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THE COUP D’ÈTAT

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Sparks fly from Kestrel’s magic arrow as it sails past the fire, gliding through the narrow gap between two swordswomen and piercing straight into the Storm Queen’s raven. It lands with an undignified squawk and a floomph of powdered snow.

“You all can do what you want,” says Kestrel. “I’m not killing one of our own.”

The queen’s best killers, twitching with anticipation of battle, their trembling weapons thirsty for blood, dart their eyes from Kestrel, to Catherine, to the dead black thing in the white snow with horror. Their white-gloved grips loose and re-tighten as Kestrel steps back beside Catherine, who crouches in a defensive position behind her shield, her perplexed eyes shimmering. In that stunned silence, there is a moment when she sees beyond the white and red uniforms, beyond the weapons, to the faces of women she used to know. The closest thing she ever had to sisters, once.

The Guard’s best daggerwoman breaks the spell, darting forward, crossing the distance in a blinding blue flash, appearing a breath away from Kestrel, her blades crossed over the archer’s throat. “She is no longer one of us,” she hisses. “And now, neither are you.”

“Really, Livia?” Kestrel grins. “I put an arrow in the eye of a man at your flank at the last battle for Lionne.” There is a popping sound, and all that remains where Kestrel stood is a phosphorescent cloud. The daggerwoman jumps back from the glowing particles, her daggers in a defensive position. “I’ve saved every one of your lives at one point or another,” calls Kestrel’s voice, disembodied several steps away from the mist.

“We have orders,” calls a shieldbearer from the front line.

“Sure, Marelde, and we’re trained to kill, not think,” says Kestrel, reappearing with a new arrow fitted to the nock of her bow, “but it was Catherine who trained you with a shield when you were ten years old.”

“Eight,” whispers Marelde.

“And you, Amie.” Kestrel’s arrow points at the forehead of a mage holding a sputtering ball of blue light. “After the northern revolt, when you had night terrors, Catherine stayed up all night to comfort you. And you, Ivet, Catherine taught you to speak Lillaise.” Ivet nods, resting her axe over her shoulder, staring at the snow.

“I never knew her, and I don’t care what she taught Ivet to say,” scoffs Elena, the youngest of them, polearm at the ready, her stance low. “She’s a traitor. She disobeyed orders, ruined a mission and disgraced the Stormguard.”

“Toujours fidèle.” Catherine sighs as all eyes turn to her. “I swore loyalty, but in war, I was never loyal to the queen. I was loyal to the woman next to me. I had no thought for Mont Lille, or a unified Eventide, when the blades swung and the arrows flew. I fought because I was afraid of what the woman next to me would think if I did not.”

“Yet you abandoned us and fled like a coward,” snarls Livia.

Catherine shoots a glare at the daggerwoman. “There are no cowards in the Stormguard. I chose to disobey so that one day, you all would have another choice. But I have … I have lived with the shame of my disloyalty to you for more than a decade, Kestrel.”

“Then make it up to me now.” Kestrel lowers her bow. “We found Julia’s whole family alive and well in Taizen Gate. They escaped and disappeared with the help of Gythians.”

Catherine’s breath catches. “Then we can waste no more time. Make your choice, ladies, and make it before the queen’s ravens find you.”

To be continued…