18

Deep vibrations moved through the cabin, pulling me out of the darkness. I blinked, aware of Ashton’s body wrapped around mine.

The ship’s floor angled up and away in a strange direction. The entire vessel rested on the bow.

A throbbing pain pierced my side, and I groaned and fought to untangle the cloak from my legs, struggling against gravity to move off of Ashton. “Ash,” I wheezed, trying to catch the breath knocked from my lungs. “Are you all right?”

He stirred, moving beneath me, his lids fluttering open. His gaze traveled my face and body. “Are you hurt?”

“No, I—” A deafening crack pierced the air, and the vessel plummeted a few feet. Another lesser crackling skittered away from us, and my heart froze. “The ice…w-we are falling through the ice!”

“Go,” He grimaced as he rose. He winced next to me as he yanked a piece of debris from his thigh.

“Can you make it?” I gasped, eyeing the gash. “Can you climb?”

“We must move, now!” Holding his hand out, he pulled me to my feet, fighting the tilt of the floor to the doorway.

Through the window over the helm, cold vapor blew across the lake, revealing a shattered surface. Chunks of ice crashed and jostled against one another, grinding as they capsized and flipped in succession. We sank again and frigid water rushed through the broken glass.

I gasped and staggered forward, my heart stuttering as the level rose ever higher and swallowed my boots. “Ash,” I cried, fear wrapping its stony fingers around my heart.

“Eyes on the door, Charlie. Keep focused on the way out.” Ashton squeezed my hand in his, the look on his face determined. His shield folded back into his arm guard with a scraping metal sound. “We will get out in time.”

We slogged upwards toward the doorway, my stomach tight with panic as the ship descended with every inch of ground we gained.

I followed Ashton, reaching and pulling myself up to the opening by the counters and shelves. Frost crawled along the walls and windows, spreading out in jagged webs as it trailed up from the waters toward us.

Ashton kicked the door free, and a rush of frosty wind blew over us, sending him into an instant shiver. Breath in white puffs, he climbed out, turned and reached for my hand.

I scrambled out, slipping on the teetering ice at our feet.

“Watch your step,” Ashton warned.

A low rumbling, like a train, sounded all around. I turned, trying to see through the wind and mist. “What is that?”

The airship jolted, plunging further. It sent a wave spilling up over the surface.

I fell backward, my cloak flying as I landed, skidding across a section of ice toward the edge.

“Charlie!” Ashton dove, catching me by the wrist.

“Don’t let go,” I screamed as my feet went over the side. The floe tilted and the waves washed over my boots. “Don’t let me fall!”

“I’ve got you.” Ashton staggered and then helped me to my feet. A sob bubbled up from my chest. He held my face with both hands, foreheads together as our hair whipped against my cheeks. “You are all right, my love. We made it out, see?”

“Yes…” I nodded, trying to gather my wits and forcing my breath to slow. We stood on the wobbling ice sheet, my knees knocking. The howl of the wind snatched the low moans from my lips and I clenched my hand to my middle, riding out the wave of pain. The Trembling sickness symptoms worsened, sending wracking quakes along my back. Not now…please, not now.

“There, do you see?” Ashton pointed, pulling me with him as we stumbled across the crevasses from section to section. “I believe that is the shore.”

“Are you sure?” Again, the rumbling in the distance sounded, and I glanced around, squinting into the whirling cold mist sweeping across the ice. I pulled at the internal muscle, trying to engage the lens in my eye, but it would not budge. “I cannot see anything.”

“Just keep moving. Don’t stop.”

The floes tilted underfoot, throwing off my balance as I followed him. A trail of scarlet splashes from his injury flashed stark against the ice. He was losing so much, his limp ever more pronounced as we leapt across churning waters, slipping on the gum soles of our boots. The wind picked up. It whirled along the surface, thrashing my skirts and tresses and biting at the exposed skin of my face. The vapors overhead broke with the tumult, letting in shafts of sunlight that glinted off the lake and ice like flashes of lightning. Nearly blinded, I stumbled, hand up to shield my eyes. The glare of the sun painful once more, I swallowed against the fear squeezing my throat that the Trembling Sickness might overcome me in my weakness.

