The Cursed Queen

  But Nisse is gone. So are his favorites. Only Jaspar remains. He stands on his bench, his eyes round. “Did you know?” I shout, violent gusts lifting my red hair, ash and cinder swirling around me. The air is filled with the scent of burning flesh, sweet and bitter.

  It’s funny the small things one notices when the world is falling apart. Jaspar’s throat bobs as he swallows, his skin shining with sweat and streaked with grime in the heat and light of my curse-fire. His fists clench. He shakes his head.

  I could kill him. Perhaps I should, for spreading the rumors that broke people’s faith and trust in Thyra. My heart squeezes at the thought of him burning in front of me, but I’m part of the fire now. I’ve accepted it as my own. It licks at my skin, striping it red and angry. Raising blisters. Pain surges into my awareness, along with an instinctive swell of ice to counter the heat. I wince as my blood runs so cold it feels like my bones will snap.

  “No!” Jaspar roars, and I jerk my head up to see him leap off the bench and land at the edge of the fight circle, his hands up and waving as he runs past me and shouts at someone above us. I turn in that direction—battle archers are lined up behind a parapet that encircles the squat stone tower, halfway up its hulking height. “Do not fire!” he shouts, lunging forward to put himself between the arrows and me.

  I turn my palms to the sky, shards of ice forming and swirling, lengthening into blades. At the sight, I smile. It is as easy as thinking cold thoughts. And now I am cold. So cold that the thought of these ice blades penetrating Krigere flesh can’t melt me. They will freeze and fall and die, and it is what they deserve. What all of them deserve.

  “Ansa?”

  The broken, hitching sound of my name brings me whirling around. Relief turns my ice blades to mist as I stare at Thyra’s red, heat-kissed face. Her blue eyes are filled with tears. She takes a slow step toward me, her injured left arm pressed to her body, her tunic streaked and stained with blood from her wounds. “Please stop this.”

  “I can’t let them kill you.” My voice cracks. Agony makes me sway, even as the fire and ice rages inside me, seeking a target.

  “It’s time to stop though. You have to stop.”

  My vision is tinted with an orange glow. I stare at her through the flames.

  “You’re my wolf,” she says with a tremulous smile. A tear escapes and slips down her cheek. “I need you to listen to me now.”

  “Your wolf,” I whisper. I clench my fists, trying to leash the massive storm inside me along with a rising agony that’s trying to eat me alive. “I have never been anything else.”

  “Oh,” she says, her voice high and shaking. “That’s where I think you’re wrong.”

  I blink at her in confusion. There’s a roaring in my ears that won’t fade. “What do you mean?”

  She gives me a pained look and tilts her head, her right arm rising to embrace me. “You are a great deal more than that.” She’s alive and reaching for me, and I cannot deny her. I move closer. Her arm slides around my shoulders, and she pulls me against her, so that I can smell her, fire and sweat and a hint of sweetness. Her whole body is taut and trembling.

  “Don’t be afraid of me. I would never hurt you,” I say.

  She lets out a quiet sob. “I know, Ansa.” Her hand slides up my back and into my hair. “I know.” She kisses my cheek, and my eyes fall shut at the absolute perfection of her lips against my skin. But then her grip tightens and her body tenses. I open my mouth to ask her what’s wrong, but before I can utter the question, my skull explodes in a thunder of pain and stars and black and I’m tumbling down, the deep darkness pulling me under.

  * * *

  She lies on the ground, blood soaking her dress, her eyes full of pain. Though the flames surround her, she doesn’t pay them any mind. Her gaze is on me. Never stop fighting. Her mouth doesn’t move, but I hear the words in my head, trilling and beautiful and true. Never stop.

  I want to obey her, but I can’t move. “Mama,” I scream. I need her to stand up and come and get me, to scoop me from the ground and hold me in her arms, to laugh and stroke her fingers through my hair. I need to smell her scent, the one that means safety and love and home. But all I can smell now is the smoke.

  I look down and realize I’m on fire.

  “Be still,” a voice hisses. “Don’t touch those bandages!”

