Our warriors responded rapidly to our call to war and all those we requested for duty prepared themselves quickly. I didn't want to enter the battlefield being carried, so as Gael opened the portal that would lead to an enemy close to Skia Hellig, I insisted on standing on my own two feet.

  Nash held my arm to support me, watching me.

  "You have to focus when the fighting starts," I said.

  "Do you even understand what you're asking of me today?"

  My head fell against his arm. "Yes. I'm sorry but we're at war now. We need to be strong."

  "You'll remember that when it's my turn to do something you're afraid for me to do."

  My greatest of all weaknesses. "I understand what we'll have to do."

  His face softened when he looked down at me. "Don't you dare get hurt worse than you already are."

  "I made a promise to Elsie. I won't break it."

  Nash nodded at this, a look of understanding coming over him.

  The portal opened and with my weight pressed against Nash, I stepped through onto the green grass of our enemy's land on my own.

  Black portals surrounded the enemy camp. Warriors jumped from the portals and sprinted for our enemies. I trained my eyes to see the portals at the center of the tents already closing and the battle underway. All around the enemy camp, our people attacked their warriors with abandon.

  Malach's army responded quickly, some burning away the tents with their power to open visibility.

  Nash took my arm with a firm grip and looked down on me. "You will say something when you become too weak to stand."

  I nodded. "Go. There's no time for you to wait."

  A pained look came over his face. "Please be careful."

  "I will. You too." Smiling to mask my condition from him, I nodded toward the camp. "Go fight, Unknown."

  A smirk hugged the corner of his lips at the old name I so rarely used. His large hand eased over the side of my face, taking the back of my head in a commanding grip. "We'll win today." He dipped and spoke the rest against my mouth, quiet so only I heard. "Let me fight for you." The tip of his nose brushed along my cheek and then his plush lips wandered along mine. His taste stole me from the battle and closed my ears to the cries of steel, the roar of battle. "Rest."

  He left me with that one command, ripping away from me so the cold wrapped around me. I felt too weak to stand without him. Wren slid against my side and carefully took my good arm to support me. Leif appeared next to me as well, holding me up with Wren.

  The rippling energy of a thick shield materialized in a dome around me while warriors gathered in a semicircle around me, their blades and shields drawn. I glanced back to see Piercey with one hand raised to me.

  Ahead of us, every warrior on each side of the battle ferociously. From my vantage point, I could see the war parties form and the larger formations begin to take shape. The advance the surprise ambush provided us and that we surrounded them as they rested allowed us to take the lead in the battle, but I didn't count either as nearly enough to set this in our favor. This was the best trained army we'd ever faced. The largest.

  Even though the grass drank our enemy's blood now, we could not grow overly confident.

  "Amplify my voice," I said to Piercey and focused on the raging battle before me. Malach's army seemed too preoccupied with the surprise attack to even have noticed I watched, or if anyone saw, their commanders had not yet organized well enough to address it.

  Darkness ate into the battlefield after already, giving us less than an hour of any remaining sunlight.

  "You've all heard the name Eclipse." Power carried my voice throughout the camp so loudly that vibrated deep in my bones. "Learn the name Eldavel." The force I put into each word felt like it ripped my wounds open, but I fought through as if I wielded a sword and not simply words. "Witness the power of our people." The last three days weighed heavily on me. Holding close every person in my kingdom who Malach killed, I cried out with all the pain that flooded my soul and my body. "They will not simply kill you without me today." I sucked in a deep breath that throbbed throughout my body. "They'll protect me while doing so."

  Nash shouted commands as he fought two enemy warriors.

  "Show the enemy your power," I commanded. "Blood for blood. Ten lives for each of ours they stole."

  The effort sapped my remaining strength and without realizing it was about to happen, I collapsed. Leif and Wren already held me, though, and they eased me to the ground. Waves of pain crashed against me, sucking me beneath the surface of a raging ocean, drowning me. I gasped in a breath and dragged myself above the surface of my injuries. My head bobbed. My friends alone kept me from falling.

  My nostrils flared and my eyes narrowed. Summoning my remaining strength, I lifted my head, managed a deep breath, and shouted. "You don't need me. The Eldavel is Eclipse. Fight and win."

  Nash bashed his sword into the face of a warrior, blood gushing down his face. He roared and buried his other in the man's chest. "Do not wait," he roared. "They slaughtered our children. Kill them now!"

  One of the commanders shouted to a war party, something I couldn't make out, but felt in my bones. The raging water of my pain seemed to spill out onto the battlefield now in the form of our warriors, rushing over every enemy warrior. Death flooded their camp. Their land.

  "Okay," Leif whispered to me. "They've heard." His hand hovered over my midsection, stopping before he actually touched my wound. "You've done enough."

