drawing back his arm, he swings around?—

And hurls us over the great wall of the Unlit Pass.