Freya Valdis's Arc

Chapter 10 of 11

The dragon set them down before a wall of heat. Freya climbed off and faced Aezrath's last stronghold. A castle of molten firestone rose from cracked ground. Its spires glowed like coals. Fire poured from every window. This was the southern hall, and beyond its gate waited the god who had cast her out. She gripped the rainbow blade and started toward the fire. The heat pressed against her skin. For the first time since her fall, Freya felt warmth. She did not like it. Her frost powers thinned in the hot air. Each step drew sweat instead of ice. But she needed to reach Aezrath before he healed his frozen arm. She raised the sword. Its shifting light held steady, unbothered by the flames. She walked into the gate. Inside, the fire did not burn her. It parted around her like water. She crossed a long hall of black stone veined with orange. Then she stopped. She knew this place. The shape of the arches. The pattern in the floor. The window at the far end, where light fell in the same slant she had seen a thousand times. Memory struck her all at once. This castle had been hers. Before her exile, before her lost years, she had lived here. She had walked these halls as their owner. Aezrath had not merely stolen her seat in the cosmos. He had taken her home and made it his own furnace. "Do you remember now?" Aezrath's voice came from the throne at the hall's end. He sat there, small and pale, his frozen arm cradled against his chest. His blue eyes burned. "Yes. This was yours. I liked it, so I kept it." Rage cleared the confusion from Freya's mind. "You framed me. You stole my seat. And you stole this." She lifted the sword. "I want it all back." Aezrath rose. His good hand gathered cold, and frost crawled across the hot floor. He flung it at her. Freya swung the blade. The rainbow light caught his cold and threw it back. The frost struck his own throne and sheathed it in ice. He staggered. His power was weaker here, split between guarding his last refuge and healing his ruined arm. Freya pressed forward. Step by step she closed the distance, the blade drinking each strike he sent. He backed against the frozen throne. He had nowhere left to run. "This is my home," Freya said. "You will leave it." She did not kill him. She drove the sword down between them and split his throne in two. The firestone cracked. Aezrath fled through a side arch, clutching his arm, beaten in his last stronghold. Freya stood alone in the hall that had once been hers. She had taken his refuge. But her memories had returned with a warning. Aezrath knew this castle better than she did now. And somewhere in it, he was still hiding.