CHAPTER 31

CHAPTER 31

QUEEN MALINA

Perhaps the cold should botherme more than it does, yet I think I have simply grown numb.

Numb when I had to flee my own castle.

Numb when I had to flee my own safe house.

Numb as I flee my own kingdom.

That could be the reason why I don’t truly feel the blizzard as it boils around us like bubbles of frost, an agitated, bulbous cloud steaming out a mist of snow.

Or, it could be the shock.

I’ve lost track of the days since we crossed out of Sixth—since we entered the cursed land of what used to be Seventh Kingdom.

No one comes out here. For one, it’s forbidden, and two, it’s impossible to sustain life. There are no trees and no birds that fly overhead, like there’s something corrupted here in both soil and air.

Or perhaps it’s just too cold.

As a girl, I was taught history lessons about the monarchs who once ruled here. About the great strides they made in seeking the unknown. The kingdom itself was once intriguing as well. Like the great glacier lakes that used to draw so many people to sightsee. Icebergs jutting from the frozen water like the teeth of a giant sea serpent come to bite through the ice.

This used to be a formidable kingdom, and despite the harsher climates, it once had a thriving city too. The heart of the Orean and Annwyn union, the doorway between sister worlds where fae and Oreans alike could pass back and forth.

Now, this place is broken.

If it weren’t for Sir Pruinn, I would’ve turned back the moment I noticed the split and ravaged landscape. I can now say with complete certainty that the lessons I had on the destruction of Seventh Kingdom were not exaggerated. The fae destroyed this place so thoroughly that not a single person survived. Not a single inch of the land survived either, and it still hasn’t recovered. After three hundred years, nothing about this place shows any signs of repair. It’s not just demolished, it’s...unnatural. Sometimes, I think I can feel some of the pulsing, evil magic hovering in the gray mist that clings to the fissures.

All around, there are jagged strips of land like serrated knives, where some of the earth has simply crumbled away. As if some great quake shook the kingdom, shattering it into pieces. All that’s left are broken-off strips on a flattened expanse, a gray and white void that lies bleak and empty.

I keep my face on the horizon as Pruinn drives the cart onward. I made the mistake of looking down into those empty crevices of earth once, seeing them gorged with whorls of mist, and the sight made me dizzy. Because in those huge cracks, there’s nothing—no darkness of shadow that tells me the core of the earth is below. Instead, there’s just the gray emptiness that goes on forever and ever. As if you could fall over and never stop falling, because whatever happened here was born of magic and not of nature, and these cleaves through the ground are an anomaly of destructive power.

And it doesn’t stop. That’s how this entire landscape has been, no matter how long we’ve been traveling. Somehow, Pruinn has used the map to guide us, knowing when to turn past different rifts and when to brave the pinched strips of land. So far, we haven’t ended up stranded, though I almost wish we would. I wish we had no option but to turn around.

But turn around to what?

That’s the question that has been tormenting me. As much as I have absolutely zero faith in Pruinn’s charlatan magic that this map can point me to my heart’s desire, where else do I have to go?

My husband sent an assassin to kill me. My own people rebelled against me. There’s nothing left for me in Sixth Kingdom anymore.

Perhaps that’s why I’m numb.

Who am I if not Malina Colier, Queen of Sixth Kingdom?

So we travel on.

I’m not even certain how the horses are still alive. It’s not as if we’re in a place Pruinn can forage for food, and I can’t believe he still has barrels of hay for them. This place isn’t just desolate, as parts of Sixth are. It’s sterile, empty. Creepy.

And yet, the further we go, the keener Pruinn seems to become.

“We’re not going to find anything,” I’ve told him again and again.

To which he always replies, “Trust the map.”

Fool.

I doze off, buried beneath the hood of my coat, lulled from the sway of the cart. I’ve since stopped being worried about one of the horses’ hooves slipping on one of the edges and sending us falling into the gray abyss. At this point, I can’t seem to drudge up the energy to care.

Perhaps that’s where my heart’s desire is—an endless end.

I get tugged out of my sleep when the cart comes to a sudden stop, and I hear a scrap of Pruinn’s voice over the wind. I turn to see why he’s stopped before nightfall, but I freeze in place when I see the silhouette looming before us.

At first, I think it must be one of the old icebergs I read about, except much larger than I ever imagined. It’s caught in a still sea of white snow, its jagged tips as sharp as canines sneering up toward the sky. It’s asymmetrical, as if three quarters of it were broken off and sunk into the ground, leaving only this last bit remaining.

Yet, as I continue to squint at it past the gray mist, I recognize the shape isn’t quite the deadened pronged berg I thought it was.

It’s...a castle.

What’s left of it anyway.

“Is that what I think it is?” I breathe, my eyes still locked on it.

Pruinn sits at the cart’s seat, holding the reins loosely in his hands, his short blond hair looking muted in the dismal daylight. “It is.”

I shake my head, disbelief rolling around beneath my skull. “How is this possible? I thought the castle was completely destroyed.”

“I suppose not.”

All this time, I was taught that the city and castle itself were swallowed up by the magical void, but as I stare at the decrepit form still standing, I realize that wasn’t true. Seventh Kingdom was broken and destroyed, yet it’s still here. Like a skeleton partially preserved.

Pruinn pulls us onward, toward the monolithic bones of what once was a pristine palace. When we’re so close I can actually see the scrape of stonework, raw and chipping on the sides of its remains, I also see what lies beyond.

My eyes were playing tricks on me before, because it isn’t just more flat, frozen ground stretching far beyond it.

I thought I saw giant fissures as we traveled here, but all of those combined are nothing compared to this. This isn’t just a cracked crevice left mangled in the earth. No, the land just beyond where the castle sits is gone.

