At the corner of my eye, the dark runes on her right arm writhe along the image of the ivory ribbon, swirling and rearranging themselves.
I don’t know what they’re doing to her, but it can’t be good.
Somehow, I have to stop this before the runes finish doing whatever it is they’re doing.
Lightning fast, I pull myself up and away from her, angling so I don’t knock her backward, making it up to my knees, half-twisted toward her.
As fast as I move, she comes with me, leaning forward, herright hand flying to the back of my neck. Her fingernails dig into the side of my throat, wrenching me back to her.
She holds on to me with a strength that rivals my own as she snarls, “You’re a weighted stone, Stellen.”
My jaw clenches so hard that my teeth clack together.
Gone is the intoxicating lilt of her voice, and now she speaks harshly, cruelly, nothing like the way she spoke before. “You’re dragging me down. Keeping me from fighting my way free.”
Wait…My forehead creases…What?
She shoves her face into mine, her chest to mine, trapping her left hand between us. “You are the stone crushing me so I can never be what I was meant to?—”
“Stop.”
This has to stop.
The blade vision on the rooftop ended when Thyra was about to step over the ledge, and I pulled savagely on the thread.
But I don’t have the thread now. It’s nowhere to be seen.
Panic is not mine to feel, but my options are limited, and a path to success is unknown.
The intensity of my uncertainty grows stronger as the black runes glow more darkly and Thyra’s icy gaze rips across me like a physical strike.
“Yellow ribbon,” she snarls. “I am nothing but a yellow ribbon?—”
From my mouth comes a single, powerful command, sung with the force of my ancestors’ magic. “Stop.”
My Voice knocks into her.
It would have carried the perfect level of power to counter her new strength and move her back a mere few inches, giving me the space I need to find a betterway forward.
Except that in the heartbeat that I utter my command, she transforms back to herself.
A heartbeat in which her eyes turn blue, her iciness vanishes, and her head smacks toward the stone.
Chapter Twenty-Four
Maxim
I’m wrenched back to myself, shivering and cold for the first time in my cursed life.
Every muscle in my body is tensed. The image of Thyra crashing toward an icy rock wall strikes me hard.
I couldn’t fucking stop it. Not even by taking hold of the amber thread between us and pulling as hard as I could, trying to slow her down. It worked before, but not this time.
“Thyra!”
My shout mixes with another voice as I rush to understand where I am and what threats exist around me.
I’m lying on my back at the edge of the black mountain ridge.
