Chapter 47
CHAPTER FORTY-SEVEN
“Alistair!” I scream. “Lyra!”
I yank desperately against the stone, but my leg is still trapped.
Chunks of ice roll down from the pile a short distance from me.
Then Orion’s arm finally becomes visible as he shoves the last of the rubble away.
Pain and worry pulse on his face where he is braced on his hands and knees above Isera.
As the final pieces of debris tumble away from them, Isera at last becomes fully visible.
Shock is written across her entire face as she lies there on her back, staring up at Orion. There is still blood on the side of her head, but intense relief washes through me just to see her with her eyes open again. It’s quickly drowned out by fear, though.
“Orion,” I call. “I can’t move! You need to check on—”
Lyra gasps awake.
I snap my gaze to her as she shoots up into a sitting position and whirls towards Alistair. The confusion on her features is quickly replaced by terror when she finds him lying there with his eyes closed.
“Alistair,” she blurts out. Fear pulses in her eyes as she grabs him by the shoulders. “Oh God, what did you do? Alistair, what have you done?”
From the pile of rubble, Orion struggles to his feet and reaches a hand down towards Isera.
But she just stretches out her arm to the side instead and shoots a sheet of ice towards Alistair.
Lyra jerks back in shock when it stops right above his nose and mouth.
Whirling towards Isera, she begins to speak.
But before she can say anything, relief crashes over Isera’s features.
“He’s still breathing,” she declares, and then makes the sheet of ice fade out again with a flick of her wrist.
A sob of profound relief comes from Lyra’s throat. Turning back to Alistair, she slides her arms underneath his back and pulls him up so that his chest is pressed against hers where she still sits on the ground. His head tilts forward until it’s resting on her shoulder.
“Oh Alistair,” she breathes, hugging his unconscious body tightly. “You gave too much. You always give too much.”
I draw in a shuddering breath. Alistair is alive. He just gave her so much of his magic to heal her that he passed out from draining himself.
Because that is exactly who Alistair is.
He comes across as angry and rude to people who don’t know him, and he doesn’t care about a lot of people.
But over this past year that I’ve known him, I’ve come to realize that Alistair is one of the most loyal and dependable people I’ve ever met.
He feels everything so deeply, which is why he only opens his heart for a very select few people.
But when he does take someone into his very exclusive circle of trust, there is nothing he wouldn’t do for them.
By the pile of rubble, Isera at last grabs Orion’s hand and lets him help her to her feet. She winces and presses a hand to her temple while squeezing her eyes shut for a second. Orion watches her intently, but the moment she opens her eyes again, he quickly wipes the deep worry from his face.
Instead, he dusts off his rumpled garments and pretends as if he has been preoccupied with that this entire time.
After blinking a couple of times, Isera looks up at him, that stunned shock now back on her face. “You…”
That one word is all that makes it out of her mouth, but the expression on her face says the rest. You shielded me with your own body.
For a moment, Orion just looks back at her.
The second seems to stretch into eternity.
But just when it looks as if Isera is about to say something else, Orion realizes that his eyepatch is askew.
In the chaos of it all, it has slid up so that it’s halfway on his forehead instead, leaving the bottom of his empty eye socket visible.
Deep embarrassment flashes across his face, and he takes a step back, looking mortified.
Yanking the eyepatch back down, he clears his throat self-consciously and moves farther away from Isera. And when he speaks, his voice only holds that nonchalant tone that he so often uses.
“We should help Selena,” he declares, and starts striding towards me. “And then get a move on. We still need to locate the Soul of Trees inside all of this… debris.”
She turns towards him and opens her mouth again, but he stalks briskly across the ground. Hesitation blows across Isera’s features as she stares after him. Orion just comes to a halt next to me and arches an eyebrow.
“Would you like my assistance?” he says, his teasing tone suggesting that he would like me to beg for it.
“If you make me say please, I will tell Draven that you let a boulder land on me,” I inform him.
“Ruthless.” He narrows his eye while trying to suppress a sly smile. “I approve.”
Crouching down, he grabs the side of the stone and then heaves upwards.
