Page 165 of Of Iron and Moonlight

“On three,” Merrick shouted. “One. Two. Th—”

The beam surged upward with a grating lurch. Duncan hooked his hands beneath Isander’s arms, dragging him clear. They stumbled backward together, lost their footing, and collapsed into the mud as the beam crashed aside with a ground-shaking thud.

Merrick threw himself over both of them as another rain of arrows hissed down. He whistled again. More Ashfell men appeared, snatching up fallen shields and locking them overhead in tight formation. Iron rims overlapped into a shell that swallowed the worst of the volley.

“Can you stand?” Merrick demanded inside the cramped circle. His familiar brown eyes moved over Isander, chest rising and falling in disciplined control. “We must get out of range.”

Isander dragged air into lungs that seemed unwilling to take it. His shoulders burned. His back throbbed beneath the memory of the beam. But he could flex his toes. His legs responded.

“I think so,” he managed.

Merrick slipped an arm around him. “Lucky the ground was soft enough to yield beneath you.”

“Thank the cursed moons,” Duncan muttered, taking Isander’s other side.

They hauled him upright. His knees buckled once, then held. The shield ring moved with them as they half-dragged, half-guided him away from the falling arrows thudding above. The roar of battle swelled and warped in his ears, distorting his sight further as he fought for breath.

As soon as they set Isander down on safer ground, the remaining Lemierre Guard rushed toward them, faces strained. “Your Grace!” one shouted. “Captain! Are you wounded?”

Hands reached in a flurry, checking Duncan for blood. A healer began to work on his bleeding thigh. He waved him off toward Isander.

Cold air struck raw flesh as the healer tore open the sleeve around the arrow cut. Isander sucked in a sharp breath through clenched teeth.

Merrick stepped in front of him and crouched until they were eye to eye. His expression carried no humor now, no languid edge. “Do not dare go back out there,” he demanded. “Do not even consider standing up. Do you understand me?”

Isander blinked at him. “I thought you didn’t use the Ashfell Quiett as hired blades.”

“I do not,” Merrick replied at once. “But I make exceptions in cases of your profound stupidity.”

Isander stared, words lodged somewhere behind the pain.

He gave a faint, uncertain nod.

Merrick clicked his tongue, still annoyed but marginally satisfied, then flicked fingers at his waiting men, and they sprinted back toward the breach.

Duncan dropped beside him next. “I could not have lifted that beam alone.” His voice wavered in a way Isander had heard only a few times in their lives. “I thought—” He stopped, swallowed, and tried again. “I thought you were gone.”

Isander searched for a reply and found none. His focus drifted to where Merrick had run, tracking the dark stream of him swallowed by smoke and battle.

“Stay here,” Duncan said, understanding the silence. “I will check on you when I can.” He took a sword from a waiting page and charged, folding himself into the tumult.

The healer worked at Isander’s cuts and bruises while Kryovarre’s last resistance buckled beneath Lemierre’s fury. Isander was astonished to be alive to witness it. More astonished that the warning in his gut had not yet faded.

Chapter 77

Gavriel

Gavriel lay flat against the slope of the ditch, cheek pressed to frozen sand. His eyes were fixed on the port of Lunnholm Bay, where the latest wave of soldiers and oraivane crates had just arrived on the mainland of Oraith from Celestine Isle—the forge of Oorlon’s ambition, the place where every road seemed to bend back upon itself. For days they had hidden in this trench, studying the pulse of the port until they knew it by heart.

At this distance, the column winding across the snow was more unsettling than it had been from the ridge. New soldiers merged with it without pause, marching in eerie silence beside wagons rattling with the draught that sustained them mile after mile without food or rest. No banter. No complaints. Only squared shoulders and dull, red-rimmed eyes.

“Does everyone remember the plan?” Elara asked. Her brown eyes swept the docks in restless passes. Watching. Calculating. Mapping possibilities.

A chill ran through Gavriel, but he nodded.

Kalaetzu followed, slow but certain.

Njall grunted, jaw set.