The extra speed only made it all the more loud and painful. The wind stabbed at her like a thousand small needles, cutting at her cheeks and eyes and lips. She squeezed her eyes shut and clamped her mouth tight, praying for it all to end. She could feel a crust of hoarfrost forming on her eyebrows, filling her nostrils, dangling off her lashes.
After a long while she heard a shout. “There, Amilia. We’re almost there.”
Thank the gods. She opened her eyes with some effort; the cold had almost glued them shut. Through the sudden white world through which they were flying she could see the city spreading out before her, ghostly in its pale misty mantle, a city of spectres and death. She had flashbacks from the night it fell. The dragons and the fire and Eldur with his red eyes, and that voice from another world, filling all the air. The rush through the palace and the secret tunnels Astrid knew, and the gasping, leg-burning escape into the Highplains to the north. The City of Thalan had become a hell that night, visited by the wrath of a god. And now that hell has frozen over, Amilia thought, as they flew across its stiff dead corpse.
They passed over the harbour where the city straddled the Izzun River. The boats were thick below them, clustered and frozen at their docks. The masts wore white cloaks, and from the rigging icicles hung down. Beyond, the city stepped up through its levels, its whitewashed walls and painted roofs, in ocean-blue and sun-yellow, all covered in a layer of snow. Great piles of rubble lay scattered where buildings had toppled, half hidden under their freezing blankets, and the open squares were deserted. At the rear, rising up with the Snowmelt Mountains to its back, the Palace of Thalan still stood above it all. The balconies were broken, the walls pitted and scarred, and some of its towers had fallen, but it still stood. To one side, Amilia saw the Tower of the Eye rising up near the cliffs, the rotunda at its summit torn open by the claws of Garlath the Grand.
“That’s where I saw him,” she said, with a shiver to her voice. “Eldur. That’s where he took the Eye.”
And Hadrin, she thought, remembering how her rat of a husband had whimpered and obeyed, taking the Eye off its tessellated stone pedestal, to fly away with the Father of Fire. That did not go well for him, Amilia had learned. Her husband had spent the following months chained to a plinth in a windowless chamber, scorned and mocked, his clothes worn down to rags, his flesh all but melted off his bones. She had the story from Elyon, who had been there to see her husband die. It gave her such joy to hear it, after all he’d inflicted upon her. “Tell me again,” she would say to him, as she cuddled in her chair by the fire. “Tell me how he died, Elyon. Tell me of his fear.” And she would sit there and listen, drinking down her wine, imagining the death of her rat-king husband over and over again, smiling.
She was not smiling now, though. There was nothing to smile about here.
“We’ll land there,” Elyon called back to her. “Just outside the palace. I see guards.”
His eyesight was clearly much better than hers, because she hadn’t seen a soul thus far. But as they flew lower, and came down to land, the faces started to show themselves. They poked from out of their broken hovels and peered from shattered windows. She sighted cloaked figures slipping away down alleys like mice, saw footprints in the snow. Through the palace windows, some fires were burning in its grand and stately rooms, glowing softly behind the shutters and boards, and outside on the steps were a host of guards, huddling about an open fire on stools and blocks of stone.
The soldiers saw them coming down. There were voices, shouts, and several of them stood and drew swords. The others made no effort to move. The rush of air softened as Elyon came in to land in a slow dismount, stirring loose snow from the surface of the icy cobbles and causing the flames of the fire to dance. Their feet crunched down through a film of ice, and Elyon dismissed the winds. All went calm and still.
“Are you OK, my lady?” he asked. “Not too cold, I hope?”
“I’ve never been colder,” she replied. “Just happy to have landed.” And dreading the return journey already, she decided not to say.
The guards were stepping over, brandishing their blades. They sheathed them at once as soon as they saw who it was. “Elyon Daecar?” one of them said, realising. He turned to the others. “It’s Elyon Daecar.”
The rest of the guards approached through the cold white mists, moving from the heat of the fire. There were whispers and murmurs among them as Elyon began undoing the straps, unfastening Amilia from her harness. It was only then that one of the guards recognised her, looking almost like a small bear in that enormous fur cloak of hers, and all the other layers beneath. “Your Majesty? Queen…Queen Amilia?”
She looked at the man who had uttered those words. He was one of the guards who had served here during her time, one she recognised. His name slipped her mind, though. “I am not your queen,” she said. “We have come for another reason.”
Another of the men moved forward, brushing past the rest. He had a black beard sprinkled white with frost, black hair, and fierce eyes of the same colour. “My lady, I am the captain here. How might I be of service to you?”
“My companion here wishes to speak with Prince Sevrin. He is still alive, we have heard. And king, if so.”
The men exchanged looks. The captain spoke. “Prince Sevrin refuses to name himself king until he has knowledge of his cousin’s fate. Until Hadrin is proven as deceased, he…”
“Here is your proof,” Amilia cut in. She opened her arms out to present Elyon Daecar. “He has a story to tell, but not to you. Bring word of our arrival to the king. We shall wait within the hall.”
