EDDIES AND ELEMENTALS
“Master!”
A shrill voice howled right in my ear, jerking me out of the glamour-induced sleep. Mostly awake now, I tried wrenching my eyes open, but sluggishness still dragged at me, and I fought to stay conscious. All the while, the high-pitched gremlin voice buzzed frantically a few inches from my face.
“Master! Master gone! Wake up, funny boy! Wake up!”
I’m trying, I thought irritably, if only to shut the gremlin up. Memory returned in an instant—Keirran using his glamour to put us to sleep; Keirran standing over me with his cold stranger eyes, then walking down the tunnel to confront the monster alone.
Kenzie shifted against my chest, also coming out of the faery slumber. She mumbled something incoherent. I tried, once more, to force my eyes open, feeling as if they had ten pounds of sand in them.
Then Razor gave an impatient hiss and bit me on the ear.
“OW!” My eyes flew open, stinging with the sudden pain, and I jerked back. “Dammit, Razor! Ow!” I swatted at the gremlin, but he leaped to Kenzie’s shoulder and hid beneath her hair, peering out at me.
“Boy awake,” he buzzed, sounding suspiciously pleased. “Boy awake now...find Master.”
I groped for the side of my head, gingerly feeling the damage. Yep, there were several holes in my left ear, no larger than pinpricks, thankfully, but they still hurt like hell. My fingers came away smeared with blood.
“Ethan?” Kenzie turned, her voice slurred. She blinked at me sleepily. “What’s going on?” Her gaze drifted to the side of my face, and her eyes shot all the way open. “Are you bleeding? What—”
Puck came into the room, long legs crossing the space in a few strides. “Oy, human!” he barked, sweeping up to the fire. “What’s with the ruckus? It sounds like you’re holding a cat-skinning competition in here. And you’re bleeding. Again.” He rolled his eyes. “Geez, I can’t leave you guys alone for a minute. What happened?”
“It’s nothing,” I muttered, dropping my hand. “Razor bit me.”
“What?” Kenzie shot a fierce glare at the Iron faery, who ducked beneath her hair again. “He bit you? Bad gremlin! Why did you bite Ethan?”
I tried to interrupt, to tell her it was a good thing the gremlin woke me up, annoying as it was, but Puck beat me to it.
“Uh, guys?” he asked, looking around the cave. “Where’s Keirran?”
“Master!” wailed Razor, making Kenzie flinch. “Master gone! Find Master!”
I struggled to my feet, shaking the last of the fog from my brain. “Keirran took off,” I said, nodding down the tunnel. “Did the whole faery sleep thing to put us out, said he didn’t want to drag us in anymore.” I glanced at Puck, who looked resigned and annoyed all at once. “How long have we been out?”
“Not long,” Puck said. “Just a few minutes. I had just gotten all nice and comfortable, too, when I heard Buzz Saw screeching and came racing back. Sleepy spells don’t work well on gremlins, I’ve found.” He shook his head and gave the back of the cave a dark look. “So, I guess we know where our impatient princeling is off to, don’t we?”
“Yeah.” I raked a hand through my hair, careful not to touch my ear. “He’s going to face whatever lives down there alone.”
“Oh, that idiot.” Kenzie huffed, surging to her feet. “No, he’s not! Come on, we have to find him.”
She turned and marched determinedly toward the back of the cave, Razor gibbering and bouncing on her shoulder, buzzing encouragements. I wanted to stop her, but she was right; we couldn’t let our idiot friend fight whatever was down there alone, no matter what he said.
Making sure my swords were in place, I followed, silently cursing the prince as we approached the looming mouth of the tunnel, icicles dangling from the edge like giant teeth. It was pitch-black through the gaping hole, and Puck sighed.
“You know, this reminds me of a time,” he remarked, tossing a ball of faery fire in front of us, revealing a narrow corridor that plunged into shadow, “when ice-boy and I were trapped in an underground crypt together, and he decided to go down another passageway without me. Ran into a horde of tomb guardians and had to play hit-and-run until I could catch up.” He scrunched up his face. “Oh, wait. No, that was me. Stupid tomb guardians and their scorpions. Regardless, does that remind you of anyone?” He snorted and continued before we could answer. “Also, does anyone ever consider the consequences of their actions? For instance, what will ice-boy do to me if his kid gets himself eaten by a giant frost worm or something? He’ll probably try to hunt me down, war will break out between Winter and Iron, and everyone will put the blame on me. But noooooo, no one ever thinks of that.”
