The Prince and the Ice King by Amanda Meuwissen
Chapter 2
REARDON WASa prisoner of the Ice King until he earned his freedom. He might die here, or his fate could be worse, but the people of this place and its curse might finally give him the answers that could change the hearts and minds of the Emerald Kingdom forever.
His father would know he was missing by now but not where he had gone—it could take weeks or even months before they realized the truth. That was all the time Reardon needed. He was on a desperate mission that could doom or save countless lives now and into the future. As prince and future king of Emerald, it was his duty to see this through—even if it was the last duty he ever performed.
Despite all that, his current preoccupation was staring at his reflection in the glass above the water basin in his room, fretting over his appearance for a welcome feast.
His hair was still well-coifed, his new clothes an attractive color combination, though he never thought he’d look so good in red, so used to wearing green. But how was he supposed to face all those people downstairs?
“I don’t need a feast. I’m hungry, but… this feels wrong. I’m not really one of them. I’m not the sacrifice.”
“But you are one of us,” Barclay insisted. “You don’t have to hide any part of you here. Magic is used freely. People love freely. You could stay forever here and be happy.”
“Is that what you saw when you touched me?”
“I….”
Reardon turned to look at his friend, sitting on the edge of his bed. Barclay had brought him several more articles of clothing, traded out for the others now that they knew his size, but he’d decided to stick with the dark red and marigold doublet for now.
“Please don’t make me say it,” Barclay said, staring down at his knees. “I saw you, I’ll admit that much, and you were smiling, but I… I don’t know.”
“It can’t be all bad if I was smiling.” Reardon joined him on the bed, creaking the plush mattress as he sat. “You don’t have to say more. We’ll find out together, like we always do. I know that being here is the right thing, no matter what happens to me. I don’t suppose you could simply tell me about this place—the king, his people, the curse?”
“I don’t know everything, but I can’t say much. We’re not supposed to let certain things slip to the sacrifice the first few nights.”
“Why not?”
“In case you were a criminal. There have been some sent here, in the past, who deserved to be condemned.”
“We’re in trouble, then, since I’m such a heinous brigand.” Reardon chuckled.
Barclay chuckled too, but his posture was slouched and his shoulders tight with tension.
“Can you really not answer anything? Because I don’t understand how Branwen is master of arms but didn’t turn my sword belt to flames.”
Barclay had returned Reardon’s belt and the sword it had sheathed, which were both warm to the touch but not singed or marred.
His dagger was still missing, though….
“They can control their touch if it’s on something not living,” Barclay explained. “They still give off, well, heat for Bran, that tingly feeling around Liam, and so on, but they can choose to not alter objects. It’s things that are alive that are the problem.”
“Even plants? Birds?”
“Anything….” Barclay looked away, a shadow crossing his face.
“You’ve seen them? Kill things?”
“No,” he said fervently, as if desperate to defend them. “But it can be useful with pests. You’ll never find any rodents or insects here, aside from the ones we want, like bees for honey. And, well, there was a thief a few months back….”
“I saw him.”
Barclay’s eyes widened.
“He made a fitting lesson from the king.”
That caused Barclay to shiver as if the Ice King was in their presence now, and Reardon got the impression that the king didn’t walk among his people the way the others did. The lack of ice trails everywhere but in his chamber proved that.
“That’s it, then? Pests and people who threaten this place?”
“And….” Barclay trailed off once more, twiddling his thumbs in his lap. “Very rarely, but… sometimes there are accidents.”
Reardon felt a stir of nausea, imagining statues made of ice or gold, piles of ash from fire and lightning, and the nothing left behind from those who went poof. “What do they do with—”
“Are you going to keep everyone waiting?” Zephyr appeared like a ghost, just suddenly there inside Reardon’s room. He must be able to pass right through the door. “Hurry along now, pretty prince,” he said, and vanished again just as quickly.
“Does he often do that?” Reardon rose from the bed with a scowl.
“Basically always.” Barclay followed suit. “You get used to it.”
“Should I…?” Reardon gestured back at his sword belt hanging from a handle on the wardrobe. “I mean, I usually have it for banquets. It’s part of proper dress.”
“Reardon, you’re not in Emerald anymore,” Barclay said with a slight smirk. “This is a nice banquet. I had mine last year, after all. But it isn’t proper. Come on.” He grasped Reardon’s hand to drag him to the door. “I’ll introduce you to my friends. You don’t have a specific place to sit. You can sit by me.”
Thank goodness. Reardon had worried he might be put on display.
That feeling reignited, however, once they reached the grand ballroom opposite the main entrance that had been turned into a banquet hall with tables to fit everyone in the castle. There didn’t seem to be any hierarchy to it, other than the lone table at the very back on a sort of stage with an intricate chair in the center and several smaller but elegant chairs framing it.
The king and his elementals were not yet there, but everyone else was, and all two hundred some pairs of eyes turned to look at Reardon as he and Barclay entered. Barclay hadn’t let go of his hand the entire way, and for that, Reardon was grateful, clinging tight as his friend led him to one of the center tables and they took two empty seats.
