Sacrifice (The Snow Queen #2)(45)

She didn’t attempt to create a piece of architecture; she went for sheer power and created a jagged, crystalline wall of frosty white ice.

The cloud and wall collided. Pain—like nails digging into her skin—hit Rakel. It’s painful to even graze his magic, but it’s a much more bearable byproduct than his curses. The ice wall sang and shattered, and the black cloud disappeared.

While she was busy defending, Tenebris had built up ammunition. Three rivers as black as tar oozed across the battlefield, spattering the churned snow. They were significantly smaller than the cloud, but moved much more swiftly and in unpredictable paths.

Rakel blocked the first with a massive ice shield and cut off the second, impaling it with a giant stalagmite of ice. The last one reared up like a snake preparing to strike—causing panic among the Verglas troops. Rakel gritted her teeth at the burning pain in her mind and redirected her magic, freezing the last river all the way through.

Drums beat from the Chosen army, and the troops rearranged themselves. They started marching down the sides of the battlefield, moving to box the Verglas troops in.

Rakel reached for the hills and pulled back her magic, whisking snow off the glittering walls behind which the resistance fighters were positioned.

Someone in the Verglas army blew a note on the ram horn, and the resistance fighters loosened their first round of arrows. A wolf howled, and lightning struck the center of a Chosen squadron.

Farrin’s men—they’re helping!

Rakel inhaled and stopped the curse that lumbered across the field. She caught sight of a giant black cloud hanging over the valley, and hurried, creating a giant, vaulted shield above the Verglas army. Little black droplets rained from the cloud. When they hit the ice shield, they fizzled and faded. Each droplet was a pinprick of pain for Rakel.

“Die, monster!”

Rakel jolted out of concentration to see a Chosen magic user running for her, his weapons dripping with poison.

Farrin appeared behind him, caught him by the throat, and flipped him over his shoulder. The magic user went down with a gurgle.

“You’re doing well,” Farrin said.

Rakel grit her teeth and hurried to block a streak of Tenebris’s black magic. “He has more power than I estimated.”

“He’s had years of practice,” Farrin said. He casually spun around and deflected two arrows.

“How long do you think he can continue at this pace?” Rakel asked. Her magic worked with her, pumping through her blood and brushing her soul, but she could already tell this battle would cost her several days of sleep—and it wasn’t over yet.

“It will take a great deal to force him into a retreat,” Farrin said. He lunged forward, blocking a spear thrown at Rakel. “If you don’t mind my inquiry, why haven’t you gone on the attack?”

Rakel almost bit her tongue when she blocked a plume of Tenebris’s magic. She could feel it burn her ice as it dissipated. “Pardon?”

Farrin’s eyes were watchful as he scanned the battlefield. “His magic hurts you, and yet you can defend against it. It is logical that your magic would be uncomfortable—if not dangerous—to him.”

Rakel stared at Farrin. Recruiting him might be the best thing I ever did for this war.

A pained scream shattered her reverie. A Verglas soldier howled as Liv—mounted behind Phile—galloped towards him to break his curse. Tenebris had snuck a strike past her.

Rakel returned her attention to the Chosen’s leader. “You say he won’t easily call a retreat?”

“No.”

Rakel smiled. “Excellent.”

She dug deep, heaping as much of her magic as she could hold. The temperature dropped, the wind howled, and snow tumbled down the sides of the hills and swirled from the sky. Rakel threw her arm at Tenebris. Ice sliced through the battlefield like a sword, hitting him.

He blocked it with his dark magic, but the recoil knocked him a step back. So if his magic burns mine, mine forces his away. Interesting.

Spears of ice shot out of the ground, nearly impaling him. An avalanche threatened to bury him, but he threw it back, rerouting it to blanket his troops.

Rakel reached for more of her magic. Ice began to bloom like flowers across the battlefield. She formed a hundred ice swords and threw them at Tenebris. He shattered them with a wall of his dark magic.

“He’s not going to pull back,” she muttered. She glanced back at the Verglas forces. They were standing their ground against the Chosen mercenaries—the resistance forces were ripping through their ranks with their archers—but the cold temperatures, wild wind, and the snow were slowing them down.

They can’t survive in this much longer. If Tenebris won’t leave, I have to trap him long enough for us to leave.

Recalling the various cages she had forged out of ice, Rakel rubbed the tips of her fingers together and grabbed as much magic as she could handle. Her ears rang, and her knees buckled under the physical strain as she pulled at all the ice and snow in the area.

The ground rumbled, and men shouted as the hills themselves shuddered and groaned. Rakel swallowed and carved into the ground with her ice magic, creating a circular wall that spiraled around Tenebris and his guards. When she raised the height of the walls, he seemed to guess what she was trying to do and tried to use his magic to destroy the wall. He reacted too slowly, however, and Rakel patched whatever holes he made as he struggled to break free.