The tunnel continued deep into the earth. Sometimes it leveled out; sometimes it was so steep we were almost sliding down the ice-covered floor. The faery light threw strange, flickering shadows over the wall, sparkling off crystals and translucent blue-and-green icicles. My breath writhed in front of me, but I wasn’t as cold as I knew I should be, thanks to the lingering effects of the flamefruit, I supposed. I was still plenty cold, but it wasn’t unbearable. I just hoped we could get out of here before it wore off.
The tunnel finally opened into a massive ice cavern, huge pillars extending up into the darkness. The whole place had a frozen blue-white tint, and it was so frigid I could actually see my breath crystallize into hair-thin shards and drift to the floor.
Puck sent more balls of faery fire into the huge cavern, where they bobbed spastically overhead and gave off a strobe-light effect, making my head hurt. The cavern was a maze of pillars, stalactites and ice boulders, and the dancing shadows made it hard to see what was open space and what was a wall.
“Well,” Puck said, his voice echoing into the vastness, “if I was a big nasty giant ice monster, this is where I’d live.”
“Yeah,” I muttered, squinting into the wheeling lights and darkness. “Let’s just hope we can find Keirran before he finds it.”
Somewhere in the distance, there was a splintering crash, like a hundred glasses smashing at once.
Puck grimaced. “Too late.”
We hurried into the shadows, following the noise, which was hard as it echoed off everything around us. But as we went farther into the cave, we could hear more shattering noises against the rocks and pillars. Puck took the lead, and we sprinted after him, doing our best not to slip, until we turned a bend and came to the edge of an open arena. Crystal stalagmites were scattered about the floor, especially in the middle, but everything else was smooth, glittering ice. Like this was a perfectly flat lake that had frozen over.
In the center, a black-cloaked figure danced and spun amid a flurry of other things that swirled around him. They looked like whirlwinds that had picked up bits of ice and stone and were spinning them in a tight circle. A pair of glowing blue eyes shone from the center of the whirlwinds as they darted around the figure in the middle of the lake.
“Master!” Razor shrieked, his voice ringing through the chamber.
Instantly, several of the whirlwind things broke off, turned and came spinning toward us, making Razor yelp and dive into Kenzie’s hair. I cursed and drew my weapons.
“Kenzie, get back,” I called, hoping she wouldn’t argue this time. She ducked behind a boulder without a sound. The whirlwind things came closer, moving swiftly across the ice, the sound of shrieking wind echoing through the chamber. I narrowed my eyes as it hissed around me, yanking at my hair and clothes. We stood between a cluster of pillars and stalagmites, caging us in on either side, so the only way to Kenzie was through me and Puck. And that was not going to happen.
I brought up my swords as Puck stepped forward and flourished his daggers.
“Well, here they come.” The Summer faery shot me a glance and grinned. “Know anything about ice eddies, kid?”
“No.”
“Probably for the best. Aim for the middle, watch out for flying rocks and don’t drop your swords.”
The ice eddies swirled in, whipping the air into a frenzy. One came at me, a cyclone of rocks, pebbles and razor bits of ice. Something struck my arm, tearing a stinging gash across my skin. I smacked down a rock with one blade and lashed out with the other, slicing through the middle of the whirlwind. There was a rush of wind, and the debris spinning around it clattered to the ground. More pressed forward, surrounding me, until I was trapped in the eye of a deadly hurricane. Ice and rock careened around me as I kept moving, kept my weapons spinning in a circle of my own. Rubble clanged off the blades, making my hair stand up, but more stuff hit the swords than me. Most of the time. A pebble struck me in the head once, and I felt a warm trickle creep down my face, stinging one eye. Angrily, I ripped the sword through the offending whirlwind, and the eddy collapsed like a stack of dominoes.
“Whoops! Crap.” Puck leaped away, holding a single dagger before him. “Head’s up, kid!” he called as the eddy he’d been fighting now turned on me, a dagger whipping through the air in deadly circles. I ducked Puck’s blade, scrambling back before it sliced my head open, wincing as a shard of ice stabbed me in the arm.
