Forged in Frost and Fire (Book 1 in the Chronicles of Kings trilogy)

Chapter Twenty Six

‧͙⁺˚*･༓☾　　☽༓･*˚⁺‧͙

"BLAZING HELLS!

"Eira, you're freezing my hand," Gray said. I looked down to see that sure enough ice had spread out from where I was laying down on the blankets. I retracted the ice, letting it fall to the ground in soft white tufts of snow.

"Gods damn, it feels worse than when I broke them," I said, squeezing tears out of my eyes as I tried to take shallow breaths. I was currently in Gray's room, which technically had also become my room. I had passed out after I slapped Sable, and Gray had found me on the stairs. He was the one who hauled my ass up here. I had awoken to the feeling of agony blazing through my side. They were setting my ribs. I had broken five of them and my wrist on top of that.

"That's because you were pumped with adrenaline and fury when you first broke them," Gray said, reaching up to pat my head. I didn't have the energy to growl at him. I did have fae healing, which meant that my ribs would be fine in a day or two, but that healing did nothing to decrease the pain. I was in a lot of that.

I felt the medic put her hands on my side again and I barely had the time to squeeze my eyes shut before her hands twitched and white, hot, furious pain erupted on my left. I screamed through my teeth.

"What in the hells even happened to you?" Gray asked. "You managed to break six bones in just over an hour. That has to be some sort of record."

"Your cousin happened," I murmured, my voice raspy from the screaming. My head fell back against the pillow and I let out a frustrated sigh, only to mentally slap myself after feeling pain course through my side.

"You said he left you on a mountaintop," he said. I squeezed my eyes shut, remembering the feeling of the cold against my cheeks, the feeling of the cold leaching into me and weakening me from the inside out. My power had been used against me and I had let it. I had let it weaken me. I was ashamed.

"He was trying to trigger my powers. He said something about a mental block." Another bone was set into place and I screamed, knocking my head back. I had broken a bone only once before in my life, when I was four. I had been climbing a tree and my father had called me in for dinner. I was hungry, and excited, and underestimated the height. I jumped and fell on my arm, the bone split straight in half. I barely remembered the pain, but Tellie told me I had been screaming for hours.

"So he left you to die of hypothermia?" Gray let out a breath. "Sounds like my cousin." He chuckled and I pinched my lips together. I didn't want to hear about Sable. In fact, I never wanted to see him again, I didn't even want to think about him. I couldn't imagine what he was going to do to me after that 'blue ball' comment. I was so dead.

"Where are we?" I asked, opening my eyes. "I've never seen a place with so many mountains and such...snow." I knew that it might have been common knowledge to any fae where we were, and I could've just blown my cover...but I didn't care. I needed to know where I was so I could know how far I was from Elda.

"We're in the northern part of Hiraeth. The king's winter palace," Gray said. "It's called Verglas."

"Verglas," I repeated. "Why does the king need a winter palace? And why is he here anyway? It's Autumn."

"He comes here for a change of scenery," Gray said. The medic started to wrap bandages around my ribs. She had already placed a healing salve on the cut on my hand and wrapped up my wrist. She said that I'd heal by tomorrow, but she didn't want to run the risk of infection.

"Does he usually live in a different palace?"

"Really? You don't already know this?" Gray looked down at me, a dark brow raised in confusion.