The Crow Queen Comes
The winter sky above Frostfang split with a sound like a dying animal. A foul wind roared down from the mountains, curling around the towers and gates, carrying with it the stink of rot and carrion. Crows, black as spilled ink, circled in a widening spiral, their calls harsh and triumphant.
Kaelin stood atop the battlements, her cloak snapping in the wind. She gripped the stone so hard her knuckles whitened. Below, the remains of her army struggled to gather the wounded, to bury the dead before rot could claim them.
Everywhere, the crows watched.
Kaelin swallowed the bitterness on her tongue. She had broken the first wave of monsters — but she could feel something far worse waiting just beyond sight, biding its time.
---
In the keep's tower, Maerlyn slept in a shallow, feverish doze. Her face was pale as paper, her lips cracked from whispered spells. Aldric refused to leave her side, even as messengers arrived in a steady trickle with reports of a growing shadow on the western road.
Rowena entered quietly, carrying a bowl of steaming herbs.
"She needs to wake," Rowena said, laying her gentle hands on Maerlyn's forehead. "The next storm will not wait for her to recover."
Aldric nodded, his face drawn. "She closed one rift, but she says there are more."
Rowena's brow furrowed. "The Queen is coming, Your Grace. The crows are her heralds. She will not rest until every soul in this valley is hers."
"Then we must stand," Aldric replied, his voice hardening like forged steel. "Frostfang will not fall."
---
Beyond the fortress walls, the Crow Queen's army took shape. Not men, not even beasts, but something other — a swirling tide of horrors woven together with threads of stolen souls. From a distance, it looked like a river of night flowing down the mountain, devouring all light.
At its head walked the Queen herself.
Her cloak was woven of raven feathers, shifting and stirring as if the birds still lived. Her eyes were pits of darkness so deep they seemed to look through time itself. In her wake, the earth turned gray and brittle, grass shriveling, trees splitting with groans of agony.
When she raised her hand, the crows screamed in unison.
---
Kaelin returned to the courtyard to gather her captains. The walls around them dripped with damp cold, lanterns guttering in the fitful wind.
"Listen well," she told them, her voice echoing across stone. "This is no ordinary foe. Her power will try to twist you, to turn you against each other. You must anchor yourselves in your purpose, or you will be lost."
Some of the soldiers shifted uneasily, glancing at one another.
Kaelin slammed her sword into the ground with a ringing clang.
"Hope is our blade," she declared. "And courage our shield. Remember that."
---
Deep within the tower, Maerlyn finally stirred, coughing harshly. Rowena pressed a cup to her lips, and she drank with a trembling hand.
"Where is the Queen?" Maerlyn rasped, her voice raw.
Rowena hesitated. "At our doorstep."
Maerlyn tried to rise, but the pain of the magic still gnawed at her bones. "I must stand," she croaked. "If I do not face her, no one will."
Aldric took her shoulders. "Maerlyn, you cannot —"
"She is drawn to me," Maerlyn insisted. "She always has been. If I hide, she will break this city to ashes to find me."
Rowena bit her lip. "Then we go with you."
Maerlyn shook her head. "No. If she takes me, she takes me alone."
Aldric caught her hand, his eyes blazing. "You are not alone."
She looked into his face, saw the love there, and for a moment felt like the girl she used to be — before power, before darkness, before sacrifice.
I wish I could stay, she thought. But that path was gone.
---
As the first ranks of twisted soldiers neared Frostfang's gates, Kaelin and her warriors braced for impact.
The Queen's voice rose, cold and honey-sweet, carrying over the plain:
> "Open your gates, little fortress. Lay down your arms, and I will spare your children."
Kaelin stepped onto the battlements and spat into the wind.
> "You'll have no quarter here, witch!"
The Queen smiled, her teeth white as bleached bone.
> "Then I shall take your hearts, one by one."
She raised her arms, and the horde surged forward, screaming in a thousand alien tongues.
