Though Astrid had trained with the Iced Guards since her eighth birthday when her mother had turned her tutelage over to General Lyons once the unruly, meant-to-be-secret princess had proven herself far too rambunctious for the propriety of a royal court, she had never been in actual battle.

Sure, Astrid had trained for it. Had executed countless training exercises and hypothetical missions against her own comrades, but against an actual enemy? An enemy who would celebrate her mortal wounds and death instead of her Icicles who would only ridicule her for days with crude songs if they had ever bested her? She wasn't sure how to think of it.

With the Elven Elder, Astrid hadn't had much time to think. Her training had done its job; her instincts having taken over as she had slain the woman without much thought. Now, heading closer towards the relentless pounding of the drums, there was plenty of time to think about what she may find on the other side of those gates. The potential blood. The bodies. Destruction.

For the first time, Astrid wondered if Rainier's decades of security and relative peace would actually be the kingdom's downfall.

Astrid forced the fear back, ripping off her gloves to extend her bare fingers.

Her arms shook as she called on Earth to move. The seamless stone wall before her shifted sideways to reveal a jagged hole large enough for her and her motley companions to pass through. She scowled as her cuff rebelled against the usage of the elements, but she shoved Sebastian inside the hidden tunnel regardless.

"Blasted stalactites," he muttered, his head thumping against a particularly low-hanging salt deposit.

A nervous laugh choked Astrid's next breath, but she was already reaching for the unlit torch she stashed in each of these tunnels. Ignoring the screeching in her head, she thrust her hand outside once more, reaching for the threads of Fire emanating from the single lantern hanging outside the nearest cottage. Hot elemental threads roared to her, a bit too exuberantly under the influence of her building anxiety, and the torch burst into flames.

"Watch it!" Abel hissed, brushing smoldering embers from her cloak.

Astrid's cuff tightened above her elbow when she pulled the stone shut behind them. A bout of dizziness rushed to her brain. But Matthias was suddenly there, placing a steady palm on her lower back under the guise of reaching around her towards the flickering torch in her opposite hand. He took the bright torch from her trembling grasp.

"Breathe," he demanded into the space between them. "It does not control you."

She nodded in turn, taking a step away. His hand returned his side, but only for a moment. Not missing a beat, Matthias produced another torch from the stash on the ground, lit it with the one already alight, and tossed it to Melvin.

"Where are we?" Abel asked.

Their shadows danced grotesquely against the dripping, stone walls. Astrid shook her arms out and pressed onwards, her boots clicking against the uneven ground. The noise of their hurried steps took the place of the now muffled drumbeats.

"These tunnels run underneath the fortress," she explained. "I'm actually surprised the whole mountain hasn't collapsed into them by now."

"Worm's tunnel?" Abel recalled.

"A legend," Melvin said from the rear. "The tunnels of Halorium are like a maze; there have been many accounts of intruders dying down here, unable to find their way back out again."

"And the worm?"

"It eats the bodies," Astrid said.

She couldn't help but smirk to herself when Abel released a frightened gasp. "And how far are these weapons?"

"No worries, Husky. Wormy hasn't been seen in centuries. He's more of a legendary pet at this point with how often I've spent time down here."

Astrid could almost sense the hysterical look Abel turned to share with Sebastian as she mouthed the word, "Wormy?" to him as if Astrid were properly unhinged.

Sebastian, who had been oddly quiet during the whole exchange, cleared his throat. "Perhaps the intruders of this attack are in the tunnels and will simply die down here...?"

Matthias paused as the group entered into a spacious cavern. Although, to be fair, even the small mountain tram she had been trapped in with Sebastian during the first task would have seemed spacious compared to the narrow tunnels they had been traversing. Three prongs of the fork in the tunnels led off into various directions.

"Perhaps," Matthias echoed, though he seemed unconvinced.

Something rumbled above their heads. The cavern's ceiling roared as it shook under the weight of whatever had just been put onto it. "Hurry," Matthias ordered, leading them towards the far-left tunnel.

