The Queen and Her Brook Horse

by Amalia Dillin

  She had gone to such lengths to prevent it, to keep Gunnar’s child from her body, to protect herself from his blood. And now—now she could not bring herself to destroy it, no matter how she ached or Isolfur begged.

  “Signy—Signy you do not know what you risk,” Isolfur said, taking her hands in his and falling to his knees. “Body and blood. Do you not remember? Your body, your blood, and your heart. That is what you gave me, what you bargained with. Do you not see? I cannot take this all upon myself, much as I might wish to. And if you make this choice, if you keep this child—we will both bleed for it.”

  Her blood ran cold as his words sank into her heart, gooseflesh rising across her skin. “It will break our bargain?”

  Isolfur pressed her hands to his lips, then his forehead. “Can you not feel it unraveling? The cut of it in your heart, across your chest.”

  The ache. Yes. She had felt it, but she had not realized it was this. “Isolfur. I did not choose this to betray you. If I had known—but you would ask me to take a life that is not mine. And we do not know what the Ancestors would have of us. If this is not something greater than ourselves. How could it be otherwise, when I ought not to have conceived at all so quickly? And I—it is like waking from a dream. Like a curtain drawing back.”

  He closed his eyes, rocking back upon his heels and rising, pale and gray and broken. “The binding is weakened, that is why you feel what you do. I do not hold your whole heart any longer. Will not, if you choose this. And I will not strike another bargain with you, Signy. I cannot. The children will be protected still, I swear it, but you—I swore to you that you would be free, too. Of me. Of all of this. I will not bind you a second time.”

  “I do not wish to be free of you,” she said. “Of this. I do not want to be apart, to be broken from you. Surely that must matter? Surely it is enough that I do not break faith in spirit, even if I have in truth.”

  “I do not know,” he said. “I do not know if it is, or what will come. I only know that it—this child, if you keep it—changes everything.”

  “But not us, surely,” she said, taking his hand in hers, grasping for it. “It does not change what I feel for you. Or. Or—will you not love me, still?”

  “Signy,” his voice broke, and he drew her in, wrapping her in his arms and tucking her head beneath his chin. She let him, melting into his body, into his strength, for it seemed suddenly as if she had none of her own. “You foolish creature, I will love you until the end of my days. That is why I cannot take this from you. Why I will not, even if it means you will never call to me again. You must be free. We must both be free. This is only—only sooner, than we might have wished.”

  “But the children will still be safe?” she asked, though he had told her so already. To keep this child, Gunnar’s child, at the cost of her own, of his—that was not a choice she could live with.

  “Yes,” he assured her. “They are my blood, and bargain or no, it is my right as their father to protect them. But you. Signy, I do not know that I will be able to protect you. My voice, the spells I’ve woven, that will be stripped away, and nothing I can do to stop it without ensnaring you in another cage. And healing you as I’ve done, that will come now only at a cost.”

  What he had done before. That was what he meant, she realized now. The fog of his voice, the suggestions they had made and planted—but she had used that power sparingly. And the bulk of it long, long ago. Surely Gunnar would not suspect. He would have no reason.

  “I will have to be careful then. More so than I have been before. That is all that must change between us.”

  She hoped.

  Ancestors, please. Keep us safe.

  When she stepped back through the mirror that same day, she felt it snap. Signy doubled over, falling to her hands and knees, gasping for breath. Her blood licked her veins like so much fire, and her body shuddered and ached. But that was nothing to the pain, the blade that pierced her heart. No longer simply cutting, but raging.

  She crawled across the floor—first toward the bed and then, wracked by another spasm, her stomach heaving against the shock, back toward the mirror. Toward Isolfur instead, for whatever she felt, he must suffer it too.

  But it was too much. The pain. The shuddering, heaving, burning pain. And her heart, her poor heart seemed to be bursting in her chest.

  “Isolfur,” she breathed, reaching for the frame. Her fingers fell just short, and part of her knew it was for the best. Knew, too, there was nothing he could do. Not anymore.

  She collapsed, cheek against the cool, rough wood of the floor, and fought to hold herself together. Against the pain in her blood and the ache in her limbs, and the violent cramping in her abdomen.

  “No,” she said, wrapping her arms around her middle. “No!” Whatever the frayed and thwarted magic wanted, it could not have that. She would not let her foolish bargain steal the child from her womb. It was not fair or right, and this punishment belonged to her. To her.

  The fire blazed as if hearing her protest, she could see it coursing beneath her skin, glowing bright against sinew and bone and flesh, and Signy screamed. Screamed and screamed and screamed again, until blood and fire filled her eyes as well.

  The door burst in, and there was Frida, Ragnar at her side, watching her writhe.

  “No,” she gasped again, closing her eyes, hoping Ragnar did not see what she did behind them. Hoping he did not recognize the signs—that she suffered from the breaking of a blood vow, turning her own body against her.

  “She is ill,” Frida said, flying to her on the floor, draping a blanket across her shoulders. “She is ill, Ragnar, that is all. Help me get her to the bed.”

