The longer I stare at the kingdom, the less I see. Unless the palace erupts in flames or collapses, I’m not going to see anything new from up here.
Glancing around, I debate going to look for Ban. Will he know anything about the Sandman if they have similar powers? He looked truly stumped when I mentioned him, so I doubt Ban knows much of anything about those powers. It’s just another mystery to add to the basket.
Creeped out, but drawn out of my pity party, I smooth my hands across my face to erase the last traces of my tears and shove down the depression that threatens to bubble up. I miss my father, but those feelings won’t help me now. At the moment, I have a kingdom to save.
~~~
I knew something was wrong the moment I returned to the kingdom’s outer walls. Without Ban’s helpful shadow magic, I have to make my way back the long way. Even though I doubledback to see if he was waiting for me, I didn’t find him. Who knows what he’s up to?
Getting from the outer walls to the palace will be tricky. Security has changed in the past century, so there are more guards on watch and fewer weak points to slip through. If all else fails, I suppose I could reveal myself and walk back to the palace with ease, but I don’t particularly want anyone knowing I was gone or where I went. Ban dragged me from my room without being seen, and if I can reappear without being caught, no one will be any the wiser.
My concerns about slipping home unnoticed disappear when I finally reach the gate and see what’s happening for myself. At first, I think maybe my chat with the Sandman drew me back into the dreamscape.
This can’t be real.
There are two guards at the outer gate, the entrance to the capital city. It’s not the same gate that allows access to the palace, but a gate all the same. There are usually a few guards at ground level and more along the upper wall.
When I see that one man is dead, lying with blood frozen to his chest, and the other guard is actuallyfrozen, my heart stalls.
What is this?
The man covered with dried blood has lifeless, dead eyes. So dead, they’ve sunken into his skull, which seems really weird. When I dare to look properly at his chest, I acknowledge one glaring detail. His heart is missing.
Spinning, I stare at the other guard. He’s frozen solid, a block of ice, and when I tap my finger on his frozen hand, he doesn’t even blink.
He’s not moving or breathing. He’s not doing anything. Dread settles in my chest as I peer down at my hands.
Ice is my element… and snow is Mother’s. Both are Ban’s. Surely one of them didn’t do this?
Holding out my hands, palms down, I decide to free him at least. There’s nothing I can do for the other guard, but at least this way I can save one and hopefully get some answers. With the gates wide open anyone or anything could walk through, and since no one’s rushing up here to help, I have a bad feeling about what that means for the other guards.
Slowly I slide my hands downward as I focus on the ice surrounding the guard, pulling and melting it away. It’s a task I can’t say I have much practice with, so when I reach the top of his head past the layer of ice, and his skin, hair, and brain matter begin melting, too, I scream.
My hands drop as the body remains, now with a missing section at the top of his head, like someone lobbed it off. Breathing hard, I press a hand to my chest and stumble backward. It just causes me to step on the other guard, the one missing a heart, and I look down to see that I’ve stepped on his lifeless hand.
Do not have a meltdown right now. Screaming is bad enough.
“Neve?”
I spin around in time to see Ban step from the shadows. He’s got his staff with him this time, a concerned, pinched look between his brows. He appears on the other side of the two dead guards, further into the kingdom, and I waste no time scrambling over to him.
He attempts to grab my arm to steady me, but I shake him off. “What happened?”
Ban gives me a grim look. “I was speaking to one of my Hell Brothers when I felt a pull toward the kingdom. Usually, near the palace, there’s significantly less death than in the smallsurrounding villages here in the Frostlands. But there’s a lot of death here right now.”
I don’t know if I’m still processing the two dead guards, but his words sound like nonsense. “What?”
“Reapers help guide the souls onward,” he explains, gesturing to the two bodies. I can’t force myself to turn back and eye them right now, so I nod stiffly instead. “When there’s a surprise pull, it means there’s a large group of spirits. The tug happened all of a sudden, which is how I knew something just happened. I came this way because the pull was strong.”
Panic hits me. “How many people have to be dead for a pull like that?”
He grimaces. “Enough. Come on, we should move.”
“Where are the guards?” I ask, and slowly I realize it doesn’t matter. If the enemy right now is death, Ban’s the only one who can do anything about it. I’m kind of worried to ask how. “There would be more than two at the gates.”
“It looks like the guards around the perimeter were taken out first, and the further into the kingdom that we get, the stronger the tug is.”
That means he’s drawn to the palace. It’s in the center of the capital city with the docks behind. “Could it be someone trying to attack our guests? Mother said the guests are special. Maybe having them here drew enemies.”
