Movement shifted along the mountainside like a wound cut into the snow. Nine dark columns carried spurts of light from enchanted torches to guide them and protect against the storm. Normally, they’d carry a little light for the recruits who weren't fully Night Fae or whose skills were not as developed as the elite and highborn, but this storm made even fae with excellent night vision need extra help to see.
They climbed steadily through the worsening conditions, their spacing tightening as the slope steepened and forced them into narrower lines. I tracked them instinctively, my gaze snagging on the biggest group, clustered near the center where the mounts moved more slowly.
Fuck! I should have known. It was the path Bram had preferred whenever he’d traveled here and speed was of the essence, but the weather made it exceptionally dangerous.
They were angling toward Spire Pass, a narrow space that cut between two of the broadest mountains in this range. Even yetis avoided it while hunting because of how dangerous it was. The Night General was gambling on speed and on the storm burying his trail. If they got through the pass and reached the other side beyond the barrier, the terrain became much safer.
But they wouldn’t.
Not with the snow buildup on the left snowcap. It already had the dull slab look of a snowy cliff about to collapse. The avalanche would barrel down into the pass like it was a funnel. They should have taken the side on the right. They probably couldn’t see it—even my own men couldn’t see as well in the dark as I could. I’d be sending them into a trap as well because that avalanche wasn’t an if—it was a when.
I jerked my head toward Gavriel and used my magic to project my voice to him. “Turn back and warn the other group that was to follow us that there’ll be an avalanche at Spire Pass on the northern side. Donotenter the pass without preparation.”
Gavriel nodded, his face flushed beneath the scarf. He reined the caribou around and doubled back.
Panic damn near choked me, and I gripped my reins tighter, urging the caribou faster. The animal surged forward, breath tearing from its lungs in harsh, steaming bursts. The gap shrank enough that individual figures resolved through the storm, cloaks snapping violently, heads down against the wind. The vibrations from their ascent hummed faintly through the ground, a low, ominous tremor that set my nerves on edge.
Snow hissed as it slid in small sheets from higher up the slope.
My fingers ached from the reins biting into my palms. Every instinct screamed at me to take to the air and close the distance, but the storm would shred my wings. I’d used too much strength and magic on the wyvern, and I wasn’t replenished yet.
Silver flashed through the storm ahead, and the troops halted.
Terror knotted in my stomach.Please don’t let that be ice imps.
A change rippled through the lines like a snag in fabric, with mounts skidding and bunching and riders shouting over one another as they tried to re-form in the deepening snowdrifts. Then, I heard it. The thin, keening sound of malicious cackles cutting through the air.
Each time an ice imp attacked, bright silver light punched through the air like the burst of a white flame. The storm carried their cries to me in broken pieces, raising the hair along my arms even through fur, wool, and leather.
They darted at the edges of the columns, too fast to follow, leaving brief streaks of pale silver that winked in and out as if the snow itself had grown teeth. Some dove low near the caribous’ legs, the mounts screaming a panicked, raw sound that punched straight through my chest even from this distance.
The lines buckled. Riders yanked reins, and the caribou tried to keep their footing on the slick incline, but the slope was already failing them. Every movement sent tremors into the snowpack above, and I felt the subtle shift in the mountain’s weight in my bones.
Hannah. Where is she?
That golden hair of hers should be easy to spot even with its luster dulled from the pale ash, so I urged my caribou forward, scanning the columns for her. When I reached the base of the mountain, I rode to the far side of the path so I avoided entering the pass but kept moving in the same general direction.
A crack ran through the top edge of the snowpack, barely visible through the storm, but my magic sensed it like a bruise under my skin. A shout carried downwind, then another, higher and panicked. The columns began to move again, but not with disciplined intent—with fear pressing at their backs.
Riders swung weapons at the imps, their blades ringing uselessly against air. An ice imp skimmed past a helm and left a bright frost-burn line that smoked in the cold.
My caribou ate up the distance. The cold tore at my lungs, but the heat in my chest grew hotter and tighter as the tug of the bond strengthened into a pull that threatened to yank my heart from my chest.
A body shifted near the head of the line farthest south.
A flash of gold broke through the storm as if a cloth had fallen away. My heart slammed so hard my vision blurred. The bond flared, a white-hot surge that stole my breath.
It happened fast. She tumbled off the side of a caribou, her arms flailing. Then she hit the snow and rolled. Powder burst up around her, swallowing her for a heartbeat, and then she fought her way up, staggering like her legs had forgotten how to work.
A sound tore out of me that I did not recognize. It scraped my throat raw. My hands clenched so hard on the reins that my fingers went numb. Rage flashed, hot enough to drown the cold, followed by terror that seemed to split my ribs wide open.
The wind roared, and underneath it, the imps’ laughter rose, frantic now, as if the chaos delighted them.
The bond yanked, and my chest tightened until it felt like it might collapse. I drove the caribou straight toward her, my heart hammering so hard that my hands shook. The only thought that remained was brutal and simple.
Get to Hannah.
CHAPTER 16
