Snow White and the Huntsman (4 page)

The black knight shook his head. He pulled his metal helmet off, brushing back his greasy brown hair with his fingers. “They were once noble warriors, my Queen.” He looked at her, seemingly almost apologetic. “We did capture two rebels. Should we put them to the sword?” he asked.

Ravenna smiled. She reached into the bowl of songbirds and plucked out another heart. She chewed it, enjoying the gentle give of the meat. “No,” she said. “I wish to interrogate them myself. Bring them here.”

The black knight signaled to a soldier in the back of the throne room. He disappeared out the massive wooden doors. Ravenna paced in front of them, feeling her breath quicken. She hadn’t gotten this far to let her kingdom fall to rebels. She would hunt them down, wherever they were. She wouldn’t stop until they were all dead, their villages charred and ruined, their children prisoners of the regime. It would take time, but she would do it. She just needed to keep her strength up. Her powers had to remain strong.

She looked out the window to the castle wall below. Peasants crowded around the trash heaps, searching through rotting pig carcasses and moldy tomatoes. A woman with a baby clutched to her chest was yelling. She grabbed a chicken bone from the little boy beside her, wrestling him for it. Ravenna watched them, flicking her metallic shimmery skirts back and forth. She and Finn were once poor
like them, gypsies living in a covered wagon. Where had the king been then? He had burned her village. He’d even killed the women, believing them to be traitors. Was she not a more benevolent leader than he?

The soldier returned, dragging two men in his wake. The older one had gray hair and deep lines around his mouth. One of his eyes was bruised and swollen. There was a gash on his arm that was still bleeding. The other was half his age, a handsome young man with broad shoulders and thick muscles that were visible even through his ripped shirt. He appeared untouched.

Ravenna strode forward. They both stared at her defiantly, their eyes ablaze from within. The older one strained against the guard’s grip. “Under your rule, we have lost everything,” he said, never taking his eyes off Ravenna. “We will not stop until this kingdom is free.”

“Not everything,” Ravenna said, considering the handsome boy standing right beside him. “Is this not your son? How dare you be so ungrateful to your Queen.” She grabbed the boy’s face, looking into his stone-gray eyes. Neither of them spoke.

For a moment, the boy let her stroke his cheek. Then, in one swift motion, he pushed the guard, throwing him off balance, reached for the guard’s dagger, and drove it into the center of Ravenna’s chest.

The room was completely silent. Everyone stared at the dagger. Ravenna nearly laughed. She couldn’t feel a thing. The power her mother had given her was so strong, so
all-consuming, even the sharpest of swords could not kill her. She pulled the dagger from her chest. The hole closed instantly. There was no blood. There was not even a mark. The skin was completely smooth where the blade had gone in.

The boy looked on in horror. “You would kill your Queen?” Ravenna asked, narrowing her blue eyes at him. She couldn’t stop herself. She felt the rage building inside her, the fury. It mixed with her blood, pulsing through her veins, making her feel stronger than she ever had before. “You have beauty and courage. But how strong is your heart?” she hissed in his ear.

She set her hand down on his chest. His face was drawn. He tried to back up, but her magic paralyzed him. She could hear his heart pounding, each beat echoing in her ears, growing louder with each passing second. Somewhere outside her, the boy’s father was begging her for mercy. She didn’t hear his words. Instead, she let the magic consume her, sweeping her away in its raging current. She leaned back, pouring her strength into her fingertips as his heartbeat sped up.
Faster
, she thought, and his heart pumped faster.
Faster
, she repeated to herself, and the beats sped up even more, one blending into the next, until the sound was so loud she could barely stand it.

The boy’s face was frantic. His eyes were bulging and red. She breathed out, using all her strength to close her fist. She could feel his heart in her hand, as if she were inside his chest. She kept closing her fingers, tighter and tighter, until her hand was balled into a fist. He grimaced in pain as she squeezed.
The hammering of his own pulse filled his ears until his heart finally burst. He fell to the ground, dead. His father knelt over him, pounding on his chest, trying to revive him.

Finn raised his sword to strike the old man, but Ravenna stopped him. “No—let him return to the duke and speak of the generosity of his Queen.” She nearly laughed as she said it. Then she started out of the throne room, Finn following close behind her.

She could barely walk. He came to her side, helping her with each step. She felt as if all the air had been taken out of her lungs. Her legs were weak, her shoulders stooped forward. She felt the skin on her face. It was now covered with fine lines.

They didn’t speak until they reached her chambers. She collapsed in her armchair, her breaths finally slowing.

Finn studied her. “Magic comes at a lofty price,” he said finally. Carefully.

Ravenna looked at her hands. There were dark brown spots on the backs of them. The skin was paper-thin. “And the expense grows,” she acknowledged. Even those few words drained her.

She knew this by now. Every time she used her powers, it aged her. That was her battle, day after day. But she had to be the all-powerful Queen. She had to be feared and respected across the kingdom, without anyone knowing how quickly her magic waned. There was only one thing that could restore her now.

