The Winter Riddle

by Sam Hooker

  “Yes, ma’am,” replied Matilda.

  “Eustace?”

  Eustace cleared his throat and unrolled a scroll. “By order of Her Majesty, Volgha the Witch Queen of Aurora, you are hereby immediately elevated to the rank of duchess, and sworn to the post of Royal Steward. Rise, Duch— Oh bother, you were supposed to be kneeling for that. Oh, well. Duchess Matilda …”

  “Bubble-Spigot.”

  “Really?” Eustace raised an eyebrow.

  “Does ‘duchess’ outrank ‘butler’?”

  “Right, sorry. Oh, you may as well kneel and do it properly now. That’s it, thank you. Now rise, Duchess Matilda Bubble-Spigot, Royal Steward of Aurora!”

  She was officially the filthiest duchess ever to have set foot in the throne room of Castle Borealis, owing to the fact that it was poultry-rending time in the kitchens. She was grinning from ear to gizzard-flecked ear.

  “What does this mean exactly?”

  “The first step will be ending your membership in the union, I’m afraid.” Eustace frowned. “It would be a conflict of interest for you to remain a member.”

  “Oh,” said Matilda, “because I’m a duchess?”

  “No,” said Volgha, “because you’re in charge of running the kingdom.”

  Matilda’s eyes went wide, more with panic than excitement, but there was a bit of the latter. “But what about you? You’re the queen!”

  “Yes, I am,” said Volgha. “That was the deal. I’ll be the queen, but I’m appointing you my steward so I don’t have to bother with the routine business of running things around here.”

  “I don’t think I’m qualified for this.”

  “Neither am I,” said Volgha, “and that’s why we have qualified advisors.” She pointed to Eustace and Reg. “They’ll help you with the affairs of the castle, and together you’ll draw up a list of nobles who can advise you in other areas.”

  “Shouldn’t a royal person be doing this?”

  Volgha shrugged. “I don’t think so. It’s been so long since we’ve had a ruler who knew what they were doing that you’re as qualified as anyone else. And besides … could we have the room, please?”

  Eustace, Reg, and the pair of guards fled the room at alarming speed.

  That’s the sort of respect you’re giving up, cawed Redcrow.

  “This is twice you’ve played the favors game with a witch,” said Volgha, crossing her arms. “Getting me to bury an old man is one thing. Trapping me into ruling a sovereign nation is quite another.”

  “You could have said no,” Matilda mumbled.

  “And give people the impression that witches don’t honor favors? Hardly. Your favor is repaid in full, and this is the one and only command I ever hope to make as monarch. You, Duchess Matilda Bubble-Spigot, will rule my kingdom for me.”

  Well said, cawed Redcrow. Perhaps she needs a Minister of Avian Relations? I shall accept generous salary terms, payable in anchovies.

  “What will you do?” asked Matilda.

  “Redcrow and I will go back to my cottage,” replied Volgha, much to Redcrow’s chagrin. “It’s witchery that demands my attention. I’ll be doing my part for the kingdom, trust me on that.”

  So you’re ready to be the Warden? Osgrey sounded hopeful.

  “We’ll talk about that later, old man.” Volgha was pointing at the ceiling. “First things first.”

  Fine, fine, said Osgrey. I’ll just sit here in your mind, not retiring to my tree to contemplate the mysteries of nature for an eternity or so. Maybe I’ll hum tunelessly until I get there.

  “No humming!”

  “Who are you talking to?” asked Matilda. “Or am I not supposed to hum?”

  “Never mind. Hum all you like. Not you!”

  “Right.” Matilda had the look of a girl who’d likely refrain from humming for the foreseeable future, just to be safe.

  “I thought you’d be happy about this.”

  “I am,” said Matilda, “mostly. It’s just a lot to take in. Do I get to do whatever I want?”

  “More or less,” said Volgha. “Just keep things running smoothly, and don’t be an idiot like my sister.”

  “All right, then. Will you stay in the castle for the winter, to help me get started?”

