The ground trembled beneath my feet, a distant rumble announcing the inevitable. Magnus’s forces were coming, and there was no more running. No more hiding. No more time to think.
Elias stood beside me, his sharp eyes scanning the horizon, his posture tense but unwavering. He was a rock, a force of nature that I’d once seen as nothing but a threat. But now, standing next to him, I could feel it. The bond between us, the power that surged through me whenever he was close, binding us in ways I couldn’t explain.
"You know what this means, right?" Elias said, his voice low, though the calmness in it didn’t match the storm brewing in his eyes. "We fight or we die."
I nodded, swallowing the lump in my throat. “I’m ready.”
The war drums echoed in the distance. They were coming for us. Magnus.
