ELRED VALKALIN IS ON THE RUN. After narrowly escaping the Synketros prison, she finds herself in the scent trail of two notorious communities miles below the island's surface. When she stumbles upon a hidden gathering of fairies from different races...
Oops! This image does not follow our content guidelines. To continue publishing, please remove it or upload a different image.
The moment the light had turned a pale shade of blue and the air smelled of fresh blood and burning fire, Elred knew she had arrived. An entrance tapered sharply to the ceiling, the jagged cuts of stone featuring something like glass. She didn't need to be a whizz to guess what it was.
Ice.
Beyond the entrance, the sounds of battle rang. She summoned her magic and crept out of the tunnel. The ceiling was nonexistent, showering her with as much sunlight from the surface as possible. Synketros and Cardovia—have they truly pierced their way here?
Shadows darted in and out of her periphery. Be it weapons or people with wings, they paid Elred no mind, even as she picked her way between fallen debris and huge chunks of ice. She looked up, noticed the ledges where the ceiling could have been. It dawned on her. The Ice Capital wasn't a single pit. It's an entire upended tower, with multiple floors and levels—all crafted from ice. As a shard fairy who grew up in a glass-sculpted city, she developed respect for this supposed-to-be-extinct keiju race.
She had studied it with her tutors, how the sprites to the west had turned against their own kind during the recent war. Then, one day, the ice sprites had vanished and no one questioned it. Umazure was a magical land. Sometimes, when things wanted to be forgotten, they would be.
A flash of brown and black rushed towards her. She ducked just as a soldier sailed over her head and slammed against the cold walls. Oh. That would hurt. She tore her gaze from the fallen soldier—they were from Synketros or Cardovia anyway—and wrenched it back to who did the deed.
A tall, slender woman rushed through the battlefield, swinging her sword in effective motions. The blade was honed to a deadly edge, singing as it met blow after blow and traded one of its own. Enemies littered the woman's feet, groaning or clutching their fatal nicks and scratches. The woman's green eyes glinted with an alertness Elred had only seen in the soldiers who have been out in the field for too long. Her long blond hair had long fallen from its complicated braids. They have been here for a while.
Elred switched panes and studied the form of the battle. By the looks of it, the enemy side dropped from the sky, bearing their recent armaments and explosives. The scent of burning odian power clung to the air. She snorted. It was still as horrid as she remembered. While there were more sprites dressed in blue armor, the soldiers clad in black and brown were far more brutal. The ice sprites and some of their allies fought with magic and blades. Synketros and Cardovia fought with flintlocks and Dwarven metal.
It's no surprise to see which side was winning.
Among the huge booms of flintlocks and rifles firing, a manic laugh floated to the air. Elred turned to see a banshee with braided hair and fur-lined cloak and shoulders twirl around, fighting with quick slashes of thin but pointed daggers. She heard of rumors of a powerful banshee inside Cardovia's ranks, but she never expected her to be this insane.
