In the moments before Naelin found the foreign spirits, while she was pillaging the minds of stray tree and air spirits, Ven was running with no other thought in his mind but Faster!
He refused to think about what could have happened to Erian and Llor, or what could be happening right now. Refused to think about what if he was too late. Refused to picture Erian, preening as she mastered another move he taught her. Or Llor, looking at Ven with those wide, hero-worshipping eyes. Refused to remember Naelin tucking her children in at night, or the way they’d started to ask to say good night to him too. He’d told them stories sometimes. Bandaged Llor’s knee when he skinned it. Fixed a knife holster for Erian that fit with her new princess dresses. He knew that Llor sometimes snored like a hibernating badger and that Erian squirmed in her sleep. He knew Llor hated nuts, unless they were crushed in a cookie, and that Erian could eat fistfuls of blueberries.
If I can just reach them soon enough . . .
He had to believe that Bayn was with them, defending them, buying Ven time to race to the rescue. Keep them safe, old friend. I’m coming!
A little birdlike spirit with wooden wings darted ahead of him, flew on, then flew back, as if waiting.
Naelin sent it, he thought. “Go!” he yelled at the spirit.
He veered, following it, leaping from tree to tree, running over the branches. After so many years of this, he could gauge every leap in mere seconds. He knew how to cling to the bark, how to use his knives like claws, how to dangle from a slim branch and land on the next one. He used every skill he had to run faster than he’d ever run.
But not fast enough. I’m . . .
I’m too late.
He knew it in his soul. The fact that Renet had returned to the village, slowed by a leg wound, but not killed, meant the attack was over. Whatever had happened to the children had already happened. It had been too long. Even Bayn isn’t strong enough or clever enough to defend the children from six spirits for this long.
Don’t think about that.
It was impossible not to, though.
He drew his sword as his senses alerted him to motion above him. A few autumn leaves swirled down as an air spirit, woman-shaped but with eagle wings and talons instead of feet, broke through the branches above. He crouched, sword ready, but then saw the spirit was falling talons first—
Another of Naelin’s, he thought.
He lowered his sword and let the spirit pluck him into the air.
With his leather armor bunched in its grip, the spirit carried him through the forest. Branches smacked into his legs, stinging, and he drew his knees up to his chest. The spirit let out a shrill cry that couldn’t have come from a human throat. In the distance, he saw the border of Aratay, which was also the border of Renthia itself: beyond it, the haze of the untamed lands curled like a forest fire on the horizon.
They flew closer.
Ahead, only a few yards from the border, Ven saw a clump of spirits—four air spirits, writhing on a branch as if they were caught in a fire. “There! Take me there!” His air spirit released him, and he crashed down, sword ready.
The four spirits didn’t look like the usual Aratayian spirits. Their wings were leathery instead of coated in feathers, and their bodies were bunched with muscles coated in sleek, snakelike skin. Razor-sharp beaks open, they were howling in pain. Naelin, he thought. She was trying to force them to obey her and they were resisting.
He leaped in between them and began hacking with his sword.
They sprang to life, focusing on this new threat, and he swirled, kicked, and struck at them, hoping that this distraction was what Naelin needed.
It was.
As Ven engaged the foreign spirits, Naelin sank into their minds. They couldn’t fight him and block her at the same time.
She saw images: Erian and Llor, on the back of Bayn, running through the forest. She felt the spirits’ hunger, their hate, their need. And she saw through their eyes as two spirits—two who had come with the others but weren’t with them now—pull Erian and Llor from Bayn’s back and then fly north while the other spirits drove Bayn across the western border.
Naelin yanked her mind away from the spirits. And she heard herself in her own body, screaming. “Erian! Llor!”
They’d been taken north.
Toward Semo.
Alive.
Reaching out, Naelin grabbed the mind of a large air spirit and pulled it toward her. Heronlike, it had a sinewy neck, white feathers, and broad wings. She flung herself onto its back and compelled it northward.
As she flew, she flung her mind out like a net, catching every spirit within fifty miles and driving them toward Semo. SAVE MY CHILDREN!
ATTACK!
Far from the border, in the capital of Aratay, Queen Daleina felt the cry of the spirits in the northwest. Naelin’s command shook through her, the other queen’s rage hitting her so fast and hard that Daleina sank to the floor.
“Your Majesty!” Her seneschal rushed to her side.
On her other side, her sister, Arin, grabbed for her, touching her arm, her forehead. “Is it happening again? Daleina, can you hear me?” To the seneschal, she snapped, “Get Healer Hamon!”
“Not . . . me,” Daleina managed. “Naelin.” She felt her spirits race northward, full of bloodlust—toward the border of Semo.
What was she doing? Naelin!
They finally had peace! Queen Merecot had been defeated. This was a time of healing! If Naelin attacked Semo . . . She’d start a war!
As the first wave hit the border, the Aratayian spirits crashed into a line of foreign spirits. The Aratayian spirits were a random assortment: a few larger earth spirits made of rocks and moss, mixed with tiny twiglike tree spirits and dandelion fluff–like air spirits, but the Semoian spirits stationed at the border were giants made of granite and dragons made of obsidian. They met the forest spirits as they crossed, and they tore them to shreds.
Daleina felt her spirits die—and with them, bits of Aratay.
Plants withered.
Flames engulfed trees.
Rivers dried.
No! What was Naelin thinking?
Daleina forced her mind northward, seizing the spirits before they could plunge over the Semoian border. No! STOP!
The minds of the two queens crashed into each other.
Chapter 5
Daleina knew Naelin was stronger. She’d started out stronger than most heirs, and becoming queen had only amplified that strength. Before today, Daleina had considered it a boon to Aratay: two queens, one with training and one with power, to protect their people. Together, they could usher in a new era of peace to their forests and guard their land against threats from within and without. She’d considered Naelin to be a sensible and reliable, even wise, queen.
She’d never considered the possibility that Queen Naelin could lose control.
It felt like a tornado. As Daleina touched the minds of the spirits, she felt their thoughts whipping cyclone-like, caught in a rush of fear and anger. They whooshed northward, swept into the maelstrom of Naelin’s fury.
Daleina tried to grab them, but they slipped away from her commands. She felt as if she were shouting into the howling wind, her words swallowed instantly. Jamming her fists into the floor, she concentrated—throwing her full self outward.
Stop! Do not cross!
She stretched her mind, imagining her thoughts were a wall that blocked the northern border.
The spirits, propelled by Naelin, battered against her wall. Her body flinched as if she’d been kicked, but she held firm. It didn’t hurt that the spirits wanted to obey her. They didn’t want to leave Aratay, especially once the first few died.
So she fed that. Stay here, stay safe, stay here, she repeated. She sent the command flowing into them, undercutting Naelin’s pure scream of raw power. Daleina couldn’t stop Naelin’s push—she didn’t have that kind of strength—but she could soften it, and hopefully hold the spirits long enough for someone to reach Naelin.
Distantly, she heard voices shouting at her.
Hamon: “Daleina, can you hear me? Answer me, Daleina!”