“What is the meaning of this, Arbiter Harlow?” the Blackmoore matriarch demanded, each word vibrating with outrage. “You say nothing, as the Thorns and Avramovs behave in lawless collusion? You make no pronouncement, even as my grandson has been bled?”

There was something off-putting about such antiquated syntax coming from that youthful face, though at least some of it was probably just affectation. Her features looked as though they’d been carved from ice, but her eyes were nearly incandescent, glowing cobalt blue with wrath. Though the family resemblance was there, I’d never seen an expression remotely as intimidating on Gareth’s face. Gareth might’ve been convinced of his own importance, but his grandmother took it to such a different level she made him seem like some paragon of humility and restraint.

To be fair, what she’d just done was a massive flex. Portal magic was big-time stuff, an enormous exertion of power and will; the magical equivalent of some glitzy and dangerous move like a triple axel, the kind that ended in a trophy or a shit ton of broken bones. Except that it wasn’t just air, but both space and time being spun around you, dimensions wound like wool around the spindle of the witch’s body.

The seemingly effortless way Igraine Blackmoore had done it made it feel like an unspoken threat.

“Oh, come on, your grandson has a scratch,” I retorted, drawing myself up to my full, colossal height, the mantle’s gravitas lending my tone an outsized disdain. “And the Thorns and Avramovs haven’t run afoul of any rules. You saw the Grimoire’s acknowledgment yourself when the Avramov scion touched the token. According to the rules, the victory stands.”

Her regal eyebrows soared, scaling her forehead. Another inch of aggrieved contempt, and they’d be congregating right up there with her widow’s peak.

“Haven’t run afoul?” she spat. “My understanding is that this is a competition, Arbiter Harlow—which presupposes the combatants acting in their own interests. Not aiding and abetting each other to their mutual opponent’s detriment.”

“One, that isn’t strictly true. Two, maybe you should attend to the Grimoire more closely, Elder Blackmoore,” I replied, falling into the Arbiter’s authoritative cadences even without the Grimoire’s prompting. I’d always hated when people got in my face, and this time, it wasn’t just me pissed off on my own account. I could feel how much bristling exception the mantle’s magic took to Igraine’s accusations and overbearing attitude. It hissed and sparked inside me like a cat at peak aggression—if the cat were the size of a small mountain, and maybe also part dragon a few lines up the family tree. “You won’t find any prohibition on teamwork within its pages.”

“She’s right, Igraine,” Gabrielle Thorn said from somewhere beyond my hermetic eyelock with the Blackmoore matriarch. “This whole thing might be a little unconventional, but Rowan and Talia haven’t done anything wrong. The Thorns are considering it a fair-earned win.”

I looked away from Igraine to find that the other elders had arrived. Gabrielle and Aspen had reached us already, Elena Avramov and my own parents close on their heels. Gabrielle met my gaze with dark, collected eyes, and though she wasn’t quite smiling, I sensed a low-key approval there, even something like pride.