by Everly Frost
“I appreciate that you arranged the table for me.” Maybe. Maybe I hate it too, because I want to dance and talk with the guests, instead of always watching from a distance while others live their lives.
I find my seat, remaining at my table while the Storm Command forms a semi-circle behind me and along my sides. I watch the dancing and revelry unfold in front of me. It’s hard not to find it contagious, but at the same time, I can’t breathe properly. With every passing second I get closer to the battle in two days.
All of the guests leave me alone, even Jasper keeps his distance which is probably just as well—there’s no explanation I can give him that would make things better—but toward the end of the night, Sebastian’s mother approaches my table. She bows. “Princess.”
“You’re Sahara Splendor,” I say.
“I am.” She has the same eyes as Sebastian—a glistening silver-green. She’s curvy and graceful in a rose gold gown that swathes her shoulders and drapes across her hips. Her voice lilts as she talks, reminding me that the Splendor House is known for its beautiful singing voices.
She looks directly at me, an unexpected intensity, as she says, “It’s a beautiful love story destined to end in tragedy, isn’t it?”
I eye her with caution. Jordan and Sebastian are chatting happily with guests on the other side of the space that’s been cleared for dancing. They haven’t left each other’s sides. “There will be no tragedy here. I won’t allow it.”
She rushes to speak. “No, I don’t mean my son and his lovely wife. I mean you and Commander Rath.”
“What did you say?” Anger shoots through me like a hot iron slamming across my spine. I can’t control it. She’s approached me out of the blue and now she tells me that Baelen and I are some sort of tragedy unfolding like we’re here for everyone’s entertainment. I shoot to my feet. The air thumps. Thunder crashes across the courtyard. Time slows. The dancing and music slow and then stop, plunging us into heavy, angry silence.
Sahara glances around, but she doesn’t seem surprised or worried. I’m the one who is shocked as I realize she’s checking that nobody’s moving.
“I’m sorry to cause you grief, but I needed a way to ignite your thunder.” She spins back to me. “I’ve been speaking with Mai Reverie and I understand you can only slow time for a few minutes.”
“Mai told you?” I’m incredulous and disbelieving. Mai wouldn’t tell anyone that secret unless she trusted them completely. And the only other two people I thought Mai trusted were her husband, Darian, and her advisor, Rebecca.
Sahara ignores my question. “Which is why I’m going to speak plainly. Commander Rath is one of my son’s true friends—a loyal friendship that I refuse to forsake. But the Commander bound himself to you, vowing to love and protect you, and now you hold his life in your hands. Will you really not yield? Or will you kill him?”
I glare at her. “You’re missing the third option: Will he kill me?”
Her eyes widen. “But that’s not an option. He can’t kill you.”
“Yes, he can—”
“He bound himself to you. He can’t harm you. Not even to protect himself. Not even to defend himself against you.”
Everything spins around me. My stomach lurches and my vision blurs. I stumble back against my chair, coming up hard against its edges. “But…”
She studies me. It would be very hard for her to miss my shock right now; it’s slamming off me in waves. “You didn’t realize.” It’s a statement, not a question. “You thought that the deep magic from the Heartstone Protocols would override his oath and allow him to fight you?”
“Yes!”
Her eyes glisten and her Splendor heritage shines in them. “You hold the power now, Princess.”
“I won’t kill him.”
She stands straighter and her eyes light up with hope. “Then you’ll yield? Despite what you said before?”
“No. I can’t do that either.” I grip the edge of the table to prevent myself from sliding beneath it. My knuckles burn white hot against the wood. “I know that makes no sense. But I have no choice. I have to win, but I can’t kill him.”
She leans forward, assessing me, but it’s not a cold calculation, it’s a look as old as time, a female’s wisdom when she understands there are no good choices but a choice has to be made. “Then you need a solution—a solution that I can provide.”
I jerk backward, not trusting her closeness. “Why are you doing this?”
“Because I owe you an enormous debt and I see a way to repay it.” She leans back too, giving me space, and cautiously sweeps her hand out in a gesture at our surroundings. “Do you like the flowers?”
I hadn’t noticed before, but I do now. Gladiolus flowers are scattered among the roses glistening on the ground, their gentle lavender petals mingling with the red rose petals. “Are you the reason for the flowers?”
“Not just me. I condemned the way you were treated during the battle in the arena. It was abhorrent. Beyond belief. I went to Mai Reverie immediately to seek her council about what I could do to protect you. I knew there was very little I could do to defend you physically, but if I could unite the people in your favor then you would have their support. I suggested the flowers and Mai grew them herself, hundreds of them.”
I want to thank her—I know I have to thank Mai and I will—but I still don’t know if I can trust Sahara.
She says, “Then you saved my son’s life. I knew that no matter what trial the Elven Command chose to administer, Sebastian would choose to die rather than fight his friends. Especially because he thought he’d lost Jordan.” She pauses, sucking in her breath. “The only way I can repay you for saving his life is by saving a life that you… care about.”
