Frost Fever Read online

  Today, I was going to help Alexandra put out fires.

  We circulated among the guests, and I put on a serious face as Alexandra talked various pompous blowhards down from their arguments. All of human politicians wanted to be as close to the Elven nobles as possible, and all of them cited their love for the High Queen and their loyal service to her realm and her lords. Alexandra had a gift for this sort of thing, and she soothed over the disputes without bruising anyone’s inflated ego. I nodded a lot and pretended to take notes.

  Then Alexandra’s phone chimed, and she glanced at the display.

  “Oh, thank God,” she said. “The Duke and his guests are arriving. I’ll need to meet the Duke.” She handed me her phone. “Can you text the manager at Battle Hall and let him know? Also, the Homeland Security lieutenant in charge of traffic? Both their contacts are at the top of my list.”

  “Will do,” I said. “I’ll get your phone back to you when I’m done.”

  Alexandra flashed me a white smile and hurried off to greet her overlord and employer. I dutifully thumb-typed the messages into the phone and sent them, and received acknowledgements in short order. It felt strange holding her phone. She had just handed me a lot of trust. With a few text messages and emails I could destroy her life. A weird tangle of emotion went through me, and I tried to ignore it.

  No, I wouldn’t destroy her life, but maybe I could help myself. Perhaps I could find a way to get myself into the Meridian-Kohler Hotel without trouble. If Duke Carothrace’s event coordinator made a request of the manager…

  Applause cut into my thoughts, and I looked up to see the crowds clapping and cheering.

  Duke Carothrace had arrived.

  I started pushing through the crowd, towards the stairs where Alexandra waited for her phone. I’m pretty short, which meant most of the crowd blocked my view of the Elven nobles. I did get glimpses, though. I saw Duke Tamirlas of Milwaukee, tall and regal and aloof in his long blue coat and the ornamented red cloak of an Elven noble. I had seen images of Tamirlas in the news all my life, and I had briefly seen him in person at Paul McCade’s ill-fated Conquest Day gala. Duke Carothrace walked next to him, a short man for an Elf, wearing his gleaming golden armor beneath his red cloak, offering the crowd a wave and a wide smile as he passed. The Elven nobles varied in their attitudes towards humans. Some thought of us as cattle. Some, like Morvilind, regarded as useful tools to be used and then discarded. And some, like Carothrace, took a paternal view of humans, regarded them as children in need of guidance.

  After all, he offered his employees two weeks of vacation.

  I wondered if any Elves thought that coming to Earth had been a mistake, that they had no right to rule humans.

  If there were any such Elves, I had never met them.

  Four Knights of the Inquisition walked with Carothrace’s party, and even the other Elven nobles made sure to keep well away from them.

  The nobles took their position upon the stairs, and Duke Carothrace stepped to a podium. A very expensive microphone had been set up there, and I knew it was expensive because I had helped Alexandra rent the sound system. A silence fell over the crowds around the Capitol.

  “Subjects of Her Majesty the High Queen Tarlia, citizens of Madison, Wisconsin and the United States,” said Duke Carothrace in a booming voice. “Today, we have a tremendous honor. The High Queen, in her wisdom, has made peace with the frost giants of the world of Jordenhalm, and the Great King of the frost giants has sent an emissary to discuss terms of peace and alliance with Her Majesty. The High Queen has chosen Madison for the honor of receiving the Great King’s emissary, and noble Elves and humans alike shall uphold the honor of our High Queen!”

  Thunderous applause and cheers answered him. I faked enthusiastic applause, and used the opportunity to push my way a few yards further through the crowd. Alexandra ought to be near the railing, not far from the podium, and I could hand over her phone.

  The air shivered with power, and my magical senses felt arcane force twisting around me. I kept pushing through the crowd, and I saw a disc of gray mist swirling and writhing atop the Capitol steps. Another pulse of power went through the air, and pale white light shone within the mist as the rift way to the Shadowlands opened. I knew the spell to create a rift way to the Shadowlands, had used it before when I was desperate. It took all my strength to create a rift way large enough for just me to enter, but the gate opening upon the steps was big, large enough for six men to walk abreast.

