Beasts of the Frozen Sun

by Jill Criswell

  The screams grew louder.

  “Bastard!” I swiped futilely at him through the bars. “How? Gwylor chose Torin at the Culling. No one usurps the god of death’s will.”

  Madoc was drawing something in the dirt floor with the toe of his boot. He stopped, staring at me like I was a fool. “My brother was chosen, given the blessings of Gwylor. Just as Llewlin and his sons were.”

  Lord Llewlin, father of Glasnith. According to the Immortal Scriptures, he and his three sons had called upon the god of death to help them save our island from the Great Betrayer’s uprising, after Veronis declared himself king. Llewlin and his sons perished nobly during the battle at the Great Betrayer’s palace.

  But according to the mystic, the Forbidden Scriptures said it was Llewlin and his sons who wanted to be kings, and they called upon Gwylor to crown the worthiest among them. The god of death toyed with and tricked them, driving them to kill one another out of madness. Just as my father had descended into madness since the Culling.

  Gwylor was a trickster. A manipulator. He didn’t play by anyone’s rules, save his own.

  Neither did Madoc. I’d glimpsed the answer months ago in the cells, when I read his soul and saw the trial from Madoc’s point of view—the way he’d pretended to scream as Gwylor whispered to him, the way he’d smiled as he held the burning heart that turned into a circle of gold. A crown, I realized with sudden horror.

  The trial had been a farce.

  “Gwylor didn’t choose Torin,” I said. “He exploited Torin’s weakness, used him to destroy our clan from within. Gwylor chose you.” Madoc finished drawing the symbol on the floor. I recognized it—I’d seen it drawn in ash on the door of his cottage before the Culling. I remembered dresses stained with blood, the sound of cracking bones, as another realization, more sickening than all the others, came to me. “The god of death didn’t steal your wife and daughter. You offered them.”

  “Yes.” His hollow gaze regarded me, and I saw that Madoc wasn’t completely heartless. His mourning had been genuine. It pained him to lose his family.

  Somehow, that made it worse.

  “It’s true, what I said at the trial. I am no chieftain.” Madoc raised the lantern. “Because I was meant to be king.”

  King of Glasnith. That’s what he’d wanted all along.

  “The Dragon will take Glasnith and appoint me high king. Then he’ll take the Auk Isles, and Sanddune, and Savanna. He’ll create an empire. He’ll conquer the world.”

  Gods be damned. Madoc, Torin, Draki, Gwylor. They had doomed us all. “You said you bowed to no one. But you would bow to Draki?”

  “If that’s what it takes to get a crown upon my head. Mark my words, girl. Before this is over, all of Glasnith will bow to the Dragon.”

  Even Madoc—blustering, bloodthirsty Madoc—had been cowed by Draki.

  “I’ll never bow.” I gripped the bars so hard my knuckles were white. “Not to him, nor to you.”

  “Perhaps not.” He smiled. “I promised you to that crafty, yellow-eyed beast, but unfortunately, you know too much for me to let you live. So instead, I’ve offered you to Gwylor.” He nodded at the symbol he’d drawn on the floor. “Think of this as a parting gift—death by my hands, rather than the Dragon’s.”

  Madoc swung his arm, hurling the lantern at the ceiling. It caught fire instantly.

  The only man with a key to the grate I was locked behind strolled off into the night, leaving me to burn. Clutching the medallion to my chest, I tried to think of a way out, but shock and grief clogged my thoughts, slowing my mind.

  The fire gorged itself on the wood and thatching of the roof, a shrieking orange sky swelling above me. Death had touched me in the loch, through the hands of the fallen gods. It had touched me in the sharp thorns of a knout, through the hands of my father. Gwylor was the god of death, but Death was its own entity, its own animal—a god could command it, but it was the teeth of Death itself that sank into your soul and wrenched you from this world. I felt it near me, slavering with anticipation.

  Wet drops dampened my cloak.

  I squinted up through the smoke at the water splatting down into the cells, molding the dirt floor into mud. Above me, past the harsh haze of flame, was a wide black scrim. Night. Rain. The fire had torn a hole in the roof.

