Together, they pointed their wands at the beast. Ellery thought of warmth and light, sun and flame. But as their fire spells flickered to life, the ghast tipped back its head and let out a deafening howl.
A winterscurge descended.
The snow thickened, and the wind accelerated as the temperature plummeted. Across the square, the neon movie theater marquee groaned and crashed to the ground. Two billboards followed it, while a nearby newsstand blew over, its contents flying into the air. A claustrophobic darkness prickled against Ellery’s skin like a tangible force. Streetlights and starlight vanished, smothered by the storm.
Ellery’s spell winked out. Something else stirred inside her again, something terribly familiar.
It couldn’t be real. It couldn’t be.
Beside her, Barrow launched a torrent of flame at the ghast, far larger than hers, but it snuffed out, too.
“It’s not working,” Barrow croaked. White blisters of frostbite already swelled across his knuckles, and as he gasped, a frozen sheath netted across his lips.
“I know!” Ellery tasted ice with every breath, yet her own skin bore no marks of frostbite. Magic surged in her veins, pushing toward the surface, as though trying to rupture her skin from the inside out. The winterghast roared again, and for a moment, its cry sounded not horrifying, but hypnotic, like a song she’d heard before.
The creature lunged for them.
Ellery and Barrow dove in opposite directions. The ghast’sclaws raked across the asphalt where Ellery had just been standing. But as she whirled to face it again, she stumbled, slipped, and fell painfully onto her back. Her vision spun.
“Barrow,” she gasped.
On the creature’s other side, Barrow had toppled to one knee, his training wand shuddering against the wind. Spell after spell erupted toward the monster, but the ghast recovered from each blow instantly, strengthened by the storm’s power.
“I-I can’t do this anymore.” The frostbite had spidered up Barrow’s neck, and his chest heaved as he braced a hand against the ground. His panic seemed a living thing all its own.
Ellery stared at the ice-encrusted chassis of a nearby car, shattered headlights staring out like vacant eyes. They weren’t strong enough. They were going to die here. Them and everyone else in Mercester Square.
“I-I’m going to try something, all right?” Ellery rasped. “Be ready.”
“Try whatever you want,” Barrow choked.
The winterghast lumbered closer. Ellery squeezed her eyes shut, tears freezing before they could trail down her cheeks.
And just as she had back in Nordmere, she stopped fighting her magic.
Instead, she surrendered.
The power within her coalesced, brutally cold, as she desperately fed it into her training wand. And then Elleryrecognizedthe winterghast’s magic. It was as though its ice coated her own skin, as though its roar was her own voice.
Ellery gathered it all, her magic, her terror, and cast the strongest spell she could.
Instantly, the wind slowed. The cold ebbed, warmth flooding through her until Ellery’s cheeks stung not with snow or sleet, but with melted tears.
She opened her eyes.
The winterghast towered over her, utterly still. A fiercewhite light shone from her training wand, revealing the creature’s fearsome snarl, its fangs perfectly positioned to rip out her throat. Its piercing blue eyes were dulled. Snow hung around her and Barrow, twinkling like constellations, as if they stood within the night sky.
The monster was Winter itself, a brutal horror, the villain of every Aldrish story.
And she’d frozen it.
She scrambled to her feet and cried, “Now!”
Immediately, Barrow pushed himself upright. Sunlight bloomed out of his wand like a flower unfurling, blazing brighter and brighter until it speared through the creature’s throat.
The winterghast wailed, thrashing against Ellery’s hold. But its sounds weakened as its body began to melt. Its blue eyes winked out like dying stars. Steam hissed into the air as its chest collapsed in on itself, its claws clattering apart until its body crumbled into a heap of slush at their feet.
The storm collapsed alongside it. The winds quelled immediately, frost misting away, snow pattering into a soft rain. It mixed with Ellery’s tears and slid down the back of her dress. She scarcely cared, shuddering with relief as the city came back into focus.
