Slowly, Orynth began to loom closer. Slowly, the walls went from a distant marker to a towering presence.

The siege towers reached the walls, and soldiers poured unchecked over the battlements.

Yet the gates still held.

Aelin lifted her head to give the order to Borte and Yeran to bring the siege towers down.

Just in time to see the six Ironteeth wyverns and riders slam into the ruks.

Sending Borte, Falkan, and Yeran scattering, ruk and wyvern screaming as they hit the earth and rolled.

Clearing the path overhead for a gargantuan wyvern to come diving for Aelin.

She blasted a wall of flame skyward as the wyvern stretched out its claws for her, for the Lord of the North.

The wyvern banked, rising, and dove again.

The Lord of the North reared, holding his ground as the wyvern aimed for them.

But Aelin leaped from his back, and slapped his flank with the flat of her sword, throat so broken from roaring that she couldn’t form the words. Go.

The Lord of the North only lowered his head as the wyvern barreled toward them.

She did not have enough magic—not to turn the thing into ashes.

So Aelin threw her magic around the stag. And stepped from the orb of flame, shield up and sword angled.

She braced herself for the impact, took in every detail on the wyvern’s armor, where it was weakest, where she might strike if she could dodge the snapping jaws.

The carrion on its breath was a hot blast as its maw opened wide.

Its head went tumbling to the ground.

Not tumbling so much as smashing.

Beneath a spiked, massive tail. Belonging to an attacking wyvern with emerald eyes.

Aelin crouched as the riderless wyvern whirled on the gaping Ironteeth witch, still atop her beheaded mount.

With one slamming sweep of the tail, the green-eyed wyvern impaled the witch on its spikes—and sent her body hurling across the field.

Then the flash and shimmer. And a ghost leopard now hurtled toward her, and Aelin toward it.

She flung her arms around the leopard as it rose up, massive body almost knocking her to the ground. “Well met, my friend,” was all Aelin could manage to say as she embraced Lysandra.

A horn blared from the city—a frantic call for help.

Aelin and Lysandra whirled toward Orynth. Toward the three siege towers against the walls by the southern gate.

Emerald eyes met those of turquoise and gold. Lysandra’s tail bobbed.

Aelin grinned. “Shall we?”

He had to get to her side again.

A battlefield separating them, Rowan slaughtered his way toward Aelin, Fenrys and Lorcan keeping close.

Pain had become a dull roar in his ears. He’d long since lost track of his wounds. He remembered them only because of the iron shard an arrow to his shoulder had left when he wrenched it free.

A foolish, hasty mistake. The iron shard was enough to keep him from shifting, from flying to her. He hadn’t dared to pause long enough to fish it from him, not with the teeming enemy. So he kept fighting, his cadre with him. Their horses charged bold and dauntless beneath them, gaining ground, but he could not see Aelin.

Only the Lord of the North, bounding across the battlefield, aiming for Oakwald.

As if he had been set free.

Fenrys, face splattered with black blood, shouted, “Where is she?”

Rowan scanned the field, heart thundering. But the bond in his chest glowed strong, fire-bright.

Lorcan only pointed ahead. To the city walls by the southern gate.

To the ghost leopard tearing through the droves of Morath soldiers, spurts of flame accompanying her as a golden-armored warrior raced at her side.

To the three siege towers wreaking havoc on the walls.

With the towers’ open sides, Rowan could see everything as it unfolded.

Could see Aelin and Lysandra charge up the ramp within, slicing and shredding soldiers between them, level after level after level. Where one missed a soldier, the other felled him. Where one struck, the other guarded.

All the way up, to the small catapult near its top.

Soldiers screamed, some leaping from the tower as Lysandra shredded into them.

While Aelin threw herself at the rungs lining the catapult’s wheeled base, and began pushing.

Turning it. Away from Orynth, from the castle. Precisely as Aelin had told him Sam Cortland had done in Skull’s Bay, the catapult’s mechanisms allowed her to rotate its base. Rowan wondered if the young assassin was smiling now—smiling to see her heaving the catapult into position.

All the way to the siege tower at its left.

On the second tower, a red-haired figure had fought her way onto the upper level. And was turning the catapult toward the third and final tower.

Ansel of Briarcliff.

A flash of Ansel’s sword, and the catapult snapped, hurling the boulder it contained. Just as Aelin brought down Goldryn upon the catapult before her.

Twin boulders soared.

And slammed into the siege towers beside them.

Iron groaned; wood shattered.

And the two towers began to topple. Where Ansel of Briarcliff had gone to escape the destruction, even Rowan could not follow.

Not as Aelin remained atop the first siege tower, and leaped upon the now-outstretched arm of the catapult, jutting over the battlefield below. Not as she shouted to Lysandra, who shifted again, a wyvern rising up from a ghost leopard’s leap.

Grabbing the catapult’s outstretched arm in one taloned foot while plucking up Aelin in another.

With a mighty flap, Lysandra ripped the catapult from its bolts atop the tower. And twisting, she swung it into the final siege tower.

Sending it crashing to the ground. Right onto a horde of Morath soldiers trying to batter their way through the southern gate.

Wide-eyed, the three Fae warriors blinked.

“That’s where Aelin is,” was all Fenrys said.

Salkhi remained airborne. So did Sartaq, Kadara with him.

That was all Nesryn knew, all she cared about, as they took on wyvern after wyvern after wyvern.

They were so much worse in battle than she’d anticipated. As swift and fearless as the ruks might be, the wyverns had the bulk. The poisoned barbs in their tails. And soulless riders who weren’t afraid to destroy their mounts if it meant bringing down a ruk with them.

Close now. The khaganate’s army had pushed closer and closer to besieged Orynth, flaming and shattered. If they could continue to hold their advantage, they might very well break them against the walls, as they had destroyed Morath’s legion in Anielle.

They had to act swiftly, though. The enemy swarmed both city gates, determined to break in. The southern gate held, the siege towers that had been attacking it moments ago now in ruins.

But the western gate—it would not remain sealed for long.

Salkhi rising up from the melee to catch his breath, Nesryn dared to gauge how many rukhin still flew. Despite the Crochans and rebel Ironteeth, they were outnumbered, but the rukhin were fresh. Ready and eager for battle.

It was not the number of remaining rukhin that snatched the breath from her chest.

But what came up behind them.

Nesryn dove. Dove for Sartaq, Kadara ripping the throat from a wyvern midflight.

The prince was panting, splattered with blue and black blood, as Nesryn fell into flight beside him. “Put out the call,” she shouted over the din, the roar of the wind. “Get to the city walls! To the southern gate!”

Sartaq’s eyes narrowed beneath his helmet, and Nesryn pointed behind them.

To the secondary dark host creeping at their backs. Right from Perranth, where they had no doubt been hidden.

The rest of Morath’s host. Ironteeth witches and wyverns with them.

This battle had been a trap. To lure them here, to expend their forces defeating this army.

While the rest snuck behind and trapped them against Orynth’s walls.

The western gate sundered at last.

Aedion was ready when it did. When the battering ram knocked through, iron screaming as it yielded. Then there were Morath soldiers everywhere.

Shield to shield, Aedion had arranged his men into a phalanx to greet them.

It was still not enough. The Bane could do nothing to stop the tide that poured from the battlefield, pushing them back, back, back up the passageway. And even Ren, leading the men atop the walls, could not halt the flow that surged over them.

They had to shut the gate again. Had to find a way to get it shut.