Tavis frowned, considering. Finally, he said, “You haven’t lost me. I’m still your bodyguard.”
Brianna shook her head. “You’re much more than that to me-and to the kingdom,” she said. “I owe you an apology.”
The scout shook his head. “What happened with Arlien wasn’t your fault,” he said. “The magic-”
“I’m talking about what happened before I drank the potion,” Brianna said. “I was wrong to insist that we keep our love secret.”
“No, you were right,” Tavis said. “We have to think of Hartsvale.”
“I am thinking of Hartsvale,” Brianna said. “If I’m afraid to act on my true feelings, then I’m not strong enough to rule this kingdom or any other. There will always be someone like Prince Arlien, shrewd enough and unscrupulous enough to pry at the seam between appearances and reality.”
The keep shuddered under some terrific blow, like a man about to fall unconscious. A booming clatter echoed up the stairway. The floor joists creaked plaintively, and an entire corner of the room suddenly sank.
Avner stepped away from the altar, where he had been waiting, and came to Brianna’s side. “Maybe we should do this somewhere else.”
The queen shook her head. “No. My spells will be more powerful here.”
“Then let’s get to the healing.” The boy eyed the sagging corner, then grabbed Tavis’s wrist and started forward. “I’m kind of in a hurry to get out of here.”
Tavis raised an eyebrow. “And go where?”
“The secret tunnels,” the youth said. “There are more beneath this castle than Cuthbert has admitted. Basil and I saw him running for one in the dungeon tower. I think it-”
“You’re getting ahead of us, Avner,” Brianna interrupted, following the boy to the front of the room. “Before we worry about our escape, we have to mend Tavis.”
Brianna slipped the bow and quiver off Tavis’s dislocated shoulder, noting that the golden arrow still remained in its special pocket. Next, as Avner tugged the boots off the firbolg’s swollen feet, she removed his cloak and what remained of the singed clothes underneath. Finally, she unclasped the necklace of ice diamonds hanging around his neck and pitched them through the window into the maelstrom outside.
“I don’t ever want to see an ice diamond again.” Brianna gently pushed the scout onto his back. “I’m sure Hiatea’s magic will work much better without them near.”
Brianna and Avner had already made all the necessary preparations. She picked up the bucket they had placed beside the altar earlier, then poured the contents over the firbolg’s body. His spirit had been cleansed earlier in the day, so the water frothed and bubbled for only a moment before she was ready to begin the actual healing.
A fierce bang resounded in the stairwell outside the room, followed by the rattle of stones tumbling down steps. The youngest Winter Wolf stuck his head out the door to see what was happening. When he turned back to Brianna, there were beads of sweat on his upper lip.
“Milady, we’d better go.”
“Not now,” Brianna said. She was dusting Tavis’s feet with powdered brimstone.
“But the giants have knocked a hole-”
“Quiet!”
As Brianna laid her goddess’s amulet on Tavis’s ankle, the scout looked over at the two soldiers. “Keep the giants away from the stairs. We’ll need them to get out of here,” he ordered. “Use the hole as an arrow loop.”
“As you command, Milord,” said the second Winter Wolf, older than his companion. “We’ll wait for you on the stairs.”
With that, the two soldiers clambered out of the room.
Brianna smiled at Tavis, then said, “This is going to hurt”
The scout winced, but nodded.
Brianna uttered the mystic syllables to her spell. The flames on her amulet began to dance and glow, first red, then orange and yellow. When they turned white, the brimstone powder ignited in a single brilliant flash. A golden fire danced over the scout’s feet, filling the air with wisps of black smoke. A long hiss of pain slipped from Tavis’s clenched teeth, but his frost-blackened flesh returned to its normal color and the swelling subsided. When Hiatea’s healing fires finally died, the firbolg’s feet looked more or less normal. The skin was still slightly gray and there was a little puffiness around the toes, but it looked as though he would be able to run.
The clack of firing crossbows echoed up the stairwell. A giant’s scream rolled through the temple window, then the veteran began yelling, “Reload, reload, reload!”
Brianna sprinkled more brimstone powder on the scout’s scorched flesh, covering him with a fine yellow coating from his ankles to his chin. She cast her next healing spell. As it had before, the powder ignited in a white flash, spreading yellow fire over Tavis’s body. The scout let out a long groan. When the golden flames died away, he looked as though he had suffered a bad sunburn, but the blisters and ugly patches of scorched hide had vanished.
A crash reverberated up of the stairwell, and the young soldier cried out. The floor joists crackled and groaned, dropping the corner of the room another two feet, and a long crack shot across the temple ceiling.
“I think we’re out of time.” Avner’s gaze was fixed on the widening gap over their heads.
“I have one more spell to cast.” Brianna motioned the boy toward Tavis’s head, then grabbed the arm of the scout’s dislocated shoulder. “Hold him steady.”
Avner kneeled beside the bench and wrapped his arms around Tavis’s collar.
The scout looked up at Brianna. “This is really going to hurt, isn’t it?”
Brianna smiled reassuringly. “What makes you say that?”
As she spoke, the queen gave a sharp tug on the scout’s arm. The shoulder slipped back into its socket with a sickening pop, and the scout yelled in pain. Brianna laid her amulet over the joint, but did not sprinkle any brimstone powder on it.
The queen uttered her incantation. Hiatea’s spear turned white, and its golden flames danced over the firbolg’s skin. The magical fire continued to flicker for several moments, its mending heat sinking deep into Tavis’s flesh to strengthen the weakened tendons and muscles. When the flames finally died away, Brianna took her amulet off the firbolg’s shoulder, leaving a spear-shaped brand where it had lain.
“Now can we go?” Avner demanded.
A thunderous boom shook the keep, and pieces of rock began to drop through the crack in the ceiling. The two soldiers in the stairwell remained ominously silent.
“I think we’d better.” Tavis rose and slipped his cloak over his shoulders, then swung his arm in a circle to test its mobility. He smiled and grabbed his bow and quiver, saying, “My thanks, Majesty. I’ll go first”
Stopping only to pick up her satchel of spell components, the queen followed Avner and Tavis out of the temple. They found the stairway half blocked by rubble. It sagged toward a large hole in the wall. There was no sign of what had happened to the older soldier, but the young one lay dead at the edge of the breach, one arm stretched into the void. Through the gap came a few wisps of acrid black smoke and the steady din of the giants pounding at the keep foundations. When Brianna looked out the hole, she could see two frost giants and several hill giants clambering over the rubble of the inner curtain.
Tavis started down the stairs, staying close to the interior wall. Avner followed close behind, with Brianna bringing up the rear. They were about halfway to the breach when the ivory-colored hand of a frost giant appeared in the hole, feeling around for a hand grip.
Tavis stopped and looked back at Brianna. “Let me have your hand-axe,” he whispered.
The queen slipped the silver-plated weapon off her belt and passed it over Avner’s head. As the scout descended the stairs, she took Hiatea’s amulet between her fingers, hoping she would not need to cast another healing spell soon.
The giant turned his hand sideways and wrapped his fingers over the edge of the gap. The jagged stub of a wrist came through the hole and pressed against the other side of the breach. A thin layer of red, delicate hide had already formed over the bone, with a series of crooked seams where a shaman had stitched the skin closed.
“Hagamil!” Tavis hissed.
The scout reached the breach and swung Brianna’s axe at the good hand. The blade bit deeply into the joint of the middle finger. The blow elicited a thunderous bellow of pain, but the giant did not lose his grip. He swung his other arm across, smashing the stub of his wrist against Tavis’s flank. The firbolg bounced off the wall and fell on
