by K. M. Shea
“Oh dear. It seems love didn’t save him, did it?” Tenebris asked.
Liv scurried towards him, but time moved unbearably slow. Rakel felt tears as hot as fire splash her cheeks, and she finally understood what Phile had tried to explain to her.
Love protects. Because of the brokenness and evil of the world, those who fought to do what was right would be forced into difficult positions. But it wasn’t their fault—it wasn’t her fault.
The fault lay entirely with the putrid darkness.
Rakel felt horribly cold and alone as Liv knelt at Farrin’s side. She saw the moment Liv purified the curse. As Farrin breathed once more, her anxiety eased…and a strange calm washed over her.
It was okay.
She wasn’t a monster; she wouldn’t be evil because of what she was about to do.
Her ice magic surged through her with the power of a hundred avalanches. Her ears rang as she turned to Tenebris, the remnants of her tears freezing to her cheeks. “You have made a mistake,” she said.
“What would that be?”
“You laid your hands on someone I love.” Her magic howled with such strength, she could almost feel snowflakes spinning in her blood.
Tenebris smiled. “You don’t frighten me, Princess. If you had more guts you would be a threat—then you would be like me. But you are spineless. So I’ll kill you with ease.” He reached for her—his hand glowing black with his powers—and laughed.
Rakel—her skin cold—caught his hand with her own and clenched it. His curse clawed its way up her arm, making her muscles twist with pain. Bile rose in her throat, and she was in so much agony she saw stars. But she clenched her jaw shut, swallowed her screams of pain, and tapped her magic. The wind picked up with an eerie howl and snow swirled.
“No.” Her conviction built in spite of the pain.
She was nothing like Tenebris. She didn’t need to prove it…but her sacrifice was still necessary. For Verglas, for Steinar, for Halvor, Oskar, and Phile, and especially for Farrin, the man she loved above all else—she would face Tenebris’s darkness.
“You can’t stop me, Princess. You have the magic, but not the hatred.” Tenebris’s eyes glowed as he leered over her.
“It seems you didn’t understand me,” Rakel said, adjusting her grip on his hand. She had to spit the words out around the pain that tore through her. “When I say that love is pure, I mean it stands unrivaled in its power.” This time, instead of pulling chunks of magic, she plunged all the way into it, bringing her body some relief from the curse.
Tenebris raised an eyebrow, unimpressed with her action, but he shifted when Rakel—still holding his hand tight—gazed north as her powers pooled around her.
Her magic was so overwhelming, she found it hard to breathe. She was aware of every fleck of ice and bit of snow on the field, and her powers reached out for more as she drew more and more of her magic into her grasp. Soon, she could feel the tug of the various ice structures: the ice wall she had built at Begna to keep mercenaries from returning to Verglas, the ice gardens she had forged in Ostfold, the wall she had made to keep the Chosen troops from following Verglas soldiers when they retreated from a march to Glowma, and finally, singing out in pure crystalline tones, she felt her ice-castle.
For a moment, her heart ached. She had put so much time and love into her castle, and she had so many books and maps there that she treasured doubly now that she knew they were from Steinar and Oskar.
I won’t have any need of them after this.
“What are you doing?” Tenebris’s voice was tight as he tried to pull his hand from her grasp, but she had used ice to fuse their palms together.
Rakel reached deeper into her ocean of magic and felt the throb her ice structures created deep in her bones. She stretched out her fingers and wriggled them in a “come-here” gesture.
She gasped when she felt her ice structures topple. Her ice-castle was the most violent. It shattered, creating a ripple of power and shaking the mountain. Ensom Peak roared. Its snow cap collapsed into an avalanche that poured down the mountainside and threw snow into the air. Rakel’s released magic streaked through the air, coloring the sky with iridescent lights.
Rather than letting it come to her, Rakel funneled her powers directly into the ground. She dove deeper and deeper into her magic—her lips turning blue with cold—and the loosened magic from her buildings started to coat the ground. Frost bloomed, traveling out across the field at a rate faster than the eye could take in. The ground shuddered under Rakel’s feet as mountains moved, hills flattened, and the plains buckled under the force of her magic.
