Skirmish: The House War: Book Four

by Michelle West

  She opened her eyes to escape that memory, and regretted it; the air was red and black. But Ariane’s gift was twined around Jewel’s wrist, and as Jewel’s sleeves flew in the wind, she saw it: it glowed. Strands of hair that should have been all but invisible to the eye glittered as if they were fine spun crystal; one was blue, one was gold, and one was white. They flashed like miniature lightning, and when she could see again, the world had become…white.

  The Winter King ran across a white desert, his breath leaving clouds in a trail.

  The ice is thin.

  Celleriant looked up into a sky of dead branches, dead leaves. Beyond them, he could see the lingering ghosts of the ancient forests that had once given voice to a world. He had—in a youth so long past him only memory retained its fragments—loved those forests. He had loved them as he had loved nothing else, although he would learn how shallow that love had been, in time.

  Beneath the bowers of singing trees, their voices attenuated and slow to build, he had traced the networks of streams, brooks, and rivers, learning to walk on the surface of the rippling water without actually getting wet. Had he fallen? Yes. Many times. As a child, it had little troubled him.

  Had he stumbled? Fallen? He was wet, now. Wet, in the warmth of Summer, was a benison. But the air was chill and cold—how else could there be ice? He tried to lift himself out of the water and realized that there was no riverbank in this place; no rocks on which to balance his weight. There was no grass.

  Those were fragments of youth; he yearned for them as one can only yearn for lost things. What had silenced the forest’s voice? Ah. Winter. Where had he been?

  Ice cracked as he moved. It was thin. It slowed him. His breath rose in a wreath, like steam or fog. He saw his name swirl in the eddies before the wind carried it away.

  The ice was thin, yes—but it hardened as he walked. It deepened beneath his feet. He slowed, then stilled, listening for familiar voices. Hearing none. Or hearing ghosts. What had happened to the forests?

  At the height of the tree, the sun shone without warmth—but it was Henden; Jewel told herself it was because it was Henden. Her arms were red with cold, her hands shaking as they clung. Angel’s hands, resting now almost on top of hers, were the only source of heat; the Winter King himself might have been a ghost. A solid ghost. She felt his fur as barding, his musculature as iron. She was momentarily afraid, but reminded herself, with what heat she could muster, that she had demanded to come here.

  Yes, he said. Just that.

  The landscape was strange. She knew she was riding up the trunk of the tree, but she saw the tree as horizontal. She saw it, bark covered in ice and snow, the height of its branches frozen and glittering in Winter sun. Its leaves were now encased; their color couldn’t be discerned. As the Winter King continued to run, the snow thickened and widened until it formed a vast plain, glittering and cold, out of which only icy branches grew. Gravity reasserted itself in the normal direction.

  You were not wrong, the Winter King said.

  About what?

  The trouble began in the roots. But as with any tree, what the roots touch travels to the branches if the tree is not to perish. We will find something buried there, in the end.

  Given the gardeners, Jewel thought this statement more prophetic than historical. Especially considering the funeral and the dignitaries who’d been invited to attend.

  But the imperative of the funeral—of the respect that was Amarais Handernesse ATerafin’s due—had receded for a moment. Jewel held onto the Winter King and stared straight ahead as he ran. The tree seemed to go on forever. To the left and right, branches encased in ice formed patchy walls. Ahead, those branches were all that remained, as trunk gave way, at last, to the tree’s crown.

  At the heart of those many branches stood Celleriant; he, like the leaves, seemed encased in ice. He was frozen, but she could see the bright, burning blue of his sword.

  He remembered now.

  Celleriant, Celleriant. Long days spent forming the syllables lent them strength and a majesty that he did not, perhaps, deserve. He turned, or tried. His hands were encumbered and heavy; perhaps this was why he could not climb.

  The Winter comes, Celleriant, and with it sleep.

  You will sleep, Ancient?

  All things which know life know sleep.

  Am I not alive?

  The rustle of laughter touched his upturned face. The leaves were falling. You are alive.

  But I do not sleep.

  Do you not?

  No.

