The throne room had become very loud very quickly.

  Ilsa had been in chaotic situations before. Training exercises that spiraled out of control, mock battles where someone misjudged their strength, that one memorable afternoon when a visiting dignitary's enchanted peacock had escaped its handler and set fire to the Knightly Order's eastern garden. She understood chaos, in the abstract sense that a nineteen-year-old knight-in-training could understand it.

  But this was different.

  The dragon had vanished, and the nobles who had been pressed against walls and cowering behind pillars now stood frozen, their faces cycling through expressions that couldn't seem to settle on any single emotion.

  Then someone screamed, and that scream broke whatever spell had been holding the room in place, and suddenly everyone was moving at once.

  "The king is dead!" someone shouted.

  "He's not dead, he disappeared—"

  "Did you see that light? Did you see it?"

  Grandpa Sael had already descended through the hole he'd carved in the floor. The chancellor dangled from his grip like a puppet with cut strings, and then both of them were gone, swallowed by the darkness below.

  Ilsa looked at Robin. Robin looked at Orion. Orion looked at the hole in the floor, then back at them.

  "Well," Robin said.

  That seemed to summarize things adequately.

  The chaos was spreading now, rippling outward from the throne room. Servants fled in every direction while guards shouted conflicting orders at each other. A woman in elaborate silks had fainted and was being fanned by two attendants who seemed uncertain whether they should be reviving her or running for their lives.

  And then someone pointed at them.

  "You!"

  The voice came from a man in robes trimmed with gold thread, his face red and contorted with an uncomfortable mixture of rage and terror. He stood near one of the side passages, flanked by two guards who looked considerably less certain about the situation than their employer did.

  "Those are the accomplices! They came with the assassin! Seize them!"

  Ilsa felt her stomach drop.

  The guards hesitated. Which was understandable, really—they'd just watched their king get blasted into unconsciousness and teleported to god-knew-where by a man who had carved a hole through floors of solid stone with a thought. Arresting that man's companions probably seemed like a questionable career move.

  But the noble in the gold-trimmed robes was still shouting, and other voices were joining his now, other fingers pointing in their direction, and Ilsa could see the calculation happening on the guards' faces. The archmage was gone. These three weren't. And if they didn't do something, they'd be blamed for inaction later.

  "We should leave," Ilsa said.

  Robin's ears had flattened against his skull. "Agreed."

  But it seemed too late as the guards moved, prompted by more pressing orders. About ten of them, converging from multiple directions with weapons half-drawn.

  It was at that moment that Orion raised his staff.

  Ilsa had seen Orion attempt spells before. Many times, actually. The results had ranged from 'nothing happened' to 'something happened but not what he intended' to 'everyone please evacuate the building immediately.' She braced herself for any of these outcomes.

  What she did not expect was for the air itself to move.

  A wave of force erupted from the staff's tip, visible, somehow, a rippling distortion that expanded outward in a perfect arc. It struck the approaching guards and pushed like a tide. Ten armored men went sliding backward across the marble floor, their boots finding no purchase, their bodies unable to resist the pressure. They came to rest in a heap against the far wall.

  Everyone stared at Orion, and Orion stared at his staff.

  "I..." His voice came out strangled. "I just leveled up."

  Ilsa felt a smile spreading across her face. She couldn't help it. Seventeen years she'd known Orion, two years of watching him struggle with spells that came easily to everyone else, one year of him insisting that he just needed more practice, more study, more something. And now, here, in possibly the worst possible moment—

  "That's the first spell I've ever seen you cast successfully," she said.

  Orion's expression shifted from shock to one approaching manic joy. "Ilsa, I cast a spell! And I leveled up!" He grabbed her arm. "Ilsa! Did you see that? They went flying! I made them go flying!"

  "I saw."

  "With magic!"

  "Yes, Orion. With magic. We should probably—"

  "I've been trying to do that for years!"

  The guards were picking themselves up now, but their enthusiasm for the pursuit had dimmed considerably.

  "Ah, right, right! The door behind us," Orion murmured. "Twenty paces. I counted when we came in."

  Ilsa didn't ask why her friend had counted the distance to the nearest exit. That seemed like exactly the sort of thing Orion would do, and she was grateful for it now, so they moved.

  The first guard reached them before they'd made it ten steps. He was young—maybe her age, maybe a year or two older—and his sword was already drawn. His form was good. Proper stance, weight balanced on the balls of his feet, blade angled for a quick strike to her midsection.

  Ilsa didn't dodge.

  She'd like to say it was because she trusted Grandpa Sael's protective spells completely, or that her faith in his magic was so absolute that the thought of being cut simply never occurred to her as a possibility. That would have sounded very noble and brave in the telling afterward.