  Or maybe three frost giants.

  The rift way opened, and through it I glimpsed the dead forests and empty black skies of the Shadowlands. A dark shape moved behind the mist, and then stepped through the gate and onto the steps of the Capitol.

  And I saw Jarl Rimethur with my own eyes.

  He looked just as he had in the image that Morvilind had shown me. The Jarl stood nine feet tall, towering over even the Elven nobles (and he dwarfed Duke Carothrace). His skin was a peculiar silvery-blue color, his hair and beard like gray ice in the dead of winter, and his eyes glowed with a peculiar harsh light. He wore ornate silvery plate armor, the designs upon it vaguely Norse, and a long black cloak lined with some kind of fur hung from his massive shoulders.

  The Ringbyrne Amulet hung from a chain around his neck.

  A little shiver of excitement went through me. The damned thing was so close. The amulet was about the size of my hand, a disc of silvery metal inscribed with alien symbols. In its center rested a pale blue crystal that gave off a strange light, and I had the peculiar feeling that it was an eye, that it was watching the crowds around Rimethur.

  The Jarl stepped forward, and I saw the hilt of the massive sword belted at his waist. A weapon like that would have wounded my father and given him the frostfever that spread to my mother and brother, the frostfever that had led me here.

  I wondered if Rimethur knew a cure for frostfever.

  “Jarl Rimethur,” said Carothrace in a ringing voice. Likely he had used a spell to enhance the volume of his voice, to say nothing of its depth and resonance. “In the name of Tarlia, High Queen of the Elves and the Earth, Defender of the Elven peoples, Guardian of humanity, I, Carothrace, Duke of Madison, greet you and welcome you to the city of Madison.”

  Rimethur offered a formal bow to the Duke and straightened up. Behind him a half-dozen more frost giants emerged from the rift way, standing behind him in silence. I tried to remember what the frost giants called their lesser nobles. Thains? Thanes? It was something with a T.

  “I greet you, Carothrace Duke,” rumbled Rimethur, his cold voice like ice cracking, “in the name of the Great King of Jordenhalm. The Great King has decreed that there shall be peace between our peoples, and so there shall be peace.”

  “Together,” said Carothrace, “perhaps we can defeat the treacherous Archons, and rid the worlds of their evil and dark magic at last.”

  “Perhaps,” said Rimethur, who did not seem convinced.

  Alexandra’s phone chimed in my hand, receiving a dozen text messages at once. I had better get it back to her. I looked around, but I still couldn’t see her, and even with high heels I wasn’t tall enough to see over most of the spectators. I pushed my way to the railing, and then made my way along it, ignoring the scowls and glares cast my way. Beyond the Elven nobles I saw the steel railing on the other side of the stairs. More dignitaries crowded the space, interspersed here and there with Homeland Security officers. A man in the uniform of a Homeland Security colonel stood at the railing, watching the Elven nobles, and…

  I froze.

  For a moment I could not think through the fear that flooded through me.

  I suddenly remembered where I had seen the officer manning the checkpoint.

  Because I knew the man in the colonel’s uniform was not a member of Homeland Security.

  About two years ago I had made a serious mistake that had almost gotten me killed.

  I had fallen in love.

  His name, he claimed, was Nich
olas Connor. I had sworn to never fall in love, to never let anyone have any power over me, but Nicholas…he was clever and funny and charming and charismatic. Something about him had wormed its way past my defenses, and I had fallen for him hard.

  He also had the build of an athlete and had been a supremely skilled lover.

  That had likely had something to do with it, too.

  Nicholas was all those things, and he was also one of the coldest, most ruthless men I had ever had the misfortune to meet. He was the leader of a Rebel cell, and I had learned that he planned to set off a bomb to kill thousands of people in Los Angeles…with me set to take the blame when he escaped. Even in the madness of my infatuation with him, I had not quite abandoned reason. I had given him a false name, telling him nothing of my magical abilities. At the last minute I realized what he had intended, and I turned the tables on him. One anonymous phone call to the Inquisition later, Nicholas had been forced into hiding, most of his Rebel cell arrested, but I had gotten away scot-free.

