The legend who had scorched armies on a battlefield was long gone, all that knelt in the grass was a mere husk, like her flame had…suffocated.
My own flame danced around my heart. Maybe no one realized Fraleigh had no power because none of them knew what powerful sorcery looked like, or felt like, or how it singed the air and made it tremble.
The only magic Lycaster ever knew was the magic of a Hyton lie.
“Today, the sun will set on Alastar the Bold,” General Hyton said. “But tomorrow, the sun will rise on our new ruler—the young, new Duke of Lycaster!”
“Hail Alastar XII!” the Barons shouted.
Alastar XII—not Derrick, not Midnight, not Der. Another Alastar.
And we did not even know where he was.
General Hyton ended the funeral by plunging an iron sword into the earth at the head of the grave—a weapon to fight Death. The mourners trickled out of the cemetery. Baron Elvar carried the crown of Lycaster away, ready for the coronation at the next sunrise.
Even as all the Barons and the Hyton daughters left, Fraleigh stayed on the ground in reverence to the fallen Duke.
Only my mother crossing the cemetery could tear my eyes away from the Great Sorceress in full submission to her last owner. Mother laid the bouquet of flowers at the head of Freya’s grave and I swore I heard an apology escape her lips.
She tugged her black shawl closed and followed the line of mourners back to the city.
I stroked Annalisa and Brietta’s hands with my thumbs. “I have to stay behind and speak with Fraleigh.”
Brietta let go of my hand and held it out to Annalisa. “Come on, Anna. I do not want to walk by myself again.”
Annalisa sniffed and took Brietta’s hand as they walked past the tall graves.
As soon as they left, Fraleigh and I were alone. For a few heartbeats, I just stood above her and listened to the waves of the Western Sea crash into the Hyton cliffsides. Mist crawled around the gravestones. Sea birds cawed over us. Clouds moved peacefully overhead in the grey sky.
Fraleigh pressed up from the ground, but refused to look at me. “I hear you came to save me.”
I gripped my hands. “I…I am. Your sister said she would release Riyan if I—”
“Don’t.”
I furrowed my brows as the sea crashed against the cliffs in the distance. Fraleigh’s eyes stayed north as I struggled to find words to say. Why would she not want me to free her?
“I am…restricted on what I can say,” Fraleigh finally said. “Everything must happen at the right time, and in the right way…but you still get a choice. Remember that you get a choice.”
I dared step closer. “What choice?”
Fraleigh paused, carefully selecting her next words. “Carrying the Man of the Mountain’s gift is a heavier burden than most people at the edge of a wishing well could ever imagine. What seems like a key is actually a lock.”
Did she think I was as weak as she was?
I straightened my spine. “My life has been nothing but a series of locks, one right after the other. Iron locks. Doors slammed on my nose. Bricks of stone that crash in front of me. I still find a key every time.”
Fraleigh finally turned, her golden eyes gleaming as much as the collar around her neck. “I believed that once too.”
She let out a breath and extended her left hand to me, where a faint scar crossed her palm. The white light twinkled between Fraleigh’s eyes.
The Great Sorceress had let me in.
My stomach turned at what I was about to see, but I stepped forward. My left hand met hers, my fresh scar brushing up against her centuries-old one. The moment our skin touched, the shrieking of the winter wind filled my ears.
I closed my eyes and let the scream of wind push me down the tether into Fraleigh’s mind.
Then I opened my eyes and saw snow.
