Queen of Summer's Ice (Book 2)

Chapter 35

     Good, we got the information we needed, it made my blood run cold with concern, but nevertheless that would be discussed later.

     "I'm going to get help, there has to be a way to stop this," Ray told Clovis. Clovis' response was the same as it was as since the poison coursed into his body.

      At the section stairs where Alagan and I had been hiding so quietly Ray comes to meet up with us. We don't dare speak, fearing that he'd hear I had been close all along. Yet all I had to do was look into my husbands eyes and see that he was relieved the plan was going so well.

     Who would have known that Lave's plan was actually a good one? She was so timid and gentle, her personality was a summer through and through with all care and no temper. Yet this was a plan that involved lying and torture, maybe even death, but she had suggested it anyway. No, she created it. I was impressed with her, everyone was. Maybe I needed to pull her out of that kitchen and have her start training with Yana.

     Ray nodded after some time, it was time to save this sorry prince. As much as I still wanted him dead, it wouldn't get rid of my problems. Not entirely. He had just proved himself useful still. I nodded back to my husband as Alagan handed me the other vial he had made for me. The yellow looking contents swished so fluidly. I still remember that burning sensation it brought me as soon as my tongue touched it. Without showing any weakness I bit the inside of my cheek to stop my spine from shivering.

     "Clovis! Clovis!" Ray yelled and stomped on the stairs in a rush with me right behind his heels.

     When the two of us made it into the cells Clovis was a sight for tired eyes. Even in the dark I could see how filthy he had become without a bath in...too many weeks really. Maybe I'd give him one after this to gain his trust a bit more.

     "What in the lands,"I muttered.

     "Oh! There's the cold hearted Queen!" Instead of bowing he bend down into a running start and charged to the bars once again. His shoulder seemed out of place. At this rate he was going to kill himself faster than the poison was.

     "Ray, get behind me," I demanded, and he did. Just because we had caused this thing didn't mean I wanted any accidents to happen.

     Clovis was stretching his good arm through the bars, his face pushed up onto them as if he was trying the squeeze his body out it. There was blood running down his lips, nose, eyes and ears. He was dying faster than I was, but he still had that strength. That and the craziness.

     I used my ice to hold him down. Shackles of ice held his arms above his head and his legs together, once he realized this he started trying to thrash his body out. Even pulling at his wrist so fiercely that his light skin was turning red, even purple, with the force.

     "Stay still! I'm trying to save you, you idiot!" I said.

     "I don't need saving! If anyone does it's you!" He coughed and some of his blood splattered onto my cheek. This time I did cringe. "My father is going to come and kill you. He'll turn all of your people just like me if he has to! Let me go!"

     I grabbed his jaw and stand on top of him with my knee to his chest. "What do you mean by that?"

      "You know what I mean, it means the end of you!" His bright green eyes were hard to see now that they were getting stained with blood.

     "Okay, that's enough talking out of you," muttering more to myself than to him I tighten my grip around his jaw to open his mouth. He resisted and tried to bite my finger as I opened the vile with my free hand. Without another second to spare I dropped the liquid into his mouth and closed it as soon as it was all in. Clovis tried to spit it out just like I did but he was so weak he stopped fighting me within seconds. Once I felt him swallow I slowly got off him.

     Clovis was himself again, I could see it in his eyes just before he fell asleep.

     I wasn't even out of breath as Alagan came down the stairs quietly to examine the room. "Well," he said, "that's one way to shut him up."

     "Could they really have tunnels running into winter so low that I can't even feel them?" I asked him right away.

     Alagan stood there quietly, thinking or feeling the land beneath him to check. I did the same, but felt nothing.

     "They're either so far down that me, a spring, can't even feel them, or they're non existent."

     "Okay, but what about the last thing he said, about making everyone just like him? I think he's planning on using the poison on my people, by making it air born. Could he just send his bird here if they're infected? Or will it be another poison that takes longer to spread but is just as deadly?

     "Poison is Springs favorite weapon. Why wouldn't it be, they have the greenest land with over a thousand different plants there as options. It's possible for them to send it to us, try to at least."

     "As long as we keep killing any birds who try to send messages to us, we should be able to stop them, right," Ray asked. He was stairing at Clovis as if he was going to wake up and attack at any minute.

     "For now, but it also means that I need to get rid of them as quickly as possible."

     "We," Alagan said. "We need to get rid of them as quickly as possible."

     I nodded my head. We were a team now after all.

     "It seems I'm more eager in getting that spring land than you are brother. Maybe I'll just keep it to myself when I kill the king."

     Alagan arched his brow. "Oh, you think you'll be able to land the killing blow before I do?"

     "Did you want to make that a bet brother?"

     "Why can't you guys bet on normal things," Ray said beneath his breath. While Alagan and I were about to continue this challenge Ray suggested that we take Clovis up stairs to clean him us and set a room for him so when he wakes up he's not in a jail cell.

     "Why don't you want to leave him in the cell," Alagan asked.

     "It'll be another method to get his trust if he wakes up showered and in a comfortable room. It shows that we care about him."

     "We, or you? Have you grown to care for him?" Alagan pushed.

     Ray looked slightly annoyed at my brother.

     "Royal or human, Spring or Winter, he is still a person. And people change if given the chance, just look at everyone in this room."

     I walked up to my husband and kissed his temple. My hand went to his shaven cheek as I caressed him. My amazing husband seemed to be the one who changed the most, but always for the better.