The Cursed Queen

by Sarah Fine

  “He is worried about our warriors.”

  “Our warriors? Whose do you mean?”

  I sigh. “Is this the argument you want to have?”

  She leans her head against the wall. “Should we bother talking at all? The last time we spoke, you seemed very determined not to hear half of what I said.” She looks toward the cold hearth. “And to deliberately misunderstand the rest.”

  “Deliberately misunderstand?” My jaw clenches. “You are guilty of that, Thyra, not me.”

  “Tell me, then, Ansa. Share your wisdom.”

  I scoff. “You’ve always been the smart one between us, haven’t you?”

  She smiles and shakes her head as her eyes grow shiny. “No. Just the one who couldn’t see the world in black and white, blood and victory.” She glances at me as she swipes her grimy sleeve across her face. “I tried, though. Everything would have been easier if I’d succeeded. Or perhaps I would have died a lot sooner. I’m not sure.”

  “You’re talking in riddles.” And so softly I can barely hear. I can’t tell if she’s broken or quietly defiant.

  “I considered becoming an andener. Did you know that?”

  My eyebrows rise. “You’ve always been a warrior. And a good one.”

  She nods. “But not the kind of warrior my father hoped for. Neither role really fit, but I couldn’t be both.”

  I sink to the floor, remembering how Lars shouted at her to come back with a raid kill, or not at all. “Your father just wanted you to be strong.”

  “Is that strength? The ability to pierce soft flesh with a sharp blade?”

  “You make it sound petty when you describe it like that. But there is no greater power than the power to take a life.” I learned that the night my parents were killed.

  “What about the power to preserve life?” she asks. “What about the power to sustain and nurture a people?”

  “But that is how a chieftain nurtures us! He gives us a mission, and we reap the riches if we succeed. We come away from each raid and battle with the understanding that we are strong, and that no one can defeat us.” Something is so wrong inside me, making every word I utter exhausting. It’s like swinging a blade that’s too heavy, one that used to be easy to wield. And yet I press on, because stopping would force me to figure out what has changed. “If you don’t believe that, why did you ever want to be chieftain?”

  She winces. “I was stupid enough to believe I had something to offer. I was so determined to change things. Think about it—as the tribes gathered from the north, as we began to build our ships and shelters—we had so many mouths to feed that raiding for our food would never have been sustainable.”

  “And that is why we were sailing south,” I remind her. “To plunder here, where the riches are abundant!”

  “So we are a pestilence,” she says. “Like locusts. We eat through one field, then find another.”

  I groan. “How is it you can make anything sound pathetic and distasteful?”

  She lets out a hoarse laugh. “That’s my gift, I suppose.” She runs her hands over her wavy hair. “Nisse was pushing so hard to invade Kupari the season before I became a warrior. He had my father convinced of the riches in the south, of the ease of the coming victory.”

  “And you opposed it from the start.”

  “I did, Ansa. I couldn’t see an end in it, and I didn’t think it was what our people needed. I also knew so many innocents would die as soon as we hit their shores.” Her eyes meet mine. “I kill without mercy or regret when I have no choice. But the idea of killing someone who could not or would not threaten my life or my people?” She shakes her head. “I can’t. I’ve always wondered how you could, actually. I know your parents were killed in a raid. You used to cry out for your mother in your sleep.”

  Saliva fills my mouth. “Don’t.”

  “You of all people should question why we live this way, and whether we should.”

  “I of all people can’t,” I shout, fire trying to push its way up from my core. “And you can’t possibly understand.”

  “Make me, then.”

  I shake my head. “It must have been meant to happen. I was meant to be Krigere.”

  “You were forced to be Krigere, Ansa. You were never given a choice.”

  “Enough.” My voice is pure warning. My hands are shaking.

  “As you wish. But I have trouble living with the knowledge that we tear children from families, that we kill when we don’t have to, that we see it as a point of pride. That we mark our own skin as a boast to the heavens!” She makes a disgusted face. “It sickens me.”

