The Fairy Letters: A FROST Series(TM) Novel

by Gow, Kailin

  The day of my father's death and the breaking of my mother's heart was the hardest day of my life. From that day forth, I knew, there was no time to think of you – except in my dreams, when you crept forth, your eyes daring and bold, your lips soft and sweet. The paintings I had once made of you had aged as you had aged, and often – when I could no longer bear it – I would sneak by moonlight to look at them and to see how you had grown – grown into a woman of such splendid beauty that my heart ached all the harder at our parting.

  But by day I had to be a soldier. By day I had to think of you not of the woman I had once loved, but as my greatest enemy – the woman whose father's irresponsibility, whose mother's weakness, whose stepmother's cruelty and treachery had led to the death of the father I loved so dearly. I could not think of the Summer Court any longer without hate and anger – for all the loved ones I had lost in the war, a body count that would grow as the war went on. My boyhood friends were killed, one by one, until of that set of us that used to joke together only Flynn – as battle-hardy as I was – remained. The only way to stay alive, in those days, was to close ourselves off, to give ourselves over to the coldness of hate.

  I don't know if I ever stopped loving you. In my heart I know that no such thing is possible – our connection was and is too strong for it to ever be broken. But I was forced to cloister my love away, hide it in a space of my heart so deep and dark that even I could not reach it. There was no use in trying to love you any longer – not when love had caused such pain, such misery. In the blank, expressionless face of my mother at breakfast each morning – the thoughtless cruelty with which she told me that if I failed at battle, she would imprison me in the dungeon as she had once done when I was a child, the threats she made against me if I dared to leave any Summer knight alive – I saw my own reflection, newly born. She had grown as cold as the snow, and many now called her The Snow Queen. Following like a shadow behind her steps, my heart was as icy as the snow which surrounded our palace. By then, my enemies knew me as the Ice Prince or Snow Prince, with a deadly sword, and ice chips in my veins.

  And then I met you again.

  Letter 7

  My dearest Breena,

  I still remember with sweetness and strangeness what it was like to see you again after all those years. You were sixteen, and I twenty-one (though in Feyland, you were a good old eighteen), and in that time we had both, in a sense, forgotten each other. I continued waging battles and you continued living your life in Gregory, Oregon – watched over by that kind Wolf whom I know you recall so well. And while I watched over you from time to time – Shasta would bring me tell of you when she sneaked into the Land Beyond the Crystal River on some of her various adventures – eventually my anger at Summer grew so great that I could not bear to think or speak or look at you at all. I began to think that I would never see you again – that you were nothing to me now – no longer my intended, no longer my bride.

  And then one morning, during the darkest days of the war, my mother summoned me, her voice cold. “Shasta has been captured,” she said, her eyes dark and flashing. “Those treacherous Summer villains – she is at their palace, in Redleaf's grasp! They have a hostage.” She gritted her teeth. “Something must be done to shock the Court – to shock that fool Flametail – into handing her back.”

  “We can march on the castle tonight, my Queen.” I bowed low, as was customary.

  “No,” she snapped. “Too dangerous. We'd never win – their magic is strong, and without Shasta's royal magic any attempt at besieging the castle is worthless. Stupid girl – getting herself captured like that! I ought to have her executed the moment we get her back.” She threw up her hands in consternation. “But we cannot allow the Summer Court the political victory of keeping her. It wouldn't do for troop morale – oh the fool, the little stubborn fool!”

  “We must get her back,” I assented, and although my mother's heart was full of anger, mine was mixed with concern – she was my little sister, after all. “What will you have me do?”

  “We need another hostage,” my mother said. “But there's no heir to the Summer throne in Feyland – only...” She did not say the name, but a shiver passed through my spine at the implication. “Only Breena,” she said coldly.

  “What do you propose, my Queen?” I ignored the feelings stirring within me. “Shall we kill her?” (Breena – remember! It was not until you melted my heart and thawed my cruelty that I rediscovered the love I once felt for you.)

  “Don't be a fool – what purpose would that serve? We must bring her here and offer her as a hostage – trade her for Shasta. While she's here, we can influence her – she has no memory of this war. Perhaps she can be far more persuaded than her father or stepmother to concede to our demands. But first we need her...”

  “But where will we find her?” I asked. “The land beyond the Crystal River is a big place.”

  “You forget I knew her mother,” said the Winter Queen. “I know where she was placed. I gave them some silver for them to sell – I helped establish their home. Her mother is an honorable enough woman – but I am afraid for her own good we cannot involve Raine in this. She may fear too strongly for her daughter's safety to allow us to do it straightforwardly – you must take the girl by force.”

  “I take it we are less concerned about her safety,” I said.

  “It is better for us if she does not die,” said the Winter Queen. “She is useless to us if she dies. But – I am not overly concerned what happens to her once Shasta is restored to us. Perhaps Redleaf will be willing to take her back for the express purpose of having her killed – the last thing the Autumn contingent wants is a return of the rightful heiress to the throne.”

  I nodded.

