by Jim C. Hines
Snow blinked in surprise. The stingers wouldn’t penetrate Hephyra’s skin. She watched through the splinters of glass as Hephyra crushed another wasp with her bare hand.
Her wasps couldn’t take Hephyra, and Snow wasn’t entirely certain how well they would be able to turn the Phillipa ’s crew against its captain. The dryad’s fairy allure was almost as potent as Snow’s own magic.
“Very well.” Snow’s wasps had taken the weather mages on the Allesandrian ships. In response to Snow’s thoughts, the wind picked up, turning the Snow Queen about and launching her after the Phillipa .
As they closed, Snow climbed onto the rail and stepped out, summoning a cushion of air to lower her to the water. The sea froze beneath her feet. Waves broke against the ice, splashing her boots and legs as she walked. She smiled, casting yet another spell. The water hardened, forming armor of gleaming ice that encased her legs and moved higher.
So much power at her command. A week ago, simply fighting the fog sent by the Allesandrian weather wizard would have left her head throbbing from pain. Today, there were no limits to what she might do.
She allowed the Snow Queen to veer away. Shouts broke out on the Phillipa as someone spied her in the water.
Ice spread to cover her face. She concentrated, keeping the front of her helm as pure and clear as possible. Only the slightest ripple distorted her vision. Her heart slowed, each beat pounding harder, as if her blood itself were turning to ice. She turned her head, testing the armor. Ice scraped against ice, cracking and refreezing to allow her to move.
A crossbow bolt splashed into the water beside her. A second struck her stomach, gouging a chip from the armor. She brushed a gauntleted hand over the chip, and an instant later no sign of damage remained. A magical attack followed, but her armor deflected that as well.
Her wasps had stung only a few men on the Phillipa, but it was enough. She reached out to adjust the vision of the closest. She peered through his eyes until she spotted two men in Allesandrian uniforms, working to prepare another spell. Her slave killed them both before they knew what was happening.
As the crew reacted to this betrayal, Snow moved on to another crewman, showing him not a maiden of ice striding toward his ship, but a drowning girl. He threw down a line to help her even as one of his companions rushed to stop him.
By the time Snow’s feet touched the main deck, her slave had fallen, but it no longer mattered. He had protected the line long enough for her to board. A sailor rushed her from the right, cutlass raised. The blade bounced from Snow’s forearm. A single punch from her gauntleted fist sent him sprawling into the boats lashed to the deck.
She touched her hip, allowing her fingers to reach through the ice to the pouch at her waist. Most of her mirror shards were locked away on the Snow Queen, but she needed only a few. When she pulled her hand away, a knife of ice and broken glass followed. The blade was long as her forearm and frosted white. The edges were jagged glass, like silver teeth.
Another sailor grabbed her arm and tried to wrest the knife away, but the hilt was bonded to her grip. She clubbed him on the side of the head, then sliced her knife along his forearm, allowing a single sliver of glass to break away.
“Keep back.” Captain Hephyra stood with a wooden cudgel in one hand. To Snow’s eyes, she was all but glowing with rage and magic that flowed through her and the ship both.
“Tell me about the girl.” The ice helm muffled Snow’s words, but Hephyra appeared to understand.
“Funny. I never thought you were interested in girls.”
Snow jabbed her knife. “Your crew belongs to me, body and mind. I can see their memories. Who is this girl Danielle and Talia brought along? She feels familiar. I want her.”
“And I want the fairy queen’s body fertilizing my roots, but we can’t have everything we want, can we?”
Snow circled, studying Hephyra. Red scratches showed where the wasps had tried to sting her, but not one had penetrated to the blood. Or sap. Whatever it was that flowed through the dryad’s veins. “Tell me where they’ve gone, and I’ll-”
“Rot it all, just shut up and fight.” The cudgel slammed Snow’s knife out of the way, then struck her forehead, sending white cracks through Snow’s vision. But the ice healed itself as fast as Hephyra could attack.
