Chapter 37
Chapter thirty-seven
“Wha—what?” Marina mumbled, stirring groggily from sleep. Her eyes fluttered open to find Eva hovering over her, her face pale and frantic. Startled, Marina yelped, tumbling out of her bed in a heap of blankets.
Eva bent down, putting a finger to her lip before her hands flew through signs.
Marina blinked, still shaking off the haze of sleep, struggling to follow her movements. “You’re awake!” Marina exclaimed, wrapping her arms around Eva.
But Eva pushed her away, shaking her head vigorously.
“What’s wrong?” Marina asked, suddenly fully awake.
Tempest appeared beside Eva. “She says Gisela is heading into danger.”
Marina jumped up from the floor and dashed into the main room. Her face fell. Thorne was alone on the bedroll, Gisela nowhere in sight. Marina hurried out the front door and sprinted down the beach, her eyes frantically sweeping the darkened shoreline.
As she looked up in frustration, something caught her eye. Something was glinting in the moonlight, halfway up the cliff.
Gisela was embedding shards of ice in the rock to pull herself higher.
“Gisela! What the hell are you doing!? Are you insane?” Marina’s voice rang out, panic surging as she watched the dangerous ascent.
She didn’t even think.
Marina rushed into the churning sea, the aggressive waves battering her as she fought for balance. “Ondine, I need you to get me up there.”
A hint of hesitation came from Ondine, but the Primal obeyed anyway, lifting Marina in a powerful surge of water toward the top of the cliff.
At the top, she stood with her arms crossed, her stern expression fixed on Gisela as she climbed the final few feet. “What are you doing?”
“I’m going to Frosthaven. I had to go around the barrier somehow,” Gisela responded with a wave of her hand.
“You have lost your damn mind,” Marina shot back. “You can’t go alone. Not now. Thorne will have a fit!”
“I need to see my family.”
“You saw how bad it was here! If the same thing is happening over there, you won’t survive it.”
Gisela scoffed, her expression hardening. “You sound like Thorne. I don’t need protection. My family does.”
“Gisela, please,” Marina implored, throwing her arms out. “I can’t let you go alone, and we can’t leave here yet. Eva just woke up. Throwing her into more chaos right away isn’t an option.” Marina caught the briefest easing in Gisela’s face at the mention of Eva waking, but it passed quickly.
“You have your father here with you. You know he’s safe,” Gisela said, her voice quiet but cutting. “How do you think I feel? Not knowing if my family is even alive.”
Marina swallowed a knot in her throat as the image of her crew flashed through her mind. The faces of those she couldn’t save haunted her, and she understood Gisela’s desperation all too well. “Nothing I say will make you change your mind?”
Gisela shook her head.
“What about Thorne? I can’t keep this from him. He’ll burn me alive.”
“By the time he finds out, I’ll already be in Frosthaven. He’ll be angry, but it doesn’t matter.”
“Easy for you to say, you won’t be here,” Marina muttered. She had no desire to deal with that. “Fine,” Marina sighed. “I’ll walk with you.”
A few small animals with swirling white eyes emerged from the shadows. Gisela froze them instantly. Her steps were confident as they walked to Aquamere’s Guardian Tree.
“Gisela, I feel sick to my stomach. Please, don’t do this,” Marina pleaded, her voice trembling. “I can’t handle losing you too.”
“If there’s immediate danger, I’ll come right back. I promise you,” Gisela replied.
Marina’s stomach churned as they approached the base of the tree.
She gripped her own elbows, her fingers digging into her skin through her sleeves.
She had never been so conflicted. The reality of the danger Gisela could be walking into was a weight on her chest, made heavier by the thought of Thorne.
To help Gisela was to betray his trust; to stop her was to abandon her friend.
But if it were her own family, she wouldn’t hesitate either.
She knew she couldn’t deny Gisela this chance, no matter how much it scared her.
“What happened to the fearless Marina I’ve come to know?” Gisela asked, glancing at her as they drew closer to the tree.
“That was before I lost everything,” Marina whispered.
Gisela’s expression softened. “You haven’t lost everything. You still have us.”
Marina nodded but the knot in her throat held. “I’ll wait here for a few minutes. If you don’t come back right away, I’ll assume you’re okay. And you are going to be okay . . . right?”
Gisela pulled her close. “I’m sorry for putting you through this.”
Marina wanted to hold on, to stop her. But she knew better than to try. She blinked back tears, her voice cracking. “I get it. But when you get back, you’re in big trouble.”