  “Or else her father, overcome by his paternal affection,” she almost spat the words, “will barter for her like the fool he is.” She scoffed. “In either case, it doesn't matter – the princess Breena is useful to us, and I demand that you find her, capture her, keep her hostage, and bring her back here.”

  “Your wish is my command, my Queen.” I bowed once again.

  “I hope you have no lingering...weaknesses for the girl,” my mother said.

  “I assure you,” I said. “All my love is for the Winter Court.”

  “Hurry, then,” said my mother. “I hear talk that the Pixies are plotting too – once the girl turns sixteen, she will come into her magic, and then all creatures in Feyland will be able to sense her. You must outstrip them – or die trying.”

  And so I went forth to seek you, Breena – forth to Gregory, Oregon. I still recall the first sight of you I had in over ten years – the way I gasped at your beauty, so much richer in real life than it had been in my paintings. I swallowed down my pride and desire, of course – as far as I was concerned, you were my enemy. You were dangerous to me – a Summer Princess – and I was dangerous to you, for I was, after all, a fairy – and I knew the legends of what fairy love could do to humans. I knew Raine had been a rare case – she had not gone mad when kissed by your father – but I knew also what a threat fairies posed to your kind.

  I remember how cold I was to you at first – trying to ignore the magic that poked and prodded at my heart – trying to maintain my fairy demeanor – the demeanor of a brave, proud soldier – the kind of which my mother would approve. I did not want to show weakness, to succumb to my incipient desires. And yet the more time I spent with you – on the run – as we stayed in my hunting lodge en route to the Winter Court, the more I felt that our separation, the fading of our love, was little more than an aberration – it was not real, only a nightmarish echo of something false, something strange. The love I had once felt for you – the love I refused to let myself feel for you – that was real. Only that was real.

  And then our kiss. I remember that night in all its glory – the milk-white shining of the night sky, the way the night was spread out like a fur coat over us, protecting us, keeping us warm and shrouded in its darkness. I remem
ber the curve of your mouth, the soft pursing of your lips that filled my veins with the fire of desire. I didn't just want to love you, I wanted to take you into my arms, to possess you, to succumb to the danger – to let it consume me, to feel the exhilaration of all my long-held principles, all my cruel competence, burn to ash. I longed to burn – and you with me – and yet I held back. The danger in the air was palpable. I knew that if you lacked the strength, the ability to burn – that the danger would be too great. I would crush you – kill you, even. Your madness would run rampant, unchecked – it would destroy you! I had sworn once to destroy every member yet living of the Summer Court, and yet I could never bring myself to do that to you. Staring into your eyes, holding you in my arms, I felt that there was nothing in the world I wanted to do more than to protect you, to keep you safe. My desire to kiss you, to let the ravaging of my lips drive us both mad, was outweighed by my desire to cloister you away from this dangerous power. I wanted to destroy you and to preserve you at the same time – to kiss you and kill you at once!

  And then you made the decision for me. As our eyes locked together, as I wavered, torn between my duty and my desire, you reached up, with a small but impish smile, and touched your lips to mine. I still remember the sensation that rushed through me at such a moment, a burst of hot magic – as white and searing as a flame. This was not the carefully controlled magic I wielded in battle. No, this was something different – something greater! This was the ancient magic of the earth, the primeval secrets that made it shake and grow and kill and give birth all at once, the magic so dangerous that fairies feared it most of all: the magic of love.

  I felt the earth calling to us, gathering its magic and connecting with ours. And all at once we were not merely two people kissing, two figures locked in loving embrace, but rather part of something greater, part of the pulsating force that tied us in to all life and all love everywhere – to the buzzing of flies and the flapping of eagles, to the rushing of river-streams and the ripe hatching of eggs – all the greatest magic of Feyland, the magic of birth and death alike, entered into us, and we into it.

  I held you tighter, afraid – so afraid – that you would not be able to withstand my gaze and my kiss, afraid this magic would destroy you as it had done so many humans, afraid you would not be strong enough to bear it.

  What a fool I was to doubt you! When, my darling Breena – oh when have you ever been anything but strong, far stronger than I! When I felt your lips kissing me back, pressing hungrily against mine, powerful in their desire, I knew in rapturous certainty that you were not mad – that I had not destroyed you! No, the magic of our love had made you stronger than ever – the fairy side of you defeated any potential human weaknesses.

  I will not deny it, Breena. You were not the first girl I had kissed in my life. It was the duty of a good and manly soldier to have the customary dalliances with tavern wenches and the customary flirtations with ladies of the court. But never had any of those lips my lips had kissed been as real to me, as full of magic and passion, as yours. Instantly, any thoughts of those half-hearted indiscretions vanished, and there was nothing in my heart but my love for you – there were no thoughts in my head but of kissing you, of holding you, of loving you forever.