Snow’s weapon should be strong enough to pierce even a dryad’s skin, but every time she tried, Hephyra knocked her arm aside. Chips of ice flew from Snow’s armor with every blow. Snow stepped sideways, trying to regain her balance, but Hephyra stayed with her. Had Snow been unprotected, her bones would have been shattered a dozen times over by now.
The spray of the waves gave her more than enough water to repair and maintain her armor. “What did they do to earn such loyalty?”
Hephyra smashed Snow’s arm hard enough to spin her around. The next attack landed between Snow’s shoulder blades, driving her to her knees. “I like the prince. I met him last fall.” Heavy blows punctuated each sentence. “He said I was pretty, and he liked my ship. Also, you hurt my cat.”
Snow swung at Hephyra’s legs, but the dryad jumped back, avoiding the knife with ease. Snow yanked a second knife from her armor, keeping Hephyra away long enough to regain her feet.
“So what is this all about?” Hephyra asked. She wasn’t breathing hard, but she pressed a hand to the capstan as though drawing strength from the wooden wheel. “What are you after in Allesandria?”
“Allesandria has always been corrupt. A place of chaos and bloodshed and ugliness.” She thought back to the nobles who always fawned over her mother, scheming and squabbling like beasts to gain her favor. She had fled that ugliness for so brief a time, hiding in Roland’s cabin in the woods, but there was no escape.
“So you mean to fix that by killing everyone?”
Snow glanced at the crew, who had gathered in a ring on the main deck. Hephyra remained free, but the crew were no longer hers. “Allesandria banished your kind. Lorindar enslaved you. Why do you care?”
“I don’t, particularly.” Hephyra’s next blow struck the side of Snow’s helm and made her vision sparkle, but it wasn’t enough.
Snow dropped one knife and grabbed the end of the cudgel. Hephyra ripped it away, but not before frost began to spread over the wood. Snow smiled as the cold seeped into the weapon. The next time Hephyra attacked, the end of her cudgel broke away.
Hephyra cried out. “Damn, but that stung.”
Snow raised her own weapon to attack, but the dryad lunged again, stabbing the pointed end of her broken cudgel into Snow’s chest.
The wood gouged Snow’s armor, driving her back until she hit the rail. Hephyra bore down, trying to force the point through Snow’s chest. Cracks spread through the armor, but it held. “You never should have come after me on my own ship.”
“My ship now.” Snow thrust her remaining knife up, using both hands to sink the blade into Hephyra’s stomach. The broken cudgel clattered to the deck. Snow pushed harder, until the hilt of her knife pressed against the dryad’s skin.
She stepped back, yanking the knife free. Dark blood dripped more slowly than Snow would have expected, almost like syrup as it froze to her blade and gauntlet.
Hephyra staggered to the mainmast. One hand gripped her stomach. The other clung to the mast, smearing blood on the wood. Her lips pulled back in a smile. “Not yet it’s not.”
With a crack like thunder, the foremast toppled toward Snow. Lines snapped, and the yardarms broke away as it fell. Snow dove to one side, barely avoiding the mast as it crashed to the deck. The entire ship shuddered from the impact, and a mass of rope slammed Snow face-first to the deck. Crewmen screamed in pain, bones crushed by the impact. The mast had snapped one of the yards on the mainmast and torn through much of the rigging on the port side.
Snow pushed herself around, clawing her way through the ropes. The Phillipa ’s lines were thin, but the sheer volume held her trapped. She slashed out with her knife, cutting everything within reach. She
pulled herself up and began to crawl toward Hephyra. The dryad was still smiling, clinging to the mainmast. The ship was her tree, responding to her will. She could sink them all if she chose.
If she had time.
Snow flung her knife, pouring her magic into the mirrored shards in the blade. Moments later, Hephyra lay unmoving on the deck.
Snow’s breath clouded the ice of her visor as she studied the damage. The Phillipa was useless as a sailing ship, the weight of the broken mast tilting her to port. Most of the crew were digging their way out from the mess, or doing their best to free the injured.
She glanced toward the harbor, where four more vessels were approaching through the fog. “Very well.” She retrieved her knife from Hephyra’s throat and turned it in her hand. The ice began to melt, forming into wings. One by one, the wasps took flight, their wings tinged pink by Hephyra’s blood. Her knife hadn’t held as many fragments as she might like, but it was enough to take the remainder of the Phillipa ’s crew.
