Snow Like Ashes

by Sara Raasch

  It’s over. Just like that. No final explosion, no departing scream of death. Just nothing, like it was never anything more than the shattered ball of glass and metal at Mather’s feet.

  I push away from Mather, but I know what I’ll see before my eyes find it. The magic in me whispers it in the deepest, most open parts of my mind, a small, quiet nudge of knowledge.

  Sir sits back on his heels, staring with wide eyes at the empty splotch of dirt under him. His knife still sits in the earth, poised vertically against the gentle current of wind.

  But Angra is gone.

  UNCORRECTED E-PROOF—NOT FOR SALE

  HarperCollins Publishers

  ..................................................................

  31

  THE WORLD IS wrong, tilted off balance, and when I stand on shaky legs I fall forward, scrambling in the air.

  Sir catches me. He cradles me against his chest, his strong arms wrapping around me so tightly I know it must be a dream, and I expect him to call me his sweet girl and for Alysson to be just behind us, serving dinner to Nessa and her family.

  But Sir is real. He is here. He is alive and when I push back from him, look up at his face, the world stops tilting quite so much.

  His lips part. “It’s over.”

  My eyes fall behind him, to the empty expanse of dirt where Angra’s body had been. Like the staff breaking destroyed him. Like it was just that easy.

  Everyone thinks it was. Everyone including the Spring soldiers, who dropped their weapons at the disappearance of their king and magic, cowering in reluctant surrender while their enemies rejoice. Green and gold and maroon and white bodies dance around the square, cheering at the cloudy sky.

  I close my eyes, breathe in, focusing on the air flowing in and out of my lungs, on Sir’s arms around my shoulders. I focus beyond him, on the sound of the Winterians’ pure and shameless happiness turning this miserable city into a paradise just for a moment.

  “Meira.”

  I open my eyes to see Sir staring down at me, his face locked in an expression I’ve never seen on him before. It takes me a moment to realize it’s admiration.

  “We decided long ago that I would be the one to tell you. The others who escaped, I mean,” he whispers. “I don’t know how Angra found out. I should have—”

  My body goes cold, the swirling conduit-magic now awakened and wild. I inhale, trembling as I put a hand on Sir’s arm. “No,” I shake my head, “it was Hannah’s secret to tell, not yours.”

  Sir frowns. “Hannah?”

  I shrug, not sure how I can explain this, but Sir shakes it away. He takes a step backward and drops to his knees as he lifts a fist up to me. Dangling out of that fist is a silver chain.

  “My queen” is all he says.

  I flinch, hating the fear that blossoms at the title. I don’t want him to call me that, but the way he looks up at me is something I’ve wanted all my life. Like he sees me, truly sees me, no matter how I am. Covered in blood and dirt and dust, glowing with the potential of a renewed kingdom.

  Like he sees all the sacrifices he’s made and doesn’t regret a single one.

  I reach for the locket when another hand beats me there. My fingers pause, outstretched in the dusty air, lingering over Mather’s hand as he takes the locket from his father.

  Mather unclasps the other half and slides it off his neck. He holds both halves out to me, his jewel-blue eyes glistening gray under the overcast sky. “Yours, my queen,” he says. His hands shake and he runs his tongue over his lips. Everything about him is strong, unwavering, but the look in his eyes speaks of a deeper fear. Fear of unbecoming, fear of all his many, many responsibilities shifting onto someone else’s shoulders.

  I lift my hand. A hundred things push at me, a hundred different ways I want to apologize or grovel or cry. I’m sorry it’s me. I’m sorry his whole life was created to keep me safe, his entire existence shattered around this one simple lie. I’m sorry we had to grow up so abruptly. I’m sorry for everything.

  But I don’t say any of that. I take the locket pieces from his hand, keeping my eyes on his, my mouth open like maybe, just maybe, I’ll find the right words.

  Mather exhales when the locket leaves his skin. He folds into himself while at the same time rising up, standing with the weight of all that has happened. His lips twitch into the pale beginnings of a smile but he stays there, suspended between happiness and shock.

  “I am yours to command, my queen,” he whispers, and bows his head.

