This dress blasts clear through them.
“I’m amazed your aunt can get away with defying convention like this,” Tierney says as she fishes through a lacquered Ironwood jewelry chest for just the right pieces. “Our rules about dress are getting stricter. This is risky.”
Aunt Vyvian doesn’t care, I bitterly consider. She’ll throw caution straight off a cliff to lure in Lukas Grey.
“Ah, this is perfect,” Tierney crows as she lifts up a gleaming necklace. Obsidian branches are linked to a slim silver chain, sapphire Ironflowers lush on the branches. There’s a pair of dangling earrings with the same branching design as well, glinting azure in the lamplight.
Tierney fastens the necklace around my neck as I put on the earrings. Then she carefully applies my makeup, rouging my lips and cheeks and lining my eyes with kohl. Scrutinizing me in the mirror, she picks up a gilded brush and styles my hair with braided accents.
When she finally steps back, she frowns into the mirror, dissatisfied. “Wait one moment,” she tells me.
Tierney disappears through the door and into the conservatory, then returns a moment later with a fist full of Ironflowers. She pulls off portions of the stems and weaves the glowing flowers into my hair.
Then she picks up her teacup, steps back and sips at it, eyeing me with cool speculation. “Yes, that will do.” Her expression hardens, braced and unforgiving. “Go get your brothers out of prison, Elloren.”
the iron flowerlaurie forest
CHAPTER NINE
BREAK
Outrage carves out my center and lightning flashes in the sky as I survey the field before me. Both the Gardnerian forces to the right and the Vu Trin on the left seem even more firmly entrenched, a wide aisle cutting up the center to expose the North Tower at its apex.
My home.
I want to run to the North Tower. I want to pull my Wand, harness my power, fly up the stairs and get Jarod and Diana out of there.
“Mage, Commander Grey is expecting you.” My bearded guard firmly nudges me, barely hiding his ill humor over how I’m dragging my heels.
There’s a sizable black tent on the Gardnerian side of the field now with our new flag, the white bird on black, flapping above it. A large, newly raised circular tent stands on the Vu Trin side, its black canvas covered in glowing blue runes, the flag of the Noi people flying above it—a white dragon emblazoned on blue. Two large, cleared circles stand in the center of both fields, ringed by soldiers.
Intimidation carves through me.
Get ahold of yourself, I harshly remind myself. You have to act like you’re Carnissa Gardner.
I straighten and force a more purposeful stride up the center of the field. As I pass, Gardnerian soldiers on one side of the aisle snap to attention, their eyes flicking over my bold dress and registering my Black Witch looks in obvious appreciation. The Vu Trin standing on the left grow rigid as I walk by, their eyes watchful and wary.
I spot Ni Vin on horseback, just behind the line of Vu Trin, and her gaze briefly lights on me, her expression carefully neutral.
A shriek splits the air.
My heart picks up speed and my eyes dart up, but I can’t make anything out in the storm-darkened twilight.
Brusque orders are shouted as both Vu Trin and Gardnerian soldiers crowd into the aisle before me, blocking my ascent.
A great hush falls over the entire field as all of the soldiers, including my guards, look to the sky.
Lightning pulses in thin lines from cloud to cloud, illuminating them with gauzy puffs of light. I squint at the intermittently storm-lit sky, trying to make out what everyone is searching for.
Another screech rends the air, and then a full-bodied roar that resonates through me. This time from the east.
Lightning flashes again, and I suddenly make out a dark, winged silhouette moving in from the east and another from the west, the incoming dragons growing larger and larger as everyone looks to the sky.
The Vu Trin dragon soars in to land, its expansive wings flapping. It flies down into the cleared circle on the Vu Trin side of the field and hits the ground with a weighty force that reverberates under my feet, the unbroken dragon gleaming sapphire, its eyes flashing silver.
