Crystal Kingdom

by Amanda Hocking

  I shook my head. “Not anybody credible.”

  Then something occurred to me. Konstantin and I had been talking once, and I’d been surprised to realize that Mina had been planning all of this for four years. Konstantin had replied that he thought she’d been plotting to take the crown since the day she met Evert.

  But that couldn’t have just occurred to her. As power-hungry and greedy as Mina seemed, this wasn’t a new thing. I bet she’d been trying to figure out a way to get the crown since she was a kid.

  “I can’t go back to Doldastam to dig up dirt on her, so I’ll go back further,” I said, looking up at Finn and Mia. “I need to go to Iskyla.”

  “Iskyla?” Finn asked.

  “It’s this tiny, isolated Kanin town way up in Nunavut. It’s where Mina’s from. And if she’s been working on this for a long time—and I’m inclined to believe she has—she probably started out working with someone up there.”

  Now that I finally had a plan, I didn’t want to waste another second, so I turned and hurried into Hanna’s room. Finn followed a few steps behind me, telling me to wait a minute.

  “Bryn, I don’t know if this is a good idea,” he said as I hurried to pack up my duffel bag. “You have all the tribes looking for you. If you go to a Kanin town, they’ll arrest you on sight.”

  “Iskyla’s off the grid,” I told him. “I doubt they’ll notice me.”

  “Have you looked in a mirror?” Finn asked dryly.

  I’d finished my packing, so I turned back to face him. He stood in the doorway looking down at me, his dark eyes grave.

  “Your parents and your sister are in Doldastam,” I said. “Along with my parents and my friends and a whole lot of other innocent people. I can’t just hide and wait for this to blow over. Unless I do something—unless people like you and me do something—this isn’t going to blow over.”

  He breathed in deeply. “You’re gonna need to travel fast. The kingdom has a few motorcycles in the garage that nobody ever uses. I’ll get you one.”

  TWENTY-SIX

  frozen

  The plane dropped in the air, making my stomach flip, and I gripped the armrest tighter.

  “We’re just hitting a little turbulence as we come into town,” the pilot said, attempting to comfort me. He’d turned back to offer the words of encouragement, but I’d have felt much better if he’d kept his eyes locked on the controls in front of him.

  While I didn’t ordinarily mind flying, this was easily the smallest plane I’d ever been on, and it seemed to tilt and lurch with every change of the breeze. The flight had been a very, very bumpy one, and it had turned into the longest three and a half hours of my life.

  In Förening, Finn had gotten me a motorcycle, a few troll maps, and given me what money he could. I’d tried to decline the offer of money, but the truth was that I was running low on the cash Ridley had gotten me, and I needed the funds.

  As a condition of my amnesty, Finn was supposed to keep an eye on me as long as I was in Förening. Once I went through the gate, I was on my own again.

  Finn warned me that there was a chance Wendy wouldn’t let me back in again. Since I’d already cast her pardon aside once, she might not grant it again.

  But it was a risk I had to take. Stopping Mina trumped everything else, even my freedom.

  After thanking Finn and Mia repeatedly for everything they’d done for me, I hopped on the motorcycle and spent the rest of the day riding up to Winnipeg. It was scary being back in Canada, closer to the Kanin and Viktor Dålig, but I hid in a motel for the night, with the curtains drawn.

  It reminded me of the time I’d spent with Konstantin, and I wondered what he was doing and if he was okay. He’d left me without any means to contact him, saying only that he’d find me if I needed him. But I had no way of even knowing if he needed me.

  Seeing him on the WANTED poster had been strangely jarring. I had seen his face on dozens of them before, but this one was different. Not only because Konstantin and I had become friends, but because this was a clear message from Mina—his behavior would not be tolerated.

  But Konstantin had been on the run for a long time, and he was capable and smart. He could handle himself. I had to believe that, because if I didn’t, I would have to face the harsh truth that he was a dead man walking, and there wasn’t a thing I could do to help him.

  That night, I slept fitfully—with my usual dreams of Kasper and Ridley mixed in with new ones of Viktor Dålig torturing Konstantin while Mina watched and laughed.