“Ow! Dammit, Puck!” I raised my sword, knocking the dagger away as it came at my face again. The screech of metal on metal sent a chill up my spine. “Can you not make things worse sometimes?”
“What? I never make things worse,” Puck replied, stepping forward to deal with another eddy swooshing in from the side. “I make things more interesting.”
“Yeah, my foot is about to have an interesting encounter with your ass.”
Puck laughed. “Ice-boy’s been saying the same thing for years, kid. Good luck.”
The dagger sliced down, narrowly missing me. As it spun for my head again, I swung my sword at it, putting all my strength into the blow. The two blades met in a screech of sparks as I knocked the dagger free of the whirlwind and lashed out with my second sword, cutting through the middle of the chaos.
As the wind disintegrated, I turned to help Puck, only to see him do a weird, crazy dance that took him through the swirling eddy and out the other side. As he did, his dagger flashed, and the thing collapsed into a scattered pile of rock and ice.
“Well, that was fun,” Puck announced. Kenzie came out from behind the boulder, holding Puck’s wayward dagger. He took it with a wink. “Appreciate it, human. Nothing more embarrassing than being skewered with your own weapon, right? Well, shall we go help the prince?”
By the time we reached the center of the lake, however, the eddies surrounding Keirran were nothing more than chunks of stone and ice. The Iron Prince stood with his sword out, the last eddy disintegrating at his feet. His eyes were hard, the glowing blue-white of the cold stranger I was beginning to hate. As we came up, his gaze flicked to mine, and that eerie glow vanished, though his face remained blank.
But Kenzie marched right up to the motionless prince and, shocking both of us, shoved him in the chest, knocking him off balance. He stumbled back, barely catching himself, his blank, cold expression shifting to astonishment.
“That was stupid, Keirran,” Kenzie said, glaring at the prince, while Razor buzzed and nodded from her shoulder. “What were you thinking? You think you can do this alone? You think we would let you just walk out on us? After everything we did to get here? And don’t start with that crap about wanting to keep us safe. You should know by now that excuse isn’t going to fly.” She stepped closer, the tiny form bristling with rage. “And if you ever use glamour on me again the way you did my parents, I’m going to kick you so hard Annwyl will feel it through that necklace, I swear.”
“Bad!” Razor spoke up, watching Keirran from the curtain of Kenzie’s hair. “Bad Master! No leave! Bad.”
Wow, even the gremlin was pissed at Keirran. I was going to say something as well, but Kenzie and Razor seemed to be handling it, so I just stood back and watched the show. Keirran grimaced, holding up his hands and taking a step back from the onslaught.
“All right, all right,” he said, his expression caught between annoyance and resignation. “I understand. You’ve made your point, Mackenzie.” He sighed, shaking his head. “It seems I’m stuck with all of you, whether I want it or not.”
“Damn right you are,” Kenzie snapped, Razor buzzing in agreement. “Don’t forget it again.”
Keirran blinked, giving me a knowing look. I just shrugged. Yep, that’s my girlfriend. And I’m not going to step in front of her for you, either. You’re on your own.
“Well,” Puck said cheerfully, lacing his hands behind his head. “Now that we’ve all kissed and made up, maybe we should focus on what we came for. Namely, the big nasty you all are supposed to fight.”
I looked around the cavern. “Where?” I asked, my voice echoing through the vast open space. “This is a dead end. It looks like something might’ve lived here once, but it’s empty now.”
“Yes,” Keirran agreed, his voice hard again. “There aren’t any more tunnels. This is the lowest level of the cave, and those eddies are the only things I’ve seen. This was a waste of time. Whatever lived here is long gone.”
“Au contraire,” Puck said, lifting a finger. “You’re just not looking in the right direction.”
And he pointed straight down, into the frozen lake.
Below our feet, cracked, blurred and distorted by the ice, an enormous shadow lay stretched out on the bottom of the lake. It was probably close to fifty feet long, and though it was hard to see from this distance, I thought I could make out thick stumpy legs, massive shoulders and a broad, armored head. I couldn’t tell if it was dead, frozen or just sleeping, but I did know one thing: it was huge.