  Signy shrank from his hard hands and impatient strength, but let them help her up. Stumbled to the bed, grasping Frida’s hand, squeezing her fingers with all the strength she had left.

  “Hush,” her friend said. “Hush now, I’m here. It was only a nightmare.”

  She pressed her palm against her belly, trembling beneath her hand as the spasms still spilled through her body in waves. “Do not let them take her,” she said. “Do not let them take my baby away.”

  “Call for the nurse, Ragnar. Call for Isabel and it will calm her.”

  “The king commanded—”

  “Would the king rather learn you left the queen to rave? They heard her screams and there is little to be done about that, but surely Gunnar does not want his people to think her mad?”

  Ragnar growled, but left, his heels ringing sharply against the wood, and Frida smoothed a hand across her brow. Signy caught it again. “The mirror. Cover the mirror, please. Before it is too late.”

  Frida scowled. “Too late?”

  “Please,” she begged.

  Her maid hesitated a moment more, but did as she was bid, returning to her bedside just as Ragnar arrived—not with her child, but the king at his side.

  “What is this?” Gunnar demanded. “The whole castle heard her screaming.”

  Signy bit her lip on a moan and pressed harder against her womb. Ancestors protect us both. Protect us both from him.

  “She’s taken ill, that’s all,” Frida said, firm and unafraid. “It happens sometimes, when a child is taken from her mother too soon. Let her see that Isabel is safe and well, Your Majesty, and it will soothe her. Perhaps enough to rest.”

  Gunnar snorted, grabbing her by the chin, fingers pressing into her skin, bruising against the bone. “Worthless woman. Look at me.”

  Signy forced her eyes to his, shaking, her skin burning hotter still against his cold, heartless touch. Whatever he saw then, in her face and in her gaze, he drew back as if her pain were catching, dropping his hand away.

  “Keep the children away,” he told Ragnar. “Keep everyone away. We can scarce afford a plague. Until she is well again, I want her kept apart.”

  “Let me tend to her at least,
Your Majesty. I beg you.”

  “If you desire to share her fate, that is your affair,” he said. “Set a guard upon the door, Ragnar. No one is to be allowed in or out.”

  And then he was gone, Ragnar barely a step behind. Signy turned her face into her pillow and let herself go, too. Likely, his fear had saved her.

  Likely, it had saved them all.

  She was thin and haggard when she came to him again, nearly a full month later, and even if she had come to him glowing, he’d have known her suffering. The thwarted magic had taken from him, too, but the worst was knowing it was not through. That there was more still, a greater debt to be paid. He could not see its shape, but it flitted about at the corners of his eyes, a wild thing, no longer leashed and unwilling to be controlled. No doubt it would come back to heel after it had glutted itself on their blood.

  Still, his heart soared to see her, for he had been half-convinced she might never return to him at all. “You are here.”

  She tripped into his arms, exhaustion in every line of her face, every movement of her limbs. “I worried for you, but I could not escape. Frida had set herself to watch over me, and I dared not reveal the whole truth. Raised in Hunaland as we were, and so closely, she knew my sickness came from magic, not disease, and that is already too much. But if she had not stayed, Isolfur, I am not certain we’d have survived, both of us.”

  He let out a breath of relief, sinking into a chair. “Thank the Ancestors. I feared—if it had all been for nothing, I am not certain I could forgive myself. If I had only told you—”

  “Hush,” she said, coming to him then, kneeling before his chair. “I might have chosen differently and saved myself the struggle, saved us both. Do not blame yourself for my stubbornness.”

  He stroked her hair, then pulled her up into his lap, warm and soft, despite the weight she had clearly lost. “Have we time?”

  “A little,” she said. “I am recovering and need my rest, and Frida has promised me a few hours undisturbed. It was the best I could do for now.”

  “It is enough,” he promised. “More than enough. But you do need rest. I can see it in your face. Between our broken bargain and the child, you have much to recover from.”

  She looked down, her hand resting on her abdomen. “I think it is a girl. Another daughter to console me. But I fear for her, Isolfur. I fear this is only the first test.”

  “She’ll be stronger for it,” he said. And even though it was Gunnar’s baby in her womb, would be Gunnar’s child at her breast, he could not bring himself to resent it. For because of this unborn thing, Signy was free. They were both free in ways they could not have been, otherwise. “And when our sons are old enough to take their father’s crown, Gunnar is dead and you are made properly my bride, I will treat her as my daughter, too, along with Isabel. For nothing else will matter then, but that we are together.”

  “Truly?” she asked, her eyes damp and bright.

  He covered her hand with his at her waist, and kissed her. “How can I not love what contains still a piece of you? And I have no doubt that she will be your daughter, Signy. In spirit and body and blood. Gunnar has not the strength or the power to stop a mother’s love. Nor mine.”

  “I feared at first it would not be the same between us,” she said softly, almost shy. “That now my heart was my own, it would change my love for you. Strip it away, perhaps. But now I am here—instead of lessening my desire, I am hungrier for you than ever.”

  It was everything he had hoped to hear, everything he had prayed for these last weeks, waiting. “Stay,” he heard himself say. “Take our children from your fool king, come through the mirror, and stay as my bride.”