  I place my palm on his cheek before I even realize I’ve moved, the cut on my shoulder making me cringe.

  I wish we wouldn’t hurt. Not now. Not after all this.

  Numbness shoots up my hand and my eyes widen. I didn’t mean to call on the magic, but it’s alive now, awakened, and the numbness climbs, grows, and surges from my palm into Mather’s cheek.

  He gasps. My whole body goes cold, icy and brilliant, and a new light shines in Mather’s eyes. It chases away his exhaustion and fear, filling him with the same strength that filled the Winterians. Nothing definite. Just a small ray to keep him going, to keep his uncertainty at bay until he finds the will to face it.

  Is he relieved to have the burden of being king gone? Or is he just afraid?

  Mather steps back, pulling out of my hand, and slides to the ground, mimicking Sir’s stance. Behind them, the cheering has dissipated into reverent awe, and every Winterian slowly slides to the ground. Their heads bow, their white hair smudged brown and red and black. My breath tightens, and I can’t decide whether I want them to stop or not. They look so happy. So whole. And I can’t break that happiness, no matter how terrifying it is that I’m the reason they’re bowing. Me, the orphaned soldier-girl.

  I spot Dendera near the gate with Henn beside her as they kneel, both of them locked in an embrace that’s tight and intimate and makes me nearly intoxicated with happiness. Greer and Finn lean on each other, a bloody gash through Finn’s left leg. Conall, and Garrigan, and Nessa, and even Deborah—everyone is happy, and here, and safe.

  And Theron. Behind them all, Theron lingers beyond the gate, a contingent of his father’s men battle-bruised around him. His eyes meet mine across the expanse between us and he smiles, a slow, deliberate smile that echoes the reverence of this moment. He bows his head, mimicking the Cordellans, the Autumnians, absorbing the awe and wonder of a kingdom that isn’t theirs. All of them smiling under the relief that came when Angra’s body vanished.

  Maybe Angra did vanish. Maybe the Decay disintegrated and ripped him down with it. So many maybes. So many years of thinking maybe they’ll come, maybe they’ll save us, maybe we’ll see our kingdom whole again someday.

  I bend down to Mather and Sir and put one hand on each of their shoulders. They look up at me, tears making them look morbidly happy.

  I exhale and smile. “Let’s go home.”

  With Angra gone, the other three work camps fall easily. Spring dissolves into a panicked chaos without its king, which makes our merged army’s job even easier as we move through the kingdom, fighting off the soldiers who hold the other Winterians captive. Any exhaustion or fear or pain the Winterians felt in the camps is snuffed out beneath the roaring joy we bring when we save them. It’s something I never get tired of, seeing their faces alight with the knowledge that they are free.

  Two weeks pass, two weeks filled with freeing the other three camps, tending to the wounds of my people, slowly nursing nutrients back into them. The Autumn army departs once the last work camp is free, but Cordell stays, a choice I try not to question. Theron is quick to offer food and supplies from his army, and I take what he gives before Noam can say anything to the contrary. The Winterians see a unified front, soldiers and food and medicine, not a queen who until a few weeks ago had no idea who she was, or a king who a few months ago wanted to dominate their land rather than save them. I will do everything I can to keep it that way, long enough for permanent healing to settle into their
bodies and minds.

  The permanent healing starts the moment we see Jannuari.

  Winter’s capital sits just inside the border, a few hours’ ride from Spring. The vibrant cherry blossom trees and emerald grass of Spring fade to Winter’s fields of white perfection, unbroken rolling hills of snow and frozen clusters of icy, ivory trees. The change is instant, sweeping over me in a rush of … right. This is right. The chill, the frozen forests, the way everything is white—the sky, the ground, the air. This is home.

  But it’s Jannuari we all wait for with breathless excitement. Jannuari, our lost capital, a city I’ve only ever seen in crafted memories. The deeper we plunge into Winter, the more my chest tightens, until I fear I’ll turn solid from anticipation long before we reach our destination.

  The Winterians see Jannuari first, the hazy outline of a city in the distance. They alert me with a cry of excitement and burst free from the ranks of Cordell’s army with renewed vigor. Hundreds of feet pound in sudden delight over the empty fields, the vibrations shaking the whole world to bits.

