By the Scribes, what if he had murdered Queen Davina's daughter?

Sebastian hadn't dared to take his gaze off the mountain as if his stare alone could call Astrid back down it. Hopefully all in one piece and not splattered to the face of a cliff. While the avalanche she'd created had threatened to bury them alive, Sebastian had felt the elements surge within him, tangling amongst his shoulders, waist, thighs, and fingers as he had been tossed around in that damned tram. The threads must have acted on impulse alone, a survivor's instinct to live, and Sebastian's terror had pulled it forth.

Wind had exploded from him.

He still wasn't sure why he'd directed it towards Astrid first.

Maybe this whole Saviour's Tournament was giving him some messed up hero complex.

"That was quite a show, young man!" someone declared with a clap of his hands, running to Sebastian's tent where he stood, still watching the mountain.

He was surprised to see Master Lambert, his cheeks red from the chilling air, which had only gotten colder once the sun had disappeared below the horizon. Sebastian blinked at the man, hands wringing in front of him. The valley remained too quiet.

Lambert patted Sebastian on the back. "You should be proud of yourself, I would think."

Sebastian nodded. The motion caused his hair to flop against the thick bandage two Halorian healers had wrapped around his head after they had pulled him from where the elements and avalanche had pinned him between a broken tree at the mountain's base. He must have hit it at some point, struck in the chaos of all the snow and ice. By all accounts, he shouldn't have survived it.

Any normal man would not have stood a chance.

But he was not merely a man, was he?

And, if he wasn't, what was he? An Author from his mother's stories he had scoffed at? Born of the royal line of Lady Guinevere Verilibros? A woman who had the same family name as Crazy Ol' Norham?

He felt like such an idiot for not having put it together sooner.

Sebastian's hands shook, so he clasped them.

He should be dead.

"I—" Sebastian cleared his throat. It felt hoarse. "I failed. I didn't make it to the top."

"Ah, young d'Aximos! Modesty does not suit you any better than your denial of elemental magic. To think, just days ago, you sat with me asking about such fiction, and here we stand! You displayed your truth, and that is, perhaps, more important than the win."

He looked away from the master scholar's bouncing grin. It somehow made him feel nauseous. Of course, that could also have been the concussion, but he had been given some herbal potion for that almost two hours ago.

Two hours of anxiously waiting for Astrid to materialize down that mountain.

He really hoped she was still alive; there were so many questions he still had of her.

The spectators remained quiet, which only meant those lucky enough to afford paying the fee for the telescopes hadn't yet seen any signs of their last remaining champion. It must be rather dull, Sebastian imagined, unable to see what was happening up on that mountain. Had she made it to the pond? Found a dead man to return to her mother?

A purplish hue lightened the night sky.

His insides flipped at the sight of dawn's nearing approach. He needed to distract himself before he puked all over Lambert's shining shoes. "You and Norham, how did you know each other?"

Lambert clicked open his pocket-sized timepiece, clucked his tongue at whatever he saw there, and pocketed it once more before turning to Sebastian. "Norham was a student at the Soleitian Academy when I traveled through there in my youth. He had a wonderful mind for knowledge—" he must have seen the shocked skepticism displayed on Sebastian's face because Lambert chuckled—"No need to look like that, dear boy! Soleita hasn't always been a place of such taboo and enemies, especially not a full decade before the Purge. I would imagine you would have adored the Elementi Temples and the immortal priestesses who guard the library there."

Sebastian's brain spun. "Norham studied at the academy." His thoughts ran so quickly they blurred inside his skull. "Norham's last name is Verilibros like in the ancient stories of Lady Guinivere who became the first known Elementi Author—"

Lambert shook his head with another low chortle. "You have learned much of such mysticism since I last saw you."

"I can't very well deny it when I was the one somehow responsible for releasing the elements," Sebastian retorted. He dragged a heavy hand down his face. "So, Norham?"

"Couldn't so much as direct a drop of rain where to land," Lambert said. "He was nothing more than an incredibly wise man sought after for the talents of his brain. You are correct in the assumption that the elvish gift of voixili created the first Author, carried down through the genetic line of Lady Guinevere Verilibros, but just how a brown-eyed babe can be born to blue-eyed parents, so can genetics skip over the elemental gift."

"And what about you?"

Lambert sighed. "I am but a mere mortal man who hoped to be something more for a long time. Most of my youth I spent searching the seven realms for an answer and found nothing." But his eyes twinkled as he offered Sebastian a quick wink. "Though, the adventures I had were not all wasted."

"You know a lot of Elementi and their magic," Sebastian said. "Did you truly not remember any of it until Astrid and I set those memories free?"

"Myself and Rainier have much to thank you for, young d'Aximos," Lambert said, his tone soft, "but so will the seven realms once this tournament has served its purpose. You could redeem Earth's deceit, the one the elements have long awaited for. You could unite us all."

It was difficult to swallow the nausea back to its place. "There is also Astrid."

"Perhaps." Lambert flicked out his circular timepiece again. "Dawn is near."

Sebastian turned back to the mountain. The first rays of light shone out from the sides of its peak like the halos around the heads of depicted priestesses. Panic swarmed over him, clenching his chest so suddenly that his bandaged head throbbed in rebellion. No! He didn't wish to win this way, this soon, when there was still so much he didn't understand—!

Someone in the stands shrieked, the sound building as others caught on.

