Page 58 of The Daughter of the Scarred Elf

In seconds, skeletal bird-like creatures materialized in the air, their wings made of sharp bones and their talons crusted with dried blood. Fire blazed in the pits of their empty eye sockets. Hundreds of them surrounded their party. But that wasn’t all—thick, fat snakes with purple skin slithered toward them all.

Ice erupted from the ground, freezing the snakes, at the same time that fire and water shot up at the sky of magical birds coming at them. But in the next second, even more creatures filled the sky.

Kolfinna spread her mana into the ground. She didn’t have time to think about the ambush. Her gaze flitted to the multiplying snakes and then at the sky.

Since she could do long-distance attacks, she’d probably be better at attacking the skeletal birds. Gunnar and Eluf could handle the snakes. There were more birds than snakes, anyway?—

“Kolfinna! Get down!” Blár was running toward her, ice-blue eyes wide. Kolfinna followed his gaze in that split second and her hands froze in the air. A woman holding a silver staff with inky shadows dripping off the metal tip sprinted toward her. She was dressed in black leather and black, scaly armor. Her skin was the color of midnight with sapphire undertones.

Kolfinna couldn’t react. Couldn’t move.

The woman’s eyes were blood red. Her braided hair was pure white. And her ears were pointed.

An elf.

Kolfinna broke from her stunned reverie and drew her mana into the rocks imbedded in the earth, but Blár was faster. His ice shot from his hand toward the woman. Quick as lightning, the woman snapped her wrist and a blast of golden-white light lasered from her hand. It struck Blár’s ice and shattered it. Hundreds of shards of ice glittered in the air.

Time froze. Kolfinna sucked in a breath. Blár wore the same shocked expression.

If she could break his ice, that could only mean her magic was equal to his or stronger.

Everyone seemed to be thinking it at the same time.

“I’ll take her on, you guys—” Blár didn’t have time to finish his sentence because the woman was on him in seconds. Shadows wisped around her staff and she struck Blár with it across the chest. Kolfinna recognized those shadows. She expected the shadows to burst out like flames and eat him alive, but they did no such thing. He only jumped back, seemingly uninjured. His ice grew at the elf’s feet and captured her in place for a split second—enough time for him to throw ice daggers at her from a dozen different directions. A black shadow fell over her body like a cloak and the ice daggers sank inside, but in seconds the shadow disappeared and the woman was in front of Blár, unharmed, and about to strike him again. They exchanged blows, light and shadows crashing into blue-white ice.

Everyone else fell into battle as well. Herja lurched back as snakes hissed at her feet, her fire blasting from the ground up to the sky of skeletal birds. Ivar sliced through birds and snakes alike, his water whizzing around him like a barrier. Inkeri was taking down the magic birds with thick currents of air that cutat their wings. Gunnar and Eluf both kicked and stomped on the snakes, careful not to get bitten.

Kolfinna also fell into the rhythm of battle; she shot rocks up at the bony birds. At the snakes burrowing through the ground. She also tried to keep an eye on Blár, but it was hard to do so when the magic beasts relentlessly rained down on her. She could barely focus on what was in front of her.

Even as she chucked stones at the creatures, she couldn’t hold back the unease and fear from washing over her. That woman—that elf—was able to rival Blár. That alone drenched her bones with a wary kind of fear. The type of fear that consumed every fiber of her being.

The crash and crack of Blár’s ice sent her heart spiking every other second. The adrenaline rushed through her veins. He couldn’t lose. He was the strongest person she had ever met. But that woman was also strong. Even though Kolfinna couldn’t pause and watch the fight, she could see from her peripheral that the warrior woman wasn’t breaking a sweat over fighting Blár. They were both even.

Inky shadows tried to get ahold of Blár, but his ice warred against it, winning most of the time, and other times splintering and falling victim to its vicious hunger.

“Inkeri!” Ivar’s scream ripped Kolfinna’s attention away from the elf woman and Blár.

A giant snake was attached to Inkeri’s leg, where it had burrowed its fangs deeply into her calf. Inkeri’s eyes were wide, her skin pallid, and her mouth open in shock. Kolfinna took a step in her direction, but at the same second, a snake shot forth from its hiding place in a wire of thorns. It wrapped around her foot and jammed its teeth into her ankle. The white-hot pain was instantaneous. Kolfinna screamed and ripped the snapping snake off her leg and chucked it away, where a blast of fire from Herja’s flames devoured it.

Ivar had dropped down to his knees and was holding Inkeri. Her body shook violently. Water whipped around him and attacked any birds or snakes that tried to get close. He was saying something to her, but Kolfinna couldn’t hear past the blood rushing to her ears and the darkness creeping at the edge of her vision.

A skeletal bird’s talons gripped onto Kolfinna’s shoulder in her moment of confusion. She waved her hand, but her vision was doubling and she couldn’t tell what she was hitting or not. In fact, the ground was inching closer and the trees seemed to be moving toward her. Her foot throbbed and burned. Herja must’ve burned her, she thought. That was the only explanation.

One second Kolfinna was swaying on her feet, swatting the birds away, and the next she was on the ground. Another snake bit into her shoulder—or was that her arm? Vicious tremors overcame her body.

“Kolfinna! Get up!”

The voice sounded panicked and distant, like there was a barrier between her and that voice. But that couldn’t be, could it? She had been fighting?—

Her mind drew a blank. What had she been doing?

Fire coursed through her arms and legs until she felt like smoke would erupt from her every orifice. Her vision was a blur of colors. She didn’t know how long she lay there, but when her eyes adjusted, it seemed like nothing had changed. Herja was fighting with orange flames in her hands, Eluf and Gunnar were kicking and smashing the birds and snakes alike, and Ivar was still cradling Inkeri to his chest while his water sliced through anything that got within a one-foot radius of him.

The temperature of the area was frigidly cold. Her breath came out of her mouth in white streams. It was the only indication that Blár was still fighting. That and the occasionalflashes of light that shone in the sky and disappeared. The elf woman’s power, Kolfinna concluded.

“Kolfinna! Come on, get up!” Herja cursed and shot fire at a snake that was two feet away from burying into Kolfinna’s arm.

Kolfinna blinked and tried pushing herself up to her feet, but her body wouldn’t listen. The burning sensation in her limbs slowly receded. Despite that, she could’ve move and her body was convulsing on its own. Her hand, which was sprawled close to her, was turning purple.

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