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

Chapter 34

34

“ S he has him,” Olivin rasped between ragged breaths, head hung, shoulders quivering. “She. Has. Him.” He withdrew his hand and pointed it, bloody knuckles and splintered flesh and all, at each of them. “Let him go. Let him go , you told me. And this”—he thrust a finger toward the wall—“this is what happens.”

“Olivin—”

“If he had stayed, she wouldn’t have him. She was probably waiting here for—” He stopped short and the danger they were in dawned on all of them.

“Go,” Eira whispered.

They all scrambled toward the windows. Alyss threw out a hand and the wall around them crumbled, shutters clattering to the street below.

Eira shifted her steps, falling back to Ducot. He had moved with the rest of them. Even if he couldn’t read the writing on the wall, he heard the panic in their voices, Alyss’s magic, their sprint.

Her hand closed around his. “When I say, jump.”

Ducot’s mouth was pressed into a hard line but he nodded anyway, putting his trust into her. They closed the distance to the wall and, “Jump!”

Olivin landed on a disk of glowing light. Cullen floated down, feet pumping through the air. Alyss raced on stairs formed from rubble. Each appeared under her toes and crumbled away as her magic and feet moved from one to the next.

After Eira’s stomach shot into her throat from the initial weightlessness, she landed on a pillar of ice, Ducot wobbly. She shifted her magic and the ice became a chute, Eira guiding his fall onto the makeshift ramp. He slid on his back and she rode behind him, staying on her heels.

They were all about halfway down the second story when a zing of magic rippled the air.

Eira spun. Part of her magic continued to focus on easing Ducot to the ground. She skidded to a stop on what was now a pillar of ice where she stood and shifted all the rest of her focus. A thick wall of ice rose against the house.

Simultaneously, it exploded.

The sudden, magical force of the explosion only compared to one other that Eira had felt—the end of the flash bead mines. Eira held up both her hands, rising to the balls of her feet as she leaned forward. As though she were trying to smother the fire with her own body rather than magic.

Ice cracked like thunder. Popped like her jaw as she gritted her teeth. Her breastbone burned around the rune etched into it.

But her ice held. It blocked the shrapnel and rubble and contained the worst of the explosion. As the last of the shockwaves rippled through the ground, she eased her magic and descended to meet the rest of them.

“That was easily half a dozen flash beads you just blocked,” Ducot murmured with awe. Out of everyone, Eira trusted he’d have the keenest senses when it came to the magic.

“I’ve been working on my magic.” Eira tried to brush off the feat. She hadn’t done it for praise. They had all seen the destruction just one flash bead could wreak before. “We have to move.”

“This way.” Olivin took the lead.

Eira fell into step and the others followed as they quickly dashed down the streets.

“Where to?” she asked.

“To get my brother back.” That was the answer she’d been fearing he’d give her.

“Olivin—”

“They want to make this a fight, we’ll make this a fight,” he growled, turning onto a street that connected with a main road. The man wasn’t thinking. He was literally going to march to the Archives right now. Eira took two quick steps forward and wrapped an arm across his upper chest and shoulders.

“Wh—”

“We cannot fall right into their hands.” Eira shoved him up against the wall, holding him there. Olivin tried to break free, but she braced herself against him. She was stronger than he remembered, or gave her credit for.

He seethed. “They have my brother.”

“I know. And I know you’ll risk anything to get him back. But, for a second, think about this : they’ll kill him once they can’t use him as leverage to get to us. So if you hand yourself over to them, what do you think is the first thing they’re going to do?” Eira shifted her grip, making sure she had a firm hold on him. Olivin looked away, but didn’t answer. She took it as a victory. “Ducot, know of any Court of Shadows tunnels in this section of the city?”

“There’s an entrance closer to the docks,” he said. “I’m not totally sure where we are, but it shouldn’t be far. I’m confident I’ll pick up my bearings on the way.”

“You want us to go down into the tunnels that Lorn said are now controlled by the Pillars? Yes, that’s so much smarter than tackling this problem head-on.” Olivin tried to break free again.

A dagger of ice pressed into his throat underneath his chin. Eira locked eyes with his as they widened, shocked by the threat.

“You would threaten me?” Hurt flashed through his eyes.

“Only until your better sense takes over. If we go to the Archives right now, they will kill us all. You are playing right into her hand. Anything you do now, she’s planning for. She already has. We’re finding a place to hole up and recalculate—doing the last thing she expects you to do: approach this logically and calmly.”

