Chapter 36
Chapter
Thirty-Six
THEA
Icut my eyes to the ramparts, knowing what I’ll see before I spy it: flaming red hair blowing in the wind.
She sends balls of fire soaring through the air, flaming death raining down all around us.
I blast as many as I can with ice, freezing them before they can strike but fucking hells how is she sending so many?
? I see more ice joining my own and smile savagely: Killian.
Him using my mirrored Gift sends a thrill through me that I can’t understand or explain.
-Thea! The lake!-
I whip my head towards them. I can’t see Killian of course, but I see Isolde, looking uneasy, wings flaring and smoke and fire roiling from his nostrils.
-She’s melting the fucking lake!-
Fuck.
I send power surging towards the lake, shoring up the ice, making it as solid as fucking steel.
Killian can wield my Gift, but not as powerfully as I can.
He won’t be able to fight and keep the lake solid beneath them all and wield all his mirrored gifts, and he knows it.
If that ice breaks, hundreds of soldiers could drown, pulled to the depths by their heavy armor.
-I’ve got you,- I promise, charging towards the lake, determined to cut down every fucking soldier in my path.
Fury gives me a flare of strength. Tesni made a mistake by showing herself, by burning my men and trying to melt that lake.
I slash and stab and send waves of ice sailing across the field as I run, but more of those balls of fire rain overhead, more pillars of it flaring up all around.
Our people are falling. Our soldiers burning and screaming.
I freeze the fires with Killian’s help, but there are so fucking many of them, I can’t keep up.
-Thea, the lake!- Soren reminds me.
I grit my teeth, sweat beading my brow as I reinforce the ice in the lake again.
I can’t keep up. I can’t...oh Makers, I can’t beat her.
I look up and I swear, even from this distance, I can see her smirking, as if she can read my thoughts.
That smirk does it. Rage roils, love and anger and the need to protect my people all filling my chest like Tesni’s own fire. I’m done with this.
It’s time to face my fucking sister.
Though I feel physically ill about what’s about to happen, I know it’s the only way.
-Isolde! Get me up there!- I yell through the bond.
I don’t put my plan into words, exactly, too focused on keeping the lake solid and putting out as many fires as I can while still slashing out with my blade, Tristan and Dessa and Math beside me, Jonathan and Kendall just ahead, but push my intentions through the doorways and I see her launch into the air a moment later.
-Come back to me, Red,- Killian says, not trying to stop me and my love for him grows ever deeper. He trusts me to do this, trusts that this is what I think is right and will follow me no matter where I lead.
-Always.-
“Get to Killian!” I yell to Dessa and the others, shoving Math towards Tristan and nodding at him in thanks, knowing he’ll keep my friend safe.
I try to keep it inside, but the scream rips from my throat as Isolde’s claws wrap around me, surprisingly gently, and she launches us skyward.
My heart leaps directly into my throat, all air leaving my lungs, and I’m honestly surprised that I don’t piss myself from fear as I see the battlefield below me, the soldiers looking like ants scrambling around a kicked-over hill.
“Fuck, fuck, fuck!!” I scream, clutching her claws, desperate to hold on.
-I promised I wouldn’t drop you,- she reminds me, a bit of humor in her voice despite everything.
She lets out a spray of fire and I squeeze my eyes closed, the heat rushing over my skin even from this height.
Soren, clutched in her other set of claws, roars loudly, clearly enjoying himself.
I’m doing all I can not to vomit all over the battle below and pray that this will be over soon.
Why Killian loves this so much is something I will never, ever understand.
The flight only takes seconds but it feels like a fucking eternity.
-Brace yourself,- Isolde finally warns and pry my eyes open.
We’re almost to the ramparts and I can see Tesni clearly now, eyes wide despite herself as she spies a fucking dragon coming for her.
She staggers back, clearly afraid, and a twisted flash of satisfaction rushes through me. Good. She should be afraid.
Isolde roars and Tesni cowers. It distracts my sister enough that I can drop from Isolde’s claws and land on the battlements, the impact jarring, but I bend my knees and roll as Tobias taught me all those years ago.
Soren lands lithely beside me and I spare a second to be annoyed with the cat.