  Jannuari sits ahead of me under a snowless gray sky. Towns lie around the main bulk of the city, its wall shattered, rocks torn into a lumpy, uneven perimeter on the horizon. Within it a few towers still stand, their determined fingers reaching up to the sky like nothing’s wrong, like they were just waiting for us to come back.

  You didn’t kill us, Angra, and we will rise again.

  I gallop alongside the Winterians but pull my horse to a stop, a great war beast borrowed from Cordell’s army. The Winterians continue running, too caught in their exuberance to notice I’ve stopped. My horse dances nervously on the old snow caked on the field, Winter’s pale grass popping through the thin layer of ice beneath his hooves.

  Sir pulls up alongside me, both of us sending clouds of frosty breath into the air.

  “It’ll need rebuilding. And we’ll need to barter rations from Cordell,” he says.

  I breathe as a cold wind pushes through the white cotton shirt I borrowed from Theron too. We’re already indebted to him and his father more than we could ever repay—and the thought that we’ll need even more makes my stomach pinch with dread. I know what Noam will want for all he’s given: access to the Klaryns, to Winter, in an attempt to find the chasm of magic. Maybe that’s why he hasn’t stopped Theron from providing us with supplies. Maybe that’s why he hasn’t returned to Cordell yet, why he’s let his army linger around us like guards standing watch over an investment.

  Whatever his reason, we need him and what he offers, and until he tries to collect, I can’t worry about it. Too much.

  “I know.”

  “But it’ll be good for them.” Sir shifts on his saddle, one hand relaxing on the reins. “It’ll be good. Rebuild the city as they heal. They need this.”

  I nod. We all need this. We need to fix something, work through it with our bare hands and feel the life flow back into our veins. To do something true and brilliant and right.

  Sir looks sidelong at me, turned away enough that I can’t see his expression. “You’re just like her.”

  I search his face. “Hannah?”

  He nods. “Every moment of your life.”

  Cold twinges through me. His way of telling me I can do this. I can bring our kingdom together again, lead them on to a better future.

  Whatever that future holds, Angra resides there too.

  I swallow, catching my lower lip between my teeth as I inhale the cold, cold air. We’ve been so busy with the happiness of freeing the other work camps, of traveling to Winter, that I haven’t wanted to ruin the joy. It’s so fragile, this joy, and a part of me doesn’t want to say anything, doesn’t want to draw attention to bad things until we need to.

  But not telling Sir could make it worse when the time does come. If it comes. If my suspicions are right, if Angra isn’t dead and his threat not over and everything we fought for still only an illusion of true peace.

  “I don’t think Angra died,” I whisper, a sad sound on the chill air. “And his magic … it’s worse than we thought. Much worse.”

  Sir doesn’t say anything, and for a moment I think maybe my voice got sucked away on the wind. I look at him and he wears that same impenetrable expression he got when I returned from Lynia with the locket half. Scared and determined, like he’s staring down the future and doesn’t have room to fear the past.

  I touch the locket at my neck. It’s whole now. Whole and empty, powerless, but touching it gives me a strange calm. Just like that lapis lazuli stone. Just like hope. The Winterians around me think the power is now safely back in the locket—they think all the times I used it were what Mather told me, a fluke. A desperate surge brought on by how far we had fallen. It doesn’t occur to them that the magic could be anywhere else now, and I’m not sure I want to correct them.

  Not just them, though—Cordell too. Noam especially.

  “One thing at a time,” Sir says. His eyes meet mine and for a breath he shows me how tired he is, how scared. “We’ll handle the future one thing at a time.”

  I start to nod when horses gallop through the still-running Winterians and canter to a halt beside us. Theron and Noam shiver in their saddles, eyes darting between Jannuari, Sir, and me. Noam at least tries to look dignified in his coldness while Theron wraps his arms around himself and lets his teeth clack together like hooves on the plain. Mather pulls his horse between mine and Theron’s, an eyebrow lifted as he assesses our nearly frozen foreign guests.

  “Tell me there’s a cloak shop somewhere in there,” Theron says, a shiver making him twitch awkwardly on his horse.

