Winter Reign: Rise of the Winter Queen

by N. M. Howell

  We come at last to the Roseheart Gate, a colossal work of steel and rubies that makes the Obsidian Gate of Golrend look like a yard fence. On our approach the gate is swinging open for a group of merchants. Thea and I crouch down among them and pass through. Once on the other side we find ourselves in the middle of a market so vast and sumptuous I wonder if anyone in these lands has ever known hunger, or cold, or fear. Everyone we pass is dressed in silk and leather, their hands and neck draped in gold and the finest jewels. They bear diamonds the size of grapes and their horses are nearly twice as large as any I’ve ever seen before. They take a single bite of meat and throw the rest into the garbage. They talk, laugh, joke, kiss, and skip as if there were nothing more to life than their own joy at this very moment.

  “We have crossed into a land of plenty,” says Thea, who, even after having been raised in a castle, seems disturbed by the gratuity of it all.

  “This is a land of waste,” I say, my hand on the hilt of my sword, fighting the temptation to punish them all for their disgusting avarice. “I cannot imagine a man who calls himself king of this circus will be of much use to us.”

  At this one of the King’s Guard turns in my direction. I have spoken louder than I intended.

  “You there, beggar,” he says to me. “You will watch your tongue in this market or you will lose it.”

  I turn to him quickly, ready to voice my opinion of this place, and he jumps back so fast and so far that he stumbles and falls. It is unbelievable. Have I truly scared him so by simply turning around? Is this all that Gardenwall has to offer?

  “Get up,” I say.

  He doesn’t move. Empty of patience and sympathy, I draw my blade. I bury just the point in his thigh. He screams like a young maiden.

  “I will not ask again. Take your feet.”

  He follows my command and stands. By now everyone around us has stopped shopping and is backing away. Thea and I follow him through the market, my blade in the small of his back. We come to the drawbridge and fortunately it is down. Once we cross the moat we find ourselves surrounded by more of the Guard, but I can tell by looking at them that they are more of the same; however, their numbers are so great that I take no chances. I command twenty of them to take up arms against me. Only a dozen can muster enough courage to draw their blade. I dispatch them mercilessly, for even though my magic has not returned and I have but one good arm at present, my sword hand is perfect. I leave them in a broken and bloody pile, not dead, but certainly wishing they had never seen my face.

  The coward leads us into Orchid’s Eye, the largest most extravagant castle ever built. There simply are no words to describe its beauty and size. Up and across and through we go, on our way to him. At last we arrive in the grandest hall I have ever seen and at the far end of the room sits the High King.

  “The High King Michael,” the coward says in a trembling voice.

  I hit him over the head and he collapses. Thea and I cross the floor, and not one of the Guard dare to get in my path. It is a truly pathetic display. I reach the king and it is certainly the same man from my vision. He does not seem so old as I imagined he would, but his hair has begun to gray and there are many lines in his face. The crown from my vision sits atop his head and all I can think is that he does not deserve it. He smirks at me.

  “You seem very pleased with yourself, beggar maid,” he says.

  “I’ve stormed your castle with only a blade and my will.”

  “You are not brave, peasant, only fortunate. The men you see here now are merely show puppets. They follow me around and speak like big men, but it is all a ruse. The true force is away just now. I only wish you’d come twenty years ago. The King’s Guard were real men then. You would not have passed the market.”

  “You do not even know to whom you speak,” I say.

  At last I remove my hood. It is with no small satisfaction that I see him sit back in his chair. On seeing my white hair he is shocked into silence. The arrogance disappears from his countenance and Queen or no, I stand proud and cold-hearted before this meager king.

  “I seek one thing from you, king,” I say. “Pardon for my people, wrongly punished for so-called crimes of past age.”

  “I know your schemes well, High King,” says Thea. “You have no honor. You hire mercenaries to protect your kingdom. And your people will not oppose you so long as you keep them buried in gold and silk.”