  And then I knew then what I know now – with that same certainty. You and I are meant to be, Breena. Our love is not, as my mother fears, an affront to magic, but rather its highest culmination – only in our love is the great magic of the world consummated. Not the spells of the pixies, not the magic tools of our soldiers, not even our respective royal magic can compare to it. I believe that, Breena – I have to believe it, if I am not to lose all hope. In our love there is something more than mere desire. There is true magic.

  Letter 8

  My Dearest Breena,

  Writing to you as I did about our kiss brought to mind an old fable told by my mother. She spoke often, as I have written to you, about Queen Tamara, the great Queen who never loved, and whose military victories and powerful magical powers were known throughout Feyland. But she spoke sometimes about the tragedy of Tamara's older brother, he who would have been king. For Tamara's brother Artaud, much like a certain Winter Prince you might recognize, fell in love with a mortal girl on his quests beyond the Crystal River – a girl called Josefina. My mother loved to recount to me and Shasta, when we were children, about the foolishness of Artaud and Josefina. For Artaud carried his maiden, so-much-beloved, back to his lair, in the hopes of making her his queen and ruling Feyland with her – much to the consternation of Tamara, his younger sister, who had hoped to rule and who, my mother was quick and keen to point out, deserved the title far more than did her brother. But when they were married, at the great marriage-ceremony in the heart of the Winter Palace, as he leaned in to kiss her his wings burst forth from his tunic- great, scaly, silver things – just at the moment that his lips touched her. Josefina screamed – she knew her beloved was a prince, but she had not understood the power of magic until that moment – and as her terror mixed in with the magic and love expressed by his kiss, the great magic of his love was polluted, and instead of blessing Josefina, it cursed her, sending her mad. It is this story that forms the basis of the tradition of which I have spoken to you, the idea that a fairy's kiss sends a human mad.

  In her raging insanity, Josefina jumped from the balcony of the palace, plummeting to her death, and Artaud was so distraught at her demise that he grabbed his father's sword – the most powerful sword in the land – and hacked off his own wings from his back, silver pouring down from the wounds. Only once his wings lay in a bloodied, messy pile on the floor did he rush forth to the balcony, and in a single cry - “Josefina!” - filled with anguish and despair – did he jump too, and with his immortality sacrificed (for not even the Snowflake can protect against such a strong magical attack) he too died a human's death, and Tamara ascended to the throne in her brother's stead.

  “Now, the moral of this story,” my mother used to tell me, “is that we have one wise ruler and one foolish ruler. Which was the wise, and which was the foolish?” We all, eager to gain my mother's reserved approval, chirped in unison that Artaud was the foolish fairy, and Tamara the wise one.

  But we – by which I mean Shasta and I – never quite gained the approval that we sought. I speak no ill of my mother. She was and is a brave woman, a courageous woman, a woman who has sacrificed much – who was even forced to kill the man she could not help but love in order to save her kingdom. I can never doubt that, nor can I begrudge her her strength. But as a child, I did not crave strength. From my mother and my father alike I craved affection, love – the warmth of their arms and the sweetness of their kisses. I received such things from neither. It was not in the fairy way – at least not at the Winter Court – to display one's emotions openly. That is not what one did – especially not for my mother, who even more than my father, took seriously what she perceived to be the ancient traditions of the Winter Court, and hence of Feyland (for she, like all good Winter patriots, believed that the Winter traditions were the most ancient and powerful, and that the ways of the Summer Court were but a recent innovation on the part of more “modern” fairies).

  I will not deny that it was difficult growing up with such a mother. In your world, I imagine, one would be scandalized to think that one's mother had locked her son up in a dungeon for failing to win a fencing-match, or for improperly reciting the dates of major battles in Feyland's history!

  Indeed, I often think back upon my childhood with a strange mix of nostalgia and faint amusement. I cannot deny either that I am envious of the life you lived with Raine in Oregon. Your mother, I knew – from the moment she agreed to give up your father and leave Feyland forever – would do anything for you. She loved you – you, Breena, not some abstract heir to the Summer Throne but rather a real, flesh-and-blood individual, her child, her only daughter. My mother's affection was of a wholly different kind. If she did love me, it was as a prince first and a son second.
She saw it as her royal duty to impose upon me the kind of sharp discipline that would make me a good, strong, soldier – a good protector of the land she loved so dearly. If she locked me in the dungeon overnight, it was not out of lack of love for me that she did so – although this was a hard lesson to learn at six or seven years of age – but rather because she believed in all her inflexible firmness that it was the best way, nay the only way, to protect me and protect Feyland. Even immortal fairies do not last forever – if they are not killed by powerful magic, they step down from the throne to retire when they can no longer reign as well as they once could. If she were to be killed – it would be my duty to take over Feyland, and I cannot deny that her harshness made me a better fighter and a better ruler than I would have been if I had been cooed over and coddled.

  But that does not stop my mind from drifting, from time to time, to your little home in Gregory, Oregon – so clear in my mind's eye. I imagined sometimes, growing up, what you and your mother were doing at that moment – was she playing a game with you? Brushing your hair? Teaching you to paint? Tucking you in to sleep? Such simple hallmarks of a human life – and yet so alien to me.