The Ruin of Snow

by Lacy Sheridan

  I couldn’t hear anything but the blurred, far-away voice, a word I couldn’t quite comprehend.

  “Neyva!”

  Louder, more insistent. I wasn’t sure if I was conscious or not. I was drifting somewhere between, in a mess of darkness and emptiness and a distant pang of something I couldn’t identify but didn’t want. A faint worry. Something needed my attention. Urgently.

  It was too late. The emptiness sucked me in, wrapped around me—

  “Neyva! I need you to get up. Now.”

  Somewhere, further away, another person spoke, voice pinched with worry. Somebody argued.

  “We don’t have time for this,” the worried voice said.

  Someone was shaking me; I vaguely felt the hand on my shoulder, the stone pushing against me. “She’s not dead yet, give her a chance.”

  Morgana, and then Idris. My fractured mind sluggishly connected voices to faces.

  “Look at her, she pushed herself too far,” somebody else interjected. Wesley, I thought.

  “She can push herself for two more minutes,” Idris snapped.

  Push myself? Why? What was so urgent?

  Leaving her lover to waste away and die. Still a Morningspell underneath. Sarafine’s bitter, triumphant voice echoed in my aching head.

  Kye.

  I wanted to shove myself up and run to them, but I couldn’t move. A soft groan escaped when I tried to push on my hands, but my arms trembled uselessly. Idris hooked a hand under my arm and pulled me up. “Come on.”

  “She’s too weak,” Morgana protested. “She used up everything she had, we don’t have time for her to try to do more, it’ll kill her.”

  I pried my eyes open. Idris knelt next to me, Morgana hovering beside us. Across from us, Wesley and Tamsin stood on either side of Kye’s body. The stained-glass coffin had been shoved aside. Aurynn sat against the wall, clearly dazed and half-conscious, blood streaking down the side of her face, but alive.

  “Kye,” I breathed, my voice cracked and hoarse. I yanked away from Idris toward them, but the crypt spun and brought bile into my throat. Morgana pressed a hand to my forehead.

  “She’s hot. Too hot, my magic is destroying her from the inside out, I need to reverse it.”

  “She’ll be okay if you reverse it?” Tamsin asked.

  I barely followed the conversation. Every second my thoughts swirled around Kye, lying there limp and pale and unmoving, like they were already dead. Terror and desperation changed every muscle to stone. They couldn’t be dead yet. They weren’t. We had time.

  “She…” Morgana hesitated. “She’ll be alive but I don’t know what will happen to her magic.”

  I ignored her. “Kye doesn’t have time,” I panted and shoved myself up again. I made it to my knees. “Where’s Sarafine?”

  Nobody spoke. I followed Wesley’s gaze over my shoulder. My blurred vision settled on the stone behind me, where I’d left her trapped. But there was no sign of my sister there now, only a dark expanse of stone.

  Then my eyes adjusted, and I made out the curves that hadn’t been there before. Fine details: a face, nimble fingers, the delicate folds of a gown. All cast in stone, like a piece of artwork. An impossibly perfect statue.

  “I…” I couldn’t find the words. I couldn’t breathe. I couldn’t think. My mind was a hurricane of chaos and fear and pain. Black clawed at the edges of my blurred vision. My last sister stood in front of me, and I didn’t know if she was dead, but she was something other than alive. I stared at her, silently begging her to move or speak. Because Sarafine…of all my family, Sarafine was the one who survived. Who always survived. Always won, even when she lost. I hated her, hated her with every fiber of my being, but she was my flesh and blood.

  Nobody else said it, and I tore my gaze away. Back to Kye. Their chest barely rose and fell; from here I could hardly tell they were alive. My arms wobbled as I pulled myself to them, every inch of my body screaming in protest, but I ignored it. Only Kye mattered now.

  “Neyva?” somebody asked. Tamsin? I didn’t look up. I buried my face against their chest and breathed in their ink-and-paper scent, fingers curling into their shirt. “Can you…?”

  “One of you can,” Idris said. Not a question, an order. “Do it.”

