A Queen of Ice (A Trial of Sorcerers #5)

Chapter 33

33

I t took them nearly four full days to cross the distance from Hokoh to Risen. The city first came into view as they crested a ridge. The valley of the main river of Meru had completely changed from when they had last seen it.

“They…destroyed it.” Yonlin’s words quivered from horror or rage, likely both.

“Not all of it.” Alyss tried to be optimistic, but the sentiment rang hollow, given what lay before them.

“Someone want to explain?” Ducot asked.

Eira described the sight for his benefit—the blackened husks of entire swaths of the city left like carcasses to rot. The vacant patches that were the outlines of buildings. Every scar on the once glorious city that led to the vast pit of rubble where the castle once stood.

“That castle had been there for thousands of years.” Olivin gripped the reins of his mount with white knuckles and a quivering fist. “It was a testament to Meru’s history, and our future.”

“The castle is gone, but the Archives are more glorious than ever,” Eira said, somewhat still for Ducot’s benefit. The houses and districts that led to the Archives were the most intact. Walls had been erected up the hill that the Archives stood atop, glowing in the new “Flame of Yargen” that ringed them. She had no doubt there was some kind of checkpoint at each wall and only the most trusted were allowed to reside closest to Ulvarth and his unholy seat.

“City gates?” Ducot murmured.

“Closed and guarded,” Olivin reported. He’d scouted ahead.

“So, Frostiness-in-Training, are we going in like Hokoh and freezing the whole damn place?” Ducot directed the question to Eira.

“As much as I wish…no.” Not right away at least . “Olivin, Ducot, do either of you know of a second way in?” They’d treat this like Hokoh and go in quietly, getting as much information as they needed to make an informed strike. The only difference here was Eira’s patience. She wasn’t going to waste the one shot she had.

“I know of tunnels,” Ducot said. “But they’re likely monitored or collapsed. The Pillars knew the central operations for the Shadows.”

“Given what Lorn said, I’m sure Ducot is right,” Olivin chimed in. “But I think I know another way that the Pillars wouldn’t be aware of.”

“You do?”

“Follow me.” Olivin led them off the main road and down to a rocky bluff. There, they abandoned their horses and continued on foot around the side of the city, toward where Risen met the great bay of Meru.

Down along the stony shoreline, they came to a halt before a flat slab of rock. It didn’t seem any more significant than the others. But Olivin stopped directly in front of it.

“Alyss, can you move this?” Olivin pointed.

“Sure.” She seemed as confused as Eira felt, but did so anyway. The slab revealed a cobbled tunnel, so small they’d have to crawl through. It was thick with algae and muck.

“What is this?” Eira demanded to know.

“An entry to our home.” Olivin looked to Yonlin, whose lips parted with shock.

“You never told me?—”

“I didn’t want you exploring,” Olivin interrupted him. “I didn’t know where Wynry might lurk—she knew about this, too—and I didn’t want you going off without me. So I sealed it and never spoke of it.”

“I had a right to know…” Even Yonlin sounded uncertain.

“You were a boy,” Olivin countered and turned back to the tunnel. “And I was doing my best to protect you.”

How had she never seen it with such clarity? Olivin might have suffered grave injustices, but he didn’t truly see himself as a Shadow. Even when he was giving the organization his all, that wasn’t where his heart had ever been. It finally all slotted together. The contradictions Eira had been grappling with smoothed. In Olivin’s mind, he was a noble knight. A fallen lord struggling to reclaim all the control that had been stolen from him. First, he’d wanted revenge, but at the first glimpse of being able to attain something more, he jumped at it.

He was nothing more than a boy who was afraid of losing the few people that were important to him after he’d already lost so much.

It was noble. But smothering and misguided at the same time. Rather than causing her heart to ache, the pain in her chest continued to knot further.

He loved her .

Never had it been more clear than in that moment. Never was something more sad…because if he didn’t love her, he wouldn’t be so bent on protecting her. He wouldn’t be happy with relegating her to the sidelines—he would’ve seen the problems with even trying.

Eira kept the thoughts to herself and dutifully followed behind him into the tunnel on her hands and knees. They were at Risen now. Having this conversation would have to wait. Right before they took down Ulvarth wasn’t the time.

The tunnel pitched down, then leveled, and sloped up again. Olivin and Yonlin’s glyphs glinted off the slick walls. As her knees were screaming from the endless digging into jagged rock, Olivin stopped.

“Alyss, once more, in front of me,” Olivin instructed.

With a pulse of magic that rippled through the stone around them, Alyss folded the ceiling of the tunnel above Olivin’s head like a sheet of paper. Stone and mortar ground against each other. The cracking and creaking ended with a few pebbles that bounced down and skittered across the floor.

Now able to stand, Olivin pulled himself through the hole in what must be a floor. He turned and reached back for Eira. She took his hand, praying that something in her grasp didn’t give away her realizations.

