Arabus had stormed off, spitting curses, his men trailing behind him. Marius watched him vanish into the camp shadows, then adjusted his spectacles and gestured.

  From the dark, one of his scouts emerged, hood drawn low.

  “If Ragnar falls,” Marius said quietly, his usual flippant tone stripped away, “it will be the end of us. Keep an eye on Shayara. If she’s wounded, you take her, away from here, anywhere. Somewhere even Arabus won’t find. We need another plan, in case everything goes wrong.”

  The scout gave a sharp nod and melted back into the unseen.

  Marius exhaled slowly, muttering to himself, “Let’s hope it doesn’t come to that.”

  Ragnar knew the moment had come. He sprinted toward the charging enemy, cloak whipping behind him. A law cut sharper than any blade, and once unleashed, it tore through the Weave with no restraint. Without control, the backlash would lash out at friend and foe alike—but timed correctly, it could annihilate the entire troop.

  Farlow barked the signal. His cavalry split left and right, leaving a clear path. Ragnar surged down the center, drawing in a long breath as the runes lit along his blade.

  “Causality.”

  The word cracked like thunder.

  Steel met flesh, but not Ragnar’s. Every strike the enemy made turned inward. Blades slid into their own comrades, spears twisted mid-flight and pierced their own ranks. They scrambled to break formation, yet every step only pulled them back into the circle and into each other’s blades. The law held them prisoner to their own intent.

  Then the backlash came. A surge of force rippled outward from the Weave, slamming into Ragnar and the soldiers alike. He gritted his teeth, dragging at the currents, spreading the force as wide as he could. Even so, the ground cracked beneath him.

  Shayara and Elof raised their hands from the ridge. Their magic flared, weaving a projection of Ragnar’s law across the battlefield, magnified by the supporting mages. The air shimmered with impossible light. Then Ragnar layered Regression atop Causality, and the clash erupted skyward. Radiance filled the heavens, Ragnar blazing as its heart.

  Shayara’s eyes glowed faintly as she pushed her perception into the Radiance, making it burn brighter, sharper, and undeniable.

  “This will draw him out,” Ragnar thought, feeling the weight of Moloch’s gaze across the field.

  The sky darkened, clouds curling into a storm. In the distance, Ragnar caught sight of Marius’s crow plummeting, pierced by enemy arrows. The message had been delivered. Moloch was coming.

  The ground shook with each step of his advance.

  On the ridge, Shayara and Elof poured their strength into enchantments, threads of light wrapping around Ragnar’s body. His blade hummed with borrowed vigor. Ragnar downed a vial of Rejuvenation, the bitter taste burning down his throat. He exhaled, raised his hand, and signaled them to fall back.

  A thunderclap split the air. From behind, a massive ballista loosed its payload. The iron bolt screamed forward, glowing with runic fire. It tore across the field, straight at Moloch.

  But Moloch did not flinch.

  He simply lifted a hand.

  The bolt froze midair.

  The world seemed to hold its breath. Ragnar’s eyes widened. Never, not in training, not in war, not in the darkest records of magic, had he seen power like this.

  Moloch broke through the chaos, charging straight for Ragnar. Behind him, his army surged forward like a black tide. Farlow’s cavalry wheeled to intercept, steel clashing with despair-born flesh, but Moloch did not even glance at them. His gaze was fixed on Ragnar alone.

  Ragnar stood firm, sword unsheathed, his cloak snapping in the storm winds. Around him, his troops unleashed volleys of elemental fire and ice, but Moloch waded through the barrage as though it were rain. Wards of despair shimmered faintly around his frame, each spell breaking like waves against a cliff.

  Then he stopped, just a few paces away.

  Towering over Ragnar, his presence seemed to darken the very air. A shattered helm clung to his head, jagged edges framing the only part of his face still visible. Through the crack gleamed one eye: pitch black, depthless, an abyss masquerading as sight.

