Chapter 33
VALANCE
The sky was made of various shades of purple, heavy gray clouds rolling across it. Strangely beautiful and alarming. Something akin to sunlight cast a violet glow across vast fields of white rolling away from the mountains.
“Now where?” Kormac asked, shivering beside me. He brought out his compass.
Nothing but snow as far as the eye could see. No trees, no rocks, no buildings. Just snow.
“Straight ahead,” the human said. “F-follow me.”
But we stood at the edge of the white, on lightly snow-dusted rock at the foot of the mountains. Neither of us wanting to step on the sea of snow.
A bitter wind blew, our clothes useless against the bite of the air. I’d never felt an icy temperature like it. This was coldness beyond imagining, a feature of Winter.
I wrapped my arms around myself, inching closer to Kormac for nonexistent warmth.
“How deep do you think the snow is?” he asked.
“I don’t know. But we can’t stand here cowering. We’re here. We made it.”
“You’re right,” he said. “Let’s—”
They came from the snow, rising through the thickness, pushing it aside as their heads crested into view. Creatures made of swirling black smoke, crawling to the surface, standing on the snow without sinking back down. Three of them, each one hunched, human looking, charcoal against the white.
“Welcome,” they said together as whispers. “Welcome, Prince Valance.”
“Hello,” I replied.
A shiver rippled through me, not from the cold, then a strange knowing. As if my body and soul had come home.
I offered these strange creatures a smile through my shivering. “I am glad to be here.”
Kormac’s eyes were hot on me. I ignored them.
“It is time,” the misty figures said. “Come with us.”
“I-I’m so cold…”
“Do not worry, Prince Valance. We shades will help you.”
“Shades?”
“We are shades. Creatures of Winter.” They bowed as one. “At your service.”
I had never heard of such creatures before, not even from the scary tales of Winter.
Silver particles manifested into being before us, a mass of magic shaping into a silver carriage and a silver, eyeless horse. The carriage’s wheels did not sink as they should, resting on the snow as these shades did.
I gasped, stepping back. Fear twinged for just a moment. Kormac moved to jump before me.
“What is this?” Kormac demanded.
The carriage door opened, offering shelter.
There is no need for fear…
“Come,” the creatures spoke. “Come and be warm and be carried.”
“To the heart of Winter?” I asked.
“Yes. Yes. Yes.”
From the two choices facing us, I opted for the non-walking.
“We have no other option,” I told the human. “I would rather this than traverse that snow.”
He nodded without argument, gesturing with an outstretched arm. “After you”
I climbed into the carriage. There were two seats that sat parallel to each other, made of plush silver cushions. Everything was silver, from the ceiling and walls to the curtains tied back from the windows. Warm. Comfortable. Safe.
I am safe. I am where I need to be.
I took a seat, expecting Kormac to take the opposite. He didn’t. He sat beside me, throwing his arm around me somewhat possessively.
“What are you doing?” I asked.
“Keeping you safe. In case this is too easy.”
“Too easy?”
“Creepy shadows show up with a carriage to take us to the heart of Winter. That’s too easy.”
“That’s a warm welcome,” I said.
“Really? I call it strange magic.”
“The old woman’s magic, possibly.”
“Just don’t get too comfortable.”
“I’m not afraid, Kormac.”
“Maybe you should be.”
“I admire your resolute defensiveness.”
“It’s called survival.” He sighed. “Listen, I’m not saying this isn’t what’s supposed to happen. I’m not complaining. I’m happy to finally be up here in one piece. But the moment you feel safe, your guard drops. Never drop your guard.”
“I try not to.”
“Good.”
“I believe we’re safe here. For now.”
“All the same, I’d rather sit here like this.”
I have no objections…
The carriage rocked gently, a soothing motion. I leaned into my rock of a companion, watching the snow roll slowly by the window.
“How are you feeling?” I asked him.
“Nervous. You?”
“Surprisingly calm. As if this is all meant to be.”
“A good sign, I guess.”
“I suppose it is.”
Snowflakes began to fall outside. I slid across the seat to see them for myself. They came down in thick clumps, floating to the ground as light as feathers. A beautiful contradiction.
“I’ve always wanted to see snow,” I said softly, wrapped in calm.
“This is too much. I prefer mine weak and unsettled,” Kormac responded, leaning close.
“Don’t you find it magnificent?”
“Not really.” I felt him lean back. “Too much snow and strange purple skies don’t give me a thrill. Answers will.”
Well, I enjoyed the odd appearance of this land immensely.
