Page 103 of Frost Like Night
“One more chance,” he tells me. “One more chance.”
It’s almost a plea, so close to begging that I wonder who he’s more worried for—himself or me, if I don’t listen to him.
The magic keeping my body motionless releases my right arm.
“Attack me,” he orders. “Embrace this new world, Meira. Please.”
He’s definitely begging me. The strain on his face, the worry.
“All right, Theron.” I lift my hand.
He starts to smile, hoping, wanting,needing.
Until I grab the chakram off my back.
His face falls. “With your magic!”
But I will use my magic—kind of.
The snowstorm still hangs over us, and I call down sheet after sheet of ice to wrap around my chakram’s blade.
I’m so sorry, Theron.
My chakram flies at him as he leaps at me, and the two collide. The ice coating my chakram’s blade turns it into a dense knot that cracks against Theron’s head. He drops to the floor alongside it, falling unconscious at my feet.
His magic releases the moment he goes down, and I stagger toward him, my hand instantly scrambling to his neck. I sigh in relief—a pulse. Faint yet steady.
I reach for his pocket. Cold pieces of metal meet my palm, and I yank them out, staring down at the two keys I spent weeks searching for not so long ago. I wait, expecting relief to flood through me, but all I feel is the gentle nudge of duty.
To the labyrinth, now. This isn’t over yet.
Then I realize—I’m touching the keys but receiving no visions. Nothing about what I need to do to access the magic; nothing to prepare me, as happened the first time I touched these keys. I check them, but they’re definitely the ones I found weeks ago.
I guess that means . . . I must be ready.
I release the ice on my chakram and holster it. Theron doesn’t so much as moan when I start for the doors, and each footstep I take away from him matches how many times I promise silently that I’ll save him.
The courtyard is in chaos.
Shouting Cordellans cluster in groups, relaying information about where the Winterian attackers were last spotted. Some say west, some east—but thanks to my magic, I can tell they’re spread out, one darting over rooftops north of the palace, one east, and one west, each of them flinging whatever projectiles they can to draw the soldiers into attack.
So when I step out onto the front steps, the already infuriated soldiers turn on me.
“The queen!”
“After her!”
The snow clouds over the city hang thick and gray, fat with condensation. I launch my hands up, calling down every flake in one furious pull.
Icy shards catch in breathtaking gales; gusts of white blind everyone in the courtyard. The Cordellans howl at the onslaught of the blizzard, armor clanking and feet stomping.
To Mather, Sir, and Greer, I fling one powerful will for them to meet me north of the palace, then I launch myself there as well. My magic dumps me into the street paces from flailing Cordellan soldiers, fists punching wildly in the storm. Other forms come into view through the onslaught of icy fury—Mather and Sir, crouching against a building across the road.
I send my magic shooting out, urging them in a wordless certainty to run to me. Mather stumbles forward blindly, and I can tell when my magic no longer needs to lead him—he makes me out in the blizzard and plummets forward, scooping me into a crushing hug so wondrously different from Theron’s that I moan.
Sir reaches us, but I don’t have time for words—I grab his hand.
“Where’s Greer?” I shout over the gale.