I suck in a hiss of pain as the pressure disappears but yank my leg out straight away. A thud sounds as Orion drops the stone back down. With my leg now pulsing from lingering pain, I crawl the final distance away from the rubble and then struggle to my feet.
My entire body aches, but when I put weight on my leg, nothing appears to be broken. I wipe some blood and gravel from the scrapes along my cheek. It will take us a few hours to fly from here back to the battlefield. That should be enough to heal most of my cuts and bruises.
I glance towards Alistair.
It should hopefully also be enough time for Alistair to regain consciousness.
Lyra notices my gaze and looks up to meet my eyes. Her arms are still wrapped around Alistair’s chest, cradling him.
“I’ll stay with him,” she says. “Go find the Soul of Trees.”
I sweep my gaze over the two of them, and warmth fills my soul. In the midst of all this pain and destruction, Lyra and Alistair are like two bright flames that have finally found each other. And now, the darkness will never stand a chance.
With a small smile on my face, I give her a nod. “We’ll be back soon.”
She nods as well.
Isera rakes her fingers through her hair, trying to get some of the dried blood out, while Orion and I walk back up to her. Then the three of us start making our way up the mountain slope again.
It’s slow going. Both because all three of us are pretty banged up, but also because there is so much debris blocking the way.
Chunks of ice and shattered stone lay scattered all across the mountainside.
And in between them are everything from pieces of furniture to burned sheets of paper to flickering faelight gems that used to be mounted inside various ceilings in the Ice Palace.
But we make steady progress as we climb over the rubble and towards the location where Orion said the Soul of Trees was buried.
Once we reach it, we all just come to a halt and stare out at the destruction around us.
We’re standing on top of what used to be Bane and Jessina’s throne room. But the grand doors are gone. The walls are gone. The floor is gone. The high ceiling covered in faelight gems is gone. And the thrones themselves are gone. Now, all that remains is broken ice and shattered stone.
“It was buried deep in the thick ice foundation here,” Orion says, and motions at the area around us. “So it shouldn’t have flown too far in the explosion.”
We nod.
And then we start searching.
Isera’s eyes begin to glow as she summons her magic and starts moving chunks of ice aside while Orion and I peer through them all to see if the artefact is still stuck inside one of them.
According to Lavendera’s drawing, it’s supposed to be a large, golden sphere. I look for any signs of something gold as we sift through the rubble.
“Here,” Orion finally calls.
Straightening from the chunk of ice I was inspecting, I dust my hands off and then jog over to where the Unseelie King is instead. Isera strides towards him as well.
When we reach him, we find him pointing down at a thick block of ice.
A large golden orb is visible in the middle of it.
Isera summons her magic again and moves her hands down in a chopping motion before spreading them apart.
The block of ice splits down the middle, and then the two halves slide sideways. Left in the middle is now the large sphere. I stare at it as it drops down the short distance to the ground now that the ice is no longer encasing it. It looks… familiar. But I’m not sure why.
It’s just a round object in a deep golden color that seems to glow faintly, as if it’s made of light rather than some hard, physical material. Where have I seen—
The orb pulses.
All three of us draw back in surprise.
Then it happens again. Lying there on the ground, the golden sphere pulses several times in rapid succession. It looks remarkably like it’s shaking itself off to get rid of the final traces of freezing coldness from the ice.
“Oh, by Mabona,” I exclaim as I suddenly realize why it looks familiar. “It’s like those spheres that lit the way after the Dryad Queen saved us by dropping us into her underground forest.”
That day when Draven and I fought and he finally broke through the flame of hatred that I had forced into his chest, there were golden orbs floating between the trees.
And they pulsed and moved, almost as if they were alive.
This sphere on the ground looks like that, except it’s bigger and has a deeper and more intense golden color.
“Well, let’s get this one back to her then,” Orion says, and bends down to pick up the slightly pulsing orb.
He hesitates right before touching it. But when nothing happens, he closes the final distance and gently lifts it up from the ground. It starts pulsing faster again, looking like a small animal that is fluffing out its fur. Orion stares down at it in confusion for a while before turning to me.
“Here,” he says, and holds out the sphere for me to take.
But before I can so much as reach towards it, the sphere pulses as if shaking itself off one last time and then flies up from Orion’s palms. We all jerk back in surprise.