“Where are the dark things?” I wondered. “The nightmares, the monsters? This doesn’t seem to be a place of such horror.”
“What about the shades?”
“They were not horrible.”
“No?”
“No.”
He shuffled beside me. “I’m sure worse waits around the corner.”
You’re here… whispers rolled in my head.
You have come.
“I have,” I answered them.
“What’s that?” Kormac said.
Sleep. Rest your weary head.
A heavy yawn. “I’m so tired.”
A yawn came from Kormac. “So am I.”
Sleep. The journey has been long for you both. It is time to rest tired bones and souls.
“I… I want to…”
Sleep.
The whispers spread across the carriage as heavy blankets.
Sleep.
Sleep.
Sleep.
I woke up refreshed to be greeted by a castle in ruins. Stone, the color of ash, sat atop a hill with a frozen moat circling it.
The ruins.
“Danu…”
Kormac yawned beside me. “It’s them. The ruins.”
Half of the castle had collapsed, leaving the other half covered in snow and cracks, strangled by thick vines from the ground to the battlements. A crumbling relic from an ancient time.
The carriage door opened. Kormac slid out first, offering his hand.
I took it, stepped onto a frozen road—a sheen of ice winding through the snow toward a mass of ruins surrounding the castle on the hill. A town? A city? So many ruins, some half-buried, some exposed.
The shades waited nearby. Ten of them now, hunched lower than before.
“The city of Snowdell,” a familiar voice said.
The old woman stood at the bottom of the hill.
A different person. Younger. Healthier. The face of the hag who’d helped us, but with glossier gray hair, cleaner clothes.
Less lines on her face, all of her fingers intact.
Dressed in dark robes that were not torn or grubby, billowing around her.
She stood straighter than I’d ever seen her.
“You made it,” she said, a terrifying grin on her face.
“You’re her? You’re—”
“The complete me,” she replied. “But didn’t I tell you I waited for you here?”
“But…”
“I’m my full self,” she said. “This is how I look when I’m not spread too thin.”
“I thought you couldn’t help us until we saw you again,” Kormac added. “But you made us a carriage. A bridge.”
“Is that your grand hello, human?” The wind ruffled her hair. “Winter offered you help. The bridge, the carriage. Winter welcomes you. Winter wants you. Winter needs you.”
“Winter did this?” I asked. “The land?”
“It did. Nifty, isn’t it? And the epitome of hospitality.”
A jolt in my calmness. “Winter needs me?”
She chuckled. “Come and see for yourself. The answers you seek are here.”
“He has come…” the shades whispered.
Kormac took my hand as my heart raced. A soothing touch, an anchor in a storm of a million questions, a million possibilities.
The old woman crossed a bridge over the frozen moat, walked up a set of grand stairs embedded in the hill, cleared of snow.
“Are you ready?” I asked Kormac.
“Are you?”
“This is what we’re here for.”
With a deep breath, I started to move, following her up to the castle. I noticed parts of a wall around the moat, another layer for protection now barely a few feet high where exposed.
“Is this the Tuatha’s former seat of power?” I asked.
“Yes, Your Highness. Winter Keep, the heart of these lands and the Winter court. Where the Tuatha kings and queens once sat.”
An ancient place. The heart of dark energy and terrifying power. I could almost feel it vibrating beneath me, within me, crackling in the air.
“It was always the dream of the Tuatha to take Faerie,” the old woman said.
“To bring eternal winter in every corner of the world,” I replied. “We know of the stories of the Tuatha’s dreadful dream.”
She stopped, looking at me over her shoulder. “One realm under snow and purple skies. A world of Winter, a world under the rule of Tuatha.”
“Precisely why they were stopped,” I said.
“How is that different to the dreams of the seelie and unseelie courts?”
“Because neither of us want to spread snow everywhere,” Kormac added.
“Only your laws,” she countered. “The Tuatha were seekers of peace.”
“I don’t believe that,” Kormac and I said at the same time.
It made her laugh.
I blushed. “Utter dominance is not the same as peace.”
“Of course, it is. There are rules and laws and people abide by them to live their lives peacefully. Those who break them suffer the consequences.”
“How is that the same?”
“It is a version of your rule, Your Highness,” she said.
“Only there is no peace,” I countered. “There is only the endless war.”
“Then your methods are wrong.”
“You’re saying peace can only be achieved by the Tuatha method, then?”
“I think they had the right idea. But they’re gone.” She carried on walking. We followed.
A broken archway greeted us at the top of the stairs, a point of entry into the castle. More vines coiled around the stone, pink roses blooming.
