Page 62 of Fate and Flame
“I think I can feel the magic in the tree, Temir. It’s like it calls to me.”
I moved to sit behind Nadra and held her in my arms as we let the tree’s pyre warm us. “I’m sure it shares a type of magic with you. Something in Autus’ binding spell probably calls to the power of the adda. I guess now we just wait. What shall we do with our time?”
A wicked little smile crossed her face.
I matched it with my own. “As much as I’d love to show you what I’d rather be doing right now, I’m not sure this is the best place for that.”
“I’d rather not freeze my ass off,” she giggled. The sound was music. Literal music as a hint of happiness resonated between us like pealing bells. “Should we look and see if the king’s soldiers are coming?”
Moving to the edge of the jagged mountain, we peered over the side to find nothing but a frozen landscape of fir trees and endless winter. “The wind is starting to pick up, so even if they are climbing this mountain, they will have to stop for the night.”
A giant crack from the burning tree snapped through the air and a massive branch crashed into the rugged mountain top.
“Good thing we weren’t naked,” Nadra teased as she pushed away the floating embers filling the air.
We spent the night watching the tree fall apart bit by bit. By morning, there was a blanket of gray smoke and the ashes were thick, layering the ground like fresh snowfall. Still, we tried to sweep them away, counting our blessings that the wind continued to blow south, into the Marsh Court.
I’d been watching for the soldiers over the northern edge of the summit, and early in the morning, we finally spotted them climbing. They had some distance to go, but there was still about four foot of stump burning like molten lava within the hard, outer core of the blackened bark. Nadra and I were both covered in soot, and no matter how much we tried to keep them away, there were ashes everywhere.
“Seriously, Temir. Do you think it’s a lost cause?”
“Do you want to give up?”
She rubbed her red eyes and shook her head, coughing. “I’m in this with you. If you want to stay and try to see it through, then we will. But we have no idea how deep into the mountain those roots go. I don’t think we can fight all six of those males on our own and continue this fight. If the wind shifts at all, it will all be in vain anyway.”
“You’re right. I’ve been thinking the same. The only thing I know for sure is that the fire moved down just as much as it moved up. The roots are practically lava right now.” I wiped soot from my face and my hands came away black.
“So, what can we do?”
“I could try chopping at the burnt bark with my sword until that molten part spills all over the ground. I believe it would become cool and then frozen. Not ash, but also not something they could reignite.”
She tilted her head and eyed me warily. “Why do I sense hesitation?”
“Because it’s going to ruin the only weapon we have, and we still have to travel down this mountain and through the Marsh Court.”
“We can find another weapon, Temir.” She bit her lip and looked toward the edge.“You have to do it.”
I stood and pulled my sword from the sheath lying on the ground next to our pack. “It’s going to come pouring out and I can’t predict where it’s going to go. Just stay back.”
She nodded and I moved to the opposite side of the trunk. I hacked and hacked the sword against the burnt crust of bark until it slowly began to crack, and just as I expected, it poured out of the hollowed-out trunk, causing what was left of it to collapse.
“It’s time to go,” I told her. “There’s nothing else we can possibly do here. We can only hope that tar dries and seals off the rest of the tree.
“And the ash all over the top of the mountain?”
“It’s in the gods’ hands now.”
“But it’s not really,” a familiar voice said from behind us. I spun around to see the damn twin harpies Autus loved so dearly, their wings flapping loudly as they gathered ashes from the ground. “The one true king thanks you for doing all the hard work.” In an instant, they soared off the edge of the mountain, their large, veined wings opened in the wind as they drifted away. The males climbing the mountain were only a distraction.
“Shit.” I slammed my damaged sword into the ground. “All of that for nothing.”
Nadra grabbed my hands and pulled me. “Come on. There’s not time for this. We need to get out of here before they come back.”
“It makes you even less safe. If he finds out about the adda, Nadra . . .” My voice softened. “He will hunt you, and there’s nowhere in this world you can go.”
“The safest place we can be is with the southern prince and his mate. If the king is hunting her, then he will have an army between them. We have to go south, Temir.”
“We’ve got to stop on the way. I need Rhogan.”