The room she now found herself in was a cellar, though it had been ages since anything was last kept in here, judging from the thick blanket of cobwebs and the piles of dust that had collected where various long-collapsed and rotted objects had been. Eira could almost see their silhouettes on the walls. An after-image remnant of bygone days.

“Where is this?” Yonlin asked as Olivin ascended the stairs tucked against one side of the room. At the top was a hatch.

“Just under the kitchens.” Olivin put his shoulder into the hatch. It hardly budged.

“Would you like me to?” Alyss readily offered.

“If you don’t mind,” Olivin said.

“Under the kitchens? How did I never notice?” Yonlin spoke partially through their conversation.

“I closed it off before you ever entered the house again.”

“And sealed the other passage shut. A bit much, don’t you think?” Yonlin looked from where they’d come through the opening Alyss had made.

“You’re clever, brother. Always have been. If anyone could find this place, it was you.” With a pat on his brother’s shoulder, Olivin marched up the stairs.

Yonlin lingered, strife furrowed across his brows. Sharpness in his gaze. Eira wanted to tell him she knew how he felt—especially after her latest realizations. And, as a younger sibling, she’d gouged that piercing look into Marcus’s back countless times. But she held her tongue, for now, and ascended into what had once been a well-appointed kitchen.

“Had once been” could describe the entire manor.

Doors hung askew, limp on their hinges, rotted from the rain that pelted the inner courtyard of the square, three-story home. Windows were smashed. Furniture had long since been eaten by moths.

“Where were you staying after…you know?” Alyss asked Yonlin. It was clear that they hadn’t been making this their home for some time.

“Deneya helped me set up an apartment,” Olivin answered before Yonlin could.

“Deneya was behind our place?” This was news to Yonlin, it seemed.

“It took a long time for our estate to be returned to us. During which we had no money that we could access. No clout our name would give.” Olivin led them through the overgrown courtyard. Eira couldn’t stop herself from scanning the mezzanine that circled it on the upper levels. The building was as quiet as a grave. “We were wards of the crown, so it made sense for Deneya to assist with our arrangements.”

“And then you started working for her.” Yonlin sounded mildly wounded by it, even still. He’d only learned the extent of his brother’s secrecy over the past few months and had—in Eira’s opinion—taken it amazingly well in his stride. But those types of wounds could fester.

“I did what I had to do to keep you safe, and I always will.”

“Always my safety.” Yonlin took a few steps forward, breaking away from Alyss. “Never yours.”

Eira was stilled to silence, seeing similar conversations replay in her memories. She’d said something similar to Marcus a number of times. The words and circumstances were different, but the sentiment was the same: See me for who I am—I’m so much more than just your little sibling .

Olivin, however, was oblivious. “I’m fine.”

Yonlin rounded on his older brother. Even though he was slightly shorter, he managed to stare up at him with a piercing gaze. “Why do you get to decide how you are for yourself, but you don’t extend that to the rest of us?”

“You’re being a child,” Olivin scolded.

“That’s all you’ve ever seen me as. A child .” Yonlin pressed his palm to his chest. “I’m eighteen, nearly nineteen. I’m a man.”

“A man doesn’t need to say he is such.” Olivin shifted away from his brother, looking back to them. “I think we’ll find somewhere salvageable enough to stay in the forward part of the building. From there we can make our plans for our strike, the other nations should be leading their attack tomorrow.”

“Will you even let me be a part of the Court of Shadows after all of this?” Yonlin continued to step in Olivin’s way.

“You shouldn’t need to be. After Ulvarth is gone, our lives will look very different.” At least Olivin was consistent in what he was envisioning for the future.

“Then will you let me be in the fray to fight him?” Yonlin seemed almost desperate.

“You know your role,” Olivin said simply. “Eira gave you the pistol because you’re the best shot among us. You’ll need to find a good vantage?—”

“Convenient that my role is away from the thickest part of the fighting.” Yonlin’s eyes darted to Eira.

She opened her mouth to speak, to reassure him that she didn’t care where he was, as long as he could take the shot to remove Ulvarth’s armor, but Olivin spoke over her.

“It’s just how it happened.”

Yonlin snorted softly and shook his head. “You can’t keep things safe by locking them away, brother.”

“I watched you die. I saw you and thought you were dead. I thought I had lost everything all over again.” Olivin grabbed his brother’s shoulders, staring straight through Yonlin. “If locking you away is what it takes to keep you safe from them, I will. I will do anything to protect you because they…they have already taken so much from me—from us. I refuse to let them have more. I will not lose anyone else I love. Not when we’re so close to reclaiming a future that they tried to steal from us.” Olivin’s fingers were pressing dents into Yonlin’s clothes.

Yonlin yanked his shoulders away from his brother’s grip and stepped back. “I don’t want to lose the chance to live my life because I’m forced to be nothing more than a piece of yours.”

