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Still, I brushed off his warning. We had seasons in the Kingdom of the Summer. And it wasn’t like I’d moved into the sunless Lands Below. How cold could it get in this pretty little valley?
Well, apparently it could get pretty damn cold in the Iron Mountains. It’s not even winter yet, and already my water bucket is rimmed with frost in the mornings. I huff out another puff of steam, slide my feet into my freezing slippers, and pad over to the woodstove that gave up in the middle of the night. My hands are shaking by the time I’m finished stacking the firewood, and the match trembles as I strike it. I shove the little flame into the kindling and curse my lack of magic with as many insults as I can imagine. Then I close the door on the woodstove, set a kettle on top, climb back into my nest of quilts, and pull my knees up to my chest.
I dreamt of Phaedron. That means I’ve had dreams about him, what, every single night since he walked into that portal to the Lands Below without so much as looking back? I groan and sink my head onto my knees. Apparently, my sleeping mind is an asshole with no imagination who just wants to see me suffer.
The sun rises slowly, melting the frost from the inside of the canvas walls and painting them in a thousand shades of gold. All around me, birds begin to sing, as if the sun depends on their twittering exuberance to shake off her slumber. My kettle joins in, its rattling scream hissing steam into the cacophonous air, and I pour a cup of tea and step out onto my porch.
Across the valley, the sun catches on the few golden leaves still trembling in the pale branches of the aspen groves, then drops to light the first tentative suggestions of dusty streets and half-finished buildings in the World’s Beginning. The tent platforms that had once housed a human army encampment have been transformed into cottages or stores, and the largest one is rapidly growing into the Dragon’s Rest, which the owner claims will one day be an elegant inn catering to the adventure-seekers who’ve come to see the Lands Below for themselves.
Mine is the only canvas tent still standing. The hastily-assembled Council of the World’s Beginning agreed to let me keep the tent perched on the hillside for as long as I wanted, in recognition of my services or whatever, but a hopeless sort of certainty snakes through my chest as my cold fingers wrap around the rapidly dissipating heat of my mug. I’m not going to be able to stay here much longer.
My gaze drifts through the construction of the World’s Beginning and settles on the dark portal to the Lands Below. It’s still stable. It feels like it’s going to stand there forever, honestly. Rowan told me he linked the portal to the energy of the void, in some complicated magical construction I couldn’t emulate even if I had a thousand years.
The portal doesn’t need me. None of the things happening in the burgeoning city below need me. I blow on my tea, sending wisps of steam skittering into the chill morning air as my mind whispers the question it’s been asking for months.
What am I doing here?
I shake my head, finish my tea, and duck back inside the tent flap. This morning, I happen to have an answer to that annoying little question. I’m waiting for my sister. She didn’t join the first official envoy to King Grathgore’s palace in the Kingdom of the Summer, for reasons including the fact that she was originally sent to the Lands Below by King Grathgore as an assassin, but she and her fiance Aloserin are going to meet the Kingdom of the Summer’s returning envoy as they pass through the World’s Beginning on their way to a diplomatic and hopefully bloodshed-free visit at King Galan’s palace in the Crystal City.
Prince Orryen and Princess Elanerill led the envoy that traveled to the Kingdom of the Summer, and apparently, their trip had gone moderately well. No one died, at least, which is always a good start to diplomatic relations. So the Kingdom of the Summer was invited to send their own diplomatic delegation into the Lands Below before winter falls over the Iron Mountains and complicates travel.
And the delegation is supposed to arrive sometime today, or possibly tomorrow, if the roads are bad. I drop my tea mug into the dishes bucket and pour the rest of the kettle’s lukewarm water over a bowl of oats. Being able to prepare my own food was almost intoxicatingly liberating at first, or at least until I discovered I’m not very good at it. Much like doing my own dishes.
I settle into my rickety wooden chair and pull up Ithronel’s latest letter. It’s full of gossip about people I probably couldn’t pick out of a crowd, as well as a few rumors about who might be accompanying the Kingdom of the Summer’s official delegation. It looks like Prince Folwynn might make the cut, and possibly Lady Arryn Damoira’s brother. I don’t see any magicians on the list. I’m guessing King Grathgore wouldn’t want to risk another escapee.
“Hello?” a voice calls outside the tent flap. “Alindra? You awake?”
I swallow my mouthful of oats and put down my spoon.
“Well, I am now,” I call.
The tent flap flies open, and my sister Ithronel steps in.
“It’s cold as hell in here,” she declares. “I swear, it’s warmer in the Crystal City!”
“Nice to see you too,” I reply.
My sister pulls out my second chair and settles on the other side of my writing desk/dining room table/kitchen counter. I open my mouth to ask her about Phaedron, then slam it shut. Just because her fiance Aloserin serves in the Kingdom of the Fall’s Royal Guard with Phaedron doesn’t mean she’s keeping tabs on him. And it doesn’t give me permission to pry.
“Phaedron’s fine,” Ithronel says, with a wicked smile. “He’s sulky and depressed, as per usual, but he’s fine.” She pauses just long enough for my heart to catch inside my chest. “And, no, he’s not seeing anyone,” she finishes.
“I didn’t even ask,” I huff.
“You didn’t even have to,” she replies. “It was all over your face.”
I scowl at her, trying to send a different message with my face. She leans forward over the desk and weaves her fingers into a steeple.
“Speaking of seeing someone,” she says. “How did it go with Connak?”
I blink, trying to remember where I’ve heard the name Connak before.
“Connak… from the Crystal City?” I ask.
“Yes,” Ithronel replies, stretching the word out until it ends with a suggestive hiss. “Didn’t you go out to dinner with him?”
I blink again. Technically, I suppose that’s true. “He wanted to see the portal,” I say. “So, I showed him the portal.”
“And then?”
