“Stop!” Bryn shouted, but from across the room, her voice was lost in the clash of steel.
“What is this? What’s happening?” Phillipa rushed through the open library doors with her cousin Declan just behind. At the sight of drawn swords, she pressed a hand to her mouth.
Bryn saw her opportunity.
“Phillipa! Declan!” she called from the balcony. “The families from Ruma, Zaradona, and Dresel have declared war—command the guards to arrest them! They can’t hear me over the noise!”
Phillipa’s eyes went large, but she nodded. Declan drew his own sword as he strode toward the soldiers. “Stop this!” he cried. “King Rangar and Prince Anter are not our enemies!”
One of the soldiers, caught up in the struggle, elbowed Declan in the face before he realized who he was. Phillipa gasped. She hefted one of the heavy iron candlesticks from a reading table and tossed it with all her strength into the center of the fight.
The soldiers jumped back from the sparks, buying Declan enough time to insert himself into the fray again. “Dammit, the aggressors are the southern kingdoms! Arrest them!”
The soldiers pivoted to face the Ruma, Zaradona, and Dresel royal families. “As Lord Declan says,” the lead soldier commanded, and they strode forward.
King Salvator immediately fled behind a settee, calling, “Felisian! Do something!"
High Priest Felisian Red was already striding forward in his singed robes. He raised his hands and whispered a spell. “Enon ella vind.”
Outside, a great wind rushed off the ocean and pummeled the floor-to-ceiling windows. The panes rattled in their frames, harder and harder, until the glass shattered. A burst of glass shards rained over the Woll guards, who fell to their knees amid yells and painful wails.
A shard of glass lodged deep in King Marthin’s neck. The old king gripped his throat as a gargle escaped his lips.
Bryn cried out, “No!”
With a roar, King Otto summoned a rival wind spell, swirling his hand in a circular hexmark shape. The broken glass that littered the floor was swept up into a magical whirlwind. Once he had control of the wind, King Otto thrust the glass back toward King Salvator and High Priest Red. The glass shot swiftly through the air, but the two men managed to duck behind a sofa in time.
Pacing on the balcony, Bryn began pulling books off the upper shelves and tossing them down onto the royal’s heads. Marthin needed immediate help, or he’d bleed to death from the gash.
“Get Queen Amelia!” King Cedric cried, wincing from a heavy tome that had crashed into his bald skull. “Bring her down here!”
King Angus and Queen Yves both pitched their heads up at Bryn with barred teeth. The two rushed toward the spiral stairs, but Illiana blocked their path.
“Spectra ka hypony,” Illiana said forcefully at Queen Yves.
The Rumese queen’s body immediately sagged as her eyes drooped.The sleeping spell, Bryn realized. But Illiana could only cast one spell at a time, and King Angus simply stepped over his slumped wife as he grabbed Illiana by the wrists.
“Try casting with broken wrists, witch,” he growled as his fists tightened over Illiana’s delicate bones. Illiana cried out painfully.
“Illiana!” Mars called at the sound of his wife's cry. There was little Mars could do without his sight, but he felt his way around the table. King Angus wrenched Illiana’s wrists painfully. Asnapcracked through the air as one of the bones broke. Mars finished making his way around the table and felt along the wall until his hand collided with a fire poker. He jabbed the poker in King Angus’s direction. It missed, but it distracted Angus long enough for Hanna, Angus’s wife, to grab the poker from Mars’s hands and slam it down on her husband’s arms.
Crying out, King Angus released Illiana, who collapsed against the stairs, cradling her broken wrist. Angus shrieked at his wife. “You bitch!”
Pressing a hand to her head, Bryn looked over the battle with a deep sense of dread. Blood coated King Marthin’s clothes as he slumped against the sofa. Rangar was battling Baron Marmose, who had gotten a sword off one of the soldiers and was proving to be a formidable swordsman. Prince Anter had cornered King Cedric by the map stand in one corner, holding off all means of escape, and Queen Karin was rushing to fetch the parchment and quill. At the threat of Anter’s blade, they forced King Cedric to sign.
That left only Marthin to sign–but Marthin was dying.
The Hytooth cousins tried to reach their wounded uncle but were blocked by a wall of fire summoned by High Priest Felisian Red. Everyone in the room was locked in battle, and the only one spared from it was Bryn.
She had no magic in this body.
She had no ability to fight.
So, what did the old queen have at the ready?
Bryn’s mind finally stopped on one possibility.
“Phillipa!” she called down from the balcony with as much strength as the old queen’s throat could muster.
