My knuckles cracked against Olivia’s cheekbone and she fell back into a tree. Pain ricocheted through my hand and it felt like I’d severed my thumb—because I was still holding Kai’s cell. As I yanked my hand back, the phone slipped from my grip. It bounced once, then tumbled off the bluff. A second later, a crunchy crack announced its arrival at the bottom.

I winced. Oops.

As Odette clutched her sister, babbling incoherently, Olivia cast a burning glare my way. Clambering up, she stalked to the bluff’s edge, cautiously pushed off, and slid down it like a muddy waterslide—except a few feet from the bottom, her heel caught on a rock. Thrown off balance, she pitched forward and splatted on the concrete trail.

Ouch. That must’ve hurt. Somehow, I didn’t feel too bad for her.

Olivia scrambled up and straightened her shirt, then ran toward the three mages. Ezra, Aaron, and Kai had retreated along the seawall, but the three rogues were closing in fast—and two more were on the way.

An ear-splitting cry erupted from the leviathan. It was a dozen yards from the ritual circle and twisting like a snake in agony, its pectoral fins gouging the mud.

The rogues reached the mages, and orange light erupted as Aaron unleashed the first attack. He charged in, flanked by Kai and Ezra. I expected them to split apart, one mage for each rogue, but as Aaron bowled through the first guy, Ezra slammed into the same mythic right after. Fast attacks—giving the sorcerers no time to complete an incantation.

Kai darted past them as Aaron swung his sword, unleashing a band of fire into the second rogue while Ezra blasted wind in the third’s face. Kai swung around, his hands flashing in quick movements. Then he raised his fist.

Lightning leaped from him and speared the three rogues. They collapsed in convulsions and even after the crackling power had died, they didn’t stir.

“Amazing,” Odette whispered.

Olivia reached the guys, her mouth moving and hands gesturing emphatically toward the leviathan. Kai shook his head. Olivia pointed again, then jumped off the seawall and charged toward the mudflats. As she went, a shape formed at her heels—an orange tabby house cat. Her fae familiar?

Aaron, Kai, and Ezra exchanged looks, and I knew what they would do. They were too valiant to do anything else. They jumped onto the rocky beach, racing after Olivia as she ran straight for the oncoming rogues.

There was no way this wouldn’t go badly. Growling, I grabbed Odette by the hair and hauled her toward the bluff.

“Stop!” she yelped shrilly. “What are you doing?”

“This is your fight too—so get down there and fight!”

“I can’t!” Odette wailed, grabbing at my arm. “I don’t have a familiar!”

“So?”

“Witches don’t have any offensive magic! Without a familiar, we can’t fight any more than you can!”

Bullshit. I was way more capable of fighting than this cupcake. “You’re completely useless.”

“That’s why we needed a powerful guild,” she whimpered. “That’s why we got the Crow and Hammer to send their mages.”

My gaze darted toward the bluff. Aaron, Kai, and Ezra, with Olivia behind them, were locked in combat halfway to the circle, but they weren’t fighting two rogues anymore. They were battling two rogues and two shadowy beasts—one that resembled an ox on two legs, and something small that flitted around on blurry black wings.

“What the hell are those?” I demanded.

Odette tugged on her hair, still in my grip. “Red Rum’s witches have enslaved familiars. They’re darkfae that would normally be too powerful to … to … to …”

She kept repeating the word, her voice growing fainter. Her throat bobbed as she mumbled “to” over and over, her bugged-out eyes fixed on something in the trees behind me.

Releasing her hair, I spun around.

At first, I saw nothing. Then the air shimmered, rippled, and melted. A shape materialized from the darkness.

“Such fascinating chaos, brazen one.” The otherworldly voice whispered across my senses as the creature’s form solidified. It was a fae.

A fae I recognized.

Flowing garments in unfamiliar fabrics draped his lean body, but that wasn’t the strangest thing about him. No, that would be the black dragon wings rising off his back, the long tail slithering along the leaf litter behind him, and the dark talons that tipped his slender fingers.

“Echo?” With effort, I closed my jaw. It had been weeks since my first and only glimpse of the dragon wyldfae’s humanoid form. “What are you doing here?”

