Chapter 8 Ban
Damned fool.
Once Neve collapses, her anger fading as exhaustion hits, I step closer and assess the Queen.
She’s pretty resilient for a woman who’s been asleep for one hundred years, but as Legs predicted in the Butterfly Garden, fatigue hit her quickly.
I doubt Neve getting into a fight and vaulting off the mountain was what Legs had in mind when we spoke, however.
When I step over to her, I check her out for any cuts or bruises.
She’s remarkably skilled, a far cry from the woman with terrified eyes who I saw in the palace dungeons.
Supposedly she fell into the frozen sleep shortly after the events of that night, yet the Queen I just fought is a force to be reckoned with.
What changed in those few short days to make her such an exceptional foe?
I thought calling the shadows out would be jarring enough to still her hand and get her to listen to reason. Neve is emotionally driven; I knew that from the first time I met her.
“You always fought for what you believed in so passionately,” I say with a sigh, reaching into the shadows for the rest of my supplies.
Legs gave me a salve to apply to her hand, the point where Ronnie more than likely repeated the curse over and over again to keep her daughter under.
Now that Neve is awake, the curse has been broken.
I have the needle, so I’m not entirely sure what the Snow Queen used for all these years.
Neve twitches in her sleep, whimpering as she dreams. I imagine, so soon after waking from a one-hundred-year spell, she has to harbor some fears about closing her eyes again.
Hopefully this won’t keep her out long, and if nothing else, it’ll give me the chance to help the Queen down the mountain without watching her struggle on her own.
Whether or not she could ever admit it, she needs a good deal of rest and healing after lying dormant for so long.
The sun is mostly gone by the time I’ve applied the salve. I sit beside the sleeping queen and survey the land. For all the unrest out here and Neve being caught in limbo, I’m surprised I don’t see more Icebound. Perhaps the Snow Queen’s evil kept them away.
At least for now, it’s one less thing to worry about.
Studying the Queen, I’m stunned by how similar she looks to the last time I saw her. Same short, dark hair. Same tension between her brows, even when asleep. Her gown is close to what she wore that night she found us in the dungeon, and her face is clear of any makeup just as it was last time.
She’s beautiful; an untouched gem that time can’t change.
“Rest, Neve,” I say, stretching out my legs before crossing them at the ankle.
My black blood still pumps from the high of being in a real fight, and I need to cool down and collect my emotions before I let anything get out of hand.
I’ve had a long time to learn to control and master my ice.
The shadows are another thing I’ve learned to finesse.
I have to spend a bit of time relaxing for things to be manageable again, so I may as well bask in the cold with the Queen.
When I first died, I thought my ice was a curse. Now I rely on it more than I would ever admit to, letting my staff send little dustings of snow along the path as the moon appears in the dimming sky.
The moon. A friend I barely know, but is always there. I don’t know whether any of Ronnie’s musings held merit or not, but some, like the Snow Queen, believe my curse is gifted from the moon itself.
“Think anyone's missed me?” I say, glancing toward the glowing crescent. Tonight is cloudless, letting me see the moon directly. My silent companion in the night says nothing, which isn’t that unusual. “Have you, old friend?”
There's no response, there never is. I'm not certain, even all these years later, that there is anyone up there who might hear me. The only things I have to go on are my ice powers and the moon illuminating the sky the night I first died. When I fell from the pass, I accepted my fate and my death.
Forces outside my control seemed to have other plans.
“I suppose you won't tell me anything anyway.” I sigh, turning toward Neve as a breeze blows past. It upsets her hair, and I find myself brushing it behind her ears as she rests. I almost believe I’m talking to her when I continue, “Will you allow the Icebound spirits to wreak havoc again tonight?”
There’s still no response from above, but given the cold dreariness of the land I expect to cross at least one Icebound later.
I told Lucius about them once, and he seemed alarmed that I had been handling them alone, but when you get down to the details, they aren’t any different from the souls we’re reaping now.
They are just older, colder, and tormented by loneliness and regret.