  The truth was simpler: she didn't have time to dodge. The guard was fast, faster than she'd expected, and her own reflexes—honed by three years of knight training but still very much the reflexes of a knight apprentice—simply couldn't keep up.

  The blade struck her side. Or rather, the blade tried to strike her side.

  What actually happened was considerably more interesting. The edge connected with the fabric of her traveling clothes, passed through it without resistance, and then stopped dead against her skin. There was no clang, no impact, no sensation of force at all. The sword simply refused to cut her.

  And then, as if that wasn't strange enough, the blade began to bend.

  The guard's eyes went very wide.

  His sword, which had presumably served him faithfully throughout his career, was now curving like a willow branch, the metal near the point of contact warping around the shape of her body as though she were made of something considerably harder than steel. The edge that should have opened her from hip to rib was instead folding in on itself, crumpling like paper.

  Ilsa looked down at the ruined blade, then back up at the guard.

  "I think," she said, "you should let us pass."

  The guard dropped his sword and stepped backward so quickly he nearly tripped over his own feet.

  "ILSA!" Orion's voice cracked with panic, his staff already rising for another spell he probably couldn't replicate.

  "I'm fine," Ilsa said, turning to show him the crumpled sword still hanging uselessly against her side. "I'm fine, Orion."

  "Damn," Robin breathed, watching the ruined metal fall to the ground. "These spells are the real deal."

  They kept moving. The door was close now—fifteen paces, ten, five—and more guards were approaching from the sides, but their advance had slowed considerably. Word was spreading. The woman who couldn't be cut. The travelers wrapped in magic that made mockery of weapons.

  A man stepped into their path. Older than the first guard, harder around the edges. His sword remained sheathed.

  "The exits are being sealed," he said, and his voice was calm. "On order of Lord Habbas. You won't make it out of the palace."

  "We could try," Robin said.

  The man's gaze moved to the fox's face, assessing. "You could. You might even succeed, if your protections are as strong as they appear to be. But there are a lot of guards between here and the gates. A lot of opportunities for things to go wrong." He paused. "I'm offering you a chance to surrender peacefully. It would be easier for everyone."

  Ilsa considered this.

  On one hand, the man was probably right. This place was enormous, and she had no idea how to navigate it. They'd been led here by an escort, through streets and corridors that all looked identical. Even if they fought their way past every guard in the building, they might simply get lost and wander in circles until reinforcements arrived.

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  On the other hand, surrendering to people who wanted to execute them for being accomplices to a coup seemed like an even worse option.

  "Orion," she said quietly. "Do you remember the way out?"

  "I think so." His voice was strained. "Mostly. There were a lot of turns."

  "Mostly is better than nothing."

  Ilsa looked at the older guard.

  "I appreciate the consideration," she said. "But I don't think we'll be surrendering today."

  The man sighed. "Your funeral." Then he stepped aside.

  Ilsa blinked. "You're... letting us go?"

  "I'm getting out of your way." The man's expression was unreadable. "There's a difference. The young ones can throw themselves at your magic shields if they want. I've been doing this for thirty years, and I've learned to recognize a losing fight." He gestured toward the door. "Go on. You've got maybe two minutes before Lord Habbas realizes I'm not actually trying to stop you."

  And so they went.

  The corridors blurred past in a confusion of identical guards who threw themselves at the three of them with varying degrees of enthusiasm and uniformly poor results.

  A spear struck Robin's back as they rounded a corner. The shaft shattered.

  An arrow caught Orion in the shoulder, or tried to. The projectile stopped an inch from his skin, hung in the air for a moment as if confused, and then dropped harmlessly to the floor.

  A mage appeared at the far end of a hallway and began weaving something that crackled with contained lightning. Ilsa didn't slow down. The spell struck her square in the chest, washed over her like warm water, and dissipated into nothing.

  "This is incredible," Orion breathed. They were running now, properly running, and his face was flushed with exertion. "The layering on these shields, I can feel them, but I can't even begin to understand how they interact. The geometric patterns alone—"

  "Maybe save the magical analysis for when we're not being chased," Robin suggested.

  "Right. Yes. Good point."

  They burst through a doorway and found themselves in a courtyard. The night sky opened up above them, stars glittering against the darkness, and for a moment Ilsa felt a surge of hope. Open ground. Clear sightlines. The gates couldn't be far.

  Then she saw the soldiers.

  There were perhaps a hundred of them, arranged in tight formation across the courtyard. Their armor gleamed in the torchlight, weapons drawn and ready. But it wasn't the soldiers that made Ilsa's blood run cold. It was the mages.

  She counted twelve of them, spread across the formation in pairs, their hands already glowing with gathered power. Court mages, by the look of their robes. These were the type who usually spent their lives studying combat magic and very little else. Behind them, archers had taken position on the walls, crossbows trained on the courtyard's only exit.

  Ilsa drew her sword.