  My eyelids are crusted shut, but I manage to open one, enough to see a blurry brown face hovering above mine. “What?” It comes out as a rasping croak.

  “If you rip those bandages off again, you can fix them yourself.” The voice belongs to a woman, and she’s speaking Krigere, but it sounds off somehow, like she’s had too much ale, or too much honey. The sounds are drawn out and warm and round instead of the pointed fierceness I am used to.

  A warm cloth is pressed to my eyes, knocking away the crust, and I blink my eyes open. “You’re the one from the banquet,” I say, wincing as the words abrade my dry throat.

  The woman pats her spray of wild ebony hair with graceful fingers. She’s younger than I first thought, not much older than I am, and her gaze is full of sharp wariness. “Halina.”

  “Vasterutian. I remember.”

  She lets out a cluck of incredulous laughter. “Do you? Wonder you can even form a thought.”

  My brow furrows. “What happened?” I glance down at myself. I’m clad in only breeches and a chest wrap, and my arms are bandaged from fingertips to shoulders. I can see every one of my ribs. Shock clenches cold and tight in my belly, and I try to sit up, but Halina holds me down. Her hand is encased in a thick leather mitt, like the kind some andeners wear when they handle iron in the fire. I collapse under the pressure, winded and weak.

  “Thought you might not remember your own name, what with that knock to the head.” She grunts, pure amusement. “The Krigere had no idea they had a wielder among them.” She whistles. “Quite a show.”

  A shadow of memory hulks at the back of my mind, pushing its way forward. “Where’s Chieftain Thyra?”

  “Alive and safe. That’s all I’m to tell you.”

  I try to get up again, but she keeps her hand pressed to my shoulder. “Why? Let me up!”

  “Hush! You quiet down.” Her skin is glistening with sweat, and her voice has risen in alarm. “Don’t you turn that fire on me!”

  My head sinks back onto the pillow, my lips tingling. “What did you say?”

  The pressure on my shoulder lets up, but Halina is muttering to herself in a different language now, probably Vasterutian. It has the same drawling honey lilt she lent to the Krigere words. When she sees me staring, she gives me an exasperated look. “I don’t want to be here. No one else would mind you, though. All afraid you would cook them or turn them into an ice statue.”

  How does she know? The dark shadow in my mind forces its way into the front of my consciousness. I remember. Fire bursting from my palms. Ice swirling in my hands. And my hate, and my rage, and Thyra’s tear-streaked cheeks. I embraced the magic and it devoured me. “Oh, no,” I whisper. “I thought that might have been a dream.”

  “A nightmare, more like.” She flares her fingers and makes a whooshing sound. Then she looks me in the eye. “But you burn me and I’ll haunt you. Drive you mad. I could do it.”

  My cheeks bloom with the heat of humiliation. “I don’t want to burn you. I’m not—” I press my lips together.

  Halina grunts and settles herself next to my bedside. I’m in a stone chamber, the air cool and heavy and wet, the walls dripping. A torch bracketed to the wall reveals a heavy wooden door but no windows. It feels like the whole thing will collapse and crush me.

  “So many brave warriors, and they send me to tend you.” She chuckles. “Not as brave as they like to claim.”

  I stare down at my arms, lifting them to examine my bandages in the firelight. “What’s wrong with me?”

  “Ha! Oh, so many things, it seems. But to begin with, your arms are blistered raw.” She nods at my head. “And you got
your skull cracked by a dagger hilt.”

  I squint, my head aching as I try to remember. But it’s like trying to lift a heavy boulder to see what’s underneath. I’m not strong enough. “Tell me.”

  “You went berserk, and the lady warrior stopped you. Crack!” She mimics slamming a dagger hilt into her own head and then rolls her eyes and lets her tongue loll.

  “Thyra,” I whisper. “She hit me.”

  “Mmm. A good thing, too. Would have burned down the world if she hadn’t.” She gestures at my arms. “Yourself included.”

  I try to clench my fists, but it feels like my flesh is tearing loose. I gasp, shaking with the pain. “Everyone knows about me now.”

  “Were you trying to hide?” She laughs. “If so, I must tell you that you’re not very good at such things.”