Ashton stumbled up ahead and beyond him flashes of gold twinkled in the shifting light.

The rumble grew to a roar, shaking the fragmented ground, the sound reverberating up my legs. The shroud of mists lifted revealing a massive wave of ice shards moving along the surface toward us. Like countless pieces of broken glass, the thin fragments of surface ice shifted over one another, their edges catching the sun as they tumbled on the waves and wind over the ice, the sound like a train rumbling toward us.

Ashton skidded to a stop, going down on his heels.

“What is that?” I gasped, flailing to reverse my stride, my boots squealing on the chunk of snow.

“Stacking,” Ashton shouted. “Back…back the other way!”

“What?”

He staggered past me, snatching my hand and pulling me with him. “It is a warning,” he panted, as we flanked back towards the Stygian. “It means an ice storm is churning. The temperature will drop to below freezing in minutes.”

“Ice storm?” I gasped. I’d heard of them. “The lake’s surface is breaking up?”

“Yes, and the wind pushed the shards into an unstoppable wave. I have only read about it.” He glanced back over his shoulder and I would have sworn, despite the blue of his lips and the trembling of his hands, that a flash of fascination crossed his face.

“Ice storms are deadly even in outlander gear!” I shouted, aware that we wore none. My boot caught on the edge of an ice chunk as I jumped and I went down, ramming my knees against the frigid surface. I caught sight of the wave of stacked ice churning, eating up the distance between us. Scrambling to my feet, my gaze flitted nervously to the sky as we ran and leapt, ran and leapt, from bobbing chunk to the next.

Ashton went down, his leg shaking beneath him. The blood soaked through his pants leg, smeared on the ice as he struggled to rise.

Heart in my throat, I wheezed, fighting to help him up. “Why now…where’s the storm?”

“It’s coming. The broken lake waters and the wind…they’re all precursors to the wave of ice clouds that will sweep over us in minutes. We must find shelter or we’ll turn to ice as we run.” Ashton’s arm slipped around my waist and we lurched together, his face ashen, teeth chattering. “If I recall correctly, ice stacking always flows to shore.”

“Then we are going in the right direction.” In my peripheral, the glint of light off the edges of the approaching shards made my mouth go dry with panic. It was gaining, the roar deafening now as the bitter wind snatched what warmth we had from us.

We hit the shore, my feet sinking into the snow to my knees.

Ashton fell over, flailing to walk. He groaned with each step, pain marring his features.

“Go, Charlie,” he panted. “Head for the foot of the cliffs. Find cover. We’ve only minutes before—”

“No,” I shook my head, gritted my teeth. I wrapped my arm around his back, pushing, cajoling him to keep going. “Keep moving, Wells.”

His breaths came in shallow puffs. Frost clung to the scruff of his beard and settled on his dark brows. Skin deathly pale, he fought to move forward. My heart tumbled painfully in my chest as I took in the uncontrollable shivering of his jaw and weakening movements. He was dying out here. He was freezing to death before my eyes. “Please, Ash,” my voice broke. I pulled at his arm, stumbling in the drifts, my core plummeting with the wet and ice. I was slowing.

Ashton fell into the snow up to his chest. He moaned, arms scraping weakly at the bank as he tried to pull himself further.

The ground trembled, the wave of ice bearing down on us.

“Won’t make…it,” Ashton chattered.

“Of course we will,” I said, repeating what he’d often told me when I’d thought all was lost. I heaved with all of my strength, desperate to get him free of the drift entombing him. “We have to.”

“Stubborn girl,” Ashton said through a weak smile. His gaze from under snow-laden lashes made my throat ache. “Leave me here.”

Minute scrapes from the ice crystals in the air left red welts on his face.

