The woods are peaceful, the murmur of voices from the camp barely loud enough to be heard over the sounds of crickets chirping and the wind ruffling the leaves overhead.

“You do remember that you have the Fire Gift now, right?” a voice says, startling me. I turn to see Blaise sitting at the base of a tree, cross-legged. Though I know he’s speaking to me, his eyes remain downcast, focusing on the dirt gathered in the palms of his hands. I watch silently as he levitates it from one palm to the other and back again. A child’s party trick, nothing useful, but his hands don’t shake at least. When I step toward him, he looks up at me. His eyes remain his own and the dirt falls back to the ground.

“I don’t want to waste my gift,” I say. “I’ll need all the fire I can spare for tomorrow. You should try to restrain yourself as well.”

He shakes his head. “We’re surrounded by earth, and that alone recharges me, but even if we weren’t…it doesn’t work that way for me,” he says. “Like a well that can go dry. The power is just…me. It doesn’t run out.”

“You run out, though,” I say, but he only shrugs.

“We don’t know that for sure, do we?” he says. “We’ve never tested that theory.”

The way he says it—so offhandedly—unnerves me.

“Tomorrow,” I say slowly, “I’m going to hold on to your gem. We won’t need your gift.”

He exhales slowly, eyes dropping away from mine again. “Theo, we’re at war,” he says. As if I don’t know that. As if I ever have the luxury of forgetting that. “I have no illusions of living to see the end of it, and I don’t care that I won’t. As long as you’re on the throne at the end, I’m happy to watch on from the After.”

I sit down beside him, careful to keep a proper distance between us. I want to argue with him again, to tell him the same thing again. I need him. I can’t do this without him. I don’t know what to do if he’s not here.

But suddenly I’m not sure how true that is. I love Blaise, and I know that I would feel his absence like a hole in my chest for the rest of my life—a void, as Heron said. I don’t want to lose him. But I don’t need him, not the way I did a few months ago. Back in the Astrean palace, he was my tether to a life I barely remembered and to the person I wanted to be. But now I’m here, I’m standing, I’m Queen Theodosia, and I know who I am. I may want him, but I don’t need him the way I used to.

“I love you, you know,” I say.

“I know,” he says.

The words hang between us, neither comforting nor wounding, just a fact that, while undeniably true, doesn’t mean as much as it should in comparison to everything else. I wish it did. I wish saying those words stopped time and put everything in the world right once more. I wish they had the power to save him and Astrea and even me, but they’re only words. They don’t do anything.

“I’m keeping your gem, but I’ll have it if we need it. It’s a last resort,” I tell him after a moment. “If we need you, we need you. But we won’t. Not tomorrow. As long as we distract them long enough for Maile to get enough warriors through the gate, it’ll be an easy battle to win. There’s no use sacrificing yourself for it.”

He doesn’t reply for a moment, but finally he nods, keeping his eyes focused straight ahead. His dirt-streaked hand inches toward mine before he thinks better of it and brings both of his hands to rest in his lap. “It’s a last resort,” he says, his voice level and sure. As if we’re talking about what we’re having for dinner instead of his death.

* * *

—

When the sun bleeds over the peaks of the Dalzia Mountains, Heron and I make the first strike. I spin a ball of fire in my hands, stretching it bigger and bigger until it’s larger than my head, before I throw it across the lake with all of my might. It shouldn’t make it more than a few feet, but that’s where Heron comes in, sending a gust of wind strong enough to carry it but gentle enough to keep it aflame. Instead of burning the fire out, the air nourishes it, growing it even larger, so that by the time it finally hits the wall of the camp, the sound of the impact echoes through the woods behind us like a clap of thunder.

For a moment, the world is quiet. The ball of fire spreads slowly across the wooden cross supports of the wall, melting the iron as it goes. Then, all at once, chaos erupts. Shouts pierce the air, carrying over the surface of the lake, loud but indecipherable. Water falls over the burning parts of the wall but it’s too far away to tell what—or who—is the source of it.