  “Isolfur…” She sighed, brushing her lips over his, softening what he already knew she would say. What he had known from just the shape of her voice around his name. “I wish that I could. That it would not mean death and violence and lives lost in exchange. If it were only me and you. If I were not a princess of Hunaland or a queen of Gautar. If the lives of so many did not depend upon mine—when that time comes, I promise you, there is no place I would rather be but here with you, as your wife.”

  Another fifteen years then, he supposed. Fifteen years during which he must make the most of the stolen hours she granted him, that when the day might come, she would not hesitate.

  They made love that day. Every touch, every kiss, every breath they shared so much more. As if they had never known one another before. She shivered and shuddered beneath his hands, his mouth, his body, shouting her pleasure so loudly, he was glad for the weight of the lake, muffling her cries to any ears outside. And when he joined with her at last, her body surrounding his, welcoming him with sweet, slick heat, he felt like a colt in rut, everything in him straining for release.

  Signy clung to him, eager and wanton, her nails marking half-moons in his skin, more his than she had ever been. For this was her desire, freely given, her need drawing him close. And when he drove himself deeper, she arched up into his body and moaned.

  “Isolfur.” His name was a prayer, pleading and pleased, and it only increased his ardor.

  “Say it again,” he begged. “I want my name upon your lips when you find the precipice. When I feel you shudder and writhe beneath me again.”

  “Isolfur,” she said, holding his eyes, meeting his every thrust as if she could not get enough. “Isolfur, my love.” Panting then, no more than a needy breath as he stroked inside her again. “Isolfur, my everything.”

  And then they both tipped over the edge into bliss.

  He hated to wake her after. To disturb the peaceful sleep that had fallen over them both. But no matter how far he stretched the hours, it still would not be enough. It would never be enough. Not until they were married. Not until she was his.

  “You must go,” he murmured against her ear, after he had kissed the sweet column of her neck, salty with sweat. “But you have only to find another hour, and I will give you all of this again.”

  She stirred then, a soft, sweet smile upon her lips. “Tomorrow,” she promised. “But it will be my turn to return the gift.”

  Still, every movement she made was reluctant as she drew herself away from his body and crawled out of his bed. He propped himself on one elbow to watch her dress, pleased that she looked stronger, with color returned to her cheeks and that spark of willfulness in her eyes.

  “Be safe, my Signy,” he said. “Be careful of your king.”

  “And you,” she said. “Be careful, too.”

  He smiled. “I fear I face far fewer threats than you do.”

  “Even so,” she said. “I would not come to your cottage and find you gone. Lost to me forever.”

  “It will never be so,” he promised. “For as long as you will come, I will wait for you here. I only leave to gather food and drink for you these days, besides. And you’ll have need of both, with another child in your womb. It is too soon.”

  “She’ll be my last,” she said, leaning down to kiss him farewell. “Whether he wishes it or not. I will not let him kill me slowly with birth after birth. Frida and I will invent some reason why, and he will be too disgusted to argue. Though I do love the way he squirms at the sight of me, full and round and fat. It is my secret pleasure to offend him in ways he cannot punish me.”

  “He has never deserved you,” he said, kissing her back. “And when the time comes, I would kill him with my own hand. Promise me that.”

  She lifted both eyebrows. “And have his spirit trapped in this cottage to haunt us? No, Isolfur. I think not. And besides, by then it will be my right. Blood for blood, and I will have mine back.”

  Yes, he decided. She was feeling much stronger. He only prayed it might last.

  The birth was not easy, and as it happened, she bled so much and so long, she had no need to invent a reason why she could not give the king another child. The woman who saw her
through the birth told him herself it must be her last.

  “She will die the next time,” she’d said, after the worst had passed, and dark-haired Arianna lay upon her stomach, sleeping soundly. Unwitting of what she had nearly lost. “The queen is not to rise from that bed for a sevenday at least, and a fortnight would be better. And she must suckle the child, to be sure she does not bleed again.”

  Gunnar’s lip curled. “For how long?”

  “Until she is fit to rise and strong enough to walk again,” the old woman said. “Unless you wish her dead, and four children to raise without a mother.”

  Her husband’s gaze slid to Arianna, where it had returned, over and over again. “She does not look like the others.”

  “No,” the old woman said. “She favors her father more than her mother, but she is strong and healthy, and better that than golden hair.”

  “Thank you,” Signy said, and meant it. For without the birthing woman’s help, she was certain she would be dead.

  She ducked her head, and slipped away before the king could stop her. No doubt to see to another woman approaching her time.

  “Well,” Gunnar said. “You’ll have what you wanted, then. Another baby at your breast. Pray to the Ancestors it does not last. You’re no use to me a ruined old hag. Nor dead, as yet.”

  Ancestors, give me strength. “A few weeks of suckling will harm nothing, I promise you.”

  He grunted. “Strange, do you not think, how you always get your way? All those days you spent wandering about the woods with no one but Frida. All those months you gave Isabel suck, though I had made it clear I wished her to have a wet nurse. And now this.”