House of Winter

Chapter 41, Part 1

LUMI

Lumi was staring at her aunt, but it was as if she was staring at a stranger. The woman before her had once been kind and loving, but now, as her white hair came undone and flew loose across her face, Lumi saw the madness behind her eyes.

"Now you know, the two of you," Virani said. "Your father killed my two sons. I couldn't let your father kill Sanna. So I killed your mother."

Lumi felt a strangled sob escape her lips.

"It was the greatest mistake I ever made," Virani said. "When she died, so too did my power. I thought I was broken, forever. I thought I would never get it back. I was a shell of my former self. Without magic, I was no one. I was nothing."

"But," Virani continued, clutching her hand to her chest. "When I fled home to Reunsgar, I felt it again. Reunsgar is the source of winter magic. I was born there. I was destined to be a fire twin, honoured to protect the liquid star, until your father took us away. We were only children when he took us. He wanted his own twins. It wasn't enough that he controlled us. He wanted to be the father of twins, too. He wanted his own magic to run in their veins. I was powerless to stop him. But now, I have my power again. I will never be powerless again. And I will protect my children from the abuse that I faced."

"You never protected me," Lumi said. "What am I, if not your child? I had no mother. I looked to you, and you turned away. You pretended you did not see what Tai was. You pretended you did not see what he did to me."

"Lumi," Virani said.

"No," Lumi said. "This is it. Enough. Tai cannot be king. So I know what I must do. I must strip him of his magic, so that he cannot take my empire. And if it strips me of my magic too, then so be it. Neither of us shall rule."

"No," Virani said. "I will not allow it."

"Watch me," Lumi said.

"Let her do it, Auntie," Tai said, his voice cold and lifeless. "Let her see who she has become. The princess who strips her own twin of power? That would be a worthy queen and empress for the Fire Lands."

"This is what I must do, Tai," Lumi said, blinking back tears. "This is how it ends, for both of us. I cannot allow you to have power."

She reached out her hand, and she pulled.

It felt like the kind of pain she inflicted on herself when she burned herself. In harming Tai, she was also harming herself. It burned, and she felt her hands grow hot and painful as she eased the magic out of him.

"No!" Virani cried out, and she grabbed onto Lumi's wrist, yanking so hard that Lumi was thrown backwards.

Jinni roared, attempting to push Virani out of the way, but Silka was there, knocking into the tiger. The two of them locked jaws, while Lumi struggled against her aunt, almost falling into the snow.

Tai pulled himself onto the back of Yainni, and pulled fire to his chest. He displayed his power in a vortex of fire around him. "Once again, sister, you are too weak."

As he spoke, she saw the neat rows of fire army soldiers behind him, each on tigerback and marching closer to the palace. They halted behind Tai, and held a defensive stance against the torrential snowstorm, holding fire in outstretched hands and glaring into the snowstorm, waiting for orders from their general.

Lumi quelled again. She quelled Tai's fire power, and she quelled her own army. Their fires died, and Lumi gritted her teeth, ignoring the pain, as she tried to quell her brother.

This time Virani's hand collided with Lumi's cheek, and the slap hurt all the more for how cold the air was. "How dare you," Virani said. "Your own army. Your own people."

Lumi clawed at her aunt, trying to free herself from her grip, and her hand snagged against the necklace around her aunt's neck. Lumi let out a shriek, as she felt a surge of power she hadn't expected. This time, she did fall backwards into the snow. She stared up at her aunt, crawling backwards through the snow.

Virani smiled. "I told you," she said. "I will never be powerless again. I have sought all power, and I shall find more. All the power in the world, Lumi. You cannot quell it all. It would tear you apart, just as it tears you apart trying to quell your own brother. You would never be strong enough."

Virani pulled the necklace out from underneath her clothes, so it hung freely. It seemed to have a heartbeat, and it was thudding on Virani's chest. Lumi could feel the raw magical power of the necklace, in the same way as she felt the magic when she was in Reunsgar.

"Surge me, Tai," Virani sang.

Tai did as he was told, sending a surge of power to Virani.

Virani seemed to glow in the magic, swallowing it up. Then the snowstorm itself seemed to slow, as if each individual flake of snow in the air had paused, waiting to see what would happen.

Virani raised her hands, and the ground trembled beneath their feet. The snow erupted and mounds of dirt beneath it exploded into the air. The dirt combined with the snow and ice already swirling in a vortex around Virani's body, and then Virani seemed to pull water from thin air, so that it too swirled, and mixed with fire, most powerful of all.

She was surrounded by a storm of her own making, of ice and fire, water and stone.

"What is this?" Tai cried.

"Liquid star, the source of winter, worn in a glass vial around my neck. The heart of a fire demon, taken from within a volcano, turned to stone around my neck. A branch from the tree of life, deep in the forests of Frühland, worn around my neck. The scale of a sea monster, pierced and worn around my neck. Four powers, brought together like no one has ever dared before," Virani said.

"Auntie," Lumi said, horrified at what she had done. Tentatively, she reached out her own quelling power, but almost as soon as she did, she was buffeted back by her aunt's power. Lumi stared down at her blackened hands in dismay.

"My fire army will take Norrlund, and from there we will move onto Lombardia, where I will finally find the saltrock."

"That's why you were in New Hamilton?" Tai said. "It wasn't for me, at all! I thought you had come to congratulate me for what I did, to kill the prince and set our enemies against each other!"

"I was hunting for the saltrock. I heard rumours that it was buried under the city," Virani mused. "There's still time. One day..."

"The saltrock?" Lumi and Tai both spoke at the same time.

"I found the saltrock," Tai said quickly. "Auntie, I can help you. I know where it is! I found it in the caves under New Hamilton!"

"You found it?" Virani asked, and she rounded on Tai, her face flushed with anger. "You had it?"

"I didn't know what it was," Tai snapped. "I discovered it had properties like air. I used it to train that dragon. I realised that if I tortured the dragon at the same time as exposing the dragon to the saltrock, it would learn to hate air starrlings. And it worked, didn't it? The dragon killed the prince, because of me."

"You foolish boy," Virani snapped. "Where is the saltrock now?"

"It's here, Virani."

Lumi didn't need to turn to see who was behind her. She could already feel him. She could feel the two hearts of his magic beating as one within his chest.

When she turned, she saw that he held a glowing pink stone in his hand.

"I found it, in the caves beneath the charging arena," Tom said, looking at the rock curiously. He tossed it up into the air and caught it neatly. "I was drawn to it. At the time, I didn't know why."