  Mather laughs, a sharp and beautiful sound that I haven’t heard in years. He’s been smiling a little more each day, that beautiful, full-face smile that makes everything around him light up. “Poor Cordellan prince. Can’t handle a little chill?”

  “A little chill?” Theron squeaks. He motions at the army, the Cordellans looking just as frozen and uncomfortable as their leaders. “We’re going to have nothing but soldier-icicles by the end of this. My father sneezed earlier and it froze in midair!”

  I giggle from my horse and Theron glances at me. The look in his eyes shifts from lighthearted laughter to something deeper, something lingering from our anxious kiss in the halls of Angra’s palace.

  Mather adjusts on his horse between us, his jaw setting. I tear my eyes away from Theron as a slow grin spreads across my face, and I want to laugh at the absurdity of this situation. Normal problems. Normal worries about suitors. It’s what Sir wanted all along, wasn’t it? And after everything … normal problems feel wonderful.

  Noam grunts on the other side of his son but doesn’t say anything. Whether it’s because he has nothing to say or his lips have frozen shut, I can’t tell. We’ve yet to discuss the marriage arrangement, whether a Rhythm still wants to ally his son to a Season, or if Winter’s growing debt to Cordell is enough of a connection. He started to ask me a few days ago, when we were resting between raids on work camps. Noam stretched out his hand to shake mine and when our skin touched, I saw again the vibrant image of him kneeling at his wife’s bedside. A connection that comes from the fact that I’m a conduit myself—a connection the other Royal Conduit–bearers must not be aware of, except for Angra, and only because he used the Decay. Noam must think I’m just a weak, unstable queen who trembles when she touches him.

  I think he needs to believe that, though. It’s better if he underestimates me, if he has no idea about my true power. An extra boost in Winter’s favor when he does decide to collect on all he’s given us.

  “If you’re done bickering about the chill,” Sir cuts in, “I believe we have introductions to make.”

  He meets my eyes, beams, and kicks his horse to a gallop, hooves tearing up clumps of melted snow as he darts between the running Winterians. Theron and Noam plunge after him, weaving in and out of my running white-haired people toward a city many of us don’t remember. Only Mather lingers, his breaths releasing burs
ts of icy clouds between us, his eyes on me as I watch everyone around us.

  “I’m sorry,” I exhale.

  Mather’s horse dances on the snow, disturbed by our tension. I peel my gaze away from the running horde to meet Mather’s sapphire eyes for more than a passing glance. It’s the longest either of us has looked at each other since the battle in Abril, and the gaze is heavy with apology.

  He snorts air out his nose in a soft, incredulous laugh. “Don’t apologize. You didn’t do anything wrong.” His focus sweeps over the city ahead of us. “At all.”

  “I know, I just—” I stop short, and Mather pivots back to me.

  “I know,” he echoes, and the smile he gives me is genuine. He shifts again, tightening the reins in his hands. “If either of us should feel bad, it’s me. William told us the truth after you were captured, and all I could think was: you’re the one who has the responsibility now. I’m free.”

  Mather keeps his gaze firmly on the horizon as he talks, and if I hadn’t been looking at him, I might’ve accepted his lighthearted tone, his jovial manner. But I watch his face as he speaks, watch the way his eyes narrow, his lips pull into a thin line. There’s far too much truth in what he says. I’m free.

  Maybe it’s not a freedom he wants.

  “When I was in Cordell,” I start, “and I had to play the part of their future queen, I pretended I was—” My words catch and I chuckle. “I pretended I was you.”

  My confession hangs in the air, a whispered strand of words that hovers in the falling flakes of snow. Mather smiles at me through it, some of his tension softening before he drops his head in a small bow.

  “My queen,” he says in response. He kicks his horse into a gallop that sends them both launching into the running horde, another body racing for Jannuari’s wall.

  I watch him go, my chest unwinding. We’re really here. Jannuari. A city I’ve only seen in memories and dreams, its cobblestone streets, its cottages. The way snow falls constantly, an ever-present rain of perfect, unique flakes. It needs to snow. It needs to always snow.