The Fairy Letters: A FROST Series(TM) Novel (12 page)
Read The Fairy Letters: A FROST Series(TM) Novel Online
Authors: Kailin Gow
Letter 18
Your Royal Highness,
I am
writing to inform you that you will see me once again, and once more. News of
the coming Peace Treaty that is to be signed has reached my ears – it is my
duty as the Crown Prince to accompany my mother on the long journey to the
Winter Court, and to sign my name alongside hers on this long-awaited document.
I cannot avoid the pilgrimage, although its prospect is not – as you might
imagine – not so sweet as it once was. I once awaited this day so eagerly,
seeing it as the culmination of our promised hopes, our promised romance – but
no. I can see from the very absence of your letters that such talk bores you,
and I have no intention or desire of wearying you in that manner. No, I will
keep this letter formal and precise. You have succeeded in your endeavors, your
Majesty, and for this I congratulate you. The borders of the Spring lands have
been successfully delineated, and I hear that the negotiations between our
ambassadors and yours proved surprisingly smooth, and that you were a charming
hostess. Of course, your charm is not in doubt – have I not learned already
that you are able to convince any man at all of your love and allegiance with a
single smile from your trembling, rosy lips? Such charm says little about the
heart within. A woman can feign love so easily, so effortlessly, that she
deceives even the one with the power to read into her heart, see what is in her
mind. Such a power as this exceeds all the magic of all the fairies in Feyland.
And
so I congratulate you, madam. You have truly become a greater fairy than I
could have ever thought possible – this power of deceit of yours is legendary!
But no matter. Fear not, madam – I will not disturb you in your connubial bliss
with that Wolf whom onlookers say has so captivated you. I will not challenge
him to a duel, nor will I kick his hide like the flea-bitten cur he is,
deserves. I will behave impeccably and with restraint, as is the fairy way.
When I sign the peace treaty, my hand will not tremble. Though this day was so
long-awaited, though I ached and agonized for a time, all that is over. I will
feel no joy at the end of this war – not for myself – but only relief on behalf
of the people I represent. Perhaps I will catch your eye, perhaps not. Perhaps
shame will at last cloud that rosy face of yours and you will look down before
I catch a glimpse of the treachery in your eyes. Perhaps you will try to speak
to me – to explain – or perhaps you will be silent, as you have been these many
months.
But
you will not see me again. Once the treaty has signed, I will go alone into the
great wilderness – trek alone beyond Mount Malum and Mount Eberim, to distant
lands no fairy has gone before. There I will encounter creatures so terrible
that they turn onlookers to stone – there I encounter magic so dangerous no
fairy can withstand it. And I will challenge all these primal beasts, one by
one, and dare them to kill me. But what of my immortality, you ask? That
snowflake pendant that guarantees my physical safety but does not safeguard my
sanity or my heart? The moment that treaty is signed and peace is assured I
will shatter it upon the marble floor of your palace.
I
once thought I would give it to you as a gift. I fingered the smooth glass and
recalled how my father had given it to my mother and I planned to do likewise.
But now I wish only to destroy it – destroy the life that has become so hateful
to me by your duplicity. Do you think I want to live for thousands of years,
playing your lies over and over again in my head, trying to distinguish them –
to separate out the reality from the falsehood? When you said you would wait
for me forever – that was a lie. When you said that you would love me forever –
that was a lie. When you said that I was your intended – you lied then, too.
But what about the other times? When you said you loved me – was that merely a
ploy, designed to affect my weakness so that this treaty could be signed? Did
you mean to ensnare me – ensnare all of us: my mother and Shasta and me – so
that you could settle peace with terms more favorable to the Summer Kingdom,
for it is on account of my love for you and the persistence with which I have
fought for you that has led peace to happen the way it has. Are you content
with your holdings, my Queen – with the result? You have shattered the
necessary hearts, executed the necessary maneuvers, and now you have your
peace, your crown, and your new husband!