“No, no,” Tenebris repeated. He tried to punch Rakel, but her magic caught it, and he cracked his fist, hitting jagged ice.
Giant spikes of ice taller than the biggest trees forced their way out of the ground, marking the Verglas border. Rakel could feel it in every part of the country, and everyone present could see it as ice jutted out of the ground, looming over the border like ancient sentinels.
Tenebris started screaming as the purity of Rakel’s magic settled into the very ground. The temperature of the air dropped, and snow fell from a cloudless sky.
Some of the Chosen magic users joined in Tenebris’s screams, their skin frosted by her magic. They disengaged from the fight and scrambled for a great gap in the icy border.
Tenebris shouted and tried to beat on Rakel with his magic, but without success. She had expelled so much power and still hadn’t reached the bottom of what she had—though she could now feel it coming.
“You’re going to lose, Tenebris.” Rakel’s lips were numb, and her voice shook under the force of the magic she was channeling. Every pore in her body was flooded with her icy magic, and it was almost more than she could bear.
“How?” Tenebris howled. “How can you fight for them? These people hated you!”
Rakel smiled. “Because I love them. No matter what their personal feelings are for me, I love them, and I want to see them happy.”
For the first time since the war, she felt free. The truth of her words resonated in her bones. No longer was her goal to prove she wasn’t a monster like Tenebris, or to try and win people over so they liked her. Her worries and fears were gone. All she had left was love as powerful as her magic.
It was almost time. She could feel almost every spark of magic she possessed. The end—for Tenebris and for herself—had arrived. But there was one more thing she wanted to say. Rakel leaned forward and whispered. “You shouldn’t have harmed Farrin. Not now, and not when you arrived in the north and punished him for failing,” Rakel said. Her voice sounded odd, like the wind spoke with her.
Tenebris gritted his teeth and tried to push a curse at her—her magic shattered it before it could brush her fingertips. “He told you?” he growled.
Rakel lifted an eyebrow. “I love him. Do you really think I wouldn’t notice?”
Tenebris howled as the blood in his body—exposed to Rakel’s magic—began to freeze.
“Never again will dark magic blacken these lands.” Rakel’s voice carried across the field, even as many of the Chosen magic users fled across the Verglas border, screaming and shouting. “It will be up to the people and the king of this land to see that they do not hoard it in their own hearts, but if anything of magic bent on death and destruction tries to enter these lands, it will be cast out!”
The entire country shook, as if bearing witness to Rakel’s words. Huge, icy gates the size of a hill formed in the gap on the border. They slammed shut with the muted roar of an avalanche. The ice formations that walled the country chimed like crystal, then shattered, lighting the sky with a rainbow of colors.
Tenebris’s gold eyes shone with fear and hatred as he died, frozen and burned by the purity of Rakel’s powers.
Rakel yanked her hand from his frozen claw, wincing when the ice took off some of her skin with it. Shaking with pain and cold, Rakel shouted and ripped out the last of the ice magic she had, creating an exp
losion of snowflakes as she shoved it from her. Dry of her magic, Rakel felt empty and hollow. She caught a snowflake on her hand and smiled when she saw the heart at the center of it.
I did the right thing.
“Rakel!”
She heard Farrin’s shout, but the dark void of her price was already claiming her. She fell, cradled by the ground, and smiled when she felt her icy magic—which was now embedded into the land the way it had danced in her ice structures—brush her. Every part of her screamed with raw pain, but she couldn’t move her lips.
The Chosen are defeated. It was worth the sacrifice.
Her eyes closed, and Rakel knew nothing.
Time seemed to stretch on for hours until Frodi finished burning a path to Rakel—though Farrin knew the young man had risked a bad burnout and melted almost everything in the area after she fell.
Farrin tapped his magic and was at her side before the melted snow touched the ground. She was in terrible condition. Her lips were faintly blue; her complexion was ashen, and she was as still as a grave. It took Farrin a few moments to assure himself she was still breathing.