  It was silent. All I could hear was my frantic heart, racing on its way to giving out. I tasted not magic but blood. “This is above my level,” Morgana murmured. “I tried already, you know that. I’m sorry.”

  “Neyva?”

  My throat burned as I forced out each word. “I can’t.” I didn’t have the strength anymore. Morgana’s curse was leeching the last of it from me by the second; I could feel it draining, pulling the world further and further away.

  I felt Morgana kneel beside me, her presence stung. “I’m sorry, Neyva.”

  “You’re as good of a witch as she was,” Tamsin burst out, every word like a blade driven into my heart. “Better. You have to—”

  “Tam!” Idris snapped.

  “I can’t,” I said again, shaking my head. My heart was splintering into pieces, that was what this feeling was. It would kill me before the curse did. I couldn’t save them. I could match any magic Sarafine threw at me normally, and she’d chosen the one I could never contest in this condition. She’d known it.

  She’d lost, but yet again she was still winning. She was right even in the end.

  I didn’t know how I felt about the Lady. I didn’t know if I trusted Nalcai. But in that moment, I prayed. I threw every ounce of myself into it, every tear and stab of pain and grief. “Please,” I breathed against Kye’s chest. I could feel the slow, weak rhythm of their heart. Too slow. “Nalcai, whatever you want from me, just please—”

  “They won’t listen,” Morgana interrupted me, laying a hand on my arm. It was like broken glass rolling across my skin, and I jerked away. “We need to break your curse. Now.”

  “No!”

  “You’ll die if we don’t.”

  “Then I’ll die,” I growled, raising my head. My vision was so shaky with tears I could scarcely see her. There was no point if I couldn’t save Kye. I couldn’t help any of them. I’d live, but there’d be nothing left in my life.

  “That’s insane.”

  “I don’t care what you think.” I braced my brow over their heart again, the one spot where I could feel them. The life slipping away. I kept praying, whispering everything I’d learned as a child and every plea I had, until Morgana hauled me to my feet by the shoulders. Nausea rolled over me and I couldn’t focus on her.

  “Listen to me, Neyva. That won’t help. They won’t listen.”

  “You don’t know that.” I’d continue until it worked, or I died.

  “I do!” she shouted, shaking me enough that the hammering in my head worsened, but I blinked away the tears. “My daughter was murdered, remember? I couldn’t save her myself, so I prayed, and I begged, and I offered everything I had to give and more. They did nothing. They won’t do anything now, either.”

  I squeezed my eyes closed, trying to draw a full breath. The sharp pains shooting through my chest made it impossible. “No.”

  Her voice softened. “I’m sorry, Neyva. I’m going to break the curse before it kills you too.”

  “No.”

  “Yes.” She let go. I couldn’t hold myself up; I collapsed, my muscles giving out, and landed in a dizzy heap beside Kye. I pulled myself close enough to lay my head on their shoulder, fingers still hooked in their shirt. If there was no saving them, I’d stay here until we both died.

  “I’m so sorry, Kye,” I whispered, a fresh wave of tears sneaking their way out. “I’m sorry. I’m sorry.”

  It was my fault. If I’d been stronger, if I’d left, this wouldn’t have happened. Rayick would be alive. Kye would be alright.

  “You have to be able to break it,” Tamsin said again, his voice thin and strained.

  I shook my head as much as I could. The darkness was creeping further across my vision. “I can�
�t.”

  A pause, and then Idris’s voice. “You can.”

  “I can’t, Idris.”

  “You can. You’ve done the impossible before.”

  “This isn’t the impossible, this is…” I didn’t have words, and my voice was leaving me.

  “I’m breaking it,” Morgana said, and I heard the musical clinking of glass jars spilling across the floor.

  Idris ignored her. “Neyva, look at me.” I couldn’t, and his voice hardened. “Look at me.” I clenched my jaw and forced my eyes open. My vision swam but he was there, focused on me. “You can. I’ve seen what you can do. Even without this curse, you’re unstoppable. With it, you’re the last person in this world I would want to be up against. You say your mother is the most feared witch in Selliira, and she ran from you. You can, and don’t you dare give up on Kye or yourself now. Not after all this.”