  “I was cursed.” I sigh. “The witch did this to me.”

  She clucks her tongue. “Don’t know about that. But I do know you’re a wielder. A Kupari.”

  My heart kicks against my breastbone. “I am not.”

  “Oh, you are. Only the Kupari have magic.” Her round face twists into a look of contempt. “Who knows why? Certainly not because they deserve it.” She mutters something in Vasterutian.

  “I might have . . . magic. Or witchcraft. I don’t know what it is. But it’s not because I’m Kupari. I’m Krigere.” Even as I say it, my mother’s face flickers in memory. I shudder as my stomach clenches.

  Halina arches an eyebrow as she points at my hair. “You were born to the Krigere? Because your hair tells me otherwise. The Kupari? So many with hair just like yours.”

  “I don’t know where I was born.”

  “Then don’t tell me who you are and who you aren’t.”

  I stare up at her, stunned by the realization. I knew I was a raid prize, but always assumed I’d been taken from a tribe in the north or the west. I’d never considered . . . “Even if you’re right, I’m no wielder. I wasn’t born like this.”

  Her eyes narrow. “Not that you know of. But the magic can come out anytime.”

  “How do you know?”

  “Oh. I know all about the Kupari.” Her voice drips with contempt. “They sat quiet and smug as the monsters climbed our walls and killed King Dakila and his family. Refused to help even when we begged. They deserve whatever they get now that old Nisse’s coming for them.”

  “I would think you would hate him. All of us, in fact.”

  Her dark eyes glitter. “Never said I didn’t, little red warrior.”

  I see the fierceness in her gaze and suddenly remember what Nisse said about letting the Vasterutians join our tribe. I’m not sure they would even if he offered. “How long have I been here?”

  “Long enough for me to kill you a few hundred times over,” she says casually as she removes her leather mitt and begins to pick filth from beneath her fingernails with a small knife.

  “Tell me how long.”

  “Days, little red.”

  “Days?”

  She sets the knife down on a small table on her other side, one laden with a basin of water and a pot of greasy-looking tincture. “Weeks, really. Your head was right cracked. Thought you were going to die for a little while there. Kept burning the bandages right off your arms. Had to put you out a few times.” She pretends to grab the water basin and dump it on me. “Had you tied down, but burned through the ropes. Decided it was best to leave you be, and that’s when you stopped setting things on fire. Guess you don’t like to be a prisoner.” Her mouth curves into a sly smile. “Not that anyone does, eh?”

  I’m having trouble meeting her eyes. Normally raid prizes are cowed and meek, but there’s no real question that Halina has the upper hand for now. “You said Thyra’s alive and safe. And she knows I’m here?”

  Halina considers me for a moment. “I believe she does.”

  “But you’re not sure? What happened to her?”

  Halina wears that clever smile as if it were a shield. “Many things happening. Many things. Everybody here wears a mask.” She traces a finger through the air, outlining my face. “Better choose yours.”

  My thoughts are so scattered. . . . I close my eyes and try to draw them together into a picture I can understand. Thyra was going to be killed in that fight circle, and I saved her. But she’s the one who hit me. . . . “And Jaspar?”

  “The prince is in the mix,” she says. “Yes, he is. You Krigere.” She laughs and shakes her head, but her lips are peeled back, tight and feral. “Come to squat in Vasterut. Think it’s easy.” She’s not laughing anymore. Now she’s just baring her teeth.

  “Those are dangerous words, considering Nisse rules your city.” I suppress a shiver, but it’s not the ice inside me. Right now I can barely feel it. All I feel is weaker than I ever have, leaden limbs and shredded skin stretched over the knowledge that the moment I actually embraced the curse and set it free, it tried to kill me.

  “Are such words dangerous, when I say them to you? Little Kupari wielder. You know what those Krigere call you?” She leans forward, so close that her sharp breath wafts across my cheeks as she says, “Witch.”

  “I’m not a witch. I’m a warrior.”

  “Like the ones who stole you away from your birthplace?”

  I stare up at her, the breath knocked right out of me.

