And I am. I feel it there, inside me, not so very deep beneath the surface. A hurricane, a tempest. Dark clouds swirl, spurred by destructive winds. I do not attempt to tame them. Instead, I pull them close—invite them out to play like old friends, long overdue for a visit.
For so many years, I feared the darkness inside. All my life, afraid of what I was. Of who I was. I’d been running long before I ever left Seahaven. Holding back those clouds for fear of what would happen if I allowed them to close in.
I am not running anymore.
I let the darkness fold over me. Surge through me. Under my skin, into my marrow. I let it take me in its arms and waltz me, slowly, toward the end. And it is not half so dark as I had feared. For inside those clouds, there is light. Not the sun shining through, nor the heat of flame…but the white-hot flash of an electrical current, striking across my storm.
I taste copper on my lips and know my eyes are leaking blood. Electricity sparks down my spine, tiny volts of pain. Every hair on my body stands on end as the air inside my tornado turns to pure static. My chest aches like one of the ice giants has closed a fist around it and is gradually squeezing the life from me. But I cling to my last remaining shreds of cognizance, letting the maegic gather strength, letting the charge build within me until I cannot hold it any longer.
My eyes slit open at the moment of release. The bolts race through me, shooting from the mark at my breast, then down my arms and out my fingertips.
Lightning.
It branches out in beautiful arcs, hitting the ice giants squarely at the center of their chests, piercing the surface of the water. The lake absorbs the charge, then amplifies it a thousandfold, the water conducting the electricity in an outburst that illuminates the night sky into daylight.
The giants writhe as they are electrocuted. Eyes rolling white, toothless mouths gaping, spines arching as convulsions splice their bones. Their bodies are no more than steaming husks when the lightning storm finally dissipates.
I smile at the sight as my own body, pushed past the point of all endurance, loses hold of the vortex keeping me aloft. I plummet back to earth in a tangle of gold skirts. I do not even have the strength to try to catch myself.
Thankfully, Soren is there to do it for me.
He lets out a low grunt as his arms close around my body. I can do no more than blink up at his face as he cradles me to his chest.
“A handy trick, that,” he says, eyes swirling with maegic and something else. Something like wonderment.
My lips part to respond, but I cannot quite manage it. My strength is flagging, my consciousness hanging by a thread. As Soren’s gaze roves over my face, reading the exhaustion etched across my features, he sends a sudden pulse of pure power straight into my chest, lending me a bit of his seemingly bottomless reserves. It crashes through me like a tsunami and coils around my aching Remnant. It feels different from Penn’s—not a heated scorch, but a soothing swell. Shoring me up from the inside out, until my very soul feels saturated with his mercurial brand of maegic.
Still, it is not enough to keep me from fading.
A dark sea of exhaustion is beckoning me into the depths.
My lids flutter shut.
And I slip under.
When I awaken,I am lying on a simple pallet in an unfamiliar room. The flaming mountain of Dyved is painted over the door. A rack of weaponry rests against the wall. It takes me a moment to realize I must be in the soldiers’ barracks.
Every muscle in my body protests as I push to my feet. My head spins so much, I have to catch myself with one hand on the wall before I collapse. I wait until the waves of dizziness subside before I leave the room.
Outside, it is chaos. The communal dining room has been turned into a makeshift field hospital. Injured Caelderans are everywhere, draped over tables, slung across stacks of chairs,being treated by anyone with a free set of hands. Before I’ve made it three feet, I find myself assisting an old woman who is attempting to wrench a soldier’s dislocated shoulder joint back into place. When the deed is done, she meets my eyes—the first time she’s truly looked at me since I stopped to help—and gapes.
“Wind weaver.” Her whisper is reverent. She makes the sign of the tetrad in the air. “Gods bless you.”
I do not know how to respond to that, so I merely nod and continue on my way. There are more survivors than I’d dared hope for, with all manner of battle wounds. I’ve stopped again to help—this time aiding a set of distressed parents who are stitching up a rather nasty gash in their daughter’s leg—when I feel the warmth of Penn’s presence.
He waits until I am done bandaging the wound before he claims me. He says nothing as he comes to a stop by my side, merely intertwines my fingers with his and leads me slowly out of the sickbay, into the early light of day. The sparring pits outside house more survivors. I spot the old chestnut roaster moving among them, passing out parcels of steaming nuts to bleary-eyed Caelderans. His wrinkled face is streaked with blood and etched with sorrow, but he manages a small, gap-toothed smile when our gazes catch.
Penn leads me down toward the lake. There are still bodies littering the shore, blood staining the sand. His jaw is tight with tension. The air is heavy with unspoken words.
Dawn has broken while I slept. I look around the ashen pallor of morning, stunned silent by the devastation. The palace has been reduced to a pile of rubble. The lake steams faintly, still far too hot to risk wading in. The surface is dotted with thousands of dead fish—unintentional casualties of my electrical storm.
I look for a long moment at the submerged remains of the bridge, buried beneath the fallen turrets. I know the answer tomy question before I voice it. Still, I have to ask. Have to hear it spoken aloud before I can convince myself to believe it.
“Uther?” My voice cracks.
Penn shakes his head.
“Damn it.” Tears—long held back during the endless night—fill my eyes. “Gods damn it.”