But Astrid knew these tunnels better than anyone, had even created some of them herself, digging them out painstakingly with the rare bits of elemental magic she could harness over the years. The tunnel Matthias led them towards would not lead them to the Daevani Pass; it wouldn't even lead them to the weapon's cache. Astrid halted, throwing out an arm to catch Sebastian and Abel.

"'Thias," she called out, "that's the wrong path—!"

From behind her, Melvin swore as his torch went out as if a mighty breath from a god had extinguished it. From up ahead, she lost sight of Matthias, his own flames dying out so abruptly that it threw them all into utter darkness. She held onto Sebastian's sleeve, forcing her eyes to adjust. Her heart thumped so loudly she could have sworn there were booted soldiers running towards them.

"There's no breeze down here," Sebastian pointed out. "Those torches should have been fine."

Astrid shushed him, having already thought of that, her thoughts running wild with the possibilities that shouldn't even be possible. Not in Rainier. Oh, dammit. Not until recently, anyways. Curse the skies. Melvin's body heat pressed against her back while Sebastian held onto her sweating grasp. Abel was, somehow, in front, and as Astrid's eyes began to adjust, she could just make out Abel's gray form bending to pick up Matthias's extinguished torch.

"He must've dropped it," Abel said. Though it sounded more like a question because even she knew Matthias would never have dropped it even if the torch had startled him by growing fangs and clawed, skeletal hands.

The realization threatened to consume Astrid with dread. "The Fae."

Sebastian finished her thought. "They can manipulate Light, right?"

Astrid allowed his fear to mingle with hers, but only for a moment. She twisted away from him and snapped her fingers behind her back, signaling for Melvin, wishing instead it was Matthias. His damned captain's eyesight had always been irritatingly perfect.

From over her shoulder, Abel's harsh breathing began to morph into hushed, sharp words of obscenity. Astrid stared into the stifling darkness, her nerves on edge, her ears piqued. Where had Matthias disappeared to? What if—?

She pushed the thought from her head. "Take out your dagger," she hissed at Melvin.

His voice was nearly inaudible. At least he had the foresight to remain quiet. "My what?"

"Your dagger," she enunciated. Her impatience flared. "Your father's blade. The one you always carry even though it is not permitted when you are out of uniform. That blade."

Without any further argument from him, she heard the soft rustle of his cloak as he extracted the thin, finely-made blade. The ice-like metal compound glinted even without light as he held it out to her. Instead of taking it, she shoved it back into his chest and shrugged out of her cloak, pushing up her sleeves until her cuff lay exposed.

"Good. I need you to cut this off."

Sebastian startled. "Astrid..."

Melvin's fingers wrapped blindly around her elbow, feeling out the circumference of the copper band. "I don't think my blade was made for this. Only the Scribe's key works—"

A growl rumbled in her chest, her worry sliding into the realm of terror as Matthias continued to fail to reappear and the possibility of massive fae warriors near enough to blink out their light became more of a reality. She needed her magic. Her full magic. There was only one way to ensure she had it.

"Then cut off my damned arm, Corporal!"

Sebastian's startled voice spoke up again. "Astrid!"

The urgency in it caused Astrid to look up only to be blinded by an impossibly bright flash from the mouth of the tunnel down where Matthias had disappeared. Abel gasped and then swore, but for a split second, Astrid's hope flared as light exploded into the cavern.

Matthias! About damn time!

But the way Sebastian's hand slipped down her arm to grasp her wrist caused Astrid to feel like it wasn't only an attempt to keep her from sawing off her own appendage.

"There will be no need for such violence, salveretta."

Sebastian inhaled. His fingers slipped past her hand to her hip as the blinding light retreated to a mere pinprick, revealing the two hulking outlines filling the mouth of the tunnel. Clearly not human but creatures. Male, in form, which was rather easy to see with Astrid's own two, mortal eyes considering they wore nothing besides a leather chest-plate and tight pants of the same material. They stuck to every line of their carved muscles. As the two fae reeled in their threads of Light, it bled into their very skin. Their veins glowed beneath tanned skin, growing into patterns of leaves and vines as if they had been kissed by Goddess Elayn herself. They were beautiful in the way Astrid's mother was: dangerous. Like the sharpened tip of a newly forged sword.