  The experience had left me sadder, but much, much wiser. Considering what could have happened, I couldn’t complain.

  The man in the colonel’s uniform was named Sergei Rogomil. He was Russian, and possessed a variety of useful skills, most of them illegal. He had been Nicholas’s second-in-command, and was the sort of Rebel who seemed to kill for the thrill of it. There was a huge bounty upon his head in the Russian Empire, most of the provinces of the European Union, and the entirety of North America.

  And he was standing forty feet away from me,

  Wearing the uniform of a Homeland Security colonel.

  My brain caught up with my fear.

  I had recognized the screener because he was one of Rogomil’s men. If Rogomil had infiltrated just one of his men into Homeland Security, then he could just have easily brought in twenty or thirty. That meant there could be dozens of Rebels scattered around the crowd, all of them carrying guns and God knew what else.

  There were thousands of people packed into the space around the Capitol. It was exactly the sort of target Rogomil would have chosen for his special brand of terror.

  For a moment I had no idea what to do.

  I couldn’t start screaming that I saw a Rebel in the crowd. I didn’t know how many of the Homeland Security officers were Rebels, and they might shoot me to shut me up. Or they would take me in for “questioning” and shoot me in the back of a van. Or maybe only Rogomil and a few of the officers were Rebels, and the loyalist officers would overpower the Rebels. Then they would take me in for questioning, and I would have to explain how I had known that Rogomil was a Rebel.

  That would end with me getting executed. Or Morvilind would kill me to keep his secrets from coming to light. I whispered a curse and looked around. There were three Homeland Security officers nearby, but I had no way of telling if they were Rogomil’s Rebels or genuine officers. I couldn’t just make a scene. I had to find someone I could warn, someone who would listen …

  The phone in my hand buzzed again.

  Alexandra. She would listen to me. I would think up some clever lie. Say that I saw Rogomil handing out Rebel literature or something. If Alexandra warned the Duke or one of the Knights of Inquisition, perhaps they could defuse whatever plan Rogomil had in mind.

  Or I could let Rogomil’s plan proceed, and use the chaos to seize the amulet. Yes. That was the best idea. Whatever Rogomil intended would be loud and spectacular and bloody, and I could use it to take the Ringbyrne Amulet…

  My stomach twisted with nausea, sweat tricking down my back.

  I couldn’t do it. I couldn’t do it because I knew what kind of men Nicholas Connor and Sergei Rogomil were, and I knew whatever plan they intended would kill at lot of people. There were thousands of people here, men and women and children.

  Some of the women had babies with them.

  I didn’t care about any of them. I cared about Russel and the Marneys, and that was it. But I still couldn’t let Rogomil’s plan continue.

  I took three steps toward Alexandra, and then the first bomb went off in the crowd.

  So much for good intentions.

  I was maybe twenty yards away from the explosion. There was a loud pop, so loud it was as if I heard the sound with my entire body rather than just my ears. A plume of white smoke erupted from the crowd. Some of the people nearest to the blast disappeared in sprays of red mist, their bodies ripped apart by whatever had been inside the bomb. Nails, perhaps, or ball bearings. Rogomil had liked to pack his bombs with nasty tricks like that.

  For a frozen instant stunned silence gripped the crowd. Duke Carothrace came to a stop in mid-sentence, looking at the plume of smoke with his mouth hanging open. Jarl Rimethur remained impassive, but both his guards and the other Elven nobles began casting warding spells, silver light and blue fire dancing around them. They had all been in combat before, and they knew what a bomb blast looked like.

  Right about then everything erupted into motion.

  Three more pillars of white smoke exploded from the crowd, the sounds deafening. People began screaming and shouting and shoving, trying to get away from the explosions. A fleeing man slammed into me, and I almost fell, my heels scraping against the pavement. Gunfire erupted, and I glimpsed the muzzle flash from an automatic weapon

  It was pointed towards the Capitol steps.

  Rogomil and his men were here to assassinate the Jarl.

