“Listen,” he hissed and cupped his hand around his ear, leaning toward the windmill.
Vi did the same motion and closed her eyes, focusing. Sure enough, there were dull thuds coming from within the windmill.
“Wind scum!” someone shouted.
“Durroe watt radia,” Vi said as she bolted from the brush, dashing over to one of the windows. She was barely tall enough to see inside, even if she jumped. But she bounced like a fool to get glimpses of the fight raging within.
Vhalla, still cuffed, was managing to hold her own against the Knights. She was fumbling with a key, trying desperately to remove the cuffs.
Vi jumped again.
The tides of the skirmish had changed. The Knights were advancing. One held the crystal weapon. Vi’s heart raced even faster.
“Kill the wind bitch!” a man shouted. The other raised the axe.
She could let Vhalla die. If they weren’t working toward the birth of a new Champion any longer, Vhalla wasn’t technically needed. She could let them fight it out, kill whoever was left, and take the axe. No one would know what happened to it. If she let Vhalla and the Knights die here and now, everyone who knew about the axe’s whereabouts would be dead. In one fell swoop, every loose end would be tied. It’d be clean. No one would come hunting for Vi and she’d finally,finallyhave the axe.
Vi pushed the thoughts away in horror.
No, that wasn’t clean in the slightest. That wasn’t right, or just. There was still no magic from Vhalla. The woman wasn’t fighting back with the ferocity Vi knew she possessed.
Vi had to intervene.
She threw out her hand and cast a ball of flame toward the door. The wood caught instantly and the flames darted within, as if her magic was seeking out the axe itself.
“Vi, that’s enough!” Taavin hissed from their hiding place. Her eyes were on the dancing flames eagerly consuming her magic and growing in size. She imagined those sacks of wheat they’d thrown Vhalla onto; it would burn just like the wheat Vi had thrown into the fire in the curiosity shop. “Stop, or you’ll kill Vhalla too!”
She withdrew, both in person and in magic. Vi retreated into the bushes, lowering the flames just as Vhalla emerged, sprinting down the front steps of the windmill.
The young woman looked around frantically. “Aldrik?” she called.
Your prince didn’t come for you. But from a world away, Vi had. She didn’t know if she’d saved Vhalla, or risked killing her with her improvisation. Yargen only knew the truth.
Vhalla wasted no time mounting a horse. She still had the axe, stashed away now in a saddlebag. Vi continued to stare, eyes glinting in the firelight, wondering if saving her and burning the Knights had been the right decision… or if it had somehow cost them their world for a final time.
As if sensing her piercing gaze, Vhalla glanced over her shoulder in their direction as Taavin gripped her ankle and whispered, “Durroe watt radia.” Vi hadn’t even realized her glyph had fallen when she’d started the fire.
If Vhalla saw anything, it was only for a moment, before Vi vanished from existence and remained the unseen hand of the Solaris Empire.
Chapter Thirty-Three
Vhalla rode into Mosant.Vi emerged from the brush, watching her descend the ridge. Men and women, up at this late hour, greeted her.
“What now?” Taavin asked. She hadn’t even heard him come up to her side.
“She’ll be too well-attended for us to take the axe here.”
“Why not just grab it?”
“Because if we grabbed it by force, Vhalla would fight us. Knowing her, she’d do so to the death. I don’t know if she fully understands what she has or not… but given how carefully she’s kept it secret, I think she has some idea.” Vi had employed similar logic when she’d decided not to take the crown.
“If we’re committing to this being the end of the vortex, then we don’t need her anymore.” His thoughts had run parallel to hers, and Vi hated it.
I need her, a voice all Vi’s own shouted from within. “I don’t want to kill her,” Vi admitted.
“You could’ve fooled me with that fire.”
“I know. It was impulsive.”