“You’ve got to be kidding me,” I muttered. Puck shook his head.
“Nope. There’s your spirit of the Frozen Wood, right there. So, can we go home now? I was going to say how impossible this task was, but I figured it would be better to let you see it for yourself. Obviously, waking that big guy up would be a bad... Uh, Prince, what are you doing?”
I looked at Keirran. He stood with his eyes half-closed, his hand raised in front of his face. And he was glowing. Like the night in Mr. Dust’s office, only this time, instead of the cold, frozen aura of Winter, he flickered and pulsed with light. Like Annwyl, shedding fragments of sunlight, it melted the ice at his feet and turned the air around him to steam. His eyes opened, glowing amber, and his voice was calm and matter-of-fact.
“Waking it up.”
He knelt, driving his fist into the ice. There was a flash as he flared painfully bright for a second, cracks spreading out from his hand, and a spear of light shot toward the thing under our feet.
“Well, that’s torn it.” Puck sighed.
A rumble went through the ice around us, and the ground started to shake. The cracks Keirran had put into the ice widened, spread out, sprouted new ones that raced over the lake. Icicles and stalactites fell from the ceiling, smashing to the ground in ringing cacophonies, and I struggled to keep my balance.
“Right, I vote we do not stand here anymore,” Puck offered, and we scrambled away, fleeing to the edge of the lake as sounds of cracking ice grew deafening and the ground began to heave.
The ice exploded, surging up like a frozen geyser, before raining sharp bits of icy shrapnel down on us. A huge, stony foot emerged from the hole, smashing down onto the ice. Another followed, and a monstrous creature of ice and stone lurched onto the surface of the lake, shook an enormous blocky head and roared.
Okay, so it was even bigger than I’d first thought, probably stretching close to eighty feet from snout to hindquarters, looming up to an impossible height. It was shaped, vaguely, like some huge bear, with a little porcupine thrown in. Its head, back, shoulders, legs and sides were covered in stone, like a bulky suit of armor, and huge icicles jutted out from its shoulders and down its back, sharp and lethal. Beneath the stony hide, a frozen blue light pulsed through the joints in its armor, and two giant glowing eyes shone beneath its helmeted head.
“Oh, good,” Puck remarked as the colossal beast turned toward us, shaking the ground. “We get to fight a mountain.”
“Kenzie, take Razor and get back!” I called as the giant creature spotted us and lurched forward with a roar. Its mouth opened, glowing blue light spilling from its jaws, as it breathed a blast of frigid air toward us. We ducked behind a stalagmite as a jagged line of icicles surged up where the creature’s breath passed, stabbing into the air. I yelped as a cold, frozen tip jabbed into my arm, ripping my sleeve and drawing blood.
Puck grimaced, peeking out from behind the stone, watching the monster through a cage of ice spears. “Right,” he muttered. “So, I’ll be the distraction again, while you two decide how we’re actually supposed to hurt that thing. Sound like a plan?”
Without waiting for an answer, he darted out from behind the stalagmite, sprinted a few feet away and blew out a piercing whistle.
“Oy, Rocky! Over here! Turn your big stony ass this way!”
The thing roared and blasted Puck with icicle wind, which ripped him apart in seconds. But a flock of screaming ravens emerged from the chaos, spiraling into the air and circling the creature like a dark cloud. It bellowed and shook its head, looking more annoyed than anything, but its attention was not on us anymore.
I drew my swords and took a deep breath. “Let’s go.”
“Ethan, wait!” Kenzie grabbed my hand while Razor gibbered terrified nonsense from her shoulder. “Don’t,” she whispered, sounding terrified, while I stared in disbelief. Something had finally given her pause. “You can’t fight that thing. It’s huge—you’ll be killed!”
I glanced at Keirran, who watched us with impassive eyes. He had already made up his mind. He was going to battle that massive, moving fortress, with or without my help.
I sighed and squeezed her hand. “Remember what I said about me standing in front of the dragon for you?” I told her softly, trying to smile. “I wasn’t kidding about that.” She took a breath to argue, and I quickly overrode her. “I’m doing this, Kenzie,” I said, making her slump. “I have to. We can’t turn back now.”