  In the morning, I chartered the cheapest plane I could find, which I was now beginning to realize may have been a bad idea. When we landed safely, I was just as surprised as I was relieved.

  In Nunavut, there were no roads connecting any of the towns. The Arctic weather made maintaining and traversing roads an impossibility. Planes were the best way to get from one place to another, but Iskyla was so isolated that it didn’t even have a landing strip, and I’d flown to the nearest human settlement.

  When I got off the plane, it was blustery and snowy, which reminded me of home, the way the cold always did. Spring was descending on the north, so it wasn’t as bad as it could be. After the warmth I’d felt these past few weeks, I pulled my hat down more securely on my head to keep out the cold.

  Fortunately, not too far from the airstrip, I found a place where I could rent a snowmobile. In my pocket I had a map to Iskyla, and I checked it three times before I headed out onto the icy tundra. The last thing I wanted to do was get lost up here in the middle of nowhere.

  From what I could tell from my map, Iskyla was supposed to be roughly a hundred miles away from the town. I figured I’d be able to make it there in less than two hours. So when I still hadn’t found the town, and I was rapidly approaching the two-and-a-half-hour mark, I started to get nervous.

  I circled back around, trying to recalibrate. There were no major rivers or mountains nearby—nothing in the landscape to give any indication that I was close or way off. It was just a platitude of white.

  Just when I was about to give up and go back, I caught sight of something in the distance. I pushed the snowmobile to full speed and raced toward it. Icy wind stung my face and threatened to blow back the fur hood that was keeping the snow at bay.

  I was getting closer, and the town was starting to take shape. A few gray houses clustered together, and a couple more buildings. Beside one of the houses, a few huskies barked at me as I approached.

  In towns of Nunavut, there were a few roads connecting houses to each other or to the local market and shops. This was no different, with the road coming to a dead end just at the edge of the town. A large, faded sign sat at the end of it, and I pulled my snowmobile up to it.

  In big white letters it said: WELCOME TO ISKYLA. Below it: . Living in northern Canada, I’d had to learn some Inuktitut—the language of the native Canadian Inuit people. These symbols roughly meant, “Welcome to Ice,” since Iskyla loosely translated to “iciness” from Swedish.

  I looked at the small barren collection of houses before me, and I let out a resigned breath. I had made it to Iskyla. Now I just had to find somebody who would talk to me about Mina.

  TWENTY-SEVEN

  iskyla

  I needed a place to warm up and a way to start asking around, so my best option appeared to be an inn just off the main stretch of road, aptly named the Frozen Inn, according to the warped sign that hung above the door.

  Icicles hung precariously from the roof of the large square building, and the white paint chipped off the sides to reveal the gray wood beneath. The door creaked painfully loud as I opened it, and a gust of cold wind came up behind me and helped push me in.

  Inside was a rather small waiting room, with worn mismatched furniture poised toward an old fireplace that was barely going. The carpet was a faded red, and the wallpaper looked like it hadn’t been changed in a century.

  A staircase with a dilapidated railing ran along the far wall, looking more like it
belonged in an old farmhouse than a place of business. In fact, if it wasn’t for the bar that wrapped along the east wall with a bell on it and a bulletin board behind it, I would’ve worried I’d walked into someone’s home.

  The door behind the bar swung open, and a girl of about fifteen came out. Her full lips and amber eyes were set in a surly scowl.

  Five or six necklaces hung around her neck, all of them appearing handmade with leather straps and wood or ivory pendants. The thick straps of leather and hemp she wore around her wrists matched.

  “Unnusakkut,” she said, which sounded like oo-new-saw-koot. It was Inuktitut for “Good afternoon,” but with more boredom and annoyance than I’d heard it pronounced before.

  “Afternoon,” I replied, since my Inuktitut was never that good.

  In school, we had to learn English and French because most of our changelings were in Canada or the U.S., and we also learned Swedish because it was the language of our ancestors. We had some interaction with the Inuit people who lived around Doldastam, so we were taught basic Inuktitut, but I’d rarely used it, so my fluency had gone way down.