  I heard the faint rattle in every breath. Death rattles, Mother called them. I closed my eyes again and pushed myself onto one elbow, swallowing a whimper as what felt like blades twisted in my bones. “Stop, Morgana,” I gasped.

  “No.” She shook her head, bending over her supplies. “You may be a Morningspell, but you don’t deserve to die like this.”

  “Stop,” Idris echoed.

  She cast him a scathing look. “Since when do I take orders from people like you?”

  My stomach churned. My heart pounded in every inch of me. “Stop, Morgana.” The last, dying wisps of magic crept into my voice, ringing through the room, and she froze with her fingers inches from a vial.

  I didn’t know if I could do this, no matter what Idris believed. He was right about one thing: it was an insult to Kye and to myself to give up like this.

  It might be hopeless, but if I was going to have a shot at all it was while I was cursed, while my magic was wild and potent, if there was any left. Without it, there was no chance. It might drain me dry, kill me, but not trying would be worse.

  My head spun, too light and airy, as I pressed one palm over Kye’s heart. The touch was excruciating enough I bowed my head, shaking, biting the inside of my cheek. I left it there, searching. Letting whatever jagged remnants there were of my magic seek something to latch onto. That little wisp of power all living things had, plant or animal, witch or no. It couldn’t be gone yet, not while Kye’s heart still beat, however faintly.

  As long as it was there, and as long as I was still alive, there was a chance. A tiny, quickly fading sliver of a chance, but a chance.

  I pushed and pushed, every passing second worse, and then I felt it. Far away and quiet, sleeping.

  My magic nudged at it, curious, but did nothing more. Couldn’t do anything more.

  Please, I begged it. I don’t have time to wait for you to decide what to do. Do something. Please.

  It coiled and stretched and prodded. I dug my fingernails into the floor. I heard it whispering. What do we do with it?

  Save it. However you need to.

  The magic of Sarafine’s poison snarled and lashed out, and mine cackled and danced around it. It will take a lot to save this.

  Give anything.

  Anything?

  Everything.

  More coiling, more dancing—and then it crashed into the black poison like barreling into a wall. I gasped, stars popping against my eyelids. On and on it flowed, like tidal waves roaring over my sister’s magic again and again, drowning it, tearing it into scraps. A sound like shrieking filled my head and ears, or maybe it was my own screaming. My body was on fire. The magic went, storming through me and around me. I was going to be torn apart by it, too.

  It might have been seconds or hours, but when it settled, every ounce of strength had flooded out of me. I heard my head crack against the floor as I collapsed again, but couldn’t feel it. I was numb.

  Except for the feeling of Kye’s heartbeat beneath my palm.

  The dark clawed its way over my vision.

  And there was nothing.

  Thirty-Three

  My head was pounding when I woke, like nails were being driven into my brain. I rubbed one temple and winced at the pain. Every muscle felt heavy and strained, and so many spots throbbed with injury I couldn’t count them. When I prodded at my magic, it hardly reacted, limp and exhausted. Something about it brought on a twinge in my chest, different from when Morgana's curse had worked itself around my heart. Like my magic itself had been torn into and left raw.

  But I was alive. I sucked in a painful breath to prove it to myself. The searing weight of Morgana's curse was gone.

  Something warm shifted beside me, and for half a second, I tensed, then pried my eyes open. Kye lay there, one arm looped around me. They were fast asleep, looking more tired and weak than I'd ever seen them. They were ashen, dark circles below their eyes, breathing shallow and uneven. I pushed hair from their face and pressed a palm to their cheek: warm. The taste of magic that stung the back of my throat wasn't Sarafine's, and I breathed a thanks to the Lady for that much. But the blood curse was still in full effect.

  My fingers traced through tiny, downy feathers on their arm that hadn't been there before. My heart dropped. The curtains over the one visible window had been tightly drawn to keep out sunlight; they should be solidly human.

