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We continued on, weaving through the trees and around the increasingly large mounds of rock. This entire area had once been a flood plain for the multitude of volcanos that still existed along the Blue Steel Mountains, and eons of eruptions and lava flows had forever pockmarked this landscape.

The deeper we moved into the forest, the sharper the noise became. I glanced upward, but couldn’t see Kaia through the gently whispering fronds above us.

Am here. Bored.

Then you should have gone hunting with Gria.

You need more.

And I appreciate your help, but your drakkling should be your first priority.

She didn’t reply, but wisps of her thought suggested revenge remained her main priority and keeping me alive was a means of gaining that. Drakkons were nothing if not practical, it seemed.

Is the cloud still there?

Thicker. Hear movement, not see.

I urged Desta closer to Red, then repeated what Kaia had said. “Is the magic getting stronger or remaining the same?”

“It remains steady, but that’s not unexpected if it is nothing more than a shield.”

A lark call came from the right. I raised a fist to signal a halt, then replied with a low whistle with a slight uptick at the end—code for, what have you seen?

Kerryn, who we couldn’t see from our position but was in the trees to our immediate right, replied with a soft, staccato series of whistles— two sentries, one hundred yards, above.

I sent a hold signal, then knotted Desta’s mane around the reins to ensure they didn’t get in her way if she decided to eat—she was too well trained to run, even if startled—and dismounted. “We’ve a sentry to our right . Mac and I will take care of them.”

Damon looked set to argue but nodded instead. I undid the nearest saddlebag and pulled out the long viewer, then motioned Mac to follow me and headed into the trees, sweeping around to the right so we could come in from a northerly direction, directly toward Kerryn’s position. The Mareritt weren’t dumb—our whistles, however like the birds we imitated they were, would have put them on alert for any movement coming from that direction.

The necessity of avoiding the whispering fronds slowed our progress, but we were closing in when I heard it—the faintest creak of wood followed by a sniff. They were in a tree somewhere up ahead. I motioned Mac to stop, then knelt then raised the long viewer, briefly adjusting the focus before scanning the trees—and saw them. Two Mareritten soldiers wearing leather armor the same ghostly gray as the foliage in which they hid. One had a crossbow nocked and ready, while the other used a flatter version of our long viewer to scan the general area where Kerryn was.

I handed Mac the viewer so he’d know their exact position, then, once he’d returned it, I motioned him to the right and raised five fingers. He nodded and slipped silently away. I retracted the viewer and tucked it inside my jacket, then went left, internally counting down. At two I stopped, unhooked my bow from my back, and nocked an arrow. At one, I drew back and sighted. At zero, I released. The arrow cut silently through the fronds and thudded straight into the Mareritt’s body, piercing his flesh deeply enough that only the fletching could be seen. He straightened in shock, a gargled cry escaping his lips, then dropped. A second later, his companion also stiffened, then raised his hands, as if intending to remove the arrowhead now sticking out of the side of the neck. Blood bubbled from his lips, and he dropped to his knees, his breathing harsh rasps that rose above the whispering fronds. I slung the bow over my shoulders, drew the knife, and ran forward, reaching the ladder—which was nothing more than notches in the tree’s trunk—a few steps ahead of Mac. I quickly climbed, saw the surviving warrior crawling toward the far edge of the platform and the weird-looking mechanical device stationed there. Some sort of alarm, no doubt.

As he reached for it with bloody fingers, I lunged at him, grabbing his boot and dragging him well away from the device. I killed him, then swung around, bloody knife at the ready. The other warrior was obviously dead, given he wasn’t breathing and there was a chunk of arrowhead sticking out of his chest, right where his heart would have been, but Mac nevertheless knelt beside him and checked.

“As dead as a winter’s evening,” he said and pushed back to his feet. “If this setup is any indication, they’ve been here for a while.”

“Yes.” And that was alarming, given our regular patrols through the area. How had we missed all this? I motioned to the dead Mareritt at his feet. “Pat him down and see if he’s holding anything useful.”

I cleaned my knife on the other Mareritt’s jacket, then checked his various pockets, finding little more than a few tokens dedicated to their god of war that supposedly brought holders luck and fortune. Obviously, said god hadn’t been overly fussed with these two.

I whistled the all-clear, then we climbed down from the platform and walked back to Kerryn’s position, softly calling out once we were close enough.

He lowered his weapon when we appeared through the fronds. “How many, Captain?”

“Only two, but there may well be more guard posts positioned closer to that barrier.”

“How far away is it from our position now, do you think?”

Two wingspans , came Kaia’s thought.

“About one hundred and sixty feet, according to Kaia.”

