“If there is anyone here, it makes sense they would be down in the servants’ quarters. We should have started by going down instead of up.”
I didn’t entirely share her enthusiasm, but I did feel a faint stirring of hope. Surely anyone forced to work for years in such a strange and unnatural place would be glad to see us and eager to help us defeat the Snow Queen.
A glow of warmth around my hands attracted my attention, and I quickly clamped my fingers into fists. When had I begun to flame?
I watched a single drop of water run down the wall and shuddered. I had every intention of burning this place to the ground before I left, but not while we were down in the lower levels. My eyes tracked back up the staircase. How many tons of water stood frozen above us? Exploring this place had not been wasted effort. I needed to assure myself no one remained inside before I could bring it down.
My fists clenched tighter. No one but the Snow Queen, that is. If she was made of ice instead of flesh, she could melt along with her palace. Anyone who would willingly freeze an entire kingdom of people needed to be stopped.
The servants’ quarters we found looked no more lived in than the guest suites upstairs. And a long empty room that looked like it might be meant as a laundry held nothing at all. The last bit of hope for this level had dwindled to almost nothing when a sound hit my ears. I looked up.
“Was that…?”
“I don’t know,” said Giselle. “But I definitely heard something.”
Together we broke into a run, heading up the corridor in the opposite direction to our previous progress, following a quiet rhythmic sound that continued to echo through the silence. We pushed through a wide door, shoulder to shoulder, and stumbled into another large room.
The emptiness of this place had gotten under my skin more than I realized because the need for caution hadn’t even entered my head. Giselle seemed equally affected, actually grinning at the sight of a man calmly chopping potatoes. Until he raised his head, and we got a look at his face.
I stepped immediately away from Giselle, fire balls springing to life above my now outstretched hands.
“Very impressive, Princess Celine,” said Sterling, his voice calm and slow. “No less so than the first time I saw them. I was hoping we wouldn’t see you here, but I rather suspected we might.”
His otherwise emotionless voice seemed to carry the faintest undercurrent of mockery. I narrowed my eyes.
“You shouldn’t have doubted me.”
He gave a small bow, his hands not leaving the vegetables. “My sincere apologies. I shan’t do so again.”
“No,” I said. “I won’t be giving you the opportunity.” My fire balls bounced slightly, as if eager to be set loose, and yet I couldn’t quite bring myself to throw them at a man calmly chopping potatoes. However much of a lying traitor he had turned out to be.
“Where’s Oliver?” Giselle demanded from a half step behind me.
“With Her Majesty, I suppose,” said Sterling, looking back at his task.
“You suppose?” I slammed both my fists down onto the table, my fire extinguishing as I balled my hands. But enough warmth remained behind that the table steamed around my skin.
Sterling’s eyes returned to mine. “I believe she means to keep him with her always.”
Something about the way his eyes tightened ever so slightly and his mouth quirked gave me the impression that he knew I felt more for Oliver than friendship and enjoyed the pain his words might cause.
I kept my expression tight, refusing to let him see the pang that his statement sent through me.
“We’ll see about that.”
“Yes, I suppose we shall.” The methodical chopping sound resumed. When both Giselle and I remained frozen in place, he looked back up.
“You’re too late, you know. You can’t win here. Not even with all your…” He waved the tip of his knife toward the steaming table.
“You know nothing of my power,” I hissed.
“No, I don’t suppose I do,” he said thoughtfully. “But I have some experience with Her Majesty’s power. And she has already gripped your precious princeling in more ways than one. I don’t think you’ll find he even wants to leave.”
I swallowed, struggling to keep my face neutral. Surely he could not have been re-infected already? But then we were now in the heart of her powers. Who knew what she could do?
Drawing a breath, I forced a shrug. “Then we’ll just have to convince him.”
Sterling also shrugged and resumed chopping, but his eyes strayed back up to me, a gleam of curiosity and something else in them.
“Is it an object that you wield, princess from beyond our lands? Because it seems the godmothers have gifted you, indeed.”
I narrowed my eyes, watching him closely. His eyes roved over me, as if searching for a significant piece of jewelry or other object likely to hold such power. And I recognized the second emotion in his eyes. Avarice.
Sterling wanted my gift. Badly.
“No…” I said slowly, seeing no reason to lie. “I carry no object. The gift is in me.”
“Ah. Pity.” He turned away, but not before I saw the disappointment in his face.
Where was it I had seen Sterling before Eldon? Marin, he had said. Another distant memory surfaced. Of Palinar, before the wedding. Princes Jonathan and Dominic had asked me to keep an eye out for a man who had escaped during their final battle to free Palinar from the usurpers who had attempted to claim it. A man they believed had taken an enchanted object and fled into Eldon before the fighting began. A man who had already helped someone escape from a prison in Marin. Sudden understanding washed over me.
“Back in Valley View, they said you have long served the Snow Queen,” I said. “And yet I saw you in Marin. You serve her by seeking out enchanted objects, do you not? To grow her collection.”
He stilled for a moment. “Impressive. Your understanding is quicker than I expected.” When he looked up to meet my eyes, there was no shame or regret in his own. “Certainly that is my role. Her Majesty can no longer leave her snowy realm to search them out herself.”
