Chapter Thirteen

 

 

 

 

Shade

 

I picked at the slivers of ice in the palm of my hand. Corb lurked behind me; I could feel his gaze focused on me, but I didn’t turn to look at him. No one had died; I’d managed to stop just in time, but it had been far too close.

“We need to work on your ice magic.”

“I’m the Summer Queen. What good does ice magic do me now?”

“You may be the Summer Queen, but you are not Kilara. She didn’t have the uniqueness that you possess. You have so much more to offer than she ever did.”

“Like what? Killing people? Abandoning my family? Did she do all that?”

“She did her share of killing, yes. And yes, she abandoned her family as well. How do you think you came about? She had a child to continue her bloodline, which you are a part of.”

I scoffed. “Then I am exactly like her. The one person I never wanted to emulate.”

“You are not Kilara.”

“Then why are you treating me like I am?” I glared at Corb, daring him to refute my argument. I wanted to be left alone, and he didn’t seem capable of doing that.

“No, you’re not. And I’ll prove it to you.”

“How?” I asked.

He slid down to the ground and took my hand with the slivers of ice and held on to it. Looking up at me, he smiled once more. I could get used to him smiling. It was far better than the broody demeanor I’d always known him for.

“Melt the ice.”

“That’s easy.”

I peered down at the slivers of ice and beckoned my fire magic to the surface, just to my hand. The slivers hesitated for a moment but then began to melt until only a small puddle of water remained.

“See? Easy.”

“Now freeze the water once more.”

I eyed him with suspicion. Was he insane? That would be easy as well. I peered back down at the water, telling it to freeze, but it did not. I pushed and prodded it with my mind, but it remained a puddle.

“I—I can’t seem to do it.”

“Your ice magic has been pushed out by your summer magic. The heat is now dominant, but you still possess the magic that you stole from me. I know because I have yet to regain it. You have to but assert control, and it’ll come back to you. You are the only Summer Ancient to exist with more than one power.”

“What does that make me?” I asked. Tears glistened in my eyes, the emotions running me down like I was underfoot in a stampede.

“It makes you unique and far more powerful than the rest of us.”

My eyes widened as I pondered this. Was it true? How could Corb know all this?

“I don’t want to be more powerful. I just want my old life back.”

Corb leaned forward, his forehead softly tapping against mine. “This is how you find it.”

I shook my head, tugging away. “It can’t be. I’ve lost everything.”

“You are different. You were made while pregnant. Your children will be powerful. You had the four elements at your command. You’re the only Ancient who had such power, even before you became one. There is nothing to compare you to because no one was ever as powerful as you in the past. You are one of a kind, and this journey, the one you say stole your life, is at your mercy. You can completely take it over, mold it to your desires. You only have to take it.”

“I wish you were right, Corb. But it doesn’t feel that way.”

He placed his hand over mine once more, the water slowly dripping from my palm. “Freeze it. Concentrate and it will come.”

I sighed, still not believing him, but it was worth a try. I closed my eyes as I felt the liquid seep across the lines of my palm. Freeze, I beckoned it. Freeze!

Seconds passed, and I was sure nothing had happened when Corb let go. “You did it.”

“What?” I flicked my eyes open and peered at my palm. The water had solidified, not only into a lump in my palm, but it had hardened into slivers again. How had I done it? How could I control it when I had no idea what I was doing?

“How?”

“You have to let go, Shade. Let go and let your inner spirit take the wheel.”

My fingers curled around the sharp spikes of ice until I heard them crack. Crimson blood filled my fist and dripped onto the hard ice floor.

“Shade….”

“I can’t. I won’t.”

“You already have,” Corb’s voice whispered into my ear, yanking me back from the trance I’d stepped into. I glanced at him, afraid to find a person pitying me for my insanity, but I found no such expression. I found empathy, like he’d been here before, so long ago. I looked back at my bleeding hand and let it go slack, dropping the now melting shards of ice mixed with blood. I wiped it on my dress. I didn’t care.

“There’s no way back, is there?”

“No, there isn’t. Only forward.”

I stood up then, no longer feeling the pain in my hand, for it had already healed, the flesh woven back together. All that remained of my injury was now streaked across my dress.

“I can’t move forward. I didn’t know this would ruin everything I wanted from life. Nothing’s the same, nothing can be fixed. I’m doomed.”

“You’re not doomed.” Corb pulled me into his arms, but I couldn’t even look him in the eyes. “I know it feels hopeless. You’ll go through an adjustment period before you’re able to think more clearly. I know. I went through it myself.”

