Page 30 of Wilds of Wonder
My nails dug into my fists. “The Battle of Sofor,” I said, “where the fire elementals were retaliating after the frost elementals froze their dragons. They wanted to steal Spirit Frost’s axe and hoped to use it to kill him.”
There were multiple sources that told this historical tale. A soldier’s record-keeping of this battle was one of the first sources we had that detailed it all.
The fire elementals surprise attacked the frost elementals here, in the mountains, since most of the elementals lived in villages around the base. The frost elementals made it snow on the fire elementals as they attacked from above with their fire magic. The frost elementals started turning the tide of the battle, the snowfall so heavy it reached the fire elementals’ waists, making it harder for them to summon their fire magic. But the frost elementals’ plan backfired because?—”
I stopped, my stomach dropping straight to the ground.
“Well, why did it backfire?” Driscoll asked. “I slept through most of the history lessons in school.”
My gaze trailed up to Maverick, to the melting snow. The snow that was now beginning to shift and move.
“The fire elementals melted the snow to cause an avalanche.”
A smile spread over Maverick’s face. “Very good. I believe that’s my cue. Don’t follow me again. I’m done playing games with you.”
He bounded away, coat fluttering behind him as he disappeared. “Done playing games with you.” He was angry with me, and I had zero idea why. I also had no time to think about it as the mountain rumbled above us.
We all froze, and my gaze swept upward, where the snow shifted again, beginning to move, to fall.
“It’s an avalanche,” I screamed above the thunderous sound.
“Yeah, I kind of got that from the impromptu history lesson,” Driscoll said.
The snow heaved, barreling toward us with a thunderous roar, rocks falling from the side of the mountain and crashing down around us. “We have to move!” I yelled.
Driscoll looked around, nothing but a flat frozen expanse behind, the nearest village at least an hour away. “Where?” He waved his hands wildly. “There’s nowhere for us to hide!”
I’d lived in frost court my entire life. Climbed these mountains as a child, playing with others, hiding in the crooks and crannies of the giant rock. “We have to climb.” I lodged my foot into the stone. “And fast.”
I heaved myself up, Leoni and Driscoll joining me.
“It really seems counterintuitive to go toward the avalanche,” Driscoll yelled over the sound of crashing snow.
“We have to find somewhere to hide,” I said, then my gaze locked on a long ledge jutting from above us. I pointed. “Up there!”
We climbed, boots and hands slipping on the icy rock, making our ascent slower while the avalanche came closer. It would be upon us in minutes.
“Can you use your magic to slow the snow down?” Driscoll’s eyes darted upward to the mass of white rolling down the mountain.
“I can’t stop an avalanche with my magic,” I said. “Something like that is too strong, too powerful.”
“Well my magic is useless,” Leoni said as she reached an arm up and pulled herself ahead of me.
We both looked at Driscoll and he sighed. “Of course it’s up to me.”
“What about a vine?” I asked. “Something that we can climb faster than on this mountain?”
Driscoll pushed out his hand, and a trellis of thin wisteria began creeping up the mountain, over the snow and ice. We wasted no time, all of us grasping onto the trellis and climbing as fast as we could. It was much easier to grip onto than the rock had been.
The avalanche crashed toward us, the ledge that we could hide under getting closer.
“I don’t think we’re going to make it,” Leoni said from above me, her words punctuating heavy breaths.
“Well, I can only do so much,” Driscoll yelled from below. “If one of you would like to step up, that would be great.”
I’d almost been choked to death by my husband. I didn’t survive just so another man who didn’t see my worth could kill me. Something told me that he wasn’t trying to kill me. That he knew my strengths, knew what I could handle. That thought alone gave me the confidence to do what I needed. I lifted my hand and tugged at the magic inside of me. A frozen thread that I could pull, that would unfurl in body and spread through me, then manifest into whatever I needed.
A wall of ice crackled over us, extending the ledge that hung over our heads. “Keep climbing,” I shouted to Driscoll and Leoni, who had stopped to watch my magic at work. “It might buy us time, but it won’t save us if we don’t get to safety.”
