Read Online Dead of Winter by Kresley Cole - Free Book Online

the current of air flowed clockwise.
    Her power stoked, the heat from her body increasing till it scalded me. But I refused to release my hold. The buzz grew in volume. Louder. Louder .
    Our hair was dragged straight upward. When her body started levitating, I sank my claws deeper. If I hadn’t been here to anchor her, would she have floated away?
    The noise had gotten so loud her ears bled. Wet warmth slicked down my neck as well.
    Suddenly Tess threw back her head and screamed. I could perceive the earth—or our existence or reality or something —stilling for one airless instant . . . before grinding into motion. The wrong way.
    We were rotating backward! The World Card, Quintessence herself, was making time flow in reverse.
    First rotation. Below us came a splash as the Priestess first attacked. The leftover arsenal I’d used against her began to vanish—but within Tess’s circle, I remained the same, wet and bloodied.
    Tess met my gaze. Her skin paled, her cheeks thinning.
    Second rotation. Previous versions of me and Tess fled from the soldiers through the rock gully.
    Beneath my claws, she was shedding weight at an alarming rate. “Please, Empress.” The whites of her eyes were red, vessels blown. From pressure?
    Jack’s own eyes were gone. Brutally stolen. So I clawed her harder.
    Third rotation. The soldiers had just begun giving chase.
    Tess’s breathing grew labored. Her face was haggard, her cheekbones jutting sharply. Patches of her raised mane of hair came out, long sections plucked away into the ether.
    Fourth rotation. Four disguised Arcana meandered through the camp, almost at the twins’ tent.
    Tess’s sunken red eyes pleaded. She looked like one of my famine victims from a past game. Brittle. Dying.
    Her arms deflated in my grip, my bloody claws scraping over bone. Scrape, scrape . . .
    Would I kill this girl to save Jack’s sight? “Not yet, Tess! Not yet!”
    Fifth rotation. Still disguised, Gabriel and an earlier version of Tess landed on this bluff, meeting up with Selena and the earlier version of me. The beginning of our mission.
    â€œNo more!” I screamed.
    As if at the end of a car wreck, the spinning abruptly . . . stopped. Tess’s head lolled, the remains of her hair hanging over her face.
    The earth righted itself in fitful movements, seeming to gasp from exertion. With a shudder, the rotation ground forward once more.
    Those earlier versions of me and Tess disappeared—leaving us , two girls aware of the near future, but physically changed. I’d been drained of power, with no arsenal to show for it.
    And Tess . . . I released her arms, catching her as she collapsed, unconscious. Her now baggy clothing swallowed her emaciated body. Her teeth chattered, and she shivered for warmth. Would she survive?
    â€œWhat the hell, Evie?” Selena cried.
    She and Gabriel would have no idea why Tess was in this condition. For them, only an instant had passed.
    â€œShe used her power?” Gabriel demanded, his disguise faltering.
    â€œJust take her back! Get her warm, and help her. Make sure she survives.”
    â€œI go anon.” He cradled her slight weight and took to the sky.
    As her illusion faded to nothing, Selena narrowed her gaze. “You and Tess don’t have disguises. You’re bleeding and soaking wet. Portal to another dimension? Or did you go back in time?”
    â€œViolet is here. We have to save Jack in the next few minutes or he loses his eyes—”
    â€œHow many minutes?” Selena was already hastening toward the camp. She fiddled with a hi-tech sports watch on her sling arm.
    I scrambled to catch up. “Enough time for Tess and me to run to the water’s edge, then fight off the Priestess.”
    Selena raised her brows at that. Then she returned her concentration to the mission. “We’ll say four minutes of running. How long did