On Reardon’s other side was the dark-skinned woman who’d asked if he’d “buggered any boys,” and across from them was the half-elf with curiously bright and mismatched clothing.
“Aren’t we lucky you know our little fortune-teller,” the woman said, as everyone else murmured and continued to gawk at Reardon. “Shayla. Thieving. Forty-five years.” She held out a hand, sporting fingerless gloves and black-painted nails.
Reardon tried to accept the hand as he would a noble lady, to which she laughed and put her hand in his with a shake. “S-sorry,” he stammered. “But… thieving? Forty-five years?”
“It’s customary to introduce yourself with the crime that sent you here and how long you’ve been in the castle,” Barclay said.
“Oh.”
Forty-five?Shayla didn’t look any older than Reardon or Barclay, yet she’d been here for decades.
Widow Caitlin was there as well, beside the half-elf, giving Reardon a calculating stare.
“Nigel.” The half-elf waved. “Charlatanry. One hundred and seventy… oh who knows anymore. Two maybe? You’re a fun addition.” He laughed when Reardon held out a hand to him as well, and he stood to accept it—which showed the jeweled dagger on his belt.
“That’s mine.” Reardon reached for it, but Nigel pulled away to reclaim his seat.
“Ridiculous. I’ve had this dagger for ages.”
“You most certainly have not—”
A bell chimed, and the din of the room instantly quieted. An unseen door opened behind the head table, permitting the elementals in order—Liam, Zephyr, Branwen, Josie, and finally, the Ice King himself, who brought with him a wave of cool air that made everyone shudder.
Jack.
The names, so human, did not fit such mystical creatures.
The Ice King took his seat, frosting it ever so slightly, as if the control the others had with nonliving things was less possible with him. His sister and Branwen each sat next to him, with Liam and Zephyr in the chairs farther down. They were a sight all together, like something out of a storybook or fantastic dream.
That’s when Reardon realized that all the tables were laden with food—game, vegetables, cheeses, and bread. He was ravenous, but he’d been so distracted by the eyes on him, he hadn’t let his attention wander or his mouth salivate.
But unlike the feast before him, the head table had nothing.
“They can’t eat,” Barclay whispered. “Not like that.”
“Then how do they…?” Reardon started to ask but thought better of it. Everyone was waiting for the king to speak.
Once the room was still, the Ice King stood, large and looming above everyone. “Another year, another sacrifice,” he bellowed. “But as you know, we were robbed of that sacrifice today, for the prince of the Emerald Kingdom deemed us unworthy and released the offering to escape into the wilds.”
Reardon hadn’t deemed—
“Make no mistake,” the king continued before Reardon could protest, “he is not a replacement. He is not a guest. He is here by my grace alone, and it will not be lasting. He wishes to change your fates, and so I ask you now, so he can have part of his answer early.
“Would you return to the Emerald Kingdom if given the chance?”
“Never!”
“No, my king!”
“We serve you, always!”
A resounding chorus rose up, and Reardon shrank in on himself as the voices grew and more and more of them cried out to say the same.
The Ice King looked so smug, his eyes piercing as he hushed the crowd. “There you have it, little prince. But I suppose you think yourself a hero anyway, hoping to prevent persecution of the corrupt. He claims he wants to know me,” he returned to his people, “know us and our ways, our curse, to bring an end to the Emerald Kingdom’s follies. Maybe he is honest. Maybe he hopes to overthrow me.”
“Wait—” Reardon tried.
“He is the future king of our neighbor, after all!” the king cried louder. “I wonder what to do with him….”
“Kill him!” someone shouted.
“Stop the Emerald Prince!”
“Freeze him now, Majesty!”
“No!” Barclay burst up from his seat, drawing the angry eyes of his fellows. His friends had not erupted with such words, but many others had. “Please. He means well. Truly. I know he means to help. He’s not like the others. Reardon has been my friend for years with no hope of gain for himself.”
“No?” Widow Caitlin said, cool and expressionless. “He did not know of your visions or benefit from them?”
“He… did, but… but I offered my visions, he never asked—”
“Sounds like a charlatan to me!” Nigel cackled.
Shayla laughed, and many nearby laughed with them, leaving Reardon certain that his death was imminent, but the Ice King quieted the crowd once more, as Barclay sat with a distressed frown.
“Let the prince speak,” the king said. “Go on, tell us. What makes you not like the others of your land?”
With all eyes on him, as pointed as the tips of pitchforks, Reardon hesitantly stood. The seats Barclay had chosen for them were almost perfectly in the center of the room, making him feel surrounded and very aware of the peril he was in if they called for his death.
“I don’t believe in corruption,” Reardon said, causing an uproar of fresh murmurs. “I don’t! Not like they say. Not for loving someone or having magic inside you. I only wish to understand to be able to better convince my father.”
“He’s not one of us!”
“Kill him anyway!”
“How can we trust him?”
The voices of dissent returned, and Barclay looked to Reardon pleadingly to say more, to say the truth—that he was like those who the Emerald Kingdom would call corrupt if they knew his secret. But Reardon had held that in for so long, he didn’t think he could admit it here, like this, in the middle of a crowded room.
