by Shelley Cass
“They have turned from their King.”
Conall sat forward with wide eyes. “Now that’s a very interesting development.”
“It must be a trick!” Glaidin gasped fearfully. “No man of Krall would unite with an Awyalknian! They are in danger if they think these men are their friends! Dalin is young and too trusting …”
“No man of Krall has had an opportunity to follow his own free will for centuries,” Asha countered Glaidin’s disbelief. “The One’s magic has freed them, and the Raiden’s cause has inspired them to follow him. It is no trick. The Lady of the Forest seldom falls for deception,” Asha reassured him, and the truth of that statement was enormous. The Lady was surely the most ancient and powerful being of the natural world.
“This is not just a war between Awyalkna and Krall anymore,” she told the mortal King. “This is another War for the World. And if we have people of Krall supporting us too, then we may truly be completely united against the threat of Darziates.”
“Friend,” Glaidin at last said quietly. “You have no idea how welcome you are as your kind again comes to share this world with us.”
Conall rubbed his hands together. “Yes,” he grinned boyishly. “You are very welcome, indeed.”
Chapter Fifty Four
Kiana
“Gods,” I hissed under my breath. It was already late in the day, but the hollow in the wall that I’d hoped would serve as our shelter was now filled in with rocks.
I turned to face the trail of glum, exhausted men still catching up behind me, all of them cold and sodden from the damp air and chilled wind.
It wasn’t going to be easy to tell them we would have to keep going. It was going to be even harder to tell them that we might not be able to find anywhere else along this brutal Pass – which could lead to fatal exposure.
“Why have we stopped, Kiana?” Roth panted as he caught up to me. He didn’t seem as robust as the others. Would I be mourning his death by the morning? I swallowed my thoughts sickly.
“Is the shelter close by?” Ferron asked wearily as the group clambered together, bumping against each other blankly.
I took a deep breath. “That was the shelter,” I answered regretfully, gesturing to the build up of rubble now blocking what had once been a sheltered opening in the rocky wall.
I saw shoulders slump and the passage reverberated with their foul words as they grimaced miserably. But I wasn’t confident enough to try to use magic to hollow out a new cavern, when I might cause a rock fall myself.
“We will just have to continue on for a while until we find something else that is suitable,” I told them, as if I didn’t doubt that we would find safety from the freezing night in time, and as if I couldn’t see the worry in their already ragged faces.
They trudged along behind me again, but the day was fading fast and the temperature steadily began to drop as we found nothing but unending jagged walls and were battered by air that was colder than ice.
The thin, watery light of the mountains was waning and as I knew the night would soon be upon us I pressed them on at an even greater pace. They were already shivering as the wind sought to freeze our extremities and as the dark began chasing us down.
The men were starting to move sluggishly, their ragged breaths echoing around the Pass and over the wind.
Purdor fell wearily forward, knocking into Thorin. Thorin had been drinking from his flask, and the water spilled down his chest, but he caught Purdor, who shook himself determinedly and started moving again.
Then the dull light was gone.
“Kiana!” Thale called at last as he helped Tane to his feet from where he’d tripped. “We cannot see.”
“Halt!” I called, and the sounds of the lagging footsteps behind me stopped.
“We don’t have your keen eyes, Kiana,” I heard Noal gasp raggedly, and I could just make out his slender figure stooped over in the dark.
Gods I could see them all swaying where they stood. They were slowly freezing on their feet. They couldn’t go on, but we couldn’t stop without shelter. They wouldn’t live through the deepest part of the night. None of them.
Yet while every part of my body was bitterly icy, my exposed face and hands feeling chapped and stiff, there were sparks of magic in my blood and I wasn’t as dangerously cold as they were.
“I can continue on and search in the dark. I will find what I can and come back for you,” I told them.
“It’s not safe for you to go alone,” Dalin managed through chattering teeth. “If something happened, we wouldn’t be able to find you.” I saw his outline straighten with an effort. “I’ll come with you.”
