“They’ll be on the beach at any moment,” Nox says as we huddle around the forge, gathering our weapons. “We have to head there now.”
He lifts up Asden’s gleaming sword.
The sun beats down, warming the back of my neck.
Around us, the warriors fasten their swords and steel their breaths. The shine of their wartime metal blooms against a backdrop of fresh lavender and the smell of lemon juice dripping from the trees.
I wish Eldara was here for this final battle, but we will be fighting it in her honor. In the honor of everyone who has perished because of the king’s evils.
“You have to stay away from the beach,” I say to Irenya as she lingers by the rows of weapons. “No matter how good a fighter you might think you’ve become in our sparring, it won’t compare to the Last Army or my mother’s magic.”
Irenya holds her hands up in surrender. “You won’t hear any arguments from me. I’ve never been one for sword fights anyway.”
Good, I think.
As long as I know Irenya is safe, I’ll be able to concentrate on what really matters.
Destroying Seryth and putting an end to the terror my family has helped him create.
I look to Nox, the warmth of his eyes steadying my nerves.
“Promise me you’ll follow my lead and be careful for once.”
Nox smirks. “Kind of hard to be careful in war, princess.”
I fix him with a firm glare. “I’m serious. I don’t want to see you die again.”
I couldn’t stand it.
I want to grab Nox and hold him close to me, away from the clutches of death and my mother, but with the fiercest warriors in the land staring between us, I swallow down those desires for now.
“If you survive past the Red Moon tonight, then we win,” I remind him. “The king’s immortality will be yours and he’ll lose all power. I know I can’t convince you to stay here with Irenya, but you can’t lead the charge with me.”
“Selestra—”
“I want you to hang back,” I say, not letting him try to debate it. “Direct the waves of soldiers where we need them. This battle is about protecting you. Promise me if you see Seryth, then you’ll do nothing but run.”
Nox looks hesitant, but I know I’m right about this.
It’s the only way we can truly avenge Asden and save the Six Isles.
Nox threads his hands through mine. “Don’t worry, princess. If there’s one thing I’m good at, it’s surviving,” he promises. “We’ve conquered death before. This is no different, as long as we’re in it together.”
I nod and calm my nervous breath, forcing my pounding heart to quiet. Nox is right: We’ve survived everything that’s been thrown at us so far by staying together.
This is no different.
Death won’t take us today. I won’t let it.
It’s time we take back our destinies for ourselves.
My mother holds the whirlpools in her grasp, placating them as if they are scared children.
The king’s ship is pure black, nothing but darkness cleaving through the waters, and at the helm of it my mother stands. She holds her arms wide and the waters of the Endless Sea spit and quake.
Her magic, our family’s magic, bursts into the air. I can only watch as she siphons the power straight from the mouths of the whirlpools and back into herself.
The waters surrounding Polemistés calm, still for the first time in a century. Eldara’s protections, gone.
I grip the knife Nox gave me back on Armonía before we stole a pirate ship.
I’ve always known my mother’s power was great, but this is mighty, beyond what I could have imagined or been told. The reason the king has never tried to attack from the whirlpools before isn’t because he thought she couldn’t do it—it was because he was cautious and calculating.
I cannot risk losing you, he once told my mother. Not when the heir isn’t yet eighteen.
Attacking from the whirlpools was a risk. But he’s not afraid of losing her life or her power anymore.
He’s afraid of losing his own.
If Nox survives tonight, Seryth dies.
If we win this battle, then we win the freedom of the Six Isles.
But if we lose …
Nox’s hand threads through mine. “Asclepina chose you,” Nox reminds me, his words pressing into my heart and clearing away any doubts like old cobwebs. “Her power lives inside of you. It’s yours to wield.”
My heart quiets in an instant, calmed by the reassurance of his words, as the king’s ships dock.
There are three of them, but in the distance beyond the cove, I can see dozens more lying in wait, biding time until the Polemistés sea battalion arrives.
A third of the Polemistés army stands behind me, Nox, and Micah, the others still guarding the walls and boarding their own attack ships. There’s barely a hundred of us on this beach and I know that there are at least double that on these three ships alone.
My hand edges closer to Nox’s. I crave the comfort of his touch more than ever.
