by K. M. Shea
“I don’t like abandoning citizens,” Captain Halvor said.
“Neither do I, but can we risk it?” Oskar asked.
“No.”
Rakel turned in Vefsna’s direction and listened to the whisper of the breeze and the rustle of snow. Her head and heart ached from the chaos.
It’s just another thankless job that might see me harmed in restitution. “But they’re children,” she whispered. She brought her chin up, gathered her black cape close, and started walking across the snow.
“Princess?” Oskar asked.
“I’m going to get them,” Rakel said.
Silence met her ears.
She recognized that this would normally be the time where a person would object, insist it was too dangerous, but she could tell—as their hands crept over the hilts of their swords, and they nervously shifted—her retinue was thinking back to the night in Fyran.
She wasn’t surprised. She had always been careful to never use her magic in front of others. If it weren’t for her ice-castle, they would have no reason to believe she used her powers, much less suspect that she practiced with them daily.
“Very well, Princess,” Captain Halvor said. He retreated to his sled to snatch up a crossbow and quiver of arrows. The soldiers behind him started to similarly arm themselves.
“Do you have a plan, Princess?” Oskar asked, pulling a sword out of their sleigh.
Rakel pushed a tendril of her snow-white hair behind her ear. “I didn’t think one would be necessary.”
“Any magic users, Snorri?” Captain Halvor asked.
The scout shook his head and spoke, but his words were quiet and mumbled; Rakel couldn’t make out any of them.
“You’re mumbling again, Snorri,” Oskar chided.
“No magic. Soldiers only,” Snorri said, speaking as if it belabored him.
“The way you cleared Fyran will work fine,” Captain Halvor said, tugging on thick, fleece-lined, leather gloves. “Assemble,” he said to his men.
Rakel took a few steps towards Vefsna until a soldier blurted out, “Wait! You’ll need these, Princess.” He held up a pair of snowshoes.
Rakel stared at the soldier for a moment, recognizing his face. He had tried to shoot her during Oskar’s appeal for Fyran. “Why?”
He flushed red. “The snow won’t hold up to your weight. Although there’s a crust, it’s not deep enough.”
Rakel looked down at the snow beneath her silver-buckled shoes. She had been wandering around in snow ever since her exile, and she had grown accustomed to letting her power seep through her feet, freezing everything she walked over so she could go where she pleased without plunging into snow. Judging by the way the jittery soldiers already treated her, the reason for her disregard of the snowshoes would go over poorly.
“What good fortune,” Oskar said, following Rakel’s trail. “It seems the snow crust thickened overnight. We won’t have to use the snowshoes after all.”
The soldiers looked to their captain, who hooked his snowshoes under his sleigh and joined Oskar and Rakel.
The soldiers reluctantly followed Captain Halvor’s example, and soon Rakel was leading the group, careful to move her silvery magic below the drifts so they would not see it at work, hardening the snow to hold up to their weight.
When Rakel had been a little girl, imprisoned near her family’s royal palace, she was taken to the gardens once every year for her birthday. There she got to see flowers and plants and a little pond. Any disturbance cast ripples across the pond. Rakel felt that was what her magic was doing—sending out ripples of power to manipulate the snow and cold.
It was good practice. As they walked along, Rakel’s powers stirred and spun, following her thoughts and actions. It moved with her like an old friend.
“How many of the enemy?” Captain Halvor asked.
The scout mumbled, but Rakel made out, “Double what attacked Fyran.”
The captain shifted so he could face Rakel. “You must move hard and fast. We’ll protect you, but you are the only hope of driving them from the village.”
She could feel the soldiers’ stares hammering into her back, weighing on her like an avalanche. Ho-ho-ho, you think I’ll fight with your fine soldiers at my back? No, thank you! “That is unnecessary. I will enter Vefsna alone.”
“No,” Captain Halvor said.
“Out of the question,” Oskar added.
Rakel narrowed her eyes. “Why?”
“Because you are royalty, and I cannot have you taking such an unnecessary risk,” Captain Halvor said.