Not like Melvin's insignificantly dull blade that she now snatched from his grasp. It would be a miracle if it would cut through even one of the fae warrior's leather straps.

"I believe my level of violence solely depends on your own," Astrid demanded. "Where is my captain?"

"Unharmed," one of them replied. The hilts of two swords peeked out from where they lay, crossed behind his massive shoulders. His eyes shone with savage as they raked over her from head to toe before dismissing her with a bored sigh.

"Lower the blade, girl."

Seeing these two males before her, hearing the shallow breaths of her companions, and feeling the slight, but familiar weight of a weapon in her hand miraculously silenced her spiraling anxieties. Her brain retreated into the place reserved for the instincts of her training. That exhilarating hum of adrenaline that coursed through her blood.

"I have used such a blade on one such as you." Astrid grinned. "A friend, perhaps?" She asked with the same feigned innocence that always sent Matthias's jaw gnashing.

Perhaps it was a purely male reaction to do so, for the other fae let loose a strangled sound and flung out his hands. The small orb of light he'd been harvesting transformed into a spear undoubtedly aimed for her. She smirked even as Sebastian grabbed at her, his hot palm pressing into her stomach. It shocked her enough that Melvin's knife fumbled from her grasp and clanged to the tunnel floor. Was he protecting her? It was a sweet, yet highly useless gesture, considering the talkative fae warrior had extinguished the lightning spear before it had left his companion's hand.

"Settle, Leolin," the fae snapped, his tone like the deep cracking of branches. "We are not to harm her."

Leolin's eyes flashed. "Was it not she who murdered Dain?"

"Tortured him, actually," Astrid corrected. She toed the fallen blade, pushing it with her boot over to Melvin. "Then I killed him. That part was true."

Sebastian tucked her into his side, his hand still sprawled across her lower abdomen. "Stop talking," he hissed. "Let me focus."

She spared a quick glance at him. His head was bowed, curls falling haphazardly into his tightly shut eyes. His fingertips pressed harder into her skin through her clothes. Oh! She squeezed his wrist, letting him know she understood his plan, before she muttered to Abel and Melvin, "Be ready."

"Imposter!" Leolin lashed. "The traditions of our people claim she is mine to take, Niahm. I will enjoy infusing her every cell with searing light until each explodes within her. One by one—!"

The magic in her core yanked, rising to meet Sebastian as he called on the threads. It was difficult to keep her expression empty.

Niahm placed a thick hand on Leolin's shoulder. "We are here only for the boy."

Astrid felt Sebastian's concentration falter. She placed a hand over his to steady it, but it was Abel who said, "Why? He hardly belongs to you."

Leolin's murderous rage remained on Astrid, but Niahm trained his gaze from Sebastian, who was muttering the Scribal word for Earth over and over again under his breath, to Abel, who stilled and held her breath under his attention.

"Nor does he belong to you, halfling." The fae male's chest expanded against his leathers before exhaling away their questions and antics as if they were nothing more than the vexation of younger children. "The boy's sire entrusted his retrieval to us. He bleeds with the blood of Authors. He belongs to Soleita."

Sebastian's head snapped up. "My father?"

Astrid's nails dug into the back of his hand so thoroughly, she would be surprised if she hadn't scarred him. "I, too, have the blood of an Author."

"You are leashed," Leolin snarled, his tone proving that he saw Astrid as nothing more than a rabid dog. Her jaw clenched when his lips twisted with mockery upon finding her copper cuff.

"You have been spoken for," Niahm added diplomatically. "Now, release the boy to us, and we will return your captain back to you."

"And if I do not?" she asked. "For I have also spoken for Sebastian if my murder of your kin was not clear enough for you."

Leolin released a howl that sent claws down Astrid's spine. In the next second, he had unsheathed one of his swords so quickly that Astrid barely had time to blink. "Then you die."

