Fenrys and Cairn crash across the tent, fighting with claws, teeth, and fists while Aelin forces herself upright despite her weakness. Seeing the hot poker nearby, Aelin drags the chain between her ankles over its red-hot tip, using the heat to weaken the links while Fenrys keeps Cairn occupied.

Cairn understands that Fenrys has doomed himself by breaking Maeve’s blood oath and tries to outlast him. Fenrys also knows he is dying, but he attacks anyway, drawing Cairn’s focus as Aelin strains with the poker until the heated chain finally snaps between her legs.

When Aelin rises, Fenrys catches her eye and commands her to run. Cairn notices her loosened chain, but Fenrys bites into Cairn’s shoulder and holds him back even as Cairn smashes Fenrys against the metal table hard enough to crack bone. Aelin obeys Fenrys’s warning and sprints through the tent flaps into the gray morning.

Elsewhere in the camp, Rowan fights his way toward the central tent where Aelin is held. Maeve’s soldiers react as Rowan predicted; some flee when they recognize the warrior who once trained them, while others attack. Rowan counters assaults from soldiers and shape-shifted birds of prey, using wind and ice to shatter their magic and kill those blocking his path.

Rowan presses closer to Aelin’s tent, holding back the signal for Lorcan and Gavriel until he is near enough to use their diversion for escape. As another wave of soldiers and archers charges, Rowan destroys their arrows and then the archers themselves, carving a path through the camp.