Chapter 40: Eye of the Storm

Matthew POV

Now

Long ago, I joined the Assassins to help people. My best friend Daniel was born into the Brotherhood, but I was born a farmer's son, in the same village of Yurness, in Arendelle. Daniel was the wisest man I ever knew, possessing capacities of mutual understanding that I never knew to exist in a person. Very rarely would Daniel get in a fight with anyone, or any kind of arguement. He knew when to talk and when to listen. He was everything that I wasn't. I couldn't hate him for that. The only thing I could hold against him was dying too early, leaving me to lead the Assassins, but even that wasn't his fault.

Jason had yanked both his hoodie and his blade off, effectively ending his role as an Assassin. I couldn't protest at him, because the part of me I never let anyone see knew he had every reason to hate me. As did Asgeir. I did a lot of things as Mentor of the Arendelle branch, but I was no leader. All along, it was meant to be Asgeir to take the leadership after his father died, not me.

I stood there at the top of the stairs for almost 15 minutes, wondering what we were to do next. My two best men were now both out of action.

My phone rang, caller ID coming up as Keaton.

"Yeah." I said, answering.

"Cormac's is becoming full with our troops. Jason just walked into Cormac's, then headed down to the Bunker. What should we do?"

I was done trying to stop him from finding out the truth he so clearly wanted to hear. Every time I did, it only made him and Asgeir hate me even more. Better Jason find out from his best friend than the Mentor that failed him at every turn.

"Keep most of the troops called back. The smaller a force we throw against Ingrid, the better." I said. "I want a team of no more than fifteen people put together. Bring them to the Outpost by the water."

"Copy that." Keaton replied. "We'll be there."

Then

Daniel was more than a wise man. He also was one who valued his private affairs above most other things. One of the many things that he kept tight lipped about were the circumstances surrounding him and Princess Gerda.

It was news that swept throughout the kingdom after we were thrown back into exile by means of the rock trolls and their forgetting potions. The Queen was now with child, less than a year after her marriage to the new King Agdar. Daniel, Mentor by that time after Maunu's death, kept his ear close to the news for the next nine months. But he never told me why he and I would pass through like ghosts in the castle.

"The child will be a prince or princess." I said to him once. "Nothing of our concern, Daniel."

I had my suspicions, but I knew better than to directly question Daniel. Like the man that I would one day become, he too was a very secretive person.

"Most children born to kings and queens, yes." He said. "But not this one."

We were thrown back on the run when Gerda, the only one aside from myself and Daniel who knew the truth about Ingrid, or even remembered her, became a fully-fledged Templar. She and Agdar led the Templar troops to burn the village of Yurness to the ground, leaving us with no home. Half our branch was slaughtered, but before he died, Maunu passed the title of Mentor onto Daniel.

From then on, we spent most of our times going back and forth between Arendelle and the Enchanted Forest. But the more the months passed, the more Daniel and I spent in Arendelle, too close for comfort for the Templars to catch us.

In one of the kingdom's coldest winters, whilst we hid in the town, we heard the news. The King came forth in the town square while Daniel was buying a pack of bullets, and made his declaration of the birth of the baby. My friend watched with this strange look of devastation on his face as it was said what had happened. It was said that the little prince Gerda had carried for nine months was stillborn, leaving Arendelle without an heir.

Many citizens gave their condolences to the King as he personally came down from his podium to shake hands, and gladhand the rest of his citizens. I watched silently as the Templar king, with the cross hanging on his neck, and a matching ring on his finger, smiled. People adored him, but they didn't know the truth about the kind of people that he dealt with. People who would put the entire world under their boots to further their own agendas. I felt my wrist twitch with anger as I watched him from the open storefront. But then I noticed where my brother was. I followed Daniel close behind, going into the woods without another word.

I was not stupid. When I saw the look on his face when we were far away from the village, I knew the truth.

"He was your son, wasn't he?" I asked as we sat in the trees, far above the ground.

