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I knew what was coming. I heard Rowan explain it a dozen times, but still, my muscles pull tight and my mind whispers to run. The crack widens, groaning as stones grind against each other, and the air fills with fine dust that shimmers as it catches the light. Somewhere, a squirrel berates us for our thoughtlessness, its sharp cries falling like a staccato accompaniment to the creaks and groans of the ancient mountain as it splits down the middle.
Suddenly, cold air gushes out of the crack in the mountain’s flank and pools around my ankles. The elves sitting in front of me shift uneasily on their elegant chairs. The frigid air carries the scent of dead wood and layers of ice and the lingering aroma of smoke. Fear trembles across the back of my neck. There’s a final low groan as the mountain settles, and then Rowan drops Alindra’s hand and turns back to face the crowd.
Flames rise from both his remaining eye and his empty socket, and for a moment I can almost believe he’s whole again. Then the flames fade, and guilt washes over me. Screaming voids, if only I hadn’t been so slow. If only I could have saved Rowan earlier. If only I could have saved all of him.
The scrape of chairs and the rustle of elegant clothes cuts off that lovely little thought as the crowd comes to their feet. For just a moment, everyone is silent as sparrows twist through the air, leaping and diving before the great hole Rowan and Alindra just opened in the side of the mountain. And in the side of the world.
We don’t need to bring down the barrier, Rowan told me. That’s what Lythienne and the rest of King Galan’s magicians in the Lands Below want to do, but Rowan insisted it was an idiotic plan, and usually in more colorful language. Blasting the barrier that stands between the Worlds Above and the Lands Below would take a tremendous amount of magical energy, and besides, the Kingdom of the Summer was doing everything it could to keep that damn barrier standing.
Plus, as Rowan would point out in a lower voice, the war between our kingdoms might have ended a few hundred years ago, but it’s not like anyone’s forgotten. And what better way to rekindle a war than to dump everyone in the Lands Below right on the Kingdom of the Summer’s doorstep?
No, Rowan said, we don’t need to get rid of the barrier. All we need is a door, one that opens up far away from the Kingdom of the Summer. The barrier between the Lands Below and the Worlds Above is already full of holes, although those tend to be unstable and only open in one direction. But how hard could it be to punch a hole through the barrier that would stay open, something that would let anyone who wanted into or out of the Lands Below?
Impossible, I suspected. And yet here we are, standing in silence as sunlight falls across the new door between our worlds. Someone in the crowd clears their throat and then begins clapping. It’s a slow, solemn sound at first, but it’s joined by another person, and then another, and then the applause swells and rolls over the cliff’s face like a wave, startling the swallows as the dust slowly settles.
My head throbs as applause crashes over me, and I try to feel something other than hungover and dizzy. A cold wind leaks from the crack in the mountain like an open wound oozing blood. Magic still sparks in the air, but it doesn’t feel frantic or unstable. It doesn’t feel like any other portal I’ve ever seen, and sadly, at this point in my life, I’m probably the biggest expert on portals in either of our worlds.
Rowan grins as the applause fades. Then he meets my gaze and tilts his head toward the crack in the mountain. I stifle a sigh. This portal feels stable, sure, but it still doesn’t exactly look inviting. In front of me, the crowd is rapidly sorting themselves, with those who are staying behind getting farther and farther away from the split in the cliff’s face. Aside from Alindra, who is still standing next to Rowan in her beautiful burgundy dress with her arms crossed over her chest, looking at everything but me.
Fine. I push my way through the crowd and step up to the portal. Rowan comes up beside me, his eye still glowing faintly with the ghost of those blue flames that always accompany his magic.
“Nice work,” I mutter.
Rowan raises an eyebrow at me. Behind him, the four ambassadors who’ve agreed to come with us into the Lands Below and greet King Galan are watching the portal with various levels of apprehension.
“You’ve been drinking?” Rowan whispers, giving me the exact same disapproving expression I’m sure I’ve given him at least a hundred times.
“Fuck you,” I whisper back.
Rowan glances over his shoulder to where Alindra stands alone beside the portal she just helped create.
“Are you at least going to say goodbye?” he whispers.
My left hand flexes into a fist as anger spikes in my chest. I have never once hit my brother, but voids below, I’ve been tempted.
“I already did,” I answer.
Rowan shakes his head like he’s disappointed. The wine I had for breakfast swirls inside my gut as my head rings like a bell and I swear the new portal pulses in front of me.
Ugh. When I make it home, I’m never drinking again.
Rowan clears his throat, and the ambassadors shift to stare at him. I turn toward the portal. The crack itself could be natural, if it weren’t for the way the edges hum with magic. Or the slight blue-green light that leaks through it and paints the thin layer of snow that’s already blowing through the hole Rowan just punched between our worlds.
“Ladies,” Rowan says, nodding at the ambassadors. “Gentlemen. May I invite you to the Lands Below, home of the Kingdom of the Fall?”
The three men and one woman stare at him for a moment before making some polite sounds of agreement, and then there’s another awkward few minutes when everyone stares at the portal but no one moves, and I can’t stop my eyes from drifting back to Alindra, to the way the sunlight paints her dark cheeks and the cold wind from inside the portal tugs her hair back from her shoulders and flutters the hem of her dress.
“Phae?” Rowan says, jolting me back to miserable reality. He’s frowning at me again, and I swear, if I never see that damned expression on his face ever again, I’ll be fucking delighted. “You sure you want to do this?” Rowan asks under his breath.
I swallow, then rip my gaze back to the black hole in the mountain that holds my entire future.
“Of course,” I reply.
Rowan shrugs, then grabs my left arm like I’m escorting him to a dance. Together, we walk across the grass and into the cold darkness of the portal powered by the void that Rowan swore would be stable for generations. Magic tugs at my skin as we pass under the mountain, but it doesn’t flood my lungs or burn, and for the first time since Rowan told me his plan, I actually believe it might work.
The ground crunches under my feet as the light fades. I look down to see the grass turn to stone, and then to snow. I blink as the light fades, the brilliant sun of the Worlds Above swallowed by shadows, then replaced by something much weaker. The blue-green flicker of the glowsoft orbs.
Slowly, the Lands Below take shape around me. The jagged spires of dead trees swim into focus, their black trunks like the bars of a cell. Cold stabs through my cloak and tears at my throat when I breathe.
