Snow fell upon Wallowdale before the sun had fully set.
It came softly at first.
White flakes drifted between the ruined houses and settled upon the shoulders of the freed prisoners. Children reached for them out of instinct. A few smiled.
Then the cold entered the village.
Water froze inside buckets. Frost spread across doors and window frames. The mud beneath the road hardened until each footprint became fixed in the earth.
The people of Wallowdale stopped celebrating.
Beyond the northern fields, the advancing storm swallowed the forest one tree at a time.
A horn sounded from within it.
Low.
Distant.
Patient.
The old woman in the green cloak turned from the storm.
“Inside,” she ordered. “Everyone who can walk, help those who cannot. Bring firewood, blankets, and every lamp that remains.”
The villagers obeyed without question.
Grazim watched the sudden change move through them. Moments earlier, they had been embracing the returned prisoners. Now they moved with the speed of people who had rehearsed disaster many times.
“Who is the Queen of Winter?” he asked.
The old woman looked at him.
“One of the reasons your world fell.”
“Our world?”
“All worlds belong to the living until they surrender them.”
Her answer gave him little comfort.
Marrick approached, supporting a wounded miner.
“Mother Elira, the meeting hall still has most of its roof.”
“Take the injured there,” she said. “Use the old grain house for everyone else. Break the floorboards if we need more wood.”
Marrick nodded and continued toward the village center.
The woman turned back to Grazim.
“My name is Elira Venn. I kept the old stories before Gorvath came.”
“A historian?”
“A criminal, according to those who rule us.”
Her eyes moved to the symbol hanging from Grazim’s neck.
“Come. You and your companions need shelter, and Wallowdale needs answers.”
“We have very few.”
“Then perhaps I have kept some for you.”
The village meeting hall had once been the largest building in Wallowdale.
The orcs had used it as a storehouse and sleeping quarters. Their banners still hung from the rafters, black cloth marked with a red circle surrounding a jagged crown.
Kaylor tore the first one down as he entered.
The cloth felt oily between his fingers.
“What does this symbol mean?”
Elira looked at it with disgust.
“The Crown of Dominion.”
“Gorvath’s banner?”
“No. Gorvath was a jailer with delusions of importance.”
She pointed toward the iron plates still attached to the walls.
“The crown belongs to those above him.”
“Who?” Fendor asked.
Elira lowered her voice, although everyone nearby was already listening.
“The Lords of the Fallen Age.”
Silence spread through the hall.
The villagers arranged blankets along the walls while fires were lit in old braziers. Former prisoners sat beside relatives who barely recognized them. Wounds were washed. Food was divided into portions far too small for the number gathered.
Hexen stood near the doorway in borrowed clothing, watching the snow thicken outside.
The transformations had left him exhausted. His face appeared pale beneath the grime, and his hands trembled when he thought no one was looking.
A little girl approached him carrying a wooden bowl.
“You are the bear.”
Hexen looked down at her.
“Sometimes.”
She held out the bowl.
It contained thin broth with several pieces of root floating in it.
“My mother says you need this.”
“Your mother should keep it.”
“She said you would say that.”
Hexen looked across the hall.
A woman seated beside the injured miners watched him. She gave a tired nod.
He accepted the bowl.
“Thank you.”
The girl remained where she was.
“Can you become a squirrel?”
Hexen paused with the bowl halfway to his mouth.
“I do not know.”
“Can you try?”
“Not at the moment.”
She considered this.
“Later, then.”
Hexen watched her return to her family.
For the first time since awakening, he smiled without irony.
Near the central fire, Isamu helped set the arm of a man injured during the escape. He worked without speaking, his movements precise and gentle.
The man studied him.
“Were you a healer?”
“I do not remember.”
“You know what you are doing.”
“My hands do.”
The man glanced at Isamu’s curved blade resting nearby.
“Your hands know many things.”
Isamu tied the splint in place.
“More than I do.”
Across the hall, Fendor repaired his arrows.
He had recovered several shafts from the mines, but many were cracked or bent. The villagers brought him feathers, cord, and small pieces of straight wood.
A boy watched him work.
“Did you really fire an arrow off a sword and hit the red stone?”
Fendor did not look up.
“Yes.”
“Did you plan it?”
“Yes.”
Nethnarel sat beside him, attempting to restore her hair to its original color with small applications of magic.
“No, he did not.”
Fendor tightened the binding around an arrowhead.
“I saw the shot.”
“Immediately before making it.”
“That is when one generally sees a shot.”
“You stared at the arrow afterward.”
