The Impostor Queen by Sarah Fine
He’s quiet for a moment. But then—“Elli? My mother said you did an excellent job with the corn yesterday.”
My head bobs up, but he’s already gone. Even so, the strangest sense of accomplishment floods my chest. I’m not useless. I can grind corn, and put on stockings, and tie a kerchief, and relieve myself without an attendant holding my gown up for me. All things I’d never done before yesterday.
Over the next week, I learn to be useful in other ways. Maarika teaches me how to use the loom. She puts me to work using a thick copper needle to stitch a few pelts together. I chop herbs and pluck pheasants and patch holes in the elbows of Oskar’s heavy winter tunic, eager to stay busy in the shelter and avoid the mistrustful stares and general notice of the other cave dwellers. What if the elders are searching for me, as Raimo feared? Would they ever think to look here?
Maarika peeks in on me often, her gray eyes somber and fathomless. She never smiles, but she doesn’t scold, either. If I make a mistake, she merely shows me how to do it right, and she is careful with my damaged hand, patient when I can’t quite manage something. I put all my gratitude into my work. Every night I fall onto my pallet exhausted and hurting but relieved; I wasn’t a burden today. I was useful.
It is a livable life. I think of Mim every day, but the ache grows more bearable. The same is true of the realization that I will never be queen, that I will never feel the magic awaken inside of me—that I am already all I will ever be. Sometimes it even feels like I’m less, especially when my hand burns like it’s been dipped in molten iron, when it’s so sensitive to touch that the slightest brush against it forces me to stifle a scream. But I learn to endure that pain as well. I am scarred, and I will never be what I was before, but I’m growing stronger.
Oskar seems to be doing the opposite, though. He comes in from days of hunting with his sled piled high with field-dressed game, enough to make the other men grumble with jealousy, but his lips are gray with cold and it takes an hour in front of the fire for him to stop shaking. He’s grown his beard while many young men go clean-shaven. He eats his soup boiling and it’s never hot enough for him. And the nights are the worst. He tosses and turns, his racked breaths huffing from him in a glitter of ice crystals. As the days pass, colder and colder, he grows silent and weary.
I lose count of how many times I almost cross the room to lay a hand on his shoulder, in the quiet hope that I could offer him some comfort. There is something about him that tugs at me. I find myself wanting to put my hands on either side of his face and tell him that I know what he is, ask him how I can help. But the only time he looks at me is in the morning as he leaves. He always turns back right before he steps out of the shelter.
“Elli? You did a good job with the patching.” He raises his elbow and wobbles it in front of me, showing off my somewhat clumsy job. “Like new.”
He says something like that every day, but his smiles are so rare that I want to collect them in a basin and hide them away. I’m sitting in front of the fire one morning after he leaves, eating a dry biscuit and trying to remember what his laugh sounded like, when Freya emerges from her mother’s little chamber. “Get up, Elli. You’re coming with me.” She begins to fold pelts and place them in a basket.
“I have chores to do. I told Maarika I would—”
Maarika pokes her head out of her chamber. “It can wait. You’ve been huddling in this tiny space for days.”
I scoot a little closer to the fire. “Haven’t I been useful?”
The firm line of Maarika’s mouth softens. “Very. But you’re also acting as if you’re hiding out, and that’s making our neighbors nervous. Oskar’s not here as often, so he doesn’t see it.”
Freya snorts. “And no one would dare approach him anyway, especially not now. But they’re talking. I heard Aira telling Senja and her husband a story about you being the daughter of a city councilman, and that you ran away because you got yourself pregnant by a stable boy.”
My mouth drops open.
“Senja’s husband said it would be bad if a councilman came here, thinking we’d kidnapped his wayward daughter,” Freya continues. “He doesn’t want to give the constables one more excuse to attack us.” She leans forward. “So was Aira right? Are you . . .”
She and Maarika glance down at my middle.
I put my hand over my flat belly. “Not even close.”