I zero in on her, choosing to ignore her comment about me caring about Baelen. I can’t acknowledge that to anyone. I can’t speak it aloud because then I’ll break down. I grip the table harder, not caring that the power of thunder gives me the strength to press so hard that splinters break off beneath my palms. I’m probably drawing blood but if I stop holding onto this table right now, I’ll lose my hold on my emotions. “Can you call off the battle? Can you make your father put a stop to it?”
“No, I’m sorry, but… are you aware that I’m a healer?”
When I shake my head, a jerky side-to-side motion, she says, “I’ve saved the lives of many beloved sons. And husbands. And lov—”
I snap, cutting her off. “Where are you going with this?”
“I don’t mind saying that I’m quite talented, especially in knowing which medicines to administer. Medicines aren’t spells of course, so they can be given to champions despite the protective spells.”
She pulls a vial from the delicate rose-gold clutch she holds in her hands. The vial is small, the size of a thimble, and sparkles gold too. “This one slows the heartbeat so much that it looks like someone’s dead. All you have to do is nick them and they fall within moments. And this one… revives them.”
The second vial is silver. She places both side by side on the table. She leans toward me, whispering, “Spin gold, shelter silver. He is worth more than both, yes?”
I stare at the vials as her footsteps retreat. One vial to make it look like he’s dead. The other to wake him up when it’s all over… Is this actually possible? Could this be the solution I desperately need?
When I look up again, she’s gone. Not wasting another moment, I scoop up the vials and hide them inside one of my gloves. I’m just in time before the dancers come alive around me again. Everything resumes as if nothing happened and Sahara Splendor doesn’t look back. She glides over to her son and gives him a hug, drawing Jordan into her embrace as well. The love between them is so strong that any suspicion I had about Sahara’s motives melts away.
The celebration might be continuing around me as if nothing’s changed, but something has changed. Sahara Splendor just gave me hope. My first real hope that I can keep Baelen alive.
33. Baele
n Rath
The winged stallion soars across the night sky above the Revenant mountains, my homeland spread out beneath us. I glance at Macsen, a silhouette on the stallion he rides beside me. We have to reach Scepter Peak in time.
As we fly across the next valley, flickering lamps traveling up the mountain range tell me that the battalion of soldiers is close to the gargoyle’s nest.
“There!” Macsen’s shout is carried away in the wind.
I urge my stallion down toward the ground, preparing to leap from its back. There isn’t time to slow down. Beside me, Macsen slips both legs over one side of his horse, ready to somersault to the ground as soon as we’re near enough.
The soldiers pressing through the snow cover lift their lamps as soon as we soar overhead. The captain at their head calls a command to stop. He’s the same male who helped me during the night patrols leading up to the Heartstone Ceremony. I leap from my horse, somersaulting and landing on my feet at a run. Macsen lands several steps behind me, running to a halt nearby.
We’re both wearing armor and carrying as many weapons as we could grab in the minutes we had to prepare before taking off on the stallions.
“Commander Rath!” The captain hurries forward, holding his lamp high.
I rise to my full height. “Captain, your orders have changed.”
He considers me for a moment. Even in the dim light, it’s impossible to miss the relief that washes across his features. “The Elven Command sent us here to deal with the gargoyle threat. They ordered us to keep the mission secret. We were not to speak of it to anyone—including you.”
The Elven Command sent a whole battalion of soldiers into Rath land to kill one gargoyle and his children.
The captain meets my eyes. He won’t ask me how I found out. I won’t tell him that it was Jasper, who has been quietly monitoring the movement of all troops from the city while Macsen arranged House of Mercy elves to monitor the border to Rath land and report back about any unusual movement.
Everyone who opposes the Elven Command is at the wedding tonight. They expected me to be there too. It killed me to miss it, but I won’t allow a gargoyle family to be killed because I want to indulge in a moment of happiness.
The captain’s breath frosts in the air as he asks, “What are your orders, Commander?”
“Go home, Captain. The gargoyle threat is not yours to fight this night.”
“Thank you, Commander.”
He signals for the troops to turn around, but none of them moves and for a moment, my heart sinks. Are they going to disobey me?
The captain considers the quiet battalion for a moment, and I can’t identify his intentions before he turns back to me. “We heard about the outcome of the trial of wits,” he says. “You will face the Storm Princess in battle. We also heard that the Princess won’t yield. Yet… her survival is necessary for our survival. Without her, the Storm will rage.”
I swallow. Clear my throat. “My duty to protect Erawind is more important than my life.”
He gives me a quiet nod. “It has been an honor to serve with you, Commander.”
The battalion of soldiers stands tall, each tapping his chest, saluting me. Then they turn and head quietly down the mountain again. It’s a long trek back to the border of Rath land, where they left a herd of winged stallions to take them home again.
Once they’re gone, I turn to Macsen. “The Elven Command will have a backup plan. We have to hurry.”
He doesn’t waste any time, taking off ahead of me up the peak. The location of the gargoyle’s nest is only two hundred feet away, wedged between rock faces in a shallow cave. It’s the same male that Marbella saved. He’s smart, moving his nest every few days to a new location. I lost track of him a few days ago, but unfortunately, the Elven Command didn’t. It baffles me how they found out. The only remaining possibility is that they’re somehow using flying creatures—birds—to surveil the mountains, but that would take sorcery of a kind that is outlawed in Erawind.