  I tied the medallion around my neck and pushed my grief down, away, into a dark corner. Later, I’d let it out and hope it wouldn’t destroy me. Now, I focused on surviving.

  Wrapping my sodden cloak around me, I stood and put a foot on the grate. I gripped the bars and pulled myself higher, scaling them carefully, until the fire was directly overhead, a wall of orange-yellow spikes, shimmering beneath the pouring rain.

  I pushed into the flames, the heat like a battering ram trying to shove me back into the hole I’d climbed out of. Crawling through it, and past it, I clambered onto the burning roof, then off it, crashing to the ground beside the cells.

  My cloak was on fire. I wormed out of it, tossing the smoldering garment aside. My skin held the fire’s heat, but the burns were light, no worse than after the Culling.

  Screams rolled across the village, and I raced up the nearest hill to get a better view. Women and children rushed in all directions as Dragonmen chased them. Sharp tongues of blue fire burst from the cottages beyond, towering above the rooftops.

  My village was lost. I couldn’t save it. But I could find Ishleen and get her to safety, helping as many others along the way as I could.

  Staying low, hunching behind burning cottages, I crept deeper into the village, passing the corpses of our sentries. Torin had trusted Madoc and left Stony Harbor near defenseless. Dragonmen rounded up my people, binding them, beating them, but others joined the Westlanders—shorter, darker of skin and hair, in an odd assortment of outfits. Equally savage.

  Glasnithian mercenaries.

  Madoc had done this, brought the most vicious warriors of Iseneld and Glasnith together. How could we defeat the beasts of the Frozen Sun when it meant fighting our own people as well?

  I’d nearly made it to Ishleen’s cottage when I spotted the three Daughters of Aillira. Each one had a Dragonman guard at her side, holding out a torch, and the girls drew the fire onto their palms and hurled it onto the thatched-roof cottages. As the roofs began to burn, the girls raised their hands and the crackling orange flames burst into blue infernos, shooting toward the sky.

  The fire-sweepers’ eyes were unfocused, the three of them moving as if they were sleepwalking. They’d been marked by the Dragon, their minds trapped within his spell.

  I squeezed the hilt of my knife. One Dragonman, I could handle, but three?

  Down the hill was the sanctuary, a pack of Dragonmen prowling around its tower like wolves protecting their den. I spotted a girl with apricot hair being escorted inside it.

  “Eathalin?” I whispered.

  There were no structures to hide behind between here and the sanctuary. I sheathed my knife and shuffled as the fire-sweepers had, slow and deliberate, keeping my face slack and my eyes forward. The Dragonmen and mercenaries I passed glanced at me, assumed I was under Draki’s control, and left me alone.

  At the sanctuary, a Dragonman looked me over. “Lost your guard, magiska?” He ushered me into the tower. “The warlord won’t want you wandering unprotected.”

  I was greeted by the shrill calls of the lammergeiers above, hunched deep in their nests, hiding from the storm. Women huddled together on the benches, holding on to one another, some weeping, some praying with Doyen, who stood beside the altar, calling out to the gods to save us. Dragonmen gathered at the sanctuary’s entrance to keep us from escaping. They argued over what they would do to the women Draki didn’t keep for himself.

  If Sloane were here, he’d tell me I was a fool—I had no idea how to get back out of the sanctuary with so many Dragonmen surrounding it—but Sloane
was dead, and if I left Eathalin behind, she would join him.

  The spell-caster kneeled against one of the benches, and I hurried over to her. “Eathalin? Can you hear me?”

  Eathalin remained silent, a vacant expression upon her face, just like the fire-sweepers. Gingerly I placed my finger behind her ear, searching until I found it: Draki’s mark. I kept calling her name, as if it might wake her, but it wouldn’t. Only one thing could.

  I looked down at my scar of flame.

  Reyker’s skoldar protected me against Draki because we were both god-gifted—a connection steeped in blood magic. A mark that could only be made once. I could do the same for Eathalin.

  Drawing the knife sheathed to my thigh, I pressed it to her wrist.

  My hands shook as I cut a skoldar that matched my own into her skin. When I was done, I slashed my palm and smeared my blood over her wound. The connection was instant, a tightening in my veins, drawing me to Eathalin. Loosening the Dragon’s hold.