I
hear the wedding is in a month's time – I regret to inform you I shall be
unable to attend. While you make those solemn vows of magic to that traitorous
Wolf, I will be in the wilds beyond Feyland, drenching myself in the blood of
beasts and dragons, until at last I find one of them strong enough to bring me
down, to overcome my royal magic and strike the killing blow, piercing my armor
and letting me forget at last of the useless life I led. But none of them – I
promise you this, my Queen – shall have overcome me as thoroughly, and as treacherously,
as you did once.
Forgive
me, your Highness. I forgot my purpose in writing you this letter. I mean only
to confirm – with the utmost formality and the most cordial regards – that I
shall indeed be attending the Peace Treaty proceedings one week from now.
Sometimes,
in my more foolish hours, I feel a tugging on my heart – a single beating power
that suggests to me in my idiocy that you still feel something for me, that you
still love me, that this is all some terrible mistake. I feel remnants of the
love for you that once kept me alive – without with which my life is nothing.
But I
would do better to forget them, as you yourself have forgotten. If only I could
forget everything. If only I can forget you. For although my mind forgets, my
soul would not.
Shasta’s Letter 1
Rodney, Darling,
It's
been too long! A few weeks and already I start to get nervous – I start pacing
the walls of my room and tugging at my hair and fidgeting. I've re-arranged all
the swords on my wall and I've re-catalogued all the books in my library (even
the cooking-texts, which I've hidden beneath the floorboard where you and I
once shared our love letters). But nothing doing, Rodney – I can't distract
myself. Not when you're out there, outside this prison of a palace (Mother
doesn't trust me to leave the grounds – she has those blasted guards watching
me like phoenixes everywhere I go!), and I'm stuck with Kian (who hasn't
stopped moping in days – he's no conversation) and my mother (who uses every
chance she gets to tell me what a failure I am as a Queen.) What do you think
of that? I spent my whole childhood trying to be Queen, trying to prove that I
was better than Kian, and now – even when he's gone all moony for Breena,
I'm
the disappointment? Poor Mother – no matter what Kian does, he'll still be
the apple of her eye, and I'll still be second-best.
But I
was never that way with you, Rodney! When it all gets too terrible, and I think
I can't bear it a moment longer (or else I'll have to rush to the top of the
Observatory, where nobody will hear me, and scream into the night!) I think of
you – of how we met, and of the taste of that first (awful!) spaghetti
Bolognese we made together in Gregory (we sure got better, didn't we?) and of
the way the tomato sauce got on my nose and in your hair and the way the
microwave exploded (how was I supposed to know metal doesn't go in there?) and
how we burned the meat and got sick for days! Wasn't it wonderful?
Oh, I
was so high-and-mighty and pleased with myself when I managed to get to Gregory.
Sneaking in through one of Kian's paintings of Breena – wasn't that ingenious?
Even he didn't know he'd created a portal – but I could spot it! And good
thing, too – if I hadn't gotten into the Land Beyond the Crystal River through
there, I wouldn't have ended up in Gregory (for my money, I wanted to go to
Paris to cook properly, since I hear they have powerful cooking magic there!)
and found you! (“Looking after Breena” my foot – everybody knows you just
wanted to learn to cook mortal food!)
Of course,
I was twenty minutes late to the first lesson. Gregory Community College wasn't
as impressive as I thought it would be – it doesn't have any spires or magic
archways or moats like our Feyland universities – and I completely missed it
the first two times I walked by! But then I remember scrambling in and
demanding that we start again from scratch since I'd missed the beginning. I
was a Princess, I figured, and I'd have my way.
