“We await your command.”
Rakel nodded. Though she dreaded seeing Farrin again, using her magic’s full potential made her almost as nervous.To free the country, to free Steinar, I will do it.
She left the shadows of the trees and approached Glowma, drawing closer to the silent city. Troops moved into place behind her, and they organized themselves just outside the biggest city gate.
Rakel brushed the door, and it frosted over as ice flooded the cracks. The wood groaned as she pushed more of her powers into the door, until the ice made the wood buckle.
As the door froze further, she leaned close and listened—able to hear officers of the Chosen shouting to their soldiers. Rakel retreated several feet away and waited as the door continued to crack ominously—though it was nowhere near falling down.
When she estimated there was a sizable crowd lined up behind the gate, she slammed the wooden doors with a glacier—tearing them from their hinges. She kept pushing so the glacier surged forward, shoving the door down the city road, plowing through the troops organized there.
After taking out rows of soldiers, she flung the door against a building, getting it out of the way for the fighting. The Chosen soldiers thrown by the door and glacier combo lay addled on the ground. She stepped aside so the Verglas troops could pour past her. They shouted and fell upon the vulnerable enemy soldiers, raising a racket.
Rakel found the archers positioned in second story windows of various buildings and got to work freezing their quivers solid so they could not retrieve any arrows, and icing over the bows so they were too cold to handle. She had one building left when something hit her uninjured side and sent her sprawling against the side of a building.
Farrin.
Rakel’s heart picked up its speed as she peeled herself off the wall.
“Why are you attempting this, Your Highness?” Farrin asked, frowning. “You’ll only get more of your troops killed with this attack.”
He took a step towards her, and Rakel lashed out, sending spikes of ice out of the ground.
Farrin ruthlessly cleaved straight through them, and they shattered.
Rakel backed up to a store and tried pummeling him with ice shards.
He deflected them, and they peppered the wall behind Rakel, digging in several inches.
She covered the ground with a layer of slick ice, but he still wore the ice cleats.
I can’t do this!Panic tore at her concentration and her powers, making her falter. She cringed when Farrin stopped an arm’s length away from her.
He still wore a frown, but now it was edged with regret. He tightened his grip on his sword. “You are afraid of me—” he started.
Snorri stepped out of the shadows and slapped a pair of cuffs on him. He turned to Rakel and said something incomprehensible as Farrin stared at the cuffs.
“You’re muttering, Snorri,” she said.
Farrin tried breaking the cuffs by yanking his arms apart with his magic-fueled speed. They held.
“You can’t break it, least, not easily. Tollak charmed them.” Snorri told him. He turned and bowed to Rakel. “Now, Princess?”
“Yes. Right now, thank you.”
“Our honor.” Snorri retreated a few steps and raised his fist in the air—the pre-determined signal.
Farrin, in the middle of adjusting his grip on his greatsword, had to tap his speed magic so he could raise his sword in time to block a ball of fire. The fire bounced off his sword—pushed away by his magic—but instead of shooting in the direction he aimed it, it flew back to Frodi, who caught it in his hand and held it painlessly.
Frodi scowled. “He can still use the sword with the handcuffs on!”
“An unacceptable outcome,” Tollak acknowledged. “But at least I have another set of unbreakable manacles for his feet—though I’m not volunteering to put them on him.” While all magic powers were unusual, Tollak had the particularly unconventional but useful ability to give magical properties to crafted objects. He could, for instance, make a pair of manacles unbreakable.
“Now he’s going to expect that we’ll try to attack his feet!” Frodi said, slapping his face with his fire-free hand.
“You’ve collected a number of other magic users,” Farrin said.
“Yes,” Rakel said, easing away from the wall.
