AllFreeNovel
Share Us
A sound slips out of my mouth, a low moan that I did not at all intend to voice, and I slam my fingers over my lips. My horse shakes her shaggy head like she disapproves of all this sudden moving around.
“Nothing,” I hiss. “Nothing’s going on. He just—”
My throat closes around the words I was going to say. He just needed me. But no, that’s not exactly it. He didn’t need me. He needed my magic. When he showed up in my bedroom the night I planned to run away, I thought maybe he was an old god coming to rescue me.
But he wasn’t that at all. If he’d been able to take me back with him, if the portal hadn’t exploded and he’d pulled me into the Lands Below and made me use my magic to find his brother, he probably would have dropped me right back in my bedroom when it was all over.
And what was the kiss in the Silver City, or the disaster of the last night we spent together? Maybe it was just a way to keep me interested, to string me along like Balmyr spreading my legs with his sweet little lies. Just a way to make sure I’d stick with him until he got what he wanted out of me. Because what else would you want with a magician?
The back of my mouth turns bitter, and my eyes sting. Had I really thought Phaedron was a good guy? Just because Lady Arryn Damoira said so?
No. All Phaedron cares about, all he’s ever cared about, is using my magic to get what he wants. Just like King Grathgore. Just like everyone else in my life. The distant campfires of the army Rowan is supposed to defeat twist and sway as tears attack my vision.
“He just needed me to get to you,” I say, spitting the words out like stones falling onto the ground.
Rowan makes a little snorting sound. “Is that why you two keep staring at each other with big, sad eyes?” he says.
I hiss like I’ve been burned, the wordsI’m not staringdrying up as I realize my stinging eyes are indeed following the sway of Phaedron’s back.
Fine. Maybe I’ve been staring, but he sure as all the nine hells isn’t. I drag the back of my hand across my eyes and squeeze my horse’s side until she gives a little start, then pulls ahead of Rowan.
Phaedron’s brother, I decide, is just as much of an asshole as Phaedron.
Chapter36
Phaedron
MORE LIES
The impossible plan Rowan told me about in the dungeon doesn’t actually start to make sense until we’re hiking up a steep mountainside, following a newly cut path through thick pines with packs strapped to our backs.
Our illusions have changed somewhat, giving us soldiers’ uniforms instead of chains to go along with our tired, grimy human faces. I’m sure our father could have made the packs an illusion too, but no, he handed us each an actual heavy square of canvas strapped to a packboard. Just to be an asshole, presumably.
At least he took the chains off of Rowan, although we’re still surrounded by quite a few more human soldiers than we could comfortably handle without busting out Rowan’s magic. And honestly, I don’t even think Rowan’s magic could handle this many soldiers. Unless what he told me in the dungeon is actually true. But, as much as I trust my brother, that’s freaking impossible.
“Ah,” Varitan sighs. “Look at that.”
He’s whispering as he sweeps his hand across the steep, rocky hillside looming before us. We’re high in the mountains now, and it’s so cold that our breath escapes in little plumes of steam. Rowan and I are used to this temperature, but voids, I’m worried for Alindra. I haven’t heard her speak since she whispered her plan in the darkness, just before the army surprised us. Now she’s keeping her eyes on the ground, like all her effort is focused on her next step. I’ve never wished I could carry someone so badly.
But I can’t, as my father so charmingly reminded me when we crashed through the portal and directly into the middle of his plans. I’m broken, and I can’t do a damned thing to help Alindra. Or Rowan.
“See the silver wires?” Varitan continues, in his hushed whisper. “They carry the illusion spell that hides the army.”
I raise my head and blink blearily at the wall of rock before us. The sky is a delicate wash of deep blue, with only a few lonely little stars winking above us. For a moment that’s all I see, those beautiful, distant stars, and then I drag my attention down to the mountainside.
It’s crawling with humans. I shiver as something cold pools in my empty gut. Bivouac shelters and the remains of campfires clutter the steep slope. Enormous crossbows mounted on piles of stone point down the edge of the ridge. And there are humans everywhere, moving with a purpose, following clear trails through the chaos of jumbled stone.
It’s the army. My chest feels like it’s been packed with ice. In the dungeon, Rowan told me Varitan taught him new magic so powerful he could defeat an entire army, although the attempt might kill him. At first, I assumed the canvas tents in the valley below were the army Rowan was supposed to defeat, although that camp felt strangely empty. Defeating the handful of humans in those tents didn’t seem like it would make much of an impression.
But no. The army is up here, poised on the mountainside.
And there are so many of them.
I don’t doubt my brother, but still, what he described is madness. Sure, I’ve seen Rowan use his magic to destroy void beasts. I saw him capture the monster prince who took my arm, and hells, he even managed to heal me when I was unconscious in the snow with half my body ripped apart. But that magic against an entire army?
There’s no way it would work. My eyes narrow as my gaze falls on my father. Did the great Varitan Sardi Fenfyr send us up here to die? And how would our deaths serve whatever new and terrible plan he’s hatching?
Rowan snorts as he shifts on the stones. “Nice, Dad,” Rowan says, in a whisper heavy with sarcasm. “If you really wanna impress me, how about you carry this damn pack?”
