Chapter 35
Thirty-Five
Icehold
There was nothing but time available to me, and it needed to be used wisely. I let the full weight of my body sink onto the fae carrying me, and I meditated. Under the circumstances, I thought my focus was pretty good, but with every step I had to fight for control.
In the little cabin in my mind, I had some cleaning up to do.
Whatever I’d done when it had all spilled out of me had had disastrous effects in my head.
The cabin was distorted, and I couldn’t focus on any one part of it at first. I began the task of reconstructing it until finally I could settle myself back inside.
But everything was different.
Just like my physical body, my magical body was more sensitive. Sounds, feelings, everything was amplified. Schula had once told me that magic could reach for other magic in this place, so I sat down in the middle of the cabin and meditated.
One . . . two . . . three . . .
I could nearly hear Schula in my head, sitting outside Thanantholl and instructing me.
One . . . two . . . three . . .
On the edge of my hearing was fluttering. The sound of a preening bird.
Still counting and doing my breathing, I carefully stood and walked to the window. I hadn’t constructed anything around my little cabin but an empty field, so with nowhere else to land, Puko sat on the ground, staring at me with his milky blind eye.
Of all the things I’d thought I could reach out to from here, this bird was not one of them. I opened my mouth to call out to him, but nothing came out. It dawned on me that I couldn’t speak in here, so I went to the door instead and reached out for him.
He opened his beak in an empty caw and hopped a few steps toward me, but he kept his milky eye trained on me, unblinking.
I reached out my hands to pick him up, but he pecked my wrist and backed away with another silent caw.
I don’t know what you want. I shook my head at him.
He shook his head back at me and took off. I watched him go until he was a speck in the sky.
Puko was no ordinary raven, that much I had always known. But what he was doing here—whether it was him or a figment of my mind—would remain a mystery for now. I retreated back into the cabin but left the door open in case he returned.
Then I sat on the floor once again and focused.
One . . . two . . . three . . .
Then I felt the subtle warmth. Floating just above my shoulder was a tiny thread of fire. I almost didn’t notice it, but as soon as I reached out to touch it, I felt it sink into me.
My heart skipped a beat. It was my fire. It was a part of me. It was coming back.
I was jolted by a large bump in the road.
My eyes, my real eyes, flew open. I blinked, looking around.
We had begun to climb the foot of a mountainside at some point, and we were traveling uphill.
I craned my neck, trying to see Puko or where the brutes carrying Schula were, but they were nowhere to be found.
Trees and boulders blocked my view, and a cold wind whipped my braids around me.
Closing my eyes again, I focused on sitting and counting, reaching around me for more tiny threads.
I slowly pulled little wisps of fire to me. Tiny bits of myself that were sinking back into where they’d come from.
When I couldn’t find any more around me, I took inventory of what I had been able to get back.
It was tiny. A small ball of heat inside me that could cook a meal or maybe light a fireplace.
I settled the little ball of fire deep within myself and opened my eyes again.
I didn’t know how much time had passed, but it was getting dark.
The mountain peaks were tall around us, looming with a threatening height and sharp evergreens growing tall toward the sky.
Our pace had picked up. I heard Asher mumble something in the front of the group, and we began a gentle descent.
I was afraid to know exactly how high we had climbed to already be heading downward again, but hopefully we were heading somewhere safe for the night. I thought about the flesh hounds and shivered.
“Getting cold, warmblood?” My guard (who still didn’t have a name, so I’d started calling him Brute) chuckled at me.
“Where are we going?” I asked softly, not wanting to get in trouble for talking now that we were closer to Asher. The last thing I needed was his attention.
Brute shrugged. “Icehold.”
Which was no answer, since I had no idea what or who Icehold was.
The slope continued for a while, and I watched the sun dip dangerously close to the mountainside. It was getting too dark and too cold for my comfort, and I held my breath with every moment that passed, hoping we were almost to shelter.
Finally, the movement at the front of the group behind me changed. Asher called out something about formation, and Brute moved us to the back of the line.
I craned my neck to see where we were, and finally a structure of sorts came into view.
Carved stone sprouting right from the mountain itself opened into a gaping maw that descended into the rock.
Countless stairs went down, down, down into a dark cavern.
Instead of cave walls, though, everything was carved.
Inlays of gold, silver, and jade depicted fae, monsters, the mountains, and animals I had never seen before.
My jaw dropped, forgetting for a moment that I was being taken against my will into the depths of the Winter’s Teeth.
My eyes covered every inch of wall, of ceiling, of pillar that they could reach.
Soft curves, intricate details, smooth edges.
They put Bryn’s little wood carvings to shame.
A lump caught in my throat as I inspected the tiny gold inlay depicting the embroidery of a young girl’s elaborate gown.
It went on like that for as far as I could see in the fading light.
We walked for a long time down those stairs, and I wondered how any of them could bring themselves to step on such glorious decoration as though it were an old, worn rug.
I wondered what kind of people could have carved all of this.
The descent finally ended with a torchlit gate. Two guards dressed in black leather opened the metal bars as Asher approached.
A scent hit my nose, and I winced as I realized they were burning their hands. The gate was solid iron. Would that burn me now too? What would affect me differently, now that I had come into my skin?
The guards didn’t flinch; they just stared stone-faced ahead and didn’t so much as glance at the half breed being hauled past them.
We kept marching through the gates and into what could only be a city, but there were no separate buildings.
Icehold.
Everything, like the grand staircase behind us, was carved from the mountain. There was little made of wood, and there were candles and oil lamps everywhere. In lanterns, in windows, on shelves carved outside of doorways seemingly for the express purpose of holding light.