“Go,” she said, her eyes meeting her brother’s. “Bring me one. Now.”

B
y the time Finn returned, Ravenna was hunched over, one hand resting on the wall to hold herself up. She didn’t dare look in the mirror. She couldn’t stand to see what had become of her face. Deep lines were now at the corners of her mouth and her eyes—she could feel them. The skin on her neck hung loose, sagging over her diamond choker.

“I have something for what ails you,” Finn said. Ravenna turned, taking in the young girl before her. “What holds more beauty than a rose?” Finn asked.

Rose strained against Finn’s grasp. Her skin was a beautiful cream color. She had big, wide-set blue eyes and blond hair. Ravenna smiled, loving everything about this one. She was so young—not even seventeen. She was so …
perfect
.

“What are you going to do to me?” the girl asked. She twisted and turned, trying to free herself. Ravenna stepped forward, her footsteps echoing in the massive stone room.
She needed this, more than anything. Not just to restore her youth and energy but also to restore her ability to lead the kingdom.
Yes
, she thought as she brought her hand to the young girl’s neck.
The people need their Queen.

She closed her fingers around the girl’s throat. Rose opened her mouth to scream, but no sound came out. Instead, Ravenna could feel the essence of the girl’s youth pouring forth, a well of energy just waiting to be tapped. Ravenna leaned back, letting the energy flow out of Rose’s mouth and into hers, filling her from her toes up to the top of her head. She felt her skin tighten. The hand that clutched Rose’s throat appeared younger now, the age spots gone. Her shoulders were no longer stooped. She stood tall, feeling the power pulsing through her. She would live forever this way, never getting old, always keeping her beauty as it was.

When it was all over, Ravenna released her grasp. Rose dropped to her knees. Her hands were now gnarled. Her face was withered and wrinkled, her hair wiry and gray. She hunched over the floor, her back curved in a
C
. She looked nearly eighty years old. All traces of the beautiful young girl she had been were gone.

Ravenna stared exultantly at her brother. Even he appeared younger, rejuvenated by Ravenna’s new power. The spell their mother used to connect them was more apparent now as Ravenna stared into Finn’s face. His skin was radiant, his eyes shining with a new light. He looked even stronger than he had before. His muscles strained against his linen shirt.

She felt no pity for the girl. She felt only power, the sweet drunkenness that came whenever she took someone’s youth. There was nothing that could stop her. She was smarter than the smartest men in the kingdom, stronger than the fiercest warriors, and she was more beautiful than all the maidens who had come before her.

She strode into the mirror chamber, wanting nothing more than to see her reflection. The mirror man would confirm what she already knew to be true. She longed to hear his voice again, to be comforted by his magic. “Mirror, mirror, on the wall,” she began, “who’s the fairest of them all?” She looked into the glossy surface. Her pulse quickened as the mirror melted at her feet and re-formed into the bronze statue. Her own face stared back at her reflection in his smooth, featureless visage.

“My Queen,” the mirror said, “you have defied nature and robbed it of its fairest fruit. But on this day, there is one more beautiful than you. She is the reason your powers wane.”

Who could be more beautiful than she was? Had she not consumed the youth of some of the most radiant girls in the kingdom? What was it all for? Ravenna balled her hands into fists. There was no one more beautiful than she was, no one more powerful or youthful. The mirror was wrong—it had to be. She rocked with anger. The high she’d felt after conquering Rose was quickly and completely gone. “Who is it?! Give me her name!” she hissed through clenched teeth.

Her reflection stared back at her. “Snow White,” the mirror said.

“Snow White?” Ravenna repeated. She swallowed hard. “I should have killed her as a child. She is my undoing?”

The mirror brought its fingers to its chin, stroking it in an attitude of thought. “But … she is also your treasure, my Queen. It was wise that you kept her close. For the innocence and purity that can destroy, can also heal. Hold
her
heart in your hands, and you shall never again need to consume youth. You shall never again weaken or age. Immortality without cost …”

Ravenna stared at her hands, trying to imagine what it would be like to never again see them as she had just minutes before—wrinkled and covered with age spots. What would it be like to never have her breaths shorten, to never feel the weight of the years upon her?

What would it be like to live forever?

She let out a low laugh, the sound of it spurring her on, until she was laughing so hard she was nearly in tears. Snow White. Of course. It had always been Snow White who could bring her this gift. There was a reason she had saved her—she had felt it all these years. There was a reason they were connected. And now it revealed itself to her in all its glory.…

“Finn!” she screamed, the laughter consuming her. “Bring me Snow White!”

She kept laughing, the lightness of it comforting her. She pressed her eyes closed, and tears streamed down her
cheeks. She would live forever. She just had to kill Snow White and take her heart. It all was so simple, so obvious. How had she not realized it before?

When she finally opened her eyes, she was alone in the chamber. The mirror was just like any other mirror, its reflection revealing the empty room. The mirror man was gone, but his words still echoed in her ears:
Immortality without cost …