Eryx nodded once. “Purpose doesn’t emerge from nothing.”
“Something is driving them,” Soren agreed.
I exhaled slowly, frost fogging the air. “Or someone.”
And the memory of the slaughter at Thistlerun—of monsters driven there like obedient hounds on a leash—made the conclusion feel inevitable.
A thunderous boom shattered the silence—followed by a scream, sharp and abruptly cut short.
Our attention snapped toward the windows where the world beyond the palace was already burning.
I crossed the room in three strides, flinging open the balcony doors as shadows swept overhead and vast shapes swallowed what little sunlight remained.
Scales glinted like fractured sapphire, broken up by sickly black frost. Wings beat unevenly, membranes marred by fissures of ice. Their very presence left drifting trails of hoarfrost… like ash from a dying fire.
Then the first opened its jaws.
Blue flames erupted across the treetops and stone, hammering against the wardline until it shuddered beneath the assault.
“Frostdrakes,” Soren breathed. “Three, no, four?—”
Villagers burst from the treeline beyond the palace gates as more screams rent the air. They tripped and stumbled throughthe knee-deep snow, panic twisting their limbs into clumsy desperation.
One of them almost reached the wardline… almost.
A Frostdrake plunged, jaws unhinging in a grotesque arc before closing around the desperate fae with a sickening crack.
“Noerwyn,” I snarled as more villagers fled the forest only to be overtaken and devoured before they made it halfway across the clearing.
Eryx stiffened. “She’s out there?”
“She went to help the injured,” I said tautly. “To bring them back to the palace after the Brakhound attack.”
“Hells,” Soren whispered, paling. Eryx was already moving for the door, but neither of them would reach her in time.
“Both of you get to the lower courtyard,” I ordered. “Get everyone you can behind the wards?—”
A spike of fear slammed into me through the bond. Everly’s fear.
Draven. What’s happening? What’s wrong?Her voice trembled in my mind. I couldn’t shield her from this, even if I wanted to.
Frostdrakes. They’re attacking the villagers before they can reach the wards.
A sharp breath echoed through the bond. Panic followed.
Wynnie—
I will find her,I answered instantly, frost already curling around my legs like a living thing.I’ll bring her back.
Soren shouted after me. Eryx cursed violently. But I was already disappearing into the ice—already stepping into the cold that welcomed me like an old, merciless friend.
Winter’s fury surged with me.
And I dove straight into the fray.
Chapter 42
Everly