From further down the tunnel, muffled by the towering fae bodies, an enraged shout bounced around the stone walls. Matthias! Astrid stumbled, but not from the startling sound. The ground beneath her feet trembled and cracked, tossing her back into Sebastian who caught her around the waist. She stared up at him and then to the splintering ground, the cracks spreading towards the tunnel walls.

Sebastian had actually done it!

"Now!" Astrid roared.

Melvin flung his dagger, Astrid throwing out her hands to yank on one of Air's threads to push the blade faster, direct it more thoroughly. With her cuff, she could do that much at least. There was a clang of metal as Leolin swatted the quick dagger with the flat edge of his sword like a horse would do to a pesky fly. The blade changed directions, but Astrid caught it before it could embed itself into the wall. She flicked her fingers, and her control over Air stilled it before she shot it back towards one of Niahm's carotid arteries. At least, she hoped fae had the same basic anatomy of the neck as humans. Otherwise, she would look quite foolish, she imagined, providing only more fuel to Leolin's rage against her.

She smiled.

There was another shout, a thump, but Astrid couldn't see if she had hit her mark because great torrents of rocky shards and dirt began to pour down from the ceiling.

"It's collapsing!" Abel cried. "Get back!"

The earth around them released a mighty roar before it crumbled, falling in on itself so loudly that Astrid's ears rang before the first piece of it had hit the floor. She spun, grabbing a dazed Sebastian around the neck of his cloak and dragging him backwards. When he found his feet, she forced him into a sprint. The four of them ran, Melvin and Abel a few steps ahead, as the cavern shattered with a wild rush of angry sounds and sharp debris. It knocked Astrid off her feet and threw her into an adjourning tunnel, her head slamming into the low walls. Tiny black stars erupted before her eyes. A scream built in her chest, thinking the fae males had somehow followed them, but any air she had fled from her lungs when Sebastian crashed into her.

Dazed, Astrid fought to catch her breath, something wet trickling from her forehead and down her face. Blood, most likely. She groaned, feeling Sebastian's cheek against the back of her clammy neck. The air was thick with dust.

Sebastian stirred abruptly, stumbling off her and landing on his back like a drunk who no longer knew how to walk. She turned her neck to watch him. At least her spinal cord still seemed intact. It hurt though. Another groan escaped her. He hurried upright, reaching out for her arm. There was a gash above his eyebrow, his dark skin coated in grime that made him appear rather ghostly.

"Astrid!" His voice wavered in and out of her ears, jumbled. She shook her head, blinking him into better focus. "You're bleeding. Can you move? According to the research of Enzo Beulgravia, spinal injuries can be quite serious, but if you helped me with Spirit again, I'm sure I could—"

Her short bout of laughter morphed into a breathless cough. Never had she met anyone quite as ridiculous as him. She pushed herself up, using her hands to brace herself. Sebastian reached for her again, wrapping an arm around her bruised ribs to help her.

"You—" she coughed again, chasing after a breath. "You brought down the entire bloody cavern!"

His cheeks paled beneath all the dirt and ashy debris on him. "I thought that was you."

"Me?" She leaned against his shoulder as she tested the movements of her different battered limbs. "I'm fairly certain you were the one feeling me up in the hopes of connecting to the elements."

This time, he flushed, his skin warming against her. "I guess."

She stared at him, a little amazed over his penance for humility even when faced with his own powerful destruction. "Your lack of confidence is quite worrying, Seabass. How will I ever trust you to save our lives again?"

He caught her watching him before his obnoxiously observant gaze found the cut on the edge of her hairline. His thumb brushed against the bump she imagined was there, and her breath stuck in her throat.

"I could heal this."

"Absolutely not," she said, brushing off his touch, but she smirked at him. "What if you crushed in my skull?"

He scowled at her but helped her rise to her feet. Sebastian had to bend his head to keep it from hitting the top of the narrow tunnel. "And it was that tongue that nearly enticed those warriors to incinerate us all with Hel's lightning."

Something about his deep voice making accusations against her tongue sent her body buzzing pleasantly. She pulled away from him before she did something incredibly stupid, like brushing the dirt and pebbles from his hair. Surely the whack to the head she had sustained had given her a concussion. She glanced back at the entrance to the tunnel they had fallen through. A wall of broken earth blocked their exit.

