He looked up at the black sky and started to laugh, snowflakes melting on his cheeks and sliding down to his chin.
“All right,” he said, his laughter growing sharper and more pained. “I’ve lost. I’ve lost and I’m lost. If only Kurtis could see me now.”
He should have taken out the boy’s eyes as well as his hand.
So many regrets.
If these were indeed his final moments, he would much rather think about Cleo than this. She’d once accused him of having a cold heart. Soon that would be very literally true. He’d heard that freezing to death was a great deal like drifting off to sleep—peaceful, with no pain.
But he needed pain. He needed to feel something so he could keep fighting against it.
“Oh goddess,” he said aloud. “I know I haven’t been your most humble servant. Nor do I believe in your radiance, now that I know you were only a greedy Watcher with stolen magic. But, whatever you are, whatever is out there looking down at us stupid mortals, please hear my prayer.”
He wrapped his arms across his chest, trying to harness what little warmth he had left for as long as possible. “Send me pain so I know I’m still alive. Help me continue to suffer. For if my father has already killed her, then I need to live so I can avenge her.”
So dark, that night. He could see no stars through the clouds. Nothing to light his way. Only the cold press of snow all around him.
“Please, goddess,” he implored again. “Give me a chance to make this right. I promise I won’t ask for anything else, ever again. Please”—he lowered his head to the snow and closed his eyes—“please let me live so I can kill him. So I can stop him from ever hurting anyone else again.”
Suddenly, Magnus heard something in the distance. An eerie howl.
His eyes snapped open and he scanned the endless darkness. The noise rang out again. It sounded like the howl of an ice wolf.
He glared up at the black sky. “I was trying to be sincere, and this is what I get in return? A hungry wolf to tear me apart on the worst night of my life? Much gratitude, goddess.”
The clouds parted and, gradually, the moon became visible again.
“Better,” he muttered, pushing against the snow and forcing himself to his feet. “Slightly better.”
With the help of the dim moonlight, he scanned the area again, searching for something, anything, that might offer him help. There was a forest up ahead, past the snowy plain. It wasn’t nearly as good as a village, but the trees might offer him enough warmth and shelter to survive the night.
Magnus trudged toward the forest, keeping one hand on the stolen sword at his side in case any hungry ice wolves decided to interrupt him.
He made it into the forest, and immediately set about searching for anything that might serve him well as shelter. But when he finally saw exactly what he was looking for, he was certain his eyes deceived him.
It was a small stone cottage, no larger than something that might belong to a Paelsian peasant, but to him it might as well have been a palace.
He approached cautiously and peered through a dirty, ice-encrusted window, but couldn’t see anything inside. No smoke rose from the chimney. No candles were lit. Just barely, he was able to climb three chiseled stone steps that led up to the door.
He tried the handle. It was unlocked. The door swung open without effort.
If this turned out to be the work of the goddess, he promised to start praying much more often.
Magnus stepped inside and felt around in the darkness until he found an oil lantern and a piece of flint. He struck the flint and lit the wick.
He nearly sobbed when the room swelled with light.
Taking the lantern in hand, he inspected the cottage. It was a single room, with a straw bed in one corner, equipped with a few ragged, but dry, quilts. In the opposite corner, he saw a large hearth, and some cooking pots.
On top of the hearth, next to another lantern, he found an effigy of the Goddess Cleiona, emblazoned with the symbols for fire and air. That meant that this cottage had at one point been occupied by an Auranian—or a Limerian who was secretly loyal to the Auranian goddess.
He built a fire with wood from the cottage’s modest supply. He sat in front of the fire, atop a thick rug embroidered with a hawk and the Auranian credo: OUR TRUE GOLD IS OUR PEOPLE.
Magnus decided that the former occupant had most likely been arrested and taken away to the dungeons for worshipping Cleiona. If Magnus lived through this, he swore he would find that man or woman and free them.
There wasn’t enough firewood inside to last the night, so Magnus took the lantern and ventured back outside. He found an ax and a chopping block, along with some larger pieces of wood, leaning against the cottage. He set the lantern down and prepared to do something he’d never done before in his entire life: chop wood.
But before he could take a single swing of the ax, a shout from not far away caught his attention. Magnus pulled up the hood of his cloak, snatched up the lantern and the ax, and went to investigate. Fifty paces away, he came across a dead man lying in the snow. He wore the green uniform of a Kraeshian guard, and had an arrow sticking out of his left eye socket.