“We could take half the soldiers—four—including Halvor and me—instead of all eight of us,” Oskar said.
Halvor scowled at the attendant. “All eight of us go in.”
Rakel shook her head. “I refuse. If I must have an escort, I will allow Oskar and you, Captain Halvor. That is all.”
Captain Halvor’s shoulders hunched up, and he appeared about to lay a scathing glare on her, but Oskar raised his hand and stepped in between them.
“Why?” he asked.
I wonder—maybe it’s because one of these guards has already tried to kill me? In a fight in which I’ll be using my magic, the trust of the fearful and ignorant is a commodity I cannot afford.
Rakel cleared her throat and regained a solid grip on her emotions. “I have my reasons.”
“Alright,” Oskar agreed, taking a step closer to Rakel.
“It is not alright, attendant,” Captain Halvor snarled, catching Oskar by his cape and yanking him backwards. “I will not have a member of the royal family—exiled or not—waltzing into the middle of an enemy stronghold with only you and me to protect her.”
A frown as thin as a snowflake settled on Rakel’s lips. “While I appreciate the esteem, Captain, I’m afraid I will not agree to your demands this time.”
“Then you do not enter Vefsna,” he said.
“You would sacrifice a village because I refuse to take a guard with me?”
“Yes.”
“And you think you can stop me from entering Vefsna?”
“No.”
Rakel blinked. If he knew all of that, why was he making such a fuss?
“Halvor, buckle on this one,” Oskar said. “It will pay off. I promise.”
The captain scowled at him and puffed his chest up with a big inhale. “Stand down, men,” he finally ordered.
The soldiers saluted him and took up positions behind bushes and other cover. The mumbling soldier—Snorri, Oskar had called him—scurried up a tree.
With only the captain and attendant as her audience, Rakel glided across the snow, following the captain’s hushed directions to Vefsna.
Vefsna was larger than Fyran, and Rakel could see hints of the idyllic villages often drawn in the few storybooks she had in her library—it was in the wooden carvings that adorned doorways, support beams, and roofs—but besides the hints, the village was a ramshackle. The invaders had done a great deal of damage, judging by the ruined shutters, broken doors, and buildings blackened from fire.
It was also unnaturally quiet. No animals bleated; no one puffed laughter or shouted in indignation. The invaders, ugly puddles on the white snow in their black and crimson uniforms, filled the streets like a murder of carrion crows.
Most of the villagers were out of sight, but there were a few out, wearing bruises and fright as they carried food and drinks to the invaders.
One of the laborers was an older woman. When she slipped and dropped a plate of ham, a soldier kicked her in the ribs.
Rakel rubbed the tips of her fingers together, igniting the cold spark of her magic. Snow began to swirl in the middle of the road that ambled through the village. Ice grew up from the ground, forming and shaping under Rakel’s magic. Glancing at the invaders, she molded the sculpture until it grew into a life-sized replica of an invader—perfectly detailed, down to the insignias on their uniforms.
The invaders exchanged glances and moved towards the statue with
reluctance, as if it would come to life and brandish its icy pike at them.
“Um, Princess?” Oskar asked. “You are quite talented, but is this really—”
Rakel snapped her fingers. A giant sword of ice dropped from the sky, impaling the sculpture in the neck. The ice statue’s head slid off, hitting the ground with an ominous thud.
One of the invaders yelped, and the rest of them gripped their weapons, turning to scowl at the villagers.
“Who did that?” an invader roared, his voice harsh like a metal dagger shaving ice from a block. “Show yourself!”
Rakel glanced at Oskar and Captain Halvor, worry creasing her forehead. I suppose it doesn’t matter if they end up fearing me, she thought with regret. Vefsna needs—
Rakel’s thoughts stopped when an invader grabbed a man by the throat. “Was it you?” he demanded. The man struggled, pulling on the invader’s wrist as his life was strangled out of him.
With a roar, Rakel’s magic flared to life. She extended her hand, and spears of ice thrust up from the ground, almost impaling the invader.