Kerryn’s gaze darted upward, though he wouldn’t see her through all the foliage. “She’s with us?”

I nodded. “Consider her an advance scout and a Mareritt murder machine if they dare attack us in the open.”

He grinned. “I’m liking the sound of that.”

If the rumble of approval running through my background thoughts was anything to go by, so did she. “Let’s head back. Now that we’ve taken out their guard post, you and the squad can safely hold here while Damon and I head in on foot to investigate the shield and the lay of the land around it.”

“And if you’re attacked?”

“I’ll call Desta in. Follow her lead and cause a little havoc.”

“Good plan, Captain,” he said, with an anticipatory grin.

Once I’d called in the two other riders, Kerryn offered me a hand so I could mount up behind him. When Mac was similarly mounted, we made our way back to the rest of the squad, signaling ahead so that they knew it was us coming in.

“Guard post?” Damon asked.

I nodded and slid over the rump of Kerryn’s mount, dropping lightly to the ground. “Given the likelihood of there being others, we’ve more chance of getting close to that shield unseen on foot. The squad will hold here while you and I see what we can do about that shield.” I glanced up at Kerryn. “Call in the rest of the team and stay wary.”

“Aye, Captain.”

Damon dismounted, then handed his mount’s reins to Sora. “Shall I take lead?”

I nodded, and we moved out quickly. The odd sense of wrongness up ahead sharpened abruptly, and unease crawled across my skin. “Something’s happening.”

He nodded. “Feels like they’re refreshing their barrier spell, which suggests they haven’t linked it to the energy within the earth.”

“Why wouldn’t they do that? It would conserve the strength of their mages, wouldn’t it?”

“Yes, but Esan’s earth mages would be able to detect the unusual flow of energy through the ground.”

Fog stirs , came Kaia’s thought. See white ones.

Doing what?

Make small throwers.

The images accompanying the comment showed what initially looked like our ballistas, but where the arrow should have sat was some sort of metal tube—one that looked a little too much like a larger version of the ones the gilded riders used.

“According to Kaia, the fog dissipated briefly during the renewal; the Mareritt are making mobile weapons.”

“Which explains the construction sounds we’re hearing, though it’s a strange place to make any sort of siege weapon. It won’t be easy to haul them through this forest.” He motioned to the left. “The nearest pin lies that way.”

We cut to the left, moving quickly and silently through the trees. It was another dozen or so yards before the fog came into sight, and it was utterly solid. Sound might creep past but there was no seeing through it.

We followed its length until we came to an unnaturally sharp junction of two walls. Even someone with absolutely no knowledge of magic would have guessed this wasn’t a natural phenomenon.

Damon squatted a few feet away from its sharp point and brushed his fingers across the ground, his expression distracted yet intense. After several minutes, he glanced up at me. “There’s no taint of the gilded riders in this wall, no matter how it might seem from above or how foul it feels.”

“Which doesn’t discount the possibility of them working together.”

“The Mareritt are no more the type to share the spoils of victory than the gilded riders appear to be.”

“Perhaps not, but what if they have a trading relationship? I did find a golden feather on that Mareritten youth, remember, so they’ve obviously been here.”

“I suspect when we get past this wall, we’ll uncover the answer.” He drew his sword. “I’m going to slide the sword into the ground and under the pinning stone to push it slightly out of alignment. That should briefly alter the viscosity of the spell without rupturing it and give us a small window in which to slip through.”

“We can’t just destroy it, like we did the one in the blue vein?”

“Aside from the fact I have no idea what else is woven through the spell aside from the barrier threading, we also have no idea of their numbers or indeed what else lies inside.”

If fog break , Kaia said, I attack. No like white ones.

I passed the comment on to Damon, and he laughed softly. “Her chance will come, and sooner than any of us might want.”

Not soon enough , she grumbled in response.

“Ready?” he added.

I nodded and drew my sword, tension running through my limbs and flames briefly flickering across my free hand.

He thrust the sword at an angle into the soil, under the fog, then twisted the blade sideways a fraction. There was a soft clunk as metal met stone, then the wall shimmered, shifting in and out of existence. Damon grabbed my hand and pulled me into it. Tiny particles of moisture slid across my face, the sensation oddly unpleasant, feeling more like oil than water. I shuddered but resisted the temptation to raise the inner heat and burn the droplets from my skin. As Damon had said, we had no idea who or what lay beyond this barrier, and I was better off conserving every scrap of flame strength I had.

