“Touch the crystals, and allow your magic to do the rest,” Egmun answered cryptically. The man didn’t know how to lower the barrier; Vi had never told him. And it didn’t seem Fiera’s instincts for the crystals had passed on to Aldrik. Lucky for them both, she was there. It wasn’t how she imagined the sword meeting its end, but she had no other options.
Aldrik stepped forward, his hand held out rigidly as he ascended the stairs. Just once, he looked back over his shoulder and Vi froze, not wanting him to see the shift in her illusion. But the prince’s eyes went to the minister. Egmun gave a nod, and Aldrik reached out to touch the thin layer of crystal covering the doors
“Rohko,” Vi whispered, feeling the magic flare.Rohkowas the word Fiera had uncovered in the crystals when she’d made the barrier. Vi could still sense the glyph holding the stones together.
Now, with that same word and her will, she’d see it dismantled.
The crystal glowed brightly in tandem with Vi’s intensifying focus. Spiderweb cracks spread out from underneath Aldrik’s hand and in a burst of light and sound, the stones came crashing down. Aldrik stumbled back, dazed. The minister stepped forward, catching the boy by the arm.
“Kot sorre,” Deneya murmured from her side.To push.
“Durroe watt ivin,” Vi whispered hastily. A flash of light hovered around Deneya’s glyph, concealing it. The men were still blinking from the release of the barrier; Vi suspected they hadn’t caught a glimpse of the true powers at work as the doors swung open.
“Wh-what’s going on?” the blindfolded man had bitten through his gag. “Where am I?”
“Quiet, you,” Egmun snarled, jerking the rope around his wrists so hard that the man tripped and fell in a heap.
“Was that necessary?” Aldrik said, still dazed, looking between the prisoner and Egmun.
“He is a criminal, the lowest of the low.” Egmun wrenched Aldrik forward by the arm as the prisoner scrambled to find his feet once more. “Come, both of you. Destiny awaits.”
You’re not wrong about that,Vi thought grimly.
She’d practiced the transference of power from the weapon to the Caverns for fourteen years. After her breakthrough, her confidence and skill had increased at a shocking rate.
Yet a shiver still rattled her teeth.
It all came down to this. The sword Egmun held wasn’t a decoy. She had one shot at seeing the sword’s power returned to the Caverns. If Egmun’s magic won over hers, if his clumsy attempts at manipulating Yargen’s power bested her transference, the sword would be broken and irreparable damage done to the Caverns.
She would fail. And if she failed now, she failed the entire world.
Egmun led Aldrik and the prisoner into the depths of the Caverns. Vi could almost see Raspian’s invisible hands reaching outward, seeking the world he was shut off from, yearning for release. Every vertebra in her spine vibrated in a resonance that screamed “no” the closer she drew to the final room in the Caverns, the place Raspian had been sealed away. Every sensation was deeper, heightened, worse than the first time she’d come to this place.
With a kick to the back of the man’s legs, Egmun brought the prisoner to his knees in the center of the stone floor. Vi crept to the door, perching herself by a crystal at its side to remain hidden.
“Prince Aldrik.” Egmun took a step toward the boy, who wore a mixture of fear and wonder. “Someday, you will be Emperor. Do you know what that means?”
“I-I do.”
“So you know that justice will fall to you.” Egmun took another step forward. “It was your mother’s last request to your father to spare you these duties as long as possible.”
Vi didn’t recall Fiera ever making any such request. If anything, the duty-bound woman Vi had known would’ve wanted her son to grow up entrenched in politics, learning from them, and becoming cunning enough to stay alive.
“My mother?” Aldrik asked with such hope, Vi’s heart ached.
The mother she’d taken from him. Had Fiera lived, perhaps Aldrik would’ve never sought out his father’s attention to the point of resorting to crystals. But, had he not, he would’ve never come here, and the world would’ve been a failure.
Everything connected in ways that not even Vi could always see. Which was as thrilling as it was dangerous.
“But you will soon be a man, won’t you?”
“I will.”
“It is rather unfair, no? For your father to be treating you like a child?”Ah, so that was Egmun’s game. Vi’s nails dug into the crystal at her side. Egmun was using the young man’s desire to prove himself against him. “Are you prepared to be the crown prince this realm needs?”
“I am.” Even though it was positively frigid in the Caverns, sweat dotted Aldrik’s brow.
“Then, my prince, for justice, for the strength of Solaris, for the future of your Empire, slay this man.” Egmun dropped to a knee and freed the sword from where he’d tied it to his belt. He offered the crystal weapon to the prince.