  I couldn't do this. That certainty welled within me, but I didn't care. Malach attacked my people in their homes and killed the most innocent among us. He stole my power and tried to kill Elsie. It didn't matter if I could do this or not. I'd die trying if I needed to.

  "Take me closer." I said it so weakly I feared my friends didn't hear.

  "It's safer back here," Wren said.

  "I need to be with them…" I'd lost sight of Nash and without my power I didn't feel him either. "Please." Before me, the battlefield looked like an indistinguishable mess of bodies, and blood, and warriors melted together in chaos.

  Leif groaned. "Your stubbornness will kill us all." He carefully lifted me and rose back up, walking closer to the battlefield. Wren followed with her sword drawn.

  Piercey and those guarding me moved in unison. Soon, we walked into the midst of the slashed and burned tents, over the fallen battles, against puddles of blood. Leif carried me to the center of the battlefield where Nash yelled his orders to commanders and fought alongside them. I clung to the image of his armored forearms slashing through the air, his chest pumping with breath, his thick shoulders hard with effort. My consciousness threatened to wane in the center of the camp with the battle in full blast around me.

  Nash spotted me and shot a look to both Wren and Leif.

  "You've made us anger our War Chief," Leif said.

  "He knows… They need to see me… As much as I need to see them…" As much sweat dampened my skin as those who ferociously fought.

  A warrior fell onto the ground near Leif. My hand reached for my sword on instinct, but Leif already rammed his dagger into the throat of the enemy who pursued the boy.

  "Thank you," the young warrior said to Leif. Then he looked to me, his face that particular mess of fear and faith. "For you, Eclipse," he said, and he jumped to his feet.

  I squeezed my eyes shut, unable to see someone so young throw himself at the enemy with such abandon for his own safety.

  My body ached to fight with them and protect them.

  I eyed Leif's dagger. "You don't have to stay with me," I said.

  Wren's soft hand slid into mine and with her other, she drew my head against her shoulder. "Of course, we do."

  "You should be out there battling."

  "Would you shut up, girl?" Leif pushed the flask of water to my lips. "Drink something and be quiet."

  I bit down my smile and accepted the water. He carefully poured it into my mouth. Despite looking and sounding so angry, he wiped away the water that slid down my chin and then took my hand like Wren had.

  Pain radiated from my side and shoulder to connect in my center, gripping me with a steely vise of weakness. My heart beat there instead of in my chest and thudded painfully. I didn't want my friends to see how much I suffered or my panic that I might not manage to remain upright. But they'd learned long ago how to see through me.

  Blades of energy shot from the edges of Nash's twin swords with every swing and carried out his attack like an echo through the battlefield. I caught his eyes shifting to me when he blocked an attack from an enemy warrior. I felt him as if we connected now. Felt his desperation to take Leif and Wren's place beside me, to hold me through the pain and fatigue, or to take me home. To heal me. But this was Nash's place, whether he wanted it today or not. He couldn't kneel beside me and hold me in the midst of a battle. He needed to kill every person who wanted to hurt me and our kingdom.

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  We both suffered in our own ways.

  "Eclipse!" One of my own warriors slid off the blade of an enemy commander and crashed onto the ground. Pain bit into me when the woman didn't move. "Malach now knows of your cowardly assault."

  "Cowardly?" I shouldn't have responded but I couldn't stop myself from saying it. "What do you call… your attack?"

  "We've done nothing to your kingdom."

  He approached but Nash flew like a flash sideways and landed before the commander.

  "You won't take one step closer," Nash said.

  "You blame us for your precious Prophet nearly dying." He released a dry chuckle. "It isn't our fault you're so weak. We played no part in the attack."

  "Don't bother with your lies," Nash said. "They're pointless."

  The two men lunged for one another. Nash flashed to the side, leaving an orb of energy behind that exploded against the man's midsection. He brought his twin blades down for the commander's neck, but our enemy's broad swords caught them.

  The commander grunted against the pressure of Nash's blades. "Word of your cruelty will spread all over the land." The twisted smirk on his face sent ripples of disgust throughout me.

  He reared back to stab for Nash, but my husband parried and skewered the man through the throat in a flash of energy that burned around his sword.

  Malach wanted to paint us as the aggressors, but he'd forced our hand. I hated political battles and hated even more that they often proved more effective than those of the sword.

  "We'll deal with Malach's antics back home," Piercey said. "Don't spend any energy worrying. This is to be expected."

  If only I could shut down the worry. Watching Nash and our warriors fight our enemy without me broke my heart.

  The ground beneath felt more like sand and the air like the waters of the ocean. Lightheadedness and dizziness set my world unsteady. Wren's hold on me tightened.