As if a huge chunk of the flattened earth has simply been torn like a piece of paper and tossed away. Roiling clouds of colorless mist drag against the craggy lip of the land, and beyond, there’s nothing. Below, there’s nothing.

The hair on the back of my neck lifts, and I have the sudden and intense feeling I’m being watched. I glance all around us, but I don’t see a single speck stretched along the white snow. Perhaps it’s the magic that’s stalking me, like it knows life has dared to breach the void.

With that eerie sensation I can’t quite shrug off, Pruinn brings us right up to the very front of the ruins. The structure has been fossilized in the freeze, preserving the abraded stone. I can’t make out where any windows or balconies may have once existed, but the general shape of a hacked off rooftop and reaching walls still remain.

Pruinn jumps off the driver’s bench of the cart and comes around, holding a hand up to help me get out. “This is where your map ends, Your Majesty,” he tells me, just as a grin widens over his face. “So let’s go find your heart’s desire.”

Somehow, Pruinn managed to find an opening so we could actually go inside the remains of the castle. It’s now nothing more than a shadowed cavern, collapsed in some places, the rubble frozen stiff.

It’s awful—like walking inside the chest of some giant beast long-since perished. Mist swirls around in here too, so the only real difference from outside to inside is the way our steps echo ominously. As I walk around, that tingling sensation happens again—the one that feels as if I’m being observed. As if the castle itself is watching me, finding me lacking.

Well, I find it lacking too.

“I hate to disappoint you, Sir Pruinn, but this is definitely not my heart’s desire.”

We stop just inside the middle of what I’m guessing used to be a grand entry hall, the ceiling at least thirty feet up, now covered in ash-colored frost.

Turning around to look at him, I clasp my hands in front of me. I’m travel weary, filthier than I’ve ever been in my life, and now all I have to look forward to is...the journey back.

“I don’t know what I was thinking, letting you bring me here,” I say, my tone gone as brittle as the ice chips beneath my feet. “I hope you’re happy. You’ve just proved how much of a fraud you truly are, and now we’re at the end of the world for no reason.”

My anger runs frigid and cold.

“This isn’t my heart’s desire,” I say again, spinning around to gesture to the ruins. “Why did you bring me here? This is a shattered and severed land that has no hope of ever becoming what it once was.”

Just as I have no hope of ever becoming what I once was.

A throat clears behind me, making me go rigid. “Actually, Your Majesty, that’s where you’re wrong.”

I whirl around at the new voice, eyes flaring wide at the two men standing before me.

The first thing that stands out to me is how thoroughly ill-fitting they are in this forsaken detritus, because both of them are impeccably dressed. As if they aren’t in the middle of ruins but ready to step into some sort of royal celebration.

The second thing I notice is the men are nearly identical. A thick curtain of hair down to their shoulders, the same height, even the same stance. The only difference I can pick out between them is they each have moles dead center in the middle of their cheeks, yet on opposite sides of their faces.

“Who are you?” I ask, taking a startled step back. That sensation of being watched comes back full force, making the mist in the air seem denser as it curls near my side.

“I am Friano, and this is my twin brother, Fassa,” the man on the left says, the corresponding mole on his left cheek. “We are pleased to make your acquaintance, Queen Malina Colier.”

I glance warily at Pruinn, but he’s simply watching me with an encouraging look I wish I could slap right off his face.

“How do you know who I am, and what are you doing here?”

Friano grins, showing a row of perfectly even teeth. “You are the queen of Sixth Kingdom. Of course we know who you are. Tales of the beauty of the Cold Queen have stretched even here.”

My brows lift in surprise. “Are you saying that you live here?”

They both nod in unison, and this time, Fassa answers. “We do, Your Majesty.”

“How is that possible? No one can live here. This place is utterly desolate.”

“Ah, yes,” Fassa replies brightly. “Brother, if you could...?”

“Of course.” With a nod, Friano lifts a finger in the air and spins it around, and like a wave rippling through our surroundings, the castle transforms.

Within moments, gone are the ruins, and in its place is Seventh Kingdom’s castle restored. Slick gray walls, dazzling blue windows, and black marble that’s whole and polished beneath our feet. What was the stripped off bones of a cavern is now a revived and elegant entry hall.

It’s like a timepiece turned backwards, reversing all the damage that had been done and returning this place to its rightful glory.

All I can do is gape as I try to take it all in, my mind not quite believing my eyes. “How...?”

“We have been waiting for you, Your Majesty.”

I rear back, looking between the two of them before my gaze hooks into Pruinn. “Did you know they were here? That this would happen?”

“I knew that we would find something,” he says before tapping on the pocket of his coat where I can see a hint of the rolled-up map. “I always trust my magic.”

Bewildered, I look back at the twins. My hands automatically run down my wrinkled, stained dress. They’re standing here looking fresh, while I’m begrimed and sloppy, my normally perfect hair a tangled twist at the back of my head. “Why were you waiting for me?”

They share a look, matching grins gathering on their faces. “Because we have prayed to the gods for a rightful heir of Orea to help us restore Seventh Kingdom to glory, and they brought us you.”

My mind snags on his words, a jolt of hope burgeoning from my weary limbs. “What are you talking about?”

Fassa comes forward and gently takes hold of my palm, like a noble would just before kissing it for good graces. He doesn’t raise my hand to his mouth though, and instead holds it, his own hands feeling far too warm.

Or perhaps I’m far too cold.

“You are the answer to our prayers, Your Majesty. You are the queen this land needs. You coming here proves it.”

“Proves what?”

“Isn’t it obvious?” he asks, his dark eyes sparkling with hope. “You’re going to be the queen who saves Seventh Kingdom.”