53. Rosalina
Rosalina
Caspian destroys my briars in a rush of green flame. His eyes are too bright, his expression distant. Wrong. The edges of his body shimmer, his shadow stretching long and curling like smoke. He’s gone. We’re too close to the Baron for him to fight the Green Flame.
And my mother…
The first time I’ve seen my mother with my own eyes in over twenty years, and it’s this?
Suspended between the obelisk crystals, once black, now pulsing with green magic, face contorted in excruciating pain.
Her head hangs low, brown hair drenched in sweat.
I can’t tell if she’s conscious. The light winks off a jeweled ring on her left hand.
A wedding band? But on her other hand, she wears another ring, a plain iron band.
Her bargain circle with Sira.
Magic crackles, snaring her wrists and ankles like webbing. The suspended water above us seems to reach for her, drawing her life force…
Making that thing, that ethereal glowing figure, more real, more here. It’s him. Caspian’s father. The Baron of the Green Flame.
“No,” I breathe.
Shadows flood behind Sira. A tide of them.
“So many choices, little rose,” Sira sneers. “But there’s no time. Once Aurelia’s fully drained, he will be free. The baron will enter this world fully—forever!”
My heart slams.
The baron has come. My mother is in chains. Caspian’s being overtaken. Shadows are spilling like oil from the walls. Our magic is weak down here. Every breath cuts me from the inside out.
Which problem do I fix first?
I grit my teeth, eyes darting between all of them. My princes look to me. They look to me for answers.
And maybe I have them.
“Kel!” I shout. “Keep Caspian busy. Don’t let him fall!”
Kel is already moving before I finish the sentence, ice leaping at his heels.
“Papa!” I face my father. “Help me. We free Mom together.”
He meets my gaze with a nod.
I turn to Dayton, Farron, and Ezryn.
“The rest of you…kill Sira.” My voice roars like thunder, and the moment ignites.
Steel flashes. Spells fire, washing the Below in light.
And I run toward my mother, praying I’m not already too late.
Sira laughs as the princes charge her.
Farron is first, his Lance of Valor blazing gold in his hands. Dayton follows, summoning the Trident of Summer in a crash of light and heat, its three-pronged edge gleaming. Ezryn comes last, his Hammer of Hope striking the stone floor with a deep, thunderous hum.
They move like dancers. Like gods.
Sira blinks in and out of puffs of smoke, dodging every blow. She slices at them with shadow blades. Farron’s lance pierces her side, but she’s gone in an instant, laughing again from across the chamber.
Dayton stumbles, his face pale, breath ragged. He lifts his trident for another strike, but I see the tremble in his arms.
“Day!” I shout, but Ezryn’s already there.
He throws his shoulder into Sira’s next blow, shielding Dayton, and counters with a swing so powerful it splits the stone beside them.
And still, she keeps coming.
The only one that’s ever been able to hold her back is—
Cas. But he’s fighting a war of his own. As I must.
“Help me!” I call to Papa and summon two golden blades of thorns, tossing one to him.
He catches it, twirling the blade in a practiced arc.
“I didn’t know you knew how to use one of these!” I say.
He raises a brow. “Neither did I.”
My mother’s body jerks between the green crystals. Her lips move, but no sound escapes.
I slam the blade against the stone.
Nothing.
Papa’s sword crashes into the other. It doesn’t crack the surface.
Again and again, we strike.
Still nothing. Last time, it took Nori’s mushrooms to destroy the crystals, but I’m not sure these obelisks are even the same thing. But I had been able to chip them.
They were black before. Farron would know more, but I can’t distract him. Dayton looks weaker by the second, and Fare and Ezryn are barely holding Sira back.
Think! How would Farron view this? All those days spent in the library of Castletree, the research we did together…
The crystals in the chamber above are not the same as these obelisks, but Sira’s using them as a substitute conduit. The words she spoke to the Baron days ago… Tether. Connection.
There’s more here. There has to be more I’m not seeing.
Snarling, I drop my briar blade and slam my hand against the obelisk.
Sira, I think. Magic flickers beneath the surface, and a single vision appears before me.
Sira, younger, hair shorter and cropped in rough waves around her face.
She sits cross-legged between these very obelisks, her fingers caressing them as if they’re sacred.
Her eyes shimmer, and then—he speaks. The baron.
“You’re not alone anymore,” he tells her.
And she smiles, tears running down her cheeks.
My throat tightens as the memory fades. The initial price she paid. A moment of her joy. This place, these stones, is where it all began.
This was where she first opened herself to him. These obelisks aren’t just anchors. They’re a door. A promise. A lie she wanted to believe.
“These stones,” I gasp. “They’re how he’s anchored here. This is his connection.”
Papa swings again, grim-faced. “Then we break them.”
I bite my lip hard enough to draw blood. “It’s too strong. Sira’s created them with too much magic.”
Keldarion and Caspian dance across the rocky ground, a sight I’m all too familiar with. My husband with his swords of ice, my love wielding shadows and flame.
The form of the Baron flickers into view below the pool, only half-formed, a silhouette rippling and pulsing with growing clarity. He turns toward me, and my blood freezes.
We’re running out of time. He’s drawing magic from my mother’s body. Still shackled between the obelisks, her head lolls. Her light dims. The more she fades, the stronger he grows.
We can’t free her without weakening the obelisks.
But the crystals are too strong. I can feel it in my bones. All the love of the Vale, poured into them for years.
That’s how she’s done it, I realize. It’s not only Sira’s magic. She’s stolen joy from fae and goblins and Elderblood. Heidigog’s bloomies. Aquila’s stars. My wedding. Sira even stole her own happy memory of when she first met the Baron.
She’s captured the most powerful force in all the worlds near and far.
Love.
And now with my mother’s and the Baron’s magic flowing through them, the obelisks have become impenetrable.
I turn, wild-eyed, searching for someone, anyone, to listen.
“They’re fed by joy!” I shout, pushing myself to my feet. “The love of the Vale! We have to break the connection and stop this flow of magic.”
But no one hears me.
They’re all too busy surviving. Sira’s laughter echoes like shattered glass as Ezryn is thrown across the floor. Farron shields Dayton with his own body. Green magic coils around Caspian like a second skin, and he’s spinning too fast, too wild, his eyes green.
No one is listening.
And if I don’t find a way to break these crystals…
We’ll lose everything.