“Here, then.” Bowing her head, she reached around her neck and pulled out Guro’s amulet, spinning from its cord. I stared at the disk in surprise; I’d almost forgotten she had it. The metal flashed in the hazy light as Kenzie reached up and draped it around my neck. Her fingers trembled as they brushed my skin. “You need this more than me.”
I tucked the amulet into my shirt, wondering if it would really protect me like it did her. Ghostly shadows springing up to deflect lethal sword blows still seemed too good to be true. But right now, I’d take all the help I could get. “Thanks,” I told her. “I’ll get this back to you later.” If I’m still alive.
She blew out a shaky breath and leaned forward, hugging me around the neck. “Be careful, tough guy,” she whispered in my ear. “Don’t get killed. We haven’t even had our second date yet.”
I held her tightly for a moment, memorizing the feel of her body pressed against mine, three little words dancing on the tip of my brain. I wanted to tell her right now...in case I never got another chance...
No. Not here. I wasn’t going to die here. I was going to kill that big ugly bastard and take Kenzie home. When we were safe, back in the real world with no life-threatening faeries surrounding us, I’d tell her exactly how I felt.
After we killed this thing.
Gently pulling back, I met Kenzie’s eyes and jerked my head toward the edge of the lake. “Go,” I told her softly, and she gave me a desperate look and fled, slipping into the shadows with the gremlin on her shoulder. I swallowed, then looked at Keirran.
“Ready?” he asked calmly.
“If we survive this,” I told him, “I’m going to kill you.”
One corner of his mouth turned up. “You’ll have to get in line, I’m sure.”
We charged. Dodging rocks and giant icicles spearing up from the ground, we sprinted across the lake toward the massive creature in the center. The swarm of birds around its head had vanished, and I could just make out a red-haired figure on the thing’s enormous skull, a speck of color atop a mountain.
As we approached, the creature spotted us. With a roar, it lowered its head and opened its jaws, bathing us in blue light. “Split up!” Keirran yelled, and we veered apart, just as the blast of frigid air sent a line of jagged spikes down the center of the lake. I dived behind a boulder as the creature blasted me again, nearly impaling me as the huge spines curled around the rock. Peeking around the edge, I saw Puck leap from the blocky head, land on the enormous muzzle and drive his dagger into one glowing blue eye.
The creature bellowed, rearing up and tossing its head, and Puck went sailing through the air. He turned into a raven midfall and flapped away, and as the thing came back down with a crash that shook the entire cave, Keirran darted beside it and cut at its chest with his sword.
The blade screeched off the armored hide, and the raspy echo sent shivers up my back. It didn’t seem to have hurt it at all. With a roar, the beast turned on Keirran, smashing at him with a stony paw, and the Iron Prince barely avoided being trampled into gooey paste. It pressed forward, but a big black bird swooped out of nowhere with a screech, flapping right into its eyes, making it flinch for just a second. Keirran dodged back and leaped between two boulders as the beast stomped at him, and the thing bellowed in frustration.
Dropping its head, it opened its jaws and breathed, but this time a cold white mist emerged and rippled over the surface of the lake. I felt the temperature drop, and my skin crawled with cold, even through the effects of the flamefruit.
“Ethan.” Keirran appeared beside me, panting, making me jump. “It’s no good,” he gasped, staring at the monster, still breathing fog over the ground. “Its hide is too tough. I can’t get through.” He narrowed his eyes at the beast, face darkening. “How are we supposed to kill it if we can’t even hurt it?”
“Yeah, well, when I said this was an impossible task, I wasn’t kidding,” Puck added, dropping beside us. “I think this is some kind of ancient elemental. The rocks aren’t a part of the thing. It just uses them for armor. The squishy center is inside.”
“So how are we supposed to hurt it?” I asked.
Before either of them could answer, a scraping, rattling sound echoed all throughout the cavern, making the hairs on my neck stand up. The bits of rock, stone and ice scattered over the lake were moving now, shifting and drawing together where the mist touched it. Slowly, they began whirling through the air, spinning faster and faster, until a brand-new group of eddies rose up from the fog and glided toward us.
“Huh,” Puck commented. “So that’s where eddies come from. Who knew?”