The voices rose higher, and Barclay’s stare grew more insistent. Reardon had to speak to save himself, and as much as it shook him, he readied himself to do just that, when the Ice King hushed the crowd like before.
“I hear you, good people, but I also hear disagreement, and not everyone has spoken. Let us take it upon ourselves to make the Emerald Prince prove himself. We will have our feast, but as the days and weeks pass, I will look to all of you to help me decide what to do with him.
“Make sure the prince pulls his weight and that he is worthy of whatever fate he earns.”
There were stomps of feet and a clatter of dishes as people pounded the tables with their fists like some tribal ritual, a promise between them that cast even more menacing stares Reardon’s way. The king had painted a target on him, ensuring Reardon’s time here would not be easy.
“To the feast!” The Ice King clapped, and the resonance of his large clawlike hands cast an extra chill through the room that spurred his people to attack the hot food before them.
Everyone started filling their plates, but as famished as Reardon was, his stomach churned at what had transpired. He was in enemy hands and had no idea how to gain their trust.
“Relax. No one will dare touch you now.” Shayla smacked his back so hard, his chin nearly collided with his empty plate. “They’ll leave that to the king.” She snickered, smacking him again before reaching for a large leg of juicy game meat.
“At least it’ll be quick.” Nigel snickered in kind.
“Stop,” Barclay pleaded. “They’re only joking.” He filled his own plate and then started to fill Reardon’s, nudging him to eat.
Maybe Shayla and Nigel were only joking, but Reardon could feel eyes on him from all sides, and Widow Caitlin kept passing him her frosty stare. She might as well have had the same powers as the Ice King for how chilly she appeared.
“Eat.” Shayla nudged him as Barclay had. “You’re no good to anyone sulking. Make friends! Get the people on your side and the king will have no choice but to spare you.”
“How do I do that?” Reardon muttered. “Everyone hates me.”
“Prove you’re useful.” Nigel shrugged, tearing into his own leg of meat. “That’s what we did.”
“More wine!” someone shouted. “And how about a tale from the good bard?”
An echo of like requests resounded, and when Reardon looked around to see who they meant, he realized everyone’s attention was on Nigel.
He winked at Reardon and hopped up onto the tabletop, sliding platters and pitchers out of his way with his feet. “Are the masses demanding a tale?”
“A legend!” another voice called.
“Tell us about our fletcher, Nigel!”
“The first sacrifice!”
Since there was no hierarchy to who sat where, there was no way for Reardon to tell at first who the fletcher might be, but he saw a few heads turn toward a table behind him at a man with a blond beard and hard eyes, holding a very pretty young woman at his side who wore tiny round spectacles.
Though Reardon supposed neither of them was truly young. The man was over two hundred if he’d been the first sacrifice.
“There’s nothing I like better than a proper redemption story!” Nigel cried. “And I can say that; I met him when he was still insufferable!”
The crowd laughed.
“Someone pass me that wine!”
A full goblet was handed up to Nigel, and he took a healthy swig before beginning, “There came the night!”
Everyone cheered, and then quieted after what must have been a familiar opening.
“There came the night!” He stomped his feet, keeping time with spoken verses.
“When a rich man’s son who dallied
owed more than he could rally
to the tavern in the square.
“And hence it was he was indebted
for all the women bedded,
and his father kicked him out to earn his fare.
“But oh alas! He had no skills but the thrills that he had wasted
and liquor he had tasted—”
“Still true!” someone shouted, and another round of laughter filled the air.
“—and liquor he had tasted to get by,” Nigel ended, balancing ginger steps on down the table with nimble leaps and flourishes to the crowd’s delight.
“The rich man’s son did wade and wallow
and become so very sallow
like a man cast adrift on a lonely, empty isle,
“But soon he turned his eyes to thieving,
blind from all his stealing,
and picked the temping pocket of the wrong kind of smile.
“There came the night!” he called once more, starting a clap with his stomps that got the crowd clapping with him.
“When he stole from worse than merchant,
who wondered how far he bent,
and lured him in with cloak and soak to keep the chill away.
“Alas again! He tried to run,
but the seedy slaver won,
by giving chase into the night for fight was yet a plight to be made right!
And was he caught?”
“No!” the crowd cheered.
“He ran and ran,
with cloak in hand
and emerald crest on emerald seaming,
lovely bright and gleaming
to the north!
“But lo, the land was quiet,
yet he would surely riot
before he stopped,
lest he drop,
as he reached the gates at hand.
And was he caught?”
“No!”
“Bright magic lit the dawn
as he dashed across the lawn
like a shot
fired taut
as an arrow to our king.
“Those others green,
left unseen,
learned to fear,
while he did cheer,
and swore to Emerald no longer
—a frozen arrow’s stronger—
the fletcher ever after and bow master!”
He stretched his arms wide with a final stomp, but then pulled one hand close to his mouth and whispered, “Just a pity it took a hundred years instead of any faster.”
The crowd cheered again with a smattering of laughter and applause.
“We all know whose bed that cloak’s on the end of now!” someone called, and the fletcher pulled his woman closer against his side.
Only when the laughter died, with Nigel bowing low to accept his accolades, did the fletcher speak.
