A patch of brown and green detaches from a tree. I wait for a bolt of blue lightning to indicate the moving bush is a rebel, but something big and black and barrel-like slips out of the foliage. Not a rebel. A vigilante. He stuffs a can inside something that looks like a launcher, then aims at the two Court fae.

The canister thumps from the barrel and then explodes.

I throw myself on top of Kyol to shelter him from the fallout. The black cloud doesn't hang in the air long; the rain washes the dust into the earth.

Kyol grips my shoulders. "McKenzie!"

"The silver." I run my hand over his hair, sloshing off darkened rainwater. Most of it's on me. He should be able to fissure.

"You don't protect me," he grates out, rolling me to my side. I cry out when something stabs into my right hip.

Kyol curses under his breath and jerks the piece of metal free. Then he fissures away, leaving me gasping for breath. Christ, it hurts. And all at once, more pain registers-from another piece of metal in the back of my left arm. It's deep, cutting into the muscle. The vigilantes stuffed shrapnel as well as silver into the coffee cans this time.

I don't have a chance to pull it out before Kyol reappears, blood dripping from his sword. He grabs a fistful of my shirt and drags me to a thick tree as gunfire and fissures rip through the air. Bark and splinters burst from the trunk above my head. Kyol fissures again and again at my side, keeping up an almost constant shield against the attack. He can't maintain this pace, though. He'll burn out.

"Jorreb!" Kyol shouts during one of the few instances he's visible in this world. A second later, Aren takes out the vigilantes firing on us, ending the assault.

But it continues elsewhere. Everywhere. I fling rainwater out of my eyes and scan the forest. It's almost impossible to see anyone unless they're moving. Kyol spotted the two Court fae before I did. Maybe I'm missing others, others he can't see because they're hidden by illusion.

But no. All the fissures-every single one of them-are camo-clad rebels. Where the fuck are the rest of the Court fae? The plan's gone to hell. We're not supposed to be the ones fighting the vigilantes.

Kyol's breathing hard at my side. I grab his wrist when he starts to rise, silently plead for him to remain. He pulls me to his chest. His arms are warm but they're trembling. He fissured too much too quickly.

He squeezes me tight. "There's no reason for you to be here if the Court fae aren't."

"How far to the Sidhe Tol? Maybe they're there."

Bullets strafe the ground to the left, and the air erupts with earth and wet leaves.

Kyol presses me into the tree trunk. "No. They'll stay away from the silver plating."

"Maybe they removed-"

"They're in the trees!"

Kyol and I aren't the only ones who hear Naito's bellow. The second I spot a Court fae perching on a thick limb, he's riddled with holes. A flash of light and he disappears. Dead. His soul-shadow dissipates into the rain-drenched canopy.

The vigilantes bombard the treetops, and the foliage erupts with fissures. Fissures and shadows. Only a few of the latter are white. The rest are all black.

"What do you see?" Kyol asks.

"They're out of the trees," I report, scanning the scene around us. The Court fae are everywhere now, fissuring in and out to dodge the vigilantes' attacks. Kyol will see the fissures, so I search for fae who aren't disappearing. They're the ones most likely to be hidden by illusion.

"Female archer by the moss-covered tree."

He follows my gaze. "Visible."

Another rebel will take her out.

"Straight ahead. A swordsman coming up the hill."

"Visible."

"Two swordsmen walking past the exploded coffee can."

"I see three. Describe them."

"The one on the left is male, crouching down now. The one on the right-"

"Is his sword bloody?"

"Yes."

Kyol vanishes in a flash of light. He reappears behind the two fae, dispatches the first before they know he's there, meets the spinning attack of the second and counters. Three swings later, that one enters the ether, leaving behind nothing but his fading soul-shadow.

Kyol fissures back to my side. I describe the scene again. Then again and again, sprinting from one tree to the next at Kyol's command. There's something synchronous about the way we work together. He knows where I'm looking, understands the details that capture my attention like that rotting limb a fae not visible to Kyol steps over, or the area of ground I describe as a giant's footprint. He stays close when I whisper locations to him, touching my shoulder, my arm, placing an encouraging hand on the small of my back. To show he's there for me. He'll take care of me, keep me safe.

His warmth is comforting and the horror of what's going on around us isn't as sharp as it will be later in my nightmares. It's as if I'm watching it from a distance. This is a scene from a movie, nothing more.

Nothing more until something hits me. I'm slammed to the ground a second after Kyol fissures away again. Pain explodes through my left shoulder blade and radiates across my back.

I gasp as I roll to my right side.

Something moves in front of me. A man. A vigilante. Vaguely familiar eyes widen in surprise. Not Naito's eyes. His father's eyes. They narrow, undoubtedly realizing I'm not one of his people, then his mouth thins into a resolute line. A pistol rises out of his camouflaged netting. It aims at my chest.

"Dad!"

The vigilante whips his head toward Naito's voice.

I roll away as Kyol fissures between us, swinging his blade at Nakano.

The gun goes off. Something wet splashes across my face.

"Kyol!" I cry out, terrified he's been shot. A second later, I see a severed arm clutching a pistol and hear Nakano's scream.