  “Eathalin.” I shook her gently and she gasped, blinking back to life.

  “Lira?” She clutched at me. I gave her time to collect herself, and then I prodded her to tell me what had happened. “The Dragon and his men were in the desert,” she whispered. “After we left you and Reyker in the Tangled Forest, we headed back. We didn’t know it, but they followed us. They took Ghost Village.”

  “What of the nomads? Zabelle and Mago? The prince?” Had Garreth been there when the camp fell? Had he been captured or killed?

  Sobs racked Eathalin. “When they attacked, I was supposed to run, but they had Mago. They threatened to kill him if the nomads with gifts didn’t come forward. I gave myself up, but they killed him anyway. The Dragon had captured and marked a pain-wielder, and they made me watch her flay Mago alive.”

  Sursha. In my dream, I had seen her with Draki at the temple. He must have gotten to her after she’d left Selkie’s Quay. I hadn’t known Mago well, but I ached for what had been done to him, and for Eathalin’s loss.

  “I don’t know what happened to Zabelle or the others,” she said. “After the Dragon marked me, he took me to Aillira’s Temple. He compelled me to remove the veil that hid the temple, and then he captured them. All the Daughters of Aillira inside. It was my fault.” Her words dissolved into whimpers.

  I put my arms around her. “It wasn’t. You had no choice. But I won’t let them hurt you again.” It was a promise. It was a lie. What could I do to stop it?

  I locked eyes with Doyen, crossing the sanctuary, his intentions written across his face.

  How could I protect Eathalin when I couldn’t even protect myself?

  “Beast-lover! Betrayer-whore!”

  My knife was in my hand, and then it wasn’t. Several of the other women came up behind me, grabbing my arms, my weapon, pulling me away from Eathalin. I tried to fight them, but I was still weak, recovering from my infected wounds.

  “It’s as I’ve said all along,” Doyen told the women. “The soul-reader brought the beasts here. The gods won’t hear our prayers and save us until we right her mother’s wrong. The girl is a heretic, just like her namesake. She must be sacrificed.”

  “No.” I squirmed, and the women’s fingers dug harder into my skin. “Doyen, please. You’re mistaken.”

  “We have carried forth through the ashes of your destruction long enough.” He took out his dagger. “We must purge this blight so we will be forgiven.”

  The women dragged me onto the stone altar, holding me down. I heard Eathalin crying behind them. Rain hammered my face, nearly blinding me. Doyen raised his dagger over my heart, the jeweled hilt glinting.

  Death had found me once more.

  The dagger plunged. I pulled one of my arms free, grabbing the dagger’s hilt, trying to push the blade away. The tip sank in just above my heart. With a cry, I shoved sideways and the blade raked across my chest, beneath my collarbone. My blood gushed across the altar.

  “Stop,” a hollow voice called from outside the tower.

  At the sanctuary’s archway, the Dragonmen yelled in alarm. “Volva,” they said—witch—making gestures to ward against evil. They moved aside for someone.

  The mystic entered the sanctuary, her creamy flesh studded with furious eyes. Away from the rotting Grove of the Fallen Ones, her beauty was restored. “I’ve come for the soul-reader. The girl does not belong to you, priest.”

  “Blasphemer,” Doyen said. “I don’t listen to the lowly servants of fallen gods.” He lifted the dagger once more. I held my breath, awaiting its blow.

  The mystic darted forward with extraordinary speed, grabbed the dagger’s hilt, and twisted. The blade pierced Doyen’s stomach. His eyes widened and the priest stumbled backward, into the fire pit, the torch setting his robes aflame. Doyen flopped to the ground, screaming, burning like an offering.

  The other women backed away, shrieking, as the mystic snatched the dagger from the dying priest’s guts and bent over the altar. Dozens of brightly colored eyes fixated on me.

  “Mistress of souls. You are the chosen vessel of the Fallen Ones.” The mystic sliced the dagger along the side of her own neck, releasing a flood of blue-black fluid thicker and darker than blood should be. It spilled onto my chest, the sludge from her torn throat flowing into my wound.

  My chest caught fire.

