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Though it wasn’t the time to do so, her mind tried to process what was happening. The dakii were drawn by the chaos and the armored bears were defending the fort, but why were Noshtiz’s creatures trying to get into the fortress? Did they want to dig their tunnel into Istri here? Was there a lot of Noshtiz’s blood in the ground here and he wanted his magic back? Could he take the magic out of the blood the metal-forged spilled, and the badgers were just here to kill them all?

Climbing over badger-created snowdrifts to reach them, Iryana could see how tired the remaining soldiers were. Pyetar fought at the center of it, Vaneshta, Lidishta, and Vabihn at his side.

“We’re here!” Iryana called now that they were finally close enough. Pyetar and a few of the others glanced their way with relief.

Her clan formed their weapons, but Iryana hesitated.

The anticipation of the pain was almost worse than the pain itself. Though not as bad as she knew it would be when she eventually released the forging. It took her a moment to identify the right magic for her beast spear and tease it out of the roiling mass of magic inside her. She groaned as the magic started flowing down her arm and forming in her hand.

She only gave herself a moment to adjust. To acknowledge it was getting worse.

Then she joined her clan, diving into the fight. Iryana found herself at Uncle Dinhal’s side, trying to pin the dakii and keep them back while her uncle hacked at them with his great axe and arrows soared overhead. Levek and the volunteers took on some of the smaller dakii. Tonhald and Uncle Byorsh fired arrow after arrow with their golden air bows.

Iryana and her uncle finally joined Pyetar and the others, who were trying to stop a badger from tunneling under the gate. It was already completely below the surface, throwing up chunks of dirt, but the spikes on its back made it hard to attack from behind.

“Metal forgings aren’t working well,” Vaneshta called over. Her hair was plastered to her face, her coat covered in black blood. She was trying to jam her metal-forged weapon between the badger’s spikes.

“We need fire weapons,” Iryana called back. Fire weakened metal.

“We don’t have fire-forged soldiers!”

She could see the back claws of the creature pushing dirt out of the hole, the claws huge and sharp.

“We have to stop it!” Pyetar roared, turning to fight off a dakya that raced toward them.

In a moment of insanity, Iryana realized that Karvek would have been able to kill these things. She shook that thought away.

“Hold this.” Vaneshta tossed her wooden shield at Lidishta who was wide-eyed and stiff with fear, forming her raw magic shield around her.

“What are you do—”

Vaneshta jumped down toward those massive claws, only a forged dagger in her hands. Iryana gasped, watching as Vaneshta managed to slide between the legs, despite catching a claw on her side. The badger thrashed, and Iryana watched in horror, joining the others in trying to stab the creature between the spikes. The dakya taken care of for the moment, Pyetar joined them. Lidishta finally recovered, rushing in to help them, her forging diving into the monster’s back.

The badger stopped moving.

Lidishta and Pyetar immediately slid down. Pyetar braced his feet against the wall, the underside of one of the badger’s legs behind his shoulder, and heaved. It created enough space for Lidishta to wedge herself against the belly of the monster to give Vaneshta room. Iryana was relieved to see Vaneshta moving, trying to climb out. Without hesitation, Uncle Dinhal grabbed Vaneshta’s arm, pulling her up.

The moment they were all on solid ground again, Lidishta tackled Vaneshta. “You idiot!” Lidishta cried. Somehow Vaneshta was mostly uninjured.

“And you called me reckless!” Iryana teased, trying not to panic at the carnage.

Vaneshta just smirked at her. “It’s called skill, Guardian.”

But they only had a moment before more dakii were on them. Iryana tricked a few into jumping onto the metal badger’s spikes, which proved surprisingly effective.

Despite the fact that her magic was killing her, her forgings were clearly still growing stronger. It was abnormal but undeniable. Iryana’s metal-forging did far more damage than the others’, though she still struggled. She cut through the dakii like butter.

They were gaining ground when Iryana picked out the thumping whooshes of large wings. Iryana watched in horror as the dragon appeared once more in the sky. She looked around, but it was impossible to make out where everyone was in the chaos. If the dragon was even half as inclined to eat people as the dakii, well…

They were fucked.

“It belongs to Mhakiza,” Iryana mumbled, trying to guess what it would do. Would it protect them like Limhiz’s armored bears, or tear into them all indiscriminately like Thelbiz’s beasts? A creature of fire magic would be strongest against the metal badgers.

It was coming at them so fast she didn’t have time to decide on a theory.

They barely had time to dive out of the way as the massive dragon, the color of cooled ash, crash-landed next to the wall, barely bumping it but still sending tremors up the surface and screams from the top. The ground shook. The dragon was less of a dragon on closer look, but she didn’t have room to analyze what it did look like. Dragon was a good enough descriptor.

Iryana scrambled back to her feet, kicking off her now-broken snowshoes. Pyetar and her Uncle Dinhal rushed between her and the beast.