Daniel looked off in the distance, sadness smearing his stubbled face. "There's no way to know for certain, now that the boy is dead, but I was very sure that he was, yes. Gerda and I…" He paused, then looked back at me. "It doesn't matter, Matthew. He's dead, anyways."

Stillborn. That's what Agdar came forth and said to the entire town, crushing Daniel's hope for his son. He just wanted to know that his son was going to be raised a prince.

"He would be raised to think of us as the enemy, as Agdar would raise him as a Templar, but at least he would have been safe." Daniel said. I began to see a few tears gathering around the edge of his eyes, but then he looked up in curiosity.

"Wait. I heard something."

Unlike most Assassins, Daniel had the Sight, passed on through the bloodlines of other Assassins that came before. He heard whispers often, which amounted to secrets that people kept, and it gave him an edge trying to spot his target in a crowd of people.

Daniel got up from the branch he sat on, and began to leap through the trees, myself coming up behind him as fast as I could go. He was in a hurry I had never seen him before. I couldn't hear what he was hearing, but it must have been important.

Then I began to hear other noises. The hooves of horses, which were cutting through the trees in the snow, far from where the main roads were. Whoever these riders were, they were trying not to be seen. Unfortunate, then, that they were being followed by the realm's greatest Assassin.

Daniel kept leaping from branch to branch through the trees, looking not dissimilar to another Assassin I knew of, the Colonial Assassin Ratonhnhaké:ton. Daniel was many things in his life, but excitable was not one of them. As the sun was going down, the snow swirling through the air, the riders suddenly stopped at a clearing in the trees.

One of the riders in a black cloak got off his horse, taking a bundle that he had been carrying with him. He walked to the center of the clearing before setting the bundle down on the ground, right in the middle of a heavy snowdrift. I saw Daniel's breath catch as he saw what the bundle was: it was the baby. His son, somehow still alive.

The figure looked down at the baby, which cooed and babbled. Two other riders got off their horses, one producing a pair of pliers, and the other lighting a torch. The snow almost seemed to glow a bright orange as it reflected off the fire light of the torch.

The figure that placed Daniel's son in the snow then spoke. "You don't even know what I am saying, and you won't even remember. But know that your birth, your very existence is a great pain for me and my wife. You will die, but not before your existence as a bastard is shown before the whole world." He held out his hands to his companions, who handed him the pliers and the torch. I knew from what he said and his voice that it was none other than King Agdar.

He held the pliers to the fire of the torch for a few minutes, then pulled them out. They glowed bright red in the night, and Daniel and I watched as he knelt down towards my Mentor's son.

I was about to jump down into the clearing, but Daniel stopped me.

"No." He whispered. "We can't stop it."

I looked down into the clearing with horror, while Daniel shut his eyes, painfully. Agdar took the pliers and clamped them down onto the baby's hand.

He cried unlike any baby I had heard before. Such a small wound if it were to be endured by me or any other Assassin. Instead, it happened to a newborn baby. Even some of the guards looked uneasy from what I could see of them as Agdar kept them clamped on the poor lad's hand, the wails splintering the cold winter air all around.

But then he was done. The baby kept crying loudly throughout the woods, but Agdar paid no notice. Instead he looked to his servants.

"Let's go." He said. "He will not survive such a wound, and even if he did, the snow will take him instead."

Without so much of a peep of defiance from any of his men, Agdar got back onto his horse and rode off into the night, his men following right behind.

We were alone within minutes, the snow coming down hard, wind whistling all around. Daniel wasted no time. As his son wailed loudly, whether from pain, or just crying as babies do, he pulled off his hooded robes and wrapped his son up in them, shushing him and rocking him back and forth. All he had left was a woolen sweater underneath, but he didn't care in that moment. All that mattered was saving his son.

"Shhhh. It's alright, son. I am your father. I won't hurt you."

It was a truly lovely sight to see, my best friend with his son in his arms, but I still felt the unease that came with being me. Nothing that I couldn't stop myself from thinking.