---
The first shock of the enemy hit Frostfang's wall like a black tide. Kaelin's archers let fly, arrows falling in sheets that cut down rows of corrupted things — but they simply climbed over their dead and kept coming.
Swords met claws, shield met talon, and the night rang with the brutal music of war.
Kaelin cut down a monster with one stroke, then another, but they were endless. She tried not to let fear find its way into her heart.
Above her, the crows circled in a dark wheel, watching. Waiting.
---
Maerlyn climbed the steps to the tower's crown, every inch an agony. Wind clawed at her robes, tugging her hair loose.
The Queen was waiting for her on the parapet, her cloak alive with fluttering black wings.
"So," the Queen crooned, "the little mage returns."
Maerlyn forced herself to stand straight. "You will not have them."
The Queen tilted her head, curious. "And how will you stop me, with your mind already unraveling?"
Maerlyn's knees threatened to buckle. She felt her thoughts slip, memories draining away like water through a sieve.
But she planted her staff against the stone and drew breath.
> I am Maerlyn of Frostfang. I am the memory of fire. I am the daughter of the tower. You will not break me.
The Queen's smile faltered.
---
Aldric and Rowena arrived at the parapet, blades drawn.
The Queen sighed dramatically. "So many would die for you, Maerlyn. How… touching."
She gestured, and the crows turned inward, a swirling shield of beaks and claws, ready to devour.
Rowena raised her staff. "Not today."
Together, Maerlyn and Rowena chanted an incantation that cut through the Queen's illusions, sending a shockwave of light into the storm of crows. Birds fell from the sky like black rain, shrieking in rage.
The Queen staggered, surprised — then furious.
---
Down below, Kaelin's troops rallied. They saw the crows faltering, saw the Queen stagger, and roared with renewed courage.
"Push them back!" Kaelin shouted, leading a countercharge that splintered the enemy's front ranks.
Spear met twisted flesh, and this time, the monsters broke.
Kaelin felt hope surge in her chest. They could win. They could.
---
On the tower's heights, the Queen snarled, baring her fangs.
"You cannot stop me!" she howled, and hurled a coil of raw, crackling shadow straight at Maerlyn.
Maerlyn raised her staff and took the blow, crying out as it scorched her soul. She felt memories tear loose — her mother's smile, her childhood laughter — lost forever.
But through the pain, she held firm.
Rowena joined her, pouring power into the circle around them.
Together, they formed a wall of light that blazed like a miniature sun.
The Queen screamed, recoiling, her feathered cloak shriveling in the radiance.
---
Kaelin saw the beam of light from the tower and knew they had their chance.
"Now!" she bellowed.
Her warriors surged forward, breaking the last of the Queen's guard, tearing through the monsters with relentless fury.
Steel rang on steel, and then there was silence.
---
The Queen fell to one knee, gasping, her crown of feathers scorched and broken.
Maerlyn stood above her, staff glowing white-hot.
"Be gone," she whispered. "This is not your realm."
With one final cry, the Queen's form dissolved into black smoke, crows scattering like ashes on the wind.
---
As dawn broke over Frostfang, silence fell. The crows had fled. The twisted horrors lay dead or dying.
Kaelin, covered in blood and grime, raised her sword.
"Frostfang stands!" she cried, and her soldiers answered with a roar that seemed to shake the mountains.
---
Maerlyn collapsed, her staff falling from limp fingers. Aldric caught her before she hit the stones, cradling her in his arms.
"You did it," he whispered, tears streaming freely.
Maerlyn looked at him, eyes hollow. "Did I?"
Aldric searched her face and saw a terrible emptiness where once had burned her fierce spirit.
---
All around them, the first golden rays of sunrise crept over the battlements, shining on broken walls, ruined banners, and the weary faces of survivors.
Hope was alive — but fragile, wounded, uncertain.
And as Maerlyn closed her eyes, she felt a distant tremor through the threads of the world, a whisper of darker things yet to come.
This is only the beginning, she thought, before the blackness claimed her.