28
Elwyn Elder rounds me and grabs me from behind, latching on to my armor and dragging me off Baelen. My skintight suit presses against my neck like a noose. He drags me across the floor, past the broken chairs to a clear space beyond them, and drops me onto my back.
I can’t move. The sorcery is like fire burning me and immobilizing my spine. Gideon Glory comes into view, leaning over me. So do Pedr Bounty and Osian Valor. The four Elven Commanders peer down at me while Gideon mutters beneath his breath, chanting over me. The other three raise a hand each and a golden thread extends between their palms, connecting into a circle when Gideon raises his too.
In unison, their hands lower toward me, one each toward my bare hands and my bare cheeks, lowering at exactly the same time.
They want my power. Theyallwant my power. They wanted Baelen to die. They wanted the chance to kill him. They… I… my heart is… so torn I can’t do anything but scream my grief. “You did this!”
They don’t respond. Gideon’s chanting grows more urgent and all four of their lined old faces begin to glow as the sorcery keeps them joined, moving them as one hand, closer and closer to the surface of my body. I scream, shouting at them, but there’s nothing I can do to stop them. How long had they planned this? How long had they schemed? There’s a dagger at Gideon Glory’s hip but I can’t move my hand to reach it. They’re going to take my power and then… they’ll kill me.
Closer and closer.
I whimper as their hands touch my bare skin, connecting at exactly the same moment.
“Finally,” Gideon Glory exhales a sigh of sickening elation. Triumphant smiles break across all their faces, but I…
I feel nothing.
There’s no surge of energy, no crackle of lightning, no pulse of thunder, nothing of the storm passes from me. It’s like being empty but not because they took my power—because it’s not there to give.
I become very quiet, sensing… a heartbeat. It’s slow. Very slow, almost like the sound of someone taking careful, cautious steps toward me except that there’s nobody approaching me. I don’t know where the heartbeat is coming from or who it belongs to. All I know is that it isn’t mine and it doesn’t belong to the four Commanders whose evil grins are fading fast.
Their fingers claw into my skin, pressing deeper, frustration replacing their triumph.
“What’s going on?” Elwyn Elder demands, a glare forming fast.
Gideon shakes his head, filled with confusion. “I don’t understand… we should have her power by now.”
“You said this would work!”
They argue back and forth, yanking on my arms, clawing at my cheeks, and I begin to laugh despite the pain, great big sob-laughs. Mostly because I’ve lost it, I’ve lost everything, but also because… “It didn’t work.”
Gideon Glory hisses at me, snarling a chant, his eyes glowing like golden orbs, but his sorcery washes over me like water off a swan’s wings. At the back of everything, that slow, quiet heartbeat thrums and it’s turning into a shield around me. The Elven Command has taken everything from me—they took Bae and now I’ll never see his smile or hear him laugh or hold his hand or join my body with his. There’s nothing more they can do to hurt me.
Gideon’s hold on my spine weakens. He chants harder, but his power is fading fast. I kick my legs, freeing one of them from the spell, and strike out at Osian Valor on my right hand side. He shouts as my armored foot cracks against his ribs, knocking him off balance. He tries to keep hold of my hand, but falls to the floor. My hand is scratched and bruised from his raking fingernails, but it’s free now. As quickly as I can, I grab hold of the dagger dangling so recklessly from Gideon’s belt right beside me as he leans over me. Oh, the arrogance that he never thought I’d be able to reach for it.
He shrieks as my hand lights up on contact, struggling to get away from me, but I hook my fingers around his belt and press the sizzling dagger into his side. I whisper, “You killed Mai. You killed Bae. You are nothing but evil.”
He leaps to his feet but I follow him up and so does the dagger, finding its target. His eyes fade. The only light cast over his body radiates from the storm I wield.
As he falls, dead, I spin to the remaining three, finally in a position to see that Teilo Splendor lies across the far dais in a rumple of robes. I don’t know what happened while I was in the simulation, but Teilo’s head wound tells me he tried to stop the others.
I’m suddenly cold as the adrenalin of escaping Gideon’s sorcery wanes. I can’t bear to look where Baelen lies. I drop to my knees, only knowing that I have to end this. If I’m the first Princess to wield the storm as a weapon then I’m determined to make myself the last.
“You want the storm,” I say as the three remaining Commanders scoot away from me. “Then you can have it.”
I lift the bright dagger to my own heart, “Be free, Storm.”
Before I can drive the blade home, athudfreezes everything around me. The dagger pauses at my chest, its tip refusing to budge. I’m not responsible for the pause in time. There’s not a lot I can think about right now but I know it wasn’t me who froze everything.
The three remaining Elven Commanders are caught between expressions of fear and rage, their glittering robes frozen in swirls as they scrambled to get away from me. My friends are frozen too, some half rising, some on their knees.
I finally see Jasper and Sebastian both stationary but in the act of running toward Baelen, with Sahara right behind them. They don’t look harmed like the others and their voices echo in my memory like a dream that happened around me while I was unaware.Get back! The Storm is too strong!And lastly Sahara shouting:Take cover! We can’t help him if we’re dead.
A drop of water hits my cheek, drawing my attention upward. A cool breeze swirls around me, creating soothing sensations across my scratched skin. I’m not sure where it’s coming from until a soft female voice speaks behind me.
“I’m here, Marbella.”