"What do we do?" I asked. "The others are back in the Enchanted Forest. He's a newborn babe."

"The others need not worry about my son." Daniel said. "I am his father, therefore I am responsible for him, and no one else needs be."

"He's a baby. We can't take care of him."

"That's not up to you, Matthew. It's my decision." He said as he turned around to face me.

I've seen the darkest side of humanity. But the light that I saw in Daniel's eyes as he held his son in his arms was brighter than what I ever thought possible. This man was more than an Assassin and a Mentor. Now, he was a father.

"Alright then." I said. "So, what's his name?"

Daniel smiled as he looked down at his son, still crying with the hood draped over his head. It was far too big for his little head, but one day he would grow into it and wear it with his father's conviction. "Asgeir."

Now

Keaton brought over an easy team to take care of. Zar, Torren, Geoff, Keif, Willis and a few others.

Zar clearly knew about Jason's rapid exit, and only angrily stood by near the wall while Keaton and I went over the plan.

"Two objectives to be completed as soon as possible, gentlemen." I said. "Firstly, HVI Emma Swan has gone missing. We track her down before Ingrid can."

"And do what?" Keaton said. "Protect her from the Snow Queen?"

"Yes, Keaton." I replied. "If anyone else has a problem with that, or a better idea, now's the time to say it."

No one did. I was hoping someone would, but I clearly had pushed my role as the Mentor too far. No one was going to question me as long as Asgeir was locked up. Every decision I made only backfired on me more and more, but I was too deep into this mess to quit.

"Secondly, we find Ingrid, and kill her. I'll be handing out the small team assignments. No rubber bullets. No handcuffs. No cages. If you see her, shoot her. If you shoot her, shoot to kill."

Torren, Zar and Willis were grouped with me. The kid was at least ready to not take any prisoners, his armor and minigun loaded in the van Zar had driven over. Unfortunately, I had no idea where we should start to look for either target.

"No number of toys we have at Cormac's will change much, Matthew." Willis said. "We have three drones with mounted turrets in the vans."

"What's the distance that they can cover?" I asked.

"Not enough." He replied. "We can try to find Emma or her bug with one of them, but we need to stay within a close enough distance."

"I thought our drones covered the whole town that one time." Torren said.

"Those ones are still back at Cormac's." Zar said. "But I can call them to send one over."

"Do it." I said, rubbing my eyes. "Anything to help us find either one of them."

Zar pulled out his phone to make the call, when it suddenly rang. Curiously, he looked at the caller ID.

"It's David Nolan." He said. He picked up. "Hello?"

I looked over as Zar spoke with the caller.

"Yes, this is Zar. Oh, Elsa. What are you doing with David's phone?" He looked up at me, concern filling his face. "We have a small team out by the North beach… Yeah, we can meet you there. Alright. Keep the phone close by, and we'll call you if we need to. Okay, bye."

"How the hell did Elsa figure out how to use a phone?" Willis asked.

"She stole David's and called Jason, since his number was listed on his contacts. He gave her mine to call me since he's not one of us anymore." He glared over at me.

"Where does she want us to meet her?" I asked, avoiding the accusation, trying not to notice the glares I was getting.

"… Outside the sheriff's station. And she said we need to hurry before David realizes his 'enchanted box' is missing."

Then

Asgeir was now reaching his fourth year. Daniel had recently saved the other two boys, Troy and Jack, from a slate mine. Our camp was getting ready to move once again. But late into the night, as I lay on my cot in my shelter, I heard the flap open.

"Matthew."

I turned over to see a shadow in the open entrance way. It beckoned me to come outside.

Blearily, I stumbled out of my shelter into the night. The skies were clear, thousands of stars in the sky. The figure stood in front of the campfire, which was beginning to die out. He held pieces of torn parchment in his hand, and had his back to me.

"Daniel?"

He turned to face me, then held up the parchment.

