Frost twins's Arc

Chapter 7 of 7

The two halves of the bunny sat in Glacienne's palm. Above us, boots pressed on the roof and slid toward the eaves. A second pair landed. Then a third. Glacienne set the halves down and told us the spell was in our body now, but a spell held once was not a spell owned. We needed to cast it again, clean, without a witness to break for us. We could not do that here. Not with fire on the door. She wanted to fight through them. I wanted to run. The body stalled at the table. Glacienne watched us stall and did not wait long. She said if we stayed, the house burned with us in it. She said Angel could hold the front for a count, no more. The door shook. Angel Frostborne stepped in from the side room, white coat still bright, one sleeve scorched black at the cuff. His hound came behind him, wings folded tight. He looked at our two faces and spoke plain. "Back door. Creek path. I take the front. The hound takes your flank." He did not wait for us to answer. He turned and walked toward the shaking door. Glacienne pushed us toward the rear of the house. She pressed the twin snowflake knives back into our hands, one in each. She said the creek ran under a thin shell of ice past the yard, and the fire fairies would not follow onto it. She said their leader was not stupid. Their leader would call them off the ice before he lost a second one through it. We went. The back door opened onto pale flat stones and the winding creek beyond. The hound moved at our left. Behind us, the front door cracked and Angel's voice cut once through the noise, short, ordering someone back. We did not turn. She wanted to turn. I wanted to run. For once we agreed on the second thing and the body moved. We reached the creek and stepped onto the shell. It held. Three fire fairies broke around the corner of the house and stopped at the bank. Their leader came up behind them, red hair bright against the snow, and lifted one hand. Blazen Emberwing. He looked at us across the ice and did not throw fire. He said one word to his fairies and they stepped back from the edge. He watched us go. His mouth moved once, like he wanted to say something more, then closed. The hound crossed with us. We walked until the house was small behind us and the noise thinned to nothing. On the far bank we stopped and let the body breathe. She said we should have stayed. I said we are still alive. Then we said, together, that the spell was ours now, and we had to cast it clean before the lake. That was the next thing. The creek carried the sound of the fight away.