I winced at his tone. So matter-of-fact. “What of the Saevallans?”
Roland tugged on his sword belt. “Many of them are already at the wall.”
“Then I’m going as well.” I couldn’t stand the thought of being left behind, especially when our reinforcements were out there risking their lives for a city they didn’t call home.
“Don’t be a fool, Ivy. No one will be able to protect you out there.”
He was right. It was a stupid, brainless thing to do. But I couldn’t just sit back, waiting on my comrades to come home. I couldn’t see Minnow or Tulia in the Curse Ward next to Kellian. I needed to go out there. Prince or no prince.
“I don’t need protection. I can stay in the Illye circle.”
“You can’t stay in there unless you’ve been Kissed. You know that,” Edric snapped.
“Then Kiss me.” I reached for his neck, but he drew back.
“No, Ivy. I’m not going to help you get yourself killed.” With that, he pushed my arms away and stomped through the doors of the armory.
Five Royals passed me before I snapped out of it.
I grabbed Matilda, Amias’s partner, and squeezed her arm. “I need a favor.”
Matilda blinked. She didn’t particularly like me—especially since her partner was always trying to leave her for me, but she also wasn’t about to turn down the direct descendant of Myriana. “Yes, Your Highness?”
“I need a battle Kiss.” If I wanted to go out and actually fight—to see if all those sword lessons were worth something, I needed a princess to cast the battle spell on me. A prince’s Kiss wouldn’t work this time, since princes couldn’t cast spells.
Matilda glanced to the doors, to the sounds of hooves thundering away. “I don’t think…”
“I’ll tell no one. No matter what happens, you won’t be blamed.”
Still, she hesitated.
“Or, I could take Amias away from you, and you’d be left with a weaker partner or a spot at Freida.” I hated to threaten her—but I was desperate.
Matilda didn’t pause this time. She grabbed my shoulders and Kissed me. Her magic was like the paws of a cat, small pinpoints of pressure. I could tell when she spoke the battle words—Silen proderr Natalya—because then I could draw the magic out of her, as Amias had done to me just this morning. I took only a sliver of hers, because I could draw from my own magic now. Blue flames danced across my skin, even though I felt nothing but a soft, warm sensation.
When our lips parted, she glared at me. “I hope my spell is good enough for the great Ivy Myriana,” she snarled.
I drew myself up, flexing my arm muscles, feeling the power and strength course through me. “It’ll do.”
…
Twilight had just begun to show on the eastern horizon, in the direction of the breached wall. It was no coincidence. Monsters preferred attacking in shadows and darkness. Perhaps by hitting us at sundown they thought they would surprise us.
But they would never truly be able to catch us completely off guard, thanks to our Sense. Royals could feel the power of darkness closing in. A stony feeling, like a heavy shadow, settled over our chests as evil creatures got closer. During the partnership ritual, where marks were exchanged, the mage performed a spell that allowed princesses to take the prince’s Sense. That way the prince could fight freely, without the weight of the darkness pressing against him like a second, heavier gravity.
The fact that the princesses had to be the ones to bear the burden of the Sense’s weight was not necessarily fair, but, like everything else, it was logical. The Legion argued that the princesses weren’t the ones outside the protective Illye circle, engaging the monsters in close combat. And the Legion ruled by logic.
I had pushed the feeling down, as I had been trained to, but as I sat astride my mare, Lorena, I let the shadow loose. It settled across my chest like a breastplate, heavy with cold and fear. Its intensity told me it was, in fact, a horde of creatures. They were not particularly strong monsters, but there were many.
I swallowed and balled the feeling back into my chest, smothering it. It served me no purpose now. I knew where the enemy was and knew the extent of its power. I could not let the darkness grab hold of me, or I would never be able to move. Instead, I focused on the strength from the pulsing blue magic that surrounded me. It had been a long time since I’d felt the battle magic myself—only in training scenarios, never on an actual battlefield. This would be interesting.
I urged Lorena forward.
Rubble lay half a mile away from the forty-foot wall. Something big must have broken through to send debris so far. My horse picked her way through the rocks, and when I could go faster by foot, I dismounted and ran toward the battle, my legs stronger now with my enhanced battle magic. It made me grateful the locking curse was long gone. Up ahead, wooden buildings were on fire, and a whole roof had been caved in by a large boulder.
Oh, Sacred Sisters, I prayed, please let there be no more innocent lives lost. Please, Queen Myriana, protect my people.
Royals helped injured villagers out from under burning logs. Two children, their clothes covered in soot and ash, huddled behind a rock with a prince guarding them with his sword.
The fight was at its peak. Princes, lit with the blue flames of battle magic, fought against dwarves with axes. Princesses crowded together in a silvery protective dome of magic as they fired out arrows with longbows and crossbows.
Saevallans were also in the fray, fighting like rabid dogs against wolves. Their bronze armor glinted in the setting sun. Weldan was among them, also alight with blue magic.
His scarlet cloak flew behind him as he leaped onto a pile of rubble and drove his sword into a troll’s neck. The troll fell with the power of a chopped brucel tree and shook the ground at my feet. Its giant body disintegrated into black smoke, and the ground where it had fallen ignited in green flames, burning all the grass and turning the earth into something that death itself had touched.
“Ivy!”
My name came from within the Illye circle, and I glanced back to see Minnow standing at the edge, her crossbow at her side, waving at me. But I ignored her. She’d tell me to get within the circle to stay safe. Not this time. Not when villagers could still be hurt and not when I could actually do something about it. After weeks of lying in bed while my partner had gone on without me, I could finally fight again—I had battle magic now. The blue fire pulsed around me, and strength and power surged through me like lightning.
I had to do this. No, I wanted to do this.
I unsheathed my sword and headed into the smoke.
The first thing I encountered was a goblin. Its bald head and big ears swiveled around to me, scaly gray arms following with a large spiked hammer in its hands.
“Yek ut Mukk!”
Die, Royal scum.
I sneered at his words. “Out Nerak!”
Not today.
I ducked low to avoid the swing and stabbed my sword into its tender feet. The creature reared back and screamed, half its cry drowned out by other sounds of battle. While it was distracted with pain, I drove my shoulder into its gut, forcing it to the ground. With a wild feeling of victory, I stabbed the goblin in the chest. The creature went up in black smoke and scorched the earth with a surge of green flames.
My nerves flew like ash on the wind. I killed a monster, without a partner to hide behind. With Matilda’s spell and my own reservoir of magic, I alone was powerful enough.
“Ivy!”
It was Edric this time, no doubt furious I went against his order. I barely glanced his way, and instead, ran the other direction, into the plumes of smoke.
I drew in a breath as the smoke around me cleared. Fire and debris were everywhere, while a gaping hole in the wall revealed rolling lands shadowed in twilight. I sent out another prayer to the wind, shuddering at the thought of undergoing another breach while civilians lay in their beds, weak and vulnerable.
Thankfully, though, we were winning. Much faster than usual.
And that was for one reason.