He dropped the villager and scrambled backwards. “To arms!” he shouted.
“Too late,” Rakel said as she approached Vefsna, the wind flapping her cape and wildly flinging her hair.
When the invaders ran at her, their weapons raised, Rakel attacked them with pin-point precision, covering their arms and torsos with armor-like ice at least a finger-length thick. Unable to move their arms, wrists, or weapons, they toddled, knocked off balance.
She raised a wall of ice behind them, formed thick blocks of ice and slid them across the iced ground, knocking the men into the wall. She didn’t release her magic but instead kept pushing. When they groaned and yelped, Rakel weakened the ice they were pinned against, so they smashed straight through it.
If an invader raised a weapon, Rakel formed a block of ice around his hands so he could not rotate his wrists or change his grasp. Then, she encircled the blades with massive chunks of ice that weighed them down so heavily, it yanked their owners to the ground.
“Leave this village!” Rakel shouted above the howling wind. Her cape snapped, and Captain Halvor stepped in front of her, his sword extended.
The invader that had kicked the old lady and almost suffocated the village man was back on his feet. “Regroup!” he shouted, trying to organize his battered men. When he rallied a group of ten, he led a charge, galloping towards Rakel.
Captain Halvor slid forward, intercepting the leader.
Rakel focused her attention on the other soldiers, freezing their arms to their sides. “Oskar,” she said.
Oskar smiled. “I can handle them, Princess.” He ran at the invaders, slamming into the first one—who fell straight into the next soldier, who fell into the next invader, until all of them toppled like blocks.
Halvor and the invader-leader fought. The invader snarled and leaned on his weapon, using his larger girth and height to his advantage.
Halvor resisted masterfully, looking for all the world as if he were parrying the blow of a child. As the leader strained, Halvor lashed out with his knee, hitting the man in the gut. He knocked him backwards, throwing him to the ground. His sword flashed, and Rakel hastily turned away, her stomach rebelling and her heart sickening with the necessary evil.
The invaders didn’t even call a retreat. With the death of their leader, they scrambled to leave Vefsna. Rakel kept their withdrawal smart by snapping shards of ice at their heels.
Captain Halvor ghosted after them—probably to assure that they had indeed run.
“We should work our way through the village—to make sure they’ve all left,” Oskar said.
Rakel nodded—pelting one of the last invaders in the back with a chunk of ice.
Together, they walked the perimeter of the village. They found two more invaders—both pinned by huge chunks of ice. When Rakel freed them, they ran, their eyes popping with fear when they looked back at her.
“I believe that’s all of them,” Rakel said as they lingered in the center of the road—near her sculpture of the beheaded invader.
“Well done. All that’s left is to find the children and wait for the captain to return—Princess!” The tone of Oskar’s words changed from approval into a cry of alarm.
Rakel spun around and, fearing another invader, raised her hand. A shield of ice shot out of the ground, swallowing up the dagger that a man—the same villager that the invading leader had almost killed—was attempting to stab her with.
“Monster!” the villager said, trying to pull back. It was no use; the ice shield had formed around both the dagger and his hand.
Rakel stared at him, his words echoing in her mind.
“You should have left us to the invaders—they would have been better than an atrocity like you!” he spat. When he realized the ice wasn’t going to give, he reached into a pocket of his coat with his free hand and held up another dagger.
“Princess, get back,” Oskar shouted.
Rakel didn’t hear him. She glared at the villager, her fury—and worse, her bitter disappointment—growing.
Again, they try to steal my life and gape at me with horror! I should not have to fear death from those I save. Enough of this!
Rakel raised a hand—her ice magic snapping like a hungry wolf at her fingertips. She readied herself to unleash it.
“No!” a child shouted.
Gerta and Kai skidded onto the road. Kai slipped and almost fell, but he managed to plant himself between Rakel and the villager. He held his arms up with his back to Rakel. His knees shook with fear, but he glared up at the villager. “Don’t hurt her!”
Gerta threw herself at Rakel, her arms ringing around her waist. “You’re the monster! She saved us!”
