Magick is everywhere. I’ve never walked inside a construct, and neither have the horses. That fact—along with worry about what might lie beyond the heavy darkness surrounding us—fills every step with expectation. Nothing awful ever comes, though, save for shivering and a few crow caws, and thankfully, the horses don’t give me too much trouble.
It feels like ages pass before bluish light tints the wood like a wintry twilight. The path is clearly visible now, covered in snow and frost. Its gentle curve gives off a muted glow in the darkness.
By the time we round the bend, my hands, feet, and face are so chilled I can hardly feel them anymore, but my discomfort is the least of my concerns. Ahead, the path ends, and what lies beyond turns my blood to ice.
I stop the horses, my legs leaden and numb. My heart lodges itself in the base of my throat.
A frozen lake.
The dense forest wall of the tunnel widens, stretching along the lakeshore for as far as the eye can see. This must be a distortion of magick, a trick for the eye, because the lake goes on forever, east and west. Odd, because to my knowledge, there is no lake in Frostwater Wood.
Turning back to the stretch of ice before me, I try to calculate the distance to the other side—at least a few hundred yards. But the distance isn’t what worries me. I’ve been to Hampstead Loch in the winter, played on its solid, crystalline expanse.
This lake is riddled with cracks. Frigid slush struggles to flow beneath the shattered pale blue surface, just waiting to swallow someone once they break through. Unless I can summon the energy and power to part a solid body of water or build wings to fly us over, our only option is to travel across.
A whistling wind whips around the lake and tears away my hood. The gust is so loud it almost drowns out the groan behind me. Almost.
“Raina.”
It isn’t lost on me that I’m Alexus’s first thought upon waking. I wrestle with how that makes me feel, how the sound of his voice brings me a strange assurance, but only for a moment, because he’s suddenly thrashing, his broad body straining against the ropes that hold him bound.
I hurry to his side, clasp his face between my hands, and make him look at me. The second he meets my gaze, his eyes clear, and he settles. His long, dark hair is wild, his green eyes a silvery jade beneath this pearly, icy light. The gambeson has fallen to the ground, and snow clings to his tunic and beard.
Closing his eyes, he rests the weight of his head against my palm before looking at me once more. “You’re all right.”
I nod, swallowing a foreign tightness in my throat, and let my hands fall away. I busy my frozen fingers with untying the ropes.
When he’s free, Alexus reaches for his wounded thigh, only to find frozen blood on his leathers but no mark.
He looks up, brow scrunched. “I didn’t dream what happened.”
“No,” I sign and shake my head.
“You…healed me, then?”
I shrug. “It was that or let you die.”
He stares at me as though he doesn’t know what to think, like I’ve sprouted a horn between my eyes.
“So you not only see things and conquer death, but you can heal too.”
Something Nephele didn’t tell him. That knowledge gives me a sliver of hope that she won’t be utterly unrecognizable once I reach Winterhold.
“I can,” I answer, too cold to even think about denying it. My fingers can’t sustain an argument right now. With a rigid hand, I motion toward the lake. “And you said I would never survive this wood without you. So what do we do now, Oh Wise One?”
He dismounts, keeping a firm grip on Mannus’s reins for support. His movements are slow and a little wobbly at first. He did lose a good bit of blood. Add in the frigid weather, and I’m sure he still needs time to regain his strength. Time is a luxury we don’t have, though.
Studying the blue-white ice that looks like a shattered sheet of glass, he sighs. “Damn. Not good.”
That seems like a severe understatement.
“At least we have a little light now,” he adds. “And I’m no stranger to ice.”
That is the only positive thing about our current situation. Well, that and neither of us is dead yet.
“You know this is a snare set by your Witch Walkers, yes?” I ask him. And though I’m not a bit happy about the lake, I admit that it’s a clever obstacle for the land of the Frost King. The Eastlanders must’ve made it across, though, because there’s no sign of them even having been here.
Unless they’re the reason for the fissures in the ice.
“Of course I know. This entire construct is a trap.” He steps to the water’s edge and toes an ice floe. “But we can’t stay here. And don’t even think about asking me to backtrack. If the way in was a way out, that Eastlander would’ve found it. He’d been in here for a while.”
If that’s even why the Eastlander was there in the first place. He was waiting.
Like a hunter.
Gods, I was lucky to gain the upper hand. I had but a moment to prepare. Everything after that was impulse and instinct, born of fear.
Cold as I am, heat flushes up my neck and spreads over my face. Chilled sweat beads on my upper lip.
“The magick will let us out,” I sign, trying not to breathe so hard. “Like you said. It will provide a way.”
I think about when Alexus called this place a hopeful tomb, and I glance back to the ice. A tomb for the Eastlanders might very likely be a tomb for us as well.
Alexus folds his hand around my shoulder. “It will, Raina. I swear it.”
Another frosty wind blows. I throw the hood of my cloak back up and bury myself as far inside the wool as possible, hiding my hands in the slight warmth beneath my arms. I am a stranger to ice—and to cold this severe too. I can’t imagine surviving these elements for the rest of the night, much less the week it would take to cross the forest and reach Winterhold under normal conditions. It will take longer now. But how long? How large is the construct?
Alexus snatches the gambeson from the ground and wraps it around me. I’m trembling hard, but I still shake my head and pull away. He may be used to harsh winter weather, but that doesn’t mean he should be exposed to the elements with no more than a thin tunic and bloody leather britches.
He draws the soft armor tight around me regardless, and I pour every bit of my frustration into my stare. He moves nearer, holding the gambeson’s collar on either side, just beneath my chin.
Head tilted, he leans close, his dark hair falling around his serious face. “You’ve saved my life twice, Raina Bloodgood. Wise or not, I’m eternally indebted to you. The very least I can do is keep you warm.”
I suppose it isn’t awful to have a man like Alexus Thibault indebted to me, but I want nothing more from him than his aid in reaching my sister. I certainly don’t want this closeness or the way his nearness makes my heart beat harder. I don’t want to act like a stupid little girl from the vale caught up in a beautiful man’s presence, sucked in by his absorbing gaze. I’m a grown woman who can think around such nonsense.