“I was assessing the result.”
“You looked terrified.”
The boy’s eyes widened.
Fendor turned toward Nethnarel.
“Is your hair becoming greener?”
Nethnarel touched her head.
It was.
The boy laughed.
For several moments, the sound seemed out of place in Wallowdale.
Then other children joined him.
The laughter moved through the hall like warmth.
Elira watched them from the far side of the central fire.
“This village has forgotten that sound,” she said.
Kaylor sat across from her.
His sword rested over his knees. He had cleaned the blade twice, but faint red marks remained where it had struck Gorvath’s crystal.
“What did Gorvath mean when he called us the returned ones?”
Elira studied the six.
Grazim stood beside Kaylor. Hexen joined them with the empty bowl. Fendor and Nethnarel moved closer, followed by Isamu.
The old woman reached into her cloak and removed the carved stone she had shown them outside.
Six figures surrounded a mountain.
She placed it upon the table.
“This symbol was once known across the world.”
“Whose was it?” asked Grazim.
“The First Company.”
None of them reacted.
Elira had expected something else.
“You remember nothing?”
“Names,” said Kaylor. “Pieces of skill. Fragments when we fight.”
“Visions,” Grazim added.
“Feelings,” said Hexen.
Nethnarel raised one hand.
“Unreliable magical phenomena.”
Fendor glanced at her green hair.
“Those do not appear to be memories.”
“They might be,” said Nethnarel. “I may have been extremely colorful.”
Elira waited until they quieted.
“The First Company stood against the darkness when the old kingdoms still believed they could win. Six champions gathered from different lands. They broke sieges. Freed cities. Killed things that entire armies feared to name.”
“Were they us?” Isamu asked.
“The songs do not describe their faces. Those records were destroyed first.”
“Why?” asked Hexen.
“Because the conquerors understood that hope survives through names. A king can be killed. A city can be burned. But if children remember the person who once defeated a tyrant, the tyrant never feels entirely safe.”
Elira touched the carved symbol.
“So they removed the names. They broke the statues. They killed the singers. They burned every book that described the six.”
“Every book?” Fendor asked.
“Not every book.”
A faint pride entered her voice.
Kaylor leaned forward.
“What happened to the First Company?”
Elira looked into the fire.
“They marched against the Lords of the Fallen Age.”
“And lost,” Grazim said.
“Yes.”
The single word settled heavily among them.
Outside, the wind pressed snow against the walls.
Elira continued.
“No one agrees on where the final battle occurred. Some say beneath the Black Citadel. Some say beyond the gates of death itself. The last surviving song says the six reached the throne of the enemy and were betrayed.”
“By whom?” Nethnarel asked.
“That verse was lost.”
“Convenient.”
“Most history is inconveniently damaged.”
Hexen looked toward the orc banner Kaylor had torn down.
“And after they died?”
“The kingdoms fell one by one. Some surrendered. Some fought until nothing remained. The conquerors divided the world among their servants.”
“The Ice Queen,” Fendor said.
Elira nodded.
“She rules the northern wastes and everything the winter can reach. Her true name has been forbidden so long that even her servants call her only the Queen of Winter.”
“What is she?” asked Kaylor.
“Old.”
“That is not an answer.”
“It is the safest answer.”
Elira traced one finger over the carved mountain.
“She was once mortal, according to one story. According to another, she was born beneath the first glacier. Some say she was a queen who sacrificed her kingdom for immortality. Others say she is only the mask worn by something sleeping beneath the ice.”
“And she controls Wallowdale?” Grazim asked.
“Not directly. Gorvath paid tribute to her servants. Ore, weapons, prisoners. Anyone taken from the northern roads eventually passed through his mines.”
“Then breaking the mines cost her something,” Isamu said.
“It embarrassed her.”
Elira looked toward the shuttered windows.
“That may be worse.”
Kaylor rose.
“How many fighters does the village have?”
Marrick answered from nearby.
“Before the mines, nearly forty.”
“And now?”
“Eight who can hold a weapon. Twelve more if you count those who can barely stand.”
Kaylor’s jaw tightened.
“We cannot defend this place against an army.”
“No,” Elira said.
“Then the villagers must leave.”
A murmur moved through the hall.
Marrick stepped closer.
“Leave for where?”
“South.”
“The southern road belongs to slavers.”
“East, then.”
“The forest is watched.”
“West?”
“Cliffs and poisoned marsh.”
Kaylor looked at Elira.
“You said the Queen controls everything the winter can reach. How far can it reach?”
