Page 45 of A Land So Wide

T he beginning of the end began with a pattering of hooves, echoing their way from the wide sea, impossible to ignore.

The queen was aging.

She could feel the end’s approach in every corner of her body. In her bones, growing thin and brittle. In her blood, circulating slow and sluggish. In her heart, beating softer and less steady.

The queen had years and years ahead of her, so many decades a mortal mind might think her invincible, impermeable to time and decay, but she could hear death’s steed, riding closer, closer, ever closer.

Every day the queen heard his approach, and every day she studied her small court, fearing for them. They would need a leader. Someone strong and fierce, someone clever and ruled by logic. None were up to such a task.

Least of all Elowen.

Impulsive, brash Elowen.

It had been a mistake to change her. The queen knew that now, all too well.

So, without a suitable replacement, the queen began to plan.

She would go into the world and allow a mortal man to claim her as his bride. She would have a child with this man, a child stronger than any of her Gathered, blessed with the wild blood of a sovereign and a mortal’s temperance.

Most of the Gathered wept and begged her to not go, but Elowen watched on with flames of wounded anger burning in her eyes. Still, the queen could not be persuaded. She promised she would return with a daughter. She promised she would bring home their new queen.

Her mission did not sit well with the queen’s guard.

He had watched over her since joining the court, when Elowen had foolishly made him, and had become the queen’s protector and friend.

The aging queen was fond of the young guard.

Before she left, she promised he’d one day win her daughter’s heart, and serve as her consort for generations to come.

The queen set out for a little village on the edge of a vast body of water.

She pulled off her magic skin, worked it into a beautiful cape, and took her mortal form, young and luminous and lovely, with a scattering of stars across one cheek.

When she looked just right, she hid herself in a hollowed trunk and waited for a young man to come and claim her.

While she waited, she drew patterns on the inside of the tree, crying tears of sadness and discomfort.

She missed her kin. She could feel the bite of the Warding Stones trying to repel her.

But she would not be moved. She needed her daughter to be born here, in this world of pushings and pulls.

She needed her to stand firm, without bending or breaking.

When a hand finally reached in, she took it and allowed a young man to pull her out of the tree and into the center of his world.

It didn’t matter who he was, only that she’d fooled him.

She fooled the town, too. They believed that she was one of them, that she’d always been there, part of their community, part of their life.

They were wed that night, and only a few weeks after, the queen felt his seed take root. She felt her womb quicken, heard a second heart beat inside her, and knew, without a doubt, it was a girl.

And the queen was pleased.

She was pleased when the girl was born and came into the world looking just like her, pale and dark and covered in stars.

She was pleased as the girl grew, full of joy and smiles but also depth and stillness. It made the queen proud, seeing the woman she would become, knowing she would make a fine sovereign.

But then, one day, the queen was not pleased.

She watched her daughter notice the neighbor boy, saw the way she smiled at him, heard her laughter, gentle and soft, and knew that, despite all her careful planning, he would be her undoing.

She prepared to leave, eager to take her daughter into the wilds and save her from the disastrous curve of the neighbor boy’s smile.

As she gathered her things, she paused at the box of her daughter’s baby teeth, counting their pearly number, and remembering when each had fallen out.

It had not been that long ago. Her daughter was so very young.

Too young, the queen realized. Too young, and not at all prepared. She needed to be older, wiser, and stronger. The queen put away her bag and went back to waiting, watching, and listening to death’s approach.

Years passed.

On the day when the hoofbeats of death grew too loud for the queen to hear anything else, she pulled out her hidden cloak. They needed to escape the village, and it had to be that afternoon.

The girl had grown and, as predicted, had fallen in love with the neighbor boy. The queen knew they planned to wed. She knew her daughter’s heart would break. She knew the patient young guard would heal it.

Bundling up her cloak, the queen was about to set off after her daughter when the door to the cabin opened, revealing the silhouette of a man.

He stepped into the cabin, lunging for the cloak, and the queen’s eyes went wide with surprise.

Death had arrived for her at last.