“Five years. It took five years before I surpassed the king’s master of arms with a bow.”
“It’s true!” Branwen called from the head table.
“And only twenty more to lose his good humor!” Nigel shouted back.
“Whose fault was that?” the fletcher responded.
“But!” Nigel cried to keep everyone’s attention on him as they laughed louder. “But. I say to you all now… here comes the night!” he cried, and then bent to speak directly to Reardon. “And on this night, sweet prince, how would you tell that tale?”
Reardon’s cheeks burned hot and his heart jumped into his throat. “I, um….”
“Go on. I’m curious what the Emerald stories say.”
“I-I thought… bards were supposed to sing.”
“It’s better this one doesn’t,” Shayla murmured.
“Free verse is allowed.” Nigel scowled as more snickers arose. “You want a song, give us one. How would you sing the tale of the Emerald Arrow first fired into the heart of this place?”
Reardon felt more on display than ever, with every table watching him, including that of the Ice King and his court. “I know a different version.”
“I’ll bet you do.” Nigel hopped down to the floor but remained standing. “Maybe a dozen or so? And what’s your favorite?”
“The story is similar but paints the slaver as a noble.”
“He was one,” the fletcher chimed in, eyes hard again and smile thin. “He was both, but history is sung by the victors.”
There was a tense silence where Reardon wasn’t sure how to proceed, but then a clear, melodic voice rose up beside him.
“Beware the lure of passion’s ploy to take what’s not your own.”
Reardon turned to Barclay. They were both sitting, facing each other, and Reardon smiled as he jumped in to join him on the verse.
“By king and country, you’ll be caught and exiled from your home.
As once a thief in dark of night did rob a noble’s horse
And run when he was chased off road beyond a noble course.
“And the thief ran on,” Reardon sang powerfully on the chorus, with Barclay falling to harmony as they had done many times before.
“Swallowed up by greed,
Toward a hungry maw
On the hill.
“Those in pursuit were sieged by death and magic in the air,” Reardon led, and Barclay came in later to add harmony they had not used the first time.
“Held back by frozen gates ahead and all they’d known to fear.
The thief escaped beyond the wall, assured that he was free
But down the Ice King came to feed and warned the rest to flee.
“And the thief cried on,
Swallowed up by greed,
But the hungry maw
Had enough.
“So, beware the vice that will feed the story’s end,” they sang in unison, “for the next year comes again too soon.”
Barclay nodded for Reardon to give the final line, and he did, softer now but loud enough to fill the room, “And the Ice King sings the final tune.”
The ceiling was high, so that Reardon’s voice echoed long after he’d finished, and while he continued to smile at his friend, the silence that reigned in the absence of their song drew his eyes to the head table, where all other eyes had turned too, because the Ice King was staring stoically back at him.
Those eyes nearly glowed, cutting across the expanse between them, but Reardon knew it was not magic. His eyes were simply that blue.
“Well now,” Nigel cut the silence as sharply as the king’s gaze, “the story might have been shit, but your singing’s not half bad. Our young fortune-teller too. We’ll have to teach them something more fitting for next time, eh?” he called, and another rumble of laughter filtered through the hall.
Reardon blushed at the shouted compliments and applause, thinking that a few of the eyes on him were a little less unfriendly now, even if the king said nothing.
Nigel sat, and with his departure from the stage, the din of separate conversations took over the hall once more, allowing some of the blood to leave Reardon’s cheeks. He watched Nigel add food to his plate, reaching over the woman next to him to grab an especially large piece of cheese. She shoved him back into his seat with impressive strength, and as he laughed, unruffled, the jeweled dagger smacked the tabletop and unhooked from his belt with a clatter.
Reardon nabbed it, but then grandly handed it back to Nigel. “Let’s say I get that back on my own someday. Without you noticing. Then can it be mine again?”
“Good luck with that,” Shayla snorted, as Nigel held the dagger delicately between his fingers.
“I’m the talented one around here at making things… disappear.” Nigel waved his hands around the dagger, covering it from Reardon’s sight, and when his hands parted, the dagger was gone.
“Magic….” Reardon gasped.
The woman next to Nigel sneered, “Nobles. Can’t tell the difference between magic and basic sleight of hand.” She was beautiful but had a lethality to her that told Reardon she had likely been a soldier or an assassin, especially given the defined muscles bulging through her shirtsleeves.
“It’s an illusion,” Nigel said, lifting the dagger from his lap. “Not real magic. But this beauty is still mine.” He grinned as he hooked it back onto his belt, eyeing Reardon in challenge.
“Until I earn it back,” Reardon promised, to which those around them snickered. It wasn’t some grand family heirloom, but it was precious to Reardon—a gift from General Lombard on his eighteenth birthday. He’d learn everything he could from these people and gain both the dagger back and their trust.
Reardon began to eat more normally then, chatting with Barclay, Nigel, and Shayla, with occasional additions by Caitlin, though she never addressed Reardon directly. As the feast waned, he realized that the room had grown darker and more torches were lit to fill the hall with light. But while the evening shadows had indeed crept upon them, the room also felt warmer, and he soon saw why.
