Chapter 20
The North is not cruel in the way men are cruel.
It does not rage or shout or strike without warning.
It simply endures.
From the moment we arrive, the cold settles into us as though it has been waiting.
It seeps through stone and wool and skin alike, creeping into bone and breath.
Fires burn constantly, yet the rooms are never truly warm.
The walls sweat with damp, darkening the tapestries and curling the edges of parchment.
Even the air feels heavy, laden with rain and snow that never quite ends—falling, pausing, threatening to begin again.
I cannot remember the last time I felt truly dry.
The moors stretch endlessly beyond the fortress walls, a wide and treeless expanse that swallows sound and distance alike.
On clear days, which are rare, the sky presses low and vast, and I find myself longing for forests, for hills, for anything that might interrupt the horizon. Here, the land offers no shelter.
The children do not fare well here in Verden.
It begins with coughs—small, persistent sounds that echo through the chambers at night.
Then come the fevers. Ella’s cheeks burn beneath my palms, her skin too warm one moment and clammy the next.
Thea grows listless, appetite fading, eyes dull with exhaustion.
Even when the worst passes, weakness lingers, clinging to them like damp clings to cloth.
The physicians murmur reassurances. They speak of northern air and adjusting humor. They brew tonics, apply poultices, wrap the children in layers of wool and fur. I nod and thank them and do not sleep.
Every night, I lie awake listening to the wind batter the walls, counting breaths that are not my own.
Charles is often absent.
He leaves before dawn, armored and grim, returning long after night has fallen—if he returns at all.
There are councils to attend, disputes among nobles who bristle beneath his rule.
There are raids to answer. Executions, too, though these are spoken of only obliquely, as if naming them aloud might summon something worse.
When he is present, he is restless. His temper frays quickly, patience worn thin by exhaustion and the endless resistance of this land.
He paces, speaks too sharply, falls silent without warning.
Some nights he clutches me as though I might vanish if he loosens his hold; others, he turns away, rigid and unreachable.
I do not know which unsettles me more.
I feel stranded here, at the edge of the known world.
Letters from the South arrive late, damp, and travel-worn.
Familiar voices feel distant, as if I am slowly forgetting those I love.
Maybe they have forgotten me, too. Even time itself seems altered—days stretching long and indistinct, marked only by rain and illness and waiting.
I miss Aileen, miss having a friend around.
Cold becomes more than a sensation.
It becomes a condition.
It numbs thought as much as flesh. It dulls fear until it sinks inward, slow and heavy, like rot beneath the surface.
The letter arrives on such a day.
The sky hangs low and gray, rain misting the courtyard so finely it seeps through every pore. Ella sleeps fitfully, fever broken at last but leaving her weak. I sit beside her bed, sewing a hem that does not need mending, simply to keep my hands occupied.
A servant announces the messenger and hands me the letter.
The seal is my father’s.
For a moment, I do not open it. I turn it over in my hands, tracing the familiar mark, feeling a strange tightening in my chest. It has been some time since his last letter. Too long, perhaps. When I finally break the seal, the parchment crackles softly, the sound unnaturally loud in the stillness.
His tone is careful.
To my beloved daughter,
May God keep you and the children in strength and steadiness of spirit.
Word has reached me of your journey north, and I pray daily that the climate is kinder to you than it has been to others of more seasoned constitution. The lands beyond the forests have always demanded much of those who dwell there, and even the strongest must learn their moods anew.
I trust the children are well wrapped, well fed, and never far from your sight. A mother’s vigilance, after all, is the surest protection a household may claim.
I write not to burden you with matters of state, but you will forgive an old man his habit of attention. News travels even to quiet halls, and sometimes it arrives bearing questions rather than answers.
You may have heard, or perhaps not, that the men assigned to guard you on that ill-fated day when Tassilo was attacked, were later found dead—far from their post and far from one another.
Such carelessness is uncommon among those sworn to their duties.
It has caused some to wonder how loyalties may fray when stretched too thin.
A man has since been taken into custody.
I am told he claims no grievance, no patron, no reason worth naming.