“I have answered your summons, as promised.” He glided closer, silent on the forest floor. Halting beside me, he gazed toward the ocean and the dual battles—one between my mages and the rogues, and one between the leviathan and the ritual circle. “A most unpleasant night, I see.”

I stared at his flawless skin, so close. I wanted to touch his delicately pointed ears and feel the texture of his braided black hair, shining with blue and purple streaks, that hung over one shoulder down to his waist. He didn’t seem real, more like a dream than a living creature.

Another enraged cry from the leviathan snapped me out of my daze. “I didn’t call you.”

His large, dark eyes turned to me. Crystalline, pupilless, and with a hint of swirling stars in their depths. “You touched my mark upon your arm and called my name.”

“No, I didn’t. I touched my arm but I—I only thought your name. Silently.”

His lips curved in an unsettling smile, and I remembered a certain druid’s warning to be very careful around this wyldfae.

A purplish glow blazed across the foreshore. The leviathan had reached the circle, and its lines pulsed with light. Contorting its thick, powerful body, the sea fae screamed as it was dragged toward the rogue in the center.

“Great fae!” Odette gasped, her voice shaking so badly the words were nearly incomprehensible. “Oh, noble lord, please, I beg you. Intercede in this black ritual and save your kin.”

Echo didn’t react to her plea. He studied the struggling leviathan, then appraised me with the same disconcerting focus. “You called, and I have answered. What aid may I give you?”

I pointed. “Can you stop that?”

“No longer.” His leathery wings stretched wide, brushing the nearby trees, then folded against his back. “Llyrlethiad is already bound. All that remains is for the witch to enslave him.”

My stomach dropped. Aaron, Kai, and Ezra were fighting to save the fae, but it was already too late. “There’s nothing we can do?”

Echo canted his head. “Wrong question, little one.”

Urgency pounded through me, and I struggled to calm myself, to think. To understand what the fae wanted me to ask.

“What can I do?” I blurted.

He smiled, flashing his predatory fangs. “You can deliver Llyrlethiad from the witch’s enslavement. I will instruct you how, and the debt between us shall be met.”

“Okay, yes! I agree,” I added formally.

Echo’s tail lashed side to side, rustling the shrubbery. “The witch holds a relic of fae power, for no human magic could enslave one such as Llyrlethiad. Part the relic from the witch’s hold and you will save Llyrlethiad from his fate. This you must accomplish before the ritual is complete.”

“How long until it’s complete?”

Echo glanced into the sky where the full moon hung above the ocean. “Minutes.”

Well, that was specific. “Anything else I need to know?”

“This you alone can do.” Another fang-laden smile. “I shall offer one more small assistance.”

“What’s th—”

His elegant hands closed around my upper arms. Wings unfurling, he drifted weightlessly upward, and with a flick of his tail he pulled me off the bluff.

I choked on a shriek as we dropped, but his huge wings caught the air and my feet settled lightly on the ground. The pressure of his touch faded to a whisper and his soft, alien voice crooned in my ear.

“Farewell, brazen one.”

I twisted around, but he was already gone. Okay then.

Facing the battlefield, I gulped down a wave of panic. I was on my own, but I could do this. I would make it work.

With my two sorcery artifacts in hand, I jumped off the seawall, landed on the rocks, and sprinted toward the mudflats. Red fire and white lightning flared, illuminating the ugly darkfae familiars—three now. The last two rogues not involved in the ritual had joined the fight.

Aaron and Kai held their tiny front line, the former with a blazing sword and the latter by whipping throwing knives into his enemies, followed by bolts of lightning. Ezra covered them from behind, his wind buffeting and blinding their opponents. Even Olivia was helping—sort of. She chucked rocks at the rogues while her nimble house cat familiar distracted the small, flying darkfae, keeping it out of the action.

My plan was simple: run around the scary mage/fae/rogue battle and figure out what to do about the remaining four sorcerers once I’d reached the ritual circle. No way that could go wrong, right?

I scrambled over the rocky beach and onto the sticky mud. It squished under my shoes, but at least it was flat. Running hard, I angled to zoom past the guys’ fight.