Essentially trapping Cal between this side of the water and the other, suspended over the armada below.
We reach her without delay, the Scarlet Guard and Montfort soldiers parting to let us pass. Tyton is quick to get to work, hurling his blinding-white darts of electricity at the ships below. The steel leviathans seem impenetrable, even for magnetrons. Blue rumbles in the clouds, before one of Ella’s storm bolts hits the prow of a battleship with the keening scream of tearing metal. I squint over the walls of the cliff edge, searching the river. It should be hundreds of feet below, but it seems closer than I remember. My mouth goes dry when I realize the Lakelanders must have raised the river to allow their largest ships to sail this far.
“It’s still rising,” Farley says over her shoulder, making room for me on her perch. “We won’t be able to escape the way we came.”
I bite my lip, thinking of the tunnels beneath us. “Flooded?”
She nods. “More than likely.” Her eyes waver, looking between the river and the silhouettes on the bridge. Smoke spirals with the fog, black against the white and gray. “We made it through just in time.”
Kilorn settles in next to us. His attention is on the Bridge, not the water. From this vantage point, I can see that Cal’s forces aren’t defending the Bridge, but striking from it. Through the fog, swifts blur along the decks of the boats below, alongside strongarms, Anabel’s oblivions, and other Silvers best suited to close combat. Shivers of House Gliacon seem to be making the most headway. They use their abilities to freeze. One of the smaller battleships is completely iced in, frozen against the supports of the Bridge.
I sigh in relief when I don’t see fire dancing among the ships. Nothing but the usual explosive blasts. Cal isn’t down there fighting the armada himself. Yet.
“Do you think he knows we’re here?” Kilorn wonders, still looking at the Bridge.
Farley clenches her jaw. She rests her hand at her side, not on her gun but on the radio strapped high on her hip. “Cal seems a bit preoccupied.”
“He knows,” I mutter, another peal of purple lightning streaking across the sky. The air is thick, like the clouds have come down to obscure the battle raging before us. I flinch as another round strikes the Square, missiles crashing through a wing of the palace.
“I don’t see Maven,” Farley says, shifting closer to me. I find myself facing the full weight of her cerulean stare, clear and bright even in the haze. “Is it done?”
I bite my lip, almost drawing blood. The sharp pain is better than shame. She reads my hesitation, and her face purples quicker than I thought possible.
“Mare Barrow—”
The crackle of the radio at her side cuts her off, saving me from her rage. She rips it free, snarling into the receiver. “This is General Farley.”
The voice on the other end does not belong to a Command general or a Montfort officer. It isn’t Davidson either.
I would know that voice anywhere, even punctuated by gunfire.
“I thought you weren’t coming back,” Cal says, sounding tinny and far away, distorted by static. The electricity in the air must not be very good for radio waves.
Breathless, I look from Farley toward the Bridge. Sure enough, one of the shadows in the fog seems to be solidifying. Broad shoulders and a familiar, determined stride move closer and closer. I keep still, my feet rooted in place on our perch above the fray.
Farley smirks down at her radio. “So nice of you to make time for us.”
“It’s only polite,” he replies.
With a sigh, Farley angles herself toward the form on the Bridge, now less than fifty yards away. Cal is surrounded by his guards, and he halts, stopping the group. The Silvers seem tense, their guns ready, waiting for an order. He acknowledges us with a tip of his head. Farley furrows her brow a little, hesitant.
“I’m guessing you know where things stand, Cal,” she says.
His response is almost too quick. “I do.”
Farley bites her lip. “And?”
A long rush of static drones, before he speaks again. “Mare?”
The radio is in my hand before I can even think to ask for it.
“I’m here,” I say, locking eyes with him across a canyon.
“Is it too late?”
The question has too many implications to count.
Purple, white, green, and blue flash through the clouds, enough to penetrate the mist and blind us all for a moment. Shutting my eyes, I smile with the burst of energy as it thrums through me.
When the lightning passes, I answer him, and everything he means.
“No, it isn’t,” I tell him, before returning the radio to Farley.
She doesn’t stop me as I clamber down the steps, and Cal’s guards stand aside when I approach, walking through the broken gates of the ruinous Square.
He waits at the edge of the Archeon Bridge, unmoving. As before, he lets me come to him. He lets me set the pace, choose the direction, make the decision. He puts it all in my hands.
I keep an even step, in spite of the rumblings far below. Something smashes, wailing and roaring. One of the ships, maybe, colliding into another. I hardly notice.
The embrace is short, far too short, but enough. I steady myself against him, holding tightly for as long as I dare, feeling the warm, hard lines of his body pressed against me. He smells like smoke and blood and sweat. His arms cross my back, holding me around the shoulders to pull me into his chest.
“I’m done with crowns,” he murmurs to the top of my head.
“Finally,” I whisper.
We push back in unison, turning to the situation at hand. We don’t have time for anything else, and I certainly don’t have the capacity to think about much more.
He raises the radio again, one hand still resting on my shoulder. “General, I believe Volo Samos and some of his own soldiers are still in War Command,” he says. Through the mist, I glance at the hulking building on the edge of the Square. “You’ll want to keep an eye on your backs.”
“Got it, will do,” she answers. “Anything else?”
She’s on the move, barking orders to her lieutenants, as she relays the advice. Kilorn and Tyton flank her like guards.
“We’re working on blocking up the river. If the ships can’t turn around . . .”
“They can’t escape,” I finish for him, glancing out at the destruction on both sides of the city. Missiles spiral overhead, trailing smoke like black ink over paper as they arc and explode.
In spite of Cal’s soldiers, as well as the jets overhead, the Lakelander armada doesn’t seem to be taking much damage. As I watch, another one of Ella’s storm bolts cracks, but a wave rises with blinding speed, taking the brunt of the blow to save a battleship. It lights up with the eerie glow of electricity before fading and falling harmlessly back into the river. It must be Queen Cenra’s doing, maybe with her daughter’s help. I’ve never seen such a display of power, even from people who delight in that sort of thing.
Cal watches with me, his face still and grim. “We have to start sinking the ships, but with the river, they have all the shields they’ll ever need. Right now it’s all we can do to minimize the damage to the city.” He curses as a wave knocks back another volley of gunfire. “They have to run out of ammunition eventually, right?” he says dryly.
I glare at the offending ships, eyes running over their steel hides. “Call up some teleporters. Let’s get Lerolan oblivions and Evangeline onto a ship. Have them tear some holes.”
“Evangeline is gone.”
“But you said her father . . .”
Somehow, Cal looks oddly proud. “She had an opportunity and she took it.”
An opportunity to run and put all this behind her. I don’t need much of an imagination to guess where she might be running. Or who she’s running with. Like Cal, I feel a strange mix of pride and surprise.
“The train,” I say, almost smirking to myself. Well done, I can’t help but think.
He quirks an eyebrow. “What?”