“Yonlin—”

“Include me, let me have a say, or I’m gone.” Yonlin glared for one more breath. Right when Olivin opened his mouth to speak, he spun and ran down the hall and dashed up a side stair.

“Yonlin!” Olivin shouted. He lunged. “Yonlin?—”

Eira caught his wrist. Olivin spun back but all the hot rage vanished from his cheeks when he laid eyes on her.

“Give him space,” she told him firmly. “You’re not doing yourself any favors by chasing after him.”

“You don’t know at all what it’s?—”

“Like?” she finished for him with a lift of a brow and a cock of her head. “You mean to tell me I don’t know what it’s like to fear losing a sibling? Maybe I don’t know that fear, because I watched it happen right in front of me when I was too helpless to stop it.”

“Eira…” His stance relaxed. But her grip remained.

“I know what it’s like to have people ‘protecting’ you to the point that it holds you back—it stints you.” She looked him dead in the eyes. “You’re going to crush him under the weight of your fears if you don’t relent.”

Eira knew there were two ways he could react to this—with more anger, committing to his rage. Or with some kind of acceptance.

Fortunately, he chose the latter. Olivin exhaled the last of his frustration, for now, at least. And shook his head. Eira released his wrist and it fell limply at his side.

“I’ll show you all to the rooms I was thinking of while he cools off.” Olivin guided them past the staircase Yonlin ran up.

Alyss paused, staring up the stairs. Eira stilled as well. Alyss’s eyes darted between her and the second floor. Yonlin was nowhere to be seen.

“You’re right,” Alyss mouthed more than murmured. Eira assumed her to be referencing the need to give Yonlin space, as Alyss followed the rest of them through to an entry hall and into a side parlor.

This was connected to another sitting room, and a study beyond that. The doors had been locked, and windows shuttered. Tarps were thrown over the furniture that were weighted down by dust.

But because of the care that these rooms had been given when they were closed up, they weren’t in nearly as rough shape as the rest of the home.

“These were my mother’s chambers,” Olivin explained, even though no one asked. He ran his fingers along one of the side tables by the leather sofa. “She’d be aghast if she saw it now. She’d always kept it just so.”

“We’ll be grateful to stay here,” Alyss said gently.

“Would you like me to fix it up for you?” Ducot offered. Olivin spun, shock on his face. “I’m guessing by your movements, this offer…surprised you?”

“The Shift,” Olivin whispered.

“What is, and what could be.” Ducot nodded. “If you’d like, I could do the whole house.”

“Let’s start with here,” Olivin decided after brief thought. “There are some reminders of what I’m fighting for—what I’ve lost—that I still wish to keep.”

Ducot set about to repairing the room. It was like watching a looking glass turn to water. Its surface shifting in the breeze, what Eira saw was different between every ripple. Time itself bent before the might of Ducot’s magic.

“It’s just like I remember.” Olivin breathed deeply, as though he were trying to inhale remnants of his mother’s perfume.

The notion gave Eira an idea. “Olivin, would you like to hear an echo?” She presented the question like a peace offering. The rest of them distracted themselves elsewhere, immediately figuring out that what was about to happen would be personal.

“An echo? Here?”

“You’re a family of sorcerers.” She gestured generally to the room. “Something would be caught up, I’d venture.”

“I… Yes.”

Eira let her power sweep across the room. Sure enough, there were multiple echoes, but she picked a weaker one in a mirror. Leading him by the hand, Eira ran her fingers along the gilded frame. Frost trailed in their wake. The magic was faint, and a bit harder to get a hold of. But she managed after only a moment of focus.

Olivin, Yonlin, we’re going to be late , a woman—their mother, she presumed—called out.

It’ll be fine . A man chuckled. There are worse things than being late to court.

We are always late to court.

And yet, everyone longs to be us.

She laughed. You are so arrogant .

And you love me all the more for it .

Eira stopped the echo there. Wynry entered immediately thereafter. But sharing just that much was more than enough. Tears welled in the corners of Olivin’s eyes. For a moment, he did nothing but stare at himself in the mirror, almost longingly. As if he could see the boy who had once been called to go by his mother.

It sounded like they’d truly had a happy home . Her stomach knotted. Maybe…maybe it wasn’t so bad for him to want that back. Or want it, at least, for Yonlin.

“Yonlin should hear this.” Olivin inhaled deeply, gathering his composure.

“I’ll go find him.” Alyss was on her feet.

“I’ll go with you.” Olivin stepped forward.

Eira grabbed his hand, holding tight. This was perhaps the most perfect time for her to catch him on his own, and before they went to fight Ulvarth, she wanted to speak with Olivin alone. Hopefully her display had shown him she meant well.

