Free The Raven and the Reindeer by T. Kingfisher Page A

game.” She glanced up at Mousebones. “Ravens and riddle games go well together, I always thought.”
    “It’s true,” said Mousebones, wiping his beak on Gerta’s hair. “I know lots of riddles, and not just the stupid one about writing desks.”  
    “So long as you don’t give me a tragic ending,” said Gerta. “Please?”
    Gran Aischa laughed. “No, I like you. I won’t have you starve to death in the snow while your prince marries another. I save that for rude people.”  
    “Good to know.”
    Gerta finished her cider and stretched her hands to the fire. The silence was companionable and the room was warm. Perhaps that was why she felt comfortable asking the next question aloud.
    “Gran Aischa—in all your stories, have you heard of the Snow Queen?”

CHAPTER FIFTEEN

    The old woman looked up, startled. Her wispy hair shook around her face. “What?”
    “The Snow Que—”
    “Hsst! I heard you.” She made silencing gestures with her hands, as gnarled and thin as Mousebones’ talons. “Careful with that name. I don’t know if she’s one of the spirits that hears when you speak of them, but I don’t know that she’s not.”  
    “She already knows I exist,” said Gerta. “But I won’t talk about her if you’d rather not.”
    Gran Aischa picked her mug up, then set it down again untasted. “That’s a darker story than I made for you,” she said. “Much darker. It’s not one I’d tell often, and not in winter.”
    Gerta bowed her head.
    “How did you run afoul of that fell maid?”
    “She took my friend,” said Gerta. “Stole him in the night. I saw them go, but I didn’t follow soon enough…”  
    Gran Aischa frowned. She got up then and went to the bar and poured herself out another drink. The smell of it, when she came back to the fire, was thin and raw and potent.  
    “Let him go,” she said.  
    “I’m sorry?”
    “Your friend,” said Gran Aischa. “That’s a story with no happy ending. You’ve still got a chance at yours.” She drank deeply and grimaced. “Let him go. Find yourself a strapping lad who knows how to listen and will worship the ground you walk on. They’re rare, but they’re worth it.”
    “But she kidnapped him!” said Gerta. “I can’t just abandon him!” She flushed with shame at the thought that she had done so for seven months already.  
    Gran Aischa shook her head. “She doesn’t take the unwilling. He had to climb into her sledge himself.”
    “I’m sure she enchanted him somehow—he wouldn’t have—”
    She had to stop then, remembering how Kay had always loved the snow and the cleanness of it, and how beautiful the Snow Queen looked. Yes. Perhaps he had climbed into the sledge himself.
    “She’ll kill him,” she said.
    Gran Aischa sighed. “Oh, eventually. She’ll give him kisses—and more than kisses—and all that ice will work its way to his heart. But he’ll never feel a thing.”
    “I can’t let that happen!”
    “Plenty of sweethearts die as children,” said the storyteller. “They fall through the ice or cross a pasture with a bull or catch a fever and die of it. It’s hard and there’s tears, but you shouldn’t throw your life away pining for them.” She smoothed her hair down. “Your sweetheart’s gone, same as if he’d died of a fever. Running after him won’t help.”  
    “Please,” said Gerta. “If you know anything…if there’s anything you can tell me…”
    She dropped to her knees in front of the fire.  
    Gran Aischa sighed and looked down at Gerta. “You’re asking me to hand you the knife,” she said bitterly, “so you can go fall on it. I shouldn’t tell you anything. But you ask very prettily and I’m too old to stop foolish children any longer.”  
    She gestured impatiently to Gerta, who climbed back into her chair and perched on the edge, leaning far forward.  
    “That one,” said Gran Aischa. “ That one lives farther north than north, and you won’t get there on