Snow Like Ashes (Snow Like Ashes, #1)(62)

Or was that wrong?

A shadow rises from the fight, drifting out of each thrown punch, each snarl of hatred. The larger it grows, the angrier the crowd gets, like each feeds the other. Anger for more anger, evil for stronger evil—

From the light, there came a great Decay.

More black clouds of Decay appear, rising out of towns, villages, all from people who use conduits to do terrible things. A murder, a theft, a woman cowering as her husband beats her. Each time someone uses a conduit for corrupt ends, the Decay grows; and each time the Decay grows, it finds people, seeps inside them, and makes them do even more corrupt things.

And woe was it unto those who had no light.

Eight people stand before me on the edge of a cliff in a great underground cavern. A brilliant ball of light from the endless depth beyond all but blinds me, and as I realize what this is, everything I’ve ever felt evaporates, leaving only gentle awe.

The lost chasm of magic.

They did beg, thus the lights were formed.

The eight people stack stones and pendants and sticks on the edge of the chasm. Conduits, still glowing softly in eight separate piles. On the very top of his or her pile, each person places an object that does not glow. A locket, a dagger, a crown, a staff, an ax, a shield, a ring, a cuff. I run my eyes over the eight people again. Four male, four female.

The four did create the lights; and the four did create the lights.

Snapping fingers of energy strike the eight piles one at a time, unstoppable waves of power drawn to the new conduits like lightning to metal. Magic fills up the Royal Conduits, connecting with their rulers, their bloodlines, their genders.

The scene changes again, flashing by me. The clouds of Decay dissipate now, waning under the power of the Royal Conduits as the rulers chase the Decay from their lands. People rejoice as the Decay’s fog leaves them.

Then I see something I recognize all too well—Spring. Cherry trees stretch in a sea of pink and white around a man with curly blond hair, nearly translucent green eyes, and pale skin. He stands at the entrance to his city, holding a staff. And around him hovers the last black cloud in Primoria, pulsing weakly.

“You are true strength,” the man tells the cloud, and opens his arms to it.

I scream, needing someone to hear me, needing someone else to see that they didn’t destroy all of it. The Decay still exists—and it’s in the ruler of Spring.

“Tell me how to save them.”

The scene changes. Centuries pass. I’m in a bedroom in Hannah’s palace, Jannuari visible beyond open balcony doors. The Decay has faded to a distant, forgotten legend, and the only thing anyone in Winter fears now is Spring. Hannah crouches at the foot of a canopy bed, tears streaking down her face.

“Tell me how to save my people from him,” she begs. Who is she talking to?

Then I see it. The small white glow in her hand where her fist sits against her chest. She’s holding the locket, begging it to tell her what to do. Has any other monarch done that before? Used their conduit as more than just a source of power, but as a source of authority?

Hannah’s locket responds to her pleading, a radiant white chill that ripples out of her hand. The magic pours into her, and through that pouring comes . . . this. All of this knowledge. The past, why the Royal Conduits were really created, what Winter is truly facing in Spring.

I fight the urge to curl in a ball and never leave this place. It’s safe here, there’s no Decay, no evil, and my chest aches with everything that awaits me outside of my dream.

“You will understand how to use all this when you are ready,” Hannah says, and I jump. I thought this was a memory of her, not actually her, but she swings her tear-rimmed eyes to me as I release a sob that burns my throat. “It’s you now, Meira. Wake up.”

Warm, flickering gold throbs beyond my eyelids, and I squint in the rays of sun passing above me, columns of dancing light under a clear blue sky. The wind churns the scent of dead grass and dried earth, so pungent that I instantly know where I am—the Rania Plains.

It’s you now.

I close my eyes, biting back the sobs that come as Hannah’s dream plays through my head. Why did she show me all of that? Why me?

Because Sir is dead and Mather is gone. I’m the only one left, the one about to face an evil created thousands of years ago, so long ago that not even myths remain from that time.

I bite back another sob, drawing in deep, slow breaths. I can’t worry about that now; I have to focus on figuring out where I am. Step by step, breath by breath, I open my eyes and survey the world around me.

I’m in a cage. Wooden bars keep me trapped as a great, lumbering ox pulls me on. Men trail alongside, their breastplates showing Spring’s black sun. I’m Herod’s prisoner. Gregg’s story comes hurtling back to me, every detail crisp and clear from when he returned to camp so many years ago, a battered soldier who had just watched his wife die. The way the words tumbled out of his mouth like he didn’t even know he was saying them, just kept coming and coming, telling us every detail about how Herod killed Crystalla. . . .

Nausea roils and I turn over, barely making it to the edge of the cage before my stomach pushes out what few pieces of food I haven’t digested yet. I cling to the bars, heaving and fighting down tears as an all-too-familiar shadow crosses over me.

“Good morning, Meira. It’s Lady Meira now, though, isn’t it? I haven’t gotten a chance to congratulate you on your engagement. A Season managing to snag the wealthy Cordellan prince. I didn’t know Rhythms were stooping to charity now.”