"No one else can know about the contents of these pages, Matthew." He said, handing them to me as I approached.

I turned through them, still half awake. But recognizing the names mentioned, the dates, and the handwriting I had read myself, I knew exactly what these were.

"How did you get these?!" I whispered, straining myself from crying out and waking up the whole camp.

"The library beneath Arendelle castle." He simply replied.

I gazed at him. "You went back?"

"Indeed." He turned back to the pit of small fires and coals. "We can thank our lucky stars that Agdar hasn't found our fortress Harald let us build. If he found the contents of the library, or anything else we left there, who knows what chaos could arise?"

I knew exactly what he meant, me being the only other Assassin who knew what story the pages I was holding told.

"What will be our next move?" I asked.

"We're going to recover what we left behind. All of it." Daniel instructed. "I will tell the other Masters the plan, but as of right now, we are going to take back every book that we left behind, and recover or destroy them all. The most sensitive information will disappear forever." He gently pulled the pages from my hands. "And as for these…"

He didn't even hesitate. He lowered the pages into the pit of flames until they caught, then let go of them to feed the fire for a few more hours. Daniel prodded at the pit for a few moments with the poker, before turning back to me.

"You disapprove?" He asked.

"I don't approve of this, but I also can't completely disagree with this decision, either." I said. "Does this have something to do about your boy?"

"It has everything to do about Asgeir." He replied. "And you are going to keep this a secret with me. Forever." He turned back at the fire. "It's enough pain for him to grow up knowing he is a bastard, and his mother wishes him dead. He need not suffer anything else."

I thought this to be nothing more than an idea that would have dire consequences for the years to come. But I knew nothing of the feelings that brushed with Daniel every day of his life since we saved his boy. As an Assassin, this decision was a poor one. But as a father, it was his to make, and his alone.

Now

When we drove up in the van, Zar opened the back doors up to let Elsa come in. I wondered how she felt in that moment to be surrounded by scoundrels beneath her, and me, the one who had locked up her brother, undermining her authority at every turn.

"What are we doing, Elsa?" Zar asked.

"Start driving." She said, pointing out the front window.

Willis squinted his eyes.

"Is that a… floating scarf?"

"Follow it." She said. "It has a locator spell on it. We're looking for Emma."

"Excellent." I said. "That'll narrow our search for certain."

"You're looking for her as well?"

"We can't let Ingrid get to you or Emma." Zar said. "It secures who she wants to protect before she unleashes the curse on the town."

"No, you don't understand, Zar. It's even worse than that." Elsa winced as she tried to say the words. "Emma's going to try to be rid of her magic."

This didn't actually surprise me that much, with all that we witnessed at the Sheriff Station.

Elsa noticed my reaction, or lack thereof. "Does this not bother you, Mentor?"

I shook my head. "I understand that this might be what she wants with all that we saw, Your Majesty. We are looking for Emma to stop Ingrid from getting to her, but I see no reason for us to stop her."

It was her choice, and her choice alone. But Elsa wasn't taking it.

"I can't believe what I hear from you, Matthew." She snapped. "We are going to find Emma, and she needs to know the truth. Her magic is what makes her special. Asgeir and Anna knew the same about me. Now she needs to realize it."

Incoming Text

Keaton: What's the latest on Miss Swan?

Matthew: Currently have a bead on her location. Locator spell.

Keaton: Should I direct our team over?

Matthew: No, it's ok.

Keaton: What is to be done with the Asgeir problem?

Keaton: U there? It's just us. No one else in the Assassins to know what goes through your head.

Matthew: Yeah. I know that… I don't want to be the one to hang him, Keaton

Keaton: Then what? He lives for what he's done?

Matthew: The story Miles told me does not feature the boy I've known since he was born. What the Templars did to him was monstrous. What Ingrid did was just as worse.

Keaton: But an innocent woman and two children killed? Sydney Glass?