Rakel froze in place due to a combination of shock and horror. Horror because she couldn’t believe what she almost did, what she would have done if not for the children.
Monster, she thought. But even this grim musing couldn’t hold up against her awe as Gerta squeezed her, like she was afraid Rakel would run away.
For the first time since her exile, another human was touching her. Gerta’s hug was strong but foreign—better than she remembered, warmer than she remembered.
Rakel couldn’t think, but her hand hovered for a moment over Gerta’s head until she dared to smooth her hair. Gerta didn’t flinch, and instead gave Rakel a smile that used her entire body. “You came,” she said.
“Yes.”
“Thank you.”
Rakel opened her mouth to say more, but she jumped when Captain Halvor appeared in front of her, plucking the dagger from the villager’s fingers.
“Idiot.” He head-butted him, and the man went down, held up only by his arm.
When Rakel released the wall, he hit the ground with a splat and was out cold.
“Are the invaders gone?” Oskar asked, stepping up to Rakel’s side. Although his words were light, his eyes swept the crowd with an unusual intensity.
“They fled the mountain,” Halvor answered.
“Do you think they’ll return?” Oskar asked.
“For certain, though I do not believe it will be for the villagers, nor do I believe they will come alone.”
Rakel clamped her hands around her pale hair, attempting to keep it from flapping wildly. “You think they will seek me out.”
The captain said nothing and eyed the villagers.
Few celebrated like Gerta and Kai. Most watched Rakel with wary eyes, murmuring and whispering to each other as they pressed away from her.
Though she was loath to, Rakel nudged the little girl away. “Is your grandmother safe?”
Gerta’s smile dimmed. “She didn’t get hurt, but the soldiers scared her.”
“Real bad,” Kai added.
“I’m fine, children. There is no need to act as if I am tottering upon death’s doorstep,” someone chuckled. A pudgy, elderly woman with a button nose, gray hair, and beautiful, vivid blue eyes stepped out
of the house. “My name is Hilda—this little trouble-maker is my granddaughter. Princess, I thank you for saving us. No one else could have driven them out.”
Rakel blinked, surprised. “You’re welcome.”
“While I cannot repay your generosity, I ask that you would stay in my home for the night.”
“It is getting awfully late to travel,” Oskar said glancing at the pink sky. “Do you want to go get your men, Halvor, or should I?”
“No,” Rakel said. She cleared her throat and repeated in a calmer tone, “That is unnecessary. I mean to return home tonight.”
Oskar stared at her. “You want to drive in the coldness of the night instead of sleep in a warm bed?”
“The path is clear, and with the moon shining on the snow, one can see clearly,” Rakel said.
“I won’t deny that, but are you certain?” Oskar asked.
Some villagers shifted behind her. “I am certain.”
“Halvor, help me reason with her,” Oskar said.
“As you wish, Princess,” Captain Halvor said, bending in a bow.
“You two have picked the most inconvenient time to join forces. Halvor, I’m going to hold you responsible if she catches a cold or chill,” Oskar sighed.
A chill? Me? In spite of our many years together, he has odd notions of my supposed humanity.
“At least allow me to give you food for your journey,” Hilda—Gerta’s grandmother—said.
“If you are willing, we would have you accompany us, Mistress,” Captain Halvor said.
“To watch the children?” she guessed.
Captain Halvor inclined his head.
“Very well. If you can haul my old bones up the mountain, I have no objections—though I still insist you let me gather food.”
Captain Halvor turned expectantly to Rakel.
Rakel blanched when a villager shifted his grip on the sword he had swiped from one of the fleeing invaders. “If you wish. I will wait for you at the sleighs,” she said, moving to get her back to a wall.
“I’ll see to Granny and the children. You’ll go with the princess, Captain?”
Captain Halvor nodded. “If you will follow me, Princess.”
Rakel trailed the captain out of Vefsna with relief, glancing over her shoulder. The villagers said nothing in parting, and they watched her go with grim mouths and lowered brows.