  "Are you sure you don't need to go?" Leif asked.

  I raised my head and met his eyes for a long while before I bit out each word. "Do not ask me again." My jaw clenched. "Not in battle."

  Leif looked as ready to fight me as the enemy warriors tried their hardest to break through our defenses to reach me. "I won't dishonor you."

  The battle continued long after I thought it was possible for me to remain up right. Finally, my body wilted, and I surrendered to the pull toward the ground. Leif and Wren helped me to lie down.

  "I'll call Gael," Wren said.

  "No… I'm staying… Just let me rest."

  No one else needed to understand. I didn't want to leave my people behind for a moment in our first battle of this war. I watched as our warriors continued to overwhelm our enemy until sleep stole me away.

  My heart hammered when I seized consciousness and I searched wildly for Nash, unable to find him.

  "Nash…"

  "He's fine," Wren said. "Leif is battling with him. I'm watching out for them."

  I lost all track of the battle until finally the touch I knew so well and craved so badly worked down my arm. I whimpered, so far beyond the point of exhaustion that I lacked the ability to try to hide the pain.

  "It's over. It's okay now." Nash held me close, running his hands through my hair, his voice tender. "We'll go home, Max. We did well. You did well."

  "I…"

  "Don't speak." His thumb caressed my cheek now, leaving traces of warm blood. Slowly, he lifted into the air. The force of gravity hurt, but I was almost numb to it by now. I was limp in his arms, cherishing the feel of him.

  Once we hovered over the battlefield, Nash stopped.

  "We won this battle, and we will win this war." His deep voice buzzed in my chest. The air around us glowed so the people could see us. "You won. Your Prophet bore witness to your strength."

  Astonishment filled me at what the healer told me as he worked on repairing Nash's wounds from battle.

  "You can't be serious." The hope surging through me was quickly tainted with suspicion. "Cleo's broth actually worked?"

  "The warriors cannot access very much of their own power yet, but our healing treatments are working, just slowly."

  "That's incredible news. Maybe Cleo actually wanted to help, after all," Nash said. "Unless she's only trying to earn our trust."

  "I'm worried about the same thing."

  "We'll give you the remedy if you feel comfortable with this," the healer said, looking to me. "There's been no adverse reactions."

  "Yes, I'll take it."

  I hated that I didn't stay awake to see the end of the battle. I'd missed the sword that cut into Nash's side and the energy attack that burned his back terribly. Fortunately, back in Gael's kingdom, this healer worked quickly, and while Nash's injuries still hurt him, soon, they'd only be a memory. Perhaps, mine as well.

  "You feel better?" I asked.

  "Yes, I'm fine." Nash squeezed my hand. "I told you that."

  Piercey rushed into the room, cutting me off as I responded. "We've received a message from Malach." He passed the paper to me, and I read it out loud.

  "The recent assault on your kingdom is unfortunate and our sympathies are with you. However, your egregious attack on my soil is unwarranted and a historic act of aggression." I rolled my eyes. "We consider this a declaration of war and will respond in kind."

  I tossed the message on the ground, not wanting to see it.

  "Whatever," I said. "He absolutely did this. What about the other Prophets? Have you heard from them?"

  "They're willing to gather again. Gael offered portals to assemble quickly."

  "Perfect." I touched a hand to my side and closed my eyes. "I don't want to pass out on the ground like I did during battle. Do we know how long after I take Cleo's broth that I'll be healed enough to conceal my wounds?"

  "Half a day at least," the healer said.

  "Then we'll meet tomorrow morning. Will you spread the word, Piercey?"

  "Of course. I'll send for the remedy now too. We need to get you back on your feet."

  That sounded incredible. I needed to be able to fight again.

  In the coming hours, the healer finished helping Nash, and the remedy I took began to take effect. Piercey sat with us both, patiently trying to heal me. It took two hours of this attempt for Piercey to notice his energy working at all, but he persisted, not wanting to even take a break.

  Finally, four hours into the treatment, I felt the slightest easing of my pain. Two healers worked with him now.

  "One of our spies made contact with Jakob," Nash said. "I just received the message that he's been in captivity all week."

  "You can't be serious." My eyes widened. "That means he didn't agree with the attack, right?"

  "We'll know more soon," Nash said. "That seems the most likely to me. I already know who I want to send to free him. We'll bring him back to us for questioning before the meeting tomorrow."

  "This is promising. If our investigations uncover any Flatlander who helped to attack us, then I want to deal with them immediately. We'll send war parties to seek out any warrior who helped Theus plan or carry out this attack." The soothing warmth of Piercey's healing nearly lulled me to sleep as I talked. "No captives."

  "What about spies or operatives who are not warriors?" Markus asked.