The Vu Trin sorceress on the dragon’s back is outfitted in rune-marked black armor. There’s a silver circlet around her brow, two curving dragon horns rising from it. She swings off the dragon as Marcus Vogel’s opaque-eyed black dragon touches down in the middle of the Gardnerian side of the field with another ground-shaking thud.
All eyes turn to Vogel, the new decider of the Realm.
The new center of power.
Rage flashes through me, and I struggle to contain it as unsettled power kicks up in my affinity lines, burning in fits and starts.
Murderer. You vile murderer.
Vogel dismounts from his broken dragon as the horned Vu Trin sorceress crosses the central aisle and approaches him on the Gardnerian side. She’s flanked by Commander Vin, as well as a sizable Vu Trin guard outfitted in rune-marked gray.
Soldiers on the Gardnerian side part, and High Commander Lachlan Grey falls in beside Vogel along with several other high-level Mages.
And just behind them strides Lukas Grey.
Anger spasms inside of me at the sight of Lukas up there, in league with such evil.
How could you be a party to this, Lukas? How?
I struggle to conceal my burning outrage as my eyes slide back to Vogel, and the White Wand in my boot starts up a warm thrum against my calf.
Vogel stills and lifts his head, as if he’s sniffing the air. He makes a slow turn and glances out over the field in my direction.
The dark shadow tree flashes in the back of my mind, and suddenly I’m pinned by Vogel’s unfocused gaze, rendered immobile, panic swiftly overtaking me.
The White Wand hums against my skin, and I’ve a sense of silvery branches emanating from it, flowing through my affinity lines and twining around Vogel’s dark tree. The shadow tree explodes into tendriling, blackened smoke.
My body slumps in, able to move again.
Vogel abruptly turns away, as if a connection has been broken. He strides off and disappears inside his tent with the horned Vu Trin sorceress.
I pull in a haggard breath, stunned and terrified by Vogel’s palpable increase in power.
My eyes suddenly collide with Lukas’s.
He starts down the aisle at a fast clip, his focus on me like a raptor focused in on its prey, and my fire lines give a hard flare as he nears, his face a lethal storm.
Lukas barely pauses when he reaches me. He holds out his elbow, and I wordlessly take his arm, an enraged fire whipping through my lines.
“You’re dismissed,” Lukas tells my guards without looking at them, his voice taut with anger.
I want to scream at Lukas and strike him. I want to take every last Gardnerian soldier down with my bare hands. Instead, I match his long stride down the field.
At the field’s base, we veer off toward the forest, the silence between us crackling with an almost unbearable tension. Lukas’s hand slides down to grasp my arm as he pulls me through the dark woods, the lights of the military encampments and the University rapidly fading as we move farther in.
The trees’ hatred strafes at us from all sides, and Lukas blasts his fire lines out at the same time I do, the forest abruptly withdrawing.
We come to a small clearing, and he releases me and turns, our eyes locking with savage emotion. All artifice instantly breaks down, the Dryad pull an overpowering wave, overtaking me.
“How could you be part of this?” I snarl at him, teeth gritted. “Did you know the Gardnerians were about to slaughter the Lupines?”
“I didn’t know.” His eyes are incendiary.
“I don’t believe you!”
“Can I l
ie to you?” he asks, his voice daggered.
“No. You can’t,” I slice back at him. “So, tell me, Lukas. Now that all of you do know, is your whole division celebrating?”
“Yes,” he says. “They’re celebrating.”
“And what about you, Lukas? Are you celebrating, too?”
Combative fire lights his gaze. “No, Elloren. I am not. Vogel just destabilized the entire Western Realm.”
“That’s what you care about?” I lash out, my rage blistering and raw. “That the Realm is destabilized? Not that large numbers of innocent people have been murdered?”
I’ve a sudden sense of ferocious conflict slashing through his lines. “Is this still just the normal cycle of history, Lukas?” I demand. “Just the way of things?”
He remains infuriatingly silent, but I can feel it building inside him—fire exploding all over his earth affinity lines. I want to harness that fire and throw it at him. To watch him ignite.