Matthew: He will answer for those crimes. But we need to know that he was in his right mind when he did those, and I can't be sure he was. We find some way to rid him of the Shattered Sight, and maybe then we find some way that he can atone for it.

Keaton: You sure about this?

Matthew: No. But I've never been sure about any decision I've made since Daniel made me Mentor. It was supposed to be Asgeir from the start. Never me. I've never wanted to be Mentor. But I've never known if he was ready to take my place. His father would have if he had lived.

Keaton: He may never be ready to become our Mentor.

Matthew: He'd be more ready than I was. Who ever was ready to be Mentor?

Then

Arendelle had sights the likes of which no other kingdom of the realm could match. It's mountains and waterfalls. And the Great Fjord that cradled the town was the jewel of the crown. Keif stared through the mounted telescope he placed on the railing. A nearby hunting shed was under the ownership of a friend of Daniel's, where we would be meeting up.

We got a tip from one of our contacts within the city that said Agdar was trying to find our hideout from under the castle. Gerda never found out from her father that it was right under their feet, but the risk of what we may have left behind scared Daniel enough to take the branch with him. Against my own advice, he even brought the boy with him.

"There will be things to explain to him there. Who his mother is, and why he has existed as a bane on her and her husband."

"But you could do it anywhere else!"

"End of discussion, Matthew."

Keif and I were left behind as the lookouts while Daniel took them back home.

"Not seeing the Mentor, or the others around…" Keif murmured as he glanced over from the scope. "A lot of villagers seem to be gathering in the town square. That'd be the distraction they were going to set up while they snuck in."

"They'll be back." I said, crossing my arms.

"Always is, Daniel Swortssen. He's gonna go far as a Mentor."

The truly careful observer would come to notice that above everything I felt for Daniel, jealousy was admittedly one thing I felt strong enough for him. He was the Assassin I wished I could be, but ultimately, the orders he had last given me stopped me from doing what I would one day want to do.

"You tell Asgeir nothing." He reminded me. "Nothing at all about who he truly is. He will know he is a bastard one day, but he will never know the true horror."

Keif looked back through the scope, then pulled away.

"Ah. Here we go. They're back."

We saw several figures in white hoods sprinting up the valley from the trees. But they were not alone. The screams and the yells came from uniformed pursuers.

"Templars!" I cried, jumping down to the valley floor to catch them. Keif pulled out his large crossbow, also mounted with a scope.

Asgeir and the other two boys, Troy and Jack were right at the front. The Master Assassins we had with us then turned and drew their swords and blades when we regrouped. With Keif providing covering fire, we made short work of them.

A heavily wounded soldier was crawling away just as I grabbed him by the shirt collar.

"You blow your cover down there, Daniel?" I called, sticking my blade in his throat.

I looked up, glancing among the hooded figures. Some of them held blank expressions, while others seemed to know exactly what happened.

The boy came up to me.

"My papa's not with us?" He said.

I ignored him, turning to Kevan.

"Where is he?"

Kevan shook his head. "We need to go, Matthew. He's bought us some time, but not that much."

"What are you-?" I stopped. "…No…"

"We need to run, Mentor."

Keif looked through his telescope, turning the dial to zoom in.

"Matthew!"

I ran up to the shelter, fearing the worst as he handed me the scope and I peered through.

It was the worst. Daniel was standing at the top of a set of gallows they had hastily set up in the town square, forced to his knees. King Agdar and Queen Gerda stood off to the side, the Templar lord speaking more of his garbage. I could use my imagination. Now I began to understand what the villagers were going to the town square for.

I felt a tug on my sleeve. "My papa?"

"Take the boy." I said, brushing him off.

"No, I want to see!" He whined.

"We're leaving, Matthew!" Kevan said. "More will be on their way!"

I put the scope away, nodding. "Let's move."

Troy and Jack came up for Asgeir, and they grabbed his hand, leading him away. Before long, he had gotten the hint, and began running with the rest of the Assassins.