  I opened my heavy eyes. "We only kill warriors. We'll hold a trial for anyone else and decide their fate then."

  By the time we took a break for dinner, they'd healed me enough that I was able to walk around. I still ached and sharp pains came when I bent or shifted wrong. The poison still inhibited the full healing effects from taking place. But this was much better. If I wasn't too tired to cry from the relief of being able to do more, I probably would have.

  Nash and I traveled to our village to check on our people and make an appearance. When we arrived, a crowd of nearly a hundred gathered at the center of town where just held our festival not long ago. Standing before everyone was the young commander who I admonished recently. Owen spoke passionately to the crowd.

  I touched Nash's arm to stop him from approaching and we remained in the back, quiet so no one noticed us.

  "Eclipse is weak," the young man said. "You saw her in the battle. She cannot remain standing on her own. We cannot rely on her to save us. We're strong enough to fight for ourselves." Owen's voice rose to a thundering roar. "We cannot afford to wait for her to recover or to play by any rules anyone wants to set, including her. She has served our kingdom well, but today, the kingdom depends on us."

  Some cheered and some yelled in defiance of what he said.

  "Eclipse may be the mother of our kingdom, but her heart is now soft. I burned everyone in my family," he screamed. "She doesn't know the pain of burning everyone you love."

  I eased back against the tree. It astonished me before how happy my people were with me and often felt too good to be true that our kingdom flourished as it did. But as unbelievable as that always felt to me, how quickly they could turn on me seemed even more impossible.

  "We should say something," Nash said.

  "Not yet. If I fight with him for all to see, then I accept him as an opponent. I legitimize him."

  "He's undermining you, which means he's undermining our war efforts. This could spread quickly."

  "You're right. We don't want to make it worse, either."

  Nash pinched my chin and turned my face to his. "You're not weak. Don't take a word he said to heart."

  "I know. Sometimes strength looks like weakness to those who don't have the wisdom to see the difference. He'll learn one day. He's a hurt boy who lost his family. He needs someone to blame, and I do have blame in this. I'm not perfect. I've made mistakes."

  Nash slid an arm around me, and I hugged him tightly.

  "This isn't good, especially considering we need to deal with the Flatlands too. Let's go to the tower. We'll greet people there and pretend we didn't see this."

  "I'm sorry, Max."

  Everyone we encountered at the temple was thrilled and shocked to see how much I'd recovered since they last saw me. I dabbed the sweat from my forehead, still easily fatigued, but I'd been dying to see my people. While we talked about our plans for the war, my mind lingered on that young man.

  A few hours after arriving at the village, I excused myself and left to find Owen at his house again. He looked even more shocked to see me than the first time.

  "I'm very sorry for the loss you've suffered."

  His eyes looked hollow. I didn't even see the same fiery rebellion. "Don't talk to me about my family. I won't apologize for things I said either. I'm assuming that's why you're here."

  He wouldn't even let me offer condolences? I suddenly wanted to hug him, because he'd said he buried his whole family, and I'd heard already about his mother's death. She was a great woman. "I don't need an apology. I just want to hear more about how you've lost your faith in me."

  The unbridled rage and heartbreak were almost too much to look at. "I have as much faith in you as I've always had. You're a great Prophet, but you've always been too merciful and too concerned with your principles and ideals. I've always heard you're a war-time Prophet. I disagree. You established a peaceful reign where we each matter and have a voice. It's admirable. That doesn't always work when it's time for war."

  "What do you know about war?" I asked the question genuinely, wanting to know what this boy who never fought in a war but just lost his entire family knew. I expected he might surprise me.

  "I know the cost." His eyes shone with fury and tears. "I know the powerlessness."

  "Then it sounds as if you do know much." I reached for him slowly, not wanting to make contact if he didn't want it. At first, he drew back, but then he hesitated, and he allowed me to take his shoulders in my hands. "I'm sorry I didn't protect your family. Nothing can ever make that right."

  His breathing turned ragged and his body tight. "I failed them. I have no one else to blame. I will never be weak again."

  "We're always weak again. We need each other." I squeezed him, trying to find my way beneath his suffering. "Don't fight me and pit our people against each other when we need to bind together to fight our enemy."

  "If you're going to get us all killed then someone needs to fight you." He pushed my hands off him and stepped back into the darkness. "We can't afford to only fight our enemies. We must fight anyone who threatens us."

  "You really believe I'm going to get you all killed?"

  "I think you need to be pushed to do the right thing. I'm going to push you because I have nothing to lose, and I refuse to see more people end up like me."

  "Be careful. Someone might use your anger. You need to look at the people encouraging you and standing behind you while you fight the battle for them. You might just be fighting for Malach."