Page 21 of The Frost Queen's Blade

“Perhaps it is imprudent,” said Lord Stallard, “but I do hope Her Majesty knows how much we look forward to her coronation.”

“Thank you,” said Elma.

The song ended, and Elma felt as if she had curled in onherself or grown a shell. She nodded thoughtlessly as Lord Stallard bowed, and he disappeared into the crowd. Elma began to return to the dais, to sit once again on her father’s throne, and then… she stopped. The musicians were starting up another song, a dance that Elma had heard so many times she knew it by heart. It was a dreadful song, repetitive and far too joyous.

“Your Majesty,” someone called to her from the crowd.

Elma was halfway across the ballroom before she realized she had changed direction. She strode toward the exit with a determination that cleared a path through the dancers and revelers, until at last, she was in the corridor. The air there was chill where the ballroom’s had been stuffy and smoky. Too many fires and no open windows. Elma breathed deeply, the tension in her shoulders lessening as her head cleared.

Without waiting to see if Luca followed her, Elma made her way through corridors and down curving staircases of stone. She ran her fingers along the cool walls. She listened to her own breath in the quiet, watched fog form at her lips when she exhaled.

Glancing over her shoulder once, she saw Luca and her guards, following respectfully behind. She was glad that they left her alone, that they were nothing more than an armored shadow.

But even alone in these halls, as alone as a queen could be, Elma felt as if the citadel were closing in on her with every breath, with every step she took. How many years would she live in this frostbitten place? How many lords would she dance with, how manythank yous andYour Majestys would she endure before, at long last, her mind faded and her body went with it, until she joined her father in the after?

Somehow, she knew, it would be a long reign. The prisonof her life would stretch out before her, unending, as if the citadel itself were a coffin.

Elma didn’t know how she ended up at the dungeon. She had made no conscious decision, yet here she was. The dungeon guards eyed her curiously but said nothing. Luca and his men hovered in the corridor behind her. She stepped forward, curled her fingers over one of the bars in the dungeon door. Peering down into the depths below, she couldn’t see the assassin. She couldn’t see anything.

“I would like to go down,” she said, stepping back to let one of the guards unlock the door for her. The same guard held a torch aloft as they made their way down the narrow stone steps.

Luca trailed behind, while the rest of his men waited in the corridor above.

“You wish to see the prisoner, Your Majesty?” asked the guard, squinting at Elma.

She nodded.

The guard carried onward. When they weren’t far from the cell, Elma stopped and held up her hand. “Wait for me here.”

“Pardon, Your Majesty,” said Luca, “but there’s no bloody way I’m letting you near that man without a guard.”

She spun on him, the rage of a life of inertia building in her like a storm cloud. “You willwait for me here.”

Luca had the sense to look abashed. “Yes, Your Majesty.” He gestured at the other guard, who shrugged.

The cell was not far, only several paces from where Luca and the prison guard waited. But it felt like an eternity before she was there, looking in at him through the bars. He was exactly as she remembered. A monster, a specter of the north, the man who should have killed her.

He sat just as he had the last time she’d seen him. Kneesbent; arms outstretched. This time, he was waiting for her. He must have heard her approach in the quiet. The torchlight carved dark shadows on his face. A bruise bloomed on his bottom lip.

They’d beaten him. There were probably bruises all over his body, in places Elma couldn’t see. She regretted that she hadn’t been invited to take part. She would have loved to watch him grimace in pain, to carve a little piece out of that tanned flesh.

A slow grin crawled across his features. “Came to admire, Your Majesty? Didn’t get your fill the last time, I see.”

She said nothing.

He watched her with keen bright eyes. “Or perhaps to gloat, then? I know what you plan to do with me. I suppose you’d like to make sure I’m whole before I die. Wouldn’t want to watch an injured Slödavan limping about in the arena, would we? Horrible entertainment. It would curse your rule from the very start.”

Elma was silent. But as he spoke, she leaned forward slightly, until her hands were braced on the cold bars of his cell.

Slowly, almost as if he meant not to alarm her, Rune stood. The chains attached to his legs clanked softly as he did. “Going to gape at me all night?” he asked, taking a hesitant step forward.

No, Elma thought, but no words came. She swallowed; her mouth so dry she might not have been able to speak even if she tried.

He laughed, cocky and brash. “No, you didn’t come to gloat or gape.” His eyes narrowed. “You came to entertain yourself.”

Elma’s breath caught.

“You came to feel fear. Isn’t that what you like? To beafraid? Or maybe it’s…” he tilted his head, the jagged scar over his eye catching the torchlight. “Yes, you came to be angry. I see it in your eyes. If only I’d come a day sooner… I’d have slit your father’s corrupt throat with my blade, and you could have watched me do it. I would have slit yours too if you asked me.”

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