Page 86 of Crowns of Ice

Young faces stared back at me. Wings flexed. Magic stirred. An undercurrent of energy emanated from the thousand fae lined up before us.

So this was what my father had on hand. Trained fae ready to do his bidding at a moment’s notice. I’d expected nothing less.

“Your lives don’t need to end today!” I roared across the courtyard.

Only their deathly silence answered me, but those in the front glanced at one another with puckered brows.

“I don’t want to kill?—”

The king abruptly appeared again, standingat the front of the line. His eyes shone with malice. “I wondered how long it would take for you to get here. I half-expected you to turn tail and run.”

I immediately shot my death affinity toward him, but when it reached his form, it engulfed nothing. I sneered. He was projecting himself magically from wherever he hid. Figured.

I scoffed. “Still the coward, I see.”

“Hardly. I’m merely prepared,” his magical illusion replied.

“We’re done running, Father, and your reign ends today.”

“Did you hear that?” The projected king threw his head back and smirked. “It’s exactly as I told all of you. The Death Master seeks to murder me and claim the throne as his own.”

The soldiers’ expressions at the front of the line hardened.

The king’s projection raised his arm. “Guards!”

The projection lowered his arm, and a flurry of arrows, hundreds if not thousands, flew from the back of the soldiers and sailed through the air toward us.

Ilara, my guards, and I all instinctively ducked as Ilara cast a large air Shield around us.

She winced when hundreds of arrowheads hit her Shield, but her fierce determination barreled toward me on our bond. I squeezed her hand while the arrows rained down. She gripped me tightly, but even though defiance shone in her eyes, through our bond, I felt herfatigue. She was already weakened from healing the queen and herself. Her magic wasn’t fully charged.

Snarling, the mate bond sang like a siren’s song inside me.

The second the arrows stopped, I shot my death affinity out of me, wrapping it around hundreds of guards who stood before us.

Their eyes bulged, but the projected king only snickered.

“I figured that would be your first move.” Before I could contemplate what my father was going to do, a vial appeared hurtling through the air.

It smashed to the ground before I could stop it, and a plume of misted magic rose around us.

“Get back!” I shouted. I flung us away on a gust of air, but I wasn’t fast enough. A trace of poisoned mist coasted over my skin. The scent and feel of it made my insides quiver.

Tylen’s nulling magic.

“Drachu was kind enough to allow my potion masters to formulate a few elixirs with Tylen’s assistance.” My father’s voice rang through the air, and this voice washis. It came from far away, near the castle wall. “I have a few more of those just waiting to make your acquaintance.”

“Spread out!” I yelled to my guards.

None of them hesitated before blurring away, putting as much distance between us as they could. Distance was the only thing that would save us fromthat poisoned mist if my father truly held more vials just waiting to be unleashed.

Already, I felt my affinities dimming. They weren’t gone, but they felt weakened. Whatever the mist was, it wasn’t as potent as being directly touched by Tylen, but with enough of it in our systems, it could render us vulnerable.

“Don’t let that mist touch any of you!”

“Norivun,” Ilara called. “He’s in the back somewhere.”

“I know. I heard him too.”

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