I stalk close to him, fists tight, fire raging. “This is what it was all leading up to, Lukas. Erthia for Gardnerians. The idea that we are the First Children, and everyone else is an Evil One. The mobs. The burning blessing stars. This is what comes of it. Not some shining, blessed Gardnerian paradise. Dead children. Dead families. And Gardnerians celebrating because our cursed book tells us that it’s all just fine.”
I get right up into his face. “I don’t care if this is the normal cycle of history. Over and over and over. This needs to be fought now. This needs to end now.”
“Vogel would have to be deposed.”
The world tilts. “What did you say?”
Lukas’s lip curls into a grimace. “You heard me, Elloren.”
My throat pulls in tight, my voice reduced to a scraping whisper. “What are you telling me, Lukas?”
“The truth.” He glares heatedly at me. “Because you and I are incapable of anything else.” His hard gaze falters. “I wish I could lie to you, Elloren, but I can’t.”
“Then tell me the truth,” I say, my thoughts reeling.
“Vogel’s too powerful, and so is our military. He can’t be fought from the outside—he’d have to be taken down from within.”
“How?”
“The Gardnerian military would need to overthrow him.”
Lightning flashes. I pull in air, stunned.
I search Lukas’s eyes, but he’s giving nothing away. Nothing except the turbulent fire that I can sense raging through his lines.
“Do you think enough of the military would be willing to turn against him?” I’m barely able to take a breath.
“No,” he says with terrible finality.
We hold each other’s gaze in sudden, grim understanding.
“My brothers have been taken into military custody,” I tell him.
“I know.”
“I need you to get them out.”
He nods, fire roaring through his lines.
“And I don’t want a guard,” I doggedly press. “My aunt’s assigned them to me. I want you to permanently dismiss them.”
He nods again.
“What are they going to do with Jarod and Diana?”
“I don’t know.” His jaw ticks. “Vogel’s leaving this evening to fly to the Vu Trin base near the Eastern Pass. He’s going to hammer out an agreement with Vang Troi.”
I tense my brow in question.
“The woman who rode in on the dragon,” Lukas clarifies. “She commands all of the Vu Trin forces. In any case, I’m to accompany them.”
We both grow quiet, the darkness pressing in around us.
“Was it the Black Witch, Lukas? Has Fallon’s power quickened to such a devastating level?”
Lukas shakes his head. “No. This was something else. Something worse.” He eyes me darkly. “But soon, Fallon will be a weapon Vogel can deploy, as well.”
I cast about, my mind a storm, searching for solid purchase.
“Fast to me, Elloren,” he says.
His tone is so brutally insistent, I’m launched into a deeper turmoil. “Why, Lukas? So you can draw on my power?”
His scalding gaze only intensifies. “In part. Yes.” He takes my wand hand into his, and I let him. His green eyes locked on to me, he turns my hand over and slides his palm firmly against mine. A shiver races across my skin, and I’ve a sense of his branches twining into my hand, fanning out over my earth lines in a heady rush.
I swallow, my heartbeat deepening. Lukas grasps my hand more firmly, and I tremble as a rush of dark flame skids along the branches and all through my lines.
“When we kissed at the Yule Dance,” he tells me, “my fire lines were strengthened for a good week. My earth lines for a full month.”
I struggle to think clearly as his overwhelming heat arcs through my body.
He leans in close. “If I can access your power when we kiss,” he says, “then I imagine the fasting link would allow me to draw even more.” The motion of his fire slows to a seductive caress, stroking down my lines. “Let me pull on your power, Elloren,” he murmurs. “You can’t access it. But I can.”
Alarm overtakes me, abruptly severing his feverish spell. I wrench my hand away from Lukas and step back, breathing heavily as I massage my fingers. An echo of his dark power pulses through me as I force myself back to coherent thought. I look up at him, defiance suddenly blazing through me.
“Break with Vogel completely.” I glare up at him with stiff challenge. “Give me your word that you will fight to overthrow him. No matter the odds.”
