Chapter 40
forty
Ishifted through the hours, the blizzard raging outside.
While avoiding the mirrored halls, I’d explored the outer corridors of the palace, through the long halls where the I’phri wept and forced soft laughs.
I’d spent every minute since I returned fighting with Aelen, or racking my mind on how to defeat Ovatar.
Killing my father wouldn’t be as simple as taking my dragon and crushing him.
I needed more.
But once again, Aelen had disappeared to the many needy I’phri, and I’d gone searching for him. Shamefully, it took two full laps around the halls before I realized he’d left.
I decided to approach one of the temple leaders, the I’phri I’d avoided since I arrived. It was the famous speaker, the one who would come out in the palace and communicate Maelindiir’s wishes when he still hid in his mirrors, afraid to face his people.
He carried a scowl everywhere he went while glaring at me. I shouldn’t have been surprised when he reluctantly told me Aelen was with the dragons, and punctuated it with an insult: Orii’ens latar.
I didn’t dare venture into the ice before seeking every enchanted piece of clothing I could find. Unfortunately, it appeared Aelen had custom-made those for me, so all I had were some ancient leather gloves.
Enough to keep frostbite from taking my digits, but not much else. Despite my tight wrappings, as soon as I stepped outside, the bitter cold seeped in. I tightened the cloth around my face. Somehow, my breath went through it, condensing into the same dreadful white that colored the world around me.
The painful burning morphed into a piercing sting that stole whatever breath remained in my lungs.
Soon, my trudging became languid, my limbs quickly freezing through.
I plowed through the forest, trying to follow the familiar twist of branches.
A devouring gale blew through the wood and straight through me, almost stopping my progress entirely.
I’d only been out here for what—an hour? Two? But every second that passed pressed me closer to the edge of death. I fought with my frozen legs and jumped through the banks—it was exhausting but somehow easier than trudging.
I hurried down the icy hill toward the thinning trees.
Eventually, they broke, pulling away to reveal the dark form of the stables on the horizon.
Distant cries filled the air, and I glanced overhead at the circling silver beasts.
They hung on the updraft and screamed down into the valley, filling it with a terrible low rumble that shook my feet.
Aelen was here, alright.
I pressed onward through the deepening snow. But when I stared down the long line of stables, there was only a resounding silence and a fresh and terrible emptiness.
This place used to be filled with noise, the rumble and metallic sound of the dragonlings shifting. The liveliness of active platoons training—but now that was gone. Nothing remained but the screaming dragons.
I moved to the training ground I used to be barred from—the clearings behind the buildings, and immediately spotted his dark, robed form. His ashen gray was stark against the snow.
He faced away from me, his attention on the silver beast behind him. The serpent bobbed, enjoying his strokes and, I assumed, softly murmured words. But the closer I got, the more I wanted to run. Numen was enormous, larger than Mourn—and larger still than the dragons that tore the kingdom apart.
A single claw was larger than my chest cavity and could crush it without a second thought.
“Aelen,” I called, my shaking screech echoing across the clearing and barren trees. Numen raised his shedding head, letting his scales fall to the thick snow. In one languid wing beat, he took to the sky and shook the surrounding forest with his departure.
Aelen spun to face me, but he wasn’t the expected picture of calm I’d come to know. Marred with pain, his twisted features matched his swirling horns. “Lorelana?”
I rushed to his side, nearly struck down by the sight of his discomfort. He met me somewhere in the middle, and I didn’t try to control myself—I threw myself into his arms and met his lips.
I shouldn’t have, but I did.
Though the ice beat at my brow, my body filled with warmth as I entwined my fingers through his hair.
He tugged me closer and let his soft hood caress my face, and without a word, slipped open his robes and invited me in.
I’d always known him to be ice in this form, but now he was blazing hot, searing my gloved hands and melting my frozen limbs.
When I finally departed from him and gasped for breath, he stole it again. The surrounding snow banks had melted, with emerald grass shooting up beneath our boots.
I froze, so he shook my shoulders to steal my attention from the melted sanctuary. “You’re freezing, come.”
I didn’t argue and followed, with our fingers still entwined.
He ushered me into an adjoining stable and quickly shut out the cold.
But when he faced me, pain still contorted his features.
I went to him and brushed the stray midnight strands from his face, pinning them above his horns and behind his sharp ear.
“What’s hurting you?”
“It’s uncomfortable to be so far from the palace.”
My stomach churned. “You’re locked in there?”
“Perhaps not by key, but by the curse—by him. The further I go, the more unbearable it becomes.”
“Then why are you out here?”
The pain slipped from his face so a smile could take its place. “Because, my Lorelana, I had to check on your dragon and ensure he was ready for you.”
I wanted to be thrilled about being allowed to take Mourn, but his sorrowful tone sobered me. “Why?”
“Things are getting worse. You can no longer walk through Eltide without risking frostbite or death. This will only worsen in the coming days as O’tvar tries to pry Ilyatria from Arthvurs’ grasp.”
A chill crawled across my skin. “He already has.”
If there was any color to his flesh, it would have paled, too. “It can’t be.”
“It is. He entered my father. I spoke to him. He’s—”
“Horrid,” he finished. “It’s worse than I thought. I thought he was at the outskirts of the city, not ruling it directly.” He swallowed. “I don’t dare approach him with an avatar.”
“I need you to.”
He shook his head and parted from me. “No, we need to get you on Mourn and send you away. It will be more complex, but we’ll sort the pact and then you can flee.”
“You’re suggesting I run.”
“No, I’m telling you that you will.”
“I can’t just let everyone die,” I yelled. “There are people here! Your people, and my people back in Ilyatria.”
“They don’t have a chance. You do. Take it, I’ll give you everything I can to save your life.”
I started toward him and took his hand, but his grip was weak, and his fingers shook. “We can fix this and stop him.”
He took my face into his trembling hands, lifting it. “We can’t. Don’t you know I’ve tried? Once before, and it ended with me like this. Caged to a palace I despise and locked in the form of a monster. I won’t let this befall you, too.”
I wouldn’t agree. Couldn’t agree. But I couldn’t fight him further as the cold battered me. When I said nothing, he took me into his arms and pressed me against his chest so tightly I could hear his heart thundering.
Beat, beat, beat. Each one marking the curse further closing in on us. And I was ashamed to admit that it matched my own.
“I need to take you back. You’re freezing,” he muttered into my hair. “We can discuss this further there.”
Before he could usher me out, I blurted, “You have a heartbeat.”
“So I do. I am mortal, after all. I offered you a knife. If you took it, it would have culled me. But you didn’t, and so I live.”
“But your father’s a god.”
He stiffened, his spine snapping audibly at the intensity.
“He’s no father to me, and no god to this world.
He is nothing but a blight and a stain.” His fingers clenched at my back, wanting to dig, but he restrained himself.
“He gave my mother a child knowing it would kill her before I took my first breath, and he did anyway. He consumed my people in his desire for more power, and is now devouring yours. He’s not a father. ”
“He’s a monster,” I whispered into his robes. He hugged me tighter, his fingers stroking down my spine.
“Let’s get you back now, before you catch a death.”
“It’s not killed me yet,” I replied.
“Yet.” He didn’t elaborate, and he didn’t need to. “I must give you something to aid you in the coming days and killing Arthvur.”
But the finality was merciless, as under no circumstances would I let our people die—whether or not it cost me my life.
When it came to the crushing and oppressive weight of the ever-encroaching curse, my beating heart was inconsequential.
One way or another, I’d have to kill a god.