“No,” I answered firmly. “I can be faster alone. We need shelter quickly. There’s no time for debate.”
I didn’t wait, but turned and jogged away from them. “Stay close together!” I called over my shoulder as I swept away into the dark. “And keep moving your arms and legs!”
“Are you sure we should let her go alone?” I heard Thorin through his shuddering.
“She’ll be fine,” Noal told him between gasping breaths. “It’s Kiana.”
I sped on desperately, but reached out with all of my senses to scan every nook and every cranny, listening to the wind curving around every rock and throwing out my intuition in the hope that I would find something. I gauged the slopes in the path with my feet, hoping to feel a slant that could indicate a hollow.
My hair, which had been saturated by the moisture of the air, was now becoming icy and stiff, and I feared that if I stopped running for too long I would lose any lasting heat in my body, and would end up shutting down myself.
I was becoming frantic when finally some instinct told me to stop. Backtracking, I strained to see if there was an opening in the wall, but everything seemed black. I reached out, wincing with the rough surface’s chill, and forced myself to patiently run my hands along it.
“Frarshk,” I cursed, finding nothing as I made my way back and forth. Gritting my chattering teeth I angrily kicked at the looming mountain, but nearly fell forward as my leg swung crazily out in front of myself, not connecting with anything solid.
With a croak of delight I fell to my knees and inspected the base of the wall, finding a low, arched opening that surely led into a cavern inside.
I laid flat on my back and pushed myself forward, sliding into the dark hole to find myself hurtling down along a short slope to hit a rocky floor below.
“Thank you Gods!” I whispered to the heavens, making out the dark space to be a room-like cave of adequate size. The galling wind did not reach this space, and I quickly felt my way around to ensure there were no other occupants or dangerous crevices in the room.
I quickly left my packs, bow and quiver against a wall before scaling hurriedly back up the slope to be lashed by the cold outside again.
I ploughed urgently back along the Pass to find my group, instinctively vaulting over obstacles, and heard the wheezing of their breathing as I drew close. I rounded a bend and skidded to a halt, nearly sliding right over Nikon, who stirred dully.
I could make out each of their forms, huddled on the rocky path as if they were only half alive, and I immediately stepped amongst them, briskly pulling them to sit up.
“I’ve found a place,” I cried with false cheer. “It’s not far, and it’s warm and dry.”
The air felt as if it was below freezing point, and nobody acknowledged my words.
“Enough!” I snapped like a commander. “To your feet! NOW!” I made out a couple of heads lifting in the dark. “MOVE!” I bellowed, my voice whipping around us in the howling gale.
One figure started to stir, and used the wall to pull himself sluggishly to his feet. Dalin.
He leaned down and pulled the feebly stirring figure next to him up as well. Noal.
I was sure that it was Thorin and Vulcan who helped each other up next, and Wolf pulled the shuddering Agrudek to his feet.
They were rising as if from a de
ep sleep. As if from death. And after what seemed like an age they were all standing, sagging against each other where they stood, waiting to be told what came next.
“Follow,” I growled. “Do NOT stop!”
I felt a shaky hand on my shoulder as they formed a line and I turned and began to lightly jog back the way I’d come, listening to their stumbling, lurching steps as they held onto each other.
“KEEP MOVING!”
Like marionettes they flopped and dragged themselves senselessly after me.
Thorin collapsed and I had to pause to drag him to his feet and roughly push him on before doing the same for Gideon and Purdor.
“DON’T STOP!” I roared as they began to slow without my direction, and they made a new burst of speed.
My heart was racing as I finally cut them off, holding out my hands and putting my palms on Thale and Tane’s chests so that they slowed, their bodies heaving with the effort to breathe.
The cold felt like knives carving grooves into the lining of my own lungs as, like sheep, the rest of them milled around me.