  We pity you, Celleriant. There is peace in sleep. There is a promise of rest. It is earned. We grow into it, year by year. How is it that you do not sleep?

  I don’t know. There’s too much to see, Ancient. Too much to learn. If I sleep your sleep, things will age and die before I wake again.

  But new things will be born beneath our bowers. We are content. Tell us, Celleriant, if you do not sleep, how do you dream?

  He had been young, then. Youth was its own country, its own terrain; the geography of folly could still be beautiful. I dream, he had told them, so defensively.

  Of what?

  Of life. I dream of the wind. I dream of flight. I dream of the earth and its mountainous heights. I dream of my kin, no matter how distant they are. One day, Ancient, I will find a calling and a duty.

  So soon?

  I have my sword, he’d said with pride. I have my shield. I have called them myself, and they are of me.

  But they have no place in the forest.

  He said nothing.

  And the things of which you speak are not dreams, Celleriant. They are your bright and quick imaginings. They are figments of your desire and your will. They are the crown of the waking hours. But they are not dreams.

  Then I want none of your dreams, Ancient.

  No, indeed, although in time you may come to them anyway. We must part for now, for you will not hear our voices, and we will be unable to hear yours. We will wake again, Celleriant. In the turn of seasons, we will wake, we will be renewed. We will look for you in the height of the Summer; that is our promise.

  The promised Summer had come, but Celleriant dwelled no longer in those ancient forests, for with Winter had come war, and with war, the Winter Queen.

  * * *

  It was Winter now. The coming of Winter presaged so many things: endings. Beginnings. He saw the ghosts of ancient forests and heard their tremulous voice and he felt an ache and a desire that became, for one moment, the whole of his desire for Summer. Winter without end was silent, still, cold. There was glory in it, there was majesty, and there was death. Not all things that Wintered survived to see Summer’s return.

  The water was just beneath his shoulders now; the cold had slowed the river’s force, but not enough. He was heavy. He could not recall ever feeling so heavy. He tried to swim, but his hands were still full and they stung. He looked down; beneath the water, warped and wavering in his vision, were two things: a sword, a shield.

  They have no place in the forest.

  He struggled with their weight.

  Chapter Six

  THE BLUE LIGHT of Celleriant’s sword began to flicker as the Winter King slowed.

  “Can you take the branches down?” Jewel asked.

  It would not help him.

  “I don’t care. It would help me.” She started to dismount and Angel tightened both of his arms, trapping her between them.

  “What in the Hells are you doing?” he all but shouted in her ear.

  She shook her head as if to clear it. She felt the Winter King’s presence; he was waiting. Watching. “I need to get down,” she finally said.

  If you do, you must leave your companion with me.

  “If you get off his back, you’re going to fall a lot farther than you think!” Angel’s hands were white; his words were almost a hiss. “Jay!”

  She pulled one hand off the Winter King’s antlers, signing. Angel, however, didn’t sign back; he held tight.
“What do you see, Angel?”

  “What do you mean, what do I see?”

  “Exactly what I said. Tell me.” Her voice was low. It must have transmitted the urgency she felt, because he drew a longer, more measured breath.

  “I see what used to be the tree. It’s black, and it doesn’t look much like a tree anymore; its branches look like vines. The leaves are blood red. Down is a long way away,” he added. “Don’t look.” He knew how she felt about heights.

  “You don’t see snow?”

  Silence. After it had grown uncomfortable, Angel said, “I see Lord Celleriant. He’s—he’s trapped.”

  “Trapped how? Angel—I can’t see what you see.”

  “Have you tried?” He was always perceptive—often at exactly the wrong time.

  “No. No, I haven’t tried—if I do, I’m sure I’ll stop seeing what I do see. And I need it. I need it to do what I have to do. Tell me—what do you see?”

  “He’s impaled. He’s impaled, Jay. His upper arms, his left thigh, the right rib cage. His eyes are open—but he’s not looking at anything.”

  “His sword?”

  “It’s there. There are vines around it, but they’re not touching the blade—only his wrist.”

  “Shield?”