Snow climbed over the ruins of the fallen mast. Let them send as many ships as they liked. She had four ships now. The Phillipa was dying, but she could still serve Snow’s purpose. At least one of the approaching ships would approach to investigate the damage and help the survivors.
“You banished me,” she whispered as she left the ship, returning to the Snow Queen and her mirror shards. Her own cousin had signed the order that she be executed should she ever again set foot in her homeland. She remembered the false sympathy in Laurence’s voice as he told her what he had done.
“I can’t change their minds,” he had said. His pale face was soft, his eyes shadowed. “You murdered the queen. Burned her to death with your magic.”
“She killed Roland.” Tears had choked Snow’s words. She had expected to die, had prepared herself for that. Instead, she would live… but she would never again be permitted to set foot upon Allesandrian soil. “She tried to kill me.”
“I know. But it’s not enough. She had too many allies.”
Allies like Ollear Curtana and Eminio Perin. Laurence had been too weak to fight them. In truth, it made no difference who sat on the throne. Allesandria had always been a land ruled by greed and cowardice.
Behind her, the crew of the Phillipa worked to reload the guns.
CHAPTER 11
Talia stood in ankle-deep snow at the edge of the river, examining the skeletal birches on the opposite bank. “You said you’d be able to find the witch’s cabin once we reached the river.”
“I only came here once.” Gerta paced along the shore. “Rather, Snow came here, but she imagined I was with her. To give her courage. She was nine years old, and was finally starting to believe some of the rumors about our mother. Snow followed her, hoping to learn the truth. Mother left the capital and headed east, following the river. I remember Noita’s cabin being near the shore…”
“Near the shore of which river?” Talia scowled at the second, smaller stream, which veered away at an angle from the first. The wolf’s senses were no help, since she didn’t know what exactly she should be tracking.
Gerta cupped her eyes and peered at the sun. “I only saw the outside, but it was a small cabin, probably one room. The windows were colored glass, square panes of blue and red. I remember the smell of flowers, and two oak trees that grew to either side of the door. They reminded me of soldiers guarding the entrance.”
“We could split up,” Danielle suggested. “If we each follow one fork-”
Talia brushed the black fur of her cape. “This cape is the only thing stopping Snow from finding us. We stay together.”
“Maybe someone else should take a turn wearing that,” Gerta suggested. “You’ve been fighting the wolf’s influence for a long time without rest.”
“I’m fine,” Talia snapped. “Or I will be as soon as you find the damned witch.”
Gerta smiled. “You see what I mean? That was testy, even for you.”
Talia started to respond, but caught herself. Gerta was right. The magic of the cape gave her strength and speed, but at a cost. She wanted to hunt, to fight. “So how do we find it?”
“I was created from magic and memories.” Gerta kicked a chunk of snow into the water. “I need to relive that memory.”
“How?” asked Danielle.
Gerta unfastened the clasp of her cloak and handed it to Talia. “We were cold. Snow hadn’t thought to bring extra clothes, and she was afraid to try magic, for fear that our mother would notice.”
The back of Talia’s neck tingled, and a burning smell indicated the presence of magic as Gerta paced a wide circle. Gerta traced her footsteps a second time, then a third, until a shadow began to form in the center.
Each pass solidified the illusion, painting a young girl with long black hair and cheeks red from cold. Talia’s chest tightened as she recognized a much younger Snow White. She wore a thick blue dress, but her hands were bare, and she clutched her arms over her chest for warmth.
“Stay down,” hissed the young Snow. “Do you want her to see us?”
Gerta crouched low, peering upstream at something Talia couldn’t see. “Where do you think she’s going?”
Snow flashed a gap-toothed grin up at Gerta. “Why? Are you scared?”
“I’m not!”
“You’re afraid she’ll throw you into a pot and boil the flesh from your bones, aren’t you?” Snow poked Gerta’s shoulder. “Then she’ll raise you from the dead and make you dance every night, nothing but a skeleton with your bones clattering against the floor.”
