Shadow Frost (Shadow Frost Trilogy Book 1)

by Coco Ma

  “They’re beautiful.” Asterin trailed her fingers along them, hovering over the empty center where a final stone representing the tenth element might have rested, had it not been long forbidden. Shadow—said to be the most powerful of all, equivalent to the power of the other nine elements combined. “Thank you.”

  Garringsford nodded, and then after shooting a quick glance at Queen Priscilla, ever her mother’s obedient pet, she said, “I understand you’ve been trying to unlock a third fundamental, Your Highness.”

  Asterin’s shoulders tensed. “What of it?”

  “In order for our soldiers to reach their fullest potential, they must be trained in both physical and magical combat. I fear they are lacking in the latter, but I believe that watching you practice your magic might provide crucial insight on how to better train them.”

  Ah, Asterin thought, letting out a soft laugh. The “gift” makes sense now. “Is it truly a gift when one asks for something in return, General?”

  “An exchange, then,” Garringsford said bluntly. “Call it whatever you will, Your Highness, it matters not to me.”

  Asterin narrowed her eyes at the general, trying to gauge a second motive behind that impassive stare, tamping down the growing unease worming through her stomach. “I’ve never practiced under the watch of others.”

  Her mother glided away from the window, crossing beneath the glittering chandelier and approaching her. Asterin did her best not to shrink from that intimidating grace, suddenly reminded of a deadly snake disguised as a swan. “Come, my child,” the queen coaxed. “Just pick up the stones.”

  Asterin didn’t want to pick up the stones. Garringsford wanted her to, and Asterin would never trust anything the general said—not since her father’s death. But her desire to please her mother overpowered her reluctance.

  “The fundamental trinity,” Asterin began, sweeping her hand over the triangle. She picked up the top stone. It illuminated as soon as she touched it. “Water.” The two women came to her side, peering over either shoulder. “Earth.” The earthstone came to rest in the cup of her palm beside the waterstone, their lights intertwining. With her other hand, Asterin cradled the third core affinity stone. It stayed dark. “And fire. I’ve been practicing, but I can’t seem to get it to cooperate.”

  “Two fundamentals,” Garringsford said. “And an ice affinity, of course. Any others?”

  Asterin nodded. “Light and wind, but those developed when I was older.”

  Although she didn’t remember it—she had only been a month old—the tale of her Revealing Ceremony had been one of her father’s favorites to recount. Revealing Ceremonies were momentous occasions, a tradition dating back thousands of years. In honor of the first—and only—child of the new royal family, noble and royal envoys from all nine kingdoms had been invited, and hundreds of Axarians had flocked to the capital to celebrate. The ceremony itself was simple—nine drops of blood pricked from each finger but the right pinky. One drop per stone. The sigils on the stones represented not only an affinity, but also a god or goddess—for the nine affinities originated from the blood of the Immortals. That blood ran through the veins of every mortal, no matter how small the quantity.

  At her ceremony, three stones had glowed—those bearing the sigils of Lord Tidus, God of Water; Lady Siore, Goddess of Earth; and Lord Conrye, God of Ice and the House of the Wolf, whose stone had shone brightest of all.

  Her kingdom had rejoiced. If any other stone had shone brighter, by tradition, she would have belonged to a different House, as her mother did. Queen Priscilla belonged to the House of the Peacock in Oprehvar—for it was Lord Pavon’s power of illusion running through her veins.

  Asterin returned the firestone to its place. “And you, General? What are your affinities?” She knew the answer, but it was worth asking just to see Garringsford grimace.

  “I was born unifinitied,” came the grudging answer. “Only ice.”

  Almost every person inherited at least one or more affinities when they were born, and most, like Queen Priscilla and the general, would only ever be able to wield their single element. Those who could wield two elements were bifinitied. Even rarer were the trifinitied, like Orion. Asterin was multifinitied—meaning she could wield more than three elements, though at the time of her Revealing Ceremony, the stones of Lady Reyva, Goddess of Wind, and Lord Ulrik, God of Light, had remained inactive. Her wind affinity manifested when she was six, and her light affinity took three years to follow.

