Queen of the North (Book 3) (Songs of the Scorpion) Read Online Free

She guessed they had a month at most before King Nabar reacted to the news that she had murdered one of his men. “Trust that we’ll have plenty of war before long.”
    “I suggest you triple your army.”
    “A lot of gold,” she said warily.
    Aedran spread his hands. “The barest pittance to keep Valdar and your crown, don’t you think?”
    “I don’t have a crown, save in name.” That was true enough. The folk of Valdar were miners, not goldsmiths.
    “Be that as it may, what are your orders?”
    Erryn raised herself up, assuring herself that she had acted rightly against the emissary, if not properly . “Dispatch a rider to Pryth, at once….”
     
    ~ ~ ~
     
    King Nabar, it turned out, had reacted slowly and without enough force to crush Valdar, suggesting he either knew little of war, or was a weak sovereign, as rumored. Erryn’s Prythian reinforcements had arrived long before Nabar’s forces, and were able to use their skills and backs to quickly fortify the fortress.
    Thinking on the day she had killed the emissary, and all the battles that had followed, Erryn rested a gloved hand on the raw logs of a turret she had taken shelter beside. Woodcutters had stripped most of the bark off the new logs, but reddish strings remained. Winter would gray them, but for now they fluttered in the breeze like bits of withered skin attached to yellowed bone. She shivered. Is it getting colder?
    “Erryn,” Aedran called, his heavy boots thumping near.
    When he halted, the smell of him engulfed her. Sweat, horse, steel, blood. The same scents cloaked all the Prythians, but on Aedran it seemed … sweeter . She frowned at the thought, as much as at his lack of courtesy. Come to think of it, he had stopped calling her queen some time ago. She thought to correct him, but when she looked into his eyes, her breath froze in her chest.
    “What’s happened?”
    His answering grin was huge and a touch wild. “Nothing,” he drawled, “unless you’re of the mind to gain an entire realm, instead of holding this tiny patch of frozen ground.” He thrust a worn bit of parchment into her hand.
    She opened the missive and scanned words written in a blocky script. Her own hand might have penned the words, except that she avoided writing almost as vigorously as she avoided reading. Nesaea had taken it upon herself to teach Erryn to read and write during their short time together. She had been a quick study, but was still far from proficient.
    As Erryn carefully reread the message, Aedran waited in silence. When she began again, the toe of his boot drummed impatiently. Erryn looked up. “What does this mean?”
    He raised his finger toward the tip of her nose, as was his wont. Instead of letting him touch her, she flinched back. “Tell me, you fool.”
    “It means,” he said slowly, unperturbed by her reaction, “that the gods have favored you with a rare chance to crush your greatest foe. Most never get an opportunity such as this. Most never dream of one.”
    She thought again about the message, put that with what Aedran had said, and in their mingling she began to see. “But what of Valdar? If it falls to my enemies,” she said, pointing at the brooding forest, now half lost behind swirling curtains of snow, “all the gold of the north falls back into Nabar’s hands.”
    Aedran laughed. “Those cowards have had all they can bear of the cold, snow, and Prythian steel tearing out their guts. My scouts informed me an hour ago that Nabar’s men have decamped and are riding back to Onareth. This time on the morrow, they’ll be south of the Shadow Road.”
    Erryn hesitated. “Still, there are bandits and worse. If we leave, Valdar will be defenseless.”
    When Aedran shrugged, a clump of snow rolled off the shoulder of his wolfskin cloak. “Leave most of the army here to defend the village—believe me, two thousand of my brothers are more than enough for any band of brigands. With winter upon us, Nabar won’t bother