He ripped off his coat and tenderly wrapped it around her as he knelt at her side and drew her up into a sitting position. He stripped his gloves off and placed them on her much smaller hands, flinching when he touched her skin. Rakel had always been cool to the touch, but now her skin felt as frigid as mid-winter ice.
“Is she gonna be alright?” Frodi asked around a wad of jerky as he fell to his knees.
Farrin stiffened. He wanted to say yes, Rakel could recover from this, she just needed time and warmth. But it was the awareness of her minty magic that kept him from saying useless niceties and made the hair on the back of his neck prickle.
Ever since he realized he could feel Rakel’s magic at a fairly far distance, he’d enjoyed it. It was refreshing to feel her magic cover an area like snowfall, and it always tugged on his senses like a puppy wanting to play.
He could feel it now, brushing at his bare hands and lurking on the frost-covered ground.
The feeling offered no comfort, only dread. If that much of Rakel’s magic was active and aimlessly floating around, it was not a good sign. He—along with every other magic user in the area—had felt when she thrust her powers into the ground. How much magic did she use?
“Rakel!” Steinar—King of Verglas—tripped and fell as he ran across the cleared path. His guards skidded to a stop behind him and tried to help him stand. Steinar waved them off, scrambled to his feet, and closed the remaining distance, dropping to his knees next to Farrin. “What happened? None of that was part of our plan.” With an expression of horror and fear, he motioned to the border, where great piles of ice lay.
Farrin shook his head.
“Princess!” Oskar was next to run down the path. He dragged Phile in his wake. As Farrin looked from the attendant to the Robber Maiden, his hackles rose. Oskar wore an expression of fear and anxiety—which was not surprising. The only times he had ever seen Oskar worried were times when Rakel was harmed in some way. What was unusual was Phile. Her eyes were darkened with dread.
She knows something…
“Frodi, signal for General Halvor,” Oskar said as he descended upon them. “The princess must be moved to camp immediately—we’re not waiting to finish clearing the Chosen.”
Frodi swallowed his food and unsteadily rocked to his feet. He shot off the signal—three tiny fireballs followed by one big one—and sat down hard.
“How is her condition?” Oskar asked.
“Poor.” Farrin shifted Rakel in his arms so Steinar could wrap his cloak around her as well.
Oskar tapped his fingers on his thighs—hard. “What on earth possessed her to use that much of her magic?”
Frodi, almost horizontal with exhaustion, shook his head.
The slant of Phile’s eyebrows was mournful and telling as Rakel’s minty magic ruffled Farrin’s hair with the breeze.
Several notes blown on ram horns echoed up and down the field as Verglas soldiers chased the surviving mercenaries. They scrambled for the border, no longer fighting. The Chosen magic users who hadn’t fled—pushed out by the pure concentration of Rakel’s magic—were in the process of surrendering.
General Halvor strode up the pathway, a scowl stretching across his lips as he barked off orders to his soldiers. “Divide up the Chosen magic users—see that Tollak snaps his unbreakable cuffs on the most dangerous. Take precautions.” The general turned his attention to angrily eye Farrin and Rakel. “What was that?” he snapped.
“I don’t know,” Farrin said.
The general stomped up to Tenebris—or what used to be Tenebris. Rakel’s magic had burned away at him and frozen what little was left. “Someone must. Though the princess delights in working alone, she takes care to inform at least one other to lessen the chance of misunderstandings.”
If she told someone…Farrin raised his gaze to Phile, his expression hardening.
Oskar noticed the change and swiveled around to frown at his companion. “Phile? Is there something you want to tell us?”
General Halvor finished his inspection of Tenebris and motioned to one of his soldiers. “Signal the troops to stop chasing the mercenaries. They’re past the border—they won’t be returning.” He glanced once more at Tenebris. “The battle is ours.” He swung his gaze around to Phile—who was already squirming under Farrin and Oskar’s scrutiny. “Phile,” he barked.