  White-hot pain poured into me, scorching me from the inside out, and my body stiffened from the shock. Darkness coursed through me, bonding with my own blood. It whispered, speaking with a thousand voices in a thousand languages, my skull pounding from the pressure. “No, I don’t want it!” I clawed at the mystic, but she pinned me to the altar.

  give in, the voices coaxed. we will make you strong.

  I struggled harder, screamed louder.

  accept us. we will give you such power.

  I had done this. I put my blood in the loch to save Reyker, gave a piece of myself to the fallen gods, and they had come for me.

  you belong to us.

  My blood burned like fuel. My bones were stretched, on the verge of cracking. I felt my own fragility, how small and frail my life was in the shadow of their immortality. I was no match for the gods, and it hurt too much to fight them.

  I gave in.

  The agony dulled to a smoldering ache. Power surged through my veins, pumped through my heart, filling me. Oh gods, Torin had been right—I liked how it felt. As much as I’d fought it, I wanted this.

  free us.

  This voice, I knew.

  arise, daughter, Veronis commanded.

  The world spun, bobbing like the sea. I looked down at my chest, ran my fingers across the skin—beneath the smears of blood was a thin scar. The mystic’s blood had healed my wound, just like the waters of the loch. She lay dead beside the altar, a shriveled, bloodless husk.

  Was I a mystic now? Would my flesh sprout all-seeing eyes?

  no. we have a greater purpose for you.

  Doyen’s body still burned on the floor. The women in the sanctuary gaped at me, as did the Dragonmen, crowding in the archway, watching. I slid from the altar, holding on to it to steady myself. “Let us go,” I said in Iseneldish, retrieving my knife.

  The Dragonmen glanced at one another warily. I took a step forward.

  Out slipped their axes and swords.

  These men attacked my people, burned my village, collected women in our holy sanctuary to enslave and abuse. Anger burned through me. Power spiked within my blood.

  use it.

  “Let us go!” All around me, the holy blood symbols painted on the sanctuary walls glowed like heated metal. The tower filled with bright red light. The lammergeiers screeched.

  “Volva,” the Dragonmen murmured.

  In a burst of sparks, the symbols liquefied, bubbled, and melted. Blood streaked down the walls in long, thick trails, drenching the floor. The Drag
onmen watched in awe, lifting their weapons higher.

  unleash it.

  I spoke a single word in the old tongue: “Destroy.”

  From above came a series of earsplitting shrieks. I had barely enough time to duck as a dark cloud rolled over me. The lammergeiers nesting at the top of the tower swooped down as one, diving at the Dragonmen. There were more than I’d realized, as many birds as invaders, each as large as a wolfhound. Their daggerlike beaks and talons tore at the men’s skin, tangled in their long hair, pecked out their sapphire eyes and ripped open their throats.

  The Dragonmen screamed and scattered. Some fell to the ground, clutching their wounds, while others ran, swatting desperately at the monstrous raptors.

  I turned to the terrified women. Part of me wanted to leave them to Draki’s mercy for what they’d tried to do to me, but to keep my promise to Eathalin, I needed them. “Can any of you sail?”

  “I can,” one woman said. “My husband taught me.”

  “Good. You can show the others what to do. Run to the harbor and take one of the fishing vessels. Head south to Selkie’s Quay and warn them of what’s happened here.” I pointed to Eathalin. “Take her with you. Watch after her. She’s a Daughter of Aillira, one of the last who remains free. Now go.” No one moved. “Go!”

  I herded them outside, where rain fell like rocks. The storm boiled into a wild vortex of wind and water. My senses assaulted me, every sight and sound amplified—colors pulsed with vivid radiance, trees and sky and fire glittered ethereally. This was the world as I’d never seen it.

  I closed my eyes, pressed my hands over my ears.

  When I opened them, the women were dodging past dead and injured Westlanders, rushing to the harbor as lammergeiers dove and screeched overhead. A Dragonman grabbed Eathalin by the ankle, and she kicked him in the head until he released her. I nearly laughed.

  Howls echoed from the village. Warriors ran toward us, Dragonmen and mercenaries, trying to stop the women from escaping.

  summon them.

  “Come forth,” I commanded in the old tongue, spreading my arms to the weeping sky. A violent pulse of thunder answered.