  There were legends, too, of those who could wield all nine elements, known as the omnifinitied, their power equal to that of the tenth element—shadow, the affinity born from the powers of King Eoin, Ruler of Darkness. But the accounts of the omnifinitied that Asterin had come by were few and far between, and she certainly hadn’t heard of any still living today.

  Asterin prepared to call forth her water affinity, laying the earthstone back in the chest. “You might want to take a step back. This can get a bit messy.”

  “What incantations do you use?” Garringsford asked.

  Asterin chewed her lip, wondering if she could get away with lying. She went with a half-truth. “A few here and there. My tutors forced me to use them as a child, but I’ve found that I prefer not to confine my magic to the boundaries of a spell.”

  Garringsford’s brow raised. “That’s practically unheard of.”

  Asterin opened her mouth to retort, but then her mother’s hand fluttered onto her shoulder and squeezed.

  “Perhaps you could give General Garringsford an example,” the queen said.

  How could she not oblige? “Fine.” Asterin grimaced slightly, her tone far sharper than she had intended. Her mother’s hand tightened on her shoulder, and Asterin couldn’t help the small part of her that wished the queen would tell the general off for once. “I suppose you could use a simple summoning spell.”

  Garringsford’s steel eyes glinted—a challenge. “Would Your Highness be kind enough to demonstrate?”

  Asterin resisted the urge to grind her teeth and took a deep breath. When her mind cleared, she lifted the waterstone. “Avslorah aveau,” she recited, the language of the Immortals heavy on her tongue.

  A serpentine stream of water flooded into the air at her command, twisting and swirling around her fingers. She controlled it with ease, dividing it again and again until only individual droplets remained. Her palm rotated, and the drops surged upward, an army waiting for the charge order. At the snap of her fingers, they fell as one. Quick as lightning she grabbed the icestone from the chest, freezing the droplets into hail just before they shattered across the floor. Each fragment spread, silver frost racing up the bedposts and the walls—as well as Garringsford’s boots, but the general failed to take notice.

  Her mother’s expression of absolute astonishment urged Asterin to the windstone. The temperature plummeted as she conjured thousands of snowflakes. She churned her fist, the snowflakes swirling faster and faster until snow became storm, howling through the room, tearing at the curtains and whipping General Garringsford’s bun into a disheveled frenzy.

  Asterin splayed her hand, and her storm echoed her movements, dispersing. Dropping the three stones she currently held back into place in the chest, she swiped up the earthstone and went to the windows. Pressing her face to the panes and squinting into the gardens below, she twisted her wrist upward. The wisteria trees shot up, their sinewy branches twining toward the sun with greedy fingers. As one, their buds erupted into full bloom, light purple blossoms cascading forth like dozens of waterfalls, hanging low. Asterin could almost smell their spring sweetness perfuming the air.

  She was just about to reach for the lightstone when Garringsford’s voice, edged with annoyance, stopped her. “Enough of your fancy party tricks, Princess. This isn’t what I came here to see. How do you practice unlocking other affinities?”

  Asterin’s fist clenched aro
und the earthstone, the wisteria blossoms outside withering along with her mood, but she forced herself to walk back to the chest, recalling the wonder in her mother’s eyes. Swallowing hard, she took the firestone gently from its place. “Avslorah fiere.”

  Nothing happened—not that she had been expecting otherwise.

  Inhaling through her nose, Asterin let her eyes slip shut, focusing on the weight of the stone. I was born with the power of the Immortals, she thought to herself. I was born with—

  “What are you doing?” Garringsford cut in.

  She cracked one eye open. “Concentrating.”

  Not even a minute had gone by before the general interrupted again, her words dripping with scorn. “Well, we aren’t here to watch you stand still, Your Highness. If you could actually do something, it would be most appreciated.”

  Deep breaths, Asterin told herself.

