James West - Queen of the North

She flew a short span and bowled over one of her soldiers. He fell on her, crushing the breath from her chest. His weight vanished a second later, and a steaming drizzle spattered across her cheeks and brow. More of it flooded her eyes, stinging, turning everything red. When she opened her mouth to scream, that scarlet rain flooded her tongue with a taste of salted rust. Blood! It’s his -The frantic thought cut off when shredded bits of armor and meat began pelting her.

Aedran called out again, off to her left.

Scrabbling madly through a forest of stout legs, Erryn’s fingers touched something familiar, and they wrapped convulsively around the hilt of the dead man’s sword. The blade was far longer and heavier than hers, but in her terror, the weapon felt light as a feather.

Swiping at her eyes, Erryn hastened toward Aedran’s voice. Through a crimson fog, she saw a serpentine shape swaying above him.

“Stay back!” Aedran roared.

Erryn lurched forward until the Joraxa’s girth filled her vision. Imitating a Prythian battle cry, she stabbed at the iceworm’s flank. The tip of the blade scraped over a smooth plate before slipping deep between two segments. The creature spasmed, jerking the sword out of her hand. She dropped to her knees and tried to crawl out of reach. The iceworm’s attack went wide, but its stone-hard belly cracked against the back of her head, knocking her flat.

Stunned, chest hitching, she rolled over to see the Joraxa soaring above her. Clustered obsidian eyes regarded her over snapping pincers. Erryn had a moment to wish her vision had remained fuzzy, before the iceworm lanced down. She flinched to the side just before the Joraxa crashed into the ground.

Flopping to her belly, she made to wriggle away, but her hands had become a pair of gloved fools. Beyond her clutching fingers, the torn snow went on and on, dotted with pieces of what had once been whole men and savaged iceworms. Behind her, Aedran screamed. Below her, the ground trembled.

A crushing pressure closed around her waist, and the iceworm lifted her high, titling her back until she saw only the night sky overhead, the depthless black expanse filled with coldly glittering stars. Something like a blunt spear jabbed brutally against her spine. Erryn heard her wolfskin cloak tearing, felt icy points digging into her skin. Searing trickles of blood began to flow, and she envisioned Captain Kormak dying. Erryn ground her teeth together, making them into an impassable bulwark. She didn’t want to die screaming. If she trapped her pain inside, the last of her army would keep fighting. And, after they had won the night and tended their wounds, they would sing a lament for their good, strong queen.

All at once, the iceworm shook beneath her, whipped her back and then forward, and she felt herself hurtling through the air without a whit of grace, her arms and legs stretched out as if held by invisible ropes.

Weightless, Erryn soared over the rampart and thumped into a deep drift of snow. A swirling white cloud engulfed her, filled her nose with icy powder. Too dazed to think, she lay there looking up at the stars, listening to the clamor of battle, and waiting for a breath to fill her chest. When it did, she gulped the bitter air, relishing the painful ache it put into her lungs. Then, for a long time, she lost herself in a cold stupor.

When the first trumpeting beast charged past, Erryn mistook it for a new kind of murdering horror. When the second went by, she sat up with a wince. Men on horses were galloping in every direction across the meadow. Men bearing torches and wielding lances, all wearing armor and strange uniforms-true uniforms, not like the wolfskin cloaks and leathers her Prythians wore. Red-and-white quartered shields emblazoned their snowy tabards, and upon each shield soared a jet-black raven. Where these men rode, iceworms died.

Her confusion deepened when rivers of Prythians began charging out of the forest and converging on the makeshift camp. There were many hundreds of them, far more than had marched with her across the Gyntors.

The battle raged on, oblivious to her.

While the Prythians herded the great iceworms with fire and steel, riders used their lances to impale the creatures before they could escape. Where that failed, they ran their warhorses over the top of the worms, letting steel-shod hooves crush the Joraxa.

Far sooner than she could have hoped, the fighting began to slack off. A familiar voice turned her head. She saw her general pushing through teeming hordes of Prythian newcomers. His cloak was tattered, blood speckled his face, and greenish ooze befouled his sword.

“Aedran!” Erryn called, but it came out as a hoarse croak. He couldn’t have heard, but his roaming gaze halted on her. Aedran came on at a run.

Erryn began digging herself out of the snow, the length of her spine filled with a throbbing ache. The longer it took, the harder she fought, until each breath burned in her raw throat. She didn’t care. She had to get to her general. To Aedran .

She had pulled herself free and was stepping clumsily to meet him, when a loud fluttering gave her a fright. She spun, hands raised in defense, but there was no danger, so far as she could see.

Erryn stared in openmouthed wonder at the scrawny little man standing next to her. She was sure he had not been there a moment earlier.

He reached out, but hesitated to touch her arm. “By the grace of Lady Mylene of House Akarlen, and by the strong arms of the Wardens of Tanglewood, you’re quite safe. Of course, if your Captain Murgan hadn’t found one of Ravenhold’s patrols, things might have taken an unfortunate turn for you and your men.” Despite the fine cut of the little man’s bulky woolen cloak, he looked ratty and rumpled, and his black hair hung in lank strands about his thin face. “But then, we’re all the safer for the arrival of Lord Lofgrem and his army of Prythians.”

Why would there be another army of Prythians here besides my own? Erryn decided that could wait. “Who are you?”

He beamed. “I’m Horge, kennelmaster of Ravenhold.” His shoulders gave a fidgety twitch. “Truth told, I’m also the master of horse and, too, I mind chickens and geese, swine and sheep, and….” He trailed off with a helpless shrug. “As it concerns Lady Mylene’s stock, I tend them all. I understand them, you see, more than most.”

There was something curious about the way he said that last, but then Aedran was at Erryn’s side, looking suspiciously at the ratty fellow.

Before her general could say a word, Horge asked Erryn, “If I may be so bold, who are you?”

“She’s the chosen Queen of Pryth,” Aedran answered.

Horge blinked, his thin fingers tapping against his lips. “Queen of Pryth, you say? Oh my. That isn’t good. No, no, not good at all.”

“Why?” Erryn asked, bewildered.

Horge’s nose twitched like that of a forest creature detecting a raging woodland fire. “Because the other chosen Queen of Pryth will be none too pleased to learn of a rival. Nor, I suspect, will those who chose her,” he added, waving a hand over the host of Prythians busily ensuring all the iceworms were dead.

Erryn faced Aedran. “What’ve you gotten me into?”

He shook his head, concern etched deep into his face. “I don’t know, but rest assured, I will find out.”

His promise should have comforted her, but Erryn felt as if inescapable chains were wrapping her about and cinching tight. A report from a man Aedran trusted had led Erryn to march her army into this frozen wasteland in order to find and destroy her greatest enemy, King Nabar. Such an audacious attack would have secured her hold on northern Cerrikoth, but without warning Nabar, wherever he was in the Iron Marches, had become a minor concern. Recalling how often Aedran had spoken of Prythians willingly fighting amongst each other, she sensed a grave danger with the presence of a second Queen of Pryth and her army. More than ever, Erryn wished she had remained a simple orphan girl who lived free, even if it meant scrounging for every meal and sleeping cold. Crowns, even nonexistent ones like hers, were nothing but shackles of gold and misery.