Page 117 of Crowned By Roses

“Eirik, watch out!” I scream. I yank on the reins, racing back, but it’s too late⁠—

The shadow stone hits the middle of the Kryodian Riders and erupts into a pit of darkness. Eirik cries out as his moose stumbles into the pit, its bellow fading as it falls. Eirik leaps, grasping the thin line between ground and nothing, his blue eyes terrified. Then he plummets. The screams of other riders’ steeds echo across the battlefield.

Another shadow ball flings forward, hitting the other Kryodian Riders. They all disappear into the void.

Blood rushes between my ears. I blink uselessly. My reindeer rears as a goblin ascends, and I’m back in the thick of battle, shooting an icicle through its heart.

“Hurry!” I roar. My steed lowers his head and takes off, thundering across the battlefield. Whatever goblins are in our way are thrown by Arktos’s massive antlers.

That horrible yawning scream that accompanies the shadow balls wails out again. Gold light flutters on my left, and I look to see Rosalina flying beside me. Her face is pale.

“Report,” I say.

“We’ve lost a third of the mole riders. Two quadrants of Deep Guard. Half the Tundrafolk. Hard to say about the foot soldiers. But…I don’t see many of them. And…” She swallows, and I see the shake in her hands. “All the Kryodian Riders are gone.”

I choke down my immediate sorrow, forcing it to the back of my mind. One day, I may have the luxury of grief, but it is not now. “Our only chance is to kill Sira.”

“I don’t see her anymore.”

“She’s somewhere in the rubble,” I say. “Hiding while she performs her damned ritual. We’ll have to fight our way to her before she can finish this.”

Rosalina stares out at the battlefield lying between us and the bones of Castletree. “We won’t make it.” Then she looks at me, her brown eyes shimmering. “You won’t make it.”

“Rosalina—”

“It’ll take too long. I can fly there.”

“Rose, don’t you go off alone. Rose!”

But it’s too late. Her golden wings flutter brightly, then she streaks into the sky. To an aerial battlefield filled with harpies and gargoyles, where I can’t defend her.

My teeth grind together, and my fists tighten on the hilt of my sword.

I can’t protect her up there, but I can protect her people down here. So I will fight for my Rose until my very last breath.

Rosalina

My heart nearly tears in two as I streak away from Kel, but there’s no other choice. All around us, Sira’s forces lay waste to our small army. With only Winter and the Elderblood, we’ll be annihilated.

But Sira has the rose. If I find her, kill her, and take the rose for my own…

I can turn the will of her every creation to my own. Make them kill one another instead of us.

There’s no time for Kel to fight his way through on foot. I’m quicker in the air.

As long as I can get through all those.

Harpies and gargoyles whip through the sky, diving into the fray to pick up our soldiers. Sometimes, they tear out their throats with their fangs. Other times, they haul them, kicking and screaming, up into the air before dropping them from such a height, they could never survive. My stomach turns, and my whole body feels hollow. What am I even seeing? Death and death and more death.

And I can stop it.

A beam of light splashes across the battlefield. I blink, peering up.

The full moon has broken through the smog. It seems so close, it’s like I could fly right over and take a seat upon its crown. Bright as sunlight, I have to shield my eyes against it.

With the light, I search the wasteland where Castletree once stood. I spot Sira, down on all fours, eyes rolled back to white, long black hair falling limply. Roots curl up her arms, slowly beginning to encase her.