“She pushed all her magic into the land.” Phile said the words proudly, and her eyes flickered with pride as she gazed at Rakel’s still body.
Farrin, on the other hand, froze. What?
Phile continued. “She thought if she embedded her magic into the land in the same way she embeds her magic in her ice-structures, like her castle, Tenebris and men like him wouldn’t be able to enter Verglas.” Phile nodded at the border where a giant wall of ice burst out of the ground when Grimick—the only remaining colonel of the Chosen forces—tried to push his way back in. “Seems she was right.”
Farrin barely heard her observation; he was still trying to take in the explanation. Rakel had shoved her magic into the land? All of it? Can anyone with as much magic as she has survive handling all of it in that short of a time frame? His eyes dropped to her face, where he saw signs of strain with new understanding.
Oskar smiled—though it didn’t cover his obvious anger. “While that’s fascinating and wonderful, that doesn’t tell me why Rakel resembles a hypothermia victim and why Farrin Graydim looks like someone stabbed him in the chest.”
General Halvor’s bristly mood dropped from him, and weariness set into his shoulders. “It’s because she barely survived funneling all of her magic at once. That, combined with the terrible price she will have to pay for using everything she has, means it is unlikely she will ever awake. Am I wrong?”
Farrin knew the question was directed at him, but he was numb, unable to respond.
“No,” Phile said. Her voice crackled as she fought to hold back tears.
Steinar shook his head. “But—no. She, she can’t. She has to wake up.” For the first time since setting eye on the king, he looked to Farrin like the young nineteen-year-old he really was as he stared at his sister, his horror mounting.
Oskar, unlike the general and king, puffed up in anger and hissed at Phile. “Why didn’t you stop her? You should have told us!”
“She did it because she wanted to save everyone. If I told, you would have stopped her,” Phile said.
“If you told us, she would be alive!” Oskar shouted.
The shouts and rejoicing of the troops nearly eclipsed the attendant. The resistance fighters wildly waved their homemade flags, and the soldiers stamped their feet, shouting.
“Snow Queen!”
“Snow Queen!”
“Snow Queen!”
They had won—not just the war, but everything. The mirror was safe—no magic user as twisted as Tenebris would be able to enter
Verglas again, unless Rakel’s magic embedded in the country faded over time. But the cost of the victory was far too great.
Farrin raised his gaze to the cheering citizens and soldiers, and the more subdued magic users—the majority of them had to be able to feel Rakel’s magic running rampant. Magic as strong as hers was difficult to miss.
For just a heartbeat, he hated them all.
Gentle, easily-embarrassed, beautiful Rakel had given her life for them. If not for these festering masses, she would be awake. Farrin would have given anything for her, but instead she had given everything she had. For them.
As quick as the hatred came, Farrin brushed it off. She would have sacrificed herself for this country if the only ones living in it were myself and a bunch of magic-haters. That is why I love her—for her fierce heart and incredible compassion. And she still breathes. She’s not dead yet.
Though he thought words of hope, his heart sank the longer he gazed at her still body. “She knew what would happen?” he asked Phile.
The Robber Maiden nodded. “She was prepared for it.”
Farrin shut his eyes as he remembered how Rakel had clung to him before he left to get Liv. I should have held her longer—even one moment more… Farrin pushed aside his selfish regret and stood, cradling Rakel in her arms. “We should move her to a warmer location. She’s freezing.”
Oskar rubbed his forehead, and the expression in his eyes was lost. “There is a possibility she will wake up?”
“She thought it was unlikely,” Phile said. “But I didn’t believe her. This is Rakel. She has beaten worse odds.”
“What do we do?” Oskar asked.
Farrin held Rakel closer to his body, even though it felt like embracing a blizzard.
General Halvor moved to stand directly in front of Steinar. “Your orders, King Steinar?”
Steinar stared at the frost-covered grass as the echoes of the rejoicing troops washed over them like a wave. “We must act as if we expect Rakel to wake up again…but we should prepare ourselves for the worst,” he finally said.