  I think back to that night in the woods, when we stood over the old man from the village we’d just raided. He’d run, carrying a bundle of food and nothing else. He had no weapons, though he tried to throw a few pebbles at us as we approached. It was pathetic. When Thyra refused to kill him, I saw weakness. I reminded her of what her father had said. Maybe I can make him understand, she’d whispered.

  I thought she’d wanted him to understand her hesitation. But now . . . “The night I killed for you, the night you hoped you could make your father understand. You weren’t talking about one man. You wanted to change Lars’s mind about our entire way of life.”

  “That was the night I realized I couldn’t change anything—until I was chieftain.”

  My heart skips. “And is that why you tried to poison your father?”

  She does not look away from my eyes. “Now you are just Nisse’s horn, playing his tune for whomever will listen.”

  My mouth twists with contempt. “Come, Thyra—you admitted it that night in Halina’s shelter.”

  “No, I did not.” She sits up, leaning forward. “I admitted to sending that slave to find the poison, and to telling my father Nisse was trying to assassinate him. I am guilty of deceiving my father, and of the scheming that he hated so much. But I never set out to assassinate him.” Her fingers clutch the blanket that covers her straw tick mattress as she sways, looking dizzy and unsteady. “I never set out to assassinate anyone.”

  “You succeeded in getting Nisse banished—along with several thousand warriors. Isn’t that what you wanted?”

  “Yes!” she shouts. “That’s exactly what I wanted. But would you like to know why, Ansa? Would you believe me if I told you, or has he won you over so completely that you are packed full of his distorted version of truth?”

  “That’s a very good question, since he’s the only one who’s been willing to tell me the truth,” I yell.

  “No,” she says in a shaky voice, rising to her knees. “He’s willing to tell you whatever story brings you his way, whatever story keeps you quiet and useful.”

  I jump to my feet. “Is that better than using silence for the same purpose?”

  Her head falls back and she takes a deep breath. “I have made many mistakes. I never claimed to be perfect. But I loved my father and would have followed him into eternity. You saw me, Ansa, on the deck of that longship. After we heard of Nisse’s invasion of Vasterut, my father was dead determined to invade Kupari, and I was right there at his side. Reluctantly, yes. But I was loyal.”

  “You split our tribe by framing Nisse!”

  “I split our tribe because Nisse tried to kill me!” she shrieks. “I found the poison in my own cup, Ansa. The only reason I didn’t drink it was pure luck—a mouse got to it first and died right before my eyes. But I knew there was only one person who wanted me dead—the man who would take my place as heir, who would offer no counterbalance in his demand for war and death. And I had a choice—publicly accuse him and light the fuse on a civil war within our tribe, or create a situation where he had no alternative but to leave quietly. I stole my father’s celebration cup and planted it in Nisse’s tent, along with the poison he had intended for me. But I did not strike first. Believe that.”

  I gape at her. “I don’t know what to believe.”

  “Then we are strangers,” she says, sagging on her pallet. “It’s
my word against his. You are free to choose.” Her voice is weary but cold.

  “Why should I choose you when you didn’t choose me?” I blurt out.

  She raises her head. “What?”

  All my sorrow and rage forces its way up, propelling my words from my throat. “As long as I can remember, Thyra, I wanted to be next to you. I’d never seen anyone fight like you, so beautiful and deadly.” My voice cracks, broken by memory. “I never understood you. I know that. But there was always something . . .” I sniffle. “Something I couldn’t stop craving. You were a mystery, and I wanted to be the only one who could puzzle you out. All I ever wanted was for you to look at me, and to tell me I was yours. I knew I couldn’t be your mate, but my only desire was to be your wolf.”

  “You’ve always been a force all on your own,” she says. “I loved watching you fight too. You possess a ferocity I lack.”

  I let out a pained laugh. “And you have a grace that is foreign to me.” The lump in my throat makes it hard to speak. “But if you admired me so much, why did you push me away? Because you did keep me at arm’s length, even before I was cursed.”

