Frostblood (Frostblood Saga #1)(50)
I could feel her eyes boring into my back as the guards led me up wide white steps to the castle’s massive iron door. My steps faltered and stopped as we entered, so overtaken with the grandness of the place I’d entered.
The interior of the castle was a monstrous ice cave. Here and there the ice came down to meet the floor in smooth, natural-looking columns. The ceiling was cold blue with repeating curves but with a smooth-looking surface, like a toad’s skin. Light seemed to shine from it and through it, creating thousands of fractal patterns on the walls. In the center, where the ceiling rose up to form a dome, stalactites clustered in a sharp, strangely elegant chandelier.
In a few spots, gray stone walls were visible beneath the blue sheets. The castle must have been built of stone and then augmented and covered with ice.
The massive scale, the intense blues, the delicacy of the stalagmites and stalactites that reached for each other in various corners—the sheer, sweeping boldness of the room—pinned me in place and stole my breath.
“Move,” the captain commanded, shoving me between the shoulder blades. I stumbled and shivered violently, my hands and feet aching with cold as they took me down a series of corridors, some wide, some narrow, all of them a mixture of stone and ice, to a wide archway.
Here the floor was made of colored stones set in an intricate mosaic of shapes that formed pictures. There were birds with berries in their beaks, horses with flying manes, frost wolves chasing a fire fox, fantastical creatures I had never heard of, gods and goddesses and mortals playing out the scenes of every myth I had ever read and many I hadn’t. I was so immersed in it all that I barely noticed we had stopped.
I pulled my attention from the floor. About twenty paces away sat a massive throne of ice, its back soaring almost to the ceiling. Ice spread out from its base and up the walls like veins connected to a heart. It was a hulking monstrosity of thick, jagged ice that thrust upward like sharpened swords. Though the ends of the icicles were sharp, the texture of each was smooth, as if they’d been polished with merciless attention until no bumps or snags remained, all of it blindingly bright in the setting sun, which entered through a large window behind the throne.
Shadows cavorted inside the ice like wisps of black smoke.
This was no simple block of ice. It was the throne, crafted by Fors and pulsing with dark power.
Excitement surged through my body. I was in the presence of the throne. If Brother Thistle was right, its destruction would mean the healing of the kingdom. My people, whoever still lived, could return or come out of hiding. Perhaps a new ruler would take a new throne untainted by the curse.
But that depended on the imposing man currently seated on it. His robes were midnight blue, his hair and skin so pale they almost blended with the ice. His eyes were polished onyx. His hands rested on either side of him, a large sapphire glinting on the ring finger of one hand.
He was much younger than I’d expected, with no lines marking his glowing complexion. He couldn’t be much older than I.
“We have a Fireblood for you,” said the captain, his low voice echoing around the massive room.
Some invisible force seemed to take hold of me, as if the throne itself beckoned and repulsed me at the same time. A rough shove from behind sent me to my knees, my palms meeting the cold stone floor with a dull slap.
Dimly, I registered several people near the king turning to look at me, a tall man in fine robes to the right of the throne, a young woman in a plum velvet gown to his left, a cluster of what must have been courtiers in conversation.
The king stared down at us with perfect indifference. It was as if I were part of the floor, one of the birds with a berry in its mouth or one of the foxes being chased by a wolf. If it weren’t for the movement of his eyes, I could have mistaken him for a statue.
One of his fair brows rose. “She’s nothing but a skinny girl.” No one could miss the crackle of scorn in his voice. “Your orders were to bring me the strong ones.”
The captain cleared his throat. “This is the Fireblood who escaped Blackcreek Prison. She burned a dozen of my men without trying. I don’t believe she is weak, Your Majesty.” Though it seemed to hurt him to admit it.
“Where did you find her?” the king asked.
“In Forwind Abbey on Mount Una. We don’t know why worshippers of Fors would hide a Fireblood, but one of the monks was loyal to Your Majesty and sent word to our garrison. We’re questioning the leader.”
Choking ribbons of fear closed my throat. The thought of Brother Thistle being tortured for information about me was unbearable. I struggled to my feet.
The king’s eyes narrowed on me. Goose bumps broke out on my flesh and my breath made puffs of mist. Even a look from the king was enough to half freeze me. I shuddered at the strength of his power.
“So, you care about the monks,” he said, rubbing his jaw thoughtfully. “They must have been good to you, which suggests they were willing hosts.”
I stumbled over my words a little as I tried to offer an explanation he might accept. “I claimed to be a refugee. They didn’t know I was a Fireblood.”
The captain gave a disbelieving snort. “The monk called Lack told us everything. They knew, and the old monk healed you anyway.”
The old monk. Brother Gamut. No.
It was one thing to hurt me, but that gentle monk had spent his life among herbs and plants, his only goal to learn better ways to heal, just like my mother. Heat covered my skin.