Lukas’s face becomes a storm, his whole body tensed as a silent argument rages between us. Thunder booms overhead, neither one of us relenting.
“I want to lie to you, Elloren,” he frustratedly lashes out. “I’d give anything to be able to lie to you right now.”
A caustic anger rises, and I look him over with blistering scorn. “Those Level Five stripes are wasted on you. If I had access to my power, I’d fight Vogel. With everything in me.”
Lukas’s fire gives off a violent spasm of heat, and he stalks close. “You’re making a choice that will end horrifically.”
I hold his stare, unmoved as my rage implodes, and desolation sweeps through me. “Lukas. So are you.”
We hold each other’s implacable gazes for a long, tortured moment as our fires race through each other’s lines. And then it’s abruptly gone—all trace of Lukas’s black fire. Like a wall being slammed down.
I move away from him, and a realization hardens deep inside me with irrevocable conviction. As much as I need his help right now, I can’t align with him and risk becoming any part of this thing.
“Goodbye, Lukas,” I tell him roughly, even as my affinity lines strain toward his. Even as all hope for my brothers’ freedom turns to dust. Even as all hope for the future comes unmoored.
I turn on my heels and walk away.
* * *
I stride away from the North Tower and onto the cobbled University streets as the wind picks up and the storm finally gives way, lightning cracking overhead and a pelting rain beginning to fall.
I walk as Urisk workers scurry toward the North Tower’s field, bringing trays of food to both sides.
I walk, alone and untrailed by guards, increasingly chilled, until I’m clear on the other side of the University, and then past it. I cross over a scrubby side field and head straight into the bordering wilds.
I dully register the forest’s hostility, but deftly force it back. The trees are so dense that I can barely feel the rain under the canopy of thick branches.
Soaked through and uncaring, I slow to a stop, my breathing ragged as an overwhelming desolation sweeps over me.
Diana and Jarod. Rafe and Trystan. Tierney and Yvan. And all the others I’ve come to care about.
There’s no one who can save them.
; A wave of anger and grief crashes into me, and I’m swept into its undertow. My legs buckle, and I fall onto my hands and knees, vomiting up all the bile from my stomach.
I’m breathing heavily, spit hanging from my mouth as I stare at the wet, dark earth. Lightning flashes, and my gaze snags on a small, arcing stem pushing its way up through the bed of leaves.
I push myself up and grab at a nearby tree for support.
Lightning flashes again with an earsplitting crack, illuminating the tree.
Ironwood.
I lean into the tree, ignoring its silent cry of protest as I rest my head against it. It’s cool and rough, and even though I have to force away its revulsion, I can feel life thrumming inside it. Spring forcing itself to be known.
Another crack of lightning and I glance up to catch a momentary glimpse of a translucent bird shuddering to life in the trees—there and gone again so fast that I’m not sure if I can trust my vision.
Newly alert, I glance around, realizing I’m surrounded by a whole grove of Ironwood trees, and the hooks of arcing stems are pushing up between the rotted leaves all through the grove.
Ironflowers.
The only tree that starts out as a flower, the delicate Ironflower blossoms seeding to trees the following year, trees with branches that bloom with a smaller version of the original flower.
The apothecary wheels of my mind start turning as an idea ignites like an explosion.
To make this work, we’ll need Ironflowers. A lot of them.
We’re many days away from the glowing Ironflowers blossoming on the forest floor.
Where could I get hold of enough Ironflowers...
In a sudden, swooping rush, it all coalesces in my head.
And I know exactly how Tierney and I are going to get them all out.
CHAPTER TEN
CHEMISTRIE
I receive a rune-hawk missive from the Fourth Division Base the next evening.
“What does it say?” Tierney asks from where she sits on the floor of my lodging’s conservatory. Delicate thread shears are suspended in her hand, my almost solidly blue Ironflower tunic splayed out over her lap. My Ironflower dress from the Yule Dance is in a crumpled pile beside her.
The Iron Flower Page 44