The orb, now glowing with warm light, bobs over to Orion’s fancy dark blue shirt and hovers there as if inspecting it.
Then it flows down into his front pocket in a way that is similar to liquid being sucked down a drain.
He starts and blinks down at it incredulously.
It must have shrunk its size as well, because the whole sphere now fits in his pocket. Though the glow is much more intense than before, as if it compressed its energy into a smaller vessel rather than simply changed size.
“Uhm…” Orion says, very eloquently.
The orb pulses as it snuggles deeper into his pocket.
“It appears to like you,” I comment, trying and failing to suppress the amusement in my voice.
Tearing his gaze from the now very contented orb, he looks up and meets my gaze with such a baffled expression on his face that I almost laugh out loud. Next to me, Isera gives him a knowing smirk.
However, before he can figure out what to say, a woman’s voice echoes across the destruction around us.
“It worked!” Kath calls, and waves cheerfully at us.
She, Kyler, and Peter are climbing across broken bits of ice as they make their way towards us.
“Yes, it did,” Isera replies in a voice so low that only Orion and I can hear it. “Finally.” Smug satisfaction shines in her eyes as she slides her gaze to me. “I told you I would shatter this Ice Palace one day.”
A chuckle escapes my lips. “Yes. Yes, you did indeed.”
The three humans draw in deep breaths to refill their lungs as they at last reach us. Bright smiles shine on their faces as they meet our gazes. Then they turn so that they’re facing the same direction we are. Standing there side by side, we just look out over the city below in silence.
The secret tunnels ran underneath the massive ice walls that used to surround the castle, so those high defensive walls were completely destroyed in the explosions. With those gone, it now gives us an uninterrupted view of the city that has always been nestled here at the roots of the mountain.
We all gaze out at it.
Light from the midday sun glitters in Stoneshallow River, which runs through the city. The brightly painted doors of the houses in Ember Hill add splashes of color while the stone and wood buildings almost seem to shine with excitement. As if waiting for their owners to return home.
Kath lets out a deep sigh. “Stonehollow is back. Our city, our home, is back.” She turns to me. Sincerity shines in her eyes as she holds out her hand. “Thank you.”
Clasping her hand, I smile back at her. “Go bring your people home.”
Her eyes light up even more. “We will.”
Kyler and Peter flash us all a smile as well. Then the three of them start down the mountain. Next to me, Isera pulls out a piece of paper from her clothes. I keep my eyes on the humans.
However, they only make it a short distance before Kath turns back towards me and calls, “If you ever pass by this part of the world again, make sure to come by The Black Emerald.” She grins and winks at me. “I’ll buy you a drink and show you how thieves and rebels party.”
With a laugh, I raise my hand in acknowledgement.
She lifts hers to her brow in a playful salute and a final goodbye. Then they disappear behind a large chunk of stone and out of view.
“What is it?” Orion asks in a gentle tone.
Tearing my gaze from the city, I turn to look at my friends instead. A jolt shoots through me when I find Isera staring down at the pieces of paper in her hands while tears slide down her cheeks.
The drawing of the woman who looks almost exactly like her stares back up at her from one of the pages. The other one has two words written in large script at the top: Elena Shaw.
I quickly sweep my gaze over the rest of the words written on the page. My heart clenches as I realize what it says.
Elena Shaw, Isera’s mother, died two months before the Atonement Trials started. Underneath the time of death, there is a sentence detailing that her body was burned and the ashes were tossed from the ice walls around the palace.
One final tear slides down Isera’s cheek as she tilts her head back and gazes up at the open sky.
“Closure,” she replies. A shuddering sigh escapes from deep within her chest. “It is closure.”
A smile, full of both sadness and relief, blows across my face.
On her other side, Orion draws a comforting hand down her arm.
I turn back to the city below, giving them privacy.
Kath and the others reappear from behind a massive chunk of ice before disappearing from view behind another boulder as they continue making their way down the mountain and towards Stonehollow.
I cast a quick glance towards the sphere of golden light that is now nestled in Orion’s pocket.
The humans have reclaimed their home.
Now, it is time for us to do the same.