A deafening roar shook the ground under their feet. Qown felt like he stood right next to a lightning strike as thunder rolled over the land.
“Holy shit,” Senera said.
Everyone looked back.
A fire column a hundred feet across tore up through the pyramid, from the bottom to the top, burning up into the sky. It turned every snowbank and mountaintop for a hundred miles orange red. The inferno seemed to pause for a split second …
And then the column of fire exploded outward.
The explosion surged, ripping right through the great hall.
“Suless,” Janel murmured.
Time slowed. Everything happened so fast, but to Qown’s perceptions, events crawled at a leisurely pace. He saw the delicate fire flower curl outward from the explosion. The shattered crystal walls flew out in a sparkling, deadly rain capable of shredding anyone standing too close to the palace—and they all stood too close to the palace. The exploding fireball looped up and out and then started to sink … heading straight for them. The blue-haired man and several of the soldiers started running.
“Duck—” What Ninavis would have had them duck behind, he didn’t know. Probably she didn’t know either.
Senera raised up her hands. Her spell kept the lethal shards and high winds from pouring death down on them.
But Qown didn’t think she could handle the wall of fire too.
As it turned out, she didn’t need to. The fire launched upward and away, melting the snow below them and scorching the rocks.
All over in seconds.
Senera turned around, looking as surprised as he felt. “Okay, who did that—”
Janel had been held tight in Xivan’s grip, but she’d fallen to one knee in a half crouch on the stony ground. It wasn’t clear if she’d wriggled her way free or if Xivan had let her go. But the duchess just stood there, mouth gaping, staring up at the devastated palace.
“If by ‘that,’ you mean saving you from burning to death, then you’re welcome,” Janel said. Steam hissed from the snow as molten metal fell from the band holding her hands behind her back. She stood and carefully pulled free of her restraints.
But after a few seconds, Janel’s gaze shifted back to the burning palace. Everyone’s did. Xivan’s mouth hung open, a look of absolute horror on her face as she stared at the devastated, burning remains of the Yoran palace.
Finally, the guards pulled out their weapons and began to walk forward toward Qown, Ninavis, and Janel. They might have still been in shock, but they still spoke the language of violence.
“Oh, come on,” Ninavis said as she noticed their behavior. “It is way too cold out here to fight. Those women look like they’re going to freeze to death.”
“They always look like that,” Qown said. “They’re Yorans.”
Ninavis waved Brother Qown off as she addressed the men. “Just hold a minute, will you? Let’s not forget we just left an angry—whatever that woman is—”
“Suless,” Janel provided. “She’s the god-queen Suless. And she just … she just blew up the palace. Who was up there?”
“Everyone,” Xivan said. “Everyone. They’re all dead. My family is dead.”
“No, they’re not.”
Everyone turned their heads at Senera’s voice. She’d pulled the Name of All Things from her bodice and crouched down, writing in the snow with a finger.
“What?” Xivan woke up. “I left my whole family up in the great hall.”
Senera shook her head as she tucked the stone back into her bodice. “I just asked. They were gone by the time the palace exploded. Your family is still alive.”6
“Of course they are,” Janel said. Disgust had replaced shock.
“What do you mean, ‘of course they are’?” Xivan brandished Khoreval, seconds from using it on Janel.
Janel exhaled. “Do you think Suless would give your husband—your son—a quick death? Does that really sound like something she’d do?”
Brother Qown’s stomach clenched. It didn’t sound at all like something Suless would do. He shuddered. Quur had a thousand stories about what the witch-queen Suless did with stolen children. Ten times as many existed in Yor about what she did with men. She’d always been a monster.
Xivan dragged a hand over her face. “How did this happen?”
“That’s the question I’d like to know too,” Janel answered.
Qown said, “Somehow my gaesh, Suless’s gaesh—they’ve vanished. I have no idea how. It should be impossible. Would you stop that?”
The guards had started advancing again.
“Stand down,” Xivan ordered. She motioned for the guards to lower their weapons. “Free the Marakori woman. I have no interest in taking prisoners today. Let them all go.”
The Spurned exchanged some looks, but no one protested her order. A woman untied Ninavis.
“Oh,” Senera said.
Janel turned to her. “Oh?”
“Someone’s finally done it. Fulfilled one of the prophecies. Destroyed the Stone of Shackles. That means someone’s found Godslayer—Urthaenriel. And so, all gaeshe have been broken, just as predicted.”
Xivan started to laugh, a wild, crazed sound. “Perfect. Just perfect. My husband looked for that damn thing for decades, and someone finds it now.”
Senera rolled her eyes. “Finally.”
Janel threw Senera a murderous look. “Finally?” Janel turned to Qown. “Didn’t you tell me, all the way back in Barsine Banner, that the only thing keeping every demon bound and unable to enter our world unsummoned was a gaesh?”
Qown’s eyes widened. “Oh no.”
“We anticipated that,” Senera snapped. “The prophecies made it perfectly clear. Why do you think we had Aeyan’arric freezing bodies after we killed them? Do you have any idea how many souls Thaena has been able to recover from demons because of us? How many demons she’s been able to destroy because we left them trapped for her to find?”
“I thought you hated Thaena,” Qown said.
“Oh, I do,” Senera said, “but I’ll still use her to destroy demons. She has to be good for something.”
“Don’t you dare,” Janel snarled through gritted teeth. “Don’t try to pretend what you did in Mereina had anything to do with altruism. You and Relos Var are not the heroes here. You did this to terrorize the region, so Duke Kaen could walk into Jorat—save the day—and be hailed as the new Atrin Kandor. You weren’t sabotaging a demonic invasion, you were waging war.”
Senera smiled. “This was always war. At least now we can to stop pretending it was anything else.”
“Enough!” Xivan Kaen said. “I don’t care about demons. I don’t care about my husband’s damn war! Tell me where Suless is, Senera. Tell me right now.”
Senera stopped smiling. “Your Grace, I’d be glad to help, but Wyrga—Suless—knows I have the Name of All Things. She knows what it can do. She’s not going to stop moving for long enough for us to catch up with her. And while you’re chasing her, what happens to your dominion?”
Xivan’s expression epitomized quiet fury. Her voice was soft. “Do you have family, Senera? Do you love someone?”