Beyond the Tower

"Oh sweet toads!" exclaims one of the the queen's lady, gloved hand flying to her open mouth, trembling. "Oh sweet toads! Oh! Skies! Oh is she-"

"Dead," Richard finishes darkly, eyes narrowing. He turns to me, fire in his eyes. "Did you do that on purpose?" he demands.

My mouth drops open in shock. "Are you serious? You think that I did that on purpose? I was just trying to prevent a war! I didn't know that would happen! If anything, you should have done in on purpose! After all, weren't you collaborating with Flor and-"

"Silence!" he thunders, looking more frightening than I have ever seen him. "If the queen is dead, then I am king and you will do as I say." He surveys the area, and upon seeing his still presumably dead sister lying on the ground beside me, his gaze softens. "I take it it didn't go as planned?"

"Unfortunately," I respond glumly.

"Miss Ivy, you will take Snow White to the stables where Aysela and is waiting. You three will return to Krwenia, to the house of the dwarfs immediately. You will not stop until you have left Mirshcon, and you will speak to no one. You-" he motions to the lady "-will stay here with me for now, and you will tell no one what you have witnessed. I am king, and if you disobey me it will be considered treason."

"But Richard," I say, quietly, reaching down to grab Snow. "Why does Aysela have to leave? Don't you love her?"

He purses his lips. "What happened her must stay here, do you understand? I believe that you did not intend for this to happen, but it is still treason, and more than enough to start a war over. And until my coronation, I will have to listen to the word of the royal advisors; if they want to start a war I cannot veto it merely by my own. I cannot have anyone associated with this here lest death be the least of the consequences. Now please, leave. Tell Flor and his brother what has happened. I will send word when it is safe to return. And please, take care of my sister."

"I will," I vow, nodding my head slightly. Then, as a foresight, I reach down to the queen and pluck the slippers right off her feet, sliding them into my bag. Without stopping to see Richard's reaction, I tighten my grip on Snow's legs and run as fast as I can.

The trip back through the graveyard is by far the scariest I've trekked. If I was scared for war before, it's nothing on how I feel now. I can't believe that the queen is dead. Did I kill her? Somehow, it's different than what happened with Alyna. Her death was planned, calculated. I hadn't wanted the queen to die, I'd merely wanted to soften the blow from a war to just my own death, not hers. I didn't know the slippers would possess her like that. I wonder if Aysela did. Did she intend for me to wear them? Did she intend for me to be the one to die?

I'm starting to get some strange looks as I hurry through town, dragging a girl behind me. I realize too late that this isn't really the best way to go about things; it might even seem like I killed Snow and now I'm going to hide the body, but it's too late. There's nothing more I can do, and I just have to get to the stables as quickly as possible.

I remember with a sort of dry humor the first conversation I ever had with Leon, in the middle of the desert when I was starving and half mad and he was questioning me about why I was in the desert, why I'd left my tower. He'd asked me if I'd killed someone, and I'd been shocked that he might think so lowly of me. Of course I hadn't killed anyone.

Not true anymore. I'm a murderer.

While I'm thinking about this, I suddenly realize that he'd asked me that because he wanted to know why I'd been cast from my tower. Why I was alone in the desert. I'd avoided the question, I'd never told him. And now I might die. Die, and nobody will ever know why I left.