“Bastards,” Adela growled, and stood, exuding strength, but only for a moment. The ship lurched again, sending Eira tumbling from her chair.
Eira forewent bracing her physical body to brace her magic. She felt the moment of impact this time as some foreign object exploded against the side of the ship. The attack hit her magic—hit her, sending her reeling.
Her head spun and the hold that Adela had on her magic retreated, pulling up her stomach with it. Eira retched and braced herself against the floor. Though she didn’t know if she was bracing for another dizzying attack, or if she was bracing for Adela’s scolding. Eira was certain the rug she’d just ruined was probably very rare and expensive.
Icy fingers closed around her chin once more, wrenching her face up, ignoring the spittle. Adela’s arm had magically extended to an inhuman length so that the pirate queen didn’t even have to kneel to reach her. She looked down at Eira not with disdain, as Eira would’ve once expected, but determination.
“I will deal with these bastards personally,” Adela vowed. “Until I return, the Stormfrost is in your hands. Do not let my ship go down.”
Eira didn’t have a chance to ask for details on what was happening. Adela left in a blur of hasty steps that crackled with power underneath her feet. She opened her mouth to call after the pirate queen when another explosion battered the side of the ship.
Digging her nails into the rug to steady herself, and her magic, Eira weathered the blast. And then a second. She closed the holes in the frost on
the side of the ship as they were made.
Eira pressed her eyes shut and drew shaking, shuddering breaths. She hardly had time to recover before there was another blast. The whole vessel groaned and tipped. Eira flopped onto her back, stretching out her arms and legs. Ice covered her, melding her with the ship.
The sounds of the chaos on deck faded away. People screaming. Heavy footsteps. Flashes of power grew distant from her awareness. Eira focused only on the Stormfrost. Her consciousness stretched around it, flowing through the ice, and reaching into the water.
She curled her fingers, magic crackling and charging through the frost. The sea swelled, pushing the vessel upright again. Eira withdrew her power and focused back on bracing for another blast. Just in time.
A scream raked up her throat and found no escape—frost had covered her mouth. Pain burned her side. It was as if she was the one being struck, rather than the vessel. As though her own flesh was being seared and carved away.
Eira thickened the ice once more. She wasn’t going to let them win. Whoever “they” were. Be it the Pillars, a rebel pirate faction, or someone else long scorned by Adela…it didn’t matter. It wasn’t about them in that moment. This moment was hers alone, to prove to herself that the pirate queen’s trust wasn’t misplaced. That she had made progress on deepening her connection with her magic and learning new feats of power.
As the battle around the vessel raged, her awareness of her own body continued to slip away. She could feel the heavy footsteps of people racing about on the deck. She could feel the inconsequential pockmarks for magic bursts not even a quarter as strong as what was assaulting the side of the hull. Even though she wasn’t battling alongside them, in her mind’s eye, she began to construct the image of her friends.
And if she could see them, then she could help them.
Her muscles spasmed as she drew more power. Sheets of ice rose to block attacks on the deck outside. They served as shields for her friends to hide behind. Spears jutted from railings, skewering those she couldn’t recognize. All the while, Eira continued to preserve the hull.
The tide of the battle turned, dictated by Adela’s magic as the pirate queen gained the upper hand. Eira breathed a sigh of relief through her nose. But she didn’t release her magic, not until two hands cupped the frost
on the sides of her face and a distant voice called, “… back… Come back…”
Eira worked to relax her magic. Little by little, she released the magic making her one with the Stormfrost. The frost that had covered her cracked. Her ears were free and her consciousness slowly returned.
“What do you think you’re doing in here?” Adela’s cool voice demanded to know.
“What have you been doing in here?” Cullen, she could hear him clearly now. “What are you doing to her?”
“I have done nothing that she did not welcome enthusiastically and could manage beautifully.” Adela’s footsteps approached. Eira’s eyes cracked open, finding Cullen kneeling at her side and Adela looming over. “Up with you. I will resume command of my ship.”
Adela’s lips were pressed into a thin line, the magic in the air around her writhing with agitation. And yet, there was a glint of what Eira would dare say was delight in her eyes. Was Adela impressed? Manage beautifully… Had there ever been two sweeter words said about her? The mere possibility soothed over the phantom aches that still riddled Eira sides and chest.
“Is the Stormfrost all right?” Eira croaked.
A long stretch of silence. Then, finally, “Passable.” That was the best Eira knew she would get. But, for Adela, combined with everything else, she might as well have been singing Eira’s praises.
“What happened?” Eira rubbed her stomach where she had felt one of the blows. Her skin was intact. But that didn’t stop her from lifting her tunic and searching for bruising. There was none. How had she felt so viscerally? What had Adela managed to teach her all these weeks without ever laying it out explicitly?