Kevan stayed for a moment. "He left you Mentor, Matthew."

I felt my breath catch. In that moment, I couldn't know for sure if it was something I really wanted my whole life, or I was truly thankful that Daniel had that burden weighing him down. But now it fell to me.

I heard the yells down in the village below. Before long, the drums began to pound. I began to run with Kevan as we caught up with the other Assassins. But then, the boy stopped running.

"Asgeir!" I called. "Pick it up!"

But the boy didn't listen. Instead, he kept his gaze fixed on the town square. A horrid thought crossed my mind. Daniel had the Sight. If he did, then did that mean Asgeir did as well? And could he see what was happening?

I got my answer. Asgeir worriedly kept looking down into the village.

"Papa?" He suddenly said. Then he turned to me. "What did the man do to my Papa?"

Now

The scarf led us in the van to a manor on the far side of town, kilometers from the water. As soon as we knew it was in there, Willis slammed the breaks down. Zar opened the door, letting Elsa and I out as we ran across the yard to the door. From within the manor's core, we saw flashes of lightning, feeling the rumble of thunder. We were coming to the eye of powerful magic, a large storm being whipped up from within.

"Emma!" Elsa called. "Emma!"

Zar and her reached the door, but when they tried it, it was locked. The scarf had fallen to the ground as soon at it hit the door, so Elsa knelt down and grabbed it.

"Stand back." Zar said, pulling his rifle off his back.

"Oh, let me!" She snapped, waving a hand over the handle. The lock instantly froze, easily allowing the door to open.

We hastily followed the queen inside as she ran down the hallways to where the lightning and thunder was at its peak.

"Emma!"

We turned the corner to find Emma about to open a set of mahogany double doors, into a room that we could see lights, wind, and a whole lot of other madness coming from the other side.

"Emma, stop!"

She turned with surprise. "Elsa? What the hell are you doing here? You have to leave now!"

As if on cue, sparks came flying from every object in the room that produced light. The chandelier above, and the lamps around. Zar holstered his rifle as he beckoned me to step back, which I silently agreed to.

"I'm sorry." Elsa said. "I won't let you do this!"

"My powers are out of control. There's no other way." Distress filled Emma's face as Elsa slowly took a step towards her. "Please go, now!"

"No." Elsa said, simply. "You didn't give up on me even when you nearly froze to death in that ice cave. So, I'm not giving up on you, now. I know how scary it is, hurting someone you love. I've lived in fear of that my entire life." More sparks and lightning filled the air. "But giving up your magic is not the answer. There is another way."

"Yeah, you told me all about how Anna's love saved you, and that's great." Emma said. "But guess what. My version of that with Henry didn't work." She swallowed, with tears in her eyes. "This is all I have left."

She turned, and began to go for the door. Zar and I stepped forwards, but Elsa held her hand up; she wasn't going to stop. More and more magical madness came about the room as Emma reached for the handle.

"I was wrong." Elsa said. "It wasn't just Anna's love that saved me."

Emma turned, puzzled. It was working. "What are you talking about?"

"When I landed in this strange town, I was certain that without Anna, or Asgeir, I was doomed." She said. "But I got control over my powers again without her."

"How?"

"I didn't really know until today, until the same thing happened to you. And then it finally hit me." Elsa continued, coming forwards to Emma. "It's not only Anna's love, or Asgeir's love, or Henry's that can save us. They accept us for who we are, and that's important. But it's not enough. It's on us, too."

Emma looked up at Elsa. She just couldn't understand how someone could accept her with what had happened. And it made me wonder as well.

"You have to love yourself, Emma. The good, and the bad." Elsa said. "The only way to ever be truly in control of your powers is to embrace them. Because this…" She gestured around the room with the scarf in her hand. "Is who you are."

Smiling, she reached her other hand out to Emma.

"What are you doing?" She gasped.

But Elsa kept smiling, waiting for her to take the hand. "It's time to stop being afraid." She said.