It really isn’t fair that he can be so damned nimble.
-Go!- I tell Isolde. -Protect them!-
She roars again and flies straight up into the air, flipping backwards to make her way back to Killian and, Makers willing, the rest of my family.
I rise slowly, Soren snarling by my side, and Tesni turns to face me.
She can’t quite hide the awe and fear in her eyes as she watches Isolde fly back into the fray, and her eyes widen even more when she sees Soren.
She actually takes a step back from the frost cat, but as a rush of soldiers floods up from the stairs a few yards behind me, Soren growls, flashing his fangs at my twin once more for good measure before turning and bounding towards the men coming for my back.
Tesni composes herself and her lips curl into that cold, wicked smile.
“Good to see you, sister. Care to watch all of your little friends drown?” She flicks her fingers towards the lake, but I send a surge of power into the water, making it completely solid once more before clenching my teeth and throwing up a dome of ice around us.
She quirks a brow and I can feel when she tries to push her Gift past it.
It holds strong. Now it’s my turn to smile.
“It’s just you and me now, Tesni,” I spit, tensing my muscles, preparing for whatever she has planned.
She narrows her eyes. “The cat is your familiar,” she says, quickly assessing everything she’s seeing. “And the fucking dragon??” she asks through clenched teeth, clearly angry but unable to stop herself from asking the question.
“The Commander’s.”
Fury blazes in her eyes and fire dances along her knuckles. “You get a familiar. You and that bastard’s lapdog both??” She screeches some intelligible sound of rage and a wall of fire hurdles towards me.
-Thea!- Soren roars. He won’t be happy when he realizes that the dome around Tesni and me has him firmly locked out. I throw up a wall of ice and the flames crash against it, sizzling as they die out.
“You’re strong now, Thea, I’ll give you that much. But you’re no match for me, you never were.” There’s a maniacal look in her eyes, something that was never there before. I wonder if it’s this taste of power she’s gotten now that she’s a queen, igniting a thirst that she’ll die trying to quench.
“I won’t let your Alliance do this, Tesni.”
Another round of flames soars towards me, the stone beneath my boots suddenly hot as lava, and though my dome holds, the entirety of the area above us becomes a ceiling of fire.
Great fucking Makers. I cool the stone, force the icy dome to grow thicker, and stop the fire coming for me again.
Sweat drips, stinging my eyes, but I don’t dare let up.
-Keep fighting,- I tell Killian. I need them to win the battle outside, or at least hold until I find a way to finish this with Tesni.
-Always,- Killian assures me. -Always, Red.-
I attack this time, sending spikes of ice flying towards Tesni. She melts them easily.
“Tell Barony to stop this!” I yell, panting.
She throws her head back and laughs, sounding truly crazed.
“Barony is dead,” she sneers, baring her teeth. I blink at that. “They’re all dead. Barony, Nicolette, William, Ruby. All gone, by my doing. I rule their kingdoms now. Half of Hypathia is mine.”
“Dead? You...murdered Barony? Murdered four other fucking royals??” Makers.
“Technically, the alchemist did before they attempted the procedure to take Gifts, but it was my plan, yes. Klaus was more than happy to assist when I promised him a fortune bigger than all of Enola. Assist in...many ways.” Her lips curl, her eyes sparking like living flames.
I take a step backwards as realization sinks in.
“Makers, you’ve done it, haven’t you? You’ve taken Gifts. That’s how you’re so much stronger now.”
She grins, a wicked slash of wine-red lips against porcelain skin.
“I did. They didn’t give me new Gifts. Klaus had never tried the procedure on someone who already possessed a Gift, so we weren’t exactly sure what might happen.
Isn’t the irony so fucking disgusting? A normal, insignificant human can steal as many Gifts as they wish, have as many powers as their puny bodies can withstand, but a blessed Gifted can only become stronger, gain nothing new?
” She curls her lip but shakes herself. “No new Gift for me, still only fire, but great Makers the new power roiling through my veins...” She shudders.
Feeling the need to demonstrate apparently, two giant pillars of fire spring from her upturned palms, soaring thirty feet over our heads.
They shift and writhe until they join and become—