  “I am a king!” he says. “The king! You will watch your tongue, little--”

  “That is quite enough from you,” I say.

  I pull out the Prism and hold it up for him to see.

  “This is dark magic here, king. I ask you again for pardon.”

  “You have your magic in a crystal?”

  “It is not mine.”

  I’ve said it before I can stop myself. And like the snake he is, he does not miss my slip.

  “Not yours, you say?” he echoes, easing some in his chair. “Then whose is it?”

  “Do not stray from our request. I will not ask again.”

  “If that is not your magic, it belongs to someone else. And why should you hold someone else’s power. . . unless you have none of your own?”

  The King’s Guard come somewhat closer, emboldened by the thought that I might have no magic. Perhaps it was my white hair and ancestry they feared more than anything.

  “And why threaten me?” the king continues, crossing his legs as if he were at leisure. “Why not simply use your power? Unless you can’t. Unless you do not even know how to use that crystal.”

  It is true. Thea has told me exactly what the Queen told her, but it has all been to no avail. We have not yet been able to open the Prism, despite using the proper incantation. I must truly seem a fool now, standing here holding another’s power without even the knowledge to use it. The king begins to laugh. Harder and louder until he is moving from side to side in his chair, doubled over in his mirth.

  “This is what I live for,” he says. “These moments of underestimation that end inevitably, as such foolishness must, in agony.”

  As if on cue, twenty behemoths come from the dark corner to our left. Brawny, bearded, and wielding curved blades. Mercenaries. The king ushers them forward.

  “What kind of fool king to you think I am?” he asks. “Did you really think I would stay in this land without capable men to protect me? Leave myself vulnerable to any weak and simple Queen who longs for my crown? No, indeed,” he gloats, turning to the men. “Kkeirgardenloth godnerhr. Flotrhh magndudehr rigsth.”

  I do not know the words, but I know the tongue. It is Blovvnerhr, language of the mercenaries from that uncharted land north of Glassenross. It is the tongue of the so-called ghost mercenaries, men so hard to kill it seems as though they must surely already be dead. As they approach I do not wait for welcome. I rush forth to engage and though it takes quite some effort, I dispose of the first. The second and third engage me, true warriors to be sure, and I have hardly dispatched another before I am surrounded on all sides. It is harder to attack without reading my opponents’ thoughts, but three years has brought me great skill with the blade. Three more I cut down, though one of those manages to crawl away. Another goes for Thea, but I cut off his outstretched arm and then his head. Another and another and another fall by my blade. These men are no ghosts, no legend, but I am not so blind that I cannot see. I will not defeat them on my own.

  “The Prism, Thea!” I yell.

  As I continue to fight, she brings it forth. I run and slide between two mercenaries and take the Prism from Thea. I smash it on the floor. Traega’s mor’lumière crawls out and I bring my hand down into the middle of it. The black stuff moves over my hand and into my skin. High King Michael, who has laughed through this entire ordeal is suddenly silent. And now it is I who laugh, for the black magic feels hot and strong in my blood. It feels good. I have never felt such power, such invincibility. And suddenly the darker side of magic does not seem so evil. Or perhaps it is that evil suits me wel
l.

  I turn to the ghost mercenaries and raise my hand. A black substance creeps from my hand, branches through the air and pierces the chest of each. I pull it back and with it comes each of their hearts. For good measure I send black stars to take their heads. I turn to the king, now cowering in his throne. I bury a black star in his chest; I sense it grasping the length of his spine. He screams.

  “I seek pardon, puny man,” I say, in a voice not my own.

  “You shall have it!” he screams. “I yield to you!”

  “Do not make it so easy, tyrant. I wish to enjoy this. Why should a pardon suffice? Why should I not seek your kingdom? You cannot even defend against two little maidens.”

  “Nevena, stop!” Thea pleads. “This is not the way! You are a Queen and I believe in your heart and your--”

  She cannot finish, for with a black gust I throw her away from me.