  “I might as well,” said Volgha. “With everything that’s happened, I didn’t really stock my cottage for the winter. I didn’t finish darning my socks, either.”

  “Great.” Matilda grinned widely. “Do you have a way to get in touch with Santa? If I really get to do what I want, I’ll need his help with something.”

  Over the course of the winter, the conversations between Volgha and Matilda were innumerable. The piles of old money were barely diminished in the name of paying the Vikings and the frost giants for their roles in the war. Alexia would have bristled at that, no doubt, but to Volgha—and the piles—it was a small price.

  They decided on a number of appointments, none of which went to Redcrow or paid him so much as a herring, but they did manage to settle on a court wizard.

  “Are you sure Santa’s not going to be upset about it?” asked Krespo.

  “I’m sure he’ll miss having you around,” replied Volgha, “but he knows that this is a great opportunity for you.”

  “I’m not actually a wizard, though, I’ve told you before.”

  I wasn’t a wizard either, said Osgrey, and I managed!

  “Neither was Ghasterly’s predecessor,” said Volgha. “Technically, neither was Ghasterly. Necromancers don’t do half the things that proper wizards do. ‘Court wizard’ is a traditional title, really.”

  “Couldn’t I be the court … thinker, or something?”

  “We don’t want to change too much too quickly,” said Matilda. “The average Aurorian citizen can’t distinguish one form of magic from another. They just like knowing that the crown has appointed someone to be in charge of wand-waving and such.”

  “She’s right,” said Volgha. “Float a spoon past their noses, and they’ll start calling you ‘Krespo the Magnificent’.”

  Not in my day, said Osgrey. You’d at least have had to float a reindeer past them back then. People were impressed with spoons in my granddad’s day, though. They’d only just been invented …

  Volgha tried to tune Osgrey out without letting him know.

  Easier said than done, cawed Redcrow. You’re doing well, though. It’s almost quiet enough in here for me to have a moment’s peace.

  “What must that be like?” asked Volgha, her tone wistful. Her payment for that quip was learning that crows didn’t need lips to sneer.

  “I don’t know anyone else who I can trust with this sort of thing,” said Matilda. “In fact, you and Volgha are the only people I know who can do magic.”

  “To be honest, I’m a bit terrified to accept.”

  “I’ve seen you terrified before,” said Volgha. “It’s when you do your best work.”

  “I have two conditions,” said Krespo.

  “Yes?”

  “No flying,” said Krespo. “Between Santa’s machine and your broom, I’ve lost enough wits. Never again.”

  Volgha nodded in acceptance. “Fair enough. What else?”

  “I don’t want to work in the wizard’s tower.”

  “Why not?” asked Matilda. “It’s tradition! Plus, it already has all of the books and everything in it.”

  “It’s creepy,” Krespo answered. “I still have nightmares about Ghasterly from that place. And I’ve seen how high it is from outside. I won’t be able to concentrate.”

  “I’m sure we can work something out,” said Volgha, “I just don’t know where—”

  “How about the dungeon?” asked Matilda.

  “The dungeon?”

  “Sure,” she said. “I can’t bear to think of what my union—that is, my former union brothers and sisters—went through in there. I’m having the cells removed as we speak, and it’ll just be a huge, empty space after that.”

  “It’ll need
a good cleaning as well,” said Volgha.

  “Not to worry,” said Matilda with a grin. “We’ve got bona fide union labor on the job.”

  “The wizard’s cellar,” said Krespo. “I like the sound of it.”

  28

  The first golden rays of dawn did nothing to abate the chill in the air. It may have been spring, but it still felt like winter to Volgha. Still, she was glad to have nearly frozen to death on the flight to Santa’s Village. Warm air currents, in her experience, were more trouble than they were worth.

  She touched down right in front of Santa’s house, just in time to get doused in snow from a lurch of the jumping holly. She was so numb from the flight that brushing it off was an enormous effort. She did the best she could and knocked twice on the door.

