He had her dead to rights for perhaps three or four seconds—but it couldn’t last. His firecraftings might have been scorching the Queen, but they were wreaking havoc on the mist beasts, burning away the tentacles that held the Queen in place. The second she was free of them, the Queen dropped her windcrafting and plummeted into the mist. Tavi had a quick glimpse of a naked body, white hair burned away, half-covered by black scorch marks, like a steak left too long over the fire. Then she vanished.

Tavi turned and streaked after her. He could not afford to let her escape.

Fire rose from nowhere as he dived, and he realized with a start that the Queen had veiled herself and slowed her fall. He lifted his sword as the flame enveloped him, drawing the heat into the blade and away from his flesh, igniting the sword once more. Then the Queen was diving toward the ground beside him, an apparition half-hidden behind a veil, only the green fire of her sword truly visible. Their weapons flashed and chimed a dozen times, and suddenly the ground was rushing toward them.

Tavi pulled up first, terrified for a second that he was already too near the ground to manage it, but he was able to turn his motion from vertical to horizontal, just above a stretch of open field. Tall weeds and bits of the previous year’s bracken scratched and hissed upon his armor, and he looked over his shoulder to see the vord Queen in pursuit, apparently none the slower for the damage wrought upon her flesh.

Crows. He’d been sure the Queen would be worse off than that after tangling with the Canim’s pet horrors. Still, it had to have taken something out of her. She wasn’t closing the distance on him nearly as quickly as he’d expected her to.

How many times had he been in this position, in front of someone much stronger than he was, knowing that only his wits would keep his skin in one piece. As a child in the Valley, and one who had never learned the knack of fading into the background, it had happened frequently with his playmates. But he had also dealt with thanadents and snow cats—crows, even the bloody sheep had been a great deal larger and stronger than he was, and the flocks’ rams had frequently chased him up trees. And all of that before he’d left the Calderon Valley.

He found himself grinning.

Though worry and terror and rage all burned away at his guts, Gaius Octavian was smiling.

This was a game he knew how to play.

He altered his course abruptly, shooting straight up into the air. The Queen came after him, her windstream a howling, cyclonic roar.