  “Now, king, we are alone at last. Throw down your crown.”

  He hesitates. I seep a red smoke from my mouth and it creeps into his ears. And then he gets a dark look about him. As if the very thought of joy had fled him. He puts the crown in his lap and stares at it. He lets it fall to the floor. He screams. I laugh as my vision is realized.

  I hear a commotion behind me. I turn to see row upon row of soldiers coming through the doors. My soldiers. Aiglon and Fox Lords and Giants, all coming for me. I raise my hand, but nothing happens. The taste of Traega’s magic is spent. And now I see Yunger approaching, furious. The High King slumps in relief. The dark magic leaves me and my mind clears, but I am already being chained. Yunger stands over me as I’m thrown to the ground.

  “Where is Lady Thea?”

  I turn to look for her, but all I see is a broken window next to where she was standing.

  Chapter 16

  Only one realm lies between the Winterlands and the Sightless Sea. Jacob and Katrina have made for the coast in search of their eldest daughter. Word has come to Glassenross that she and Laoren have already set sail. The lord and lady intend to meet their daughter at the shore. They do not know what they will say or do. They know only that they love her and that she must be saved.

  At that very moment, some distance away on the same sea, Delara sits in the unlit corner of the bottommost level of the ship. She is watching Horace to ensure he does not hurt the body, for somewhere in her cold heart she still desires Eduard. She has used a cloaking spell to conceal herself, so that if Eduard wakes she might look at him for a time, unnoticed.

  She hears footsteps on the stairs. Laoren descends into the room. She walks over to the cage and looks down on the prisoner.

  “I warned you, Horace,” she begins. “And you, too, Eduard. This madness will not be tolerated. I know not if you can understand me now, but I have already judged you guilty of the dreadful waste of powerful magic. You cannot control your own mind and you are of no use to me. When we reach land I will peel the flesh from your bones and what is left will be food for Vampires and Loqckna.”

  The body is still insensible, its eyes rolling back and forth, its mouth hanging open.

  “Fear not, mad prince, for you shall have company. As soon as I suck the vierg’lumière from your child, it shall follow you to the belly of the beast.”

  Laoren ascends the stairs. Delara begins to weep, her heart breaking as she holds her stomach.

  I lie in the middle of a windowless dungeon, starving, weak, and hated by too many to count. My clothes have become rags, my sword has been melted down, and I have been chained here for three months. Long, hard weeks have I spent here, growing thinner and thinner by the day. I have not been allowed to shower or go out into the sun or eat anything other than bread and water. I have been branded an enemy of freedom and the Hundred Kingdoms. I hear them. They are coming for me now.

  They unfasten my chains from the wall and half lead, half carry me out of the cage, through the dungeon, and up the stairs. When we pass the first window, I scream. The sunlight burns my eyes. From here they all but drag me through the halls, where hundreds have gathered to watch. I am acutely aware of my filthy appearance and smell.

  On and on we journey past the spectators and their whispers and pointing fingers, until at last we reach Chrysanthemum’s Break, the highest and harshest court of the kingdoms. On the Grand Petal, where the judges stand, I see the nine men and women who will condemn me. And in the special section beside them I see Yunger and Dameron. And Ciraa.

  I am lead to the stairs of the High Stem, a stand that rises thirty feet in the air so that the one hundred and fifty thousand spectators in the room can watch me. I reach the top. The royal sorcerer lengthens my chains and attaches them to the ceiling high above, keeping my arms raised above my head. The hammer falls. My trial begins.

  In the months that have passed, Laoren and her horde have made their way to the coast. Finally they have made land. Delara has become quiet and despondent, more murderous and volatile than ever. She has begun to both fear and long for the birth of her child. Her doomed child. Terror and loathing are driving her mad.