  “Your Majesty,” said Sergio with a bow. As much as she wanted to chastise him for it, the witch in her simply couldn’t protest his overt nervousness. It was just weird not having to do anything to intimidate people. It was almost too easy.

  “Hello, Sergio.” Volgha pushed past him into the deliciously warm house. Redcrow flew from her shoulder and perched on the back of a chair, while Volgha thrust broom, hat, and layers of black wool into Sergio’s waiting hands. On second thought, she took the hat back.

  “I’m afraid Santa’s not here,” said Sergio from beneath the pile of Volgha’s flying cloaks.

  Typical, cawed Redcrow. We’ve flown all this way! He should have more respect for royalty.

  “Do you know where he is?” asked Volgha.

  “The armory,” answered Sergio. “He never leaves it, not since he came back from the Battle of Castle Borealis.”

  Oh no, they’ve named it! Volgha sensed Osgrey slumping and appreciated how hard that was to manage without a body. That’s bad luck. I imagine the bards will write songs about it, too.

  “You disapprove of bards writing songs about battles?” Volgha held a hand up to Sergio and stared off down a hallway.

  Not really, said Osgrey, bards have to work, after all. But a man like Santa’s won’t like it.

  Volgha nodded. Santa hadn’t wanted to march off to war, and people treating it as glorious was sure to weigh on him.

  “If it’s not too much trouble, Sergio,” said Volgha, still shivering uncontrollably, “could I have a cup of tea in the sitting room?”

  And some anchovies!

  “And something for Redcrow.”

  “Of course,” said Sergio. “No anchovies, I’m afraid, I know he likes them. I’m sure I can dig up something.”

  Volgha sipped her tea while Redcrow picked at a plate of sardines.

  They’re just not the same, cawed Redcrow. Maybe we can go back to Asgard? They’ve got loads of anchovies there.

  “I’m not sure we’re Odin’s favorite people just now,” said Volgha, who was able to feel her fingers again.

  Speak for yourself, said Redcrow. He said lots of nice things about me.

  “We’ll see,” said Volgha.

  I wouldn’t mind seeing Asgard one more time, said Osgrey.

  “I thought you couldn’t wait to get back to your tree.”

  Oh, I’d like that, but I’m sure retirement could wait a few evenings. If a trip to Asgard was on the table, I mean.

  Sipping her tea, Volgha stared into the fire. She thought about her duties as Warden, and everything waiting for her in her little grove on the valley floor. That was all the adventure she wanted. If she had her way, once she got back home, she’d never leave it again.

  Once she was sufficiently thawed, she made her way to the armory. A pair of guards were standing out front as always, and though their steely, straightforward stares never wavered, they somehow seemed relieved that she was there. They made no move to stop her as she opened the door.

  The armory was as quiet as it had ever been, though it was more crowded. Santa was there, sitting in front of his armor. As were several dozen Faesolde, likewise sharing the silence.

  She crept into the room, doing her best not to disturb the tranquility. Santa didn’t look up from his contemplative pose when she approached, so she announced her presence as gently as she could by staring at the back of his neck. After a moment, the hairs started to rise, and Santa turned slowly to look at her. His eyes were red and puffy, and the bags under them suggested that they were there for the long haul.

  Santa sighed at Volgha and nodded. Despite his muscular form, he stood at the laborious pace of an old man. It was enough to make Volgha tired just watching. The two of them tiptoed from the armory together and shut the door behind them.

  “The sun’s coming up,” said Santa, his voice far lower and more gravelly than usual.

  He’s been in there a long time, said Osgrey.

  “I wanted to come sooner,” said Volgha. “After the war, to see how you were.”

  “We lost some brave elves,” said Santa.

  “I didn’t know,” said Volgha. “We cleaned up the battlefield, and we didn’t find any of them.”

  “They came back here with us,” said Santa.

  “How many?”

  “Too many.”

  Some of the silence in the armory must have followed them out, and was now taking its turn in the conversation. It was potent, as silences go. It was a long time before Volgha found suitable words to interrupt it.