Eyes peered at me from around corners and through windowpanes.
The Winter Court for sure. The thing that struck me as odd was their clothing.
It all looked so shabby. Hand-me-downs of hand-me-downs, garments I was more than familiar with.
It made me realize I hadn’t seen one item of patched clothing since entering the Wyldes until now.
If this was their common citizen, the Winter Court was far poorer than either Autumn or Spring.
We continued through the streets, pushing fae who were brave enough to be there out of the way and heading toward something I couldn’t see around Brute’s shoulders.
Then I started seeing silk.
And gold, and veils, and flowers. Money.
It was as though we’d stepped through a curtain and found the upper class.
The difference between what I had been seeing and what I saw now was staggering.
And the clothes . . . I remembered Eberon saying that the clothing style here would be eccentric, but I hadn’t been prepared for this.
The females in this area wore fine lace or thin silk veils that covered their whole bodies to the floor and were held in place by ornate circlets on their heads.
Beneath the see-through layer, they seemed to be in competition with one another as to who could wear the smallest amount of clothing despite the freezing temperatures.
Every bit of fabric was covered with beadwork or embroidery.
At least I won’t be too out of place with my missing tunic.
The males were little better. Other than the leather-clad warriors, the fae in this aristocratic district walked around with no shirts and a finer version of the kilted wraps that the human plainsmen favored in battle.
What they lacked in cloth on their bodies they made up for in jewelry. Rings, ear cuffs, bracelets, necklaces, and items I couldn’t even identify adorned them like jewel boxes. Even King Baeleon’s court wasn’t this extravagant.
The deeper into the richest part of the city we went, the more activity happened around us. Lanterns were being installed, decorations strung on thin ropes to be hung above us, crossing back and forth overhead.
“What is happening?” I said more to myself than anyone else, but Brute graced me with an answer anyway.
“Solstice preparations,” he grunted.
I stared, bewildered, as we marched on. The ever-changing but ever-the-same carved walls still held my fascination over everything else. When I was thoroughly lost from the twists and turns of the carved city, we halted in front of another grand gate made of iron.
This one took four guards to open, and again I could smell the damage to their bare hands as we passed. The gate took us to an open doorway, which took us through a grand carpeted entrance, which took us through a series of lavish halls.
I was lifted and set on my feet in one swift motion, showing me the gilded door we had just passed through and an opulent room.
I hadn’t realized how much blood must have been flowing to my head, because as it rushed to the rest of my now upright body, I nearly fainted.
I was still seeing spots when a gnarled voice spoke.
“Asher,” it drawled. “What have you brought before us?”
The big gray male kneeled before a dais, on which was a grand throne of marble. A smaller, only slightly less elaborate throne sat empty next to the first. The fae who could only be the Winter King sat with disgust and disinterest as he looked down his nose at his servant.
His skin was the palest blue, almost white, and his eyes were piercing.
His hair was a smoky gray, and it fell around his shoulders with a few small braids adorning it.
Unlike his court, he wore little jewelry, a single pendant and three rings.
Behind him stood two thin wisps, almost shadows with white eyes.
It was difficult to make out their shape in the low light of the room.
When I tried to focus on them, I got a sharp pain behind my eyes, and they seemed to be ever-whispering though I couldn’t understand a word of what they said.
“My king, I bring you something we haven’t seen in these lands in an age.”
Mumbles pricked my ears and told me the room held more than just the captivating figure in front of us. I glanced around, quickly taking in the forms of more Winter nobility before focusing again on the fae on the throne.
A hand grabbed my bound wrists and yanked me into the light, leaving me to stumble on the white carpet at the King’s feet.
“We found this half breed in the Sangolins without your permission.” Asher bowed his head. “She was burning off a considerable amount of fire in the crater.”
The king tapped a finger on the arm of his throne for a moment before he leaned forward and his nose twitched. The wisps behind him thrashed and hissed, whispering even more fiercely in his ears.
“You,” the king rumbled and stood suddenly, bringing his court to their knees around him. “How did you come to exist?”
I had no clue how I was supposed to answer that. None at all, so I tried to say something that might lessen his wrath at me.
“I don’t know my parents, Your Majesty. I was raised by humans. Please, I am here with your permission. I was traveling with an envoy from the Autumn Lands, I’m—”
Smack.
Asher stood over me in a flash, backhanding me. I spun and fell to the ground, landing on my shoulder hard as I cried out from the impact. I gasped at the sharp pain, the eye on the right side of my face watering in protest.
“That is not the answer King DuVarick asked for!” Asher roared.
“She was traveling with others?” the king asked, still not taking his piercing eyes off me.
“Yes.” Asher bowed his head and took a knee once again. “Sire, it was Schula.”
The roar that echoed in the room could have shattered bone if we weren’t all fae as the Winter King leaned forward, baring his fangs and howling out in fury. My stomach lurched watching the wisps writhe and dance at the display.
“Throw this one to the below. We will deal with her later. We will have Schula in front of us now.”
So the king ordered, and so I was taken away.
The room still spun as I was carried out by Brute, and I cried out for Schula. Her still-limp body was carried by me as I screamed. She didn’t wake up; she didn’t even twitch.
Still, I screamed for her as I was carried down a narrow hall until she was out of sight.
Until I was out of sight.
Until I noticed I was being taken somewhere even the torchlight wouldn’t touch.
As the last flicker of distant fire left us, so did my raw voice.
Brute threw me onto what must have been a straw-covered floor, and then it was just me.
Me, and the below.