I trudge toward the tree line. Truly, he thinks I am loyal to him?
“Wife.”
“Give me space,” I growl.
With the Shade fortified, the king’s army quickly puts an end to the remaining darkwalkers. Across the field, I lean against a tree for support. The trunk is rough, cold against my shoulder. My shredded back throbs, but the pain grounds me.
Somehow, I need to find Zephyrus.
A shout snaps my eyes open. The ground lurches—an arm banding around my waist, scooping me up and depositing me atop a horse. It’s not the Frost King. No, the king—Boreas—stands halfway across the field, eyes wild as he watches my captor dig his heels into the horse’s sides. We spring through the trees and disappear.
I glance down. A dark, clawed hand curves at my waist with iron strength, and I scream, trying to tear free as the horse careens through dense wood, carrying me deeper into the Deadlands.
The Frost King’s roar shakes snow loose from the trees.
Hell hath no fury like a wronged god.
16
IFIGHT. THERE IS NOother option. I thrash around, attempting to toss myself from the saddle, but the arm around me is immovable. No matter how hard I tear my nails into my captor’s forearm, I don’t break skin.
The chase takes us east, then north. Towering mountains and plunging valleys, the forest strangely eerie. The horse, bearing the weight of an extra rider, breathes heavily as the man directs it down a snake of a path, which curves treacherously against a crumbling ledge. Despite telling myself not to look, I peer into the long drop below. Far, far into that abyss lies a thick gathering of shadow.
“You’re making a mistake.” My fingers clutch the front of the saddle as the horse stumbles, pebbles scattering beneath its hooves.
“Quiet.”
We’re beyond the ledge, aiming for a shallow descent. “Take me back,” I demand.
“No.”
“Then leave me.” I gasp as we barrel toward a tree. Only a last-second twist saves us. “When the North Wind is through with you, you’ll wish you were dead.”
A wisp of darkness coils around my neck, stroking it like a lover’s caress. “The North Wind will attempt nothing.” The man’s voice isguttural, as though impeded by the teeth crowding his mouth. “Not when I have his wife.”
“He doesn’t care about me. He cares that you have taken what he considers his property.” And he will do whatever it takes to get me back, for I am his prize, his precious tool. No method is too perverse.
The man fails to listen. Too blinded by hope. To overcome by greed. He has carved himself a path that can only lead to one thing, and it is certainly not everlasting life.
Pressed between the earth and the flat gray sky, we surge across a snowy clearing as a cold, wet flurry overtakes us, stealing the world from sight. The wind howls with such unbridled strength it threatens to tear me from the saddle—the king, gaining ground.
An enormous shard of ice bursts from the ground a few paces ahead. The horse screams, rearing, as the snow melts and refreezes as a layer of ice, sending its hooves scrabbling. The man, cursing, jerks at the reins. When the horse rears a second time, I’m tossed from the saddle.
My back slams against the ice, crippling my lungs, my wounds awash in agony.
There is a scream.
My head snaps to the side. The man kneels on the ground, shaking, his hands black and clawed, eyes all pupil. An icicle as thick as my forearm has punctured one of his thighs. He bends forward, whimpering as blood streams down his mutilated leg, steaming as it hits snow.
The darkness deepens.
From out of the gloom, two clouds of steam materialize… and two obsidian eyes.
What emerges can only be described as a nightmare. All this time, Phaethon has taken an equine shape, but now the darkwalker’s form is decidedly more wild, similar to those beasts that prowl Edgewood. Its shoulders sit crookedly on its sloped back. Its long, skinny tail lashes back and forth, forked at the end. Lastly, its teeth: jagged, blade-like, dripping shadow thick as blood.
The Frost King sits astride the beast, the head of his spear pointedat the small, cowering man. He dismounts with grace. His gaze flits to me, a brief head-to-toe assessment, before it returns to my captor.
A slow, purposeful tread brings him closer, and the temperature plummets. This isn’t cold. This is the absence of warmth.