  “Oh.” She looked up at me in surprise as I unwound the scarf from my face. “Most of the people that stop in here are Inuit.”

  I pulled off my hat and brushed my hand through my hair. “I’m from Doldastam, actually.”

  She narrowed her eyes at me, and I realized that her left eye was slightly larger than the other, almost imperceptibly. Her nose was petite and turned up at the end, and her skin appeared fair and rather pale. Unruly dark blond hair landed just above her shoulders.

  “You don’t look like you’re from Doldastam,” she said, but I’d already come to the conclusion that she didn’t exactly look Kanin either.

  “Well, I am.”

  That’s when I noticed the WANTED poster tacked up on the bulletin board behind her. The one that Bain had shown me. Right next to Konstantin Black, I saw a black-and-white photo of my face staring right back at me, and I realized that I might have made a mistake coming in here.

  “Are you a half-breed like me?” she asked. Her eyes brightened and she stopped slouching.

  I nodded. “I’m Kanin and Skojare.”

  She smiled crookedly and pointed to herself. “Omte and Skojare.”

  I smiled back, hoping to earn some goodwill. “It’s so rare to meet people that share a heritage like that.”

  “Maybe where you come from, but not so much around here. Iskyla is where they drop all the trolls they’d rather forget about—unwanted babies, outlaw changelings that can’t hack it, half-breeds that don’t fit in anywhere.” She shook her head. “That’s how I ended up stuck here.”

  “What do you mean?” I asked.

  “My parents were unmarried royals that didn’t want to lose their inheritance because of a bastard child, but apparently my mother loved me too much to just let me die out in the cold.” She rolled her eyes. “So they dropped me here when I was a week old, and the innkeeper has been putting me to work for my keep ever since.”

  Truth be told, I didn’t know much about Iskyla. It was very secluded, so we rarely had reason to talk about it. But since it was one of the most isolated towns in the entire troll community, it made sense that it had become a collective dumping ground.

  “I’m sorry to hear that,” I said, and I meant it. It had been hard enough for me growing up as a half-breed with parents who wanted me and loved me. I couldn’t imagine what it must’ve been like for her growing up in a place like this without anyone.

  She shrugged. “It could be worse.” Then her forehead scrunched up and she tilted her head like something had occurred to her. “Hey, didn’t the King die or something?”

  I was taken aback by the casual way she broached the subject. Living in the Kanin capital and working for the kingdom, I’d gotten so used to the royalty being talked about with great reverence. But she seemed only vaguely aware that we even had a King.

  Here in Iskyla, things were obviously very different. It was so disconnected from the rest of the kingdom—geographically and socially. It was like its own private little island.

  “He did,” I said somberly.

  “I heard that nobody in Iskyla was allowed to go to the funeral,” she said, then looked down and muttered, “Not that any of us would’ve gone anyway.”

  “Ulla!” a voice barked from the back room. “Stop wasting the guest’s time and show her to her room.”

  The girl rolled her eyes again, this time even more dramatically than before. “Sorry. I’ll get your room key.”

  She turned back around and went into the back room, where she and the innkeeper immediately began sniping at each other. As fast as I could, I leapt up onto the bar and leaned forward. I snatched the WANTED poster of myself off the bulletin board, crumpled it up, and shoved it into my pocket.

  I’d just dropped back to my feet when the door swung open again. The teenage girl came out carrying a large metal key attached to a big carved chunk of wood.

  “Come on.” She motioned for me to follow her as she went up the stairs, each one of them creaking under her feet.

  As I followed her up, I realized how tattered her layers of clothing appeared. The long tunic sweater was frayed at the edges, the fur on the hooded vest was coming out in patches, her heavy leggings were thin in the knees, and even her leg warmers had seen better days. Despite the cold, her feet were bare, and she had on pale blue toenail polish and a toe ring.

  At the top of the stairs, she opened a door that had the number 3 painted on it, and she held it open for me. I slid past her into a narrow room with hardly enough space for the queen bed and a rocking chair. Several quilts were piled up on the bed, and a dusty arctic hare had been mounted on the wall.

