Darkness carved in bone

Chapter 38

Helen

Helen knew what would come next. She didn't even need the token in her pocket to tell her that. The next thing in her path was the queen. A heavy sigh went through her as Mørk pulled her off the horse and checked if the rope around her hands still held. The gnawing pain the rope left on her skin told her that it did. He moved behind her and pulled on her hair leaving pain running through her scalp as she stumbled backward, but a hand against her left shoulder stopped her from falling uncontrolled backwards. Something cold and pointy was pushed up against her ribs. A dagger. Mørk pushed her forward as he took up position next to her, holding onto the rope. The dagger pushed itself through the fabric of her dress, the cold metal scraping against her skin. The feeling made goosebumps form across her skin and her heart raced in her chest.

Two soldiers approached them, one walked over to the horse and led it towards what had to be a stable, but the other lingered close to Mørk, unease in his eyes as he waited for some command to come from the Mååning's lips.

"Tell the queen I want to see her," he pushed the dagger closer, the cold blade tingling her skin, as he looked at her and said, "Tell her that I have brought with me a gift."

Nausea hit her as she realized that if no one intervened on her behalf, she would be dead very soon. Breathing became hard as Mørk pushed her forward, the soldier running before them and vanishing into the palace. She would die. She would fail everyone. She would doom this entire world to a cold darkness that would only bring a slow and agonizing death to them all.

"One wrong move, and you're dead," Mørk said to her, pressing the blade so it just barely punctured her skin, drawing blood. Her mind didn't register the pain from the blade, her eyes too occupied with the palace they were approaching, her eyes seeing everything, yet seeing nothing at all.

Tears pressed behind her eyes, and she let them fall. The cold bit into the tears and sent shivers of pain through her stiff skin. Perhaps it was better to die like this, under a sky that would give way to the light tomorrow, than to die in eternal darkness. If she had failed, if she had failed them all, she was perhaps allowed to cherish that her own death would not be under an eternal night.

That moment in the snow, when she had been running from Ten as he took up the fight with Mørk to buy her time to flee replayed in her mind. What if she had been wrong? What if she had been supposed to run, to save herself? Maybe Ten's role in the prophecy had been to sacrifice himself to buy her time to run. It had felt so very wrong to run away from him though, to just let him die. She had felt it in her bones, just like she had felt the rightness of every step she had taken on this path in her bones.

No, she was supposed to have ended up here. To die her even, perhaps.

The faces of her family appeared in her mind, Ten, the people of Ejfjordswerf and Sigfjordswerf, Jenny, all who would die because she had failed. All who would suffer and die in a cold dark world. For them she would at least try to not die tonight. She would at least try to find some way to stop all this.

The tears halted as she let the faces of the people she loved, the people she would fight for fill her with determination and purpose.

The determination inside her made her able to see clearly again, as Mørk began pushing her up the stairs and led her into the dark palace before her.

There were only a few candles lit in every room they entered, so the palace just appeared dark and dim to her eyes. She could make out carved wooden furniture against the walls and a red carpet under her feet, but other than that the palace was just dark. It felt dark and it smelled of darkness. Unlike any starless and moonless night Helen had experienced before, she felt that this was true darkness. Darkness that crept up on you from behind and stole small pieces of your soul. This was not the darkness she had found so alluring. This was not Tens darkness. This was the darkness of nightmares, and Helen had a feeling she would not wake up anytime soon.