CHAPTER FIFTY

When Eadric finally came to amidst the wreckage, he could hardly recognize the ballroom. With a groan, he tried to push himself up only for his arm to collapse beneath him, pain shooting through his wrist. His uninjured hand came away red when he brushed it across his temple.

Ears ringing, he heaved himself to a sitting position, the dull thud of his own heartbeat intermingling with the low moans and faraway shouts. Breathing deeper revealed the stab of a fractured rib or two. Holding his injured wrist close to his chest, he flexed his other hand, gripping his affinity stone, and summoned his magic to help him onto his feet. He attempted to heal himself as best he could, which, frankly, wasn’t very good at all, but he had survived worse. At least the gashes from Garringsford’s sword had clotted.

Surveying the damage, Eadric realized that Priscilla must have escaped. Several people—guests and guards alike—lay on the ground, unmoving. Dust floated thick in the air. A pillar had collapsed, and past it he saw a hole that had been blasted through the far wall, wisps of black, putrid smoke still curling from the rubble.

Where was Asterin?

She had been right in front of Priscilla when the woman had released that demonic explosion. Eadric prayed to every Immortal he could think of that she had managed to shield herself in time.

Eyes stinging from the smoke hanging in the air like a thick veil, he scanned the faces around him, trying to find any of them—Asterin, Rose, Orion, Quinlan.

“Eadric!”

He spun around. A man with a prominent serpent tattoo winding around his neck clambered over the fallen pillar, his dark hair lengthening and lightening back to gold even as he approached.

“What are you doing?” Orion exclaimed. “Don’t just stand there!”

“Where’s Asterin?” demanded Eadric.

“Went after Priscilla already, come on.” Orion slung an arm around Eadric’s waist and swiftly guided him over the pillar. “You sure look beat up.”

Eadric only grunted in response. The other side of the ballroom had fared better than he’d expected, though that wasn’t saying much. He spotted Rose flitting about, sending up swirls of debris as she brandished her affinity stone, healing people left and right. That mysterious figure in gray from the earlier battle trailed behind her, his knives sheathed at his sides. He had taken off his hood—Eadric caught a brief glimpse of his flat, stormy expression and a shock of unruly white hair.

“Any internal injuries?” asked Orion, glancing at the blood dribbling down Eadric’s temple.

“Rib and wrist, but I healed them. Sort of.”

Orion raised a skeptical eyebrow. “I see.” He waved his arm. “Rose!”

The Queen of Eradore rushed over to them. She placed a hand on Eadric’s chest, as if she could sense his pain, and muttered under her breath. He winced at the tugging ache of the bones mending at her touch. Two deft fingers prodded at his wrist, then pushed back his matted hair to heal the gash on his forehead, her gold eyes meeting his. He found comfort in their steadiness.

At last, Rose exhaled. “Better?”

“Better.” He stepped away. “Thank you.”

“Are you coming?” Orion asked Rose.

“A lot of people here are injured. I need to help them first,” the Eradorian said. “But I’ll be there as soon as I’m finished with the worst of it.”

“Captain!” Eadric heard someone call.

He turned to find Gino jogging over the rubble toward him. “Gino,” he said with a sigh of relief. “Are all the other Elites all right?”

Gino bobbed his head, gelled hair sticking up in every direction. “We’re still evacuating guests. Asterin told us to stay here, sir, but we wanted to tell you that we found a trail probably leading to her location.”

“If we aren’t back in a quarter hour, come after us. Bring reinforcements, and do not underestimate Priscilla.”

Gino saluted. “Understood.”

Orion tugged at Eadric’s sleeve. “Let’s go.”

They left Rose and the ballroom behind, dodging the stream of evacuees, and tore through the corridors, their path unmistakable thanks to the black sludge leading down the hall and up the grand stairway. They followed it up three flights and dashed left, where they found the end of the trail leading through a pair of double doors—or rather, the gaping hole that remained. Eadric could hear the screaming and yelling of a duel beyond.

Orion sprinted for the hole, only to be launched sideways back into the corridor by an unseen force. He sailed into the air and crashed through a window in a shower of glass.

“Orion!” Eadric rushed to the window, expecting to find a broken form on the ground far below. To his relief, the Guardian clung to the stone ledge of the shattered window, bloodied and peppered with cuts but otherwise unharmed. Eadric grasped him by the forearms and heaved him back to safety.

They approached the destroyed doorway. Eadric aimed a kick at the hole, but it was blocked by some sort of invisible air barrier.

Orion’s eyes widened with terror, staring beyond the hole. “Almighty Immortals.”

Eadric followed the Guardian’s gaze. Inside, Harry lay crumpled beneath a melting shell of ice that protected him from being crushed by the remains of a fallen column. Eadric shoved Orion aside for a better view and saw a grinning Priscilla, pupils blown to bottomless pits of hatred. And closer, just a few paces from the door, Princess Asterin on her knees.

But nothing could have prepared Eadric for the sight of Quinlan and Luna—his Luna—being yanked up by nooses of pure shadow, their bodies dangling five feet off the ground. Quinlan appeared to be unconscious, but Luna thrashed and clawed at her noose like a lion, face steadily purpling.

Eadric could have sworn his heart stopped beating. “What are Luna and Harry doing in there? They were supposed to—”

“Never mind that,” Orion exclaimed. “We need to get inside.”

Together, they blasted magic at the air barrier, dodging whatever ricocheted back at them.

“It’s no use,” Eadric panted, overwhelmed by the sudden urge to throw his affinity stone out of the window Orion had broken. He saw Asterin raise her palms, struggling to conjure two pitiful shields. “It’s too powerful.”

Orion let out an animalistic snarl and pitched himself at the hole again. Eadric lunged forward, preparing to seize the Guardian when he went flying, but to his astonishment, Orion fell right through and landed in a heap on the other side.

A burly man with sandy-gold hair appeared beside Eadric, the crown on his head tipped askew. “You’d better hurry if you want to save my daughter.”

Daughter?

But instead of dwelling on the thought, Eadric just thanked the Immortals above and plunged through the hole.