  When she sees them standing on the shore, she is bewildered. Her mother and father. They have waited there every day. They smile at her, coming slowly, hand in hand, happier than they have been in years. They call to her, but she can hardly hear them. Her brain is a web of confused and black images. Her senses do not work. Evil and joy are at war within her, tearing her heart and spirit in two. She turns and sees Laoren behind her, quiet and serene, waiting. Somehow Delara finds herself on her knees. How can her child be marked for death? How can she be a killer? How could she have trusted this witch? Where is Nevena? Why doesn’t Eduard love her? When will this evil consume her completely so she does not have to feel? Why can’t she simply kill the world?

  Her parents are nearly upon her. She looks up and sees their smiling, tear-streaked faces. She reaches out to them. They reach for her. The earth begins to tremble. A blackness begins in her palm. Then her parents and an entire half mile of the shoreline are gone.

  “Nevena of Ethore, servant girl, false Queen, mutineer, and murder. You are charged with endangerment of your battalion, negligent command, murder of an unarmed prisoner, the death of Aiglon Commander Floron, and failure to complete your mission or return to the city of Golrend. We charge you with the destruction of Night’s Deep, since called the Battle of the White Forest, and the inadvertent deaths of four hundred refugees taking shelter in those woods. We charge you with wrongful entry to the royal city of Gardenwall, assaulting the King’s Guard, besieging the castle, vicious murder of the king’s personal guard, and, most shocking of all, the ruthless attempted assassination of the High King Michael himself. We charge you with the reckless and dangerous use of magic, both here and abroad. This court also takes special notice of what befell Thea, of the former House of Eaynfall, your own companion, for whose fate you can blame only yourself. Lastly, we charge you with being of the Braelynn folk of the Winterlands, a people long since marked for death for their crimes against all that is good and true on earth.”

  The list of crimes bothers me not. I am hollow. Empty. I feel nothing.

  “How does your heart stand here today?”

  “I do not stand at all,” I say. “I have committed these sins and more. Send me to my death.”

  “Were I you, I would not presume to sway the minds of these nine men and women, in your favor or against,” Fifth Judge says.

  “You do not seem a murderess,” says Third Judge, “Though in my years I have seen terrific changes in a heart after confinement to our cages. This desire to end your own life does not garner you any pity from this court. Chrysanthemum’s Break will judge you for what you are, not what you want.”

  The judges nod in unison and all around me I hear the murmuring of a quarter million people anxious to see my fate decided.

  “Let us not waste further time,” says Fifth Judge. “The numerous charges have been read and now the court will call its first witness. General Yunger.”

 
Yunger leaves the special section and walks across the narrow band running in front of the Grand Petal. He reaches the witness stand and turns to face me.

  “General, Chrysanthemum’s Break calls upon your true and heartfelt testimony, unadulterated and given in the sight of the Almighty. Will you give it?”

  “I will,” Yunger says.

  “Very well. As you were not present at any of the events for which the accused is tried, we ask only that you provide some detail as to her character. Proceed.”

  “I have known her since she was a child,” Yunger begins. “I was a knight and Wall Watch at Moerdra Castle for several years. The accused, Nevena, would come to the top of the wall at night and I would allow her to sit up with me. She was quiet, kind, wise beyond her years. She was beloved by all and one of the closest, most trusted servants of the House Eaynfall. They took great pride in her, so much that they assigned her to be the Red Shadow of Eduard Fenraden. She was brave, strong, caring. Just more than three years ago, the castle was attacked by the Empress’s Helkar. Nevena and Grandestor saved us all. And for some time after that I heard nothing of her.

  “Finally, I met her again at the city of Golrend and as time passed and the skirmishes began, I grew to trust and respect her. After three years of fighting together, depending on each other in battle and in peace, I appointed her command of twelve thousand soldiers. I sent her on a mission to the Winterlands to ascertain what schemes the enemy brew there. That was the last time I saw before I arrested her. I never dreamed she would lead them into the hell of Night’s Deep or that she would cost us the lives of almost a thousand brave soldiers. I am still in shock that she was directly responsible for the death of Commander Floron. Even more so for what she did to Thea.”