Page 137 of Fallen Nocturne

She climbs onto my shoulder and settles beneath my hair to hide from the sun.

“Better,” she declares.

The ninth circle opens before I finish the invocation.

The ground beneath it caves inward.

A circular mouth rises from the darkness, wide enough to swallow a wagon. Rings of hooked teeth turn inside it as the first enormous worm forces its way through. Its pale, segmented body is covered in hard plates of stone and grit.

A second follows. Then a third.

The earth tears open farther as three more emerge, until six colossal worms writhe across the plateau. They tower above the soldiers when they rear, their bodies long enough to coil around the base of a fortress.

The largest turns its eyeless head toward me.

Hungry, it whispers into my thoughts.

“Then eat until you are full,” I tell it.

The six worms plunge beneath the ground. Ridges of broken earth race toward the front line as they burrow into position.

I draw another circle and nearly fall while kneeling.

Rainer’s hand closes around my elbow. “You are already weakening.”

“I need to do this, Uncle,” I insist.

“You have summoned fifteen ancient fae.” His grip tightens, but he does not pull me away. “You can barely stand.”

“Neither will our soldiers if those mammoths reach them.” I pull free of Rainer’s grip and force myself toward the next empty space.

The sixteenth creature arrives in chains.

“Rhazel, Horned Prince of the Wastes. I release you to battle.”

A fiery bull smashes through the center of the circle. Broken chains drag from its neck and legs. Smoke rises beneath its hooves. It lowers its enormous horns toward me.

“You release me?” he asks.

I nod. “Only until sunrise.”

The bull stamps the ground hard enough to crack it.

“Until sunrise, then.”

Rhazel charges from the circle, each strike of his hooves leaving fire burning in the grass.

The mages stare at me, waiting for me to step away. Several of them are already trembling from the strain of maintaining the passages open.

Beyond them, the Fae King’s army continues to advance.

Sixteen will not be enough.

I begin drawing another circle.

“Rhianelle.” Arescaine catches my wrist. “You are bleeding.”

I look down. Blood runs from my nose and falls in dark drops onto the grass. “Then I have less work to do for the next circle.”