  “I’m so sorry, Santa. It’s all my fault. If only I hadn’t—”

  Santa held up a hand. It stilled the air between them without malice or impatience.

  “I’ve survived more than my fair share of battles,” said Santa, “and I can tell you that ‘if only I had-or-had-not’ is the first step on the path to madness. Whatever you were about to say, you did. Yes, a different choice might have ended in a different outcome, but history didn’t turn out that way.”

  “I talked you into this,” said Volgha. “You didn’t want to go to war against the frost giants, but you did, because we thought that it had to be done. You didn’t want to join the Really, Really Big Army and march on Castle Borealis, but I convinced you. You went to war, and people are dead because I convinced you to go.”

  “I could have said no. The elves could have said no. I’m not their general, they work for me of their own free will.”

  “Stop talking like that! I’m hardly blameless.”

  “No, you’re not. And neither am I for agreeing to go along with it. And neither are the elves who lost their lives, for they agreed to go along as well.”

  “So that’s it? It’s everyone’s fault?”

  “Yes.”

  They stood in silence for a while longer. It was a silence particularly well-suited to the dawn, remarkably different from the kind one might not hear at sunset.

  “What do we do?” asked Volgha, not meaning to. The words just sort of fell out of her mouth.

  “We remember,” said Santa. “We accept. We put one foot in front of the other, as hard as it may be, for as long as it takes, until we emerge from our darkness. And then we keep going.”

  Volgha nodded. This had been her first war, and she never really even saw it. She didn’t even see the battlefield afterward—the servants’ and guards’ unions had made a joint effort to clean it up as quickly as possible so they wouldn’t have to wait for the summer thaw.

  Santa, on the other hand, had the look of a man who knew war all too well. Sadness and grief were plain on his face, but in a practiced “here we go again” sort of way.

  “When was the last time you ate anything?” asked Volgha.

  “Well there’s no food in the armory, and I’ve been in there since before the sun started to rise.”

  “Long enough then,” said Volgha.

  “Are you ordering me to eat something, Your Majesty?”

  “I’ll thank you not to call me that.”

  Santa forced half a smile, but his cheeks appeared to have been caught off-guard in the attempt.

  “I’ll have Sergio whip us up something,” he said. They started walking.

 
“By the way,” said Volgha, “there’s one more thing you owe me.”

  “Is there?”

  “You told me that if we survived the war, you’d explain how you’re ‘sort of a Viking.’ The war’s over, so spill.”

  Santa sighed. “That’s a really long story. I’ll give you some of it over dinner.”

  The tale that Santa weaved for Volgha was one of epic high adventure, the sort one avoided telling children just before bed. It was beyond thrilling, just the thing that would guarantee they’d get no sleep at all.

  He was from the south, but not by much. He became a man during a time when kingdoms came and went, crowns barely having time to muss the hair of one warlord before another came along and knocked his head off.

  One such ephemeral king seized the wares of a merchant ship and imprisoned her crew, Santa being among them. What followed was a rollicking tale of jailbreak, mercenary work, and battles before he went north with as much gold as he could carry. That’s when he met the elves, helped lead them to victory in the goblin wars, and left the warrior’s path a second time to settle here.

  “So this makes thrice you’ve put down the sword,” said Volgha.

  “Hopefully this time will be the last,” said Santa. “So to answer your question, I’ve spent a lot of time among the Vikings, but I’m not one of them.”

  “Fair enough. One more question, if you’ll humor me.”

  “Yes?”

  “When we first met, you were quick to make me your guest. There was no trust between us then, so why did you?”

  Santa smiled. “Trust must be given to be earned. It’s something I’ve picked up from the Vikings. They don’t trust anything that they can’t see clearly.”

  “So … you were letting me see you?”

  “That’s the long and short of it.”

  “You’re a wise man, Santa,” said Volgha. “I’m glad to call you my friend. Krespo sends his regards, by the way.”

  “I’m glad he’s doing well. I have a gift for him, would you mind delivering it? The sooner, the better, I think.”

  “As much as it galls me to do favors, I can’t say no to you. What is it?”