Elira did not answer.
The wind struck the meeting hall.
One of the shutters burst inward.
Snow flew across the floor.
People cried out as the nearest fire dimmed.
Grazim and Isamu forced the shutter closed. Ice had already formed along its edges.
Fendor examined the frost.
“It is moving against the wind.”
Nethnarel held one hand near it without touching.
“Magic.”
“Can you stop it?” Hexen asked.
“Possibly.”
Nethnarel concentrated.
A small flame appeared over her palm. It burned blue, then orange, then produced the unmistakable smell of cinnamon.
The frost continued spreading.
“Possibly not.”
Grazim placed his hand against the ice.
The symbol on his chest warmed.
For a moment, the frost receded around his fingers.
Elira noticed.
“The old powers remember you.”
Grazim withdrew his hand.
“I wish they would introduce themselves.”
A commotion rose near the entrance.
One of the villagers pulled open the door. A young woman stumbled inside carrying a boy wrapped in a blanket.
Ice covered the child’s eyelashes.
“They came through the north field,” she gasped. “Little things with wings. They took Brenner and Sal. They froze Tomas where he stood.”
Fendor was already reaching for his bow.
“How many?”
“I do not know. The snow hid them.”
Elira closed her eyes.
“Ice pixies.”
Hexen frowned.
“Pixies?”
“Do not let the name comfort you.”
A sharp sound struck the roof.
Then another.
Something scraped across the wooden shingles.
The villagers looked upward.
A small face appeared in the smoke opening.
It was beautiful in the way a knife could be beautiful.
Blue skin. White eyes. A crown of icicles rising from silver hair.
The creature smiled.
Fendor fired.
The pixie vanished before the arrow reached it.
The shaft passed through the opening into the storm.
Laughter surrounded the meeting hall.
Dozens of high voices.
The roof shook beneath many tiny feet.
“Move away from the walls!” Kaylor shouted.
The windows shattered inward.
Ice pixies poured into the hall.
They were no larger than children’s dolls, each carried by translucent wings that scattered frost into the air. Some wielded narrow bows made from bone. Others carried wands of frozen wood.
Their arrows were needles of ice.
The first volley struck the floor, walls, and people huddled near the fires. Wherever the needles landed, frost burst outward.
Grazim raised his hammer.
Golden light spread across the nearest group of villagers as ice struck around them.
Kaylor overturned the table, creating a barrier for the children.
Fendor fired rapidly, but the pixies twisted through the air with impossible speed. His first arrow missed. His second clipped a wing. The creature spun into the wall and shattered like a dropped statue.
It did not bleed.
Hexen seized a burning brand from the brazier and swung it through a cluster of attackers.
The pixies scattered.
“They dislike fire!”
“So do most things made of ice!” Nethnarel called.
She released a wave of flame.
For one glorious instant, it traveled exactly where she intended.
Three pixies melted into steam.
Then the fire curved upward and ignited the remaining orc banner.
Kaylor glanced back.
“Could you avoid burning the building?”
“I am attempting to save it from freezing.”
“Those are not the only choices.”
Isamu leapt onto a bench and struck one pixie from the air with the flat of his hand. He turned, caught another by the wrist, and redirected its frozen wand toward a third.
A bolt of ice crossed the hall.
Both pixies froze together and fell.
Isamu released the first before the frost reached his fingers.
Outside, something howled.
Not a wolf.
Something larger.
The sound was answered from the opposite side of the village.
Then from behind the hall.
Elira’s expression changed.
“The pixies are marking the prey.”
“For what?” Grazim asked.
The front doors exploded inward.
A white wolf filled the opening.
Its shoulders stood higher than a man’s waist. Frost smoked from its jaws. Its eyes burned with the same pale light Grazim had seen within the undead knight.
Behind it came another.
And another.
The first wolf lunged into the hall.
Kaylor met it behind the overturned table. Its weight drove him backward, claws tearing grooves through the floorboards.
The creature snapped at his face.
Kaylor wedged his sword between its jaws.
The wolf’s breath froze the blade.
Cracks of ice spread toward his hands.
Hexen threw himself against the animal’s side.
His body changed in motion.
Dark fur erupted across his arms. His spine bent. By the time he struck the wolf, he had become the bear again.
The two beasts crashed through the doorway and disappeared into the snow.
Grazim charged after them.
Outside, Wallowdale had vanished.
The village remained beneath his feet, but the storm had swallowed every building beyond a few paces. Shadows moved through the white. Wolves circled. Pixies darted above the rooftops, their laughter carried by the wind.
