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Within Hauke’s mind, Kimsel sighed heavily as Ansgar wrestled control away from her. She had tried to give him the greatest stage and highest honor to salvage this situation for them and their descendants but pride and an inability to accept defeat was about to doom them all.

"Eraric," she said, leaning on her frozen staff more than ever before and looking exceptionally weary as she turned to face the architect who kept Hauke tightly bound. "Release the young man. We’ve lost and it’s time to accept that defeat."

"Is this the wisdom of your years, Kimsel?

" Eraric asked bitterly. "If you cannot win with words, then we are to lower our heads and present our horns for the hunter’s saw to harvest?

Ansgar was the greatest of us," he said, crossing his arms over his chest and refusing to move or do anything that would alow the young Frost Walker to escape the chains he’d doubled in strength since the young man nearly managed to escape them once before. "He will not fall here."

"We have done all we can," Ines added, looking helplessly through Hauke’s eyes as Ansgar prepared to unleash all of his frustration and rage at the woman who dared to laugh at them. Part of her longed to emerge with him, to use Eraric’s sword as her tool of destruction in a fight to the bitter end.

It would have been so much more satisfying than the end she met at the hands of her own people when she surrendered her throne to become one of their eternal guardians.

"I’m afraid it’s in his hands now," she said, sighing as she watched the young witch stepping back from Ansgar’s burst of power.

As much as she longed to fight once more against the witch, the backlash she suffered when the Mother of Trees shattered her blizzard had come close to cracking her horn.

Now, any sorcery she attempted was likely to consume her assuming that the spell didn’t go awry in the first place.

At the back of his mental space, Hauke hung his head, powerless against the chains Eraric had bound him with. his body moved under Ansgar’s direction, drawing deeply on what little power remained in Hauke’s body for a final all-or-nothing assault.

"Zedya, distract him!" Ashlynn shouted as she once again poured energy into the holy sword in her hands. The flames were weak and feeble compared to their earlier blazing glory, but she didn’t have time to draw on the strength of the mountain again,n and she wasn’t certain that she could manage the magic even if she could.

Just a minute longer, she thought. All she needed was a minute longer, and Nyrielle would be here to help. But perhaps she wasn’t the only one who sensed her approaching lover. If the ancestors had detected Nyrielle’s approach, then it would explain the sudden outburst.

"Endless White, Empty Thoughts, Frozen World and Frozen Form," Zedya intoned in a rich, resonant voice as she strode forward.

Her amethyst eyes glowed with all the power she could manage as she sought to draw the ancestral spirits into a world so empty and frozen that they would be unable to make a move against Ashlynn.

At the head of Nryielle’s army, Lennart’s heart froze in his chest as he watched the normally purple energy that flowed from Zedya’s eyes take on a dark crimson hue.

Whether it was because she was exhausting the blood that sustained her life to pour more power into her technique or because she encountered fierce resistance, he didn’t know, but it took all of his strength to hold his position at the head of the army instead of rushing to her side and offering up his own blood if she needed it to fight.

For a moment, Zedya’s Mesmerizing Gaze seemed to work on the enraged ancestor. Hauke’s figure stopped its rush, and the painfully cold energy that surrounded the icy blade began to dissipate as a blank, empty expression settled over Hauke’s face.

Ashlynn didn’t waste the opening, sprinting as fast as her abused legs would allow her to, not away from Hauke but toward him.

She had no intention of letting the spirits force her into a one-on-one duel when she’d already rejected it, but with a little bit of help, she was certain that she could put an end to this insanity.

More than anything, she wished that Heila’s Tuscan mercenaries were close enough to restrain Hauke, but by the time they arrived, it would already be too late. All she could do now was hope that Zedya’s Mesmerizing Gaze would be strong enough for her to make her move.

It almost was. Ashlynn was only two paces short when clarity returned to Hauke’s eyes.

Ashlynn didn’t dare to hope that Hauke had been able to free himself from the grip of his ancestors, and the bellow of fury that resounded from his throat as he spotted Ashlynn was all the confirmation she needed that the enraged ancestor had broken free of Zedya’s gaze.

"DIE! WITCH!" Ansgar bellowed, pouring all of the energy he could into the Runic Blade of Eternal Ice. The weight of thousands of pounds of snow piled up behind his swing and the temperature of the air around him plummeted, instantly freezing the sweat on Ashlynn’s body through several layers of clothing and making it almost impossible to breathe.

"BURN! GHOST!" Ashlynn shouted in return, swinging the Holy Flame Sword upward with all the strength she could manage, cloaking herself in a wave of flames and heat that freed her from the oppressive aura of frost that descended along with the sword of ice.

Both swords met in a collision of fire and ice that shook the mountain, triggering a number of small avalanches above and below Nyrielle’s army.

The stones beneath their feet cracked and shattered, along with centuries-old ice hanging from the nearby bridge, sending it tumbling into the chasm below.

On the ramparts above and among the ranks of soldiers watching opposite them, everyone held their breath as a wave of rapidly freezing steam enveloped the area, obscuring their vision and making it impossible to see the results of their collision.