“Great,” I muttered, raising my swords as the first of the swirling creatures rounded the boulder. I smacked a rock away with one sword and lashed out with the other, but then two more eddies swirled toward me and I stumbled away, into the open. I looked up and saw the ice elemental opening its jaws....
“Ethan!” Slashing through one whirlwind, Keirran lunged out and tackled me, sending us both sprawling to the ground, just as the blast from the giant elemental ripped through the spot where I had just been standing. Scrambling behind another, smaller rock, we huddled against the stone as the eddies glided toward us and the giant roared angrily behind them.
“This is impossible,” I told Keirran as we faced the opponents coming at us once more. Puck, standing in the center of another group of eddies, fought determinedly but had his hands full. I grabbed the prince’s shoulder. “Keirran, we have to get out of here. We can’t beat this thing. It’s not worth dying for.”
“Yes, it is.” Keirran’s voice was steady. “It is for me. Go if you want, Ethan. I can’t give up.”
He ripped his arm from my grasp, raising his sword as the eddies closed in. I cursed and leaped to help him, fending off rock and ice that spun through the air. There were too many of them, and they just kept coming. Stones and jagged bits of ice struck my skin, tearing me open even as I parried or blocked most.
The ground trembled, and the huge head of the ice spirit loomed above us with a roar. Apparently, it had gotten tired of waiting for the eddies to flush us out. I cursed, scrambling backward as the armored skull swung down and smashed into the rock protecting us from the wind. Stone and ice flew in all directions as the thing pulverized the stalagmite—and most of the eddies—to dust. I turned to shield my face from the explosion, but something struck the side of my head, making me see stars.
When I looked up, I was lying on the cold ice near the center of the frozen lake, completely out in the open, and a mountain of stone and light was standing directly in front of me. Puck had disappeared. Keirran was nowhere to be seen. The thing regarded me with soulless blue eyes, ancient and depthless, a lesser god looking down on an insignificant mortal. For a moment, I hoped it would deem me inconsequential, a speck of dust that couldn’t really hurt it, clearly not any kind of threat.
Then it opened its jaws, and I felt the cold blue light wash over me, right before the wind shrieked forward to tear me apart.
I flinched, covering my face and eyes, as useless as that would be. For a split second, I thought of Kenzie and my parents, and how sorry I was that I broke my promise, that I’d never see them again.
The wind screamed in my ears, bone-numbingly cold. I heard the crinkle and snap of ice as the jagged spears surged into the air...but didn’t touch me.
Heart in my throat, I looked up.
A dark figure stood between me and the ice monster, one hand outstretched, the billow of his long coat settling around him. The line of ice spears had split at the point where the figure stood, slicing off to either side. I blinked, both horrified and relieved that he was here, that he had found us.
“’Bout time you joined the party, ice-boy!” Puck yelled from somewhere overhead. The Summer prankster appeared on the monster’s head again, grinning down at us. “I was wondering if Furball would ever find you. Hey, remember that time we fought those hill giants throwing boulders at us down Redwater Gorge? This is so much worse than that!”
I scrambled upright as the ice monster roared and blasted us again. But Ash raised his hand, and the wind sheared around him once more, splitting off to the side. I guessed the former prince of the Unseelie Court had a few centuries of Winter magic under his belt; the cold just didn’t affect him. The ice monster bellowed angrily, and Ash turned his head and gave me a furious glare.
“Ethan, get out of here, now!”
“No!” I panted, lurching forward, needing him to understand. “We can’t leave!” I insisted. “We have to kill it, Ash! Keirran won’t give up until it’s dead.”
“Keirran. Where is he?”
With a roar, the elemental started forward, intending to crush us now that it realized it couldn’t breathe us to death. Ice eddies came to life and whirled around it, forming a small but deadly army as they pressed forward. I spotted Keirran then, crouched behind an ice spear, glaring up at the monster as it passed. Ash saw him, too.
“Keirran!” he roared, and Keirran flinched, glancing at him with wide eyes. Ash pointed to the elemental bearing down on us. “Get below it!” he called. “Its underside isn’t protected! A strong pulse of Summer glamour to the heart is the only way to take it down!”
Keirran’s eyes narrowed. Raising his sword, he darted around the rock and sprinted at the monster.
