Queen Glaciana Frostborne Alpineglow's Arc

Chapter 5 of 33

Six days after Victor left her mountain, his first sealed letter came by snowy owl. Glaciana broke the silver wax with her thumb. She read it twice, then hid it in her ledger. She needed to answer, but she had no safe way. Her court read everything that crossed the gates. A queen's letter to a foreign king would not stay quiet for long. She tried the simplest plan first. She wrote her reply and gave it to a stable boy to carry down. She kept her name off it. She sealed it plain. She thought a servant's letter would slip through unwatched. It did not slip through. Two of her guards found it at the gate. They knew the king of Alpineglow had climbed her mountain days before. They knew their queen ruled alone and worried for her. So they carried the letter straight to her rooms, meaning to protect her from a stranger's trick. Garrett knelt before her, the letter in his gloved hand. He was one of her royal guards, brown-haired, steady, the sort who never guessed wrong. "Your majesty, someone tried to send this in secret," he said. "We stopped it. We won't let anyone reach you unseen." He did not know he held her own words. Glaciana's face went hot. Her plan had failed, and worse, her guards now watched every letter twice as close. She could not scold them. They had done their duty well. That was the problem. Kira leaned in the doorway, tail flicking. Her best friend and maid missed nothing. Kira had sucked snake poison from Glaciana's leg once and earned the right to tease her forever. "A king climbs the whole mountain," Kira said, grinning, "and now secret letters fly at the gate. My, my." "Kira," Glaciana warned. "I'm happy for you." Kira's grin softened. "You've been alone up here too long." She dropped her voice so Garrett could not hear. "Give the letters to me. I run every corridor in this keep. I know which walls have ears. No one questions where a maid goes." Glaciana looked at the letter in Garrett's hand, then at Kira. Her guards would search any stranger. They would never search their queen's own maid. She thanked Garrett and told him he had done right. She took back the letter herself. Then she gave it to Kira. From that night, Kira carried every letter to the owl and back. The court never knew. Glaciana wrote to Victor freely, and his sealed answers reached her hand alone. The secret held. But Kira now knew everything. And Kira could not stop smiling at every message, every closed door. Glaciana watched her friend beam across the hall and felt her stomach tighten. A secret was only as safe as the one person who could not hide her joy.