“Again,” I say, my voice firm. I look to where Griselda stands beside me and nod to her. Though she and Laius, like Blaise, are pots close to overflowing, he vouched for their control. Theirs hasn’t been pushed to the edge yet, the way Blaise’s has been. Today won’t require much effort from them; it won’t be too much.

A smile blooms on Griselda’s wan face as she summons her own ball of fire, holding it between her hands just as I did, before she hurls it across the lake. Again, Heron guides it to hit the target—the south corner of the wall, far from where the Kalovaxians have gathered.

More shouts. More panic. But before they can put out that fire, the other six Fire Guardians throw their fireballs, and Heron pushes the balls toward the target until the entire wall is aflame.

“They’ll need some water to put those out,” I say, looking at Artemisia, who grins. Beside her, Laius looks more nervous than excited, but he manages a small, tight smile as well.

I’ve seen Art in battle before, seen the light that comes into her eyes, the way she fights like she’s not entirely in her body. This is different—it’s personal.

With the grace of a dancer, she lifts her arms over her head, and Laius mimics her movements, watching her to make sure he gets them just right. The once-placid surface of the lake rises as well, higher and higher, until it blots out the sky overhead.

“Careful,” I say to them. “There are innocent people there. Many of them in chains. You don’t want to drown them.”

Artemisia gives a huff, and they reluctantly lower the height of the wave. “Where do you want it?” Art asks me.

“North wall,” Blaise says, before I can. His interruption annoys me, even though it’s exactly what I would have said.

Artemisia looks to me for confirmation and I nod.

With force, she and Laius bring their arms down, falling into matching crouches and slamming their hands to the ground. As they do, the tall wave crashes down as well, destroying the northern wall.

The chaos multiplies, and through the holes that Griselda and I melted into the iron wall, I see figures running to and fro in a panicked frenzy.

Blaise steps toward me but I put a hand out, rest it on his arm.

“Not yet,” I say, though I feel the weight of his Earth Gem heavy in the pocket of my dress. “They’re distracted enough.”

As I say it, a new sound joins the cacophony, a single battle cry that repeats a thousandfold.

“Our warriors are coming through the gate now,” Artemisia says. “We’ve distracted them, but it’ll only work as long as we seem like the larger threat.”

“Well then,” I say. “Let’s threaten some more. Fireballs again in five, four, three…” I summon another fireball along with the others, except for Griselda, and again, Heron carries them over the lake, igniting one of the few intact parts of the wall.

“Another wave, Artemisia,” I say, my voice winded.

Art nods, though she looks worn as well. These are not the easy tricks we’ve gotten used to practicing. This is larger, heavier work, and it is taking its toll. Laius is unfazed and I know that he could easily summon more water, but like with Blaise, I don’t want to use him more than necessary. As Art brings up another wave, I look at Heron, who is doubled over, hands on his knees, catching his breath.

Raising her arms once more, Artemisia summons her strength, and the lake rises for her, spiraling into a tall spindle. It reminds me of a sword’s blade, thin and sharp and precise. She doesn’t ask where to aim it, but I know she’s thinking about the armory in the very center of the camp.

“Can you do it?” I ask her quietly.

Her concentration is focused on the spire of water, but she nods once, her expression drawn tight and sure. I open my mouth to remind her of the others, of what will happen if she misses, but I quickly close it again. She knows what will happen. She knows the risks. If she’s sure of it, I have to be sure of her.

“Do it,” I say.

She doesn’t need to be told twice. As soon as the words are out of my mouth, she’s bringing her hands down again, eyes closed tightly and hair writhing wild around her shoulders, tips flashing a blinding blue. When her hands hit the ground, the sound of it rings in my ears so that I can’t hear anything else. All I can do is watch as the perfect spiral of water arcs over the iron wall to the center of camp, the tail of it following.