  The blade, as always, felt familiar in her hand, grounding, too. Years of training, countless hours of practice, and she'd never once drawn steel expecting to actually use it in a situation like this. Or get mortally hit and survive. Or participate in a coup, for that matter. Tonight was apparently full of firsts.

  Beside her, Robin raised a crossbow. She hadn't seen him pick it up, must have grabbed it from one of the fallen guards during their escape through the corridors. His clawed hands adjusted the grip, bolt already loaded.

  "Accomplices to the assassination of His Majesty!" A man Ilsa assumed was some sort of commander stepped forward, his voice carrying across the courtyard. Dragon motifs adorned his plate mail, worked into the chest piece with obvious care. "By order of Lord Habbas, acting regent in His Majesty's and the Chancellor's absences, you are commanded to surrender immediately! Lay down your arms and submit to arrest!"

  The mages' hands burned brighter. Ilsa could feel the heat from here, the crackling promise of violence barely contained.

  "We can't fight through that," Robin muttered. "Even with the shields. Those are war mages. That's minimum level 200."

  Ilsa didn't answer immediately.

  Something was happening in her mind, a stillness settling over her thoughts. She'd felt it before, during particularly difficult training exercises, or during exams where a single wrong answer could mean failure, or even during that one memorable afternoon with the enchanted peacock when everyone else had been screaming and she'd simply known what needed to be done.

  [Cold Blood].

  She didn't control the skill, as it wasn't something she could activate at will, like [Feline Senses] or [Colossus Strength]. It simply happened sometimes, at random moments, descending without warning and augmenting her Wisdom stats in ways that sharpened her judgment to something almost painful in its clarity.

  It was happening now.

  They were protected. Grandpa Sael's shields had already proven themselves against swords, spears, arrows, and magic. Even if they surrendered, even if they were captured, what could their captors actually do to them? Lock them in a cell they could walk out of? Chain them with metal that would bend like paper against their skin?

  And where would they even go if they escaped? They didn't know this city. They didn't know this world. Loyalists would be hunting them through every street and alley, and eventually catch them again. But if they let themselves be taken and simply waited, Grandpa Sael would eventually come back. And when he did, he'd find them, and none of this would matter.

  She wasn't trained for situations like this. But this seemed like the most logical path forward.

  Ilsa was about to voice it when Orion moved past her.

  "Orion—"

  But she didn't grab him or pull him back,

  Part of her wanted to. But another part remembered something Grandma Margaret had said before they left Orlys, when she'd told her about the staff that now rested in Orion's grip. Erwyn, the Gentle Root. Grandpa Sael wielded it alongside Eld during the Last Stand at Mount Yrsult, four hundred years ago. Two staves, working in concert, holding back an army.

  And now Erwyn was with Orion.

  Ilsa watched him walk forward, and she let him go.

  He didn't look confident. His shoulders were tight, his grip on the staff white-knuckled, and she could see his legs trembling with each step. But he kept moving toward a hundred armed soldiers and twelve war mages with nothing but a staff he'd barely learned to use and terror written across his face. Ilsa judged this to be a good experience for Orion, one that would make him grow more confident.

  "Move," Orion said. His voice cracked on the word. "Please. Just... just move aside. Let us pass."

  The commander laughed.

  "I said move!"

  Three of the mages broke formation, advancing with fire gathering between their palms. They were younger than the others, eager to prove themselves, and their spells were already taking shape: compact spheres of flame that would expand on impact, designed to cook a man inside his armor.

  Orion raised his staff, and everyone cast at once.

  The fireballs screamed toward Orion, trailing heat and light. At the same moment, something erupted from Erwyn's tip: a pulse of energy, formless and desperate, more panic than purpose.

  The mages' spells hit first... and vanished.

  The fire touched Orion and simply ceased to exist. There was no explosion, no impact, no heat. The flames kissed the edge of whatever protection surrounded him and dissolved, leaving nothing behind but wisps of smoke and the smell of ozone.

  But Orion's spell—whatever he'd been trying to cast—did nothing at all. The pulse of energy scattered harmlessly into the air, dissipating before it reached its targets.

  Orion looked down at his staff. "No. No, no, no—"

  The mages had stopped advancing. They stared at the space where their fire had been, then at the boy who should have been burning but wasn't, and Ilsa could see the confusion on their faces.

  "All of them!" The commander's voice rang out. "Target all of them! NOW!"

  The courtyard erupted.

  Twelve mages cast simultaneously: fireballs, lightning, shards of ice that screamed through the air like arrows. The soldiers scattered to give them clear lines of fire, and suddenly the night was alive with magic, spells converging on three figures from every direction.

  "Oh, shit—" Robin's curse was swallowed by the roar of incoming fire.

