Hansel Müller's Arc

Chapter 2 of 2

They never reached their horses. Hansel and Gretel stepped out of the alehouse into the night, the charred cloth folded in his fist. Two riders waited in the lane. Lantern light caught their armor. Each wore a red cape and a rose-crested shield across the chest. Royal guards. Hansel knew the crest. It belonged to the Queen. The nearer guard held out a sealed letter. "Hansel and Gretel Müller. By order of Queen Snow White." His voice came flat through the helm. "You are summoned to Rosenfeld Castle. Tonight." Hansel took the letter but did not open it. A door down the lane cracked open. He saw three commoners peer out, the same ones who had listened to his story over ale. Two children stopped their game in the mud to stare at the knights. The whole lane had gone still. People watched witch hunters get summoned by the crown, and they remembered it. "We were already riding to the castle," Hansel said. He kept his voice easy. "Save your ink." "The summons is not for the archive," the guard said. "It is for the Queen." That stopped him. He broke the seal and read. The words were short. The Queen knew about the cloth. She wanted Gretel before the court. Hansel looked at Gretel. "She named you. By name." Gretel read it over his shoulder. Her face did not move. "Then she already knows what we found." That was the problem. Hansel had wanted Kwame's old records. He had wanted to slip into the archive, dig up the coven's mark, and leave before anyone asked his name. Quiet work. Now the Queen herself had reached down and pulled them into the open. There was no quiet left. "We could ride the other way," he said. He meant it half as a joke. "No," Gretel said. "The records are locked. Only the court opens them. She is the court." She folded the letter and handed it back to him. "She wants what we want. The coven." Hansel hated how clean her logic was. He had spent twenty years staying clear of the throne. The court kept hunters at arm's length until a witch got close to the crown. Now one had. He did not know which one. But the Queen did not summon hunters over nothing. "If we go in," he said, "we don't come back out as nobodies. They'll know our faces." "They already do." Gretel nodded at the guards. "We ride." The guards turned their horses. Hansel swung into his saddle and tucked the cloth against his chest. The lane watched them leave. The alehouse door swung shut behind them. They rode through the dark until the castle rose up ahead, black against the sky. Torches burned along the wall. Two tall doors stood at the top of the steps, shut and waiting. Hansel stopped his horse at the foot of them. He had his lead now. He had no way back out. "Here," Gretel said, and dismounted.