Danielle stepped closer. “She was a morbid child, wasn’t she?”
“Look who raised her,” said Talia.
Gerta appeared not to notice them as she huddled beside Snow, shivering. “I don’t want her to lock us away again.”
“She can’t punish us if we don’t get caught!” Snow cupped her hands to her mouth and blew, then jammed them back beneath her armpits. “She’s probably just collecting ingredients for a potion, or something like that.”
“Alone in the woods?” Gerta asked. “In the middle of winter?”
“Maybe she’s discovered a fairy plot,” Snow said eagerly. “She could be disguising herself as one of them to learn their secrets.”
“There are no fairies in Allesandria,” Gerta said primly.
Snow stuck out her tongue. “Shows what you know. I saw a pixie in the sky just last month.”
“Did not.”
“I did so!” Snow punched Gerta in the arm. “Come on, before we lose her.”
They hurried upstream, following the larger branch of the river until they reached a stone bridge. Snow raced across, stopping only to toss a rock into the water. She and Gerta laughed and shushed each other as they ran through the woods.
The horses followed behind them, staying close to Danielle. Talia searched the trees, but the woods were quiet, save for the occasional crow.
“Maybe she’s not even human,” Snow said. “Maybe she’s a monster who plans to eat us both!” Her laughter gave the lie to her fears, though Gerta appeared worried.
Snow and Gerta led them to a small clearing at a bend in the stream. The air was warmer here, and the snow was little more than a thin crust over the branches. The cabin was built back from the water, hidden by a thick grove of pines. The smell of magic made Talia’s nose wrinkle. It smelled like old perfume, cloying and stale.
Snow dragged her sister down to crouch behind a fallen tree. Following their gazes, Talia could just make out a shadowy figure approaching the cabin door. Gerta’s memory of Rose Curtana was tall and imposing, her body held straight as steel, her chin tilted upward.
Snow waited until her mother went inside, then tugged Gerta’s hand. “Come on, let’s go around back. Maybe there’s a window.”
Gerta began to tremble. “We should leave.”
“Don’t be such a polatto.”
“Polatto?” Danielle whispered.
“Morovan slang for a coward,” said Talia. “It
means tail-flasher, after the deer who run away at the slightest sound.”
Gerta yanked her hand away. “I don’t want to see what’s back there.”
“I’m going.” Snow stood and stepped out from the trees.
Gerta’s voice rose. “Snow, please!”
Talia grabbed Gerta by the shoulder. “It’s just a memory.” Gerta stared through her, her eyes round. “Gerta, you’ve found it. You can end the spell.”
Gerta shrieked. Talia slapped a palm over her mouth. The illusory Snow White had already vanished behind the cabin.
Danielle caught Gerta’s arms. “Gerta, it’s us.”
“Wrap the edge of my cape around her,” Talia snapped.
Danielle did so, and the worst of Gerta’s trembling started to die as the cape’s magic shielded her from her own illusions. Gerta spun, burying her face in Talia’s shoulder.
“I’m sorry,” Gerta said.
Talia watched the cabin, but the door hadn’t opened. If Noita was still here, hopefully she hadn’t heard Gerta’s aborted scream.
“What happened?” asked Danielle, her voice gentle.
“We snuck around to the back, making our way to Noita’s garden.” The worst of the panic had faded, but Gerta clung to Talia like a child woken from a nightmare. “There were three bodies, laid out in shallow graves. I thought Mother was helping Noita to bury them, but-” Another shudder cut off the rest of her words.
“You’re safe,” Danielle said. “You found the cabin.”
Gerta pulled away. “I’m sorry.” She turned toward the cabin. “I wanted to run away, but Snow stayed. She watched… we both did.”
A growl built in Talia’s chest. She yanked her sword from her belt and strode into the clearing. There was no light through the windows, nor smoke from the chimney. The steeply angled roof came almost to the ground. Dirt and frost obscured most of the color.
Brown ivy strangled the knee-high stumps that dotted the small yard. A pair of skeletal oaks, each an arm’s length in diameter, stood to either side of the door.