  Ilsa raised her arms reflexively, sword forgotten, some primal instinct demanding that she shield her face even though she knew it was pointless, and that if knew that if the protection failed she'd be dead before she felt anything.

  Without delay, the spells hit. Fire washed over her. Lightning crackled against her skin. Ice shattered into powder, and in all the chaos, she felt nothing.

  The magic touched the barrier around her and simply stopped, neutralized by the spells Grandpa Sael had woven into existence. She stood in the center of an inferno and felt nothing more than a gentle warmth, like standing too close to a hearth.

  The barrage ended, and eventually, a heavy silence fell over the courtyard.

  A hundred soldiers stared at three unburned figures. Twelve mages lowered their hands, their faces cycling through disbelief, fear, and terror. The commander's sword hung limp at his side.

  And in front of Ilsa, Orion was talking to his staff.

  "Come on," he whispered, his voice barely audible in the sudden quiet. "Please. Please don't do this to me. Not now. You worked before, you worked, I felt it, I know I did—" He shook the staff gently, desperately. "Please. Just... just one more. One more spell. That's all I'm asking. Come on, Erwyn. Please."

  "Give it some time, Orion. She has a bit of an attitude at times."

  A voice came from above, familiar and warm, and every head in the courtyard turned skyward.

  Grandpa Sael descended slowly, his robes rippling in some unfelt wind, Eld glowing softly in his grip. He looked entirely unbothered by the hundred armed soldiers beneath him, the twelve war mages and the crossbows still trained on empty air.

  Beyond the palace walls, the city had found its voice. Bells were ringing in a wild, discordant clamor, and distant shouts rose and fell like waves, individual words lost to distance but the tone unmistakable. Somewhere, a man was screaming about liberation. Somewhere else, glass was breaking. T

  he Dragon King had fallen, and the city was waking up to what that meant.

  Grandpa Sael touched down beside them, light as a leaf settling on still water, and looked at the three of them with concern.

  "Are you children alright?"

  Robin gave him a thumbs up, his ears slowly rising from where they'd been plastered against his skull. Orion didn't speak at all, he just nodded while still staring at Erwyn.

  "They attacked us, Grandpa Sael," Ilsa said, pointing at the soldiers, and she was fully aware of how she sounded at the moment.

  The commander flinched when her finger swung toward him.

  "This one gave the order," she continued, warming to the task. "And those mages, all twelve of them, they fired at us. That one with the lightning, and that one, and the one in the back who tried to hide behind the others just now, I saw him too." The mages in question had gone very pale. "Oh, and apparently they're all acting under the orders of someone named Habbas, who's declared himself regent, so probably a loyalist making his move."

  Grandpa Sael listened with his hands folded behind his back, nodding along like she was telling him about her day.

  "Is that so," he said.

  "It is."

  "Hmm." He looked at the commander. "Hmm."

  His gaze moved to the soldiers, to the mages, to the archers on the walls who seemed to be trying very hard to blend into the stonework, and the courtyard went very, very still.

  Ilsa had a mana core, though she wasn't a mage and had never had the talent for it despite years of trying. But she was aware enough to sense the currents of magic around her, and what she sensed now made her breath catch.

  The mages had actually tried to cast spells even now, and said spells had simply stopped, the mana that should have woven into fire and lightning and ice instead dissipating like morning fog, scattering into nothing before it could take form. The mages' hands fell to their sides, their faces draining of color as they realized what had happened, and the quiet panic spread through their ranks like ripples on a pond.

  Grandpa Sael's attention had moved to the commander now.

  "The Dragon King's reign has ended," he said, his voice carrying across the courtyard without effort. "Those of you who served him, who benefited from his rule, I understand. Power offers many comforts, like security, purpose, a clear understanding of one's place in the world." He paused, letting the words settle. "But that world is gone now, and clinging to it will bring you nothing but grief. So be smart. Move on. Build something new."

  The commander's sword clattered to the ground, his fingers seeming to have simply stopped holding it, and behind him other weapons followed in a ragged cascade of metal ringing against stone.

  Ilsa allowed herself to breathe.

  ....And then she saw it.

  High above the city, descending from the direction of the mountains, a light was growing. It wasn't magic or stars, but fire, painting the darkness in shades of orange and gold as it cut across the sky. It moved with terrible purpose and Ilsa had seen that fire before, barely ten minutes ago, wrapped around white scales.

  The dragon was coming home.

  "ARCHMAGE!"

  The voice resonated across the heavens themselves, shaking windows in their frames and setting the bells to ringing even louder, and Ilsa knew that everyone in the city had heard it, from the beggars in the slums to the nobles in their estates, all of them looking up at the same burning sky.

  Grandpa Sael looked up at the approaching inferno, and his expression didn't change.

  "This will be over in a moment," he said.

  And then he rose into the sky to meet it.

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