The Queen of Frost and Darkness Read online

  “But miss — “

  “My mind is quite made up, Oksana.” Galina spoke firmly, and pressed Oksana’s hands. “Take the carriage back to the house, and try not to be seen. The longer my parents don’t know I am gone, the better. And don’t you dare let them blame you, whatever they might say. You must tell them that I ordered you back home.”

  Apparently Oksana didn’t quite know what to do with such a suddenly masterful and commanding mistress, for she hesitated, and wrung her hands, then said, “If you think that is how it must be — “

  “I do. Now go, for the driver is becoming impatient.”

  So he was; he shifted from foot to foot and scowled at the two of them, and cast a jaundiced eye at the lowering skies overhead. Galina fished a coin from her reticule and pressed it into the driver’s hands. He pocketed it at once and climbed up onto his seat without giving either her or Oksana a second look. It seemed quite clear that he was ready to drive off without either one of them if they tarried much longer.

  Galya opened the door to the carriage. Oksana paused, then gave her charge one final glance before heaving a resigned sigh as she climbed into the passenger compartment. “How I will ever explain this — “

  “Don’t bother,” Galina replied. “I’ll explain it all myself, when I come home.”

  And with that she shut the door and turned away from the carriage, facing into the bitter wind. True, she wore her new mink-lined cape and its matching hat and muff, and even her hands inside the muff were covered in warm fur-lined gloves, but even all that did not seem much of an armor against that biting blast from the east. However, she had decided her course, and she would follow it, no matter what happened.

  At least since it had not snowed recently, the road was easy enough to navigate. From time to time a carriage or wagon would rattle by, more often than not with its occupants giving her increasingly puzzled stares, but Galina kept on, following the route as it wound away to the south and east.

  She tried to tell herself that it was not so very cold, not really, but after awhile she only put one foot in front of the other because she knew that was what she had to do, not because she could really feel those feet anymore. The light began to fade, and then the first snowflakes gently started to fall — one by one at first, and then in flurries, and finally in billows of white. By that time Galina had given up any pretense of following the road, or even of knowing in what direction she was headed. She only blundered forward, hands clenched inside her muff, her entire being focused on Karel. The thought of him would be enough to keep her alive.

  So intense was the storm, and so complete the darkness, that she was shocked to hear a female voice cry out suddenly, “Hold!”

  Galina stopped, and saw the flare of a torch bobbing through the white-shot darkness. Her heart began to pound. Had the icy princess discovered her quest?

  The stranger had sounded far rougher than the sweetly chill voice of Tatiana Vasilievna, however, and the personage who revealed herself now was obviously no princess. Rough furs muffled her form so that one could barely discern her sex, and the tip of the nose that protruded between the fur hat she wore pulled low on her brow and the muffler that covered most of her chin had a distinct spot of soot on it.

  “Who goes there?” demanded this apparition. She held her torch up high and gazed into Galina’s face. The strange woman — or girl, as something in her shape seemed to suggest that she was not much older than Galya, if that — cocked her head to one side and said, “Are you mad?”

  “No,” Galina answered, although she wondered even as she made the denial if perhaps she had gone mad, to push on into the heart of the storm after a man who perhaps did not love her as she thought he did.

  “Hmm,” said the rough young woman. “I think you must be mad to be out in this.”

  “You are out in it as well, aren’t you?”

  The stranger appeared to consider. “True…but I was on my way home, and I know that you live nowhere around here.”

  “No, I don’t,” Galina admitted. “I’m seeking the palace of the Princess Tatiana Vasilievna Zakharin.”

  “The Queen of Frost and Darkness?”

  Somehow Galina knew that this Queen and the Princess must be the same person. For how else could one describe a woman of such outward icy beauty, yet with such a black heart beating within her perfect breast?

  She nodded, and the young woman said, “And I believe I know why. Only this morning a fine young man went riding to the Princess’ estate and never came back. Someone you know, I presume?”

  Galina nodded, but found herself quite unable to reply, for her teeth had begun to chatter so violently that she could not get a word out. The stranger cocked her head and said, “I know the way. But we cannot stay out in this — let me take you to my home, and we shall see if the morning gives us better weather.”

  To this suggestion Galya could only nod, and she bent her head in thanks. The young woman took her by the arm and led her off away into the swirling snow. How she could possibly find her way in this, Galina did not know, but after what felt like an eternity but was most likely less than a quarter-hour, they blundered out of the storm and into a cave opening half hidden by a stand of dark pines.