My breath came in labored wheezes as the cold penetrated even the warmth of our lungs. Joints stiff, as if I were rusting, I yanked on his sleeve, frantic to get him moving. “Please, Ash!” Panic squeezed a cry from me.

“G-go, love…” His eyes swam. He was fading.

The ground shook beneath us, the snow breaking as the ice barreled forward. The tumult of the building wind threw me back onto my heels, nearly knocking me over. Flashes of those creatures in the warehouse crept across my vision. Laboratory animals with their faces frozen in contorted screams, their bodies reaching, solid, slick with ice. A shudder moved through me. I refused to die here. “Forgive me for this,” I said and pulled the baton from underneath my bodice. I swung my arm out and ratcheted out the sections, wincing at the jolt of silvery energy that tore from the mechanica of my hand to the rod.

Eyes going wide, he opened his mouth to protest.

But I was already swinging, making contact with his chest in a rain of sparks.

The pulse bolted through him, lighting up his mouth and eyes. He shook with the power, jerking backward with a strangled wail. Hair smoking, he staggered to his feet, his face a mask of disbelief as he stood gasping and twitching.

“I c-can’t believe you did that!”

“Can you run now?” I pointed to the churning ice as I retracted my weapon. “Hurry…please!”

“I’m right behind you,” he said, turning me and giving me a push.

We fought the snow, crawling on our hands and knees over the bank to the soft powder, panting with the effort.

I chanced a look back, a section of the wave hit the Stygian, shoving it ahead of itself. Crashing like breaking glass filled the air, the beams and sides of the air ship giving way to the mounds of moving ice. The ballast crumbled, shredded with a thousand frozen slices. The wave took the ship with it, bubbling and churning around the vessel. It sucked the ship into the icy depths in a whirling pool of debris. Escaping air rushed out of the hole, hissing up from the waters and spraying into the sky where it froze, drifting down in a shower of snow and bits of ice.

The rest of the swell surrounded us, slowing against the snow, but just barely. I battled the drag of ice-laden skirts and snow-filled boots with every step. Ashton’s hand at my back kept me going, every few moments urging me forward. And then, the sound changed. The relentless vibration of the ground stopped. The wind stilled, and my hair dropped heavy around my face.

“What…” I looked at Ashton, whose gaze went not to the wave behind us, but to the cliffs.

A billow of white vapor crawled along the ground from the cliffs—mist so thick it appeared the clouds were pouring down the face of the rock.

“It’s here,” he breathed, reaching for me.

“Ash!” I took his hand, saw the dread in his eyes. My voice quaked. “What do we do?”

“Go, go, go!” Ashton pointed, veering us right. “There is a cave. Do you see the mouth?”

I nodded, heart pounding at the fear in his voice. The air grew thick around us, heavy with moisture. Minute shards of ice floating in the air pricked at my face and neck. The sound of crackling, of a layer of ice solidifying onto my cloak and hair, sent a sizzle of fear racing up my spine.

We raced with every last bit of energy we had, reaching the cave as the thickest clouds swirled down the rocks, pooled on the ground, and billowed outward. Ice formed solid and clear on the rocks, making instant icicles on anything it touched. The bare trees glimmered as if encased in glass. Branches shattered. The ground snapped and split, the snow forming fractals. All around, the heavy silence was broken only by the crack of a snapping tree or the slushing of the water as it froze over.

Ashton’s arm slipped around my waist and he held me to him, shaking. We stole deeper into the cave, leaning against the rough rocks, clutching to one another.

“I have never seen anything so beautiful and so deadly in my life.” I looked at him—and at the pale of his skin, the blue of his lips, the chattering of his teeth. “We made it.”

“Almost, love,” he said softly, his gaze darting over my shoulder.

“What?” A sound behind me made my stomach drop. I turned, a scream catching in my throat. Deeper in the cave, a tunnel led into darkness, but it was the forms slumped against the walls that nearly made my heart stop. Blue, ragged bodies twitched against the rock or flailed on the ground. The nearest jerked at my gasp, its roving black eyes locking onto mine. “Tremblers…here?”