  Another two minutes passed, and then a scoff from Garringsford. “Pray tell, what purpose is there in teaching soldiers to close their eyes?”

  Queen Priscilla sighed and asked Asterin with a touch of derision, “Is there any way you can speed things up a little?”

  Asterin’s face heated, but she tried to ignore the sting of her mother’s disdain. “I’m doing my best.”

  Garringsford shook her head and clucked. “I came hoping to learn from you, Princess Asterin, but as entertaining as your stunts are, I do have other matters to attend to.”

  The lingering patience Asterin had been desperately clinging onto evaporated. Her eyes snapped open. “Then you are more than welcome to leave.”

  “Perhaps I shall, since it appears that your ‘practicing’ is nothing more than a sham of sleeping,” Garringsford said, and Asterin could have sworn she saw the woman smirk.

  “I have stood like this for hours at a time, trying to unlock the third fundamental,” she said, barely noticing as the firestone grew hot against her palm. “This is nothing.”

  “Hours wasted, then. You would be much better off practicing things you are actually capable of—”

  “Shut up,” Asterin snapped. A low rumbling sounded in her ears, but she paid it no attention.

  “Asterin!” her mother exclaimed. “Apologize at once!”

  Garringsford was definitely smirking. “It’s fine, Your Majesty. It’s always difficult admitting failure—”

  Something in Asterin broke at the word. “I said, shut up!” she snarled, the firestone scorching her skin.

  As one, the other eight stones in the chest quivered and rose up into the air.

  “Well done.” The general sniffed, utterly unimpressed. “Floating rocks, very masterful. At least you can do something with them.”

  An ear-shattering bang tore through the room. The stones exploded in a flash of blinding light, dozens of white-hot shards shooting straight for Garringsford like a mouthful of jagged teeth. Blood misted into the air as cloth shredded.

  “Asterin!” her mother shouted over Garringsford’s shrill curses and the sizzling of flesh. “Stop this at once!”

  “I don’t know how!” she exclaimed, horrified.

  “Drop the stone!”

  She did so with a gasp, heart thundering in her chest. Immediately, as if she had severed her connection with her magic, the shards froze and rained upon the floor like an ominous chorus of bells.

  Garringsford had gone terrifyingly silent. The color had drained from her face and the smirk was nowhere to be seen. Slowly, she reached across her own body and attempted to dig a particularly large shard out of her forearm.

  Asterin stared at the firestone, lying innocently on the floor.

  “Asterin, are you harmed?” Asterin had only begun to shake her head when Queen Priscilla thrust a finger toward the door, already turning her attention back to the general. “Fetch a healer immediately.”

  “Yes, Mother,” she whispered, bile rising in her throat. Hastily, she scooped up the firestone and stuffed it into a hidden pocket of her skirts. Slivers of stone sliced her bare feet as she dashed out of the room, but she hardly felt them. She burst into the corridor, shoeless, gasps echoing through the nearly empty halls—luckily, most of the queen’s court had already gone to dinner. Down the grand stairway she ran, only realizing how heavily her feet were bleeding when she nearly slipped, clutching the banister for dear life, a trail of crimson footprints spattered across the glass behind her.

  Night had fallen, Asterin noticed, and it seemed as though the lamps could barely manage to ward off the ominous gloom. As soon as the thought struck her, the flames flared brighter. She averted her gaze, the firestone a dead weight in her pocket, and kept running. At last, she reached the passage leading to the medical turret and lurched up the stairs two at a time. Halfway up, she crashed into an apprentice, sending scrolls flying down the blood-streaked steps and scaring the poor man senseless.

  Once assured that a healer would be sent to her mother’s chambers right away, she found a deserted workroom on the second landing with its door ajar and scrambled inside.

  Slamming the door behind her, she pressed her back against the wood, chest heaving. Forcing her breathing to slow, inhaling air infused with the calming scent of menthol and other bitter herbs, she uncurled her fists and took a tentative peek at the tender flesh. The firestone had burned its sigil right into her palm, and it throbbed something fierce. Twisting around, she discovered that the train of her dress was soaked with blood from the soles of her feet—a grotesque, weeping mess of gashes. Nothing she couldn’t fix on her own, though.

