Aili approached the narrow portcullis of the tower. Pale stone rose out of the groundsnow. It looked like a bleached skull with a lantern jaw. The thick wooden door behind the barred maw of the tower swung aside, but the metal gate stood fast.
“Princess Aili. You were not expected for another moon. But if you come again in friendship, then I am more than happy to extend my hospitality to you. And to your sneaking soldiers.”
“Shush, Tähti. Cannot your welcome be sincere? I have longed to see you again.” With that, Aili approached the bars, gripped them with her gloved hands, and kissed the wizard. The cold of the metal gate made her cheeks flush even as her lips bloomed with warmth and the taste of herbs and incense.
“Such sweetness,” said Tähti. “Call your dogs in from the cold. I shall welcome the three of you.”
Inside, the guards eyed Tähti with suspicion. They were clearly upset at marching in the front rather than scaling the icy back wall. Such is the folly of warriors, thought Tähti. There was a fire in the courtyard. Hot lingonberry mash, hard bread, soft cheese, and mulled wine would occupy the men while Aili held court in the tower proper. As the princess ascended the ladder, Tähti gave her rump a pat from below. A gloved hand swatted down in response, but Tähti caught it, twisted and released it in one swift motion.
In the starry chamber, Aili removed her gloves to massage her wrist, while Tähti lit an array of black candles. A small flame erupted straight from one curling fingernail. The smell of molten wax brought Aili pleasant memories. This parlor trick had impressed on her last visit. In the warm upper chamber, she clutched her robes close even as Tähti’s cloak seemed to disappear with a quick wrist flick. Next came the eyelock, and the embrace. And Aili’s robes fell unbidden. The kiss reignited the bonfire between them.
Then she broke away.
“This is not what I have come for, Tähti! Not this time. My king has need of one such as you. And you are all that I know.”
Tähti scoffed. “Since when has a king in Kvenland had any say over its subjects? Let alone an exile such as I? I cannot be bothered. My work here is of greater import than you can imagine, my dear Aili. Come without escort next time, and I will show you many wonders. My, how fair you look... ”
Tähti’s bare hand brushed Aili’s cheek, when a distressed manscream issued in the window from without.
This time Tähti tore the tapestry from the hooks on which it hung. Aili stepped into the wind and saw one of her soldiers down below locked in dire combat with… what she could not say.
“Blast you, Aili. You did not warn me of the third man. I have defenses… ”
In the instant Tähti flicked the cloak back from nowhere to shoulders, Aili had already pulled on her gloves and rushed down the ladder.
Outside in the scattered snow, all three warriors were engaged, circling something that shambled along. An axe was embedded in its curdling side. But the only blood on the ground was red and all too human. One warrior held a withered forearm close. The hand looked shriveled, as if caked in salt. His gaze skewered Tähti with mistrust and hatred.
Another greataxe was lost to the creature’s moldy torso. But nothing seemed to slow it. The wound belched forth a bubbling liquid that froze in the air and fell as grey lumps into the white snow. Those lumps crawled together, fused, and disappeared into deeper drifts.
Aili stepped forward, bitter, determined. “Bring me my broadsword!” she called. One of the warriors sprinted toward the horses and promptly returned with her weapon.
As the fiend loomed over her men, she drew cold steel and flung aside the scabbard. Her first swing lopped off a chunk that would have left any man counting his life backward from three. She whirled for a second swing, knees bent, using the ice beneath the snow to her advantage. The great blade sunk, stuck, hit something harder than bone. Then a grey tendril snapped out and caught her wrist. The supple reindeer hide of her glove sizzled and smoked.
Tähti stepped between the mindless servant and Aili’s ponderous troop, raising arms in the air and chanting in a language that rang of dust and sunlight unknown for thousands of leagues. The creature’s body grew swollen and took on a slight glow from within, then gradually fell into submission. First Aili was released. Then the weird thing crept back into winter, leaving two crossed axes and a broadsword piled in a smooth ring of tundra. Tähti’s arms lowered.
Aili picked up her weapon. Tähti’s gaze lingered on the fresh notch in its blade.
“Curse ye, witch,” said the wounded man, glowering through clenched yellow teeth and gums that seeped blood.
“None set eyes on my watcher without uttering a cry of warning,” Tähti replied. “Such is its glamour. You should have told me there were three of you.”
Aili rubbed her wrist again, dropped her blackened glove in the snow, and gave a grim nod. A moment later, a dazzling head blow robbed the wizard of consciousness.
“Aye, but there were four of us,” said the wounded man to Tähti’s crumpled form.
“The last only kept his voice because he is mute.”
Mauno slept little but did much dreaming. His life had been so simple for so long. Hedda was strong, wise, beautiful. Her temper was fierce, but such was the fate of one who married a queen. He always healed — or scarred. It mattered not. Though at times she seemed far more apt to trace his scars than humor his words and desires.
The loss of her was so fresh. Too great to bear. Yet the alternative was to admit the weakness of his programming — to relinquish all and live a cold life of toil. No, it was far better to stand ready. He had watched her long enough to mirror her will.
As the dream died, he watched her ride into the northern wastes once more... then woke in a fit to a knock.
“Come,” he said as the tail of Hedda’s horse disappeared into the ceiling.
“Qu… Majesty, Princess Aili returns.”
“With the wizard?”
“She rides with five horses and five men.”
By the time Mauno was dressed and escorted to the great hall, Tähti had begun to stir and murmur. But the incantations were silenced with a crack to the jaw from the wounded man’s one good hand — a hand that now seemed doubled by the strength of its phantom twin. Tähti’s vision dissolved momentarily into a gyroscopic star field, then contracted into focus on the uninviting dawnface of Mauno.
A torchbearer stepped closer to Tähti as the examination began. A robust villager called Lalli tore away Tähti’s cloak.
Mauno leered with scorn at Tähti’s slender kneeling form. Breasts bunched into a form-fitting corset. Two lean arms with long nails were pinned back and bound. A cascade of jet-black hair ran down the full-length gown, tattered and frayed, above slender black boots.
“I ask for a wizard, and you bring me a witch?” Mauno shouted.
A guard handed him a mug of black morning tea, which he took and held steaming below the new white strands that striped his autumnleaf beard.
“Which are you, then? ‘Tis a wizard we need. Speak now.”
“Which do you fear most? For that is what I am,” Tähti answered, eyeing the one-handed man warily.
The blow came, just as expected.
“Father!” Aili strode before Mauno, still dirty from the night’s long ride. “Tähti is a wizard, and you would do well to woo this magic to aid our cause.”