  I tossed my duffel bag on the bed and turned back toward her. “Sorry. I didn’t catch your name.”

  “Ulla Tulin.” She hung on to the door handle and half leaned on the door, so I didn’t attempt to shake her hand.

  “Bryn.” I declined to give a last name, since that seemed less likely to trigger a connection to the WANTED poster. But either way, Ulla didn’t give any sign of recognition.

  “It was nice meeting you, and let me know if you need anything. We don’t have any other guests, and I’m hardly ever doing anything, so I might as well be helping you.”

  “Actually, I did need your help.”

  She perked up and took a step in the room. “Yeah?”

  “I was wondering if you know anything about a Mina Arvinge?” I asked, using Queen Mina’s maiden name.

  Ulla cocked her head. “That name sounds familiar, but I don’t think any Arvinges live here now.” She thought for a moment, staring off into space, then looked back at me. “Isn’t the Queen named Mina? I’d heard someone say she was from here once, but I just thought they were lying. People come here to disappear.” Then, sadly, she added, “Nobody ever actually makes it out.”

  “I’m sure some people do,” I said, attempting vainly to cheer her up. I neglected to address her connection about Mina and the Queen. The less she knew about what I was looking for, the better.

  Ulla gave a one-shoulder shrug, like she didn’t care one way or another. “There’s only eight hundred and seventy-eight people that live here, so you’d think everybody’d know everything about everyone. But truth is, most people keep to themselves. We like our secrets here.”

  “Do you know of anybody named Mina?” I pressed on. “She probably moved away around five years ago.”

  “Five years ago?” Ulla repeated, thinking. “Kate Kissipsi had a couple sisters that left. I’m not sure when, but you could talk to her. She might know something.”

  “Do you know where she lives?” I asked.

  “On the north side of town.” Ulla gestured behind her. “I could take you there if you want.”

  “Could you? That’d be really great.”

  “Yeah.” She smiled broadly, probably excited about the idea of getting out of the inn. “
I have to make supper first, and you can have some. It’s nothing exciting. Just boiled potatoes and ukaliq.”

  “Ukaliq?” I echoed, doing my best to make the ew-ka-lick sound she made.

  “Sorry, arctic hare.” Her expression changed to one of exaggerated weariness. “We eat so much hare.” Then she shook her head, clearing it of the thought, and her smile returned. “I’ll meet you downstairs in twenty minutes for supper, and then I’ll take you out to see Kate.”

  TWENTY-EIGHT

  visitors

  “We have to walk,” Ulla told me as she pulled on heavy kamik boots made of sealskin and lined with fur. “It’s only about a mile north, so it’s not that bad.”

  “Why do we have to walk?” I asked, bundling up the same way she was in the lobby of the inn.

  “Because Kate doesn’t like visitors, so it’s better if she doesn’t hear us coming.” With that, she turned and headed toward the front door. “Let’s go. We have to be back before dark.”

  Dark was still several hours away, but I didn’t argue with her. I just followed her out into the cold. We went down the front steps, and then walked half a block. The streets were deserted, and if I didn’t know any better, I would’ve thought this was a ghost town. But Ulla assured me that people actually lived here.

  At the end of the block, we took a right turn onto a poorly kept path. It had obviously been shoveled at some point in the winter, since it had less snow than the areas around it, but it was covered in snow.

  “Why doesn’t Kate like visitors?” I asked as we walked out of town.

  “Nobody likes visitors here.” Ulla spoke loudly so her voice would carry through the thick scarf she’d wrapped around her face.

  “It seems like a lonely place,” I said.

  Ulla looked at me with a snowflake stuck to her eyelash. “You have no idea.”

  We’d walked for quite a while before Ulla pointed at what appeared to be a heap of snow on the ground, claiming that it was Kate’s place. As we got closer, it finally began to take shape. It was so low to the ground that it had to be built like Ridley’s house, with most of it below the surface. Snow covered it, probably both to camouflage it and to help insulate it during the harsh winters.