One dove low, its veins and scales already glowing with stolen mana. It angled toward a cluster of villagers fleeing for the treeline.
I surged forward on ice, mana hurling me across the snow faster than the beast could drop. Frost spiraled from my boots, lifting me above the churned ground as I slammed into the monster before it could crash into them.
It let out an ear-splitting roar, its jaws snapping shut inches from a young mother protectively curled over her child. Toxic blue venom sprayed in icy arcs, hissing where it struck the snow and the fringes of her cloak.
The impact sent me skidding backward, my heels carving deep ruts as the Frostdrake fought to wrench free from my grasp.
Frostfire poured from the monster’s throat, blistering cold curling around my jaw and shoulder as it thrashed.
“Move,” I snarled at the female. “Get to the palace if you can.”
There, at least, she would be protected by the wards. There, at least, there were still walls left to hide behind.
She stared at me through snow-laced lashes, muttering something that was lost to another roar of the Frostdrake. She scrambled to her feet, her child clinging to her as much as she was to him.
The Frostdrake seethed, its attention snapping fully to me now, drawn to the mana rushing through my veins.
Something tugged at my racing thoughts, clawing its way forward to be understood.
Frostdrakes were drawn to mana… They followed it like carrion birds followed death. The last time I’d faced one, it had been chasing Nevara through the skies for that very reason… Drawn to her power. To the density of it.
So, what had called to them now? Why had they chosen this village to consume when there was no unordinary surge of mana here…
I drove the creature back with a burst of ice and turned, scanning the village as more Frostdrakes circled lower. Four in total.
The questions consumed me as I raced through the ice, striking the monster from the back, then its front. One flank,and then another. Sowing more confusion with each attack and expending enough mana to draw the others to me as well.
All around me, bodies lay half-buried in the bloody snow. Soldiers and villagers alike. I scanned each of their faces, looking for Everly’s sister, for anyone who might be out of place and the reason the monsters had come calling.
An overturned cot lay splintered down the middle, its canvas dark with blood, the straps meant to carry someone to safety hanging useless and torn. Another lay farther on, abandoned mid-run, what was left of its occupant hanging in bloody ribbons beneath the frame.
“Noerwyn!” I shouted again, forcing the name through clenched teeth, before trying her nickname. “Wynnie!”
Nothing.
A scream cut off abruptly to my left. I turned in time to see another Frostdrake drop onto a burning roof, the structure collapsing beneath its weight in a plume of blue fire and ash.
I answered instinctively, calling Winter to my hands. Ice bloomed along my forearms, climbing fast, dense and razor-edged, hardening into twin blades that hummed with barely contained cold.
I launched myself forward on a surge of frost.
The first Frostdrake struck high. I twisted beneath it, slashing upward as it passed. It screamed as both blades sheared through tendon and scale, sending the creature spiraling into the snow in a spray of frostfire and inky blood.
Villagers stood by and watched, frozen in the snow as if time itself had rooted them to the spot.
My boots bit into the ground as the second Frostdrake raked past me, claws shrieking against the ice I had already pulled up as a shield.
“Run!” I shouted at the villagers, hurling the shield forward. It shattered on impact, shards tearing into the beast’s flank and driving it back. “Get to the palace. Now!”
They didn’t move.
The wounded Frostdrake surged back up, fury boiling off it in waves of blue fire. I slammed a fist into the ground, and Winter answered. Ice speared upward in jagged columns, catching the creature mid-charge and impaling it through the chest. It screamed, thrashing, frostfire pouring uselessly from its jaws as I closed the distance and drove my blade through its skull.
A Tharnok raced through the smoke and shadows. It ran right past the villagers, launching itself at me.
I spun, ripping frost from the air itself, shaping it into a hooked chain that snapped tight around the monster’s throat. It crashed into a half-collapsed wall, stone exploding outward as I yanked hard and followed, burying my fist into its neck. Cold exploded from the impact, spreading inward, freezing muscle, bone, breath, until the Tharnok went rigid and shattered beneath my grip. Its death cry fractured the air before cutting off abruptly.
I turned toward the villagers, breath burning in my lungs, ice still steaming from my hands.