  “Haelein,” she whispered, and her skin began to sew itself back together. Moments later, the cuts had closed completely, and the burn had faded without a trace. She couldn’t find it in herself to care about the dress.

  Fully healed, she slid to the floor, still breathing heavily. She grimaced when her hand smeared through a sticky puddle of blood. To the empty room, she asked, “What in hell was that?”

  But of course, no one answered.

  CHAPTER TWO

  The bubbling chatter of the royal court rose above the clatter and tinkle of dishes and silverware as Orion sauntered through Mess Hall. He breathed in the mouth-watering aroma of roast. Three long tables swept across the length of the hall, draped in pristine white tablecloths and decorated with blue-flamed candles set amid bouquets of floribunda roses and blushing bellflowers. Even on an ordinary evening like tonight, plump candy goldfish with sugar-spun tailfins swam through the air in a kaleidoscope of colors over gravy tureens or darted between gigantic marzipan mushrooms.

  Orion tore off a chunk of mushroom and popped it into his mouth on his way to his customary spot beside the Princess of Axaria. They always sat at the end of the farthest table, closest to the exit and secluded from the rest of the court—an overpopulation of fake smiles, acute ears, and loose mouths. The empty chairs surrounding them were reserved for Captain Eadric Covington and Asterin’s Elite Royal Guard, but their absence probably meant they were running drills.

  Princess Asterin herself was bent over her plate, cutting into a pork chop, her ebony hair veiling her face. Orion reached for a hunk of soft cheese as he sat down and took a bite. Then he swiveled to face her, an elbow propped on the table, and waited.

  Without even looking up, Asterin asked, “What time are we training tomorrow?”

  Orion raised an eyebrow. “I have to go to the residential district to visit my father, so it’ll have to be before dawn.”

  “All right.” She stayed focused on her pork chop, apparently unaware that she was sawing away at the bone.

  He resisted the urge to pull her hair to get her attention like he used to when they were younger. “Not even a complaint? What’s wrong?”

  A hesitation. “I’m fine.” She gave up on the chop entirely and shifted her attention to stirring peas in a puddle of gravy instead.

  “Don’t lie. You aren’
t still mad at me for clobbering your face, are you?” he asked, peering at her, still unable to see past the impenetrable curtain of black. “I can apologize, if it’ll make you feel better.”

  She looked up sharply at that. Finally. He shot her a grin.

  Rolling her eyes, she said, “I’ll tell you later,” and promptly shoved three forkfuls of mashed potato into her mouth to prevent further conversation.

  “Whatever you say, Princess.” Orion drummed his fingers on the table, eyes darting around the hall. His gaze inevitably landed back on her. “No, but seriously. What happened? Did someone else punch you?”

  She huffed in exasperation and pushed her plate away. “No one punched me, but I almost killed my mother’s pet. Accidentally, of course.”

  His face split into a grin. He and Garringsford shared a mutual dislike. “Nice.”

  “No, Orion, not nice.”

  He took a sip of wine from her glass. “Sure, whatever. How?”

  “I don’t really know. I held a firestone, and then the rest started floating, and then … they all just exploded.”

  He clasped his hands to his chest. “That’s fantastic! I’m so proud of you!”

  She swatted him. “Orion.”

  “Right, that’s terrible.” He reached for the bread basket. “Why did they explode?”

  Asterin shrugged. “Beats me. All I know is that she seriously pissed me off.”

  His lips twitched into a smile. “Then it sounds like she probably had it coming.”

  A thoughtful nod. “She kind of did.”

  He frowned. “But why was she there in the first place? You never practice in front of other people.” As Asterin explained the entire debacle, Orion found Garringsford at the head table in her usual spot flanking the queen among the other important guests of the night. The healers had done their job well; looking at her, no one would ever guess that she had nearly been impaled just a few hours prior.