Hexen and the white wolf rolled across the road, claws and teeth tearing at one another.
Grazim reached them and struck the wolf’s shoulder.
Golden light burned through its fur.
The creature recoiled.
It stared at Grazim, and a woman’s voice emerged from its mouth.
“So the priest returns.”
Grazim froze.
The wolf smiled.
Its jaws moved around words they should not have been capable of forming.
“Does your god still whisper from his grave?”
Grazim raised his hammer.
“Come closer and ask him.”
He swung.
The wolf dissolved into snow before the weapon struck.
Hexen rose from the road, blood staining the fur along his side.
All around them, the other wolves stopped moving.
Their heads turned north.
The storm opened.
A road of black ice stretched through the fields.
At its far end stood a woman seated upon a throne carried by four enormous white wolves.
Her gown flowed like falling snow. A crown of jagged ice rose above her pale face. Long white hair moved around her despite the stillness at the center of the storm.
Beside the throne stood two figures.
One was tall and thin, wrapped in dark robes. No face showed beneath its hood. Its hands were covered in black gloves, and a faint whisper seemed to follow every movement.
The other was a warrior in silver armor, her body surrounded by drifting frost.
Elira emerged from the meeting hall.
Her face became colorless.
“Lady Frost,” she whispered.
The armored woman looked toward the old storyteller.
She smiled.
The hooded figure raised its head.
Nethnarel stepped into the road behind Grazim.
The whispers around the figure grew louder.
“Dark Voice,” Elira said.
The Queen of Winter regarded the six heroes.
She seemed neither surprised nor afraid.
Only curious.
“I watched your graves for centuries,” she said.
Her voice carried across the village without effort.
“And still, you find ways to disappoint me.”
Kaylor, Fendor, and Isamu joined Grazim and Nethnarel in the road. Hexen abandoned the bear’s shape and rose painfully beside them as a man.
The six stood together before Wallowdale.
The Queen’s gaze passed over each of them.
“No memories,” she said. “No crowns. No armies. Barely enough power to kill a corrupted jailer.”
Her attention settled upon Kaylor.
“And yet you still arrange yourselves in the same order.”
Kaylor tightened his grip on his sword.
“You knew us.”
“I watched you die.”
“What killed us?”
The Queen smiled faintly.
“You are not ready to remember.”
She lifted one pale hand.
The wolves surrounding the village lowered themselves to attack.
Grazim stepped forward.
“Then why come here?”
“To see whether the rumors were true.”
Her eyes moved toward the freed villagers gathered behind the heroes.
“And to correct an error.”
The temperature dropped.
People screamed as frost climbed the walls of the meeting hall.
The Queen continued.
“Give me the villagers. Return to your mountain. Sleep until the world ends.”
“No,” said Kaylor.
It was a simple answer.
The Queen looked almost amused.
“I did not ask for your lives.”
“You were going to take them anyway,” said Fendor.
“Eventually.”
Nethnarel raised one hand. Magic trembled around her fingers.
Dark Voice turned toward her.
The whispering beneath its hood sharpened.
Words entered Nethnarel’s thoughts.
Little spark.
Lost flame.
Do you remember how brightly you burned?
Nethnarel’s magic flickered.
For an instant, she saw a tower surrounded by purple fire.
She stood at its summit.
Dark Voice stood across from her.
Both of them were laughing.
Then the vision broke.
Nethnarel stumbled.
Dark Voice bowed slightly.
“We have unfinished music,” it said.
Its voice came from everywhere except beneath the hood.
Nethnarel steadied herself.
“I dislike you already.”
“You disliked me before.”
“Then at least I am consistent.”
The Queen lowered her hand.
The wolves charged.
At the same moment, Elira drove her staff into the frozen road.
Green light burst from the old wood.
The snow around the village erupted upward, not as ice but as vines. Roots tore through the hardened earth and wrapped around the legs of the charging wolves.
Several fell.
The Queen turned toward Elira.
“You kept more than songs.”
Elira gripped the staff with both hands.
“Run!” she shouted to the heroes.
Kaylor looked back.
“We are not leaving you.”
“You cannot defeat her here!”
The villagers began retreating toward the southern houses.
Elira pointed toward the mountain.
“The old road beneath the ice! The entrance is above the mines!”
The Queen’s expression changed.
For the first time, she appeared concerned.
Lady Frost drew her sword.
“Stop them.”
The silver-armored warrior stepped from beside the throne and vanished into the storm.