The head table where the elementals had been watching and talking amongst themselves was now empty, the Ice King’s chair looking wet as the frost melted without his presence.
“They don’t stay out at night,” Barclay said.
“Part of the curse?”
“Yes….”
“What?” Reardon pressed when he sensed that Barclay was keeping something from him.
“I’m sorry. I can’t say,” Barclay whispered. “I’m welcome here in ways only you ever welcomed me back in Emerald, and for that, no one will ever replace you in my heart as friend and brother, but….”
Reardon shook his indignancy away as he saw his friend’s pinched frown. “I understand. I’m meant to earn learning the rest, and I will. I will change things like I promised, even if you never want to come home with me.”
Barclay took Reardon’s hands beneath the table, like a silent apology for wanting to stay. “Eventually we’ll be able to talk about everything, and then I can explain why I’m so happy this is my home now.”
Reardon supposed he’d never envisioned what a place where he could be himself would feel like. He wasn’t sure he knew how to be himself. Barclay knew his secret, but Reardon had never been able to tell anyone else or openly express romantic affections for another man. He saw men and women express it to each other all the time, but….
But here there was so much more to be amazed by.
A pitcher held aloft at the end of the table caught his attention, and when he looked, he saw that no one was holding it. It floated, moving down the table to the waiting hand of an elf.
The elf was broad-shouldered and handsome, with black hair and an unruly curl hanging across his forehead. He poured water for himself, and then some for the human woman next to him, who sat close, clinging to his arm.
They were clearly a couple, something that would have condemned the woman too, just for that—lying knowingly with someone of mystic blood. Perhaps that was what had happened, him sent here, discovered as an elf, and her following, called corrupt, right behind him.
Fewer eyes were on Reardon now, and it afforded him the sight of casual magic being performed all around, as well as other mixed couples showing affection. More items floated rather than having to be handed down. There were simple transformations, like bread becoming cakes and the white meat of the game birds becoming dark for those who preferred it. Even mending could be done at the wave of a hand, fixing a stain from an overzealous wine drinker or a button that had fallen off someone’s tunic.
Reardon stared at it all in awe, but maybe more so at the couples, so comfortable and unafraid together, whether elves and humans or half-elves and—
His heart jumped, all other focus draining away, as he looked back to the muscled woman beside Nigel, who had a beautiful dark-haired half-elf beside her. She was cupping her cheek, whispering sweet words that had them both smiling. Then she kissed her, simple but bold, right there at the table for everyone to see.
No one else seemed to care or even looked their way. And they weren’t the only ones. At other tables there were other such couples, just as brazenly holding each other or enjoying brushes of their lips—women together, men together. Suddenly, Reardon noticed all of them and couldn’t look away.
“You’re safe here,” Barclay whispered, noticing his diverted attention with a soft smile.
Reardon smiled too, because these daring couples gave him hope, even if he wasn’t ready to sing his own secret to the rafters like he had the thief’s tale.
He shook his head when Nigel tried to fill his empty water goblet with wine, but Nigel insisted. “It’s your party, even if much of the room is being poopers about it. Have one glass or you will deeply offend me.”
Reardon had two, enough wine that, combined with his exhaustion, his eyes soon started to droop, and his head nearly slumped into a pudding.
Barclay coaxed him out of his seat to lead him from the hall, assuring him that he could go to bed whenever he wanted now that the king was gone, even if there were a few jeers thrown their way as they left. Barclay’s friends had all departed too, though he wouldn’t have pegged them for early retirees.
“Where’s your room?” Reardon asked, waking up more as they walked, alone now in the corridor to Reardon’s chambers.
“Right next door,” Barclay said. “People change rooms sometimes, but generally, each new sacrifice is next to the previous year’s. Easier to expand that way.
“Nigel and Shayla aren’t so bad, right? And Caitlin will warm to you. She just doesn’t talk much until she gets to know someone.”
“And here I was taking it personally,” Reardon joked. “They’re lovely, really, but an odd match for friends, especially since you’ve all been here a different amount of time.”
Barclay wrinkled his nose.
“It just surprised me!” Reardon amended.
“They all have other friends too, and so do I. Everyone is friendly here. They will be to you too, I swear. But the four of us have… a lot in common.”
“Caitlin also works with the wizard?”
“And Shayla. She collects most of the supplies we use. I’m sure you’ll see for yourself. They’ll all think of ways to put you to work.”
“Is that what they did to you?”
“To start. To gauge what sort of person I was but also my interests. It’ll be fine,” he reassured him, taking both hands again. “How can it not be when you were nothing but honest in there?”
The knot in Reardon’s stomach twisted to remind him that he wasn’t as certain as he pretended. “Do you think we offended the king with that story?”
“He isn’t easily offended or I wouldn’t have started it.”
“His gaze was just so….”
“Intense. I know.”
They both shivered, and after another tight squeeze of Reardon’s hands, Barclay let him go.
“Sometimes, in my dreams,” Barclay said, “I see a world where magic is used openly everywhere, where people love openly whoever they want. I like to think that’s the future, and not too far off.”
“Maybe it is,” Reardon agreed. “Good night, my friend.”
