Ashes of a Black Frost

The dwarf stood on the edge of the storm. He was looking straight at Alwyn. The tears in his eyes were unmistakable.

“I knew from the moment I laid eyes on you that I’d have my work cut out turning you into a soldier,” Yimt said, “but I always knew I would. You ain’t about to prove me wrong now, are you?”

Alwyn laughed and cried at the same time. “Yimt! You’re alive!”

“Well, what the hell else would I be? You didn’t think I’d let some mangy rakkes get the better of me now, did you?”

Alwyn found the strength he needed. He squeezed one more time, and this time the creature was unable to resist. The monsters and shades of the rakkes were cast deep in the abyss of the distant past. He absorbed the creature’s pain, robbing it of its power.

“I. . there’s so much I want to say,” Alwyn shouted. His entire being was agony, but he still managed to smile. Yimt was alive.

“Save your breath, Ally,” Yimt shouted back, his voice breaking up between sobs. “I’ll say it for both of us. You’re the skinny, overly sensitive, whiny, yet tough as bloody iron son I never had. I’m damn proud of you.”

As the life force in his hands flickered with its last moments, Alwyn smiled. He crushed the last particle that had been Gwyn and the tear between the worlds was closed. The storm around him began to die, and as the air cleared he was able to get one, perfect look at Yimt. The dwarf stood military straight, giving Alwyn a salute.

Alwyn saluted back as the toboggan engulfed in black flame slid to a halt beside him. The frost fire reached the kegs of black powder and exploded, banishing the darkness in a burning white sun brighter than a thousand stars.

Snow flashed and vaporized. Everything went pure white then black as the night shattered. A sizzling wave of cold and hot air washed over Visyna, stealing the breath from her throat. Bright splotches of color swirled before her eyes as icy shards of frost fire crackled and slivered amidst searing-hot tongues of red-orange flame. A moment later, the booming sound of an explosion tore through the air, crushing everything flat in its path.

It felt as if the ground had risen up and slammed into her instead of the other way around. Alternating currents of bitter cold and caustic heat roared overhead, twisting and turning in the sky. Visyna tried to lift her head, but it was pinned to the ground as much by her exhaustion as the rolling blast wave of the explosion.

Unable to breathe and too weak to move, her vision began to gray and she experienced a growing numbness throughout her body. No, not like this! Fighting every urge to close her eyes and drift into unconsciousness, she pulled her arms back until she could prop herself up on her elbows. Straining like she was in labor, she hauled her body up to a sitting position.

She brought one arm up to shield her face as she peered ahead, trying to find Konowa. There was so much flickering light and shadow that it took her a minute to find the spot she’d last seen him. She realized suddenly she hoped to see his body lying on the ground. It sounded perverse even as she thought it, but the logic was sound. If he was dead, there would be nothing left, but if he was only wounded, he would still be there.

She scoured the ground ahead looking for any sign at all of the body of the elf she loved. She found him a moment later, but despite the horrors she had already witnessed, she wasn’t prepared for what she saw.

THIRTY-ONE

I’m dead. Surprisingly, it didn’t feel strange to think it. He tried out the concept again. I’m dead, I’m really dead.

Something distant and loud echoed in the space around him, but he couldn’t put any meaning to it. Everything was dark, not black exactly, more like the absence of. . anything.

He tried to move, but the process by which that happened escaped him. For all that he didn’t feel trapped. It was as if he knew he could travel wherever he wanted, but he had no desire to go anywhere or do anything, so the fact that he couldn’t move was moot.

The noise sounded closer. It was more distinct now, like a huge drum being beaten. . or a cannon firing. He thought it strange he could hear that in the afterlife, but then again, why not? The Blood Oath meant he wasn’t really gone, not all the way.

The thought was comforting. He realized he wasn’t ready to leave this world, not yet. His nose itched and he wanted to scratch it, but his arms still wouldn’t move. Wait a second. If my nose is itchy. . oh bloody he-

“-EELLLLLLLL!” Konowa yelled, his eyes flying open. Spots flickered in front of his eyes making it impossible to see anything clearly. He kept yelling, knowing that the moment he stopped he was going to experience something he had no desire to feel. He yelled until his whole body was rigid and shaking and his throat on fire. Finally, he closed his eyes and took in a breath, and with it the pain.

“. . mother,” he whispered, tears welling in his eyes and rolling down the side of his face. If he’d had a pistol in his hand and the energy to lift it he would have put it to his head and ended it all. Never in his life had he felt pain like this. This wasn’t possible. It was as if he was being frozen from the inside out. He could feel tiny, razor-sharp pieces of frost growing like crystal inside his body. The agony was so pure he could have cut diamonds with it.

“I’m here my son, I’m here,” Chayii said, her voice coming to him like a rope to a drowning elf.

“What’s happening?” he asked, unable to open his eyes again as the pain robbed him of the ability to do little more than breathe.

“The blade is still in you, my son. That is why you are suffering. Hold on a little longer.”

Konowa tried to make sense of what she was saying. What blade? He couldn’t remember how he got here, everything was fuzzy and out of order. His memory lay scattered about his mind like a spilled deck of playing cards. Images flashed in his mind, of sliding, of black fire, of rakkes, of-

“Kritton!” He opened his eyes again and forced them to look to his left. A dark, shimmering, ethereal blade protruded from his shoulder. The shoulder itself was sheathed in black ice like an armor suit. That’s what saved me, he realized, also understanding that it was the power of the frost fire that now kept the blade firmly lodged in his flesh. The blade faded in and out of sight, and as it did the pain ebbed and flowed like the tides. “Pull it out! Bloody hell, pull the damn thing out!”

Now that he knew the source of the pain he found strength in his limbs. He thrashed and cursed and spit and dug his heels into the dirt as the pain wracked him. He tried to reach the blade to pull it out himself, but when his hand grasped the shadowy pommel it closed around nothing. It was as if the blade really was just shadow. There was nothing to hold on to.

“You see our dilemma,” Pimmer said, coming into view. “We’ve tried all manner of ways to remove the blade, but thus far none have worked.”

“We haven’t tried my idea yet,” Yimt said, barging forward. The Viceroy started to object then thought better of it and disappeared. Yimt knelt beside Konowa and laid a hand on his right arm. Even through the pain, Konowa could tell the dwarf had been crying.

“You remember Ally took that black arrow in his leg. He lost the leg, but he survived. Miss Red Owl, er, your mother, helped with that.”

Konowa felt colder still. “You want to cut off my arm?”

“This thing is killing you. If we don’t do something soon you’re going to be a solid block of ice.”

Konowa knew it was true. He could feel the frost fire inside him. It had never done that before.

His back arched as a new surge of pain raced through his body. “Okay,” he panted, “let’s call that. . plan B. Mother, can’t you do some magic and get it out?”

She leaned forward so that her face was above his. “My child, this is beyond my power, and even if your father were himself, I do not think he could do it either.”

“Visyna?”

There was a pause before Chayii answered. “She is. . too weak right now. But have faith, we will find a way.”

“Renwar,” Konowa said, his mind reeling through the list of people he knew with magical powers. It was surprisingly large. “He’s part of their world. Can’t he pull it out?”