“Remember,” I announce to our warriors. “We need to delay until the Red Moon. After that, the king loses. Protect Nox and know that you are fighting not just for your own lives, but the life of the Six Isles.”
I watch as the ladder from the royal ship unfolds onto the beach.
Seryth and my mother descend.
It feels like eons since I’ve seen them, lifetimes ago when I last bowed before a man of souls and shadows.
Seryth’s long black hair drips like squid ink down his bare chest, skin plagued by those same serpents that once marked me and Nox. They strike across his cheeks too, which are marred by black paint and ancient symbols, crisscrossing against his unblemished skin.
The immortal warrior. Ever young, ever brutal.
He holds my mother’s hand, helping her descend the ship.
Like me, she doesn’t wear gloves.
Like me, she is dressed for war.
A black suit chokes at her neck, cascading down her back in a cape threaded in gold and green. She looks older, somehow. And though she’s standing right in front of me, she looks so far away.
A memory of another world.
When she sees me, her lips part.
I am not the little heir she remembers, dressed in fine gowns and clutching at my gloves. I look her straight in the eye, an army behind me and a knife in my bare hands.
“Daughter,” Theola says.
“Traitor,” Seryth drawls, louder.
It’s the first time I’ve ever seen the slip of his measured cruelty. The anger that must simmer beneath him rises up to the surface so it’s clear for me to see.
The gibe doesn’t touch me.
Just weeks ago it would have pricked my skin like a hundred needles, making me feel worthless and inept. Not good enough to be his heir, let alone his witch.
Now it washes over me like the waves of the Endless Sea.
He’s the one that’s unworthy. That crown isn’t his to have.
“So what is it then?” Seryth asks. His feet crush a wild lily flower. “Before I kill you, I’d like to know about the magic this island holds.” He spreads his arms out, gesturing toward the hundred Polemistés warriors across the sand. “What keeps these cretins alive?”
There is a brief pause, where even the sun seems to flicker and hold its breath, before Seryth gets his centuries-awaited answer.
“I do,” I say.
The sun beams down onto the beach.
Seryth smirks, the points of his lips curving upward, smudging the symbols painted in the creases of his cheekbones. “You’re just an heir, Selestra.”
At this, Nox inches closer to me. I think he wants to reassure me, give me some kind of comfort that his words don’t matter.
It’s not necessary.
I already know.
Seryth isn’t my king anymore. He’s just a man. I know better than to give him any power over me.
“That’s true, I am an heir,” I say, my confidence rising to the surface. “I’m the heir to goddesses and queens.”
“You must stop this, Selestra,” my mother says, scolding me like I’m a child. “Your place is at our side.”
“That was never my place.”
“Then you’re nothing but a dead witch.” Seryth spits on the sand.
“Your fleet can’t match the Polemistés battalion,” Nox says.
Seryth’s laugh shakes the trees. “This isn’t going to be settled with ships. Let your little boats destroy mine. Let them kill every soldier I have.”
Nox’s eyes narrow.
“I’m willing to sacrifice everybody,” Seryth says. “Are you?”
He looks between us, seeing how closely we stand together. His eyes flicker as he notes my lack of gloves.
His smile widens.
“Who are you willing to let die tonight?” Seryth asks.
I glare. I want to kill him where he stands.
This man has imprisoned my family into servitude for generations, forcing us to be monsters at his whims. He’s stolen souls and homes and now he thinks he can steal us from each other.
From his three ships, ladders drop down onto the sand.
Seryth’s army begins to descend.
They are in the hundreds.
“Let’s see how this ends,” he says as they draw their swords. “Between the best of you and the best of us.”
He glances at my mother and runs a hand down her cheek.
“Between mothers and daughters,” he says.
Theola blinks. If I didn’t know better, I’d say it was a flinch.
My hands shake as I watch my mother. Her chin is high and her hands are like daggers pointed at her sides.
I thought I was ready for this, but a seed of doubt grows in my mind at the solemn look on her face.
She’s still my mother.
Maybe there is a way to save her from all this if only—
“Kill them all,” Seryth says. “But leave the traitors until last.”
His smile is ever ripe, eyes like pits that absorb any light.
“I want them to see the world burn before they die.”