“Good night, Reardon. I’m so glad you’re here.”
Reardon didn’t bother lighting any candles or lanterns when he entered his room, finding his way easily enough in the dark. The idea of sleeping in a real bed reminded him of his exhaustion, and he barely took the time to strip before he climbed under the covers.
The quilt smelled like lavender. They really had done everything they could to make the sacrifice feel welcome, even if they were cautious of anyone new.
As Reardon closed his eyes and started to drift off, he wondered where the elementals had gone when the sun set and what they did during the night. One of the many mysteries he had to solve, he supposed, and come morning, he’d be ready to get to work.
JACK STOODin the same passageway he’d watched the prince from earlier, seeing the bed clearly through the hole he’d made by removing a carefully chosen stone. His goal wasn’t to peep, and it was far too dark to see much of him undressing anyway, but the faintest flash of bare skin made his chest feel warm—and nothing felt warm to him anymore.
The young prince was just so beautiful. And he had a voice to match—one that had enchanted Jack, so much so that he hadn’t dared speak after the tale Reardon sang for fear of his own voice breaking, even if the words had painted him as the villain.
Jack was a villain, worse than any bard’s tale could say. His people were too forgiving, but then, none of them had been there in the beginning, only those who carried the curse with him.
He’d been keeping his eyes on the banquet hall and knew the moment when Reardon and Barclay left, but now the prince merely slid into bed, planning nothing untoward but slumber.
Jack had to admit that Reardon seemed earnest with no ulterior motives, but there was no ending to this experiment where over two hundred years of dissenting beliefs was resolved by a single hopeful boy made king.
Turning from the even breaths of the prince, who had already fallen asleep, Jack replaced the stone and moved quietly back down the passageway to his chamber. He knew where his court members were, but for him, there was nowhere else to go but back to his icy halls.
He shivered as he crossed into the main room, a sensation that made him smirk, and then continued behind the throne to the other door, the one on the left, where no one else was ever allowed to go.
The next morning, Jack was shocked—and possibly a little irritated—to leave his private room, just after the crack of dawn and planning to sprawl himself across his throne dramatically before calling for the young prince, only to discover Reardon already waiting for him.
“I expected a chronically late and ambivalent young royal, and yet… here you are,” Jack sneered, crunching one clawed hand onto the armrest of his throne.
Today Reardon was dressed in complementing green and blue, accentuating the hue of his eyes, with the contrast and bright light of the sun making his auburn hair far redder than before.
The boy was a royal, gorgeous, and seemingly smart and talented—surely he had to have glaring faults hidden away, or was otherwise secretly daft or entirely full of himself. Yet, despite the haughty smirk he wore as he bowed low in Jack’s presence, his eagerness seemed genuine.
“Majesty,” Reardon greeted as he finished his bow. “Widow Caitlin left several draughts in front of my door to keep back your chill, so after scavenging for some quick breakfast, I came straight here for our inaugural audience. Princess Josie assured me you would be ready.”
“I’m sure she did,” Jack grumbled. Gripping the side of his throne more tightly, he made a show of easy strength by swinging himself up onto it with a loud crash and burst of icy wind that made Reardon shudder.
The prince remained undaunted, however, and steadied himself with a shake of his hair. “I understand certain things have been kept from me. Barclay is loyal to you, aside from sharing what he deemed safe, but I intend to learn the rest, as I told you.”
“You will know me, and I you,” Jack recounted. “So far, I have learned that you are equal parts bold and meek, completely ignorant of my kingdom, an admittedly impressive bard… and quick to blush.”
Reardon’s cheeks went instantly scarlet.
Ignorant again? Jack wondered. Or merely bashful?
“One would think you’d be used to having attention on you, little prince.”
“N-not volatile attention.”
“You sure? Not everyone is tolerant of princes, not even your own people.”
A scowl crossed Reardon’s face, like he knew of some not so well-meaning subjects, but he kept that story to himself. “I apologize if my naivete is a concern to you, but that is why I wish to learn. The banquet… I know it was not really meant for me, but it was still wonderful.”
“Yes, parlor tricks, wine, and amorous strangers.” Jack trailed the tips of his claws down the front of his throne, watching Reardon’s body language and the way he bit his lip. “I bet you thought you were right at home, like in the cellar of some sleazy tavern.”
“I have never frequented brothels, if that’s what you’re implying!” Even Reardon’s ears went red at that. “Your wizard said the same, but I am not like that.”
“It’s easy to pretend you like magic and mixed company when it’s a novelty instead of a way of life.”
“Knowing each other means putting aside assumptions, and you are making a lot about me.”
If that scarlet color was as real as it seemed, Jack wondered how naive Reardon truly was. “So, convince me you’re interesting enough not to simply banish you from my sight.”
Something seemed to spring to Reardon’s mind immediately, but he dismissed whatever it was and emboldened himself with something else. “I told you my mother died. I was ten years old.”
“And how old are you now?”
“Twenty-one.”
Maybe a rebel then. If his father was Prince Consort and only King as placeholder, then Reardon was meant to marry within a year and take the throne.