Was that love in his eyes? Did he love this Snow Queen? But, no, that wasn’t quite it. Obsession then, perhaps? With her, or with the power she wielded?
“How can you?” I asked, the words bursting from me. “How can you serve such a person?”
He looked up at me, something like scorn in his expression. “Her Majesty wields power such as you can’t even imagine. She provides resources I could never hope to match on my own. And she is generous with the power she does not need.” His words cut off suddenly as if he’d said more than he intended.
I eyed him with narrowed eyes. So he got to keep some of the objects, did he? I thought of the empty pedestals in the display hall. What had he done with them?
After a moment of silent chopping, he continued, as if unable to help himself. “But soon that will all change. Soon she will wed the princeling and descend from her mountain fastness to take her true throne. Soon all of Eldon will be hers. And then she will have even more power to bestow upon her truest servants.”
My heart seized at his words, although I had already suspected it.
“Oliver would never marry this queen of yours,” said Giselle, disgust heavy in her tone.
“Won’t he, lass?” Sterling gave the ghost of a laugh. “I don’t think you’ll find he has any interest in gainsaying her. And once he is king—which will be soon enough, I imagine, given the state in which we left the capital—there will be no force to prevent the spread of her authority.”
I struggled to breathe, leaning heavily on the table as I fought to shrug off the weight of his words. That would never come to pass. Never.
“I thought you said she couldn’t leave this mountain,” said Giselle. I had expected her to be horrified at his casual reference to her parents’ death, but she sounded merely angry.
“No,” he said, drawing out the word, as if he enjoyed the conversation
. From the look of this place, he didn’t get many. “I said she couldn’t leave her snowy realm. But you saw how her power spreads already. Soon all of Eldon will meet that criteria.”
My mouth actually dropped open as the full extent of her plan crashed over me. I had suspected she wanted Oliver and his throne. But I had thought the winter and the frozen people a means to that end, not an end in itself. I looked around the large, mostly empty kitchen. I needed no more evidence that this was a queen who would happily rule a kingdom almost devoid of people.
“She can’t really mean to kill everyone and turn Eldon into an icy wasteland,” I managed to choke out.
Sterling looked at me, almost quizzically. “Why ever not?”
“But…all the people,” said Giselle, coming to lean on the table beside me as though her legs had grown weak. “She can’t!”
“I think,” said Sterling, “you’ll find she can. And I suspect a few of the strongest will survive. She might even lift their enchantment enough to let them serve her.” He stopped to ponder his words. “Yes, she might well do that.”
I wanted to burn the kitchen down around him at his words, but curiosity restrained me. He seemed to be enjoying speaking freely as his true self rather than the front he had shown us previously. And I had questions I wanted answered.
“The cave in,” I said. “That wasn’t you, was it?”
I had expected him to look confused, but instead he looked contemptuous.
“Of course it was me. Her Majesty wouldn’t have entrusted the task to anyone else, I assure you.”
“But she needs Oliver,” said Giselle. “You just said that. Why would you try to kill him?”
“Kill him?” Sterling’s knife continued to descend in methodical rhythm. “Of course I didn’t intend to kill him. I would have ensured the rock landed on his head if that had been my aim. I merely wanted to trap him for a while. To weaken him enough to allow—” He cut himself off abruptly, eyeing us briefly. “Suffice to say I had a means of getting him up the mountain, but it required him to be a little less energetic. And since the queen’s enchantment wore off unexpectedly, I had to improvise another way.”
He looked at me. “I suppose you were responsible for that. I don’t suppose you’d tell me how?”
He paused, but I said nothing, and he sighed. “No, I didn’t think so. After your unexpected escape from the tunnels, I’ll admit I became a little cautious. I don’t like having elements at play that I don’t understand.” He eyed me again, and I glared at him.
After a moment, he continued. “But it eventually became clear that I had no need to force Oliver up the mountain. His desperation had grown to the point that I needed only to spin the truth a little, to give him an appealing enough story that he would follow me of his own volition. I didn’t even have to make most of it up.”
I closed my eyes briefly. The most convincing lies always held some measure of truth.
“You told us a story about an orphan girl turned princess.” After seeing the bizarre portrait gallery, I couldn’t help myself asking him about it. “Was that part true? Did you speak of Queen Estelle?”
He looked between us. “You’ve been in the portrait gallery, then?” He shook his head. “I suppose even the most powerful of us have our weaknesses.” The thought seemed to give him pause, and he fell silent.
“What is the connection between them?” I prodded him. “And what was the object beside her portrait?”
For a moment I thought he wouldn’t answer, but then he shrugged. A shadow filled his eyes, and he seemed distracted still by whatever earlier thought had made him pause.
“As you guessed, the deserving orphan girl from my story was Estelle. And she was real enough. She was also the servant in a noble household. A household with a daughter her own age.”
I could already see where this was going, but I didn’t interrupt.
“The servant girl was much beloved by all who knew her. Except for the noble girl who was jealous of her despite their stations.”
