Page 149 of Heart Cradle
“FORM THE LINE!” he roared, pointing towards the fractured wedge near the ridge. “DROP THE FLANK, NOW!”
Warriors scrambled to obey, then the wind shifted, his instincts screamed, he had turned too late. A flash of movement, a figure charging from the smoke already descending. An elite, fast and silent, meant for Orilan, and Taelin didn’t hesitate. He moved into its path, to protect his king, the father who had raised him bereft and alone. The enemy’s blade sank into his side with a sickening crunch, he twisted, grunting. He grabbed the attacker’s collar and drove his own sword upward, straight through ribs and throat. The body dropped at his feet, then so did Taelin. One knee hit the earth, then the other. He tried to stand, but the light was flickering now. His hand pressed to his wound and came away slick and dark. From the haze, Orilan appeared, eyes wide.
“Taelin,” he said quietly, voice like winter cracking stone. “Son!”
The commander looked up, blood trickled down his mouth. “Tell the line to hold. Tell them… tell them I’m not… done.”
He tried to rise and failed again. Orilan caught him before he could fall forwards, cradled him with quiet softness. Taelin’s fingers curled aroundthe front of the king’s cloak. “Don’t… let the… bastards win, Pa.” He breathed, chest rattling.
Then his eyes went still, and the moment Taelin’s body slumped, the battlefield seemed to shudder, but there was no time to grieve. From above, a scream broke through the chaos, not from a fae, but from something older, Draeven, the Shadowcoil paired to Taelin. He dove from the clouds like a dagger unsheathed, black and copper wings snapping open as he reached the ground in a single, bone-rattling second.
The dead and dying scattered as he swept his tail wide, carving space around Orilan and his fallen son. Without a word, without a roar, Draeven dipped his head and scooped Taelin’s body into the curve of one claw, cradling him as a brother, not a beast. Then he rose again, straight into the sky, out of reach and the war did not pause.
Eiran saw it from midair, saw the fall, saw the lift, and something broke inside him as the thunder roared through the link. Eiran could not think, he could not feel. Taelin had been hard, sharp, loyal to a fault, but he’d stood beside Eiran through every order, every rebellion, every lost hour of doubt, and now he was gone. Xelaini responded to his rage like a whirring tempest. Her flame ignited around them in a torrent, and Eiran didn’t think. He pointed towards the inner command ridge, where scouts believed the last of the Avelan stronghold stood, and they dove.
“There!”he shouted over the mind-thread. “Break the ridge!”
They hit the ground as a fireball, Eiran slammed into the command circle and released everything. A wave of flame magic, magnified by his rage and desolation, exploded outward, burning through command wagons, disrupting rune anchors and throwing captains back like ragdolls. One tried to speak, Eiran just stabbed him through the mouth. Behind him, Xelaini span in a wall of fire and smoke, and then there was clarity.
“MAGICERS!”Maeve shouted over the thread. “Back hill. Last line of defence, circle of six!”
“On it!”Fenric snapped.
He and Laren landed fast, far too fast but that was the point, surely. The Avelan magicers had formed a last ward, chanting in an ancient, sickly rhythm, runes glowing with death light, magic pulsed thick in the air. They were trying to reset the battlefield, bend time, to collapse the strike from within.
Too fucking late.
Fenric’s blade was already out, glowing with disruption counter-runes. Laren’s bow strained with tension as she leapt to a rise, one knee down, eyes locked.
“Left two are mine,” she said.
Fenric nodded. “Middle’s mine.”
“And the rest?” She asked, mouth quirking.
“Let’s just improvise, Moon.” He said with a wink.
The first arrow flew before the magicers even noticed them. Straight through the eye. The second twisted midair, shifting trajectory with intention magic, and buried itself in another’s heart.
Fenric dove straight into the circle and unleashed hell, his blade sang through two warding lines, shattering the enchantments. He stabbed the third magicer in the stomach and flung disruption powder in the air, shorting every casting hand within ten feet. The last two tried to scream, but Laren didn’t let them. One final arrow, through the neck, pinning one to the ritual stone behind and Fenric sliced the other’s head off their shoulders. The light sputtered, the magic died, and with it, the Avelan army’s last hope of control.
?????
The silence, when it came, didn’t fall. It crawled, slithering in between the dying embers of magic, over the broken spears and the smoking ruin of tents. It coiled beneath the charred wreckage of command tents and around the bodies strewn across the clearing, friend and foe alike. It rose like mist from scorched ground and threaded through the throats of the living until no one dared speak, lest the sky hear them and restart the frenzy.
Maeve stood in the hollow left by the last detonated rune, blood on her face, soot between her teeth, and her chest still heaving with each inhale. The Chain’s armour pulsed around her, she asked the armour to retreat, and it did. The shift was immediate but unhurried, like a sigh let out after holding breath too long. The armour lifted from her skin in waves, pieces slipping away in delicate, fluid motions, as if they were reluctant to leave her but would obey.
She watched, transfixed, as the plates shimmered, turning soft at the edges, folding inward and drawing back towards her wrist. Her skin prickled where it left her, nerves still tuned to the memory of battle, of its protection and of its power. She felt bare, not just physically, but inwardly, as though something sacred was being tucked away, something that had wrapped itself not just around her body, but through her soul. It didn’tclatter or vanish with a spell. It returned, like it was always meant to. Threads of gold and strength wove themselves into the single, familiar Chain at her wrist, resting there once more like a waiting secret.
Maeve touched the metal lightly with her fingers. It was warm from her skin, or maybe it had always been warm, she couldn’t remember at that point. The weight of it was slight but steady, like a promise, or perhaps a warning.
She swallowed past the taste of ash. "Thank you, friend." she whispered.
Above her, Jeipier circled once more, then descended with a screech that sounded more like grief than victory. His wings beat a rhythm into the ground as he landed, but Maeve didn’t mount, not yet.
Around her, the thunder gathered. Wounded, weary, but victorious.
“They say the commander is dead.”Jeipier keened into her mind, low and uncertain, like a dragon trying not to cry.