I turned to Tane. “Get on your back. Lay with your feet pointing to the wall.”
Unquestioningly he obeyed, just dropping down and folding in on himself.
“Trust me,” I told him sternly, and knelt to put my hands on his shoulders before thrusting him towards the wall.
I heard only a few interested stirrings from the others as Tane seemed to disappear into the wall, sliding down into the cavern, and I turned to Thale.
“You’re next,” I instructed.
His chest was broader than Tane’s and he almost didn’t fit, but he scraped through with my help, and I pushed man after man down into the hole, hearing them collapse inside when their feet touched solid ground. I had to give Vulcan a more forceful shove, and then it was just Dalin and Thorin.
“Come on Raiden, it’s not the Palace, but it’ll do,” I teased, and he slid down into the cavern as well.
Thorin didn’t move to follow him immediately though, standing against the wall with his head back and his eyes closed.
His breath was wheezing and rasping, his chest fighting to rise and fall in a more extreme way than I’d noticed with the others.
“We need to get you inside, right now,” I told him as he opened his eyes and I pulled him to lean against me. His stocky build dragged along with me as I walked him to the gap and helped him to lie before it and slide in.
I heard Vulcan catch him and whisper with an effort up to me that the slope was clear.
I slid at long last back into shelter, but in the darkness the sound of everyone’s laboured breathing seemed loud and ghastly.
“Please Gods,” I mouthed silently, “let me be able to give them heat.”
I cast my eyes around the darkness uselessly, wondering how I could make fire without anything to burn. Unsure, but determined to at least try, I picked my way over and around the heaving, shuddering bodies scattered across the floor, and found a clear spot in the middle to sit in, thinking furiously.
I closed my eyes and tried with all of my might to will a fire into existence. Even just a small flame at least. Yet nothing appeared.
Perhaps I couldn’t create fire without anything to build off, I considered despairingly, thinking of how I could make rock change shape simply because the rock already existed. How could I muster heat to work with?
Then an idea took shape and I frantically felt the ground around myself to find two pebbles, which I hastily beat together so a little flicker of light sprang up in a flash between them. I beat them together again, but this time I pictured the spark growing, and the flicker of light seemed bigger. Eagerly, I beat them together one last time, now picturing that spark exploding into a flame, and I jumped when a burst of light and heat exploded from the clashing rocks in my hands.
This time it didn’t fade, but stayed stretched between the rocks as I held them in a small, flickering ball of white flame.
Some of the men were rousing at the sight of the small light, and I pulled the rocks away and set them on the floor while the flame globe stayed up in the air where they had been, levitating and creating a floating light in the middle of the cave.
I focused on the white brilliance and pictured in my mind what I wanted it to do, before it obediently swelled to more than double its size. Now all it needed was:
“Heat,” I whispered to it, and suddenly I felt radiating warmth touch my cheeks as I beheld it.
Warmth trickled tenderly through the cave, settling upon the hushed, shivering figures like a comforting blanket and I put my hand out to touch the flames with my fingertips, feeling nothing but waves of comforting warmth.
I took a handful of it and it sat on my palm as if I held a light globe from Sylthanryn City. Then, with a sense of new confidence, I sent out a new thought. At once some of the swirling light broke away into pieces to cross the room and float at intervals along the walls of the cavern.
Able to see clearly at last, I dragged all of the packs and bundles of armour to a spare space and left them there. Then I rustled up some frugal snacks despite the fact that we’d already eaten that day’s ration, and put a touch of my newfound skill with heat into each portion.
Some of the men were stirring and a lot of them were sitting up by the time I was passing the snacks around, which they quietly chewed while they recovered their senses.
Vulcan was the first to speak, croaking to Thorin that he should be making an effort to get up too, as Thorin was the only one who hadn't sat up yet. But the young warrior didn’t respond.
Vulcan frowned and nudged his friend, who was lying motionlessly next to him.
