The Queen of Nothing (The Folk of the Air Book 3)

Fear steals my breath. Not only do I not have a weapon with the range of his sword, but it’s unimaginable to win in battle against the person who taught me nearly everything I know. And looking at him, I can tell he’s come to fight.

I draw the cloak more closely around me, inexpressibly glad for it. Without it, I would have no chance.

“When did you know it was me and not Taryn?” I ask.

“Later than I ought,” he says conversationally, taking a step toward me. “But I wasn’t looking, was I? No, it was a little thing. Your expression when you saw that map of the isles of Elfhame. Just that and every other thing you’d said and done went slant, and I saw they all belonged to you.”

I am grateful to know he didn’t guess from the start. Whatever he’s planned, he had to do it hastily, at least. “Where’s the Ghost?”

“Garrett,” he corrects, mocking me with part of the Ghost’s true name, the name the Ghost never told me, even when I might have used it to countermand the orders he’d received from Madoc. “Even if you live, you’ll never stop him in time.”

“Whom did you send him after?” My voice shakes a little, imagining Cardan escaping from Madoc’s camp only to be shot in his own palace as he was once almost shot in his own bed.

Madoc’s smile is all sharp teeth and satisfaction, as though I am being taught a lesson. “You’re still loyal to that puppet. Why, Jude? Wouldn’t it be better if he took an arrow through the heart in his own hall? You cannot believe he makes a better High King than I would.”

I look Madoc in the eye, and my mouth makes the words before I can snatch them back. “Maybe I believe that it’s time for Elfhame to be ruled by a queen.”

He laughs at that, a bark of surprise. “You think Cardan will just hand over his power? To you? Mortal child, surely you know better. He exiled you. He reviled you. He will never see you as anything but beneath him.”

It’s nothing I haven’t thought myself, yet his words still fall like blows.

“That boy is your weakness. But worry not,” Madoc continues. “His reign will be short.”

I take some satisfaction in the fact that Cardan was here, under his nose, and that he got away. But everything else is awful. The Ghost is gone. The Roach is poisoned. I’ve made mistakes. Even now, Vivi and Taryn and possibly Heather wait for me across the snow, growing more and more worried the closer dawn creeps to the horizon.

“Surrender, child,” Madoc says, looking as though he feels a little sorry for me. “It’s time to submit to your punishment.”

I take a step backward. My hand goes to my knife on instinct, but fighting him when he is in armor and his weapon has the superior reach is a bad idea.

He gives me an incredulous look. “Will you defy me to the last? When I get ahold of you, I am going to keep you in chains.”

“I never wanted to be your enemy,” I say. “But I didn’t want to be in your power, either.” With that, I take off through the snow. I do the one thing I told myself I would never do.

“Do not run from me!” he shouts, a horrible echo of his final words to my mother.

The memory of her death makes my legs go faster. Clouds of air gasp from my lungs. I hear him barreling after me, hear the grunt of his breaths.

As I run, my hopes of losing him in the woods diminish. No matter how I zig and zag, he doesn’t let up. My heart thunders in my chest, and I know that, above all things, I can’t lead him to my sisters.

It turns out I am far from done with making mistakes.

One breath, two breaths. I draw my knife. Three breaths. I turn.

Because he isn’t expecting it, he crashes toward me. I get under his guard, stabbing him in his side, striking where the plates of his armor meet. The metal still takes the better part of the blow, but I see him wince.

Cocking back his arm, he backhands me into the snow.

“You were always good,” he says, looking down at me. “Just never good enough.”

He’s right. I learned a lot about swordplay from him, from the Ghost, but I didn’t study it for the better part of an immortal life. And over most of the last year, I was busy learning to be a seneschal. The only reason I made it as long as I did in our last fight is that he was poisoned. The only reason I beat Grima Mog is that she didn’t expect me to be very good at all. Madoc has my measure.

Also, against Grima Mog, I was wielding a much longer knife.

“I don’t suppose you’re willing to make this more sportsmanlike?” I say, rolling to my feet. “Maybe you could fight with one hand behind your back, to even the odds.”

He grins, circling me.

Then he swings, leaving me only to block. I feel the effort all down my arm. It’s obvious what he’s doing, but it’s still devastatingly effective. He’s wearing me down, making me block and dodge again and again, while never letting me close enough to strike him. By keeping me focused on defense, he’s exhausting me.

Despair starts to creep in. I could turn and run again, but I’d be in the same situation as before, running without anywhere to run to. As I meet his blows with my pathetic dagger, I realize how few choices I have and how they will continue to shrink.

It’s not long before I falter. His sword slices against the cloak covering my shoulder. Mother Marrow’s fabric is unscathed.

He pauses in surprise, and I strike for his hand. It’s a cheat move. But I draw blood, and he roars.

Grabbing the cloak, he winds it around his hand, hauling me toward him. The ties choke me, then rip free. His sword sinks into my side, into my stomach.

I look up at him for a moment, eyes wide.

He seems as surprised as I feel.

Somehow, despite knowing better, part of me still believed he would pull a killing blow.

Madoc, who was my father ever since he murdered my father. Madoc, who taught me how to swing a sword to actually hit someone and not just their blade. Madoc, who sat me on his knee and read to me and told me he loved me.

I fall to my knees. My legs have collapsed under me. His blade comes free, slick with my blood. My leg is wet with it. I am bleeding out.

I know what happens next. He’s going to deliver the final blow. Lopping off my head. Stabbing through my heart. The strike that’s a kindness, really. After all, who wants to die slowly when you can die fast?

Me.

I don’t want to die fast. I don’t want to die at all.

He raises his sword, hesitates. My animal instincts kick in, pushing me to my feet. My vision swims a little, but adrenaline is on my side.

“Jude,” Madoc says, and for the first time that I can recall, there’s fear in his voice. Fear I don’t understand.

Then three black arrows fly past me across the icy field. Two whiz over him, and the other strikes him in the shoulder of his sword arm. He howls, switches hands, and looks for his attacker. For a moment, I am forgotten.

Another arrow comes out of the darkness. This one hits him square in the chest. It strikes through his armor. Not deeply enough to kill him, but it’s got to hurt.

From behind a tree, Vivi steps into view. Beside her is Taryn, wearing Nightfell on her hip. And with them, another person, who turns out not to be Heather at all.

Grima Mog, sword drawn, sits astride a ragwort pony.