Her Cinder Throne (Completed)

Chapter 90

Immediately, Cole dropped her magic and rushed through the rubble, stepping over the stones and crawling over the clumps of the wall that had fallen more intact than others. Mabon repaired the phalanx around her and her raiding party, and they looked ahead to see what was to come. Unfortunately, that sight sent a shiver of fear through the ranks, visible in tensing shoulders and the almost imperceptible hesitation in their steps.

Four Cursed floated in the air in front of the first building in the palace grounds. They were not yet accompanied by their creatures from the mountain, but they did not need them to look as terrifying as a hundred foot drop. Much like Bastian had seemed, they were covered in shadow and almost seemed to shift in and out of corporeal form. Their edges blurred and fought with the sunlight, and Cole got the uncomfortable feeling that they could win if they only had a bit more power.

Mabon turned to her. "We'll have to fight them. No way around," he said. She nodded. There was nothing more to say.

They approached the Cursed, and though Mabon's men did try to get Cole and her party past through sheer brute force, the Cursed were not going to let anyone by without first marking them with battle.

So, though she was in the protective circle of Mabon's soldiers, she still found herself summoning up magic to send a Cursed spinning through the air above her. Tanwyn swung his sword, clipping the side of one of the Cursed, through this seemed to do no more than make it retreat for a moment.

Cole glanced at the path, knowing that it would still take a few more minutes to reach the actual palace. She needed to wrap this up and get moving, so she raised her one hand, fingers dancing through the air, and pulled a surge of power toward her. Her Sparkstone cufflette shone bright before the magic, like a beam of pure light, ripped through the air and engulfed one of the Cursed. The shadowy form of the Cursed struggled in the light, writhing around, seeming to almost burn and smoke. Cole kept up the intensity, pushing away the gnawing worry in her stomach when she saw the remnants of the Cursed's face gritted in pain. She couldn't think of the life that the Cursed had once lived. She couldn't wonder about whether they had volunteered to become the monster, or if they had simply been in the wrong place at the wrong time and been preyed upon by the evil king. Right now, she needed to get to Thijs as soon as possible, and delaying around Cursed was not going to help anyone.

She was about to draw magic from Mabon to help her increase the power of her Sparkstone when she was hit hard from the side and lost her balance. Her knee slammed into the ground, pain juttering up her body, and she quickly rolled to one side before a large, clawed hand smashed the stones where she had been a moment earlier.

Forcing herself to her feet, Cole came face to face with one of the mountain creatures, its emaciated face looking even more garish and wrong in the pure morning light. Backed by the blue sky and large white clouds, it looked every kind of wrong in the world, like a trail of blood in a clean river.

The Cursed had each summoned their bound monsters, and now the Eldritch and humans were forced to fall back in order to stave off the onslaught of claws and teeth and brute strength. The Cursed themselves took only a moment to regain their composure and add their own dark magic to the mix, though as Cole blocked one shadow tendril she realized they were not as strong as she had thought. These were new Cursed, the kind that Gethwine was forced to create with the weaker monsters from the mountains. There were not that many left in Thijs' mines, and the proverbial barrel was being scraped. Until he could dig deep in new mountains, he was forced to create weak Cursed who had not even a fraction of the power that his son did.

Cole regretted bringing the image of Bastian to her mind and tried not to let the visage of his face, stained with shadow and hardened beyond recognition, distract her as she parried a blow by a monster. She had been carefully keeping him in the back of her mind, where he could not fill her with guilt and anger and confusion. Where she could not think of what she might have to do if she met him on the battlefield. Where she wouldn't have to consider finishing the job she had taken at the very beginning of it all... trading his life for hers.

Tanwyn pulled her from her mind into the moment by grimacing in pain. She startled, realizing that he was standing nearly pressed up against her front, his face a few inches from hers. She looked down, seeing his arm swung out in front of her, the metal of his vambraces dented and torn as easily as wet clay. A flash of red and pulpy skin peaked from under the damaged armor, and he quickly pulled it back to his body as Cole adjusted her eyes beyond his protective arm to see the monster that had nearly decapitated her now rearing up for another attack.

Anger flared in Cole and before she realized it, her hand was up and fire was pouring from her palm, with no beauty or grace or anything that felt like something she had learned from the Eldritch. This was purely her rage, fueled by the sight of Tanwyn's pained face and her desperation to reach Thijs and make him pay for... everything.

The flames engulfed the monsters, twisting into it, ripping through its skin and blasting away its flesh. It screeched, a horrific sound like nails dragged across metal, and writhed. A voice blasted into Cole's mind, twisted and whispery.

Faaaalse queen, you kill our brooooooother! it shrieked, a single voice made of hundreds.

Cole ignored it, pouring more anger into her flames until the monster dissolved into nothing more than bones, and then dust, and then nothing. Only when she was certain it was completely obliterated did she close her palm and stop the flames. Her cufflette felt hot on her skin, and she looked down to see red hot welts on the skin around its golden band. Grimacing, she quickly twitched her shirt down to cover it before looking for Tanwyn. He was already engaged in another fight with a monster a few steps away, but Cole could see the pain in his face as he was forced to hold the double-sword with his injured arm.

We are coooooming. We willllll destroy you! You will be puuuuunished for your crimes to ouuuuur brothersssss! the voices in Cole's head screamed, filling her mind until it echoed. She glared, pushing them away as she raised her sword and brought it down on the monster Mabon was fighting. Her blade bit through its arm, severing it from its body, and as it shrieked and pulled back, Mabon finished it off with a blast of magic to its head.

Tanwyn, breathing heavily, rushed to her side. "We're drawing all the Cursed to this location," he said through gasps. "We need to move fast before we're overwhelmed with them."

Cole nodded, her eyes seeking out Mabon. He had heard the voices as well, and already knew that they could not afford much more fighting. They needed Cole and her men in the palace, looking for Thijs immediately. He ducked his chin to let her know he knew what she wanted, and then signalled for his men to redouble their attempts to corner the remaining monsters and the Cursed controlling them.

As Mabon and his men tried to corner the Cursed, Cole and her contingent broke away and pressed on down the path toward the palace. The rest of her army fought in the city, keeping the majority of Thijs' army busy, and now she was leaving Mabon and his men behind as well. She felt suddenly exposed, with only around twenty men (less than half Eldritch) with her still. But she couldn't just stop and give up now. The men who had already died, and the men fighting to still stay alive, were all counting on her to accomplish the impossible. To rid the land of the man who brought dark magic to both worlds.

They ran past the barracks she had once slept in while a servant, and the bamboo forest where she had talked to Tanwyn. She viewed them with a jolt while she whipped by, and she realized that the life she had lived here felt so far removed from her that she now almost viewed it as a life of someone else. While she could remember walking this path from the sleeping quarters up to the palace, it felt like memories of a tale. She was no longer the scared girl pretending to be a prince's servant in order to kill him. Now she was a queen of an ancient race, blasting open the front doors of the palace with the magic from her Sparkstone, and marching right into the heart of the enemy's territory.