“But Kilara helped you, didn’t she?”

“Yes. She seduced me.”

“You loved her though.”

“Not at first.”

I perked up at this and looked at Corb’s face. He looked deadly serious talking about it. I couldn’t ever imagine a time when Corb hadn’t liked Kilara.

“What do you mean?”

“I was angry at first. Kilara had tricked me. She took me to the Heart of Fire and Ice, for that is the center of magic in Faerie. It chooses the next rulers of the realms. She detested the last Ice King and had chosen me to take his place, unbeknownst to me, of course.”

“She took you there without telling you why?” I was astounded. That was cold, even for Kilara. I had known what would happen when Kilara eventually died, but I hadn’t realized that I’d gone there to make it happen in that moment. I knew exactly how Corb had felt.

“She wanted what she wanted. You know how she was. She would get what she wanted with or without your consent.”

I shook my head. “She was horrid.”

“She was my love for a long time though.”

“But you said you didn’t love her at first.”

“No.” He glanced away, staring at the icy walls as they shifted before our eyes. I wondered if he was doing it subconsciously, moving the ice like a labyrinth in his mind. “I loathed her for taking me away from my family. I could never make myself known to them again.”

“Your faery wife and son… what happened to them?”

“They died.”

“Oh.” He’d already told me that, and I felt embarrassed for forgetting, but so much had been happening that I couldn’t keep it all straight. At least he didn’t seem insulted by my lapse. “But you had Ursad later?”

“Yes, with a beautiful princess. She raised him well, even with my intrusions now and then.” He watched me, pensively. “You know, Ursad wasn’t in the greatest of shape the last time I saw him. You did a number on him.”

I looked up at Corb, shocked. “What did I do to him?” I recalled nothing.

“He was in love with you, yet you married another. Plus, I forced him to betray you, trapping you and Dylan in my castle. He hated following my orders. He still does, but he can’t resist. Just about as much as you could resist Kilara’s demands.”

“Our descendants suffer, don’t they? Why are we forced to have children when all we do is torment them?”

“Because that is the way of the Land of Faerie.”

I flinched, but it was true. “Ursad… he’s all right, isn’t he?” I made a mental note to visit him as soon as I could. I wondered if he knew I was now an Ancient of Faerie.

“He’ll be fine. Just a bit wearied at the moment.” Corb brushed off the subject of his son without another thought. It was easy to do when you didn’t care about anything.

“So how did Kilara get you to fall in love with her?” I could take a hint to change the subject.

“Ursad’s mother?” Corb stared at me, confused.

“No. I meant Kilara. How did she finally get you to fall in love with her? You obviously did, and hard. You spent years looking for her as though she were the only thing that mattered.”

“She was. I was lost back then. I was devastated about losing my family, feeling alone. I was a descendant of the last Ice King, but I wasn’t necessarily destined for this life. It was pure chance she picked me. She could have picked my father or his father before him, yet it was I who caught her attentions.”

“So you were feeling alone. That’s how you fell in love with her?”

“Oh, no. I banished her from my sight the moment I realized who she truly was. I avoided her for a long while, but like I said, being alone as a newly fledged Ancient was hard. I finally let her in when she offered to help me adjust to my new life and powers. I had never had ice powers before; it was quite the experience. She didn’t have them either but was able to coax them out of me after demonstrating her fire powers.”

“It’s the same, isn’t it? Like fire, like ice.”

“Yes. The same. She gave me pointers, helped me adjust. Most of all, she talked to me and let me vent. She was the most patient I had ever seen any woman be, and that was what finally won me over.”

“But she stopped loving you.”

Corb frowned for the first time since he’d begun helping me. He looked genuinely pained.

“I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to bring it up. I was just—”

He held a hand up. “It’s all right. It’s not your fault. I wanted to help you, and that involves telling you everything. I want it to be revealed so that you can understand things a lot more readily. Yes, she stopped loving me, but from what I later learned, she became quite ill and refused to tell me. With this illness came madness, and with her madness came her absolute avoidance of me. She didn’t want me to know that she was fading… that the time had finally come to pass on the crown. In the end, it was the worst thing she could have done, but it doesn’t really matter anymore now.”

“How did you stand it?”

Corb furrowed his brow, confused. “What do you mean?”

“Losing her. How did you stand it?”

He exhaled, turning away to stare at the ice beyond. It shuddered under his gaze, knowing its master was disturbed. I hated to shake his feelings to the core, but I had to know the truth. I had to know if being an Ancient would always hurt this badly.

“The truth is, I still can’t stand it, not even now.”