“Take her,” she urged in a whisper. “She won’t be able to walk, and I can’t carry her.”
He didn’t give any indication he was going to lift Addie from the ground. Instead, with a whirl so fast it surprised even Gandrett, he darted for Linniue, sword lifted over his head in preparation to strike. He attacked like the wolf he’d slain to protect her, fast and deadly. And he’d come so close. So close—
Blue flames surged toward him, hitting him in the chest once more and causing him to drop mid-leap like a sack of flour. He hit the ground with an echoing thud where he remained as lifeless as Addie.
“Nooo!” Armand had given enough, sacrificed more than any of his people knew. He didn’t deserve to die here, underground where no one would ever know—let alone believe—how he’d met his end. He was the future of this court.
Gandrett braced herself for the all-consuming fury in her and let her instincts take over.
Linniue was still smirking at Armand’s sagged shape as Gandrett flicked her arm, releasing Nehelon’s knife, sending it right toward Linniue’s heart.
The woman screamed in fury as the blade got stuck in her shoulder.
Only her shoulder. Where Gandrett never missed a target, anger and real emotion had made her sloppy. She loosed a string of curses.
But Linniue had already regained control over her body, now sending lances of fire toward Gandrett, keeping her busy dancing and whirling between them, left with nothing to defend herself from such an attack.
At a glance, she saw that Armand was still down.
Linniue dragged Nehelon’s knife from her shoulder with a smile, stopping the attack for a moment, giving Gandrett time to catch her breath.
Behind her, Addie’s breathing had turned shallow enough to tell that she was fading.
“If she is dead, I can always use your lover,” Linniue said, nothing human in her voice. Her hand never let go of the altar almost as if she was drawing her power from there.
No. Not Addie. Not Armand. No one would be sacrificed to an outdated deity of terror and blood.
Gandrett’s hands trembled.
No one would harm her friends. No one.
Heat washed through her. Energy. She couldn’t tell where it originated from, only that it was there and that it was strong. Way stronger than when she had incinerated Nehelon’s dagger and the chain around Joshua’s neck.
And the ground began shaking where her feet stood on the frost. Linniue halted, the smile that hadn’t left her face despite the stab-wound on her shoulder now fading, Nehelon’s knife clutched in her hand.
“What is this?” Linniue asked, eyes on the dragon fire illuminating the room. “Is it you, my Lord?”
Was she speaking to Shygon? By now, nothing would surprise Gandrett.
But the tremor in the ground didn’t come from the god of dragons. It came from within her, and as Linniue realized that the ground was cracking open between them, she stumbled one more step backward.
What was happening? Last time her magic—if it truly had been hers—had manifested as fire. As burning heat, able to melt steel. What was unfolding before her now wasn’t even remotely comparable. If she didn’t find a way to stop, the canyon that was spreading would swallow them all.
Gandrett didn’t dare move for fear the crack would move with her and swallow Armand, who was so close to the ground rift that part of his arm hung into it.
“Armand,” she called, voice raw with strain.
To her relief, he lifted his head with a groan, and as he noticed the gap clearing his shoulder, he gave a solid curse.
“Get up,” she cried, hoping he would understand without explanation that this wasn’t the time for heroism but to save his own ass. “Now!”
He crawled to all fours then inched away from the canyon.
Stones were beginning to crumble from the ceiling.
But Gandrett didn’t dare move as much as an inch, anxious she would make it worse.
“Stop it.” Armand had realized what was going on, eyes wide with something more than fear. “Stop it or you’ll bring down the castle.”
“There must be a sacrifice,” Linniue screamed from the other side of the canyon, voice half-mad.
Gandrett didn’t know what would be worse—if she managed to stop and Linniue got to sacrifice Addie or if they all died in an attempt to halt her from beseeching the god of dragons for power.
Before she could make up her mind, an avalanche of stone fell from the ceiling, cutting Linniue off from them. Gandrett threw herself back over Addie, protecting the girl from the rain of gravel while Linniue’s shriek tore through her mind like a bolt of lightning.
The trembling stopped, and the rift yielded as the energy in Gandrett came to a halt. She panted, sweat beading her forehead and neck, making her shiver in the stirred cold.
“Get Addie out of here,” Armand said. An order this time. “I’ll take care of my aunt.” His tone promised violence.
So Gandrett obeyed. With her last strength, she pushed herself up enough to slide off Addie, who no longer groaned, and tried to heave her off the ground.
“Watch out!” Armand’s warning came too late as Linniue sent another line of flames after Gandrett. They brought her flat to her stomach where she landed with a rib-shattering crash, and the moment she was down, Linniue aimed for Armand, attempting to do the same.
Gandrett’s anger flared again. Linniue couldn’t win. Not like this. So she summoned that heat that had incinerated the dagger. That heat that had saved her from Joshua. And released it on Linniue.
The sound of more gravel falling and the hissing of fire on ice filled the air.
Then a scream followed by a whimper. Gandrett couldn’t prop herself up enough to tell what had happened, but Linniue’s voice returned to that whispering chant from her nightmare, speaking those prayers to the god of dragons until they ended in a gurgle.
Armand felt the tidal wave of heat flooding through the chamber, leaping over the canyon too wide for even him to jump across. He ducked away, shielding his face, and with gritted teeth, waited for it to fade. So strong. Her magic was like a force of nature. If she truly hadn’t known until recently, it had surely occurred at the perfect moment to save their asses.
The air tore from a scream. His aunt’s scream. A sound that pierced him to the marrow of his bones. Then the muttering in that strange tongue began, making his hair stand on his neck.
But only so long—
For it soon got weaker and weaker until it faded into a whisper and ended.
The heat—probably deadly in any other environment but the frosty caves of the last Dragon King’s dragon—subsided, and Armand dared to lift his head and peek over the rocks.
On her island of stone, enclosed by half-incinerated boulders and canyons, on the glowing altar, lay Linniue Denderlain, Gandrett’s dagger sticking from her blood-drenched chest, one hand still clutching it tightly where she had pushed it into her own heart, and lines of crimson were starting to drown the symbols in the stone.
Chapter Forty-Five
Armand’s voice was the first thing she heard as he muttered her name, close enough to her ear to tell her he had made it through Linniue’s attack, that he had been able to at least crawl over to where she must have collapsed.