  Her blue eyes are steady on me, though the rest of her trembles. “I let you as close as I could, Ansa. Can’t you see that? Is there anyone closer? Has there ever been? But when one is born a stranger in her own tribe, when she must wear a mask every day to be accepted, can you blame her for being terrified to show who she really is?” She inclines her head toward me. “Especially to one who fits so perfectly. Regardless of how you came to us, you have always been more Krigere than I.” She laughs. “Even now, when you’re revealed to be the queen of a foreign tribe.”

  “Do you have any idea how much I loved you?” I whisper.

  She nods. “I also saw the fear and disappointment in your eyes when I refused to kill.”

  “It seems neither of us could accept the other.” I swallow. “And I can’t control this magic if I don’t feel accepted, Thyra. You’ve made me feel as if I was evil. You said I was evil.”

  “I said what you had done was evil.” A tear slips down her pale, sunken cheek. “But I never thought of you as anything but my Ansa.” She wipes the drop away. “That hasn’t changed. But how will you use this magic, now that it is a permanent part of you?”

  “To bring us victory.” Assuming it ever learns to obey me.

  “So you are to be Nisse’s sword on the battlefield,” she murmurs. “He will wield you as it suits him.”

  I take a step back toward the door. “He wants me to be a good warrior. He is giving me a chance, Thyra—I can be accepted by the tribe again.”

  “We always accepted you.”

  “Because I fought! That’s the only reason I’m alive. I earned it.”

  She sighs. “Do you ever wish you hadn’t had to? Do you ever let yourself feel the anger you must bear deep inside you, knowing it was the Krigere who stole you from your native land, who killed the people who—”

  “That is deep in the past.” How I wish it felt that way. “And the present holds more than enough to occupy us.”

  “We agree on that, at least.” Her eyes are bright with hope. “You are still part of our tribe, Ansa. You were never banished. Don’t act like you were.”

  “Where is our tribe, Thyra?” I ask, waving toward the window. “They’re dying in some maze of mud and human waste, all for their loyalty to you!”

  Thyra’s lips are a gray line as she nods slowly. “And what would Nisse have me say to them? What would you have me say to them, since you wouldn’t deliver my message?”

  “Tell them to join us,” I snap. “Tell them to live and die like warriors, not mice!”

  “And help Nisse destroy another people, another land? Your people, no less!”

  “They are not my people!” My voice cracks over the denial.

  She gives me a wary look, perhaps seeing the fire in my eyes. “As you wish. But tell me—why is Nisse so afraid of what I would say to our warriors that he’s cut me off from any communication with them at all? If he was so worried about them, so unwilling to let them die, why wouldn’t he allow Preben or Bertel to come to the tower and see me?”

  “It’s not my place to know,” I say, backing toward the door as she sands away the last layer of my control.

  “Oh, so it’s only your place to do his bidding now, without thought or question? You’re not his wolf, then—you’re his dog.”

  “Shut up.” I close my eyes as fire and pain streaks along my limbs.

  “Do you trust that elder he has training you? Do you believe the story he tells? How do you know he’s not leading everyone into a trap?”

  “Nisse trusts him,” I say, because I can’t quite claim that I do.

  “Nisse only cares about what you can do for him. He doesn’t care that the magic burns you. He doesn’t care about how it hurts you—and I can see that it does. Right now, even.”

  “At least he lets me have a place at his side!” I roar, the fire dripping from my fingers onto the stone floor. “At least he lets me be who I am!”

  “Is this who you are? Just fire and ice magic, controlled by rage and fear and a wild desperation to belong to a tribe, even a twisted, corrupted one? Because that’s when this power becomes vicious and unstoppable. Have you noticed? You have a perfectly good mind, Ansa—you’d be more powerful if you let that rule you, instead of fury and terror!”

  I breathe and breathe and breathe, but the heat rises unbidden.

  “I love you, Ansa,” Thyra says breathlessly, her skin turning pink as the air becomes searing. “I love you. And this magic is part of you now. You can kill . . . or show mercy. You will decide to be in control . . . or not.” Sweat streams down her face and she grimaces with the pain. “You can only . . . blame yourself. . . .”