  Inside were a score or more of men, ruffians and robbers by the look of them, and Galya shrank back against her guide, quite certain she had been led astray on purpose. But the young woman called out, “I am here with a friend. You would do well to look elsewhere!”

  And the men turned away, and Galina found herself led to a smaller chamber outfitted with quite a warm bed piled high with furs, and a brazier that served to take some of the chill from the air.

  “You — you are very kind,” she stammered, and the strange young woman only smiled and replied,

  “As to that, I expect payment for my assistance. That muff you carry is quite fine; I think that should do nicely.”

  Something in Galya quailed at the thought of giving up the muff, which had protected her hands so well, but perhaps the storm would have blown itself out by morning, and she would no longer need it quite so badly. Besides, what was a muff, compared to shelter and the prospect of finding Karel on the morrow?

  “Of course,” she said, “but I will give it to you only after you have brought me to Tatiana Vasilievna’s palace.”

  “Well enough,” replied the young woman with a grin. “It’s good that you have some spirit. You will need it.”

  And with that she settled herself into her bed, and gestured for Galina to join her. They slept, safe and warm in the heart of the robbers’ stronghold.

  ***

  The next morning they set out for the Princess’ palace, which Sasha the robber girl claimed lay only a few miles off. The storm had moved on, and the countryside was blanketed in white, dazzling under a pale morning sun. Galya squinted against the glare as best she could and trudged along after her unlikely companion. An hour or so later they reached a border of dark hedges half-buried under the snow, which Sasha said marked the border of Tatiana Vasilievna’s property.

  “And here is the gate,” the robber girl said, and produced a rather fine set of lock picks from her belt. Within a moment she had dispatched the heavy padlock which held the gate shut.

  “You are very clever,” Galina said quite honestly. It seemed quite a fine skill to have, and she smiled as she pulled the muff from her hands and gave it to Sasha. “You have earned this, and more.”

  “That I have. But I shan’t leave you here — let me take you to the back door.”

  How Sasha had gained this knowledge, Galina didn’t know and felt sure she couldn’t ask. But she followed the other girl around the outskirts of the house, which took some time, as it truly was a palace, and not just a fine country house such as the dacha Galina’s family stayed in every summer. There seemed to be no one about, not even a footman or a scullery maid. As they approached the rear door, which was covered by a small portico, an odd little flurry of snow rose up from the gro
und and surrounded the two girls. For a few seconds Galya felt as if she might be blinded by the driving flakes, but she murmured the words of the Lord’s Prayer under her breath, and asked the Holy Father to protect her and Sasha. As quickly as it had risen up, the snow fell to the ground.

  Sasha stared at her with wide, dark eyes. “I thought you were mad,” she said, “but perhaps you are only touched by God.”

  Was it God’s hand that had guided her so far, that had brought her here so far unharmed? Galina thought that more likely than simple blind luck, but she merely lifted her shoulders. “I cannot say. I only know that I must bring Karel back to me. If God has guided me so far, then let us pray that He will continue to do so.”

  Her companion made a clumsy sign of the cross on her breast, and then she pushed the door inward. “You first. I fear I do not have the same protection that you do.”

  Galina did not bother to argue. After all, this was her quest; Sasha was only an unexpected — if very welcome — attendant. She stepped inside, the robber girl at her heels, and made her way into the Queen’s stronghold.

  It was a very elegant palace, all marble and gilt, but so cold within that Galya’s breath hung as clearly in the air as it had outside. She did not begrudge Sasha the muff she now carried, for the other girl had earned it and more. Still, it was so very, very cold.

  There was no movement, no sign of life. The two girls peered into room after room, from salons and drawing rooms to dining rooms and libraries, and yet they did not see Karel, nor Tatiana Vasilievna, nor any retainers or servants.

  Perhaps this wasn’t the Princess’ palace at all, but rather the home of some unknown Count or Prince, retired for the winter months to the sunnier climes of Italy or Greece. Galina would not rebuke Sasha, not when the girl had been such help, but she worried that somehow she had guided them to the wrong house.

  But then they passed through a great hall, where an icily perfect portrait of Princess Tatiana Vasilievna stared down at them from the damask-hung wall, and beyond that hall two enormous double doors yawned into a space that let forth an exhalation so icy that Galya was sure it had come straight from the North Pole itself. She shivered, even as Sasha sent her a questioning, frightened glance.