“Your magic? That was the natural evolution of seeing through the frost, as we had discussed. The attack? Come and see for yourself.” Adela turned and then paused halfway to the door. She looked back to Cullen, any glimpse of approval in her eyes having vanished. “And you…should you ever enter my personal chambers again without permission, I will kill you.”
Cullen frowned but had the good sense to say nothing. The moment Adela was gone, his arms flew around Eira’s shoulders, pulling her in tight. Compared to the magic and the frost, Cullen was searing hot. She wanted to melt into him, to lose all shape of her own and rely entirely on his in an
utterly boneless state. She couldn’t resist the indulgence of his comfort for one sweet minute.
“Do you think you could stop terrifying me just once?” he murmured into her hair.
“Come now, if I did that, you would get bored of me.” She inhaled his scent—sweat, salt, and the freshness of wind over snowcapped mountains. Him.
He chuckled and shook his head. “I could never be bored of you.” “Everyone else?” she asked.
“They’re fine, everyone’s fine. The other ship, however…”
“Good.” Eira closed her eyes and took another slow breath. “Do you remember the last time you pulled me from a magical, frozen state?”
“As if I’d ever forget.” Cullen’s arms tightened briefly. He held her as tightly as he had that day in the room following the second trial, the day she had learned her parents weren’t who she’d thought they were. “No matter how far you go, I will always be ready to pull you back the moment you need.”
Her eyes fluttered closed and Eira sighed softly. A lifeline. A North Star. Not a shackle holding her in place, or a high wall surrounding her, but a dotted line on a map to guide her from the brink—a tether to grab before she toppled over the edge of being lost forever.
Eira pulled away. Their eyes locked. Something had shifted—been shifting. Yet, in this breath, it was all the more palpable and real. His fingers pressed into her skin a little deeper. The air was a little thinner. Every swell of her chest against his reminded her just how close they were.
Kiss me, her heart whispered, loud enough that for a moment she thought she’d spoken the words aloud. His eyes darted to her lips, as if she really had.
“Cullen, I—” She didn’t have a chance to finish, her words stolen with a kiss that sent a burning rush all the way down to her toes.
A gasp escaped her as the familiar taste of him consumed her senses. The feeling of him was like a return home at long last—somewhere she once knew, yet had been changed by time and distance. A place that she couldn’t see quite the same as she once had, yet also remained imprinted on her heart. His hands moved to her face as her fingers curled around his clothes, balling into fists and pulling him closer, were that possible.
Time held its breath.
His lips parted, allowing her entry, and a gasp escaped. She wasn’t sure who it belonged to, nor did she care. Cullen’s hands continued to move; his fingers were now in her hair. Perhaps it was the rush of yet another near- death experience. Perhaps it was the tension that they had been building with every spar on the deck. With every look across hammocks in the dim light belowdecks. Every brush of their thighs as they ate… Building, and building, and building. All the way back to that night in Champion Village when it took everything they had to hold back.
But the things she would let him do to her now if he only asked… He pulled away abruptly.
An unbecoming groan escaped her. “Why are you always the sensible one?”
“One of us must be.” He tucked a strand of hair behind her ear, no doubt one that he had just pulled out of place. The movement was gentle, a stark contrast to him leaning to rasp in her ear, “I doubt Adela would want me locking the door and taking you on her floor.”
A whole fresh wave of heat rushed through Eira at that. But it was doused by better sense prevailing.
Eira went to stand. Every muscle in her body was exhausted. Doing anything more than being putty in his palms and kissing was too much, given the pain that jolted between her joints. She stumbled.
“Are you sure you should be standing?” Cullen was at her side, one arm around her back. Gripping her arm closest to him to support her. “You could—”
“I’m fine, just exhausted.” She gave him a weary smile in an attempt to reassure him. It was hard not to touch his face and get lost in his embrace once more. But… “I want to see what happened.” She could only indulge so many seconds of escapism.
“I could carry you,” he offered.
Eira considered it. She felt far shakier on her feet than ever before. She hadn’t been aware of how much magic she’d been using in the thick of it. But now that it was gone, and the rush was leaving her…it felt like she had gone five days without sleeping, running nonstop the entire time.
“Just help me, I want to walk on my own as much as possible. I can do it,” she decided. No matter how tempting the idea of being cradled in his arms was, she wanted to move on her own two feet.
If the roles were reversed, Adela would walk. So Eira would, too.
Cullen didn’t fight her. He tightened his arm around her middle and she leveraged his support as they stepped out of Adela’s cabin and onto the deck, covered in the aftermath of battle.
