Chapter 44

44

A frozen wind swept over Risen. It darted through narrow alleyways, tucked away into squares and broad plazas, giving the architecture frosted kisses from head to toe. Windows and doorways donned an intricate latticework of ice, the frosted patterns as unique as the city’s residents themselves. Puddles that had collected in the drains and on the streets surrendered to frost, turning into glassy mirrors that reflected the vacant sky.

The frost ensnared the citizenry in Eira’s icy grasp. It laced their hair with shimmering diamonds and collected on their eyelashes like an early winter’s bluster. It invited itself into homes, sneaking under doorjambs and down chimneys to sink into bones old and young as an unshakable shiver.

Men and women stilled, turning their gaze to a bright blue late-afternoon sky from where snow inexplicably fell. The blood of the fallen in battle turned to little more than crimson mirrors, embedded into the grooves of the cobblestones where they lay. Risen was draped under a white veil of unexpected winter, of silence and stillness that placed it into the palm of her hand.

Hokoh had only been practice.

The cold brought with it an eerie and profound silence—the stillness of a deep winter’s freeze. All of Risen was gripped within her spell, swept away by the tide of Eira’s magic that had washed over it. Not one corner was immune from her spectral touch.

Her senses felt heightened to a nearly divine extent. She could feel all of them. The rhythmic thrums of their heartbeats, the sharp gasps of surprise, the wheezing exhales of the dying as they relaxed into the numbness her cloak of cold had brought with it. She stood beside all of them. Knew them as well as she knew herself.

Simultaneously, her own body was fading from her consciousness. Ice coated her feet, starting as frost on her toes and climbing up her boots to form a creeping shell that slowly embraced her body. It spread across her like creeping ivy, enveloping her in a crystalline cocoon. But, this time, she wasn’t losing control of herself. Her powers weren’t getting the better of her.

For the first time, Eira had thrown herself into her font of power and traversed it with the skill of a ship cutting effortlessly through the tides. She stood as the beating heart of the city. Her body was a monument to the power that flowed through her. She was both the vessel and the conduit.

It was time .

The ice creeping across her finally reached the dagger. It enveloped the blade and sank into the steel, drawing out the words she’d managed to lock within it. Every magic she’d ever learned and studied was brought forth—the echoes, vessels, manipulating a sorcerer’s channels, a deft control over her magic, coating things in ice to extend her power and awareness, projecting echoes…all of it and more.

But never on this scale.

Ulvarth’s words filled her mind as she drew out the echo she’d created.

Fine, I admit it—I am no more the Champion of Yargen than any other man .

Every sheet of ice cracked in time with the words. It was a symphony across the city. A whisper heard by every person connected to her.

But you know what? It doesn’t matter. Because I put on the cape, and …

His earlier tirade continued. Every sinister intonation. The incriminating ruthlessness.

In the end, Ulvarth’s arrogance was his ultimate undoing.

… So, you see, I don’t need my magic. They’ve already given me enough strength to do everything I’ve ever dreamed of .

That was enough. It had to be. Her magic was beginning to waver.

Eira relaxed her hold and allowed her powers to dissipate on a much warmer breeze that broke through her chill. The frost retreated. Snow evaporated in the sun in a blink, not even leaving behind ghostly traces of moisture. Ice slowly faded from her body with a frosty gasp.

The whole thing, beginning to end, was over in minutes. But it’d felt like a lifetime. Like she had spent years in her frozen chrysalis and was just now reemerging into the world for the first time.

Eira blinked at the sunlight that still streamed through the windows in the back of the room. Somehow, everything felt completely normal…and yet like it all had changed.

Her gaze drifted back to Adela. The Pirate Queen was as unreadable as always. A stoic statue of gray and crimson.

“Did I do it?” Eira whispered.

“You did.”

Two words and her strength gave out. Eira fell back, hit the floor, and succumbed to an exhausted, deep, and dreamless sleep.