“I don’t?—”

“Olivin, please,” she said softly. Don’t make me do this . “I swear to you, we will get him back. If not because we care about him—which we do, I do —because he has the pistol and without it, no one is defeating Ulvarth. So if you can’t believe I’m going to prioritize getting him back because he’s one of this crew and I care, then believe it’s in my self-interest to do so.” Eira tilted her head to look Olivin in the eyes, seeing all his fear and worry. “You’re not going to help him if you’re dead. Don’t die on him. Don’t put him through that.”

Perhaps it was just how recently she’d brought up the pain of Marcus’s death, but Olivin’s shoulders sagged. He shook his head and made a noise of disgust—of pain she could empathize with all too well.

Ultimately, he resigned himself to her plan. “Fine.”

“This way.” Eira led them once more.

It wasn’t hard to find their way to the docks. She remembered the pathways from the books she’d read on Risen and from their arrival. It also didn’t take long until Ducot caught his bearings and led them down a side alleyway and into a door that Alyss helped open for them.

Eira was reminded of the storeroom by the Archives—the place where Alyss and Noelle had first been wrapped into the insanity of the Court of Shadows—and instantly wondered if this somehow connected. Even if the Pillars had brought down the Court, their underground labyrinth was extensive and there was no way they could monitor every tunnel. Even with the risk of the Pillars, she was betting it’d be a safer way to travel than aboveground…

“Through here.” Ducot shifted a back wall into an opening that held a ladder.

“I’ll go first,” Cullen offered. “See if I sense anyone.” He descended into the darkness. After a long stretch of silence, he called up softly, “I think we’re clear.”

Ducot was the next down the ladder. He paused and pulses of magic radiated from him. He shook his head. “I don’t feel anything either.”

The rest of them followed.

“Good, so we’re alone. What next?” Olivin was understandably eager.

“Let’s find a place where we can spread out a bit and organize ourselves in safety,” Eira suggested. The tunnel was rather cramped.

“There should be a supply cache not far from here.” Ducot led the way.

They all followed him around a few bends and ultimately to a door. Inside was a basement. But another ladder going down farther made it feel like the attic of a completely buried home.

The room wasn’t large, but there was enough space for them to spread out among empty crates and cracked barrels. The room had been picked clean, everything of use pulled from it. Still, Cullen and Alyss began searching anyway.

“It goes on forever down here,” Alyss murmured, running her hand along the wall.

“Risen is an ancient city,” Eira said. “Built and rebuilt upon its old footings for thousands of years.” Who knew what could be found down here if they went looking? Perhaps there would be room for pirate stowaways in the future, or a good route to infiltrate the city, should she ever need to… For now, she’d keep her focus on what was happening on the surface.

“I can’t believe she took him…that I let him go…” Olivin paced in the farthest corner of the room, berating himself under his breath. Just when he was feeling as if he might reclaim everything that was lost, this happened. Even if Eira didn’t share his goals for the future…she still felt for him.

“This is what they do,” Ducot said gravely. “You know it as well as the rest of us. It’s what they did with Eira, with Taavin, with Yonlin.”

“Twice,” Olivin added unnecessarily.

“Once the dust settles, I want to move quickly.” Eira set a definitive tone in trying to shift the conversation away from the cycle of rage and annoyance to something productive. All eyes went to her. “I have a plan, but it’s open for discussion.”

“Tell us,” Ducot demanded, keeping the focus.

For the next two hours, they debated the best steps for them to take to save Yonlin while not risking the attack on Ulvarth too early. Lamenting that their element of surprise was gone. But there were still things Ulvarth wasn’t expecting—the attack from the other nations, hopefully, and with any luck Yonlin had kept the pistol secret.

They drew lines in the dirt on the floor, overexplained, and looked at everything in every possible way. The most important thing was to get Yonlin back, and Eira suspected she knew where Wynry and Ulvarth would put him. If it were her hiding Yonlin, she’d put him somewhere that she’d expect none of them to know about while lining the way to the dungeons with knights and other traps. So the plan was to get to the Archives—clearing a path when possible for the larger attack on the city—and then get to Yonlin.

By the time they all seemed more or less in agreement, Eira was confident the initial hunt for them on the surface had ended. Which meant that the Pillars were likely to turn their attention below.

“Take us on the least common paths to get as close to the Archives as possible,” Eira commanded Ducot. “Alyss, connect passages when you sense another close by for us to move on different tracks.”

