Queen Elowen hadn't fully recovered either.
Every time she breathed, ice crystals spilled from her lips—sometimes a few tiny snowflakes, sometimes chunks of ice the size of a fist. Even she couldn't stabilize it.
While everyone sat there in a daze, the ground suddenly bulged.
A thin crack split open, and black particles wriggled out.
Ethan popped up from underground like some kind of local earth god, his face still bright with the relief of getting out alive.
"I'm back—"
He cut himself off the second he saw them.
Everyone's eyes were unfocused. Their spirits looked drained, their bodies slack, sitting in the ruins with almost no reaction at all.
Ethan's smile faded, inch by inch.
What the hell happened?
Could it be… kidneys—?
The thought had barely surfaced before Lily, unusually, flew out of his body on her own.
She rose above them.
White power spread from her small frame, forming a soft layer of shielding that wrapped around each person separately.