“Ah. Well, Luukas will be pleased then. He thought that was an idiotic rumor,” Maarika says. But before I can smile, she adds, “He thinks you’re spying on us, trying to figure out which of us are wielders so you can take that information to the councilmen and priests, so that when they return to reclaim the caves and the copper hidden in these tunnel walls, they’ll be able to kill us all. We’ve had spies try to infiltrate the camp before.” The lines around her mouth grow deep. “And we’ve dealt with them before they had a chance to tell our secrets.”
I draw my knees to my chest, imagining how the cave dwellers might “deal” with a spy.
Maarika leans on the wood frame. “Yesterday I heard Luukas in his shelter, telling Veikko—that’s his oldest son, who happens to be a wielder—that they should tell Oskar to get rid of you or they’ll make our whole family leave. Is Luukas right? You did show up only two days after Sig chased off the miners. Are you a spy?”
A hard chill rolls through me. “Definitely not,” I say in a hollow voice.
Freya tugs my arm, trying to pull me to my feet. “But no one will know that if you don’t get out there and act like a normal person.”
I turn to Maarika, and my voice trembles as I say, “I never meant to put your family in any danger.”
Maarika nods. “I know, Elli. But now you need to go out there and show them that you mean no harm—and that you have nothing to hide.” She disappears into her chamber.
I meekly follow Freya through the main cavern as she barters bundles of Oskar’s elk sticks and fur pelts for other basic necessities, like thread and cloth, a few loaves of bread, and a fat cube of lard. She introduces me to everyone as “the girl Oskar saved from a bear trap” or “the girl Oskar found mostly dead in the woods.” None of the cave dwellers are openly hostile, but they’re not a talkative, friendly bunch. I feel their wariness like a firm hand pushing me away. And I realize—all of them have something to hide. That’s why they’re so nervous.
I find myself wondering which are wielders—and which are criminals.
As we trade, I begin to notice signs of magic all around me. Small. Subtle. Unmistakable. We exchange a pelt for a stack of firewood with a black-bearded man named Ismael, who is coaxing a fire to full flame—even though he’s using soggy leaves as kindling. Next Freya heads over to trade with a woman cooling a cup of boiling tea for her daughter with a swirl of her finger. It turns out to be Senja, the one whose husband, Ruuben, was worried I’d draw constables here in search of the councilman’s pregnant runaway daughter. Senja licks tea from her finger as her gaze drops to my belly, and I smooth the loose fabric down so she can see there’s no baby hiding in there.
“Lovely to meet you,” she says brusquely, pushing her long blond hair over her shoulder and setting the cup in front of her daughter, who looks to be about six or seven years old. “Kukka, it’s warm. Drink up.”
Kukka, whose golden hair is curly and tangled, stares at the tea with a mischievous smile on her face. The tea in the cup freezes instantly.
My eyes go round and Senja groans. “Stop doing that, you little scamp!” She gives me a nervous look and blocks Kukka from my view. “I’m sure you have work to do elsewhere.”
“I would never tell,” I say, though I’m still staring at the frozen lump of tea in Kukka’s cup.
Senja’s eyes narrow. “Well, I would hope not,” she snaps. “Because anyone who tries to take my daughter from me will—”
“Thank you for the stockings, Senja. Enjoy the pelt!” Freya grabs my left hand and pulls me away from their shelter, telling Senja that Maarika will drop by later
“Freya, is Maarika a wielder?”
She gives me a sharp look as we reach a shelter near the back of the cave. “No. Why would you think that?”
I blink at her. “No reason.” Except that I’ve spent at least an hour each night watching beads of sweat turn to frost across Oskar’s forehead. The suspicion on Freya’s face is enough to shut me up, even though I’m wondering about their father, too. None of them ever mention him.
“Harri,” Freya suddenly calls out, waving to a young man with curly black hair who has a shelter full of fine weapons, several cloaks and pairs of gloves, and even a small pile of copper baubles like those worn by the wealthier women of the city. He trades us a new hunting knife for Oskar in exchange for a bundle of elk sticks, a beaver pelt, and the next turkey Oskar bags.