Fendor saw the movement.
“Mountain trail!”
He fired into the white.
An arrow struck metal somewhere beyond sight.
Lady Frost laughed.
Isamu looked toward the villagers.
“We cannot lead the wolves to them.”
Grazim understood.
They had to draw the attack away from Wallowdale.
“North,” he said. “Toward the old road.”
Kaylor raised his sword toward the Queen.
“This is not finished.”
“No,” she replied. “It has only begun again.”
The six ran.
They left Wallowdale through the northern fields with the wolves behind them and ice pixies filling the sky. Elira’s vines broke one after another beneath the weight of the storm.
Fendor fired while moving.
Isamu guided the others between abandoned walls and frozen irrigation ditches. Grazim remained near Hexen, whose wounds slowed him. Kaylor guarded the rear, his sword striking white shapes that emerged from the snow.
Nethnarel ran beside him.
Dark Voice appeared for an instant within the storm.
A black hand extended from its robes.
Nethnarel released a bolt of magic.
The two spells met above the road.
Purple and black light twisted together, forming the brief image of a door.
Something knocked from the other side.
Both sorcerers lowered their hands.
Dark Voice tilted its head.
Nethnarel stared at the fading doorway.
“I am beginning to understand why I disliked you.”
The hooded figure vanished.
The heroes reached the foothills.
The old mine entrances had collapsed, but the storm revealed another path higher on the slope. A wall of blue ice covered the mountainside, smooth and nearly vertical.
Behind it, faint golden light shone through the frozen depths.
“The entrance,” Grazim said.
“There is no entrance,” Fendor replied.
Hexen placed both hands against the ice.
“This was once stone.”
“Can you break it?” Kaylor asked.
“Not quickly.”
Wolves emerged from the storm below.
Dozens.
Lady Frost walked among them, Fendor’s arrow protruding from her shoulder. She pulled it free and examined the bloodless point.
“Nowhere left to run.”
Nethnarel pressed her palm against the ice.
Her magic spread into it, violet veins moving beneath the surface.
“I may be able to melt it.”
Hexen looked at her.
“Your fire smells like cinnamon.”
“It still burns.”
Grazim placed his glowing symbol beside Nethnarel’s hand.
Golden warmth entered the ice.
Kaylor added the light of his sword.
Hexen summoned what remained of the heat within his changing blood.
The frozen wall began to steam.
“Faster,” Fendor said.
He fired at the approaching wolves.
Isamu stood beside him, knocking ice arrows from the air with his blade.
The opening widened.
Not enough.
Lady Frost raised her sword.
The snow gathered above the heroes, forming hundreds of sharp, suspended shards.
Nethnarel looked over her shoulder.
“That seems unpleasant.”
“Continue,” Grazim said.
The shards fell.
Kaylor stepped between them and the others.
His sword blazed.
A wall of pale light appeared above the slope.
The ice struck it like rain upon glass.
Cracks spread through the barrier.
Kaylor dropped to one knee.
“I cannot hold it!”
The ice wall before them split.
Hexen drove both hands into the opening and pulled. The bear’s strength surged through his human form. The crack widened enough for a person to pass.
“Inside!”
Fendor entered first and turned to cover the others.
Isamu followed.
Nethnarel slipped through, her coat smoking from her own magic.
Grazim pushed Hexen into the opening.
Kaylor remained beneath the failing shield.
Lady Frost advanced.
“You cannot hide in her labyrinth forever.”
Grazim seized Kaylor by the shoulder and pulled him backward.
The shield shattered.
They fell through the opening together.
Hexen and Isamu dragged them deeper into the passage.
Nethnarel released one final blast against the weakened ice.
The wall collapsed.
Tons of frozen stone crashed into the entrance, sealing it behind them.
Darkness surrounded the six.
For several moments, they heard only their own breathing.
Then something laughed deeper within the mountain.
A small, bright laugh.
Another answered.
Dozens of blue lights appeared along the walls ahead.
Tiny figures unfolded their wings.
Fendor raised his bow.
Hexen leaned against the ice, exhausted.
Kaylor looked into the passage.
“What did Elira call this place?”
Grazim remembered her warning.
“The old road beneath the ice.”
Nethnarel watched the lights multiply.
“I suspect it has another name.”
Far below them, something enormous scraped six heavy feet across the stone.
The laughter stopped.
The blue lights fled into the darkness.
The heroes stood at the entrance of a frozen world beneath the mountain.
And somewhere ahead waited the road that would lead them to the Labyrinth of Wicked Souls.