“Her death raised many suspicions,” Reardon continued. “No one could explain it, and so magic was blamed. But I never believed that. There was no evidence; people simply chose something they didn’t understand to be the scapegoat because they saw no other answer.”
“Your point?”
“I never jump to conclusions. Not about anyone or anything. I’m a scientist. I would have apprenticed as an alchemist right along with Barclay if I’d had the option. But I also believe that magic can’t be any eviler by default than alchemy. Nothing is evil by default, only by choice.”
A philosopher too, but that wouldn’t change anything.
Lurching up from his lounged position, Jack took great enjoyment in the way Reardon scrambled back as he began to lumber toward him. “You might be everything you claim to be, little prince. But your task here is also to convince me that releasing you won’t bring doom upon my kingdom.”
“When I am king—”
“You will still be at the mercy of your people.”
“I can sway them—”
“With what? What will your arguments be?”
Reardon floundered, starting and stopping again many times, before giving up with a defeated sigh. “I don’t know, but that was why I asked to see you each day. I can only discover the answers by learning. I appreciate all the time you are willing to give me.”
Jack could move upright like a man, but it was easiest on all fours with how large and changed his form had become. Regardless, he remained tall, looming over Reardon. “You get until I notice your potion has begun to wear off. No longer.
“Why don’t we start with a walk?”
“W-walk?”
“So you can see my garden for yourself.”
Turning around, Jack headed for the door to the right of his throne. When he reached it, he looked back to see that Reardon had not yet moved.
“Well?”
Clambering forward, Reardon showed commendable speed to catch up, long limbs flailing, yet he was still somehow graceful. He shivered as they moved into the passageway, but there were no signs of ice crystals forming on his skin or clothes.
Jack had to hunch to traverse the corridors upright, knowing each path by heart as he led Reardon through halls and down several staircases, all paved in ice, toward the ground floor and a door to outside.
It was early morning and late in the year. The sacrifice arrived the first day of winter, and so today was the second, meaning that outside was just as cold as in Jack’s chamber as they stepped out into the sun.
Reardon was as impervious to this cold as to Jack’s with the potion in his veins, and he smiled as he tilted his head toward the light. “It was freezing following the caravan all those nights. How wonderful to be outdoors in winter in nothing but a doublet and be this warm.”
Naive, ignorant—but filled with wonder that made his lovely face light up like the dawn.
Jack turned away before Reardon could notice him staring. “I don’t feel the sun at all anymore.”
As Jack moved down the familiar path, Reardon detoured off the walkway into the dead grass, allowing him to get closer to Jack’s side without slipping. “That sounds awful. You never feel warmth? Ever?”
“Tell me, little prince,” Jack asked without stopping his progression down the path, “how could I, while I am made of ice?”
Reardon gave no answer but followed quietly, beginning to look around and take in the grounds.
They had exited from the side of the castle. In spring, only Jack’s path would be dead and frozen, the rest surprisingly lush with greenery that various people of the kingdom kept tidy. Over the years, more and more planting had begun. Now, even in winter, there were a few smatterings of color.
Reardon gazed fondly at the bright yellow winter jasmine that dangled like ivy along the wall. Jack was leading them along a purposeful path to look out beyond the castle, opposite the Emerald Kingdom, a view Reardon had likely never seen. There was a second gate there, not easily reached.
Jack’s castle stood atop a hill like the song said, and out that gate was the path toward what once was the rest of his kingdom. He paused as they reached it and let Reardon wander to the chilled bars that separated them from what lay outside.
“I always wondered…,” Reardon said, taking it all in—the sprawling city below that was desolate now, with collapsed houses and not even the scurry of animals, like a wasteland. “Only your castle was ever spoken of, but as grand as it is, it’s still only a court. What became of your people? Your original people?”
Jack stayed on the path, for if he drew closer to Reardon, he’d inevitably lean out toward his empty legacy, and he did not wish to endanger the young prince.
Yet.
“Some left before I was cursed. The rest after. Beyond the city, farther down the hill, you can see the start of the Mystic Valley. Some went there. Some to Emerald. Some beyond to lands unknown. No one stayed behind but my inner circle. We had many years alone before the story of the first sacrifice you heard last night.”
“He wasn’t really a sacrifice.”
“No, but he was the beginning.”
“And what of before then?” Reardon insisted.
Jack held his head high, the shape of it formed together with his crown feeling forever heavy, but he did not answer.
“You’re not going to tell me what the curse is, are you? Not without effort.”
“You can see what it is, little prince.” Jack gestured at himself with one of his massive hands and at the trail of ice behind them. “But come now, we barely know each other to be spilling such intimate secrets.” With a grin, he moved on, expecting Reardon to follow, which he did, and brought them around the side of the castle toward the front courtyard.
“You said some of your people escaped to the Mystic Valley,” Reardon said, falling in beside Jack again, “but the elves have been gone from there for centuries. It’s as abandoned as your city and farms.”
“Is it?” Jack tilted his head, and when Reardon’s brow furrowed, he laughed coldly but didn’t elaborate.
