Page 61 of Heart of the Shadow King

Crystal wraps around my heart. Spreads.

Formations of shining gems erupt from my flesh, protrude in jagged points from every joint. Inside it spreads faster still, blocking out fear. I am stone. I am hard. I feel nothing as the world around me breaks apart. Something heavy crashes into my skull, shatters. Streams of dust and debris pour around me, and thelorstlights flash and go dark.

It feels like hours. In truth, it was probably no more than a minute. One of those minutes in which entire lives are lived and ended and lived again. When it is done, I lie in a ball of crystal, curled into myself. Covered in chunks of rock which should have crushed my human body to powder.

But I amjor.And I am alive.

I’m not sure how long it takes to find the will to sit up, to push back the rubble and slabs of broken stalactite. To stand and look through my many-faceted gemstone eyes. My room is unrecognizable. One would never know this was once a well-furnished chamber fit for a princess. It’s nothing but a cavern, poorly lit by a single struggling, half-buriedlorststone.

Unhurried I pull thatlorstfree. It’s broken in two, but the larger half still shines. I hold it up to light the far wall. The door is blocked behind fallen rock. I’m almost certain I hear scrabbling on the far side.Hael. A distant part of my mind, deeply embedded under stone, tries to cry out in fear for my bodyguard. Is she alive? Was she buried in the quake? But those questions seem to belong to someone else. Not to me. I am hard. I am fearless. I am unmoved.

Slowly, I make my way across the chamber, my crystalized feet crushing smaller stones beneath them. The scrabbling is louder now, and voices push through swirling dust and layers of rock.

“Faraine?”

“Princess?”

“Faraine, can you hear me? Are you all right in there?”

Two voices. Hael. And Theodre. Odd. I would not have expected my brother to come rushing to my aid so swiftly. Unless he was already there when the stirring began, lying in wait to pester me yet again. I draw back, staring at the pile of rock between me and that door. It looks precarious, but I might try to shift it. After all if it tumbles on top of me, what difference would it make? But somehow, I cannot find the will to bother. Let them dig me out in their own time. In the meanwhile . . .

I return to the center of the room, thelorststill cradled in my hands. The crystal pendant around my neckclinkssoftly against my hardened breast. I touch it on impulse but feel nothing.

“It is likely that once the price of your life is paid, the darkness in the crystal will clear.”

I draw a sharp breath. Vor’s voice, deep and dark, rumbles in my memory. With it comes a burning brilliance of feeling which penetrates straight through every layer of stone and pierces me to the core. The price of my life . . . but who is to pay it? Vor? Vor, who even now risks his life fighting my father’s war. Vor, who may already be dead.

I stare down at the pendant in my palm, at that black spot in its heart. Slowly, the crystals crusting my face clear away. Tears trickle down my cheeks. Grimacing, I close my fist around the pendant, strive to pull thejorback around me. Now is not the time to be without my protective covering. Now is not the time for feelings like these. I must be strong. I must be hard. I must be—

“Ah! You’ve kept your wits about you, I see. Good, good. I half-feared I’d arrive only to find you crushed to a bloody pulp.”

That voice, sharp as a pickax, shocks me back to awareness. How long have I been lost in a hard space of unfeeling? I’m not sure. ThelorstI was holding has gone out, and the whole room is dark save for the gleaming figure standing in the broken frame of my balcony window. Like me, she is covered from head to toe in a crust of crystal, pulsing gently with living light. “Maylin?” I say. My voice feels hard and echoes strangely.

Her eyes, bright gold and shimmering with power, flash. “You sound surprised. Did you think I’d forgotten how to fullyjor?Some tricks even an old mind like mine can’t unlearn.” She beckons. “Up, girl. We have business elsewhere. Those fools scratching at your door will be through any moment. We must be away before they reach you.”

I’m too far gone in stone to feel curiosity. I merely rise, step across the broken rock, and take her hand. She leads me through the window onto the small ledge which is all that remains of my balcony. A morleth stands there, writhing black shadow standing on nothing more than darkness. Its eyes smolder like lumps of burning coal.

“What?” Maylin says, when I turn to her with some surprise. “How else do you think I’ve been coming and going all this time? It’s not as though our gods-gift enables flight.” She mounts, moving with surprising agility considering her age and the crystal wrapping her body. The morleth doesn’t seem bothered by her weight. She settles in the saddle, then extends her hand to me. “Hop on.”

“Where are we going?”

“I’ll explain on the way. Come.”

My lips part, questions mounding fast. Something about this makes me uneasy, even through layers ofjor.“I’m not sure—”

A crash rumbles behind me. Whirling, I see the stones before my door fall away. Hael steps through a storm of dust, holding aloft alorststone. Behind her a muffled voice cries, “Do you see her?” and I half-glimpse the figure of my brother trying to peer around my big trolde guard.

Hael does not answer. She steps further into the room, lifting thelorsthigher to better angle its light. It flashes across my crystalized skin, sending fractured glints of light dancing. Hael stops short. Her eyes widen. A wave of absolute shock emanates from behind all her carefully erected barriers.

“Princess!” she gasps.

Before she can form another word, a brilliant burst of white light fills the chamber. Hael cries out, throwing up a hand to cover her face. I pivot on heel, see Maylin holding out her walking stick, aiming the brilliance of its stone in a painful ray. “Stop!” I cry. “You’ll hurt her!”

“Get on then, and let’s be off,” the witch snaps. “Do you really want to stop and make your excuses?Move, girl!”

There’s no time to dither. I spring from the ledge onto the back of the morleth, wrap my arms around the witch’s waist, and hold fast as she spurs her beast into motion. Careless of the weight of our twojor-coated bodies, the morleth gallops out across the air above the palace, moving like a streak of living darkness, only just holding onto physical form. I look back over my shoulder, see Hael stagger to the window, her feet poised on the edge of the broken balcony. Theodre joins her, but I turn away swiftly. The last thing I need is for my brother to see me in this state. I grind my teeth, grip the barrel of the morleth’s body with my legs, and stare into the shadows before me.

Mythanar is dark following the stirring. The crystals in the cavern ceiling are at the lowest point ofdimness,and thelorststones which would ordinarily light up the city streets are all fallen, cracked, or struggling to shine. I cannot see how bad the damage is, but I can feel the rising pressure of fear from below, the turmoil in the hearts of the city denizens as they scramble to find loved ones in the rubble of broken buildings. At least with my body and soul safely wrapped injor,their fear cannot overwhelm me with pain as it once did.

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