Page 141 of Autumn Queens & Shadows

“We do what the land does. And the land bowed to you as we all saw it. We will, too. And more will soon follow once the word reaches the rest of the clans.”

“This seems—”

“Simple?”

“Strange.”

He grunted. “You’re the first of your kind, so I’d think it would be.”

“First of my kind?”

“Winter has bowed to you. Winter bows before no one.”

“What if you are wrong in your assumptions?”

“We are not,” he confidently said. “But even if we were to be, it would not matter. It is clear even to the blindest mind that what you are is beyond what any of us can comprehend. Iskyla twisted much of our perception, but that day we say you was when her lies became undone. We didn’t know you, what you are, how you rule or what you rule. We knew of you from what was told to us. Though we are firm in our ways, we’ve always found it in our cold hearts to at least consider change might be good for us.”

A familiar face caught my eye by the old wall ruins. Karl leaned against a massive rock, listening in. Unlike very few were aware, Karl had also once been under a barbarian queen’s rule. Skadi’s. When he gave me a nod of approval, I managed to let out a strange sigh of relief.

“Then remain. But I wouldn’t think of betraying my kindness.” I said, feeling the one presence I trusted more than my own join in. “I do not believe in killing the bait, but I know someone who does.”

They all shifted and bowed their heads to Malik who materialised from nothing.

I heard a prayer murmured and then another few as he made it to my side. Guess they had all either seen or heard of their dead kind walking back to their homes. And they had been right to assume it was Malik who had given the order.

The Tenebrose Academy students flocked around me, watching as the Isliners began settling in the temporary tents at the edge of Tenebrose city, by the remains of the old wall. They’d escaped their lessons with the excuse of learning more about Isean history from the barbarians themselves. Somehow, their poor elderly professor had bought it and they had dragged the sweet gentleman down here with them.

A woman who looked no older than I was came out of one of the tents, holding a young child in her arms with the same white colour of locks as his mother. She stopped when she saw me and then she gestured in holy greeting as she made in my direction.

I laughed a little when a few of the students came to stand in front of me, between the woman and me. “It is fine. The child doesn’t grow tentacles and three heads to swallow me whole. Yet, I think,” I whispered at them, and they all gave me some unamused glances.

Reluctantly, they backed away, but stayed close.

Reaching in her fury jacket between the child she’d tied to her front, she brought out a piece of round wood with a burnt engraving on top. The head of a wolf. “Each clan carries one,” she shyly began, “We call them makaôl.”

“A talisman,” I said, taking it from her and studying the marking.

Nodding, she pulled one from her pocket, but instead of the wolf, hers had a deer engraved on it. “The three horned deer clan.”

“And this?” I asked, lifting the talisman to her. “Who does it belong to?”

“You. The direwolf.” She pointed her head to the students behind me. “Your clan is growing.”

“My clan is my kingdom.”

“Your clan is who you’d trust as family. Who you’d trust with your life. The rest are simply admirers, people who follow your rules, your guidance.”

“I trust every single Isjordian with my life.”

Her brows rose. “You would?”

“I do. In whoever hands it falls, it will be theirs to decide to do what they want with it. I swore to it when I wore this crown. These aren’t just people who follow me. These are my people. Whether they like, dislike, hate or love me, loathe or admire me, every single life from the foot of the Islines to the fields of Arynth, they all are my people. My oath was sacred, it doesn’t discriminate because of the free will we all have.”

“What if they want you gone?”

“If they believe I’ve done something to deserve it, then I will do so.”

“That simple?”