Ash drew his blade with a chilling rasp. “Go help him,” he said, his voice hard and cold. “I’ll keep it off you both. Puck!” he called, and Puck’s face appeared, peering over the monster’s head. “Keep it distracted a little longer! We’re ending this now!”
The elemental turned its massive head toward Keirran, but Ash stalked forward, flinging out an arm. A flurry of ice daggers struck the monster in the face, shattering harmlessly on the rock, but the thing turned back with an angry roar and plowed toward him.
Puck dropped to the monster’s snout, right in front of its glowing eyes, grinning cheekily. “Hey, ugly, lookee here! I’m doing the Macarena on your nose.”
Guess that’s my cue. I raced across the ice, right for the mountain looming in front of me. Any other time, it probably would’ve blasted or stomped me into paste, but it had its hands full at the moment, with Puck dancing on its snout and Ash fending off blasts of icicle wind, hurling his own ice daggers back. I reached the place Keirran stood, in the shadow of the monster’s bulk, surrounded by ice eddies. Ash had been right; overhead, the elemental’s chest and stomach were open in places, blue light streaming through the cracks and holes in the armor. It was also ungodly cold this close to the monster; each breath stabbed like a knife, and I could see frost creeping over my skin, ice forming in my hair and eyelashes.
“Keirran!” I gritted out, slashing through a whirlwind as I joined him. “Hurry up and kill it! Let’s get this done so we can get the hell out of here!”
He nodded, slicing an eddy that came whirling at us. “Keep them off me for a second!”
I lunged forward, protecting his back, as Keirran dropped his head and closed his eyes. Light formed in his hand, a pulsing globe of pure sunlight, growing hotter and stronger with every passing second. I spun and whirled around him, cutting at the eddies that got too close, wincing each time something hit me. But nothing struck Keirran, who was throwing off waves of heat now, melting the frost on my skin.
“For Annwyl,” I heard him whisper, and he thrust his hand up, between the cracks in the armor.
There was a searing flash of light, and a shudder went through the ground. The elemental threw up its head and roared, shaking the cavern, as bits of stone and ice began falling from its bulk, smashing to the ground. The ice eddies shuddered and collapsed into piles of rubble as the monster roared again and started to collapse.
“Keirran!” I spun toward the Iron Prince, but he lay motionless on the ground, all his color washed away. Dodging a huge chunk of armor, I grabbed Keirran’s arm, slung it around my neck and hauled him upright. The elemental was crumbling like a cave-in, stone and ice smashing around us. Clenching my jaw, I leaped forward, pulling Keirran out as I did, and the huge bulk of the elemental collapsed with a deafening roar, sending ice and rock flying everywhere. Something hit me in the back and I fell, bringing Keirran with me as I tumbled to the icy ground, stunned.
Gasping, I let Keirran go and rolled to my back, staring up at what was left of the elemental. The cold blue light was gone, and only a shifting mountain of stone remained, spreading over the ice. I was relieved, and at the same time, I felt abruptly guilty. We had just destroyed an ancient force of nature, probably the only one of its kind. And for what? To appease a fickle faery queen who cared nothing for any of us. I had no quarrel with this creature; we had strolled into its home and woken it up when it had been sleeping peacefully, not hurting anything. I wondered if the thing hadn’t been trying to kill us, would Keirran still have struck that final blow?
I felt tainted. I’d allowed myself to become an assassin of the fey, carrying out their dirty work. I’d sworn I’d never do that. I’d sworn a lot of things, back before I met Keirran. My only comfort was that the prince was family and that Annwyl at least would get to go home.
Keirran groaned and stirred, pushing himself to his knees. His color had returned, though he looked paler than before, faded out and exhausted. He met my gaze and offered a faint smile...right before Ash swept up, hauled him to his feet by the collar and slammed him back against a pillar.
“What have you done, Keirran?”
The dark faery’s voice was cold, furious. I scrambled upright, feeling my bruised, aching body groan in protest, unsure if I should step in or not. Keirran winced, but didn’t try to struggle or break free.
“What I had to.”
“You had to kill the spirit of the Frozen Wood.” Ash narrowed his eyes, unappeased. “You had to wake an ancient elemental that has been asleep for centuries, fight it in its own territory and destroy it. Because you had no choice.”
