Ashes of a Black Frost

he’d just dived into a cool lake on a hot summer day. The feeling only lasted a moment.

“Right, this is going to explode,” he said to himself, and prepared to jump. He was halfway to throwing himself off the side when the battle somewhere out in the snow between Private Renwar and Her Emissary caught his attention. The acorn made a grating sound as it constricted with an icy burst of energy. Konowa bent over double with tears streaming down his face. He struggled to right himself as the toboggan continued to tear through the battlefield. He wasn’t steering, but the pull of the conflict between Renwar and Gwyn was drawing him and the toboggan toward them. The power in the night was astounding. It was as if all the breathable air had been replaced with raw energy, and he wasn’t breathing it so much as absorbing it.

The toboggan began to pick up speed as it homed in on the dueling pair and Konowa knew his time was now. The temptation to ride it out and draw even closer to the swirling battle of power almost kept him on the toboggan.

Almost.

With a scream he didn’t pretend was anything but, he flung himself off the side. He’d lost count of the number of times he’d experienced the sensation of flying and falling, but he knew if he never felt it again he’d be entirely okay with that. The snow-covered desert floor came up and punched him in the face and everything went white, cold, and suffocating for a while.

After what could have been an eternity or a few seconds he lifted his head and sucked in some air, choking down a mouthful of the bitter-tasting snow in the process. He gingerly climbed to his hands and knees as the earth pivoted and spun beneath him. He shook his head, which didn’t help one bit. Everything was vibrating, and not in that warm, slightly drunk-feeling way. This was harsh and unsettling. He stood up, surprised to see his saber still clutched in his hand.

“Where’s my. . damn shako?” he muttered, poking around in the snow with the point of the blade in the vain hope of finding it. He turned around in a small circle intent on finding the hat while a voice deep inside was screaming at him to pull himself together. “Not without my shako,” he said to no one, then dry-heaved.

Sweat dripped off his nose and his whole body began to shake. “Think I should sit. . sit down,” he said, starting to walk instead. That’s when the sights, sounds, and smells of battle assaulted him all at once. He staggered and had to use his saber as a cane to stay upright. Rakkes howled and screamed. Musket volleys rippled and snapped through the air as the acrid smoke of gunpowder mixed with the falling snow turning everything a dusty, pale gray.

He heard shouts, saw shadows, felt the cold wind on his face. It occurred to him then that he was still sweating a lot as more liquid poured down his face and dripped off the end of his nose. He reached up with his left hand to wipe the sweat away and thought it felt awfully sticky. He looked at his fingers. They were covered in blood.

“Oh. .”

Got to keep moving, he thought, even as his knees buckled and he sat down in the snow. The weight of the world pressed down on his shoulders. He watched the snowflakes spin and float in the air. That was him. Weak and blown about by the wind. He shook his head again. No, that wasn’t him. He had purpose. He had strength. Still, right now that was just so many words.

“. . just close my eyes for a minute,” he said, aware that the ground was shaking. Something loomed over him and he looked up.

A rakke stood two yards away. His shako was clutched in its claws. It opened its mouth and peeled back its lips to reveal the full length of its fangs.

Konowa tried to lift his saber, but his right arm stayed limp at his side. The rakke stepped forward, looking around as if trying to detect a trap.

“Run,” Konowa mumbled, not sure if he was talking to himself or the rakke. It didn’t matter. He couldn’t move and the rakke took another step toward him.

Something hard and impossibly cold pressed against his breast until he thought it would burst through and shatter his chest. Still, it wasn’t enough. He watched the rakke approach, the shako still dangling from a claw. He ignored the creature’s milky eyes and its drooling fangs. All his attention was on the shako.

“That’s not yours,” he said, his voice little more than a hoarse whisper. Images of a locket and four words inscribed inside-Come back to me-kept him from slipping into unconsciousness.

The rakke seemed to understand what he meant. It looked down at its claws and brought the shako up to its face. It sniffed at the hat and then tore a chunk out of it and threw it to the snow, spitting out the piece a moment later.

Konowa got one leg underneath him and tried to stand. “You really shouldn’t have done that,” he said, struggling to stand upright. He wobbled and collapsed back down, the strength from anger not enough this time.

The rakke growled and took another step forward. Its arms could now reach Konowa. One swing and his throat would be torn open or his intestines spilled in the snow. That’s all it would take for him to be so much red meat going down the gullet of a rakke.

“I haven’t had a bath in weeks,” Konowa said, doubting the rakke’s taste buds would care. He took in a breath and cursed under it. Not exactly the most poetic of last words. He was still thinking of something better when the rakke screamed and vanished in a burst of frost fire.

A shade stood where the rakke once had. Konowa blinked.

“Kritton? You saved me?”

The shade of Kritton stepped forward and swung its blade. “No, I didn’t.”

TWENTY-NINE

I am the master!

Never in the creature’s past life had it ever believed that statement in its entirety. It had served senior diplomats, and then the queen of Calahr, and finally the Shadow Monarch, and though it had exerted much power and control over the destinies of others in those roles, it had always had a master to answer to. What few memories remained of that time only served to fuel the uncontrollable rage that now consumed it. How could it have been so weak, so powerless, so. . human?

It continued to tear itself apart, ridding itself of everything superfluous and soft. The human frailties that had defined Gwyn eroded in the fierce storm of its madness. All that remained was pure, unadulterated power. Its world was now one of unbearable pain, yet within that suffering it found an existence so euphoric that it sought even more ways to hurt itself. It scoured and tore every last shred of humanity from its being, whittling itself down to nothing but a collapsing mass of absolute agony.

The vortex of its madness swirled faster and faster, rending the fabric between the planes of the living and the dead. More and more creatures long vanished from the world poured through the tear, taking up ethereal form and attacking the shades of the Iron Elves with raw, wild glee, unfettered again after millennia.

I do this! I control this!

Its core grew smaller even as its power expanded. Its rage and power flew around it in a blur, spinning so fast they created a vacuum. There was no longer any air to breathe within its boundaries, but it had long moved beyond the need for it.

I am the master!

The voice that answered back shook it to its core.

“You are mistaken,” Alwyn said, “and I am here to put things right.”

“Are you all right?” Visyna asked, helping Chayii to her feet while brushing snow from the elf’s hair.

“I appear to be,” she said, her voice shaking as she smoothed out her Hasshugeb robe and straightened up. “Your weaving has saved us again. The snow is much deeper here.”

“I hope the others landed as softly as we did,” Visyna said, not entirely sure her weaving had really had that much of an effect. The burst of fear- and anger-induced energy brought on by Konowa’s latest recklessness had fueled her power to weave the snow in the wake of the toboggan. She doubted she could do it again, although