  “Same, I think. I can’t see his wrist on that side.”

  Jewel lifted the hand with which she’d signed; it was the hand on which the twined hair of the Winter Queen was knotted. “What—what do you see here?”

  His breath cut. “I can’t—I can’t take it off you.”

  “No. You’ll fall. That’s not what I asked, anyway. Angel—what do you see?”

  “It’s glowing. It’s glowing—but Jay, I’d swear it was alive—it’s…crawling. Squirming.”

  Jewel nodded and exhaled. “Let me go,” she told him.

  “I can’t—”

  “That wasn’t a request. Celleriant is trapped, Angel—we’ll lose him.”

  “You’re certain that’s a bad thing?”

  “No. No, I’m not. But while he’s here, I can’t just surrender him. You need to hold on.”

  He was den. He hated to let go of her, but he knew and understood the tone of her voice; he trusted her, and the trust was stronger than his fear. “I will. Don’t take too long,” he added.

  She laughed. It was the wrong laugh. But she let go of the Winter King’s antlers completely, and after a tense minute, she unlocked almost numb legs.

  Will you take him back down? she asked.

  I will not let him fall unless he desires it.

  She swung herself clumsily off his back. Her stomach lurched; she stumbled. For just a minute she felt the air rush toward her back, but it was only wind. It threw her hair into her eyes, where pieces of bark and ice joined it. Against the snow, she saw the Winter King’s shadow; she stood in it a moment as if it were an anchor. His hooves didn’t break the snow’s crust. Her feet did. The relative difference in their weight didn’t matter.

  Maybe gravitas did.

  The Winter King chuckled and nudged her shoulder with his flecked muzzle. Not gravitas, Jewel, or you would already be lost. Not as I am, he added. That will never be your fate. In my youth, Jewel ATerafin, I would have said you wouldn’t last a day.

  Yet you are here. Go. I will keep your Angel as safe as he allows.

  She began to walk toward Celleriant. Beneath her feet, beneath the snow, the ground was solid. Her knees were no longer visible, and her skin stung with cold. A feral, small smile touched her lips and the corners of her eyes; her den would have recognized it. They’d wintered in the holdings. They knew cold could kill; it was a fact of life.

  Stripped of wealth and the privilege of wealth, anyone could die in the Winter.

  Celleriant.

  Ice covered branching vines, things twisted so far out of shape they might never have been part of a tree at all. But they weren’t a wall. There were gaps, and for thorns, red leaves, as covered in ice as everything else. Jewel caught a branch in shaking hands, ready to leap forward—or back—if it lunged. It was frozen in place, in shape. The moving mass of thorns below might have been a bad dream.

  And this? she thought, snorting. Was this a good dream?

  No, ATerafin, the Winter King said. It is simply a dream. It is not even your dream. But it is strong. It is old. If you will it, I will carry you back to your kin. Pass beyond those branches, and I cannot guarantee that I will be able to save you.

  “I can’t even guarantee that I’ll be able to get past them,” she said, uncertain of how far the spoken word would carry. Here, in this grim, vertical winterscape, the Winter King’s voice was disturbing; she wasn’t sure why. If he knew, he didn’t tell her, and she concentrated on two things: the winding, cutting maze of branches and the man—if he was that—who stood suspended at its heart. His sword was dying slowly, like a candle that had reached not only the end of wick, but the end of wax as well. Candle stubs, on the other hand, had never been so cold or perfect in their final, sputtering moments. Arianni Lord, he was beautiful, the red of his blood like the delicate stroke of a Maker’s brush—larger, more perfect, than life.

  Jewel began to crawl over and under the looping curves of branches as if each were a miniature arch or groove. Leaves’ edges, blunted by ice, scraped against her exposed skin. Reaching out, she pushed them away. Some snapped off in her hand, the stems were so brittle. She brushed them off and kept moving, wishing she had chosen to wear different clothing. Her shoes weren’t meant for this weather, and she’d followed the imperative of instinct out the doors without bothering to grab a coat. Cursing in Torra, she ran into a snarl of branches, and began to work her way through them. They didn’t grab her. They didn’t cut her. But they only barely moved, and she was straining.