“You told me how to kill it,” Keirran pointed out. “You didn’t have to.”
“Yes I did. Because I know you. If I hadn’t arrived, if I hadn’t said anything, would you have stopped? Or would you have kept fighting an unwinnable battle until it destroyed you all?” Ash paused, waiting for Keirran’s reply. The prince met the icy gaze for only a moment, then looked at the ground. Ash nodded.
“That’s what I thought.” His voice, though it had thawed the slightest bit on that last part, hardened again. “Do you realize what you’ve done? That spirit is what kept the Frozen Wood alive. With it gone, Mab will lose this territory, either to Summer or the wyldwood. She’ll blame Summer for the destruction of her territory, and probably Iron when she hears who dealt the final blow. You’ve probably started a war.”
“It was to save Annwyl!” Keirran’s outburst made Ash pause. The Iron Prince glared at his father, his face suddenly tormented, eyes glassy. “It was the only way to get Titania to relent, to stop Annwyl from Fading away completely. I had to do it.” His gaze narrowed. “I would’ve thought that you, of all people, would understand.”
Ash sighed, and to my extreme shock, pulled Keirran forward so that their foreheads were touching. “I do understand,” the dark faery murmured, and Keirran squeezed his eyes shut. “More than you know. But this wasn’t the way, Keirran. You should have come to us. We would have worked something out. But you had to go do everything alone, and now matters are even worse.”
Keirran slumped, clenching his fists, but didn’t say anything. Ash released him and stepped away, casting a somber look at the mountain of rubble that was once the spirit.
“I have to go to Mab,” he muttered as Puck appeared beside him, looking grave. “See if I can convince her not to declare war on Summer or Iron. Keirran—” he stabbed a terrifying glare at the Iron Prince “—go home. Right now. You, too, Ethan,” he added, glancing at me. “I’m sure your parents are worried about you.”
“No,” Keirran whispered, and Ash’s icy stare fixed on him. He swallowed, but remained firm. “Not yet. I have to go back to Arcadia, make sure Titania lets Annwyl return to court. Please.” He met Ash’s gaze, imploring. “Let me do this one final thing. I’ll go home after that, I promise. And I’ll never leave Mag Tuiredh again.”
“I’ll take them back to Arcadia, ice-boy,” Puck added, his voice uncharacteristically grim. “And I’ll send him home afterward. Both of them.”
Ash stared at Keirran a moment longer, then sighed. “Fine. I’ll allow it, this once. But you had better be waiting for me when I return to Mag Tuiredh, Keirran. We are going to have a long talk. Goodfellow...” He glanced at Puck. “Inform Oberon we’ll be contacting him soon, as well. He’ll want to know about this.”
Puck nodded. Ash spared one last look at me and Keirran, his gaze lingering on the prince. Then he whirled away in a swirl of black, stalked into the shadows and was gone.
Kenzie. As soon as Ash left, I spun toward the place I’d left the girl...and nearly ran into her, coming up behind me.
“Oof.” She staggered back a pace, but I caught her and swept her into my arms, holding her tight. She hugged me back fiercely. Razor peeked out of her hair and grinned at me, but I ignored him.
“Hey, you,” she whispered into my shirt. “Looks like you managed to slay the dragon.”
“Yeah,” I muttered, not wanting to say how much I regretted it. That destroying something so ancient and primal, something that had kept a part of Faery alive, seemed wrong. Not to mention we might’ve sparked a war. Pulling away, I gazed at the mountain of rubble that was once an ice spirit and grimaced. “We should’ve never come here.”
“Was that Keirran’s dad that just left?” Kenzie went on, looking in the direction Ash disappeared. I nodded. “Where’s he going in such a hurry?”
“Oh, just to visit Mab.” Puck sighed, shaking his head as he walked past. “You know, catch up, have some cookies, maybe prevent her from declaring all-out war on the other courts. The usual.” He gave me and Keirran an unreadable look and rolled his eyes. “You two. I swear, this is so familiar. What’s that human saying about having a kid that turns out to be just like you?” He snorted. “Well, come on, then. Let’s get you back to Arcadia so you can see Titania, and we can put an end to this insanity.”