  An ashen cloak snapped and fluttered behind him, trailing embers and rot. His hands were bound in thick iron chains, yet they moved with ease, like ornaments rather than restraints.

  Ragnar saw nothing but the black eye, a void that threatened to swallow him whole.

  “You are the Radiant Son?” The gravelly voice rumbled from Moloch, each word heavy enough to shake the air.

  “Yes.” Ragnar’s answer was steady, his stance unbroken.

  “Then you shall be the one to taste despair,” Moloch growled. “Do it. Show me the power you wielded before. I grant you one chance. Fail, and I will make you understand what true despair means.”

  Ragnar said nothing. There was no time for words. He raised his blade, and with a surge of will he called forth the spell of Amun: Holy Pillars. Radiance erupted, pillars of blinding light crashing down around Moloch, searing the battlefield with divine fury.

  The earth shuddered. The air burned with sacred fire.

  And yet, when the radiance faded, Moloch still stood. Unmoving. Untouched.

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  Ragnar’s breath caught in his chest.

  “This is not it,” Moloch said, his black eye gleaming with hunger. “I felt another power before… Show it to me.”

  His presence thickened, pressing like a storm on the Weave itself.

  Ragnar held his ground. He was facing a demigod, ordinary spells would never suffice. Sword blazing, he charged. He needed Moloch to strike, to give him something he could bend back with causality.

  Moloch merely raised a finger. The air thickened, despair pressing down like iron chains. For an instant Ragnar’s knees threatened to buckle. Then he cast Regression, and the weight broke, the despair peeled away, and his body felt light once more.

  Moloch’s black eye widened, just for a heartbeat, as Ragnar’s blade met him. Steel clanged against iron, sparks bursting. A shallow mark carved itself into Moloch’s armor.

  Then came the laugh, a low, guttural, echoing with hunger.

  “Show me more.”

  A storm of elemental fire and lightning streaked toward Moloch. He brushed it aside with a sweep of his hand. The earth cracked, shadow spears erupted upward, forcing Ragnar to twist away, only to be slammed down as a tide of iron chains lashed across him.

  “Show me more!” Moloch’s voice thundered. “And I will show you true despair!”

  Ragnar struggled to rise. The weight of Moloch’s aura pressed him into the mud, crushing his chest, choking the air from his lungs. He reached for Regression, his lifeline, his shield but his body rebelled. Too much. He had called on the laws three times already in too short a span. His veins burned, his strength faltered.

  Then glyphs flared into the air. Ragnar knew them instantly, Shayara’s sigils, the same disorienting pattern she had once demonstrated in his tent.

  Moloch’s black eye locked on the symbols. His breath hitched, then he screamed, voice cracking with madness. “I can see it, all of it, the kingdom, the towers, the sewers, the dirt beneath the dirt, the roots drinking rot, hail the almighty!” His body convulsed, and for a heartbeat the demigod staggered, collapsing to one knee.

  Ragnar turned. Shayara stood behind him, her cloak whipping in the wind, Arin at her side with fire gathering in his hands.

  “Go back!” Ragnar roared.

  But Shayara lifted her staff, determination burning in her eyes. She began weaving an enchantment, threads of light circling Ragnar like a shield. Arin followed, a searing flame igniting across his palm.

  “You cannot die,” Shayara said. Her voice trembled, yet it rang like iron in the storm.

  Arin stepped forward, fire blazing in his palms. The spell surged into molten fury, searing earth into liquid stone. The torrent struck Moloch full on, a storm of fire and rock that shook the ground beneath their feet.

  “I can see it,” Shayara whispered, eyes wide with her heightened perception. “Every strike, it’s chipping away at his ward.”

  Arin raised his hand, signaling. A fresh volley of elemental fire and lightning rained down, followed by the thunderous launch of a ballista bolt. The massive spear roared across the battlefield and tore straight through Moloch’s chest, the force echoing like thunder.

  For a heartbeat, silence.

