“Somebody please get Meghan out of here!” Samheed begged, his voice hoarse, but the battle was so fierce that no one could pause for a moment to help any of the wounded. He was sure she’d been trampled, and there was nothing he could do but fight to stay alive.
Finally Simber swooped in, and Alex, Lani, and Henry all jumped to the ground and began casting lethal spells alongside a bruised, broken, and bloody Samheed. The fight continued to rage with wave after wave of soldiers running to attack the person who had killed their general, until there were only a handful of Quillitary soldiers left alive.
As their components dwindled along with the enemy’s numbers, Ms. Morning and Mr. Appleblossom finished off the remaining Quillitary near the former gate area and ran toward Samheed and the others to assist. There they helped finish the battle. The last soldier went down with a deathly poem from Mr. Appleblossom.
And then the world was silent.
Heaving and gasping for breath that wouldn’t come, Samheed sought out Lani, and then his eyes rolled back into his head and he crumpled to the ground next to Meghan. Neither of them moved.
And then, in the very moment that all the friends rushed in to help Meghan and Samheed, the land beneath their feet turned slick. Not with the blood of their enemies or friends, but with a thick layer of blinding white ice—ice from the veins of the most evil one of all. Gondoleery Rattrapp.
Artiméans everywhere slipped off their feet and went sprawling, landing hard. Quillens, too, apart from the fighting, were frozen inside their homes or fell while doing their jobs. The few Quillitary soldiers who had survived the battle now watched in horror as their vehicles slid off the road and skidded down the embankments to the frozen shoreline. And the pirate ship nearing the lagoon in Artimé stopped short, its hull encased in a sea of ice.
Aaron in Trouble
It was midday before Aaron gained consciousness. When he could pry his swollen eyelids open, he found himself flung out across a bench in a little fishing boat, alone, bouncing and churning and lurching against the waves. His stomach lurched too, but there was nothing more than bile inside it to expel.
His face throbbed. Gingerly he reached up to touch it. His skin was on fire. It was more pain than he’d ever known. Every rise and fall of the boat caused his sight to waver and his nose to feel like it was going to explode. He pushed himself up and peered fearfully over the lip of the vessel’s side, and then he sat up and gripped the bench. The sea swam before his eyes, and briny water sloshed about at his feet. The only solid thing in sight was the pirate ship, to which his little fishing boat was attached by a heavy gold chain.
He could hear voices coming from above him, on board the ship, but he couldn’t make out any words. “Hey,” Aaron said, but little sound came from his parched throat. His bottom lip was split, he could feel it. “I’m the . . . I’m the high priest. . . .”
Every effort to remain conscious took more out of him, and eventually Aaron gave up. He sank back to the floor of the boat and closed his eyes.
The Queen of Ice
Almost no one on the island of Quill had ever seen ice before. It felt cold before it stung, and with little warning it became awful to touch. Alex, who went down hard on his back, caught his breath and scrambled to his feet, and promptly slipped and fell again. “What’s going on?” he whispered to Simber, who was splayed out, legs in all directions.
“I don’t know,” Simber said under his breath. He flapped his wings to help him get to his feet.
From somewhere in Quill, a dark, magical, thunderous voice rang out above all other sound on the island, and spread beyond to the icy circle of the sea around it.
“Greetings, my people,” boomed the voice.
Claire Morning froze. “Who is that?”
Mr. Appleblossom shook his head.
“I am your new high priest,” the voice said. “I want to take a moment to thank Artimé for destroying the Quillitary. I didn’t care which side won, I just wanted one of you out of the way. So it’s Artimé I welcome back into the fold—you are a part of Quill once more. We are a complete nation again.”
She paused. No one moved.
“Enjoy the ice,” she said. “It’s my little way to keep you all safe until I get my kingdom sorted out. It’s only temporary. Probably. Or maybe not.”
Alex and Sky exchanged horrified glances.
“I’ll keep you informed. Try not to freeze to death in your little ice desert.” With that, the booming voice faded away.
Those near Alex turned their frightened eyes to him. He stared back, rapidly trying to figure out what was happening.
“Okay,” he said. “I don’t know who that was. We’ll figure it out. But first we need to take care of our injured. I need a team to somehow get to the mansion door and wait for Simber and the squirrelicorns to airlift our wounded and deliver them to you.”
A few able volunteers raised their hands and began sliding on hands and knees toward the mansion.
Alex looked around at all the injured, his heart filling with dread. Artimé was a disaster. Swiftly he sought out the friends he knew he could count on. “Henry, Carina, pick an additional team to take inside so they can help treat the incoming patients.”
“Got it,” Henry said. He and Carina began recruiting help from uninjured people all across the lawn.
And then Alex’s eyes landed on Meghan and Samheed. Sam’s face was hidden, but Meghan’s was ghastly white. The ice was red beneath them. “Oh no,” he breathed. He stepped gingerly toward them on the ice, trying not to slip. Each step was agonizingly slow. “Everyone, get moving!” he shouted. “Crawl if you have to! Let’s get the injured inside now!”