Well, at least that would keep those massive faeries with raging mood swings from coming after them. If the cavern's collapse hadn't killed them, that was. Speaking of..."Matthias," she muttered to herself. "You foolish imbecile."

She turned back to Sebastian. "Where are the others?"

"Safe." He fidgeted with his hands. "I think."

"Again with the lack of confidence not helping the situation..."

Sebastian sighed, peering around her at the blocked entrance. Worry crinkled the soft skin around his eyes. "I called on Air to push us along," he explained. "We weren't going to make it. You were closest to me, so it was easier to direct the thread to wrap around us, together, but..." His words trailed off with a sheepish shrug. "Melvin and Abel should be no worse for wear than we are, just in some other parallel tunnel."

Astrid nodded. He had made no mention of Matthias and his fate. She frowned, but otherwise hid her concern as surprisingly well as Sebastian appeared to be. In truth, knowing him, he was probably close to pissing himself from not having Abel within reach.

"She's fine," he said. "I can tell. Melvin, too."

Astrid turned from him again, gesturing to him to follow. "You're seeking out her Spirit's threads?"

"Trying to," he amended. "I'm not sure if I'm doing it right, but I can sense two, wispy threads right here." He patted the side of the tunnel to his left.

"Well, if it isn't them, then it may be those blasted faeries, and I've been thriving on the hope that you pulverized them thoroughly. No need to crush those dreams now."

Sebastian snorted. There was a brief reprieve of silence until he said, "Can I ask you a question?"

"I doubt my answer would stop you either way."

She felt his eyes on her back. "You didn't turn me over to them."

The tunnel narrowed further, continuing into a steady incline. Astrid paused at the base of the earthy hill. There was an empty sconce on the wall. A crude drawing of a crown with an arrow shot through it lay scratched into the stone above it. She knew this tunnel; it was the worm's weapons cache! Despite the luck of Sebastian throwing them into the correct tunnel, she felt an odd sense of vulnerability as she crouched lowly to the ground and onto her hands and knees to crawl while Sebastian stood behind her, watching her.

"That doesn't sound like a question," she said over her shoulder.

"Well, I suppose my question is why?"

Astrid was glad he was unable to see her flushed face. He dropped down behind her, swearing to himself when his palm sliced against a protruding rock. Not that she was looking back at him or anything, but she had nearly done the same thing just moments earlier. With him behind her, she felt rather antsy. His face had to be mere centimeters from her backside. She couldn't help but wonder if he found the view agreeable.

Stop it, the rational part of her brain hissed at her. You are crawling through a potentially worm-infested hellhole after narrowly avoiding being buried alive, and you're wondering what Sebastian-Fish-Lover-d'Aximos thinks about your arse? Get a grip, Salvera!

"Did you just growl at yourself?" Sebastian asked.

Astrid shook her head. "Let me get this straight," she said, trying for an air of coolness that her body currently lacked. "You are asking me why I didn't hand you over to giant beasts with glowing veins who probably would have eaten you?"

"Do they truly eat humans?"

When she scoffed, she wasn't sure if it was out of annoyance or enjoyment. The grin threatening her face proved the latter. "I figured if they could call Rainier's royal heir an imposter to her face, then Scribes-only-know what insults they would have hurled at you. Your fragile ego would never have survived such an ordeal."

He huffed out an amused chuckle, apparently mollified by the answer. Astrid could hardly fathom why; she felt as though she hadn't said anything truly worthwhile or comforting. They fell back into an amicable silence in which Astrid was left in peace—and without unwanted distractions—to continue her counting of one-hundred-fifty-three notches she had carved into the base of this tunnel all those years ago. Without any light, she felt for them instead. The counting had begun when she had spotted the crown drawn above the sconce, an artistic license she had taken in a fit of frustration after one of her meetings with Davina and the Fables of Monverta.

She smirked a bit at the memory before pausing at notch one-hundred-fifty-two.