“Flowers in Winter?” I asked, stunned by the pretty sight.
“Winter roses,” she answered.
“They’re beautiful.”
“I know.” She touched the wall. “The Tuatha monarchs were great sorcerers of silver magic, born to it, their souls calling to the power. Only they could use the magic to its full potential. It allowed them to lead, to become a great power.”
I moved closer to her. “You use this silver magic.”
“All creatures of Winter do, Your Highness. It is the magic of the north, a skill of summoning and enchantment. Of attack and defense. Of balance. My powers are weak compared to that of a chosen one—a Tuatha monarch.” A heavy frown distorted her features.
“The south feared the north, feared the power of silver magic. It has been removed from history, buried so deep it is not even a whisper of a rumor. They destroyed the Tuatha, broke their magic with seed and shadow, uniting to make a curse. It struck the last queen first, taking her off the playing board. Weakening us straight away.” She released a heavy breath.
“When the Tuatha fell from the killing spell of combined shadow and seed magic, a curse fell upon the lands, upon the fae who lived here. A sickness, a distortion. Everything fell into despair. With a Tuatha monarch using the silver magic, Winter was nurtured, the circle of life kept in balance—a balance of the brutal and the gentle.”
“The king or queen fed the lands?” I asked.
“Yes. But the lands died without it, leaving us who remained destitute. Weak. Even though I channel the silver magic, I do not wield it as a monarch. My skills do not help. It does not change.”
“You’re fae?” I asked.
“Yes.”
“Not… Not Tuatha?”
“No. The Tuatha are all dead.”
Obviously. “Then what?”
“A darkling. Dark fae. A creature you know nothing of.”
In the Tuatha days, there were creatures here much like the rest of Faerie—human, elf, goblin, all of those fae. But the details were always scant in the many texts I’d read.
“Winter has it secrets,” she said. “We dark fae have always been hidden, erased from greater consciousness.” A cackle to throb in my ears. “I am skilled in making things.”
“Like our supplies,” Kormac responded.
“Exactly, human. Some would say I’m a trickster. Darklings are known to be naughty.” She laughed again. Her laugh remained a horrible thing. “They would not be wrong.”
“And we’re supposed to trust a trickster?” I asked.
“Yes, because I have your interests in here.” She tapped over her heart. “The last queen, Queen Orla Thistrai, trusted me, enjoyed my counsel. She gifted me with long life. A dear friend and queen until she died, until I ran and hid with the other dark fae to mourn her.”
“You’re immortal?” I asked.
“Nothing is truly immortal. Well…” she trailed off.
“Well, what?” I pressed.
“No, Your Highness. I am not as a Sidhe fae. You can only die with the strike of a blade or from a terrible accident.”
“Or a broken heart,” I added.
“Yes. Indeed. The Tuatha held the same immortality until they were destroyed.” Shadows passed across her face. “I will die of old age like all other things, but not for many, many years. Hopefully.”
“Kormac,” I said. “He healed me. He brought me back from the edge of death.”
“Yes. I know.”
“What does it mean?”
“It means he was meant to be your companion.”
He spoke. “Why? What did I do? What was it? Why have I been sharing the same visions with Valance? Where are you going with this… Tell us your name.”
“I wondered if you would take a breath,” she said with a cackle. “My name is Brigid.”
“We finally have something to call you other than old woman,” I said.
She found that amusing and reached for the pink roses, slightly out of reach. “Winter roses have not grown here in years. They have returned because hope has returned. And they have never been pink before.”
My nerves were thorns raking across my soul.
Pink roses…
The symbol of Rosestar.
Me?
By Danu…
My head was spinning. Things were moving in my head, sliding together to try and form a thought.
She started to walk again. I moved to stop her.
“What does this have to do with me?” I grabbed her by the shoulders. “And don’t tell me to follow you. Don’t delay this further. Please.”
“Prince Va—”
“I’m begging you, Brigid. I can’t wait anymore.”
“You have waited all this time.”
“I’m done waiting. Please.”
She curled her fingers over my hands. “My prince. My king. I am whole. I can give you the answers. I can show you inside.”
“I’m… I’m not… I’m neither of those things now.”
“You can feel it, Valance. The call of the land. It needs you. It begs as you beg me. Not every inch. You are not fully welcome yet. You must win back every corner, learn, reach out to the other dark fae in order to make Winter one beating heart again.”
I released my hands. “What do you mean?”
“Can you feel the power, Your Majesty?”
“Majesty? I… What are you saying?”
With visible discomfort and clicking knees, she dipped to genuflect. “My king. My Tuatha king.”