Page 94 of Suffer No Fools
"I don't know her motives for aligning against Coryn." Vadim's words came slowly while he thought them through. "I'd left the island by then. I only know she couldn't have taken the statue by herself."
They returned to the conference room, and Elder Beatrice reported the missing statue.
"This is all my fault," Klaus said. "I should have gone to the docks when that ship arrived."
"You think someone stowed away on the ship with the undead?"
"Yes. Maybe more than one. Elsie's not on the island, and the ship is gone. It must have sailed away while we were all distracted."
The ship had been docked to the north, out of sight behind a grove of trees at the farthest new floating dock Stan had built. Hugo remembered thinking it was strange they had docked there, since so many places had been open along the main beach.
"They wanted to hide," Hugo said.
"Aye." Vadim sighed. "Efren's sea creatures might stop them, but we've been fighting for hours. EvenWildfirewould miss them on the open sea."
"It's not open, though," Hugo said. "Our ice is ..." He sighed. "Shit." He hadn't been checking on the ice weaves during the battle. "It's gone."
"Gone?" Elder Beatrice rose from her seat. "I will kill that man."
"Frost?" Vadim followed her.
"He knew. He knew, and he did nothing. He let her go. He helped."
"You don't know that!" Hugo followed them out the door again. He couldn't believe that Frost, who had taught him how to build the giant field of ice spanning hundreds of miles of ocean, would have betrayed them for Elsie. It didn't make sense.
Stan and Tovey followed on his heels, as did Klaus and the children. The impromptu meeting was adjourned.
"Take them home," Klaus told Trin at the top of the stairs. "We won't be long." Klaus ran to catch up with Vadim and led him around to the back of the trees and the entrance to the tunnels beneath it. "He's in his workshop."
"Not hiding?" Elder Beatrice scowled at them and picked up speed.
"What were you thinking?" she screeched as she entered the workshop.
"It's empty." Vadim blinked as though trying to force his eyes to work in the low light from the doorway. "Where is he? He should be right there." He pointed into the dark room.
"Fuck." Klaus touched the globe enchantment on the wall to activate the light and approached the stone workbench. A single bauble rested in the middle, a glass ball in the center of a brass holder. "No. No, no, no." A single tear slipped down Klaus's cheek. "When was the last time anyone saw Frost?"
"I saw him earlier!" Elder Beatrice frowned. "I saw ... you're saying he was dead, one of those abominations? That would explain why he acted so strangely. I thought this betrayal explained it, but ... gods. He never meant to do this at all."
"They drained his power into this." Klaus reached for the ball but pulled his hand back before making contact as thoughit had stung him. "This is what they were doing to seekers, using their life force to turn their power into enchantments. Coryn's spectral weaver was here. If she's wearing a suppression necklace ... no." He gripped Vadim's hand and closed his eyes. He raised his hand toward the east, and Hearthstone. "They're on a ship. Elsie, the spectral weaver, a handful of others."
Hugo couldn't hear Klaus over the sound of his own sobs. Frost, his friend and mentor, was now a lifeless ball of glass sitting on a table. Hugo recognized Coryn's strategy, but he couldn't understand the sheer horror it would take to carry out her plan. The spectral weaver had drained Frost's life force, and for what? To aid in their distraction? It made no sense after such a long and harrowing day.
#
Stan
Tovey held Hugo as he cried, and Stan wrapped his arms around both of them, wishing for the world he could make it all better. He felt Hugo's grief through their bond. Stan felt like an uncaring, unfeeling monster. He'd known Frost his whole life. Why was he suddenly numb?
"Everyone deals with grief differently,"Tovey said through their bond."You are not a monster. You're still processing everything else that happened today."
Stan didn't consider himself the smartest man, certainly not in present company with Bea and Vadim, but Frost's death troubled his mind. He stared at the globe containing Frost's power. Where was the ice weaver's body?
Despite Tovey's reassurances, he still felt like a monster. He couldn't focus on Hugo's grief, and he couldn't console him the way Tovey did. He stared off into the darkness as Klaus dimmed the water globe and removed the glass ball from its stand on the table.
"I'll see if Gulde can use this," Klaus said.
In a move out of nightmares, something slithered across the workshop floor in his peripheral vision. It was no longer human. It didn't move like a human, and when it bit into Vadim's ankle and rent his flesh, even as Stan swore and grabbed Vadim's shoulders to pull him back, its bite was stronger than a human's.