A soft laugh escaped Gisela’s lips as she pulled away, locking eyes with Marina one last time. She turned and placed her hand on the trunk of the tree.
The forest stilled. The leaves on the Guardian Tree shuddered, though there was no wind.
Gisela went rigid.
Marina watched her grip tighten against the bark, watched the color drain from her face. For a heartbeat, Gisela didn’t move at all—just stared at something Marina couldn’t see.
Then Gisela looked back at her. There was no explanation in her eyes. Only urgency. Fear.
A decision already made.
“Gisela, wait—don’t!” she called out.
Gisela vanished, leaving Marina to drop to her knees.
“Damn it!”
Marina had said she would wait. She’d told herself she would trust Gisela’s promise to come back if something was wrong. Scrambling to her feet instead, she sprinted back toward the house.
Marina barreled through the door, jolting Thorne awake. Breathless and flushed, she paced the room.
“What?” Thorne asked, rising on one elbow, scanning the empty space where Gisela had been. “Where’s Gisela?”
Marina flinched, running a hand through her hair.
“Marina . . . where is she?” Thorne scanned the empty room. He closed his eyes, focused, before disappointment was etched in his features.
Marina exhaled shakily. “She went to Frosthaven, Thorne.”
Thorne’s anger surged, flames erupting at his fingertips as a wave of heat enveloped the space, stealing the oxygen from the room. Without another word, he stormed outside and unleashed his fire, the blast sending the ocean recoiling in a hiss of steam.
Marina rushed after him as Adrian, Eva, and Silas followed close behind.
Thorne looked to where Terranox slept.
He was gone.
“Where is Terranox?” he demanded. “Terranox!”
Adrian approached Thorne cautiously. “You can’t take him. He has to go back to Mystic Isle. He probably already left.”
Thorne’s eyes were wild as he turned to Adrian. “Adrian, go after her. Please.”
Adrian shook his head. “I can’t. I won’t leave Eva. She needs me here, especially now that she’s awake.”
Thorne’s frustration boiled over. “Gisela!” He dropped to the ground. “Why won’t she answer me?”
Marina watched his face shift.
“The bond is still there,” he said. “But she’s distant.”
“She hesitated,” Marina said. “I think she saw something but she went anyway. I tried to stop her.”
Thorne’s head snapped up, anger igniting in his eyes. “You were there?” he growled. “How could you let her do this, Marina?”
Marina narrowed her gaze. “Don’t you dare blame me. She wasn’t changing her mind. What was I supposed to do, hold her down? She’s not a child.”
Thorne’s face softened, but before anyone could respond, a powerful rush of wind swept across the beach.
Terranox descended from the sky, landing hard in the sand, his wings stirring the waves into froth.
“Thorne, please, think this through,” Silas said, taking slow steps toward him. “Let her do what she needs to do. Gisela is strong. You know that.”
“She went alone,” Thorne said. “Into something already unstable.”
Silas frowned, his concern deepening. “Rushing in without a plan could make things worse. She might come back before you even get there.”
Thorne closed his eyes, bringing his hands to his temples.
For a second, Marina thought he might actually listen.
“Ignitus,” he called. “Can you sense Eira?”
“I can feel her,” Ignitus said. “Gisela can’t hear you from this far away. They’re using enormous power.”
The ground felt less solid under Marina’s feet.
Thorne’s eyes snapped open. He was already moving toward Terranox as he spoke. “If that much power is being used, waiting isn’t safer. It’s worse.”
“But we have no plan!” Marina shouted.
He settled into the saddle, hand gripping the leather strap. “I’m bringing her back. That’s the plan. If I stay here and something happens to her—” His voice broke off. “I won’t forgive myself.”
Terranox launched into the air.
Adrian sighed and Aerion appeared next to him, shaking his head. “Well, this is a disaster.” Adrian muttered a curse and turned back to the house with Eva in tow.
Marina watched in frustration as Thorne and Terranox disappeared into the night, the dragon’s silhouette blending with the darkness.
He always acts first, thinks later.
Marina let out a ragged sigh. Her hands wouldn’t stop trembling as she tried to grasp how quickly everything had splintered.
Silas placed a hand on Marina’s shoulder. “He’s acting out of fear. And love.”
Marina nodded. “I know. How long until we go after them?”
Silas’s gaze was distant. “First, we need to make sure Eva is stable.”
“I agree,” Marina said solemnly, following him into the house.
With a final glance at the night sky, Silas closed the door.