The master scholar remained in place as Sebastian pushed by him on his way out the tent. Noise from the previously half-asleep crowd grew louder, pounding in time to the increasing staccato of Sebastian's heart. As dawn encroached and lightened the scene, he could just make out a dark, hulking shape hurtling down the starkness of the white snow.

Whatever it was, it was coming in fast. Unnaturally so.

Sebastian ignored his battered ribs and ran towards the base.

"Oho! What a sight to behold!" Master Caius's voice boomed around the spectators. "Astrid Salvera in a race against the sun, and—is that an ice sled she has crafted?"

Sure enough, a contraption of some sort lay underneath the approaching form that was Astrid. Sebastian squinted, wishing he had his spectacles to help him see further distances. As the first rays of morning sun breached into Muir Valley, the sled refracted into an array of colors, like the alchemical sticks the Iced Guards used to communicate messages across the fortress.

Cheers erupted among the valley.

The avalanche had created a thick, fresh slope for Astrid to skid down. She came to haphazard stop just as Sebastian reached the disheveled path where the snow had halted its descent. He saw her roll off the contraption before two healers advanced on her.

"A dramatic finish indeed!" Master Caius declared amidst the hollering of the spectators. "Astrid Salvera arrived only moments after dawn with her deceased possession! Our judges will have much to discuss when assigning scores to our two saviours, I'm sure."

Sebastian could care less for his points because, from behind the walls of healers, he heard Astrid cry, "Get him off me! Get him out!"

An older woman with matted silvery curls knelt next to her, allowing Sebastian to see over her head to where Astrid struggled against one of the male healers. The furs of her hood were brittle with frost, her lips an unhealthy shade of blue. Her shaking hands scratched at her legs and arms like there were invisible ants crawling over her skin. However, she did not look at the male healer who tried to place a vial of Firewater to her lips, a potion made of turmeric to help warm her body temperature; instead, her wild gaze locked on the sled that had carried her down the mountain.

Except it wasn't a sled.

Sebastian's stomach rebelled at the sight.

It was in the form of a sled, that much was true: a long middle for a seat with the two opposite ends curved upwards, but it was made entirely of ice. And trapped in that ice...Sebastian caught a rippled reflection of bent knees, curved fingers, bloated pale flesh—

By the Scribes!

Sebastian swallowed his horror.

He scrambled away from the grotesque thing and bumped into the older woman's hunched form. She paid him no attention as she tore away the sleeve of Astrid's suit and snapped the copper cuff back onto Astrid's arm. Sebastian must have made some noise because Astrid found him, her haunted gaze catching on his own.

"I had no other choice," she said, half wild, "I couldn't touch it, not anymore, I-I—"

She leaned to the side, shoulders convulsing, and immediately threw up.

The healers scooped her up, one at her legs, the other at her shoulders, even as Astrid continued to gag and splutter. "N-no! I need...the quill—it's there! I—"

Sebastian startled with a jolt. The quill?

The black quill on Norham's door, a student of the Soleitian Academy and descendent of the original Author; the quill depicted on Lambert's office; the one his mother handed to him in a dream that night he and Astrid had activated the queen's Fables of Monverta, a scribal journal. Without much conscious thought, he started after Astrid, questions on the tip of his tongue, but a gnarled hand on his elbow gave him pause.

The older, brown-skinned woman who had knelt beside Astrid now held him.

"What is it?" Sebastian asked, his voice a strangled, deep mumble he had never quite heard before. "The quill she speaks of?"

The woman blinked and patted him on the cheek with knotty fingers, her silver hair falling limb over her thin shoulders.

Master Caius's voice broke between them. "Our judges have come to a conclusion based on the initiative of the task and the use of the elements that were displayed.

"While Sebastian d'Aximos showed considerable ingenuity in the use of the tram and in the control he wielded over the water element, as well as air, he, though heroic, broke the rules in saving Astrid Salvera from the avalanche of her creation. Nor did he return with one of our fallen soldiers. Astrid, though she accomplished the task with admirable flair, arrived back to the valley just shy of dawn. Not to mention, it has been decided that Astrid would not have ever made it to the Watchtower of Muir had it not been for Sebastian's assistance. Therefore, the winner of this first task has been awarded to Astrid Salvera with a margin of ten points to Sebastian d'Aximos's score. Well done to our competing saviours! I think it's fair to say we can't wait to see what you accomplish next!"

Sebastian continued to stare at the silent woman, unsure how he had even heard Master Caius's results over the noise in his head. The woman drifted a light thumb over his brow in a reverent gesture that caused a shiver to drag down his spine before she imply inclined her scarred head and backed away towards the tents.

But the stranger hadn't bowed her head towards Sebastian but to someone behind him.

Bracing himself, Sebastian turned back to the human ice sculpture.

Queen Davina stood over it, blocking his view.

One slender brow raised up her pale forehead. "It will only lead to harm, caring for my daughter." Her palm hovered above the man-made sled as if she could use her own body heat to melt it. "Do not become a slave to kindness, Sebastian d'Aximos."

It took the remainder of the day to shake off the disturbance with which the queen's parting words had left him. Because everyone was a slave to something, he had come to determine. Astrid, a slave to her mother's control and that cuff. He, a slave to a fate he had been forced into by this terrifying tournament.

At least being a slave to kindness would be a choice of one's own making.

It seemed far more preferable than anything else he had been handed lately.

_ _ _

Another update will be coming shortly! The first task is complete. Any guesses as to what the second task could be? 

Thank you for reading!