Sometimes, I wonder if they’re what spirits used to become before my Hell Brothers and I became the Reapers.
We don’t have anything to go on about who took care of channeling the dead into the next life before we were assigned our roles.
I’ve gotten very good at handling them since I first died. Even before I was a Reaper. Sometimes the presence of the Icebound is good, because it shows the spirits a fate worse than death or splintering.
“I wonder if you could see them in your dreams,” I go on, keeping my gaze on Neve. “If the Icebound ever tried to speak with you. Would you try to stop your mother then?”
Thinking back to the first time I spoke with the Ice Queen, I wonder if she ever put together who I was. I was a wholly different person when I was alive.
“The princess doesn’t need to hear a peasant boy’s woes,” the guard says, shaking his head at me. Today we’re allowed to go in and seek an audience with the royals, sharing what we so desperately need with King Andor and the Snow Queen, hoping for pity.
Since I am alone with no one to share my struggles, I’ve decided to make the journey anyway.
If I’m turned away by the greedy royals I will only let myself down.
After my parents died and Lady Hartsell lost interest in me as her wedding with the King of Diamonds loomed closer, I found my funds running painfully low.
Somehow, on my journey through the castle, I collapsed in the grand hall leading to the throne room. Guards shuffle us along for the most part, and my fellow beggars bypass me in fear of earning the King’s ire. I’m not surprised, but the guards don’t need to be such dicks about it.
“You do not speak for me, Captain,” the princess says, her dark hair twisting down her back.
The end of the braid is close to my face, distracting as I try to get to my hands and knees.
The ache in my stomach makes me want to stay on the ground forever.
“How can our citizens be this malnourished? Go, the line is long. Fetch him something so he doesn’t perish here. ”
The princess is kind, but I imagine the cold north will eventually freeze that out of her.
There are murmurs behind us, and she grabs my arm when I push up until I can sit. She urges me to stand, yet I just look up at her and take in her appearance.
The capital city in the Frostlands is built like a maze, with the outer walls of the city connected to the slums by the gates.
There’s a path that weaves from the wall toward the center of the kingdom, leading to a secondary set of gates that opens up to the official palace and the docks beyond, though they are largely unused.
I live between the outer wall and the palace gates, below a tiered division that separates the nobility from everyone else, yet they are still in a different area outside the official palace walls.
I used all the spare change I had to travel here and implore the King for aid beyond the walls and across the land. Even a job in the palace would be better suited than begging like this.
The princess herself is whispered about, a blend of King Andor’s aristocratic features and upbringing and Queen Snedronningen’s sharper features from her home kingdom in Ander Son’s Way across the water.
The princess has blue eyes and dark hair like mine, with pale skin and an angular face, and I know from the whispers that she’s desired by many.
She’s pretty, something that statues of the royals often leave out.
She’s a little younger than I am. I’m closing in on twenty-five, so she’s somewhere close to twenty. But a kind soul all the same, a gift not yet squandered by greed.
“Do not fear,” she says, a gorgeous smile spreading across soft lips.
The people filing into the palace around us are slowing, staring at the spectacle of the Crown Princess and a beggar sitting together just off the main path.
“My parents see your struggles. They know your worries. We are working to make life easier for all of those who live within the Frostlands.”
Her voice is full of promise and belief, as if thinking things will get better will make it so. Her slim fingers are still wrapped around my arm, and when I glance down surprise hits me.
There are specks on the sleeve where snowflakes and frost cling to the threadbare material, and she quickly pulls her hand back when she notices my stare. “Apologies, you must already be so cold. Magic is something that’s a little tough to learn.”
My eyes widen, and the strangeness of this situation is enough to forget how cold I am.
The palace is warm, fighting off the chill that always lingers in my bones and making me more and more aware of the ache in my stomach from lack of food.
Before I can respond, another guard, not the captain, appears with food.
Bread. It looks warm and soft. The princess remains kneeling on the floor at my side and takes a piece. It’s some type of roll, and it smells heavenly. “Here, eat.”