I hurry after Macsen, darting through the snow flurry, my eyes adjusting to the dark as I run. I catch up to him at the top of the next peak. He crouches at the entrance to a maze of rock faces. The entries and exits to the nest will be narrow. We’ll have to proceed one at a time.
No matter how many soldiers the Elven Command sends, they would never survive a battle with a gargoyle like this one—he would pick them off one by one. Even an approach from above is difficult in this location; the jagged outcrops make landing a flying creature nearly impossible.
I know these peaks well.
I also know there are better places to hide. My goal tonight is to convince the gargoyle to relocate to one of them.
I grip Macsen’s shoulder. “I’ll go first.”
He shakes his head. “It’s my job to keep you alive, Baelen.”
“Macsen.” My shoulders slump. “Marbella has chosen her path. I don’t know why, but she made it clear that she won’t yield—”
“She wouldn’t say that.”
He didn’t believe me when I told him. He didn’t believe Jasper, either. The soldier’s salute just now doesn’t seem to have convinced him, either.
I close my eyes against his denial. Ever since Marbella offered me her hand, my heart has been dying a slow death. A small part of me still feels something, but I’ve tucked my feelings away, far from where I can reach them.
Now, I have to make the most of the days I have left.
“I’m living on borrowed time, Macsen. I can’t control what happens in the final fight, but I can control what I do between now and then. If one of us dies tonight, it will be me.”
A deep, unhappy crease appears across his forehead. “I don’t think so.”
He spins to the opening, but I was ready for his stubborn behavior and I’m not afraid to use dirty tactics to stop him. I step forward at the same time he does, ram my shoulder against his, and use his sideways momentum to push him off track, slipping my foot across his. He jolts, trips, then rights himself, but not fast enough.
I dodge his outstretched hand and slip through the narrow opening into the tight pass between the rocks. The constricted corridor extends for fifty paces before it lets out into the clearing with the shallow cave.
I’m sure Macsen wants to shout at me right now, but that would be foolhardy this close to the nest. He doesn’t make a sound as he follows my steps.
The clearing is dark up ahead, the low hanging outcrop obscuring the stars. I slow my approach, taking deep breaths, preparing myself. It’s been a long time since I fought a gargoyle—or more importantly, it’s been a long time since a gargoyle saw me as a threat. It leaves a sick feeling in my stomach that this gargoyle thinks I’m here to kill his children.
I grip the stone wall for a moment, pushing away the memory of tiny running feet through the wilderness, a little girl’s sobbing scream, and the moment when I made a choice about who I really am. That was when I decided that my race does not determine whom I protect.
I reach for the string of talons and claws that used to hang around my neck before I remember that I left it far behind me, the same place I left the last three years of my life. All I have now to prove to this gargoyle that I mean no harm is my actions.
Leaving my weapons fully harnessed, I extend my hand back at Macsen, planting my palm against his chest: Stop.
When he edges forward, I give him a firm shake of my head. I want him to stay out of sight.
Lifting my hands up in front of me, I splay my fingers to show that I don’t hold a weapon, and then I move, inch by slow inch, into the clearing.
I clear the entrance.
The air shifts to my right, the slightest movement.
My instincts kick in.
I duck the enormous fist aimed for my emerging head—a blow that would have crushed my skull against the rocks. I dart forward at a crouch and retaliate with a fist swung back into the gargoyle’s knee cap.
He roars, his wings spreading, and his wing daggers
pointing down. I keep moving but he follows me, quick and agile. His fist meets my cheek but luckily my movement lessens the impact. I fight back with two quick blows perfectly landed on his cheek and temple.
His eyes widen for a second, clearly surprised that I survived the crushing blow to my face just now, let alone hit back with fists that, well, he might try to hide it, but I hurt him. He inhales, his eyes widening further—this time for reasons I can’t fathom—but he shakes it off.
His response is to rain blows onto me. He can’t spread his wings fully in the confined space, but he uses them to catch the air and gain height, slamming each fist down onto my head and shoulders. Bare to the waist, his muscles ripple across his chest with every movement.
I keep moving, block several blows with my own fists, and flow with the others. I’ll only be in real trouble if he pins me against the rock.
Or if he decides to use his wing daggers.
I hit back, my own crushing blows to his side, chest, chin. A thin line of blood trickles from his split lip.
His clawed foot flies toward me, attempting to knock me against the rocks, but I dodge it. The rock face cracks where he hit it. Fissures speed through the mottled surface and chips fall from up high.
He growls as I dart away from him, his threatening snarls becoming fierce and anxious when I stop between him and the cave, a threat between him and his children, the most dangerous place I could put myself.
“I’m here to warn you, not harm you,” I say.
His chest heaves, growls filling the air around us. “All elves are murderers.”
“Gargoyles have their share of evil, too.” I slowly reach for the weapons harness around my waist, sliding the clasp loose to remove it and hold it high. I throw it to the entrance at the side of the clearing. Macsen remains concealed inside the corridor. I can barely distinguish his shape from the boulders around the space.