Pushing forward, they reached the true garden of the center courtyard that had been well-kept by the people of the castle, though the fountain held no water this time of year. Reardon looked at it with as much awe as he had the flowers, but Jack steered away from it to bring them closer to the gate, where the other garden existed as upright sentinels to ward off any who entered uninvited.
Reardon’s posture changed immediately, seeing the multitude of frozen figures like the thief Jack had shattered in front of him.
“More unlucky cutthroats who didn’t realize where they were. And some who did, sent here like the others, but they chose to not belong.”
“Barclay said the same, that some of the criminals sent here deserved it.” While Reardon held himself more stiffly among so much glaring death, he walked unafraid through the statues, almost touching one before he pulled back.
“Does that assuage your guilt?” Jack asked.
“No.”
Jack waited for Reardon to return to his side before continuing. He had to make him understand. “You’ve heard the story of our first offering, now hear the truth of our first death.”
Watching the way Reardon’s face paled further, Jack moved on down the path to the other side of the castle. His garden was not merely the guards past his gate but also figures lining the walkway along the right side, since it better faced the Emerald Kingdom.
“She was a sacrifice, you see, after nearly a decade of people wronged, only hoping to find sanctuary. She tried to swindle me. Me. Swore allegiance, acted the part, and then, once she had gained our trust, she attempted to make off with trinkets she thought would fetch a nice price in other lands and fled.
“On her way out of the castle, she stabbed a young elf gifted with beautiful magic who tried to stop her. He didn’t survive. The thief didn’t get far, however.
“How did you put it? But down the Ice King came to feed,” he sang softly, haunting and low. “I swooped upon her like a storm. I knew what my touch would do, though I hadn’t seen the effects on a human yet. In that moment, I wanted to freeze every highwayman that had ever lived, every liar, everyone who thought they could claim their place and then simply be gone when it no longer suited them.
“If she wanted out, then she was out. I caught her before she reached the gates and laid my hands on her without mercy. She froze on the spot… right here where I left her.”
Jack saw Reardon stumble, the young man not expecting to be brought before the subject of the story, yet there she was, untouched by time. Jack rarely shattered statues, preferring to keep them as reminders.
Her expression was preserved in mute shock, the trinkets she carried frozen with her in a bag at her side.
“Was I wrong?” Jack asked as he stopped in front of her.
“I… don’t know,” Reardon said. “I can’t say I ever agree with someone being killed. But you certainly seem to be the hero of your story.”
“I’m no hero,” Jack snapped, lunging toward Reardon more closely than intended and causing him to stagger back. “That is not the lesson here. I earned my curse, but the people your kingdom sends to me did not. Even ones like her….” He glanced at her frozen body, remembering the sweet smile she’d afforded everyone in the castle, like she was a doppelganger of her own self once the truth was revealed. “I can’t say if she deserved her fate, but as I said—”
“You won’t hesitate to kill an enemy,” Reardon finished. “But like I told you, Majesty, I am not one. I believe all of this. You don’t need to frighten me. We can end this. Together. The sacrifices. Maybe even the curse. Just tell me. Tell me what caused it.”
What caused it… was that Jack had proven to be the real monster of his kingdom, far worse than the jagged edges his body now displayed. He hadn’t killed or robbed or bedded anyone unwilling. He’d done worse.
Apathy was so much worse….
“Please.” Reardon inched closer. “Do you think I can’t sympathize?”
Jack fell to crunch down into the frost at his feet on all fours and leaned close to Reardon’s face. “I think you will realize that this curse cannot be broken and all you hope to accomplish will fail. When you can no longer deny that is true, you will see no other answer but my death. And I will not allow that to happen.”
“Majesty….” Reardon shuddered.
A small part of Jack would have preferred to end this now, before he had to again be disappointed, but the sweet face before him… he didn’t want to see it frozen. “We’re done for today,” Jack said and turned to move back toward the castle.
REARDON HADthe entire day ahead of him—but for at least a quarter hour he didn’t move from the garden.
He walked back through the statues of ice, staring at each expression, at each look of terror or surprise, and understood why the Ice King didn’t believe him or his ambitions, but he couldn’t give up after only one day.
He hadn’t seen Barclay yet that morning. Maybe he could find him—
“Thinking of fleeing already, dear prince?”
The familiar voice spun Reardon around.
Shayla.
Even in the bright light of morning, she wore dark colors, making her stand out starkly against the frost on the ground, with her equally dark skin and black hair. Adornments hung from her ears, and her lips were painted burgundy. She looked like the type of thief the Ice King had talked about, especially with a large knapsack thrown over her shoulder, yet she had proven herself welcoming and clearly had her place here.
“Dear prince, sweet prince, little prince. Can someone just call me Reardon?”
Shayla laughed, reaching him and giving his shoulder a firm smack like last night. “Reardon it is. Still have some time left on your cold potion, Reardon?”
“I think so.” Reardon didn’t feel much chill, and Caitlin had said the potion should last for hours.
“Then come on.” Shayla motioned him toward the gate, which Reardon had assumed didn’t open much outside the acceptance of annual offerings, but apparently he was wrong. “You said you wanted to earn your place. It’s my day to go foraging, and around here, no one leaves the castle alone. You’re coming with me.”