  Avandar.

  Silence.

  She was used to his silences; she could’ve written screeds about them. But this silence had none of Avandar in it.

  He cannot hear you, Jewel, the Winter King said.

  Why not? You can.

  Yes. I am here. He is not. I believe your Angel can hear the Warlord; the Warlord is not pleased.

  Later, she’d ask him where he was. Or where she was. Now, she forced her way through the last of the branches and discovered that they grew at the lip of a small outcropping. She almost fell and reached in a panic for the curved limbs she’d been cursing so loudly. Breathing quickly enough to make her throat raw, she looked down. It was only ten feet. No, probably a little less, given how she felt about height. But it was a straight drop, a sudden plunge, and it reminded her that it wasn’t height she hated—it was falling.

  She looked across at Celleriant. He stood both above the ice and almost encased in it; he wasn’t moving. She wasn’t certain he needed to breathe, but if he did, he was in trouble, because he didn’t appear to be breathing either.

  His sword flickered. The intervals between light and its lack grew as she watched, her eyes unblinking. When they started to sting, she blinked; tears ran down her cheeks, but these tears didn’t bother her.

  “Celleriant!”

  She hadn’t expected an answer, because she was almost certain he couldn’t hear a word she was saying. But she tried again, and a third time. There wasn’t a fourth, not immediately. Instead, sliding down the edge of one vine, she took a deep breath and let go.

  * * *

  The ice was hard. It was hard, it was flat, it was cold, but ice was like that. She found her footing, wobbling on one knee. She’d tensed too much before the drop and had bruised or pulled something—but as long as she could stand and walk, it didn’t matter. She stumbled, righted herself, and found momentum. It carried her to where Celleriant stood.

  His feet were mired in ice; she couldn’t distinguish them from the frozen water itself. She didn’t try. She shouted his name a fourth time, in the faint hope sheer volume could crack the thin ice around his shoulders and his neck. No luck.

  Celleriant, where are you?

  N
o answer, but she didn’t expect one. She looked up at his face. The difference in their heights was less pronounced because she was standing on the ice and he was partially beneath its surface; she looked at his eyes.

  It was her turn to freeze. She had never liked Celleriant. He was everything that she’d always assumed—as an orphan in one of the poorest holdings in the city—nobility would be: cold, arrogant, completely devoid of humanity.

  His first act, his first interaction with her, had been to attempt to drive her from where she stood in the open road. But it was an ancient road, a wild one; she had known what she fought for, and the road had responded. Celleriant couldn’t force her to move, no matter what he rode or what he wielded; he had been unable to touch her at all, which no one, Jewel included, could have predicted. He had failed the command of the Winter Queen.

  And the price for his failure?

  To serve Jewel ATerafin. She hadn’t wanted him. She didn’t want him now. His suggestion that he casually slaughter—with Avandar’s help—every living person in the manse had enraged her; she hadn’t been in a mood that black for as long as she could remember. She knew he’d meant it. That was never going to change, because he wasn’t mortal.

  But he’d obeyed her furious denial. Jewel had learned the hard, harsh way that obedience was better than nothing. She’d had Duster, after all. But Duster had wanted the den. She’d been afraid of what she wanted, but she’d wanted it anyway. Celleriant?

  No. Never.

  Why had she taken Duster? Why had she worked so hard to keep her?

  Because she’d needed Duster. In the end, she’d needed her. Maybe need and love had been so entwined Jewel hadn’t been able to tell them apart. She’d been younger then, and no question, she’d loved Duster as family. As kin. She could never love Celleriant. But she could need him. She knew she did need him. She’d accepted that sometime between their first meeting and this one.

  What she hadn’t considered then was that this icy, arrogant, inhuman immortal might need anything of his own; he’d always seemed above need, beyond it. But his eyes were wide with pain and longing, his lips thin with them. She’d never expected to see vulnerability from this Lord, and seeing it, wished she hadn’t. Like everything else about him, it was larger than life; brighter, harsher, deeper.