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ROYO

CHARM BEACH, GAYA

T he war drums beat until they rattle my skull. I really want to go the rest of my life without hearing this shit again. The percussion goes right through me, stomping on my last nerve.

Mikail comes back into the tent, and everybody snaps to attention. Everyone but Aeri. She’s curled up on a sofa with a book.

“It’s time,” he says.

He puts his hand out for her. She rises from the couch, but she turns and gives her hand to me. We both step forward.

Mikail smiles, and it’s genuine.

Teo and Duval fall in line with him, and I hold Aeri’s hand. The five of us step out into the breaking dawn. The breeze carries the smell of salt and moves the fleet closer. They’re fully visible now—a sea of ships.

“Promise me something,” I say to Aeri.

“It’ll depend,” she says. “There’s not a lot, but there are a couple of things I can’t promise you.”

She side-eyes me, and I know she’s talking about the night we killed the king.

“Don’t use your relics unless you have to,” I say. “You don’t know what it will do now that you have the crown, and there’s no telling how long you’ll get frozen in time…or worse. It’s gotta be a last resort.”

Her golden eyes look everywhere but at me. “All right, Royo. Unless we’re in danger, I won’t use them.”

I flatten my lips. That promise has more holes than lace, but it’s as good as I’m going to get.

We make our way to the overlook, and the line of archers breaks for us to stand in the middle.

Out on the water, the Weian fleet is still hundreds of yards away, but there’s a lot of them filling the harbor.

The dawn sky lights up in pinks, oranges, and gold. I grip Aeri’s hand while I can. It won’t be long before she has to stand ready, before the ships are within range of our archers. But we have this quiet moment.

My heart pounds like the war drums. What I wouldn’t give to run. To bring Aeri to my shack on the Sol and hide out there. But we’re long past that option. We’re in this now.

Mikail pulls out a spyglass and scans the waters. I’m not sure what he’s looking for, but he takes his time before he lowers the glass. Whatever it was, I don’t think he found it. The only thing I can figure he’d look for is Sora.

Maybe it’s better that she’s not in this.

We wait. One hundred longbowmen stand in a line and breathe with the five of us. The thick air hangs on all of us. I want to scream, to take my axe and run at an enemy, but we just stand here waiting while they creep closer and closer.

Minutes crawl by, and then Mikail takes a step forward on the grass.

He stands alone. I wonder what he’s doing, but then he slowly sweeps his right arm out in front of him.

The closest Weian ships catch fire. I mean in the blink of an eye, ten ships become bonfires on the water.

The flames are so large, it hurts to stare at them.

It’s the same way the port caught fire—unnaturally ablaze from god magic.

My breath catches. Ten fucking Hells.

The overlook and Charm Beach below are dead silent. Mikail just took down a thousand Weians with one move of his arm.

Aeri squeezes my hand. We can do this. We can win this thing.

Hope surges in me, filling my chest. I look at Mikail.

He smiles but coughs. Then he waves his left arm—the one with the blue metal that used to be the Water Scepter.

The row of ten ships behind the first wave lights on fire.

Mikail’s eyebrows move just enough for me to know he’s confused. He didn’t expect fire.

He expected water.

But the men don’t know that. A chorus of cheers rise from the beach and through the archers. The people chant: Adoros, Adoros, Adoros .

We can’t hear screams from this far away, but I’m sure there’s plenty on the water.

Men are on fire, and the twenty Weian warships begin to break apart and sink into the sea.

That means we have two thousand fewer Weians to worry about.

Even if they survive the fire and can swim, their steel and the wreckage will bring them down.

Two thousand as good as dead in seconds from one guy. I rub my forehead. Maybe he really did need the sword. We’ve been used, played, abandoned, and left for dead. But this time is different. This time, the gods are on our side. Maybe, despite everything, we’re gonna come out on top.

I smile at Aeri just as Mikail drops to his knees. His chest heaves, and he puts his arms out on the grass to brace himself. His face turns light red, then crimson.

Fuck, he can’t breathe. Fear seizes me, making me stand still.

“Mikail!” Aeri says.

Before I can even move, she dives to the ground next to him, then sits back on her heels. Her light skin gets even paler.

Mikail pukes. Water comes out. A lot of it. And he didn’t drink anything in the tent.

Aeri’s face morphs in horror as she looks at the ground and Mikail, who’s coughing now.

“Water turned against you the way time turned against me,” she says. “That’s why you don’t have control over the sea anymore. This is the cost of multiplication. This is the new toll—using the relics is slowly drowning you.”

Goose bumps coat my skin as I think back to the hot spring in Khitan, the man pulled from the Sol, and my mother’s body in Tamneki.

Mikail sits up, wiping his face. “It’s okay. Fire will be enough.”

I stare out at the sea. There are dozens and dozens of ships left. I say a silent prayer that he will be able to do it, because there’s an entire Yusanian fleet behind them.