The Winter Queen

[Guest guest]

This is a rough draft of a story based on one of the dreams I mentioned. It needs some polish but I don't have time for that at the moment. If anyone reads it and catches typos or other errors, let me know. I'll touch it up before long, soon as I get my printer working again.

Note: there is some cussing in this one in keeping with one of the characters.

A Bad Day for Some 11/04/10

It was cold at the front of the century old trading post. The wood burning stove was in the back outside my office and its heat stayed close to home. It was late winter yet still the air was cold enough to fog my breath and stiffen my fingers as they fumbled over the week’s sales book. Not that there was much to tally since custom came as infrequently as power down the lines these days. Raucous laughter from the card table by the stove broke my concentration. Four men lurked at the table, amusing themselves by cheating at cards and telling lies. Large men, ragged and dirty, in so need of a wash I could almost smell them sixty feet away. I’d have to open the window and back door to my office later to air out after them. A white ceramic jug of rotgut moonshine sat upon the table, and battered shotguns leaned against the walls, as my self describe security guards protected myself and my wares. If they only knew. The heavy inner door a few feet in front of my station at the register opened, blocking my view of who entered my establishment. I’d neither heard nor seen anyone approach so my right hand casually slid down to the cut down double-barrel under the counter. I hoped my fingers had enough feeling to shoot straight. My guards in the back were oblivious. The lady appeared around the door, looked about the store until her gaze settled upon me. She smiled and closed the door behind her. My hand returned to the counter top. I wouldn't have to shoot just yet, which was good because that beast was hard on my wrist, and it was loaded with lead and likely to only irritate my customer. She was dressed in clothes more than a century out of date. Her 1900’s dress was mostly a dark royal blue with black highlights and a high collar that nearly brushed her jaw. Fine gloves of the same blue and black theme graced her hands. A black hat with a blue ribbon wrapped just above the brim sat atop her head at a jaunty angle. Midnight black hair framed a face of ice white skin, large amber eyes and a small expressive mouth. “Has my package arrived good sir?†the lady asked. Her voice was smooth as wind driven snow. It carried to the back of the store. The four men forgot all about their game and stared wantonly. “It has,†I replied, my breath fogging the air more than it had before. The lady excitedly placed her hands on the counter. One was empty, the other held a small pouch, my payment for services rendered. I crouched behind the counter and pulled a blanket off a wicker basket. Inside was the small, plainly wrapped package the lady had come for. I stood with it and placed it before her on the counter, noticing yet again the elegant calligraphy in a language I could barely understand. The lady picked up the package, roughly the size of a paperback book, and shook it gently beside her ear. She seemed as pleased with what she heard as it disturbed me. The four men in the back were rising to their feet. “Is there anything else I can help you with?†I asked out of habit and regretted it instantly. “You know there is,†the lady giggled. The smile she wore reminded me of the finely scrimshawed ivory handle of the straight razor in my shaving kit at home. “Sorry, but that’s still not happening,†I replied. Her laughter contained the same genuine mirth a cat might grace upon a mouse. She waved goodbye and exited through the heavy door. I could see her standing on the porch waiting for someone. “Who’s the skank?†grunted the first brute to reach my counter. He could see her through the window, his face a mask of feral lechery. “No one you should bother about,†I said honestly. “Bullshit,†came the witty reply. His cronies guffawed. “Just because you ain’t man enough to hit up on it doesn’t mean I’m not†“We’re not more like,†said one of the others. I thought for a moment the first one, their leader by virtue of being the largest, meanest, and smelliest, was going to deck him. Instead the brute glared at his mate a moment, then laughed saying he got first dibs, then the rest could have her. They exited the store and the leader sidled up to the lady. The rest surrounded her, blocking the steps on the end and my view from the window. I could hear the leader’s voice, but not the lady’s rebuff. The leader roared at whatever she said. The lady could handle herself I knew, but four to one I wasn’t so sure. I noticed the men had left their shotguns in the back, so I picked up my revolver, which had lain beside my blunderbuss and made for the door. No sooner had stepped onto the porch when I heard the lady scream. She fell the few feet down from the rail-less porch to land in a most unladylike fashion in the remnants of a mud puddle. The men jumped down from the porch, surrounding her before she could rise to her feet. Their laughter spoke of the cruelties dancing in their heads.

Then the Winter Queen arrived.

She was suddenly just there, close behind the leader. Now, I don’t mean Winter Queen as some title from the fair or what some crazy woman fancies herself. She was THE Winter Queen. Damn the bastards for bringing that kind of trouble to my doorstep. She was angry, too. You could feel it even though you couldn’t see her, not straight on anyway. At the edge of your sight you might see a fractional glimpse of a tall and terrible entity, but look straight at her and she was a blur as a shard of thin ice distorting the view beyond. Perhaps it was simply the mind blotting out what it couldn’t comprehend. I’d seen her once before clear as day, when she was in a good mood, well, I should say a hospitable mood toward me. To her, she was in the good mood now. The brutes were frozen in terror at the sight. They wanted to run, I could see them fighting to, that and scream, but they couldn’t. That’s when her gaze fell upon me as well. It was like a tsunami of liquid nitrogen. My breath crackled in the air as it froze, falling with a whisper of sleet to the weather wooden boards of the porch. The lady said something. I recognized a few a word or two, but Sylvan is a bloody hard language for humans to fathom, its concepts being literally alien to the human mind. The Winter Queen’s gaze softened to a mere stream sized torrent of water from the arctic depths. “Mind your business, shopkeeper,†the Winter Queen’s voice said directly to my mind leaving the chill imprint of the words upon the gray matter itself. I nodded and hurried back inside. I caught the spring loaded outer door to keep it from slamming, and bringing attention back to myself. Leaving the eyehook dangling, I close the heavy inner door as quickly as silence permitted and pushed the bolt home and made my way to my office in back. Their kind provided me with more custom than the humans in these parts. My trading post is kind of a neutral ground where they can come to trade now and then. I’ve gotten pretty used to their kind and they to me, but still they are touchy and not to be trifled with. I warn folks now and then to be careful about who they meet around here and in the woods. But they just laugh at the crazy rustic who runs a store in the middle of nowhere. Like I’d warned those very four many just this morning: Don’t trifle with the fey.