It is a strange thing, to risk one’s life without purpose.
Stranger still, perhaps, are the coins discovered upon him—newly struck, fine in make, of a kind not yet common beyond certain workshops, and so recent in issue that few could have come by them at all.
I mention this only because coincidence has ever made me uneasy.
There are those who say the Duke himself was the intended victim. Others are less certain. It is often difficult, from the outside, to know where danger is meant to fall—especially when more than one life shares a single path.
I will not insult your intelligence by offering counsel you do not require. You have always known when to speak and when to listen, when to hold fast and when to step back. Still, I would urge you, for a time, to favor caution over confidence, and quiet observation over explanation.
Trust, once shaken, is not easily restored. Nor is it always wise to demand certainty where shadows are thick.
Above all, keep the children close. Distance is a luxury not every season permits.
Should you wish to write, speak of small things. I will read between the lines, as fathers must.
May God watch over you, and grant you clarity where others offer only assurance.
Your loving father
The parchment trembles in my hands.
I read the letter again. And again. Each time, the words seem to rearrange themselves, revealing meanings I had tried not to see before. At last, I am forced to set it aside, lest I tear it in two.
Panic rises swiftly and sharply.
Has Charles discovered the spell?
The thought strikes like ice water.
My father had been careful—too careful. He had written as a man does when he knows his words may be read by eyes not meant for them. No accusations. No names. Only observations, laid out as one might lay stones across a river and trust the right person to find the path.
The coins.
Newly struck. Fine in make. Not yet common. Not yet passed through many hands.
I close my eyes.
Such coin does not wander far from its source. It does not find its way into taverns or onto the palms of desperate men. It is counted, weighed, recorded. It is issued with purpose. And before it ever reaches the markets, it passes through the court.
Through this court.
A chill seeps through me, colder than the wind outside the walls.
If the man truly carried such payment, then someone with access to the mint had placed it in his hand. Someone close. Someone powerful. Someone who could afford silence as easily as gold.
Tassilo was the one struck down—but was he the true mark?
Or had the blade simply missed its intended target?
My thoughts turn, unwillingly, treacherously, toward Charles. Toward his long reach, his quiet orders, the way justice is so often done in his name without ever troubling his conscience. Toward the wars that bleed him, the enemies that multiply in shadows, the burdens he bears as God’s chosen king.
And toward the ring.
A tremor runs through me as understanding coils tight around my heart.
If he has learned of it—if he believes I wield him, bind him, weaken him—then I am no wife at all in his eyes.
I am a threat. Perhaps he cannot strike me himself.
But others—others might be able to harm me on his command.
Threats eliminated quietly, blood spilled at a distance, hands kept clean.
My gaze drifts to Ella, her small body curled beneath furs too large for her. To Thea, pale and thin, sleeping in the bed next to her sister.
My breath comes shallow.
What if it is not only I who is in danger?
Love has always been my shield. I believed that, once. Believed that affection, devotion, and shared children might protect me from the worst of him, from the world he inhabits.
Now I am no longer certain.
The North has stripped away illusions as easily as it strips warmth from the body.
I fold the letter carefully, then throw it into the fire.
Silence has kept me alive thus far.
But silence, I sense, may soon demand more than I can give.
Tonight, the wind rises.
It howls across the moors, battering the fortress walls, rattling shutters and doors as though seeking entry. I lie awake, listening, every nerve drawn tight.
It sounds almost like breathing.
Like something vast and patient, waiting for a weakness to reveal itself.
I draw the children closer, pressing my face into Ella’s hair, breathing her in as if I might anchor myself through her warmth alone.
The cold does not recede.
It never does.
* * *
The halls are empty. Torches gutter in their sconces, shadows stretching and collapsing as I pass. My footsteps echo too loudly on the stone.
I know where Charles will be.
The council chamber door stands ajar. Light spills into the corridor. Voices—low, strained.
I pause only briefly before stepping inside.
Charles stands near the table, one hand braced against its edge. Maps lie scattered beneath his palm, stones and markers littering the table. His hair has come loose from its binding, his face drawn tight with fury or fatigue, I cannot tell.