Mercedes Lackey - Snow Queen

They all went through their belongings, though in the end they had only two things that Aleksia thought would pass muster; a mother-of-pearl comb that was in Annukka's pack, a beautiful thing carved with seaweed and waves, and a nearly finished kantele, inlaid with so many tiny bits of metal and wire that scarcely anything of the wood could be seen, that had been among Ilmari's things.

“This is stunning,” Aleksia said, touching the silk-smooth mosaic with a wondering finger. “I have never seen the like. You are an artist, Ilmari.”

“I work on this in my spare time,” the Wonder-smith said sheepishly, looking pleased. “I started it for myself, but I never liked it — I thought one day I could give it to someone I wanted to impress.” He looked up at her for a moment, and she was flattered to see frank admiration in his eyes. “Perhaps one day I can make one for you.”

She felt herself blushing, and quickly went back to the subject. “Can you work some kind of spell on them, so that they become unique as well as beautiful?” Aleksia asked anxiously.

Ilmari looked at both pieces. “Well, this is easy,” he said, finally, pointing at his kantele. “I simply work a bit of magic into it so that it plays itself. But this — ” He held the comb in his hand for a moment, muttering over it. “I cannot think what one could do with a comb — ”

“What if it were to comb hair by itself, and magically untangle all knots?” Aleksia asked, thinking back to hours of misery as a child as her nurses would, none too gently, pull and tug on her hair and her sister to get them both presentable. The Snow Witch had only the crudest of servants, and surely they were about as gentle as Aleksia's nursemaids had been. Perhaps when the Witch had young men, they would do the office, but she did not always have them.

Ilmari turned the comb over and over in his hands, considering it. “Yes,” he said, finally. “I can do that. Should I do so tonight?”

“Please. I do not want to linger here any longer than we have to.” Aleksia looked at the village and shivered. “I think their heartlessness may be catching.”

“All right then, I will prepare my forge,” the Wonder-smith said, and then smiled a little. “And do not be alarmed at what I do. I shall not harm these things, though you would not know it to watch me at work.”

Indeed, they shook off some of their own low spirits as they watched him prepare the tiny forge. He built it painstakingly from flat rocks culled from the rubble at the base of the wall. When it was done, he shoveled coals from the fire into it, and began to alternately blow on it and chant over it. Aleksia could not hear what he was chanting, and truth to tell, she did not even really try. Every Mage had his or her secrets, and deserved to be able to keep them.

As he chanted and blew, the coals glowed, brighter and hotter, until at last they were white-hot. That was when he took a small pair of tongs from his pack, the forge hammer from his belt, picked up the comb in the tongs and placed it in the fire.

It should have crumbled, or burned up, or otherwise gone to bits. It did nothing of the sort. It, too, began to glow, until it was as white as the coals. He pulled the comb out with the tongs, placed it in a flat rock, and began to hammer on it, chanting in time to his blows. It was not just random hammer strokes, either. A tap here, a tap there, a heavy overhanded blow, all in time to the chanting — there was a pattern there, but Aleksia could not discern it.

It all blended into a rhythmical whole, though, not unlike Annukka's singing.

“Annukka — do you know any songs that talk of the beauty of a girl's hair?” Lemminkal asked quietly. “If you could sing them to the beat of the hammer — ”

Annukka nodded, and blended her own music with that of the forge-song.

Ilmari raised an eyebrow at her and caught her eye. He nodded and Aleksia felt the two songs blend into one, with an unspoken communication between the two Sammi. The spell-singing built to a crescendo, and both ended on the same note, as Ilmari seized the white-hot comb and thrust it into the snow. Steam rose in clouds around it, filling the camp for a moment, and silence rang hollowly in the absence of the spell-song.

When steam stopped rising in billow from the snowdrift, Ilmari reached gingerly into it and came out with the comb. It would not be fair to say that it was untouched — somehow, it had become more sensual to look at, shining like the light of the moon in his hand. He gave it to Kaari, who, as a maiden, wore her hair unbound — and at the moment, it was rather tangled and tousled from travel.

“Let's see if I'm still good at improvising.” The Wonder-smith chuckled. “Try it, Kaari.”

Kaari pulled off her hat and headband, and gingerly touched the comb to her hair.

The thing leapt from her hand as if some invisible servant had taken it, and began gliding through the knots and tangles, leaving Kaari's tresses clean, smooth and shining, like a golden waterfall. And when she put her hand up to it, it obligingly left her hair, and lay quietly in her hand.

“Well, there is our first wonder,” Ilmari said, with a significant look at Aleksia. “From the look of you, lady, you have a cunning plan.”

“I do, and if it works, we won't need a third wonder,” the Godmother replied, looking around the fire at her companions. “Nor do I intend to keep you in the dark on this. I want you to think out your parts as you go to sleep. And here they are.

“Kaari,” she said, turning to the girl, “yours will be the hardest. My plan is that the three of you who know and love Veikko are to try to get him to recognize you, to crack the shell of magic the Witch has cast about him and get him awakened so that he had fight from within as we fight from without. I intend to use you last of all, but that means that tomorrow, and perhaps the next day, you must stay here in camp and do nothing more than to concentrate with all your heart on Veikko. You must not come down to the gate, and you must not stop thinking about him and how he used to be until we come and tell you otherwise. You remember how Ilmari told you that love has a magic all its own. Can you do that?”

Slowly, Kaari nodded.

“Let me explain this. I will use the three people with whom Veikko has the strongest bonds to try to win him free. First, you, Annukka, his mother. If you fail, on the morrow, Lemminkal will take your place with the kantele — his bond being that not only of mentor and master, but of trusted friend.” She smiled as Lemminkal flushed with pleasure. She had not mistaken it, then. She would not further embarrass the old warrior with “father-figure,” but she was certain that Lemminkal also filled that role.

“Once again, Kaari, I will ask you to remain here and bend your mind on Veikko.” She paused and pursed her lips, thinking. “Now, listen to me carefully. Even if this appears not to work, I swear to you, you will be eroding some of those walls about his heart and mind. As a tree's root slowly cracks a stone, the result might not be visible until it shatters. Do you understand me?”

Kaari nodded.

Aleksia could feel magic, Traditional and otherwise, slowly gathering about them. Even though she did not have a tale to follow, all this had the same sure and right feeling that came when a Traditional tale was coming to an end. The trouble was, being inside it, rather than outside it, she could not tell for sure if the ending was going to be a happy one.

“Now you, Kaari, we will save for the third day.” She nodded, as the young woman's cheeks flushed. “The Witch will probably think us fools by then. She will underestimate you. She does not know the strength that lies in the heart of a woman that truly loves and is loved.”