Page 40 of Witchlight
Iseult lurched out of the Dreaming, her body crudely trying to remember how muscles connected to ligaments connected to bones. Heat billowed, orange and blue, fed by the fuel of Iseult’s and Safi’s supplies.
They were all on fire.
Somehow, while Iseult was distracted in the Dreaming, Leopold had ignited the crates, and now they all burned.
Iseult half crawled toward those flames, toward the smoke and heat billowing above it all. She didn’t think to cover her mouth or face, nor did she think to protect herself in any way. Not until she made it five steps over and suddenly remembered what wasinsidethe crates.
Firepots.
Iseult flung herself around. She crossed five steps in only two bounding leaps. Then she jumped, headfirst behind the altar.
The first firepot exploded. A mere stutter, a merecrack!before the rest of the cataclysm joined in.
Fire, heat, noise, and stone. It convulsed over Iseult, rippling with power and rage. She was midair, reaching for the snowy banks behind the altar—when the force of the explosion slammed her down. Right into snow and stone. She lost all hearing; she lost all sight; she lost all sensation in her limbs, her lips, her skin. She could do nothing but lie there, facedown and limp, while heat and shockwaves boiled across her.
She thought of how Safi had described being trapped beneath a flame hawk. She thought of earthquakes and Sirmaya and all the power of a Firewitch contained inside a single clay pot. Inside fifty clay pots.
The tower burned.
Iseult burned with it.
Until suddenly she was being moved. Someone was rolling her over. Then tugging her to him. There was so much smoke, her eyes streamed. She coughed and gasped. She couldn’t see her savior, but she knew who he was anyway.
He had no Threads.
“I’m here,” he told her—or at least, she thought he told her that. Everything was echoey and vague. Fire and smoke swirled like Threads. Her body hurt where Aeduan held her. As he carried her step by steady step out of the tower.
Then it was not fire, but snow.
It was not smoke, but starlight.
Cold air beat across her. Aeduan solidified into sharp specificity: fire-flap across his face, eyes glittering like bloodied ice. He walked and walked until the tower became nothing more than a distant torchlight. Until they were beside a stream, frozen save for one patch where ice had not laid claim. There was no light to create reflections upon the black, burbling surface.
Here, Aeduan eased Iseult down. She had, by now, reclaimed her senses. Reclaimed her mind too, and a thousand questions crowded in:Why is Aeduan here? He should not be home yet. What will this do to our plans? What can we do if we have no supplies?
But there was only one question that really mattered in this immediate moment. She coughed and scrubbed ash from her eyes. “Where is he? Where is Leopold? F-find him, Aeduan, before he can get away.”
NINETEEN
Aeduan didn’t need to be told twice. He had smelled the prince near—both of the man’s blood scents—and if Leopold was the one who had set off the explosion…
Then Aeduan would destroy him.
With nothing more than a nod of obedience for Iseult, Aeduan abandoned the stream. His muscles flamed with strength, pumped there by his magic. Faster, faster through the trees. He sprinted and veered. Any direction his witchery sensed the prince, Aeduan followed. Two bloods to track.
Leopold fon Cartorra:New leather and smoky hearths.
And the Rook King’s:Clear lake water and frozen winters.
There it was, the Paladin scent. Paces away, but to the left. Aeduan halted so hard, his cloak cracked like a whip. Then he turned and followed Leopold anew.
He knew that he was once more that broken bear from Saldonica, and Leopold was forcing him to stomp and spin wherever he desired. Yet what else could Aeduan do? He couldn’t rest if the prince was here. He couldn’t rest when he knew Leopold might try to hurt Iseult again.
Wind slammed against Aeduan, dismantling snow drifts. Singeing his eyes. He almost missed when the forest changed. The trees went from spaced and natural to a tunnel of nearly locked branches. Footsteps tracked inside.
Aeduan swerved after them.
Faster, harder. Not his mind. Not his body. A collection of seamlessly interacting parts—although… He was also inexplicably flagging too. Worse, his old wounds were pricking awake.