Unfortunately,
none of those people in the class knew I was a Princess, and so they all just
thought I had the temper of a dragon (not that any of them had
seen
a
dragon, mind you! They've got a couple of scaly things in zoos but they don't
breathe fire or fly or do anything interesting.) So they refused – flat out –
and I decided I'd use a little telepathy to set them straight. And I tried to
enchant the lot of them, making them think that the class was just starting –
and weren't you sweet to play along and pretend I'd enchanted you too? (Of
course, I
could
have enchanted you if I really wanted, but I thought you
were all just humans, so I didn't try that hard!)
Oh,
that was wonderful – that first class! Finally doing what boys got to do while
I was stuck forging stupid swords – smelling the roasting meats and vegetables,
chopping the tomatoes into little pieces. I felt so
powerful
– I was in
control of the very stuff that makes life happen – think about that! You men
don't know how thrilling a feeling that is – you're used to cooking. And I
started to notice you – and think you weren't half bad (as far as humans went),
and then we got to talking and cooking and suddenly we were cooking together,
and fighting over whether we should add more basil or more oregano, and then
you sneaked a bit of elf-wheat into the sauce and I tasted it and
that' s
when I knew something was up.
I can
always sniff out elf-wheat.
Well,
I'm sorry for the big bruise I gave you. (It healed awfully quickly, didn't
it?) I thought you were one of Mother's guards following me to report back
about how naughty I was being. But you promised not to squeal, didn't you – and
then you told me that you thought women and men should both be allowed to cook
(and forge weapons too, although I don't see why anyone would want to do that!)
and then I remember that we left the class to wash the tomato sauce off our
clothes and got to walking in that “fairy wood” (why they call it that is
beyond me – there's no fairies there but us!) and before I knew it it was dawn,
and you were holding my hand, and I'd met the first person in my life who truly
understood me. Nobody telling me I was second-best. Nobody telling me I
couldn't do what I wanted. Just someone else who thought all this rigmarole
about war and status and fairy rules was silly and wanted Feyland to move
forward a few millennia.
I
know I lied and told you I'd kissed loads of boys before – I didn't want you to
think I was going to get hung up on you or anything – but I want you to know
now that you were my very first kiss. And that I'm awfully hung up on you. But
you probably knew that, didn't you? Sometimes, when you're far away, I think I
can hear your thoughts. And I know that sometimes you've heard mine – I feel
you, like a presence, in my head.
Now,
I'm not going to say we're “soul mates,” because Kian hasn't stopped talking
about how he and Breena are soul mates and, while I may be second-best at
ruling, I'm not going to come second in matters of romance. But
if
there
were such a thing as soul mates, that's what we would be – and I'll be damned
if we're not more of “soul mates” than the two of them! Just because I'm no
good at all the sentimental talk doesn't mean I don't spend every day that's
gone by missing you.
I
love you, Rodney – I love you and your messy ginger hair and I love the stupid
burned tomato sauce we made together and I love the walks we took in Feyland
and I even love that little ugly brick building where we met. So what if we
weren't intended for each other at birth – the way Kian and Breena were? So
what if the universe didn't wake up and magically bind us – I
picked you.
I
said to myself “Shasta, that's the boy you're going to marry, and nothing's
going to get in your way.” I didn't wait for the universe to tell me who to
marry – I decided myself.
I
know Kian and Breena love each other – and I know it's been hard for them
(believe me, I have to sit with Kian at breakfast every morning), but sometimes
it feels like at least their love
matters
to people. Mother likes
Breena, and listens to her and Kian much more than she ever listens to me. I
don't matter – I'm just the daughter, the second-born, the second-best.
But I
don't care anymore. I don't care if I can't be Queen. I just want to run away
with you to the Land Beyond the Crystal River, and wear human clothes and buy a
house with a big kitchen and leave all the rules and regulations of Feyland
behind me – just me and you and a whole lot of cookie dough.
(Only
sometimes we'd have to go back to get elf-wheat).
I
love you, Rodney, and don't you dare even think about forgetting about me –
because if you do, I'll give you a bruise ten times bigger than the one I gave
you the night we met!
All
my love!
Shasta