Page 44 of Skalterra By Nightmare (The Skalterra Duology #1)

The glacier groaned as the ice settled. It hurt to so much as breathe, and I lay motionless as footsteps grew closer overhead.

“Well done, little Saergrim,”

a new voice crooned. I forced my eyes open to see Caitria standing over me, her dark face framed in frost-coated curls.

Rough hands yanked me to my feet, and pain radiated through every bone and muscle. Still, I fought back, digging in with the heels of my shoes and trying to gain purchase on the ice as I was dragged backwards with an emerald sword at my throat.

“Here she comes,”

Ferrin growled in my ear.

“Stand still, and be good.”

The walls separating us from Caitria’s side of the cave were gone, and the light in the cavern had dimmed, but now I could better see the people in fur-lined cloaks held on their knees by Ferrin’s soldiers. They stared back at me with scared faces, ruddy in the cold and cast in shadow by the light that streamed in through the cave entrance, but I recognized each and every one of them.

Siobhan, Teddy, Olive, Sarah, Gladys, Mr. Lane, and all the rest of Keel Watch Harbor sat on the floor of the ice cave.

The two closest to us kneeled just a few feet behind Fana, and my shaking limbs turned heavier at the sight of them. Sabrina’s face held more freckles than it had in Keel Watch Harbor, and her nose had a more pronounced bridge, but the strawberry curls that hung limp around her fiery orange and black glare were exactly the same. Maybe if she hadn’t had them hidden under her hood before, I would have recognized her when she’d chased us down on the frozen lake and put an arrow through Orla.

Ciarán sat next to her with his cowl down around his neck, a black eye that stood out against his pale skin, and a green sword held at his neck by one of Ferrin’s men. He stared past me with a look that held none of Liam’s warmth, but I could see my friend hiding in the shape of his face, easy to find now that I knew to look for him.

“Lady Saergrim!”

he roared and lurched to his feet. The soldier guarding him grabbed him by his cloak and slammed him into the ice, but Ciarán kept his eyes up.

I shifted in Ferrin’s arms to follow Ciarán’s horrified gaze. My heart constricted when I saw the dust scattered on the ice where Gams had stood a moment ago.

“Gams?”

I whispered.

Jonquil was gone too, and the ice where she’d lain was cracked and melted, a bright glow emanating from the crevice that now split the floor.

A shadow shifted inside, and Ferrin dragged me closer so we could look down into the broken ice together.

A young woman with long blonde hair stood in a pool of Skal with the skirts of her blue gown floating up around her waist on the surface of the liquid. She held Jonquil in one arm while the other fished in her dress pocket before pulling out a pair of thin-rimmed, circular spectacles.

She pushed them up her nose to better glare at us.

She really did look just like Mom.

“What a charming way to discover my grandkid is a Magician,”

she sniffed. Her voice was just like Mom’s too, and the sound of it took my breath away.

“Releasing me from my glacier when I specifically told her not to. How very like her.”

“Saergrim,”

Ferrin chuckled darkly.

“You look younger than I expected, based off your Nightmare.”

“I went nearly four hundred years without aging. It was fun to try it out.”

The air around her rippled with blue heat, and Skal evaporated off her hair and gown in puffs of glowing steam.

“Out of the pool, Frozen God,”

Caitria jeered.

“Your people are waiting for you.”

Caitria approached Gams with her golden sword outstretched, leaving Orla to scramble towards Fana with her hands still bound behind her. The girl bowed into Orla’s attempt at an embrace, and I wanted nothing more than to join them.

Gams’s eyes flickered between my face and the sword at my throat.

“I’m sorry,”

I choked out at her. It was hard to reconcile the ethereal Magician in the pool with the image I had of my gray-haired, glaze-stained grandmother in my head.

“You were only trying to help your friend.”

Blue stairs appeared beneath Gams as she ascended out of the pool with Jonquil purring in her arms.

“Don’t worry, Wren. I’ll take care of this. This fraud knows which of us is the more powerful Magician.”

“Then you’ll understand why I can’t let you live.”

Ferrin’s grip on me tightened.

“You or your granddaughter. One of you dies, so who will it be?”

I was helpless to defend myself against the blade under my chin. Even the tiniest movement hurt, and my arms shook with fatigue.

“Don’t you dare hurt her,”

Gams hissed.

“You or her,”

Ferrin repeated.

“I’ve got to be honest, Wren’s been such a thorn in my side, I almost hope you pick—”

An orange blast knocked us sideways, and I sprawled out on the floor. Shouts echoed through the cavern, but by the time I gathered the physical strength to look up, Ciarán had already been subdued.

He’d almost made it all the way to Gams before Caitria had stopped him. He glared up at Ferrin from where she held him against the floor with his arms pinned behind his back.

“The little orphan boy.”

Ferrin still had his sword pointed at me, but he kept his focus on Ciarán.

“I remember your admissions interview. The question is, do you?”

Ciarán scowled at the question, and Ferrin laughed.

“Is that a no, then?”

He turned towards Gams.

