Page 4 of The Midnight Blizzard

Any misgivings I may have had about being alone with a strange man vanished on the spot. Jack handed me into the sled and slid down next to me. A peppermint scent lingered about his person, and I found myself drawn to it. Despite it being pitch black and well past midnight with no sign of dawn on the horizon yet, the exhaustion I knew should have come was still held at bay by the excitement of my new discovery.

“Mush!” Jack shouted, and we were off.

“Tell me,” I asked eagerly. “How did you manage to get a position as the prince’s advisor at such a young age? Father made it sound as though you’ve been the one proposing the majority of changes on laws about mages to the other nine lords.”

“A gross exaggeration,” Jack answered in embarrassment. “My mother was the queen’s handmaiden and I’m only a little older than the prince, so he and I became friends. The king and queen had already been working on amending laws, and it looked good to have a mage asa member of staff. Cedric was really the mastermind behind all those laws.”

“But they ask your opinion with each proposed bill. Father told me.”

“Well, Iama mage, so I can give an insider’s perspective.”

I stared at him in awe. Meeting him was so surreal; it was as though one of the characters from my bedtime stories had come to life. Father had talked about Jack so much, but it had always been from a professional point of view. I had passed those tales onto my students, who had all begged for me to tell them again and again, delighted at the idea of a mage who wasn’t rejected by society and instead rose to a position of prominence.

“Cedric talked a great deal about you,” Jack told me. “He was very proud of all your accomplishments.”

“Which all pale in comparison to yours,” I protested. “Royal advisor, mage with ice magic, clearly an accomplished dog team handler…”

“Says the woman who founded a school on her own, won multiple ice skating awards at ten years old, and trained dogs for agility competitions when she was twelve. You’re the amazing one. I just have white hair, was born in a convenient location, and made friends with the right people.”

I blushed, slightly embarrassed but also secretly pleased by his praise. A fluttering in my chest warmed me; Jack remembered what my father had told him about me. “I didn’t found the school on my own. Father helped. It seems that we can both agree that we both think the other is far superior to ourselves?”

Jack flashed a grin that showed off teeth just as white as his hair. “I can agree to that. Haw!”

The team veered to the left, pulling the sled’s runners smoothly through the snow. The jingle bells fastened to the sides chimed merrily. Basking in the relief that Kodiak would recover soon, I continued to joke with Jack as we sped toward the castle, traveling much faster than I ever would have on foot, and we pulled into the castle’s dog yard just as the sky began shifting from inky black to velvety blue, hinting at dawn. I stole a look at the heavens. It must have taken much longer to patch Kodiak up than I thought.

“Easy, easy,” Jack called to the dogs, slowing them until he finally let out a long, “Whoa.” The sled skidded to a halt as Jack set the brake.

“Give me a few minutes,” Jack said, patting each dog in line, who all had tongues lolling out and panted hard. “Good girl, Shooki. Nice hustle, Nanook.”

“What are all their names?” I asked, unable to resist patting their heads as well.

“The lead is Ace, then the swing dogs are Yeti and Shooki. The others are Belinda, Nanook, Cinder, Sierra, and Rocky.”

I bent down to help strip off the booties that protected the dogs’ paws from becoming too packed with snow.

“You said you needed to come to the castle, but only said that it wasn’t for the prince’s bride competition. What is it for?”

“Oh, right.” In the excitement of meeting Jack, I had all but forgotten my purpose in setting out in such a foolhardy manner. “Before my father passed away, he said that he was going to pass his estate to me so I would be the next lord and also be able to use the funds to continue keeping the school open. But his will and all his documentsvanished the same day he died, and I have reason to suspect my stepmother had a hand in it.”

“Do you have any proof? And are you suggesting your stepmother took the will, or that she had a hand in his passing?”

“No, I don’t think she’s responsible for his passing,” I admitted grudgingly. “She wouldn’t have done that, even if she doesn’t like me, but I also didn’t think she would leave me abandoned on a forest road yesterday. Father had been ill for a year before he met Valencia, and he seemed to be getting better. His death was sudden, but the doctors all said it was his illness from before. I don’t have any proof that Valencia took the will, either. But why would the documents vanish otherwise? There is no one else who would lay claim to the estate, and she was the one who revoked the funding and had the school closed.”

“It does seem suspicious,” he agreed. “What did your stepmother say about it?”

“She denied everything. When I questioned her, she broke down crying and asked why I was badgering a newly widowed woman who was still in mourning.”

Jacktskedquietly. “I can see how that would be effective in deterring prying questions. Did they have a reason for leaving you last night?”

“You have to be nobility to compete, correct? My guess is that if the estate passes to me, my stepmother and stepsisters won’t have titles anymore and can’t compete. I’m assuming they wanted to ensure that they would be entered.”

“But you said you don’t care about participating in the balls?”

“No. I heard that the archives keep records of wills and other legal documents and I planned to search them. It’swhy I was so eager to come with my stepfamily when they said they would be attending.”

“Sometimesthey keep records,” Jack clarified with an apologetic shrug. We had finished unharnessing the dogs and unfastening all of their paw coverings. While I stored the booties in the compartment Jack showed me, he wrapped the gang line and tug lines into neat coils and hung them on the wall. “But only when things are submitted with the proper credentials. It’s a legal nightmare to get anything processed in a timely manner, if I’m being completely honest.”

“Yes, I know. Father and I had to go through a mountain of paperwork just to get our school’s license approved. It rather felt like he and I had to leap through flaming hoops to get the license originally, and now if I can’t get it renewed in the next six days, it will expire and the school will be closed permanently, or at least until I start all the paperwork over again. And if that’s the case, I have to have a lord’s approval for it. If I’m named the next lord in his will, I can approve it myself, but that means I need to find the records.” I massaged my temples. “It gives me a headache even thinking about it.”

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