  Then Moloch stirred. Slowly, impossibly, he stood. His black eye blazed, bleeding darkness as he wrapped chained hands around the embedded bolt. With a sickening wrench, he ripped it free from his own heart.

  “This is good,” he growled, voice breaking into a guttural laugh. “I want more.”

  Ragnar’s stomach sank. Whatever he was facing, it was no longer mortal.

  Arin raised his hands to cast, but Ragnar stopped him.

  “Ordinary spells won’t break him. His shield cracked before, only then can we strike.”

  Shayara and Arin fell back just as Moloch’s laughter rumbled through the field.

  “You,” he snarled, eyes locking on Shayara. “You showed me those visions. Show me more!”

  He pointed, and Shayara gasped, choking as if the very air was being torn from her lungs.

  Ragnar’s voice thundered. “Causality!”

  The fallen ballista bolt quivered, then shot upward with blinding speed, reversing its course. It slammed into Moloch’s chest, tearing through flesh and iron. The demi-god staggered.

  Arin scooped Shayara into his arms and sprinted back.

  Moloch’s voice rasped out, broken and harrowing, air hissing from his torn lungs.

  “This… this is it. The power I was looking for.”

  With a flick of his hand, hundreds of shadow-spears unraveled across the sky, raining down like a storm. Ragnar moved instinctively, weaving through the barrage, while the infantry braced behind their shields and the ward-casters raised barriers of light.

  It wasn’t enough. Screams tore the air as soldiers were skewered, shields shattered, wards cracked apart. In the span of a heartbeat, half of Ragnar’s troop lay broken on the field.

  “You can’t cast laws in succession,” Moloch said, voice wheezing as he tore the bolt from his flesh. Black ichor hissed against the ground. “You can not save them all”

  The sound that followed was a grotesque mixture of laughter and air leaking from ruined lungs.

  Ragnar caught sight of Grahm, still alive, dragging the wounded to cover as the remnants of the troop rallied around him.

  “Look at me!” Moloch’s voice roared like thunder. “Your moment of true despair hasn’t yet arrived.”

  Ragnar tightened his grip on his sword and surged forward. The demigod’s iron chains lashed out, crashing against steel. The force hurled Ragnar back, but he forced his body up again, teeth clenched against the weight pressing down on him.

  Then a fireball slammed into Moloch’s side. Arin came charging with a squad of soldiers, spells crackling in their wake. Elof limped behind, and Ragnar’s heart lurched, Shayara was among them.

  “What are you doing? Fall back! That’s an order!” Ragnar roared.

  Moloch only laughed, the sound like broken stone grinding together. His black gaze locked onto Shayara. He pointed, chains rattling. ““You. Untouched. Perfect. My lord will break you first, make you his whore, shatter your innocence, and fill this world with your screams.”

  Steel flashed. Moloch staggered as unseen blades carved across his flesh. Ragnar saw it, the brief glimmer in Shayara’s eyes. She was cloaking the assassins, bending even a demigod’s perception.

  Ragnar rose, mind ablaze with fury. Nothing else mattered, only Moloch’s words about Shayara, echoing like poison in his skull.

  The fallen bolt wrenched itself free, reversing course in a blur of light and steel, piercing flesh once more. Every spell Moloch had brushed aside moments ago now snapped back into existence, striking him again and again in relentless succession.

  He tried to cast, but each weave unraveled, regressing into nothing. Ragnar’s steps brought the laws themselves to heel, shaping around him, shackling Moloch with invisible weight.

  Then he halted, hands gripping him tight. Shayara, tears streaming, begging him to stop. Only then did Ragnar hear her voice through the roar in his mind.

  Arin and the others surged forward, seizing the moment. Ragnar swayed, awareness returning just long enough to notice the blood pouring from his eyes, nose, and ears. Darkness swallowed him as he collapsed.

  Ragnar staggered upright, vision swimming. Through the haze he saw Arin charging at Moloch, fury in his every step, Elof limping behind, weaving what strength he could into him.

  Then his mind went cold as his gaze dropped.