  Somehow Galina knew she must go forward alone. She held up a hand, indicating that Sasha should wait in the hall, beneath the Princess’ pale, freezing stare.

  “No worries,” Sasha said at once, and sat herself down on the marble floor, hands still tucked improbably into the muff.

  It is for Karel, Galya told herself. She held the image of her friend in her mind, a stray memory from a summer sunlit day, when his eyes as he smiled down at her had put the blue of the sky to shame. He had brought her wildflowers that day, in bunches so large she could barely wrap her fingers around them. And it was the memory of that warmth which held her up as she strode forward into the freezing chamber.

  The floor was ice, stretching before her as smooth as the rink below the walls of Novodevichy Convent. At its very center sat a chair so grand it could only be called a throne, carved all of wood dark as ebony, with an ice-blue cushion. And below the chair, crouched on the ice, Galina saw the dark, huddled form of a man.

  She knew at once that man was Karel, and so she ran out onto the ice, even though her boots slipped and caught and threatened to throw her to her feet with almost every step. But she would not give up now, not when she was so close.

  At the very end she did stumble and fall, but she only slid along the icy floor until she was only a few inches away from Karel. Even then he did not look up, but kept sifting pieces of what looked like thin shards of ice, setting them together very much as one would the pieces of a puzzle.

  “Why, Karel,” Galina said. Somehow his odd concentration on such an inconsequential task frightened her more than the blizzard the night before, more than the robbers who had crowded the cave where Sasha lived. “Whatever are you doing?”

  Finally he lifted his head and stared at her, although she saw no flicker of recognition in his eyes. “She said I should do this, that if I could spell the proper word I might be hers for all eternity. But I cannot find all the pieces, as you can see.”

  Galya’s heart was wrung then, for she saw at once that he truly was bewitched. “Who said that? Princess Tatiana Vasilievna?”

  He nodded slowly, still watching her with those uncomprehending eyes.

  “Dear Karel,” Galina said. She hesitated, trying to decide what on earth she could say to break the spell, to have him truly see her once again. At least he was looking at her, instead of those incomprehensible pieces of ice scattered around him.

  Then it seemed so very clear. She must do the one thing that would remind him of warmth, of light and sunshine,

  Of love.

  She leaned forward, and carefully removed the gloves from her hands. Still he watched her, even as she raised her hands, now bare to the cold, and placed them on either cheek.

  His skin felt scarcely warmer than the frigid air of the chamber around them, but it was enough. It had to be.

  She drew closer, then laid her mouth against his.

  At first he did not move, but only sat there, immobile, as if he had finally succumbed to the freezing air. Slowly then, so slowly that at first Galina was not sure she hadn’t imagined it, his lips pressed against hers. And he lifted a hand, and another, and then it was him touching her face, his mouth exploring hers as a heat she could never have imagined flooded through her body.

  “Galina,” he choked. His eyes shone bright with tears, and she watched as one slid down his cheek, glinting in the pale light that slanted through the chamber’s tall windows. On that cheek flashed something diamond-bright, something she knew was not a tear.

  She reached out and caught that glittering speck, felt it sharp upon her fingertip. A drop of blood welled up there, shocking red in the white glare of the ice-filled room. So that is how you caught him, she thought, and deliberately bent down and wiped her finger against the icy floor, leaving a thin trail of red against the white.

  “Will you come with me?” she asked.

  Karel blinked. “Of course,” he said, and got to his feet. He extended a hand to her. “How did I come to be here?”

  If he truly did not remember, then Galina saw no reason to task him for his defection. It had not been his fault, after all, but the black spells of the woman Sasha had called the Queen of Frost and Darkness. “A mote in your eye,” she said lightly. “But it is gone now. Are you ready to go home?”

  “Yes,” Karel said at once. Then he paused, and looked down at her with eyes that once again recalled summer and a warmth she had almost forgotten. “That is, if I can share that home with you. Would you, Galya?”

  It was not the proposal she had imagined, back in her rooms as she prepared for her coming-out ball. She had thought he would go down on one knee and say something exceedingly flowery. But that didn’t mattered. Nothing mattered, save the look in his eyes.

  “Yes, Karel Ivanovich,” she replied. “Yes, I would.”

  Table of Contents

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  Queen_of_Frost_and_Darkness

  Table of Contents

  Queen_of_Frost_and_Darkness_cover

  Queen_of_Frost_and_Darkness_fm

  Queen_of_Frost_and_Darkness