  With a grimly satisfied look, she slaps her palms on her thighs and pushes herself to her feet, deftly pocketing the knife in her skirt. “You rest some more. Drink some.” She gestures to a stone cup at my bedside. “I’m going to report to old Nisse. He wanted to know if you woke up. And if you were sensible. Wasn’t sure you’d ever be sensible again after the crack in the head, but he’ll be glad you are.”

  I push myself up to sitting, now that she’s too far away to stop me. Dread has welled up in my throat, and I swallow it down. “Glad?”

  Halina grins. “Oh, yes. I’m thinking he wants to know why you roasted or froze nine of his warriors, little red.” She walks to the door, her hips swinging. “And I’m thinking you’d best think very carefully about your answer.”

  CHAPTER SIXTEEN

  As I wait to hear of my fate, I stare at the ceiling and try to keep my thoughts in line. It is exhausting. Before, I was holding back the curse. Now I am holding back the memories. They used to only inhabit my dreams, hazy and horrifying. But now they hover at the edges of my waking moments, circling predators waiting for the right moment to pounce.

  I was born Kupari. It must be true. It’s why Hulda’s language was so familiar, why the sound of her words scraped at the armor laid over the raw memories of my childhood home. The home I had before it was ripped away from me.

  By the Krigere.

  I clench my muscles and push that away yet again. I am a warrior, and I am a Krigere. I am part of a strong people. I am part of a tribe. I fought and killed to become one of them, to have a home again.

  You know what those Krigere call you? Witch.

  Perhaps I am not part of a tribe after all. In saving Thyra, I doomed myself. And how did Thyra reward my service?

  She pretended to love me and lured me close—she was the bait, and my heart was the snare.

  And then she tried to kill me.

  Halina comes back for me sometime later and tells me I’ve been summoned to the council room. My mouth is too dry to allow me to ask questions, and I’m not sure she could—or would—give me a straight answer if I did. But the way she watches me, her dark eyes glittering bright, her mouth curved but tight . . . it’s like she’s waiting for something.

  I feel like a bundle of sticks stuffed inside a bag of skin as she helps me to sit up and unwraps my bandages. A lump rises in my throat as I see the swirls of scarring along my arms, red and silver and shiny and fragile. I have never given much thought to my appearance, save the number of kill marks on my arm, but suddenly I want to hide. I look like a monster.

  Halina must see the shadow of shame cross my face, because she says, “Only your arms, little red.
And it’s not as bad as it looks—been moving them every day, not letting them get stiff—you still have full use of them! Rest of you is pretty all right too. Except for that spot on your leg.”

  I glance down at the red mark on my right calf, in the shape of a burst of flame, and let out a choked laugh. “That’s not a scar. It’s a birthmark.”

  Halina leans back so that the light of the torch reaches my bare leg. “Is it now?” she asks quietly.

  “I need boots,” I blurt out, eager to cover the mark, even though I’m dreading what comes after.

  Halina fetches me my boots, along with a new, overlarge tunic. It hangs from my scrawny frame and makes me look like a child, and Halina is obviously trying not to laugh as she steps back and lets me tie the collar with stiff, sore fingers. The long sleeves hang to my fingertips, but I don’t mind that. For once, I want my arms covered.

  I want a weapon, too, but it seems foolish to ask for one. As soon as I’m dressed, Halina yanks the door to the chamber open and leans out. “Got her ready,” she says in a flat voice, so different from the warm, round tone of a few moments ago. She turns back to me with eyes so full that I can’t sift through what’s within. Curiosity? Regret? Fear? Hope? All at once?

  “Step into the hallway,” says a familiar voice.

  “Sander?”

  “Step into the hallway now, Ansa,” he says from the corridor.

  My stomach is a ball of ice as I obey him. Apart from Sander, three other warriors are waiting for me, including Carina, the one with the long, dark braid. All of them have unsheathed daggers, and they surround me as I leave the relative safety of the stone chamber. Halina has shrunk back into the room, but watches from behind the door with her keen gaze as Sander presses his knife against my neck.

  “If you try to burn us or freeze us, we’ll kill you.”

  I grit my teeth, trying to hold in the stinging tears that are filling my eyes. “I wouldn’t.”