Page 155 of Witchshadow

Iseult flew. Her back hit the tree. Her skull too, and stars flashed over her vision. But Corlant wasn’t done. A gust of winds laced with fire lashed out, catapulting her up, up, through snow and Threads and frozen shadows. Then she was above the trees and sucked into Corlant’s spinning storm.

Winds hit her, collapsing her lungs, and erasing all sight. There was only snow and wind and unconsciousness clawing in. She could do nothing. She had no army. She had no stolen power, and the lives of the Cahr Awen couldn’t help her here.

Then as quickly as she’d been siphoned upward, she was tossed back down. A sack of organs and bone, she hit the ground with such force she couldn’t even feel the pain. There was only death rushing in.

And cold. A distant, numbing cold from a Void Paladin’s Threads.

Laughter trickled into Iseult’s hazy, spinning awareness.You have no idea what I can do, daughter, and this is not a fight you can win.As if to prove his point, the earth began to shake. First a lurch beneath Iseult’s back. Then a quivering that rattled her teeth and kicked up snow. Winds roared in her ears, yet the earth roared louder.

With each fraction of a heartbeat that passed, more shadows coiled up around her. As if the earth itself were cleaving—as if Corlant had taken too much power, and now the soil died. Ropes sliced over her and held her down. More, more, hundreds of them, then thousands. She couldn’t move, couldn’t see, couldn’t feel. There were only shadows and snow. Lightning and pain.

She would die here. One more dark-giver fallen to Corlant’s power.

And so much power it was. Too much power. She’d been a fool to think she could ever beat him. Fool, fool, always a stupid fool.

I’m sorry, Alma. I’m sorry, Mother. I’m sorry, Safi.

As the last of consciousness faded and the last of her senses rubbed away, Threads punctured in. They replaced the earth’s shadows. Silver and hungry and burning with eternal rage. Corlant, she thought, come to end her once and for all.

Except that instead of destroying her, the Threads only closed in. Instead of laughing at her, they softened into understanding.

The shadow wyrm, she realized distantly. It had found her, and rather than devour, it was protecting. A shield against the storm with no cold to pitch off it, nor even Void darkness. It was simply a monster who had lived too long, beholden to a master it feared.

Slowly, Iseult’s senses returned. The twisted world of snow and storm was replaced by a billowing chest covered in onyx scales. Its heart beat, bound in silver Threads.

And in the sunset bond of family.

Itwasa mother. Itdidunderstand, and unlike Gretchya, it hadn’t been there to save its child when death had come closing in. Now it wanted to protect Iseult.

And spooling atop the sunset was another shade—one she’d seen on Owl. One she hadn’t appreciated, though that color was the source of everything.

Three lines upon her Threadwitch gown. Three lines to represent the world of Threads: Threads that break, Threads that bind, and Threads that build. Iseult had lived so long with the gray, lived so long craving pink, she had forgotten entirely about the green.

Forever reaching, forever trying to forge and grow and become the bond this wyrm now offered her simply because it understood what it meant to love. Simply because even a monster could feel empathy and pain.

Iseult began to cry. Unbidden and unstoppable, the tears swelled in her chest. Her mouth hinged wide, and a hiccuping, sobbing scream tore free. It broke her more than Corlant’s storm had, and she welcomed it.

Because she had lived so long without seeing.

Even after she’d crossed a continent to save her Threadsister, even after Gretchya had chosen her, and even after Alma had died because of her inaction, Iseult still had notseenthat true power had never been in death or in control. Cleaving was something she could do, but just as Alma had told her: it didn’t have to be that way.

She wasn’t merely the dark-giver. She was the shadow-ender too, and the Hell-Bards werenother tools.

“Thank you,” she said to the wyrm. A sound lost to the earth’s shaking and the storm still punching around them. “Thank you.”

At those words, the shadow wyrm gave a rumbling purr—more feeling than sound—and slithered its shielding body away. The storm instantly pummeled in. The earth’s shadows instantly grasped for Iseult again. Butshe was prepared; she already had exactly what she needed clutched in her hand.

The noose she’d taken a lifetime ago off a man she should never have slain.

She opened the cloth around it and placed her bare palm atop it. Then the world around her disappeared.

FIFTY-ONE

Vivia could not stop the drills. Vaness had crafted them for speed, and even she with her Ironwitchery could not stop the spell before the damage was done.No,Vivia wanted to scream. This warship wasn’t supposed to sink here. TheIriscrew wasn’t supposed to still be in chains. The hunters weren’t supposed to still be in dinghies bouncing toward shore.

Now the plan was ruined. There was nothing for Vivia to do but fight and try to save as many Nubrevnans as she could.

Kadossi leaped into action. He opened his mouth, and pure fire poured forth, a stream targeted directly at Vivia. And this was exactly what shehadn’twanted to do: face him directly.