"But this could kill you."

She chuckled. "I'll take that risk if you will."

Slowly, Emma reached her hand out, and placed it in Elsa's. Zar and I watched with amazement as the room lit up, yet the sparks dying down in that instant.

The whole room, all four of us, sighed with relief as it finished.

Hook rushed in, cueing Zar and I to head outside. What I saw between Emma and Elsa gave me plenty to think about.

"Why is Jason no longer a brother?" Zar said as we walked out.

"This is hardly the time-" I said, putting on my Mentor face.

"It never will be at your rate, Matthew." He said. "Did he quit? I'll do it next if you don't start giving us answers and pulling our strings. This is not your army to command. We're a brotherhood."

My eyes were still narrowed, but I kept thinking back to Elsa and Emma. What their… bond held, and what I might need to do when we got back to Cormac's. What I really needed to do.

"He did quit. Because I've been making the stupid decisions lately. The really stupid ones. Ingrid will not hold back against us when the spell is cast, Zar. So when we get back to Cormac's, I'm letting Asgeir go."

This was not what Zar was expecting, but I was prepared to elaborate.

"I'm not meant to be Mentor, Zar. I'll admit that you're the only one aside from Keaton who now knows that. All this time, it was meant to be Asgeir to do it. And then Ingrid happened, and all went south. He was never the same after losing his sisters."

"Who would?"

"Indeed." I took a beat. "She's divided us for the last thirty years, and she's done it enough. We need to stay united if we are going to stand a chance against her. We're going to regroup at Cormac's, I'm going to let Asgeir go after a talk with him, and we are going to find that bitch and end her."

Walking back along the porch of the manor, we saw Emma running up to meet her worried parents.

"Emma! Did you do it?" Snow cried.

Emma ran and embraced her mother.

"I didn't. Thanks to Elsa."

The queen proudly smiled.

Snow kept a hold of her daughter. "I'm so, so glad. Just…please don't change."

"I don't want to."

Then it was David's turn. "We love you, no matter what." He said.

"I know." Emma said. She then noticed the boy at their side. "Hey kid! How are you?"

"Just glad you're okay." He said, grinning as she hugged him.

"So your magic…" Snow asked. "Are you in control of it again?"

Emma grinned. "Absolutely."

To demonstrate, she walked right to the edge of the porch and waved her hands to the night sky. An Aurora Borealis conjured up. Then it turned into a large fireworks display. Elsa chuckled with delight as we all admired the fine show Emma was putting on. The sign that she had overcome those demons of the fear from her family, and accepted herself for who she was.

Grinning, I pulled out my two-way as I walked over to the side, letting the family have their moment. "Kevan, this is Matthew. We found Emma and are returning to base."

I let go of the button to let him respond. Silence on the other end.

"Kevan, this is Matthew. We're coming back. Over."

More silence.

Zar looked over with concern as I pressed the button again.

"Kevan, respond. Kevan… Respond." I ordered.

Nothing. Completely out of character from him. He always kept in contact on his radio. He never took this long to respond.

"This is Mentor. I request that any hands at Cormac's respond immediately."

While I said immediately, I decided to give a minute or two to let them respond. But three passed, and there was nothing. I did hear Keaton on the line, though.

"Why aren't they responding?" He asked.

I was about to reply, but then I felt something drop on my cheek. It was the size of a house fly, and cold and wet.

Zar and I looked up, and saw the fireworks had stopped. Snow was now falling down, and a lot of it. It felt a lot colder, suddenly, as though we had already skipped over two weeks before the first frost, and gone straight to five below. We walked back to the others. Henry noticed something as we did.

"Mom, when did you get that?" He asked.

Emma looked down at her wrist. Something yellow was tied to it.

"I don't know…" She said, examining it.

It was a ribbon. A familiar ribbon. My breath caught in my throat as I saw it. The most treasured possessions that Ingrid forced Gerda and Helga to throw away in exchange for the urn and the gloves that brought all this misery on us.

