He drew his dagger from the hidden sheath against his arm and with a single fluid motion cut his palm. Blood fell to the street in heavy red drops.
“As Isera,” he said, the words taking shape in his blood and on the air at the same time. They vibrated through the alley.
And then, the ground began to freeze.
It started at the drops of blood and spread out fast like frost over the stones and underfoot until a moment later everyone in the alley was standing atop a single solid pane of ice. One man took a step, and his feet went out from under him, arms flailing for balance even as he fell. Another must have had better boots on, because he took a sure step forward. But Kell was already moving. He crouched, pressed his bloody palm to the street stones, and said, “As steno.”
Break.
A cracking sound split the night, the quiet shattering with the pane of glassy ice. Cracks shot out from Kell’s hand, fissuring the ground to every side, and as he stood, the shards came with him. Every piece not pinned by boot or body rose into the air and hung there, knifelike edges facing out from Kell like wicked rays of light.
Suddenly everyone in the alley grew still, not because he was willing the bones in their bodies, but because they were afraid. As they should be. He didn’t feel drunk now. Didn’t feel cold.
“Hey now,” said one, his hands drifting up. “You don’t have to do this.”
“It’s not fair,” growled another softly, a blade of ice against his throat.
“Fair?” asked Kell, surprised by the steadiness in his voice. “Is three against one fair?”
“He started it!”
“Is eight against two fair?” continued Kell. “Looks to me like the odds are in your favor.”
The ice began to inch forward through the air. Kell heard hisses of panic.
“We were just defending ourselves.”
“We didn’t know.”
Against the back wall, Rhy had straightened. “Come on, Kell….”
“Be still, Rhy,” warned Kell. “You’ve caused enough trouble.”
The jagged shards of ice hovered to every side, and then drifted on the air with slow precision until two or three had found each man, had charted a course for throat and heart and gut. The shards and the men that faced them waited with wide eyes and held breath to see what they would do.
What Kell would do.
A flick of his wrist, that’s all it would take, to end every man in the alley.
Stop, a voice said, the word almost too soft to hear.
Stop.
And then suddenly, much louder, the voice was Rhy’s, the words tearing from his throat. “KELL, STOP.”
And the night snapped back into focus and he realized he was standing there holding eight lives in his hand, and he’d almost ended them. Not to punish them for attacking Rhy (the prince had probably provoked them) and not because they were bad men (though several of them might have been). But just because he could, because it felt good to be in control, to be the strongest, to know that when it came down to it, he would be the one left standing.
Kell exhaled and lowered his hand, letting the shards of ice crash to the cobblestones, where they shattered. The men gasped, and swore, and stumbled back as one, the spell of the moment broken.
One sank to the ground, shaking.
Another looked like he might vomit.
“Get out of here,” said Kell quietly.
And the men listened. He watched them run.
They already thought he was a monster, and now he’d gone and given the fears weight, which would just make everything worse. But it didn’t matter; nothing he did seemed to make it better.
His steps crackled on the broken ice as he trudged over to where Rhy was sitting on his haunches against the wall. He looked dazed, but Kell thought it had less to do with the beating and more to do with the drink. The blood had stopped falling from his nose and lip, and his face was otherwise unhurt; when Kell quested through his own body in search of echoing pain, he felt only a couple of tender ribs.
Kell held out his hand and helped Rhy to his feet. The prince took a step forward, and swayed, but Kell caught him and kept him upright.
“There you go again,” murmured Rhy, leaning his head on Kell’s shoulder. “You never let me fall.”
“And let you take me down with you?” chided Kell, wrapping the prince’s arm around his shoulders. “Come on, Brother. I think we’ve had enough fun for one night.”
“Sorry,” whispered Rhy.
“I know.”
But the truth was, Kell couldn’t forget the way he’d felt during the fight, the small defiant part of him that had undeniably enjoyed it. He couldn’t forget the smile that had belonged to him and yet to someone else entirely.
Kell shivered, and helped his brother home.
IV
The guards were waiting for them in the hall.
Kell had gotten the prince all the way back to the palace and up the Basin steps before running into the men: two of them Rhy’s, the other two his, and all four looking put out.
“Vis, Tolners,” said Kell, feigning lightness. “Want to give me a hand?”