“Thorin?” Dalin asked, who was on the soldier’s other side. He took hold of Thorin’s shoulder and gently rolled his friend over onto his back, gasping when he saw that Thorin was not conscious, though his purple lips were parted and his teeth were bared with the rasping effort it took for him to breathe.
“What’s wrong with him?” Vulcan cried, and scrambled to pull Thorin into a sitting position against himself, away from the icy rock floor.
I lurched fearfully across to Thorin’s side and took his face in my hands, feeling that it was freezing to touch before I examined Thorin’s tunic in consternation.
A thick layer of icicles lined his collar and was growing down along the material across his rasping chest. It was much thicker than the dusting of frost that everyone else had already shaken off.
“There’s ice all down his front that hasn’t melted,” I said in confusion. “How did that happen? No one else got that icy did they?”
“No,” Dalin said. “None of us got wet enough for the cold to make the ice that thick.”
Suddenly Purdor gasped. “Oh Gods! The water!” he cried in horror. “I fell against him and he spilled his flask! His chest was wet the whole time we were out there!”
Thorin’s clothing and chest had been slowly freezing for that whole time.
“Will he live?” Wolf asked apprehensively.
“Are his lungs still working?” Thale asked, his face drained of colour.
“He didn’t complain. I didn’t even notice,” Tane said guiltily.
I brushed the ice from Thorin’s shirt.
“Dalin, get the shirt open and tell me the damage. Vulcan, keep him warm,” I rose and scooped up my healing pack, rustling around in it.
“It all seeped through to his skin,” Dalin gave a commentary as I dropped down and began hurriedly chopping ingredients. “His throat and chest are blue all over.” His voice was hard, trying not to panic.
I nodded. “How blue?”
Noal was crouching by them now. “Not as blue as Dalin looked in your cottage after the Evexus attack,” he responded, guessing what I was going to try to do.
“Alright,” I replied. “I don’t think there will be permanent damage as I can still hear him fighting to breathe. But we need to warm him up.”
Dalin rubbed Thorin’s hands and chest, trying to
bring heat back into his skin. “You’re going to give him that fire drink you gave me?” he asked as the soldiers watched tensely and I mixed ingredients furiously in one of the bowls from my pack.
“It worked for you, it’ll work for him.”
I used my new talent to send heat through the bowl and warmed the liquid up so that it bubbled thickly.
“Get his mouth open,” I ordered, rising with the concoction and crossing back to them.
“It won’t hurt him, will it?” Vulcan asked uneasily over Thorin’s head.
“I sure hope it does,” I told him seriously. “It’s got to be hot enough to heat up his blood and organs.”
Vulcan let Dalin take Thorin’s jaw in his hand to open his mouth. “Sorry Thorin,” he told his friend.
I poured the drink down Thorin’s throat, massaging it down until it was all gone, but nothing happened and Thorin didn’t twitch.
Dalin started to rub Thorin’s arms and hands in his own again and I followed suit, now trying to put my hands over his chest and sending waves of magical heat from my own body into his.
“Come on …” I muttered as everyone else held their breath, watching for any sign of movement.
Then he spluttered weakly, and stirred in Vulcan’s arms.
The men let out a series of whoops and cheers, and Thorin blinked.
Then he raised a shaking, unsteady hand to his throat. “It feels like I’ve swallowed lava.”
Vulcan squeezed his comrade tightly in relief as Dalin and I sank back in euphoric, dizzy exhaustion.
“Just wait until Kiana gives you a second dose,” Dalin told him.
Chapter Fifty Five
Aglaia was beside her young soldier, Elan – or Friendly, in a dining hall brimming with other volunteers who were counting out rations for the City’s midday meal.
“Majesty?” a page boy’s soft voice said from near her elbow, and she peered down with a start from where she had been levelling off a cup of grain.
“Yes?” she asked kindly.
“A royal messenger from King Glaidin has arrived.”