The pond is covered by thick white ice; its surface is the face of the moon. A dog skids across the ice, barking with surprise, and some of the children decide to try skating, something they’ve heard about but never experienced. They hurry to strip bark from the birch trees around the pond and strap it to their boots with ribbons of leather. The bravest go out first, soaring across the ice, laughing when they lose their balance and sprawl across its hard, slippery sheen. Soon the village children play on the frozen pond.
A crash of thunder sounds, splintering the calm of the afternoon. A dark cloud moves across the wintry blue sky so the snow no longer glints in the sun. Some of the children look up, hoping for more snow.
But no more snow falls. Not one crystal snowflake. Thunder crashes again, so loud the nearby houses shake. Lightning cracks open the sky, and ink-black fingers shoot across the pond’s surface, staining the ice with veins of ebony. The same black ripples from the hillsides to the banks surrounding the pond, and outward to the snowbound streets of the village.
Along these ominous fault lines, ice begins to crack. Snow melts as suddenly as it fell. Torrents of freezing water pour down the hills, and Stur’s main street is transformed into an icy river, sweeping people and animals into its freezing surge. With a thunderous crack, the frozen pond splinters and the children sink into the frigid water, screaming and thrashing. As the hills above churn with cold water, the pond becomes a drain, drawing everything—and everyone—into its icy whirlpool.
When the dark cloud passes, all evidence of snow has disappeared. All that remains are soggy fields, bare hillsides, and streets thick with sludge. The village pond is still, its bright moon face gone. The villagers who survived the deluge rush to its banks, and there, through a thin layer of frost, delicate as a spider’s web, lie the frozen bodies of the children, their faces distorted with terror.
By the time the messenger rides out to the capital of Mont, he is reminded to report that of all the day’s strange and horrifying events, there is one detail that is so curious that it must not be overlooked.
The layer of frost across the pond was not gray, or even dirty white, the usual color. It was the color of fresh spring lilacs.
—I—
King & Queen
Chapter One
Caledon
He can’t take his eyes off her. The royal procession—newlywed king and queen on horseback, trailed by courtiers on their own steeds, marching guards, and a tootling band squeezed into a decorated wagon—is out for another jaunt into the countryside surrounding the capital of Mont.
Cal has positioned his assassins throughout the procession, to stay alert to any threats from within as well as among the gaggles of farmers and villagers thronging the road. He’s sent Jander to ride at the front, along with the scouts and the royal crier. Cal will never get used to the lilting sound of the Montrice accent. Better the flat tones of Renovia, where everything—people and geography both—lacks pretension. There’s an ostentation to Montrice, and its court, that he doesn’t like. Even this procession is ostentatious—thirty courtiers and twice as many guards.
The distant mountains are capped with snow above the tree line, but here in the lowlands it’s still autumn. Since their marriage several months ago, King Hansen and Queen Lilac have ridden out like this at least twice a week, to visit hamlets and villages, and to preside over harvest celebrations.
Queen Lilac. His friend Shadow’s true identity, revealed to the world. It has taken some getting used to, even if he has accepted it, accepted her, for who she is. He watches her up ahead, a slim and graceful figure on her horse, cloak thrown over her shoulder because the day is so fine. Hansen, her husband, leans toward her and says something; Lilac laughs. She lifts her face to the light, but Cal’s behind her and can’t read her expression. A spark of jealousy shoots through him, painful and sharp. The king is handsome in the bland, expected way of titled monarchs, but handsome nonetheless, sitting regally on his majestic steed, waving to the crowd.
The Kingdoms of Montrice and Renovia are united: Look at the happy young king and queen—so beautiful, so well dressed—delighted to be meeting grubby country folk in their muddy villages. It’s all designed to dispel rumors that the marriage is one of mere political expedience.
Lilac might be Hansen’s queen in public, but at night, in private, thanks to the secret room and passageway adjacent to her own, she is still his Shadow. Just this morning they were entwined in each other’s arms. But now she rides next to the king while Cal remains on the fringes, watching for danger.
The fact that Cal shares the queen’s bed, while the king sleeps with his own rotating array of favorites, is nobody’s business but their respective royal Majesties. Hansen and Lilac are cordial, distant. If the king is unnerved about his wife’s curiously close friendship with the royal assassin, he has made no indication of it.
“Long live the king!” people shout from their perches on hedgerows, or from stations along stone walls and tumbling wooden fences. A few cheer for the queen as well, the local maidens and lasses the loudest in their admiration. Lilac is young, energetic, and vibrant—an equal to their handsome king—and her blood hails from the old and storied line of Avantine’s ancient rulers. Not only that: Everyone knows that she’s brought Renovian bounty to the Montrician coffers.
There aren’t as many people out today, Cal observes, reining in his horse and falling farther back. It’s later in autumn now, and most of the harvest festivals and rituals are over. Lilac will miss the outings, Cal suspects, though she always complains afterward about being forced to ride alongside Hansen and pretend his conversation is sparkling. She finds him exceedingly dull, and Hansen has been chafing about having to visit villages rather than riding to hound out in the forest. Every cold day reminds the king that hunting season is underway, and he wants to get back to his usual pursuits.
A village looms, one of several the procession will pass this morning on its way to the town of Sancton. Cal gallops to the front, whipping a glance at Lilac as he passes. She’s smiling, but it looks strained. At least the village visit will cheer her up. During these autumn processions, in every hamlet and village, every tiny settlement and every town, Cal has seen lilac-colored ribbons tied to window latches and branches of trees. The people of Montrice are welcoming Lilac as their queen. In the towns, small girls present her with bouquets of autumn leaves and flowers. Hansen is asked to drink a symbolic draft from a horn of plenty, and he makes the same joke every time about wishing for ale rather than well water. Everyone laughs, he plants an awkward kiss on Lilac’s cheek, and then the entire royal procession moves on.
Today should be no different, but Cal feels uneasy. He rides up alongside Jander and nods at his slight, frowning apprentice. Some people are surprised that the Chief Assassin trusts and relies on a skinny boy, but they don’t know that Jander is more than just a humble stable hand, and older than everyone in the entire kingdom.