We came out a few steps later. The small valley that lay before us was pitted with rocks and covered in long, yellowish grass. It had also been partially deforested, the trunks of the old ghost trees now piled beside several forges, ready to fuel the fires that burned within. Thick columns of smoke rose, staining the underside of the fog wall, which was undoubtedly the reason for its yellowish color when viewed from above. Hammers clanged as smiths worked metal into long rounded forms that looked far too similar to the tubes the gilded riders used to fire their liquid shit, while in other sections of the valley, a good dozen smallish catapults mounted on wheels sat in various stages of production. Beyond that were a series of temporary shelters and kitchen facilities.

We ran low and fast down to the nearest outcrop of rock and hunkered down behind it.

“They’ve been here for a while by the look of things,” I whispered. “So why haven’t any of our patrols ever noticed the fog or come to investigate the noise?”

“There’s probably some sort of redirect woven through the magic creating the fog.”

“And yet we heard hammering on approach and weren’t redirected.”

“No, because they’re still in the process of revitalization.” He pointed to three red-robed gaze men standing, hands linked, on a wooden platform that had been constructed midway up the other side of the slope. “You might not be able to see it, but there’s a triangular vortex of power flowing from those three.”

“Then they need to be the first thing we attack the minute we get that barrier down.”

“Agreed.” His gaze met mine. “Though the odds are greatly against us, no matter how capable your squad is.”

“Then we don’t use the squad. We use our ace.”

What ace? came Kaia’s thought.

I hesitated, then simply said, The reason we win.

Am queen. We always win.

Not always, and certainly not against better armed foes, but she knew that as much as I did, even if she wasn’t admitting it.

“That is a dangerous ploy for us all,” he said grimly. “We have no idea what weapons they have here, and if they have gained the cylinder construction details from the gilded riders, that’s more than capable of bringing Kaia down.”

“Only if they get the chance to deploy it. We need to make sure they don’t.” I met his gaze. “Will destroying the pin behind us result in the same sort of explosion that happened in the blue vein tunnel?”

“Unlikely, given the scale of the barrier. It’d take out a good chunk of their own encampment.”

“So it’d simply retract?”

He nodded. “But given its triangular nature, it’s likely only two sides will fall, not the three.”

“Two sides is more than enough.”

I quickly explained what I had in mind, and his expression darkened. “You’ll end up trapped.”

“No, because I’ll call in the team the minute those ballistas are ash. And if I can’t get back here, then Kaia can grab me on the fly.” I placed a hand on his arm. His muscles tensed under my fingers, making it feel as if I was gripping warm steel. “I can’t throw flame from here, Damon—it’s simply too far away.”

He took a deep breath and released it slowly. The man definitely wasn’t happy with the plan but all he said was, “Keep low and as close to the fog wall for as long as you can.”

I studied the sweeping line of the barrier for a second, seeing plenty of areas that provided good cover, and plenty of areas that didn’t. But a good portion of the smoke coming from the smithy fires drifted over this half of the valley, and that at least gave me a little extra cover. I drew my sword and exchanged it for his. It had been carved from stone of the Blue Steel Mountains, and while it was prized for its strength and imperviousness to weather, it simply didn’t have the capacity to cut through steel and stone that the Ithican blade did. “I’ll head for the privy block—once I’m in position, take out the stone.”

He nodded. “Best give me your bow and arrows. I can take out anyone who gets close and give you time to run if you flame out.”

If I got to the point of flaming out, I wouldn’t have the strength to run, but I wasn’t about to mention that. I handed him the weapons. “If they charge you, you run. Don’t wait for me—Kaia can get me out.”

His expression suggested him running was not going to be an option. Not until I was safe, anyway. “Don’t get dead.”

I grinned. “I can’t get dead because I haven’t finished playing with you yet.”

He scowled, though amusement danced briefly through his eyes. “Begone, woman, before I do something I might regret.”

My eyebrows rose. “Like what?”

“Like kiss you senseless and run the risk of discovery.”

“There’s a part of me definitely wanting to run that risk.”

“An insane part, I suspect.”

I grinned and didn’t bother denying it. I squeezed his arm, then rose and padded away, following the line of rocks and using them as cover. Damon’s gaze was a heated weight that pressed against my spine long after I’d left.

The ground sloped downward toward the small stream that meandered through the center of the shallow valley, and was littered with not only stone but the shattered remnants of the old trees, making caution even more necessary. The last thing I needed right now was to be tripping over and gutting myself on one of the thick splinters rising from the stumps.

The closer I got to my target, the thicker the smoke became and the more difficult it was to breathe without coughing. I continued on warily, fighting the growing tickle in my throat, my gaze constantly scanning the area, keeping an eye on the few Mareritt that were close enough to see me.

I was near to the stream, about a dozen yards away from the privy sitting on the other side, when it happened—the tickle in my throat overran my control, and I coughed.

Just as a fucking Mareritten warrior came out of the damn building.