“Tell him it had better be fat,” Harri says with a laugh, revealing deep dimples in his cheeks.
Freya puts her hands on her hips. “You know Oskar would never give you a skinny bird to pay for goods.”
Harri puts his hands up. “I’d never challenge him on it. He’s way too grouchy.” He winks at me. “But maybe our new girl is putting him in a better mood?”
I wish that were true and am about to say so when Freya’s mouth drops open. “Harri, you are the cheekiest boy in these caves.” Her face is flushed. “Apologize.”
My eyebrows shoot up. “For what?”
Harri laughs as he steps in front of me and bows low. “Dearest new girl—”
Freya pokes his arm. “Her name is Elli.”
Harri’s head hangs. “Dearest, dearest Elli, of the coppery hair and lovely blue eyes”—I take a quick step back, nervous that he’s noticed my features, but he continues, his tone playful—“please forgive any thinly veiled insults, implications, innuendos, insinuations, intimations—” He looks up and grins, and I can’t help but smile back. “Am I forgiven?”
When I nod, he straightens up. “And can I also assume that you and Oskar are not . . . erm . . . entangled?”
I gape at him, finally grasping why Freya was offended. “Yes. Please assume.” Now my face is probably flushed.
Harri folds the beaver pelt over his arm. “Then I will definitely see you around.”
Freya steers me toward the community hearth in the center of the cavern. “He’s the biggest flirt in this camp. The biggest pickpocket, too. He’d never dare here, but he sneaks into the city—there are ways to do it—and he’s always coming back with stuff.” She holds up Oskar’s new knife. “I doubt he came by this honestly.”
Maarika is kneeling next to the hearth, kneading dough in a stone trough along with two other women. Her eyes meet mine as we approach, and I wish to the stars I could read minds. Freya waves the new knife at her, and the older woman smiles. “Looks nice and sharp,” she calls out.
The other women look up, and their faces twist into identical looks of mistrust when their gazes land on me. The one on the left, a young woman about my age with thick black hair and light-green eyes, looks particularly sour. “That’s Aira. She’s Ismael’s daughter,” Freya whispers. “She’s got a little thing for Oskar, and she hates that you’re living in our shelter.”
“Isn’t she the one spreading the rumor that I’m pregnant by a stable boy?”
Freya chuckles. “It would be convenient for her if it were the truth.” She waves at Aira and gives her a sugar-sweet smile.
“We’ve been wondering when you’d emerge from hiding,” Aira says as we reach the trough. Her hands are crusted with sticky brown dough.
I glance around. Apart from the other woman, who’s older than Maarika, with one eye that’s cloudy and another bright blue, there’s only one person at the hearth—a slender man no taller than I am, with a dented nose. He looks me over and grunts. “She emerges all right—whenever she wants to spy. Tell me, girl, when will the constables and priests be showing up?”
“Hopefully never,” I reply. “But if they do come, it won’t be on account of me.” I hope that’s true, and that for the sake of the people, they’re looking for the real Valtia instead of wasting time trying to hunt me down.
“Luukas,” says Maarika in a flat voice. “Elli was freshly injured when she came to us.” She gestures at my right hand, my lurid pink scars and missing fingers. “If she is a spy, that’s a fairly elaborate disguise.”
Luukas chews on the inside of his cheek as he stares at my hand, and then his eyes rise to mine. “What happened to you, then?”
“I was a servant,” I say, hoping he can’t hear the tremble in my voice.
“In what household?” Aira asks.
I bow my head, my heart drumming a frantic beat against my breast. “I would . . . rather not say.” I gesture at my back, praying to the stars that this is a believable story. “I was accused of stealing. I didn’t do it. But my mistress didn’t believe me. She whipped me and threw me out. And then I was banished from the city for stealing a meat pie. I was just so hungry.” I glance up to find a bewildering array of reactions.
