Cursed, cursed woman!
Ezryn growls. “Let’s fucking kill him.”
I click my tongue and the reindeer lowers its antlers. With a roar, my great steed charges straight into my vizier, sending him flying.
I pull to a stop, and Ezryn and I jump from the animal.
“Kel,” Rosalina breathes, and I turn to her. Gods Above and Below, she is beautiful. And despite the battle that rages around us, there’s no fear on her face, only determination. I fight the urge to grab her in my arms and—
“It can’t be.” Ezryn’s voice. He collapses to the ground beside a body, and my heart tightens. Princess Niamh.
Green glows from Ezryn’s hands, but even I can see it’s too late. She’s gone. The only consolation is that Quellos’s unnatural magic has yet to animate her corpse like the other soldiers.
“You came.”
Farron stands before me, a flat expression on his face. I grip him around the back of his neck. “As long as I draw breath, I will fight for you.”
“Yeah, well, let’s get to fighting then.” Dayton stands beside him, body drenched in blood. I inhale. It’s his own.
Quellos staggers to his feet.
“Your time is over,” I call to him, dragging my sword through the earth.
He bares his teeth and hisses, “Keldarion, cursed one, traitor. Beast of the Briar. I’m liberating Winter from your rule.”
“Liberating it with death.” I slam my foot upon his spear, shattering it. My family comes up beside me, and I feel their presence like a warm breeze. My brothers. My mate.
Quellos’s eyes flash. “Death would be better than serving under a monster such as you.”
I kick him in his chest, drawing my sword up over my head. “Then I shall grant your wish.”
I swing the blade down—
It smacks hard against ice. Quellos laughs, a shield of green frost between me and him. “Always the fool, Keldarion. I am not like you. I am so much more. I need not Winter’s Blessing or the Sword of the Protector, or even life itself. I am beyond it. I am greatness. I am—”
Something shoots forward: a purple thorn vine. I whirl. Caspian? But no. It flies from a coil around Rosalina’s wrist. The briar wraps around Quellos’s crown and draws it toward her. A horrific crunch sounds through the air. I reach for her but—
But I don’t need to. Quellos’s green crown lies beneath her boot.
“Everything you say is poison,” she snarls to the vizier and grinds her heel harder. A green mist oozes out from the crushed crystal. “You don’t get to hurt anyone else.” Her expression flashes with darkness. “There is no future foryouin the Enchanted Vale.”
Her vines twist around the gnarled vizier, binding him in a vice of thorns. He struggles against the hold, but without his cursed magic, he’s nothing but a weak old man.
I will not suffer this traitor to live. I rise my sword above my head—
Farron grabs my arm. “Wait,” he says. “We should take him alive to question him about this sorcery.”
With a heavy grunt, I lower my arm. Farron’s right. My former vizier can rot in a cell for the rest of eternity for all I care.
“The crown is broken but the wraiths live,” Ezryn says, drawing our attention back to the fight. Though the cavalry has handled a great number of them, our troops are retreating, the undead too plentiful.
“There’s another crown,” Farron says. “Rosalina and I saw someone else wearing one at the war camp.”
Ezryn spins around. “No sign of him now. You must use the spell to rest the dead again.”
A horrified emptiness takes over Farron’s face. “My magic is depleted. I’ve got nothing left.”
A desperate fear spreads throughout us. I turn, staring out at the battlefield. Our soldiers scream, a new panic lacing their features as they are attacked by their own comrades. Many abandon their posts, sprinting toward the city walls.
