Nalin's POV
Twenty priestesses. Twenty against two.
We were dead.
"Any brilliant plans?" I asked Kael, my back pressed against his.
"Don't die," he said. "That's the plan."
"Very helpful."
High Priestess Mara stepped forward, her smile cold and cruel. "Did you really think we wouldn't prepare for you? The moment you escaped the palace, we knew you'd come for me."
"Then why let us get this far?" Kael demanded.
"Because I wanted you here. Underground. Trapped." Mara's eyes gleamed with dark joy. "You see, killing you in the open would make you martyrs. But down here, in the dark, you simply disappear. No witnesses. No proof you ever returned."
The other priestesses began chanting. Magic filled the chamber—not just one type, but all of them. Joy, sorrow, rage, fear, all twisted together into something horrible.
"They're combining their powers," Kael said urgently. "When they finish that spell, it'll tear us apart from the inside out."
"Can we fight it?"
"I don't know. I've never fought combined emotional magic before."
The chanting grew louder. I felt the magic pressing against my skin, trying to force its way inside. Trying to make me feel things that weren't real.
Artificial joy that made me want to laugh while dying.
Fake sorrow that tried to drown me in tears.
Manufactured rage that wanted me to attack Kael instead of the enemy.
"Fight it!" Kael grabbed my hand, and our ice magic flared. The cold pushed back against the emotional assault. "Don't let them in your head!"
But there were twenty of them and only two of us. The magic kept coming, wave after wave.
"I can't—" I gasped. "It's too strong—"
"Yes, you can!" Kael's voice cut through my panic. "Listen to me, Nalin. You want to know why they feared you enough to seal you as a baby?"
"What?"
"You want to know the truth about everything? About why emotional magic exists? About what the empire has been hiding for three centuries?" He pulled me closer, his winter eyes blazing. "Then listen fast, because we're running out of time."
The priestesses' magic pressed harder. I felt my mind starting to crack under the pressure.
"Three hundred years ago," Kael said quickly, "magic was different. It came from nature. From the elements. Ice, fire, water, earth—all natural forces that people could learn to use."
"But that's not how magic works now—"
"Exactly! Because my brother—your ancestor—wanted more power." Kael's face twisted with old pain. "Natural magic takes years to master. It requires balance and discipline. But he discovered a shortcut. If you torture someone to extreme emotion—pure rage, total despair, absolute terror—you can harvest that feeling and turn it into instant power."
Horror crawled up my spine. "The torture chambers."
"I found them by accident. Underground rooms where they'd chain up citizens—usually criminals or poor people no one would miss—and torture them. When the victim felt maximum pain, they'd drain that emotion and give it to nobles as magical power."
The chanting was reaching a crescendo. Mara's smile widened.
"I tried to stop it," Kael continued desperately. "I went to my brother, the emperor. Showed him what was happening. Begged him to end it. But he already knew. He'd ordered it. The entire emotional magic system was built on harvested suffering."
"So he sealed you to keep you quiet."
"He did worse than that." Kael's voice cracked. "He performed the first emotional sealing on me—ripped out my ability to feel and turned me into pure ice. Then he locked me in the Sanctum and told the empire I was a monster who'd tried to destroy the world. And for three hundred years, every powerful mage in the empire has been drawing power from my imprisoned essence."
My mind reeled. Every noble's magic, every royal's power—it was all stolen from Kael?
"And me?" I asked. "Why seal me?"
"Because you have primal ice magic. The same kind I had before they sealed me. It's the opposite of emotional magic—it can't be harvested, can't be controlled, can't be stolen." His grip tightened. "You were a threat the moment you were born. So they sealed your magic and convinced everyone you were broken."
"We're wasting time!" Mara shouted. "Finish the spell!"
The combined magic slammed into us like a physical force. I screamed as it invaded my mind, trying to shatter my sense of self.
"Nalin!" Kael shook me. "You need to understand something! The reason primal magic scares them isn't because it's powerful—it's because it's true! Emotional magic is fake, harvested, stolen. But your ice? My ice? It's real. It comes from who we are, not from other people's suffering!"
"I don't understand—"
"Your magic responds to your real emotions, not forced ones! So stop trying to fight their spell!" He pressed his forehead to mine. "Accept it! Let it in! Then show them the difference between fake emotions and real ones!"
He was asking me to let the enemy magic into my mind. It went against every instinct.
But I trusted him.
I dropped my defenses.
The emotional magic flooded in—twenty priestesses worth of harvested feelings, all hitting me at once. Joy, sorrow, rage, fear, all fake and stolen and wrong.
And my ice magic recognized the lie.
It knew the difference between real emotions and manufactured ones. Between feelings that grew naturally and power that was ripped from tortured victims.
My magic rejected it all.
More than rejected—it froze it solid.
The emotional magic shattered inside me like glass. The backlash exploded outward in a wave of pure cold that knocked all twenty priestesses off their feet.
I opened my eyes, and they were glowing winter-blue.
"Impossible!" Mara shrieked. "No one can resist combined emotional magic!"
"She's not resisting it," Kael said, pride in his voice. "She's judging it. And finding it worthless."
I stood up, and ice spread from my feet in beautiful, deadly patterns. For the first time since awakening my magic, I felt completely in control.
"You built an empire on lies and torture," I said to Mara. "You stole power from suffering and called it holy. You sealed children and threw them away like garbage."
"We did what was necessary for the empire's survival!"
"No." I raised my hands, and ice formed into deadly spears above my head. "You did what was convenient for your own power. And I'm done pretending that's acceptable."
The ice spears shot forward.
But Mara was faster than I expected. She pulled something from her robes—a small crystal that glowed with dark light.
"You want the truth about everything?" she screamed. "Then here's one more truth!"
She crushed the crystal.
Magic exploded through the chamber. Not attacking magic—summoning magic.
A portal ripped open in the air, and through it I saw the imperial palace. Specifically, the throne room.
And chained to the throne, beaten and barely conscious, was a small boy with dark curls and brown eyes.
Finn.
My little brother.
"Hello, Nalin," my father's voice echoed through the portal. He stood next to Finn's chair, a knife pressed to my brother's throat. "I believe we need to renegotiate the terms of your surrender."
My blood turned to ice. "Let him go."
"Come back to the palace. Both of you. Surrender peacefully, and I'll spare the boy."
"He's your son!"
"He's a tool." Father pressed the knife harder, and blood welled up. Finn whimpered. "Just like you were. Just like everyone in this empire is. Now choose, daughter. Your freedom, or your brother's life."
I looked at Kael. He looked back at me.
We both knew it was a trap. Knew that even if we surrendered, Father would kill Finn anyway. Would kill all of us.
But I also knew I couldn't watch my little brother die.
"We go back," I said.
"Nalin, no—"
"We go back," I repeated firmly. "But not to surrender."
I turned to face the portal, face my father, face the empire that had broken me.
"We're coming, Father," I said sweetly. "And we're bringing winter with us."