“Let me guess, the noble girl is the Snow Queen,” said Giselle, with a disbelieving look. “And I suppose she told you all about her jealousy.”
Sterling gave us a wry smile. “I am not without intelligence, you know. I can read between the lines as well as the next man. And, as I said, we are none of us without our weaknesses.”
“Was there really an enchantment on the royal family?” I asked.
He shook his head. “No, that part I made up. I needed to link the story to the village. To give a reason for them to possess an object that protected them from both snow and enchantment. Estelle was given a magical cloak by her godmother. One that would reveal her true self when she wore it. So she might attend a ball at the palace, and be seen for who she truly was.”
He looked disgusted. “What a ridiculous use of such power. Truly, power is wasted on the godmothers.”
“And yet Estelle’s pedestal is empty,” I said. “And the one here bears a cloak. I suppose the noble girl stole it?”
“It is all rather predictable, is it not?” he said. “She hated the idea that her own servant might be judged more worthy of being a princess than her. But she was a different person then. It would be many years before she became a queen worth serving. But even now, when Estelle is long dead, she cannot let go of her completely. She keeps the portrait and the cloak, a constant reminder. But perhaps when she rules over Estelle’s kingdom—when it has become an icy wasteland that serves only her—perhaps then she will at last be able to put it all aside.”
I wanted to be sick at the calm way he said the words, at how coldly he viewed the horrifying story about his chosen ruler.
“The servant girl became a princess anyway,” I said, trying to understand how the noble girl had ever become the Snow Queen. “So Estelle didn’t need the cloak in the end.”
“No.” Sterling looked thoughtful. “I suppose that only enraged her noble mistress further. And when she tried to use the garment herself, it didn’t work how she had imagined. Even her only family turned away at the sight of her true self.”
He said the words with no more emotion than he had said anything else, but in spite of myself I felt the force of them in my gut. Didn’t we all fear that somewhere deep inside? That if people saw our true selves, they would turn away in disgust. However dark her heart had been as a girl, could I wonder that it had only become more twisted?
Giselle must have seen the reluctant pity on my face because her next words seemed directed as much at me as Sterling. “A sad tale, certainly. But whatever she suffered then, she isn’t that person anymore. I would say she’s long since forfeited her humanity with the choices she’s made and the magic she’s used. She might have twisted godmother objects, but she seems to have twisted herself even more.”
Sterling actually laughed at that. “It’s an apt parallel. Only the objects have kept her alive so long, and it’s hard to know where they end and she begins. I have long pondered on it. She searched many years for an object that would remove her crippling emotions. Strip her of the grief and anger and make her strong. She told me long ago that she eventually found a locket. The second of her many magical acquisitions after the cloak. The locket was enchanted to guard the wearer’s heart. That seems to have been the start of the ice theme.”
He glanced down at the frozen bench beneath his knife. “I suppose when what you wish to guard against is actually your heart itself—when you direct such an object against itself in such a way—it is bound to have unexpected results.” He looked up at us. “But you won’t see that object on display anywhere. Even I have not seen it. She keeps it close to her always, I believe.”
Something about the calm way he spoke such monstrous things about his own mistress ignited my fire again without conscious thought. It sizzled against the ice table, and I sent it shooting along the surface to consume his potatoes.
He jumped back with a yelped exclamation, and I cut off the flames, standing tall again.
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“You can stay here if you want,” I said, turning to leave the room. At the door I paused, looking back. “But I intend to melt this place to the ground, so you might want to consider leaving before that happens.”
I didn’t wait to hear his response before stalking out of the room.
Chapter 28
I was done skulking below stairs. As usual for a palace, a set of servants’ stairs stood just outside the kitchen door, and I stormed up them. I could hear the patter of Giselle’s feet behind me, but I didn’t stop to look back or speak to her.
The staircase led us up to a small antechamber. We had yet to explore the state rooms on the main floor, but I easily recognized the purpose of this space. Maybe because I had stood in the equivalent stone room in many other palaces.
I pointed across at a door on the other side, larger and more ornately carved than the one we had just entered through.
“I think that’s the throne room. Or a banqueting hall, at least.”
Giselle worried at her lip beside me. “Do you think she’s in there? Do you think he’s in there?”
I snorted contemptuously. “She sounds like the type to sit around on her throne all day, don’t you think?”
I strode forward and put my hand on the door, but a soft protest from Giselle made me pause. I looked back at her.
“Do you think…Are you sure that’s a good idea?” she asked.
I paused, forcing myself to truly consider her words. Now was not the time to let reckless emotion drive me. If the Snow Queen was holding solitary court inside, with the man I loved chained to her side, did I really want to go bursting through these doors? I tried to think of other options, craftier ones, but nothing came to me. I could feel down to my bones that there was no escaping a confrontation with this woman—or whatever she was.
“No,” I said at last, in answer to Giselle’s question. “But I don’t have any other ideas. And I’m sick to death of all this snow and ice. It’s time to end this.”
Beyond the Four Kingdoms Box Set 1: Three Fairytale Retellings (Four Kingdoms and Beyond Box Sets Book 3) Page 77
