Chapter Twenty-Five #3
“No, that’s it from me,” said Marie, with another shallow curtsey and a blunt nod. “It’ll be roast boar again tonight, Your Majesty. The next few nights, too, I expect. And then I suppose we’ll figure something out until new trade deals have been agreed. Thank you for your attention.”
Benan stepped forward, scowling, to escort Marie down the aisle that split the audience, but she shrugged him off with a tut and bustled off to the inner door that returned to the palace.
The next to step forward was a tall man who seemed to have pressed to the front of the crowd by virtue of his broad shoulders and the resolved scowl on his face.
He bowed and introduced himself—Samuel, a grocer who made his livelihood on the Laune.
“Your Majesty,” he began with little preamble.
“The Laune merchants are a tight-knit community, and we’ve little to do these days but talk.
There’s been whispers. We hear you’ve granted work and coin to some of our number, while the rest of us are forced to lean on the kindness of our friends and neighbours.
We’ll work. We’re happy to work. Tell us what we can do, and we’ll do it. ”
“We have offered work to Wielders,” said Avette. Her smile was thin, so transparent she may as well have rolled her streaked and glittering eyes. “We need magic to protect our boundaries. Unfortunately, we have little need of greengrocers.”
“Well, pardon me, Your Majesty, but it would seem we have a rather urgent need of fresh fruit and vegetables.”
An angry burst of laughter and derisive scoffs rose from the emboldened crowd, and Benan hissed something venomous at them, scrambling for his hilt. Avette held up a hand; her pendant gave a warning pulse.
“As I have said. We all must adjust to Aera’s blessed gift.
” Avette spoke in a clipped tone; gone was the attempt at a smile, the dreamy airs of the beloved fairytale queen.
She’d grown tired of playing the Saviour, it seemed.
“Your peers have the means and talent to forge a new path in my employ. With no comparable talent, you must find your own path.”
The low murmur chased around the room like a snake after its own tail. But the merchant merely stared at her in silence, his jaw loose with shock. He finally closed his slack mouth and swallowed, indignant.
Then bowed.
“We called Her Late Majesty the Queen of Snow and Silver,” he said as he rose, tone mild. “But she wasn’t perfect; sometimes she was too cold. Sometimes she was known only as the Snow Queen. It seems unjust now, since you, Your Majesty, are colder by far. A true Queen of Ice.”
Kai’s blood turned bitter, his heart freezing mid-beat as though he had swallowed his own frozen tongue.
He could not say what roused the dread within him, what stiffened the gooseflesh already layering his arms. But the merchant was walking away one moment—and in the next, a bolt of lightning dropped from the ceiling and struck him down.
Not a bolt of lightning; a shard of ice as long as a sword.
Not struck down; impaled.
Bile rose in Kai’s throat, trapped, sour and burning.
And then came the screams.
???
The ceiling came into bleary focus, dripping shards of ice that winked like bloodthirsty stars. The ground beneath his back was cold tile. He could have been anywhere in the palace, really, but the dead silence in the air told him this was not the packed reception hall.
Or if it was, something had gone horribly wrong.
A shadow moved in his periphery, and Kai jerked upright—then immediately collapsed as a blinding bolt of pain engulfed his skull.
“Easy, easy,” said the shadow, a coaxing weight laid on his shoulder. “You took quite a blow.”
What happened, Kai tried to say—all that came out was a muted moan that vibrated around his aching teeth.
“Shit,” the shadow breathed. “He can’t even speak. How hard did Doran hit him?”
“His jaw is frozen shut,” said a second, impatient voice. “Move over.”
A cool gust plucked at Kai’s shirt collar, and all at once his jaw relaxed, the ache in his teeth forgotten even if his head still throbbed.
He managed to crack an eye open, to glance up at the shadows kneeling by his side.
Gerard and Lady Imogen. Two others stood behind them, though his vision was still too blurry to pick out much more than vague shapes.
“What happened?” he tried again, hoarse and pained.
“A man was killed,” said Imogen.
“Violently murdered,” muttered Gerard, but Imogen went on as though she hadn’t heard him.
“It caused a panic, and Her Majesty reacted on impulse. You tried to stop her, and Captain Doran intervened.”
Kai’s head throbbed, and he cradled his skull, wincing. Beside him, Gerard gave a derisive scoff.
“She started freezing people as they fled, and you lunged at her,” said the gard. “Doran knocked you out.”
He remembered.