  Spells flared around the frost giants and the Elves. I had shot an anthrophage in Los Angeles, but bullets generally did not work on Elves or creatures from other worlds. Morvilind had explained the reason to me once, but I hadn’t really understood, so I had just nodded along until he stopped talking. Bullets made from Earth’s metals did not work on Elves, but bullets made from the ore of the Shadowlands would kill them just fine. They were stupendously illegal, but Rogomil knew where to find them and how to make them.

  A screaming woman shoved past me, running away from the Capitol, and the impact knocked me against the steel barricade, the metal bar digging into my back. I shoved away and looked around, my mind racing. I couldn’t do anything to help the people getting killed around me, and I couldn’t do anything to stop Rogomil.

  But I could get the Ringbyrne Amulet. If the Rebels succeeded in killing the Jarl, I might be able to snatch the amulet from his corpse. That would be dangerous in front of so many Elven nobles, but they would be distracted by the chaos. I could snatch the amulet and run, and use my Cloaking and Masking spells to get out of Madison and back to Morvilind.

  I heard a whining noise by my right ear, even over the screams and roar of the gunfire, and I realized that a bullet had missed my head by about an inch.

  Maybe I had better just run. Getting killed retrieving the amulet would do me no good. I ought…

  Alexandra burst from the crowds, her eyes wide. Something had clipped her temple, and blood trickled down the right side of her jaw. Her eyes were huge and frightened, and her face had gone the color of a sheet.

  “Irina!” she screamed. “Run! Run! For God’s sake run! They’re trying assassinate the Duke!”

  Well. That was at least partially true.

  “Go!” shouted Alexandra. “Go…”

  Something metallic flashed behind her. A bundle of lead pipes, about as long as my forearm and as thick as my thigh, rolled across the pavement. The pipes had been welded closed, and a bundle of wires dangled from the caps.

  It was a pipe bomb.

  Time seemed to slow down.

  We couldn’t run. We couldn’t dodge behind anything. I had no way of knowing how long until the bomb went off. Cloaking or Masking or Occluding myself would be useless. My spells fooled the senses, not shards of explosive-driven metal.

  I could only think of one thing to do.

  I ducked, snatched some pebbles from the ground, gathering all my magical power as Alexandra stared in horror at the bomb. The courier bag fell from my shoulder, landing with a thump on the pavement. I drew in every bit o
f magical power I could manage until I seemed to burn with it.

  Then I cast a spell. A disk of gray mist swirled in front of me, and then shone with a pale white light. Beyond I saw a dead forest and a bleak, empty sky, ribbons of blue-green fire dancing overhead.

  The rift way to the Shadowlands snapped open, and I fell through it.

  Alexandra fell with me.

  Chapter 4: Useful Lies

  I had been to the Shadowlands before, but I had never been there while wearing high heels.

  My left foot caught on the uneven ground, and a stab of pain went up my ankle. I staggered forward three or four steps, my arms flailing, and I kept from falling on my face. Behind me the rift way shimmered, showing the chaos before the Capitol, and I released the spell.

  I just had time to see a flare of fire, and then the rift way snapped closed before the bomb exploded. A gust of hot air came through the collapsing gate, but none of the explosive force. I let out a sigh, my head aching from the magical effort I had just expended.

  “Oh my God,” said Alexandra. She was sitting on the ground a few paces from where the rift way had been, her face bloody, her jacket torn. Her eyes were huge and shocked. “Oh my God, oh my God, oh my God.”

  I looked around, trying to take stock of the situation.

  We had escaped the bomb…but considering what might happen to us in the Shadowlands, it might have been better to let the bomb kill us.

  We were somewhere in the Shadowlands, somewhere in the dark places between the worlds. The ground was covered in pale, dry grasses that felt smooth and cold where they brushed my calves. Trees stood here and there, their bark black and glossy, strange colorless leaves hanging from the branches. We were in a little valley between hills, and the hills rolled away before us, rising to grim mountains in the distance. The sky was a black, empty vault, and ribbons of blue and green and purple fire danced in silence over the void. I had never seen the aurora borealis while high on hallucinogens, but if I had, I suspected it would look like that.