The Fragile Tower - Book 1 of the No.1 magical fantasy series

The Fragile Tower Chapter 36 - Ruidic's Fire

            She smiled down at it, feeling so tired that she thought about lying down right there and sleeping. She heard a sigh from behind her, and she turned her head slowly to find Ruidic, standing where he had stood but visible to her now that she had passed by the tree he had hidden behind.

He gave her a strangely brilliant smile, and she saw that through his stormy eyes and his bedraggled hair there were blue and gold lights running, as if he still had the magic of the spell in him.

"You did it," she said. "Ruidic's Fire."

He laughed, but it was a distant laugh. He seemed to be seeing more than her when he looked at her.

"I should have done this earlier," he told her. "It's like standing on top of the world."

She shook her head at him. "Don't let it go to your head."

She realised, then, that there was nothing she had to do now. There were no more enemies to fight, nobody to rescue, and nobody to save. The thought left her strangely empty.

She heard a muffled sob, then, and remembered the Queen. The empty place in her was replaced by an ache.

"Can we save her?" she asked Ruidic, but he seemed not to hear her. He was gazing out at the wall, and she didn't have time to ask what he was seeing. She hurried past him, and pushed through the vines.

Roschan clung to her, twining his fingers through and through hers and pressing his head against her as he cried. The Queen herself seemed so calm, so still, that Grace thought she had already died, until she saw her lift a hand up to Roschan's dirty, blood-smeared face.

Grace met Afi's eye, where he held Edin – who had finally given up struggling – and she saw the tiny shake of his head. She knew what he meant. She knew that the Queen was dying. But she couldn't let her die when she had any power left in her.

Grace moved towards her, summoning up the Symbol of Healing, and hoping that she had enough power to work some kind of spell.

"Ma, help me," she said.

The Queen's head moved just enough to look at her, and she shook her head.

Grace felt as though she had walked into a wall. There was nothing in front of her, but she could go no further and the magic fizzled and died.

"I can help you!" she said, trying to push against the Queen's magic.

Ma didn't even start to move, and Grace wondered whether the Queen was stopping her too, or whether she had accepted that shake of the head.

"No," the Queen said, and breathed in with a shaking gasp. "I don't want to drag – my heart through this world – any more."

"Please, please live," Roschan said to her, and kissed her forehead. He left a smudge of black on the Queen's perfect white forehead.

"I can't, my Captain. There is – my death waiting – at last. And if there is – forgiveness in all of the – worlds, I hope I will see my Gregori again. At last."

Grace felt a warm wash of air beside her and she smiled, remembering a spell that was almost a boy, and how he had promised to help the Queen one last time.

"Here," she whispered, and she held out her hand, filling it with all the power she could drag from herself. As it flowed into the cloud of moving lights, they blazed, and span, and once they had settled they became a little dark-haired boy once more.

He ran to the Queen as if playing on the lush grass again, instead of scuffling through snow and fragments of ugly grey ash.

Grace saw the rush of joy on the Queen's face, and she tried to swallow a lump in her throat. It wasn't her place to cry over a woman she had hardly known. But she couldn't help the tears that blurred her vision. She had stood in front of the Cold Mage to save Ruidic.