Page 17 of Ties of Frost

I would eventually. But Kyrundar had turned the best day of my life into the worst day, and I was having difficulty releasing my anger.

When we arrived, we lit a lantern Kyrundar had “borrowed” from Merael’s and retraced our steps. The stench assaulted my nose again. Dead grasses rustled in the breeze,and small creatures skittered in the shadows of the ruins.

How had I missed that this was a trap? No, not missed. I’d ignored the warning signs, too eager for a distraction from the debacle of the Emperor’s Merit ceremony. Even before that, I had wanted to prove I was right about Magistrate Nevros’s death, so I’d followed a lead I shouldn’t have.

Fine, Kyrundar didn’t deserve all the blame. But if he hadn’t intruded, maybe my mind would have been clearer, and I wouldn’t have gone into that hole.

This time, I paused at the entrance to the cellar to determine what might await us inside. I detected the tang of drying blood but didn’t smell anything else, nor did I hear anyone. I decided not to shift my eyes and risk affecting the ice magic.

Kyrundar held out his hands, and tendrils of minuscule glittering ice crystals swirled through the opening and into the cellar. “Hm.”

“What?”

“I don’t sense the corpses.”

“I’m sorry;what?”

He shrugged. “They should still be warm enough my magic could sense them, but I don’t. I don’t sense anyone living, either, or any latent magic.” With that, he leaped down. He always had to be first.

I massaged my temples and followed.

Sure enough, no one was there—not even the bodies. I retrieved my sword, and some of the strain in my shoulders relaxed. “There you are, gorgeous,” I whispered while I dug a cloth out of my hip pouch. “I didn’t meanto abandon you.”

Kyrundar huffed. “And I didn’t even get a hello.”

I ignored him and cleaned the blood and dirt off the etched blade. With my weapon back where it belonged in the scabbard at my side, I stood and scowled at the cellar.

“Are you certain you killed the ice elf?”

He winced. “Yes.”

I turned in a circle. “And I’m sure I killed the metalmage and the shifter. Someone took them? Already? How long was I unconscious?”

“Not long. You woke up shortly after I laid you on the bed at Merael’s.”

Why did he have to phrase it likethat? I wrinkled my nose but moved on, as I didn’t care to think about Kyrundar carrying my unconscious body through Laedresh.

“Whoever took them must have been fairly close.”

I nodded. As much as I wanted to gripe about having no corpses to inspect, if he hadn’t taken me to Merael’s and waited for me to awaken, whoever retrieved the bodies might have arrived while I was still unconscious. Perhaps Kyrundar would have handled them as well, but what if there had been too many or he’d been too weakened from helping me? At least we were both alive.

“All right,” I said. “Let’s see if they dropped anything.”

Kyrundar’s face twisted. “I’m sure there’s a lot of refuse and forgotten items down here. How will we even know if it was theirs?”

“Maybe it will be obvious,” I grumbled, already inspecting the dirt around my feet. Searching was probably futile, butI didn’t want to accept another defeat without even trying.

Several minutes of searching turned up nothing of use. I nibbled on my lower lip and surveyed the cellar, as if an answer might be etched into one of the dirt walls.

Kyrundar cleared his throat. “I’m sorry we didn’t find anything, Zee. We should leave in case whoever took the bodies returns.”

I arched an eyebrow. “Why would they do that?”

“I don’t know.” He tossed up his free hand, and the lantern juddered in his grip. “They could have someone watching the ruins in case we returned.”

That nearly tempted me to stay, but the strain on my body from my wound and all the cold magic I had endured had caught up to me. I needed to rest more than I needed to wait in putrid ruins for someone who might not appear. If I tried to stay, Kyrundar would probably point out that I couldn’t shift and my arm was injured. I was ambidextrous, but for someone who usually fought two-handed, still not ideal.

I led the way to the exit. For now, I would return to the Haven and consider what I knew and what to do next.

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