Page 125 of The Prince and the Ice King

The dagger had been glowing while pierced in Reardon’s chest, but now it lay dull and dormant on the ground. Jack picked it up, and in his grief, he found rage, spinning around to see a similarly seething Lombard, who had rushed back to stand beneath the ruins of the castle gates. Whatever he’d been doing, Reardon’s sacrifice had stopped it.

Jack launched himself forward with a vicious cry, not trying to use his touch, just the dagger, and when the blade struck Lombard’s barrier, it didn’t bounce but caused a glowing crack to form like a bolt of lightning hanging midair.

The snarl vanished from Lombard’s face.

Jack struck with the dagger again, relentlessly stabbing into the shield as fiercely as he had tried to pummel Lombard before, and with each blow, the cracks in the magical armor began to multiply.

“Stop!” Lombard tried to scramble backward, but Jack kept at him, hitting again—again—again.

The shield shattered like translucent glass, and in one fierce movement, Jack grabbed Lombard’s shoulder, digging his icy claws into flesh, and stabbed the dagger downward into Lombard’s chest, piercing right through his metal armor like the blade was a white-hot poker.

Lombard was too stunned to cry out, Jack’s touch finally doing to him what it did to everything else. He froze right there with terror in his expression, a counterpoint to how Reardon had let it happen with a smile.

Finally, this time, the dagger too turned to ice. With the force of Jack ripping it free and tearing his claws out of Lombard’s frozen shoulder, Jack broke the ice that made up that awful man until he crumbled into pieces.

It should have been satisfying, dropping the frozen dagger onto the chunks of his enemy, but all Jack felt was numbness. He stared downward, not wanting to turn and see the statue of Reardon outside the gates.

“Majesty,” Oliver called, soft but also strangely loud with the battlefield silent.

Jack looked up, and Oliver, who had been on the ramparts with the archers, stood before him now, bow in hand. The court had all floated down too, in an arch surrounding Oliver, waiting on Jack’s next order.

“What say you?” Oliver asked, an arrow nocked and ready should Jack tell him to raise his bow and fire into the soldiers outside.

Now Jack had to turn and see how bad the damage had been to everyone else.

“If even one of our people has been maimed or killed…,” Branwen warned, his grumbling voice making many Emerald soldiers cower now that the energy of battle had dissolved.

But there were no prone bodies, only people limping or holding small wounds with the light pressure of a palm. The only casualty among the innocent was Reardon—smiling still like he was made of crystal instead of ice.

Stepping back out the gates so everyone could see and hear him, Jack rose as tall as he could. “Did you follow that man out of loyalty or fear? Because I never asked for the sacrifices you sent me. I took in your rejects and made them welcome in my home. You might see monsters, in them and in us, but you were also following one, and your prince chose to sacrifice himself to stop Lombard’s plan. I don’t even know what that madman wanted….”

“Immortality!” an unknown voice called.

All heads on the battlefield turned toward it, as a man came forward on horseback, leading all those who had joined the fray behind Reardon. When he stopped in the middle of the converged soldiers, he took his helmet off to reveal elven ears.

Those who had been with Lombard shared further looks of confusion.

“I am David, house of Zheck, a castle guard for Emerald. Prince Reardon told us everything he could. Lombard sought immortality, and as someone born without magic, he believed acquiring it from others was his only way to continue cheating death. I am happy to explain the rest to you, Majesty, but I say to you others, the Ice King speaks the truth.”

Others who had come with Reardon shed their helmets to proclaim their lineages to their fellows. Reardon had gathered his own army. He must have been so relieved, so proud, to have found allies in his own city.

Jack was still angry, still deeply grieving, but he knew that the one who deserved blame was already dead. “Throw down your weapons,” Jack called to the Emerald soldiers, “promise peace and no one else needs to die.”

He wasn’t sure if that would be enough, or if a few would be so terrified and bigoted against them that they would continue to fight or try to run.

None did, and after the first few dropped their weapons into the snow, others followed. Jack would invite them all in through the gates, but first he had to face the one part of this that he wasn’t sure he could stand.

Looking upon Reardon, glittering in the sun, Jack had to say goodbye. His eyes felt hot, but his tears were unable to become anything more than icicles on his cheeks.

Slowly, he walked back toward Reardon and spoke aloud, not trying to hide how his voice caught. “I am so sorry, my love. You asked me to forgive myself and move on, to see in me what you always did, and I will hold true to that promise. Iama good king, and I will be a good king hereafter, for you, for them, and for me.”

As gentle as he could, Jack reached his clawed hand to Reardon’s cheek, wishing he could feel its warmth one last time against his skin, but all he had to touch him with was ice.

Jack gasped at sudden cold—coldbecause he was touching ice, but his hand was starting to melt, and beneath was his human hand.

Snatching his hand back, Jack gaped, seeing the ice melt away rapidly. The relief was instant, the jagged edges and harsh cold of the ice that normally encased him vanishing from his body far more dramatically than he had ever seen it when night fell. In mere moments, he stood in the snow, naked but human.

“Jack!” Josie called, and when he looked back, he saw that she too was human—and so was everyone in the court.

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