"Dad!" Naito skids to his knees beside his father.

"McKenzie!" Kyol's hands are on me.

Before I can say anything, Aren fissures to my other side. "Are you hurt?"

I shake my head. There's too much going on. Too many gunshots and fissuring fae. And there's an arm on the ground in front of me and a man bleeding and cursing and trying to push away his son, his son, who-even though he hates him-is trying to save his father's life.

Naito cinches his belt around the stump of Nakano's arm.

"Help him." I push Aren toward the humans.

"You're not hurt?"

"No." A bullet in the back is what knocked me to the ground, but I don't think it penetrated my vest. Adrenaline's numbing the pain now.

"Get her out of here," Aren orders. He scrambles across the forest floor to Nakano.

As Kyol's pulling me to my feet, a shadow captures my attention. I would just let it go, but it nags at me like an itch that needs to be scratched. It's a Court fae. I can't see his face, but I'm certain I know him. He's . . . Holy shit, it's Radath.

I yank my sketchbook out of my satchel as he fissures away. "He's running."

"Not now, McKenzie."

I push Kyol's hands away and take the pen out of the spiral. "It's Radath."

Kyol freezes. I take advantage of his indecision and scratch the first twist of shadows across a blank page. The trail's fresh enough. I think I can map his location to within a couple hundred feet.

"He's gone to the Realm." He'll double fissure so I have to be accurate. A deeper shade of black narrows into a curving line. The river leaks out into the Jythia Ocean.

I focus. The shadow's scale changes, grows more precise. I flip to the next page to narrow my map down as well. He's fissured into a rocky field. It's nowhere near a town, just a place in the middle of nowhere.

"Criskran." I shove the sketchbook in front of Kyol's eyes. "You can catch him."

His jaw clenches.

"Stay with Jorreb," he orders. He takes my gun out of its holster, presses it into my hands, and something flickers in his eyes. I don't realize what it is until he fissures out. He doesn't expect to see me again. Why? He can take Radath in a fair fight.

In a fair fight.

Fear drives the air out of my lungs. It's a trap. It's the only explanation for Radath being here, right here, where Kyol and I both stood.

God, what have I done?

I press my back against a tree and scan the forest for anything, anyone who can help him.

Aren's stopped Nakano's stump from bleeding. He fissures away to fight a trio of Court fae, leaving Naito at his father's side.

"Get away!" Nakano roars at his son.

Naito complies. He picks up the gun from his father's severed hand and takes aim at one of the fae Aren's fighting.

I scramble in the direction of the Sidhe Tol, slipping on wet leaves as the battle roars on. I have to find someone willing and able to help Kyol. I have to.

I spot Nalst running past Nakano. Before I call the rebel's name, Nakano moves. My heart thumps in my chest as he pulls a gun out from behind his back. He aims.

"Watch out!" I scream, swinging my gun up to aim, but Nalst is in my way.

Two shots ring out. I spin in the direction Nakano shot, making sure he hasn't hit any rebels.

He has.

Kelia cries out, sinking to her knees. She has armor under her camo, though. She'll be okay. She'll get up. She'll . . .

A wet stain grows across her breast.

Oh, God.

I run to her. I drop my gun, placing my hand over her heart to try to stop the bleeding. Her cuirass is in the way. The blood's leaking out the gap on the side, too. It's leaking everywhere, staining her clothes. I can't put enough pressure on it.

She cries out when I yank at her shirt, ripping it so I can get to the strings holding the jaedric together.

"I'm sorry. I have to . . . God. I have to get this off you."

My hands shake. Blood tightens the knots at her side. I can't get them undone.

"Naito," she chokes out.

Shit. She's going to die. She can't wait. She needs help now.

"Aren!" I yell.

I scan the forest, spot him slaying a Court fae. He turns toward me the same instant Naito does.

"Kelia!" Naito flies across the forest floor almost as quickly as Aren fissures here. He drops to his knees, takes his hand in hers. "Baby, hang on."

"Naito," she whispers, focusing on his face.

Aren takes out a knife, cuts through the bindings on her side. He flings the cuirass aside and places his hands over Kelia's bullet wounds. His hands glow blue as he flares his magic. The tension floods out of Kelia's body. An instant later, she vanishes.

I stop breathing. No. She couldn't have died. Aren was healing her. He was . . .

A spasm wracks through Naito. An anguished scream rips from his throat.

"No!" He reaches for her rising soul-shadow, clutching at the air as if he can keep it in this world. "No!"

The white shadow dissipates.

"No!"

I back away. Kelia's dead. Kyol's gone. Fae are still dying around us. I don't know if any rebels have made it to the Sidhe Tol. Don't know how much longer until the reinforcements from the other attacks arrive.

Naito screams again. His pain brings tears to my eyes.

God, we shouldn't be here. We shouldn't have come.

I take another step back. My tears stream down my face, mixing with the rain.

Another step back and I hit something. I put a hand behind me to balance against the tree, only it's not a tree.

I start to turn, but something wraps around me. Something invisible.

The forest blurs, darkens, then reappears in a shade of blue. A hand covers my mouth. I can't suck in enough air to scream.