“Or…why don’t you go, Alyss?” Olivin said, somewhat begrudgingly. “I bet he’s gone to his room. I’m sure he remembered the way. It’s the second door once you reach the third floor.”

“I’ll be back.” Alyss smiled and stepped away.

“We’ll trail behind,” Eira suggested to Olivin, by way of compromise. “Give them a moment alone first.”

“Sure.”

He followed her into the entry hall, leaving Ducot and Cullen behind. Alyss’s footsteps were already fading on the stairs. Though Eira wondered if she was intentionally slowing them. If Alyss was looking for more “inspiration” for her book by eavesdropping on Eira and Olivin.

“What is it?”

Eira jumped right to the point. “I know what you’re doing and I’d rather discuss it outright. You must know I’m going to keep running toward danger. You’re not going to be able to stop me.”

“What?”

“I swore to kill Ulvarth, and I will.”

“Of course. We all will. With your help?—”

“By my hand,” Eira clarified, looking him in the eyes once more. His expression hardened some. “It will be me who does it. It must be me. No one else can bring down the very idea of him like I can.”

“I know you think you’re powerful but Ulvarth isn’t one to be underestimated.” Olivin seemed genuinely concerned that she hadn’t fully considered the dangers.

“Do you think I got this solely out of hubris?” Eira pointed to the center of her chest. “For some kind of ability to gloat? Olivin, I know he’s dangerous, I’ve faced him before multiple times and failed. So I know what it takes. I’ve been working on a plan for months now, I have power no one else does”—she gestured vaguely in the direction of the mirror in the other room, her display was both a kindness and a reminder of her power—“so I must be the one to do it when the time comes.”

His eyes widened a fraction, as though he hadn’t fully considered this. “Then let me be your sword and shield.”

“You can’t protect me if your focus is your brother,” she said as gently as possible.

He took a step back in shock. “You don’t want me to protect Yonlin?”

“I want you to,” she insisted. “That’s why I’m trying to say, don’t worry about me. I need to kill Ulvarth because it was by his hand that my brother died. I want to kill him because he tore apart a land I dreamed of for years. A land with flaws and ugliness, but also beauty and goodness. A land that wasn’t my own and might never be, but that I loved anyway. Because as long as he lives, I and those I love will never know true safety. And…yes. Before you even say it, you’re right. I want to kill him out of my own pride. Who would ever take a pirate seriously if she ran from her first real enemy?”

Olivin listened in silence, his expression hard to read. But something got through to him. At least she thought so…

“Why are you saying all this?” he finally asked. He was going to make her spell it out.

“I know what you did—tried to do in Hokoh. I know your heart was in the right place. But don’t try it again.” Her hand slipped in his. Panic flashed through his eyes but she couldn’t tell if it was a result of what she was asking, or that she had discovered him.

“I will not endure what he did.” Olivin’s words dropped to a hushed whisper as he glanced toward Ducot in the other room. “I will not watch you die.”

“I will do everything I can to keep myself safe, along with everyone else. But my life is not yours to live, or to keep.”

Olivin tightened his grasp. “Why do you resist help?”

“I want your help.” She wanted to plead with him to understand. “I want you by my side, helping me, protecting me, but as an equal. Just as I will do the same for you. Please, Olivin…” She had a thousand things she wanted to say. Please don’t make this complicated.

Olivin searched her face, as if he could hear all those sentiments. Hear her fears and the dreams she hadn’t even realized until that moment. Until she realized she might lose them.

“I love you, Eira.”

“I know.” She nodded, heart squeezing to the point of pain. “I know you do. You wouldn’t have done it if you didn’t.”

“Do you…” He almost couldn’t finish the question. “…love me?”

“I—” She didn’t have a chance to finish.

Alyss’s bloodcurdling scream echoed through the empty house.

Eira ripped herself away from Olivin’s grasp and took the stairs two at a time. Noelle’s soundless scream rang in her ears. Frost exploded from underneath her feet. She wouldn’t let it happen again. She wasn’t going to send off another of her friends to the worlds beyond.

The men were close behind as she rounded the stairs and continued up to the third floor. Just as Olivin had instructed. The door was open. Pushed aside.

Snow drifted through the air around her as she turned the corner. Eira was ready to unleash all manner of frozen death upon whatever awaited her. But Alyss stood alone in the center of the room.

Her quivering hands covered her mouth. Eira slowed to a stop, chest heaving. The footsteps of the men slowed behind her…all save for Olivin.

He staggered forward, eyes fixated on the singular point none of them could look away from. Olivin reached up and touched the wall. His fingers came away bright red. Sticky, like the sick horror and rage that was coursing through Eira’s veins.

“Blood,” Cullen whispered.

“Damn her!” Olivin screamed. His knuckles cracked the plaster of the wall, strips of wood jutting out like freshly cut teeth. It made a morbid period to the end of the statement that had been written in dripping streaks of fresh blood:

Hello, brother .