They descended the ladder, farther underneath the streets of Risen.

She wasn’t trusting Olivin to guide them, not when it was clear that Wynry was already anticipating his every move. Twice, they heard movement in the distance. Both times, Alyss pulled them onto a side path and they waited. It was impossible to know if the noises were from the Pillars, from Rebec’s Shadows, or rogues and vagabonds. But Eira wasn’t going to risk an encounter.

They began to ascend, eventually coming up to a cellar. Hunched and with breaths held, they listened and reached out with magic. There were no noises or signs of life above them.

Ducot moved for the door, pushing on it. Fortunately, it hadn’t been locked or barricaded from the other side and they emerged from underneath the corner of an intricate rug in a house long abandoned.

“Thank goodness this is still here,” Ducot breathed. “It should be all right to stay for the night.”

“We’re not staying the night here.” Eira moved to a nearby window, lurking in the shade of the heavy curtains and trying not to sneeze from the clouds of dust her movements created.

“It’s a Shadow safe house. No one ever owned this place but us,” Ducot said.

“Exactly. We can’t depend on anywhere owned by the Shadows.” She scanned the street below, recognizing the rougher area of town she’d once used as her entry and exit to the Archives. This seemed to be somewhere opposite, but close enough to be useful. “I’m going to go and find us somewhere else to stay. I’m sure there’s some back door left unlocked, or attic no one will look in.”

“Isn’t that more of a risk than staying in the attic here?” Alyss asked. “If we’re somewhere else, people could be there.”

“Any life a Pillar senses here they will automatically assume is a Shadow and weed us out. We need to hide among the masses.”

Alyss nodded at that after a moment’s consideration.

“I’ll come with you,” Cullen offered. “There’s safety in numbers.”

Eira briefly considered telling him no. But if they did run into trouble, it could allow one of them to escape and get word back to the rest. So she said, “All right.”

A few minutes later, they emerged onto the street in new clothing and hooded cloaks. A benefit of emerging into a Shadow supply house was that there had been ample options to change their appearances. Despite this, she kept an illusion wound tightly over them as they left. To a casual observer, the door to the townhome hadn’t even opened.

“You know it won’t take much to goad him off the plan,” Cullen said gravely. He didn’t have to specify who he was talking about.

“I know.” Eira sighed. “But what am I supposed to do? Let him run off?”

“Yes.”

She looked at Cullen, aghast.

“I don’t speak from jealousy,” Cullen made sure to clarify, though surprisingly the thought hadn’t crossed her mind. “But if it is his life or the rest of ours, it’s not really a choice, is it?”

Eira gritted her teeth and looked toward the Archives looming over them. She imagined Ulvarth skulking in the highest, secret rooms where she’d met Taavin. Looking down across all of Risen as though it were a game of carcivi, and he was moving his pieces around.

He knew the corners he was pressing them into. Forcing them to take actions that’d lead to mistakes and play right into his hands.

“No, it’s not,” she said. A pirate wouldn’t sacrifice the lives of an entire crew for one rebellious sailor. “Let’s hope it doesn’t come to that.”

Those words lacked confidence. She tried to make up for it in her steps, charging forward. But a sense of doom had settled on her shoulders like winter’s blanket. A deathlike chill.

You’re not all going to make it out alive , it seemed to whisper.

I know , her better sense wanted to reply.

Watch me , every beat of her heart uttered.

After piecing together a few hours of rest, they moved at midnight for the Archives. They were running out of time before the coordinated attack would be launched. And, before then, she needed to get Yonlin and the pistol back and find Ulvarth to put herself in position.

The first part of their trek was relatively easy. The pathways unblocked and no one bothered them, save for the mildly curious glances of a few unsavory sorts that were cast their way. The inky shroud of night offered the perfect cover.

The three rings of walls that led up to the Archives were bigger than Eira had imagined. The first was a towering spectacle, larger than any of the surrounding buildings so there was no possibility of leaping over it. It was so thick that it made seeing the Archives—even high up on their hill in the distance—nearly impossible. If there was any noise on the other side at all, it was entirely muffled.

She’d expected the formidable sight of guards and hardened fortifications, regular patrols, or poised cannons on the ramparts, preloaded with flash beads. But, instead, they found a haunting stillness and an eerie emptiness. There was no one along the wall. No signs of Pillars or any other living soul at all. The gate itself was a mere archway. Equally unguarded and completely open. Within was nothing but swirling darkness, as black as pitch, that seemed to entirely absorb the light.