Maarika’s brow is furrowed in what appears to be sympathy. The cloudy-eyed woman is on the verge of tears. Luukas’s lips are pursed, like he’s trying to find the lie. And black-haired Aira is scowling. “So you’re a thief,” she says. “And we’re supposed to take your word that you were banished instead of fleeing from a worse punishment? How do we know for sure your mistress hasn’t sent the constables after you?”
“Why wouldn’t you believe her?” comes a rough voice from behind me. Oskar strides out of the back tunnel with a few other men. His long hair is wet; he must have just had a wash. His lips are gray with cold and his jaw is set like he’s trying to keep his teeth from chattering. He wipes a wool cloth across his face and slings it over his shoulder as he and the others walk toward us. “How many here have similar stories? How many here have been banished? We have no choice but to trust one another.”
“I’m sorry, Oskar,” says Aira in a silky, careful voice. “I feel protective of the people in these caverns.”
Oskar runs his tongue over his teeth as he gives her a hard look. “And you think I don’t?”
She looks away. “I know you do.”
“You trust her?” asks a boy about Oskar’s age, jabbing his finger at me. He’s lean, with a wary look in his gray eyes, and he’s got a bundle of stained rags tucked beneath his arm. He leaves Oskar’s side to stand by Luukas.
“Veikko,” Oskar says to his lean friend, “when I found her, she was as close to death as one can come.” Oskar stands close enough for me to see the goose bumps on his throat. Cold rolls from him like waves on the Motherlake, but it doesn’t make me shiver like a stiff wind from the outside might. Like I experienced when Raimo attempted to heal me, this cold is something I understand with my mind, though my body appears immune to it. What I am not immune to: the weary, miserable look on Oskar’s face as he continues to speak to Veikko. “The lash marks on Elli’s back were worse than any I’ve seen, save one.”
Veikko, who I recall is Luukas’s son—and a wielder—bites his lip and looks me up and down. “Aye. I remember,” he mumbles. “And we’ve got bigger problems anyway.”
Luukas slaps his son on the back. “Did you find out anything in the city?”
Aira sits back on her heels as she wipes the dough from her hands with a damp rag. “I thought the constables had plugged up the hole in the city wall. You found another way in?”
Veikko smiles, revealing a slight gap between his two front teeth that gives him a charmi
Luukas squeezes Veikko’s shoulder. “And? Are we going to have a good winter—or a bad one?”
Veikko’s smile disappears. “The whole town’s talking about it,” he says in a hollow voice. “How the ground is freezing and gardens are dead. And all the priests are saying is that the new Valtia has requested a postponement of the coronation so that she may mourn the death of the old Valtia.”
My stomach drops.
Oskar frowns. “Has that ever happened before?”
The cloudy-eyed woman shakes her head. “But maybe the old Valtia’s not really dead.” Her doughy hands flutter over the trough. “I think the elders made up the whole Soturi invasion story to cover up a takeover. They’ve got the Valtia in chains somewhere. Doing bad things to her.” Her voice rises. “Mark my words—it’s the elders who’re in charge now. They were just biding their time!”
The way everybody’s avoiding looking at her, I’m thinking this isn’t her first outburst. Maarika gently nudges the woman with her shoulder. “Josefina, hush. The Valtia’s too powerful for that.”
Josefina shakes her head, her grayish-yellow hair swinging around her face. “The Saadella’s probably locked up too,” she says in a choked voice. “The elders would do it. They would.” She leans against Maarika like she’s about to collapse, and Oskar’s mother holds the older woman, though Maarika’s forehead is sheened with sweat. I look closely at Josefina, wondering if she wields fire, especially when Aira winces and moves away, plucking at her tunic like she’s trying to draw some cold air toward her.
“I was in the city when the Valtia’s death was announced,” I venture. “The elders went out in search of the new Saadella. They wouldn’t do that if the old Valtia were still alive.”
“That’s true—they venture out every day, trying to find her,” says Veikko. “They’re offering a fortune if her family gives her up. They’ve doubled the reward.” His eyes find Oskar’s. “But then what’s wrong with the new Valtia? The air is bitter with cold! Why isn’t she giving us warmth?”