“I see what you mean about him being too gentle now. This will be my fourth Grimguard, and it feels a bit more like mercy-killing the runt of a litter than dealing with an actual threat. Still. Both can be fun if you do it right.”

Ferrin pulled his sword away from me to hold it over Ciarán’s neck.

“Ferrin, my pet!”

A lilting voice called out, bouncing off the ice and wiping the triumphant grin from Ferrin’s face.

“You nasty liar. All that talk about preserving Skalterra when you intended on freeing the Frozen God yourself.”

My vision swam with exhaustion, but the fiery red hair and the glint of a monocle at the entrance to the ice cave was unmistakable. Tamora stood in fur-lined boots with impractically high heels and a small army of Nightmares at her back.

Titus’s hulking shape next to her blocked out the late afternoon sun that poured in from behind them.

Stanley had listened. Something I said had gotten through to him.

“The Baron?”

Caitria hissed.

“You said we didn’t have to worry about her!”

“You’re too late, Tamora!”

Ferrin called.

“Keldori is mine. Go home, and maybe I’ll let the Grand Barony see the next great age of Magicians.”

Glowing orange eyes caught mine, and Ciarán held my gaze where Caitria held him against the frozen floor. He smirked at me, and then drew his tongue along the glowing ice beneath him.

Skal sparked in his hands, and the air around him erupted in orange flames.

Caitria shrieked, and Ferrin brought his sword down, but Ciarán was already rolling out from under them. An orange spear burst to life in his hands as he leapt to his feet, and he drove the pointed end through Ferrin’s Nightmare chest.

Ferrin roared in rage, and then crumbled into dust.

Red burst overhead as Tamora took advantage of Ciarán’s distraction, and her Nightmares charged into the cavern, led by Titus. Gold and green Skalmagick rose to defend against Tamora’s attack, and shouts and screams echoed through the cave in a disorienting clamor.

The floor shook, but I didn’t have the strength to run. I was pinned to the ice by pain and exhaustion, so I closed my eyes, waiting for the battle to swallow me.

“Wren.”

Soft hands cupped my cheeks, and my eyes fluttered open. Gams, so young and ethereal with rosy cheeks and blonde hair that pooled on the ice, smiled behind her round spectacles as she knelt down with me.

“My beautiful girl, I’m so sorry. I never meant for you to get dragged into all this.”

She looked so different from the Gams I knew, but also just the same. Her brow creased with the same worry it always did when she fussed over me, and her lips drew down in the same neat frown.

“Did I ruin everything?”

I choked. Tears welled in my eyes, and fatigue made the edges of my vision dark and blurry.

“Is the world going to end because of me?”

Her frown melted into a gentle smile.

“I told you. I’m taking care of it.”

A green and red blast sent more tremors through the floor, and Tamora’s cackle rebounded off the icy walls of the cave. Caitria was shouting somewhere too, but I couldn’t make out what she was saying through the chaos.

“Look at me, Wren.”

Gams’s eyes swam with unshed tears.

“I’ve created mountains and seas, but of all the things I’ve made, you have been one of the greatest. What an honor that I should get to look upon you with my real eyes.”

Her hand lingered on my cheek for just a moment more, her blue eyes holding mine. Then her gaze snapped upwards, and she rose to her feet.

“Gams…”

I reached out for her, but another explosion rocked the cavern and ice shards fell, forcing me to hide against the cracked floor.

“Protect her,”

Gams’s voice, young and so much like Mom’s, said overhead. “Please.”

“With my life, Lady Saergrim.”

Arms wrapped around me as the cavern trembled. The floor dropped away, and a cowl-covered chin swam in my vision.

The fire in my veins burned, and the porcelain chicken pulsed in my hand where I held it against my chest.

“And take my cat!”

Lips pressed against my forehead.

“I love you, Wren. Tell your mother when you see her that I love her too.”

“No…”

I fought through my blurring vision for a final glimpse of my grandmother, but then Ciarán was running and lights were bursting overhead as I called for Gams. Ice groaned and cracked, and a massive chunk of ceiling fell. Maybe telling Stanley to warn Tamora was a mistake. She’d been a useful distraction, but she wanted the same thing Ferrin did.

Screams echoed through the cavern, and blue lightning flashed in the enclosed space, sending fissures spiderwebbing across the frozen surfaces of the walls.

“Ciarán!”

The cavern was collapsing, and from my vantage in Ciarán’s arms, I could see the ice above us crumbling.

“I’ve got you,”

he panted.

“But Orla and—”

“Worry about yourself for once, Blue.”

The cave opened up overhead, revealing a fog-laden sky. Skalterran sun percolated through and bounced off the icebergs that floated in the water around us. Everything was in shades of white, blue, and gray, and Jonquil mewed somewhere nearby.

I was meeting Skalterra for the first time, in the light of day with my real face and my real self.

I’d made it back, but I wanted to go home. I wanted my mom. I needed my grandma.

“Gams…”

An explosion of yellow and green rocked us sideways, and the sun snuffed out.