The people are gone.
Auren is gone.
And my fucking power to get to her is...
Gone.
EPILOGUE
QUEEN MALINA
“It’s time.”
I slowly turn my head from the window I was watching to see the twins standing there. I’m not sure how long I’ve sat here, blinking out at the swirling mist. Sometimes, I think I nearly get a peek at what’s beyond, but it’s far too thick to see through it. Yet now, it’s pitch-black, so I know night has fallen long ago.
With a smile, I rise to my feet, glancing down at the white and blue dress draped over my body. I don’t remember putting this one on, but it’s thick and heavy, probably in preparation for tonight’s ritual.
I follow behind the brothers, and it seems like in no time at all, we’re already outside. Like in a dream, when you go from one place to the next in an instant, without any time or effort.
The night is so dark I’d be blind out here if it weren’t for the row of torches stuck into the icy ground. It makes the snow look like it’s on fire, and I shy away from the flames, a bead of sweat collecting just at the nape of my neck.
Fassa and Friano lead me behind the castle and right to the end of the world.
With my feet poised at the edge, I look down into the brink. Just darkness and gray mist forever. Land and then nothing.
“This way, Majesty.”
I turn and follow their voices until I find Pruinn standing beside some sort of pillar right at the rim of the land.
No, not a pillar, it almost looks like—
“Are you ready, my queen?” Pruinn asks, expression full of joy, his silver eyes pulling me in.
I breathe in the fresh, cold air.
“I am.”
The soft music that I’ve had stuck in my head since I got here seems to grow louder. I hear it in my ears, feel it reverberating in my bones. The light of the torches seems to intensify too, though I don’t like the heat. I wish I could sit in the snow and let it soak through my dress to cool me.
I can’t sit though, because Fassa and Friano are both taking my hands, and then Pruinn has a small blade that he pulls from his pocket. The music is so loud, the firelight so hot...
The dagger is pulled across my palms in a single line that spreads from one hand to the other, cutting through the lines and marking it with the red of my blood.
“Repeat after me, Your Majesty.”
So I do.
“I am Queen Malina Colier of the Colier royal bloodline, and I willingly give my blood to restore what was lost and to gain what is new.”
I’m not sure what magic feels like.
I never felt anything with Midas, and aside from feeling watched, I didn’t sense the assassin.
Yet I feel magic now.
Fassa and Friano slam their palms against mine, threading their fingers in, turning my hands so that my blood coats their skin and then drips into the snow.
And magicroars.