The captain commanded for the doors of the palace to be unbarred and opened. Inside it was much warmer. The main hall had a large and elegant hearth, beside which a great pile of firewood had been stacked, and the flames were crackling pleasantly. There was a stale scent of smoke in the air, from the fires that had torn through the palace long ago, and ash still sat in little heaps and drifts here and there.
“My lady, please wait here,” the captain of the guard said, voice echoing softly. He called for two seats to be set by the fire. “Is there anything I can get you while you wait?”
“Nothing. Thank you.’
She lowered herself down onto the seat, enjoying the licking warmth of the flames as they thawed the cold from her bones. The chair was sturdily built, capable of bearing the weight of godsteel, so Elyon decided to sit as well, stiff and grand in his armour and overcloak, resting the Windblade beside him, along with the pack he had brought with him, containing the book. He removed his helm to let his black hair tumble down over his forehead, and his beard was growing longer. Amilia regarded him for a long moment. With the hair and beard, and the new scar across his right eye, he was starting to look the spit of his father. Even more than Aleron did, she realised. Maybe this is always how it was meant to be. Elyon was always the true heir.
“I hope the book didn’t get too wet,” she said, looking at the bag beside his chair.
He checked to make sure, but did not seem too concerned. The bag had a waterproof lining, he told her, should they encounter rain. “I didn’t expect snow, though,” he said, with half a laugh. “It’s almost like the seasons are reversing.”
“Or changing forever,” she said, feeling a pang of tiredness. Flying was weary business, even as a passenger. She yawned, lifting a dainty hand to cover her mouth, as her mother taught her. “This fire is far too soothing. I could sleep right here, couldn’t you?”
He nodded wearily. “I wonder…would you mind if we stayed here, for the night? Pending what happens. I just…with the snow and the cold and how long it’s taken to get here…”
“We’re not going to make it back for dusk, are we Elyon?” She smiled at him, to show him it was fine. “I’m happy to stay if you are. These halls…” She looked around. “They don’t seem so bad now that Hadrin’s gone. It’s like the evil has been removed, scoured away by fire. There’s something peaceful about it, something almost pretty.” She frowned at her own words. “Is that bad to say? To find beauty in all this death and ruin?”
“It’s important to find light even in the dark,” he told her. “That doesn’t mean you don’t care.”
“Really?” As far as she was aware, Elyon understood her to only care about herself. “You think I care?”
He laughed softly. “You’re not a monster, Amilia. So you think the world is going to end, that’s your right. It doesn’t mean you want it to. I’m sure you’d sooner live into your dotage as a crazed old drunk, still bedding handsome spearmen and stableboys.”
She chuckled, removing her gloves, and reached her hands closer to the flames to warm them. “I guess that wouldn’t be so bad.” Little clumps of snow and frost were melting off her cloak and hair, trailing down her neck. She shivered as a drop snaked down her spine, and then reached up to touch her cheek. It felt sore, windburnt, bitten by the chill. “I need a mirror,” she said. “I must look awful after that.”
“You look beautiful. You don’t have the capacity to look awful.”
She smiled at him. “It’s nicer when we’re kind to one another, don’t you think? In another life, it might have been me and you who were betrothed. Do you think we would have been happy?”
He met her eyes, wondering on the question for a moment. “Maybe,” he said at last. “I’d have to put a curb on your drinking, but…” His lips twisted into a smile. He had done more of that of late - smiling - since his visit to the refuge, and seemed in better spirits. “We’d have had pretty children, at least.”
“Not with all the drinking. That isn’t good for an unborn child, I’ve heard.” She grinned and withdrew her wineskin. “Fancy a taste?”
He seemed to have lost his strength to fight her on it. “Hand it here,” he said.
They shared the wine as they waited, passing it back and forth, whispering into the quiet of the hall, laughing and smiling. After a while they heard the tread of footsteps outside. The door swung open, stirring ash from the tiled floor, and a small troop of guardsmen entered in yellow cloaks, with a young man at their head. He had a neat, confident step, a pleasant, narrow face, and keen golden eyes. He was not large, nor small, very much of average height and build, though trim, lean in a good way, and had a fine head of wavy chestnut hair that bounced winsomely as he walked toward them.
“Your Highness, Your Highness,” he said to them as he approached. “What an honour to host you in our humble home.” He smiled a courteous smile and performed an elegant bow, the links and scales of his whaleskin armour catching the light of the fire. It was a beautiful suit, in shades of gold and royal blue, and over it he wore a fine cloak of lambswool at his back, split blue and yellow for his kingdom. “I am so sorry to keep you waiting. I hope you will forgive me.”
“You’re forgiven,” Amilia said, standing to face him. “I’m sorry, but I don’t think we’ve met.”
