“I’ll distract the soldiers,” Callen growls. “You two push the ship from the front left side. The way it’s tilted, it should fall to the right more easily.”

“Be careful,” I say, batting my wing to his. “Keep your helm down.” With the right angling, a Leonodai in lion form would be mostly protected by their breastplate and front-facing armor. Mostly. “Fly fast.”

He nudges my forehead. “Always.”

Tiles come loose from the rooftop as Callen leaps toward the ship. Shouts sound from below, but Callen’s roar is quickly joined by another as a nearby warrior comes to his aid.

“Now!” Vera and I jump together, swooping low. The humans’ gunfire peppers the air. Behind me, Vera lets out a low snarl, followed swiftly by “Armor! Skimmed armor, keep going!”

Jumping over the fallen stones of the Northern Gate, Vera and I reach the ship’s hull. The craft reeks of metal and blood and human, and my stomach roils. But my mind clears as Vera catches my look. We’ll ram it.

I fold my wings back and down. We move as one, backing up to ram our armored shoulders against the wood. The ship groans as our combined weight slams into it, but after the third try, I check the evidence in the dirt on the ground—we’ve barely moved it an inch.

“Up,” I tell Vera. “Let’s push it from the deck.”

Taking to the sky, we start to dive wordlessly when a third shadow crosses overhead. I look up as a resounding roar rips through the air.

The Ninth Sentinel has joined the fight.

“On three!” Shirene yells. Vera and I obey her command. Summer wind whips by me as all three of us fold back our wings and dive, free falling, toward the railing on the edge of the ship. The impact sends me spinning up and off to the side as my ribs rattle in my chest. The frigid plunge of ocean water follows right after.

Instinctively, I flare my wings in the water, pushing against the pressure without much success. My claws scrape idly against nothing as I swing myself upright. Taking my human form, I kick toward the surface when from the corner of my eye comes a flash of vibrant white and pale blue.

I break the surface for a gasp of air, then look into the water again.

One of the sea-folk watches me. Human from the waist up with a long fish’s tail the color of moonlight, she wears armor on her wrists and chest—Leonodai-made, but marked with a different crest. Her large eyes drink me in, and the placid expression on my face jogs my memory. The ambassador for the Sea Queen.

She rushes toward me, closing the space between us with a flick of her tail. Icy hands clamp down around my wrist as she drags me down.

Skies. She’s going to drown me.