Sebastian's head rammed into her bum.

"Watch it!" she yelped, flustered. "You must have eyes, so here is a rather brilliant and novel idea: Use them!"

"Is it the worm?" His voice went up one or two octaves. "Is that why you stopped? You see him, don't you?"

Astrid shook her head, pushing back her tattered, torn sleeves to expose her hands. "For all you know, the creepy-crawly could be a girl."

"Which leads to the possibility of her being pregnant and procreating, so I'll stick with my male theory until proven otherwise."

"By the Scribes, Seabass, I swear your very existence was created to debate people to death."

"I think you've defied death enough times since meeting me to prove that otherwise."

She wished it wasn't so dark so he could see the extent of her exaggerated eye rolls. Instead, she pushed her scraped and bleeding fingers into the final notch and pulled on Earth's threads buried deep into the tunnel. They filled the cramped tunnel with the rich smells of fertilizer and damp soil as she manipulated the threads with her hands in the same way she would throw a shovel into the ground. Her mother had taught her this trick when she had been not even five years old.

"Always make your own hiding place," Davina had told her, "a place only you have the key to unlock."

What had made Davina's one-stroke of motherly advice even more brilliant was that it required such a small amount of Astrid's elemental concentration that her cuff barely reacted at all. "Use what is already available to you," Davina had instructed. "If a hole exists, do not create a new one. Just cover up the old. Make it new."

Astrid wasn't sure how long this particular hole had been underneath this tunnel, but she uncovered it now, revealing the dark, small cavern that lay beyond.

"Come on," she said over her shoulder as she crawled into it. "How do you feel about swords? You may look quite dashing with one, I would think."

Despite the darkness, she could sense the weapons she had stashed down here, their elemental threads tickling her skin. To her left was a crossbow, leaning against the narrow cavern wall. Nearly two meters in front of her, she knew she would find three sheathed daggers and a sword she had nicked from Matthias just to prove that she could.

This particular tunnel space was taller, so she sat back on her heels, brushing off her hands.

"I don't think it's wise to be carving holes into these tunnels." Sebastian knelt beside her shoulder; his head grazed the ceiling. "Not in their present state anyways."

"Not like you had anything to do with that, huh?" She snatched up a small knife that only a complete idiot could harm himself with and pushed it into Sebastian's palm.

He fumbled with it. "I told you; I don't think that was me—!"

A muffled bang shook the ceiling above them.

Astrid's heart leapt. "Please tell me that, at least, was you."

Sebastian sucked in a breath like a scream he wanted to contain. His eyes were wide in front of her face, so close that she could see the flecks of gold hidden in the green.

"Astrid," he breathed, "I can see you."

It took her only a short moment to realize what he had meant by that particular sentiment. Bloody Hel! She swallowed her snarky retort; it only stuck in her throat. A dull light grew from the narrow tunnel that led out of the weapon's cache, emanating more brightly with each frantic beat of her pulse.

"Blasted faeries," she hissed.

The ground beneath their knees trembled. Astrid blinked furiously to clear her vision as dirt and dust rained from above. She pressed a shaking hand into the earth, feeling the cracks reverberating against her palm. But the fae could not manipulate Earth. Only those from Galandreal could.

"You have got to be kidding me."

"Elves?" Sebastian finished for her.

Frantic now, Astrid recalled all she knew of the seven realms and the half-truths she had been taught. The fae court of Avylon lay to the west of the elvish realm of Galandreal, only separated by the shallow Holalethe River, and in all the ancient stories and texts, the two realms were considered rivals over their lands.

Were they now allies?

Astrid swore as the small cavern shook.

"You might need this." Sebastian grabbed her wrist and shoved the small blade she had given him back into her grasp. "And, for the record, this truly isn't my doing."

Astrid would have laughed at that, but the ground chose that moment to give way and disappear entirely. Her scream choked her, stomach sky-rocketing into her throat, as she fell through the earth.

If they survived this, she was going to murder Sebastian regardless of his fault. 

_ _ _

Another long chapter, but I couldn't break up all the suspense!

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