  She slumps against the wall as I slam the side of my fist into the door.

  “Let me out, for heaven’s sake,” I shout, calling to the ice as Thyra faints.

  The door swings open and Carina pokes her head in. “We heard the shouting. Did you kill her? You weren’t supposed to kill her!” She waves her hand as I rush out of the room, wincing as the heat reaches her.

  “Get Kauko up here to heal Thyra,” I bark, fear jittering along my spine. Thyra’s starving and weak already. What have I done? “Summon him now!” I stalk down the hall with no idea where I’m heading as Carina runs past me, on her way to find the elder. My entire body is burning with the magic—and with Thyra’s words. She’s reached inside me and poured out all my thoughts, scattering them to the wind, leaving me jumbled and spinning. I walk blind and stumbling, my vision blurred with hot and cold tears. I shiver and sweat. So badly, I want to hurl fire. I want to rage. I want to call to the magic and let it loose. But if I do, it could kill me. Bleeding or not, I’ve never felt less balanced than I do now.

  A hand closes around my wrist as I reach the very bottom of the spiraling steps, and I’m yanked into an alcove. I slam my hand against a hard, sweat-slick chest—and my assailant lets out a hiss of pain as his back hits the wall, followed by a shaky laugh.

  “Sig,” I say as he leans into the torchlight. “What are you doing?”

  “No. More. Bleed,” he whispers, pressing his thumb to the wound in the crook of my elbow.

  I stare up at him as the torch flares, and I’m not sure if he’s causing it—or if I am. “Why?”

  He shakes his head. “No more,” he says again. He puts an imaginary cup to his lips and pretends to drink.

  “Have you had too much mead?”

  “Bleed? No,” he says. “No more.”

  This is hopeless without Halina. “What are you doing outside your chamber?” I point down the corridor, where I know he’s being kept. Through the gloom, I can just make out two prone figures lying next to an open door.

  When I try to step back from him, he holds my arm tight. “No,” he says. His mouth twists with frustration as he mutters something in Kupari. He points at my hand. “Teach you.”

/>   “Yes. Kauko is teaching me. Not that it’s working.”

  He seems to understand the frustration in my tone, if not the words. His grin is a bright, deadly thing. “I teach you.”

  I peer at him through narrowed eyes. “Um . . .” I glance up the hall toward the guards, sincerely hoping he hasn’t killed them. At the same time, I can’t bring myself to call for help, or to fight him, because no matter what he’s done, and no matter how gentle Kauko has been with me, I have come to hate the way the elder treats his apprentice. I wish I could ask Sig what really happened, but without translation, we must remain strangers. But I am running out of time to learn how to control the magic, and at some point Nisse will give up on me. “All right. Tomorrow.”

  His brow furrows. “Teach? Yes?”

  I nod. “Yes.” I put a finger to my lips.

  Sig lays his own finger over his smug grin. And then he releases me and heads up the hall. As he walks by a torch, I gasp at the horizontal stripes of blood that have bled through his shirt. He’s been whipped.

  Sig enters his chamber and pulls the door shut without giving the felled warriors so much as a glance. To my relief, they start to stir. Whatever he did to them—perhaps making them faint in the heat just like I accidentally did to Thyra just now—the effect was temporary. But it only makes his power clear; he kept that heat in place while he crept down the hall and talked to me. I don’t understand how someone with that much control and power could allow anyone to whip them.

  I lean against the wall, trying to sort things out. I don’t know who to trust. Nisse or Thyra, Kauko or Sig. Each of them has an agenda. I’m not naive enough to believe otherwise. But two kingdoms and a thousand warriors might depend on which way I jump. Only a few hours ago, I thought I had made my decision.

  Now I realize I’m frozen midair, and I have no idea where I’m going to land.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE

  As soon as my back collides with stone, I have my legs up. I jab my foot into Jaspar’s middle and roll before he can wrap his hands around my ankle. My head throbs with the jarring aftermath of the fall as I jump to my feet, but my blood sings.