  I maneuvered out from under their arm and stood. My vision spun and I gripped the edge of the night table. When it righting, I studied where we were. A little square room, nothing more than a bed, night table, and small wardrobe. A woven rug in the center of the floor. A lantern had been left, unlit. Everything was old, grayish wood, the blankets on the bed handmade. Kye's boots were by the door.

  I was still in my nameday dress, the skirt torn and crusted in dry mud, my feet bare and dirty. The chill air swept over my skin, and I wrapped my arms around myself as I pulled the door open.

  Morgana's small living room, fire blazing. A pot of stew waited, and the smell made my empty stomach growl. How long had it been since I'd eaten? How long had I been unconscious?

  “She lives.”

  I jumped and saw Wesley sitting on the floor, carefully keeping to the shadows of a corner. He didn’t look better than Kye, pale and unsteady. His fingers shook around the bit of leather strap he played with. When I said nothing, at a loss for words, he nodded to the stew. “Morgana said to tell you to eat if you woke up.”

  I wasn't about to refuse the offer. Bowls waited on the tiny counter beside half a loaf of bread, and I snagged one and spooned stew into it, then tore off a chunk of bread. It took a moment of control to not tear into it the second I sat beside him. “Are you alright?”

  He lifted one shoulder. “It's been getting worse. Fast.” I watched as he knotted the leather, clumsy. Frustration rimmed his eyes. “A few days, maybe a week, I'm guessing, before...”

  Before the curse killed them, unless Morgana found a way to break it. But she hadn't meant to cast it in the first place. “Where the others?” I asked.

  “Tam and Aurynn went out hunting. Or at least that was their excuse. I think they just want to get away for a little. Idris vanished who knows where. How's Kye?”

  “Still asleep.” I pushed chunks of carrot around.

  “I hate to say it, Neyva, but it might have been better to let your sister work that poison,” he murmured. “Kye doesn't deserve to waste away like this.”

  My knuckles went white on the spoon. “Don't say that. We'll figure something out.”

  “What will you figure out? It's over. At least we got to help you take care of your family first.”

  “It's not over. I promised to help you. You're going to go back to Fraida and become the best blacksmith in the city, or whatever else you decide you want to do. Make pretty things out of rocks or train a bunch of street rats to carry on your thieving legacy.”

  He shook his head with half of a broken smile. “You remembered that?”

  “Of course.”

  “I haven't thought about going back to Fraida since...since Enaelle.”

  “H
er family is still there, aren't they?”

  “As far as I know.” He sighed. “They deserve to know what happened to her. I know it's not your problem, but once this is all over would you find them for me? Tell them she's gone, but she was happy with us, and she never regretted leaving, but always did miss them?”

  My throat tightened. “If you can't, I will.” I'd tell them she was one of the warmest, kindest people I'd ever met, and I wished I could have known her better, and she'd died protecting her friends.

  “Thank you.”

  We fell into silence while I ate, and Wesley fiddled with the old leather as if trying to prove he could make something from it. That he could do something other than steal, or maybe that his fingers weren't as unsteady as they looked. When I finished, I left the dishes in the kitchen basin and pulled the shutters closed. “Don't spend your whole day hiding in a corner.”

  “It seems as good a place as any,” he mumbled, but he dragged himself to his feet.

  “Do you know where Morgana is?”

  “Shopping, I think. She mentioned needing vegetables and more firewood.”

  “I need to talk to her.”

  “Feel free to tell her vegetables aren’t going to help our current state.”

  I had more than that to tell her. I didn’t know my way around her village—I didn’t even know how she’d gotten us here in the time between my last memory in the crypt and now, or how long I’d been unconscious—but I picked a direction that looked likely and walked. I must have looked horrid, and a bath and clean clothes sounded divine, but this was more important.

  The entire village was hiding away; I didn’t pass a single soul. A thin cat curling around a fence, but no people. Not until I was two crooked streets down from the house, and spotted a woman walking toward me, head down to examine the contents of the basket hooked over one arm.

  “Morgana.”

  She jumped and looked up, but then smiled. “You’re up. How are you feeling?”

  “Less like I’m about to die.”

  “Sounds like an improvement. What are you doing out here?”

  “Looking for you. I need to talk to you.”