There was another tied to Elsa's wrist.

"Emma, what's happening?" She said.

They both tried pulling them off, but nothing happened. Typical.

The ribbons then began to glow, and Emma and Elsa both squirmed with discomfort.

"I feel it, too." Elsa said, noticing the other's pain. "It's like it's funneling all my magic away. Like it's… harnessing it somehow."

"Any idea what this is?" David asked.

"No." Emma said, her expression darkening. "But I have a pretty good idea where it came from."

I pulled my radio out one more time. "Anyone at Cormac's. Anyone?"

Nothing but the light buzz of radio feedback from silence.

Zar's foot was pinned to the floor of the van as we sped through Main Street. The sky cracked and crumbled as the snow fell. I instinctively zipped my hoodie up as I kept trying to reach someone on my two way. It was coming down hard in sheets, and I knew before long, we would have a blizzard.

"This is Mentor calling for response for any hands at Cormac's. Respond. Please respond." I was losing hope with every breath I put into the mic.

Keaton was the only voice I heard in my time trying.

"There's no one on the line, Matthew. We're heading back to Cormac's."

Goddamn it…

Zar's foot then pinned to the ground again, the van stopping in an instant. The tires screamed and shrieked as I threw the shotgun door open and leapt out, running up the small hill to the front porch of Cormac's.

Cue "Eye of the Storm" by X Ambassadors

The door to the pub was wide open. More snow and ice was filling the air outside, but I could have sworn there was more coming from inside the pub. I felt my heart stop. Zar and Torren ran through the open doorway.

"NO! NOOOOOO!"

Somehow, my breath felt even more heavy in my chest as I slowly stepped forwards and into the pub.

It was not a pub. It was a frozen killing floor. Blood and gore, snow and ice filled the entirety of the pub. An Assassin I couldn't remember the name of was bleeding heavily, crawling to me, pleading.

"Help… me!" He wheezed. But it was too late for him, and I could only look down in horror as he faded away.

Assassins lay about the pub. The whole pub was filled with red snow, and bloody icicles. All the brothers I could see were either dead or dying. One of them was slumped against the wall, an icicle sticking out of his front.

I felt my screams come out in that instant. They filled the pub as steam rushed out of my open mouth. How many were dead? How many more would die like the boy at my feet? I fell to my knees into the snow. I could actually smell all the copper in the air.

What had I done? I was named Mentor by Daniel himself, named to lead and protect all of these men and women to fight for freedom and honor. It was my job, no matter what I wanted. It was not what I was meant to do, but it was what I had been named to do. And I had failed every one of them by letting them all die at the hands of that... that monster.

"What the-? SEVEN HELLS!"

Keaton and the others came into the pub behind me. They felt the same dread that I was feeling. Then I saw who in the corner was slumped against the wall.

"M-Matthew…" Asgeir said, holding his front.

Groaning, I saw the boy pull the icicle in his belly outwards. He dropped it to the ground beside him, then looked down. Blood was still coming out of his wound, which made both of us realize even more.

"You're…bleeding." I said.

Asgeir struggled to get his breath out. "So, I am…"

Ingrid could kill Asgeir. She made it so that none could kill him except her. I saw that as he gasped for air before slumping forwards as Zar and a few others rushed for him. But before they reached him, he tried to point his index finger to his right.

And then I saw why.

Unlike every other Assassin in the room, who looked to have been merely killed in the moment as they came for her, he was… displayed. Icicles coming out of the wall impaled nearly every point on his body, one even going right through the middle of his forehead, his eyes rolled upwards as he had tried gasping for that last breath. His pistol was still in his hands, and I spotted that baseball cap he always wore on the ground.

Ingrid didn't just leave Jason like that. She carved a message in the wall beside him. One that broke my very spirit as I screamed for his name, and felt the same burning desire Asgeir felt to have that monster burn in hell for everything that she had done.

"HE MISSED"