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“Can’t let you leave with that shard still inside you, cousin,” Kelaros gloats. “It belongs to me, as do all fragments of my realm.”
Amalia collapses to her knees, one hand clamped over the wound while the other still grips her dagger with white-knuckled determination. Across the diminishing distance, her intention becomes horribly clear. She’s saying goodbye without speaking the words.
Thalindor’s arms wrap around my chest as he hauls me toward the failing portal. “Your Majesty, we cannot save her now!”
“Watch me.” The words emerge as arctic wind, freezing the very air between us.
I channel every ounce of my remaining power, digging it from my depths, and Silver fire streams toward Kelaros in a torrent of royal rage. The magic strikes an invisible barrier inches from Kelaros, splashing outward in harmless sparks that cast his triumph in Silver light.
“Too late, Silver King,” he calls, fingers tangling in Amalia’s hair. “Your pet has served her purpose. What remains belongs to the court now.”
My fire intensifies, wild and desperate, scorching a path between us. Cracks spread from the charred trail, racing toward where Amalia kneels.
She lifts her head, blood trickling from the corner of her mouth to trace a crimson path down her chin. The sight ignites fresh rage, and Silver fire courses through my veins with enough force to crack stone.
“Don’t you dare die,” I command, royal authority bleeding into each word.
A trace of her usual humor breaks through the strain. “Never took you for an optimist, Silver King.”
“How touching,” Kelaros mocks. “The king mourns his pet while his realm crumbles in his absence.”
The barb strikes deep. How long since I abandoned the Silver Sithe to Caelan’s care? How much damage has my absence wrought upon the realm I swore to protect?
The mirror’s surface bubbles and warps, edges folding inward. The portal’s imminent collapse hangs between us, an ultimatum neither asked for nor accepted.
Stay and die with her, or leave and live with failure.
Amalia reads my choice and looks to Thalindor. “Save your king.”
My guard’s arms lock around my chest, dragging me backward.
“No!” I thrash in his hold, Silver magic erupting in wild, undirected bursts. “Release me!”
Thalindor remains deaf to my orders, his duty to preserve the Royal line superseding obedience as he hauls me toward the failing portal. “Forgive me, Your Majesty.”
I claw at his arms, dignity forgotten in desperation. “Amalia! Fight!”
Resolve settles over her, her blood-slicked palm drops toward the crystal floor. “Tell Elionn I kept my promise.”
The court responds to her blood, crystal spires erupting between us and hiding her from view.
My final glimpse is of Kelaros yanking her backward before Thalindor shoves me through the mirror.
37
WHERE KINGS FAIL
AMALIA
Ifloat in nothingness for what might be seconds or centuries. Time loses meaning in the void between consciousness and oblivion.
When awareness returns, it comes in fragments. Cold crystal bites into my back. The copper tang of blood coats my tongue. The acrid smell of ozone and decay fills my nostrils.
My eyelids weigh a thousand pounds, but I force them open.
Crystal pillars curve around me, forming the massive ribs of an impossible skeleton, their surfaces reflecting fractured images of my broken body.
I try to sit up, but fire erupts from the wound in my side, stealing my breath. The shard Kelaros drove into me throbs with malignant energy, sending tendrils of cold fire through my veins with each pulse.
