Lindarion moved first.
He didn't think.
Didn't channel.
He just acted.
Lightning burst from his legs as he lunged forward, fire coiling behind his right hand, precision-wrapped and sharpened to a point. The rune-glow was still fading behind Dythrael, but Lindarion didn't care.
'Hit fast. Hit clean. No speeches.'
He aimed straight for the core, the chest.
His fist got close.
Then Maeven, white-haired bastard, always smiling, vanished from where he'd been standing.
And reappeared between them.
Lindarion barely registered the shift in pressure.
The next thing he knew, Maeven's fist was in his ribs.
Not a jab.
Not a counter.
A detonation.
Every sound in the chamber blinked out at once.
The world tilted.
Then cracked.
He was gone.
Through stone. Through marble. Through the palace floor.
Out.
Into open air.