Page 125 of Frost Like Night
And once I got magic, once I had far, far too much of it, I hated and feared it. I couldn’t fathom how our world could be so dependent on something that had done so much bad. But there was good in it, such wondrous good that the bad was almost understandable.
That is what I see as I plunge toward the source. The brilliance of it hurts my eyes, makes me unable to distinguish one color from the next until all I see is the most searing, perfect light. Beautiful and painful and unmarred and flawed. And while these extremes have made my world a realm of chaos and uncertainty, the answer is so simple:
The good and the bad that the magic gives us are equally unnecessary.
All my life, magic has been a driving force. All my life, I’ve fought and bled and wept for a future when those I love are safe and happy.
And so I close my eyes and let the magic bring about a new world.
38
Mather
MATHER TOLD HIMSELFit was Meira’s final burst of magic that made him leave the chasm. That she infused her will into him, a single command drumming at his heart until he couldn’t conceive of any other option.
But that was a lie.
She had told him to run with such a distinct crack of her voice that he wanted to drop Theron’s wobbling form and dash back for her. No, something more powerful made him keep the Cordellan prince—king—around his neck and sprint up the exit tunnel. Something that, once he saw it, shocked an even stronger sensation into his body: hope.
He and Phil had carried Cordell’s conduit all around this world. From Rintiero up to Paisly and down to the Rania Plains, all the way from there to Autumn. Mather had taken it into the labyrinth because he’d expected Theron to appear in the battle above, and he didn’t wantany of the Thaw to have it lest Theron somehow manage to take it from them. Mather hadn’t considered the conduit more than that, mostly due to the hatred that filled his veins whenever he even thought the wordCordell, but now he realized just how blind he’d been.
That was the solution. Cordell’s conduit.
Theron had surrendered it. He’dgiven it upin Rintiero. That was what had to happen—a conduit had to be sacrificed and returned to the chasm. Cordell’s conduit had been sacrificed, and it was now returning to the chasm—only by Meira’s hands, not its own bearer’s.
Would that be enough to destroy all magic? Would it allow Meira to survive? It had to work. Ithadto.
The only light in the exit tunnel came from the magic chasm below, so as Mather dragged Theron up, darkness swallowed them whole. He paused just inside the tunnel His ears strained for any sign of Meira behind him, racing up the exit. But all he heard was the continuing sizzle and crack of the magic electrifying the chasm—
Then a rumble. As if the Klaryn Mountains were awakening after a long slumber, shaking their shoulders back as they rose from the depths of the earth. The tunnel vibrated so hard, rocks tumbled from the ceiling and walls, a few stones cracking on Mather’s head and arms. He staggered, Theron moaning in a half-conscious gurgle as they slammed into the wall. The vibrations didn’t let up, and in the wake of the initial rumble, an explosion ripped throughthe chasm and up the tunnel.
Mather didn’t turn to see what came at them. Survival instinct overtook him, and never had he been more grateful for that numbness. Clarity only, no thoughts that would destroy him.
Thoughts like:The magic is exploding. Because Cordell’s conduit fell into it?
Or because of Winter’s?
He shifted Theron over his shoulder and ran like he’d never run before, legs pumping as if his speed might make everything all right. But even that failed him, and when a flare of painfully white light illuminated the tunnel, charged heat slammed into his back. He cried out, legs giving way under the bombardment of prickling fire crawling over his body, burrowing into his muscles.
But when he dropped, he didn’t hit the ground.
He fellupward, carried on that wave of magic with Theron hurtling through the air ahead of him. The magic surged beneath them, like a wave relentlessly crashing for the shore. Blood roared through Mather’s head, or maybe it was the magic, or the continuing explosions beneath them—the deafening intensity of the tunnel was matched only by the brilliance of the white light. It grew the longer they flew, gleaming brighter and brighter, the magic burning hotter and hotter. . . .
The magic relinquished his body to the surface. Drifts of snow caught him as he dropped to the ground, flippingand rolling down a sharp slope peppered with boulders and tufts of grass. He slammed into a tree trunk, shaking loose a deluge of golden leaves and ice. The tunnel had dumped them somewhere between Autumn and Winter in the Klaryns’ foothills. They had to be close to the battle.
These details registered in Mather’s mind, but barely, a flicker of fact that vanished as he found himself staring up at the mountains beyond.
The explosion that had ejected him and Theron from the tunnel raged on. The ground shook so hard, he had to steady himself on the tree to stand, and Theron, waking slowly, braced his hands on a rock and bowed his head to block out the rising noise. Because rise it did—the vibrations retracted, the deep breath before the war cry, and as Mather watched, golden leaves raining through the air, the mountains exploded.
Red, orange, silver, green—tendrils of color fanned across the clear blue sky, bursting up as if a volcano had shot a rainbow into the world. Rock cracked in earsplitting shatters; the spark and hiss of the magic evaporating lit the air like the fuses of a thousand cannons readying for battle. But no battle came on the wake of their spark—thiswasthe battle, this great explosion that drowned out the blue of the sky in favor of streams of color and magic that made every nerve in Mather’s body swirl under his skin.
The absence of emotion let him have one moment of watching this display unburdened. And in that moment,he almost thought it looked beautiful, the destruction of magic—
But there it ended.
This explosion was the magic disintegrating. The colors that swirled out of the mountain dissolved against the air, and each breath that passed brought with it less and less of that sparking sensation, the feel of the air saturated by magic. It was leaving, as Meira had wanted.
Mather flung himself away from the tree. Stones barred the exit tunnel now, thrown there during the continuing eruption. He tugged on one, but it didn’t budge. No—she had to have gotten out. Maybe the magic threw her elsewhere, farther down. . . .
