The Witches' Game- Sacrificial Spotlights

Edmund Barrow: the King of Winter

With a touch, the portrait melts away gratefully, revealing a glass panel, and the most intricate Clock that Edmund has ever seen. Moons, planets, stars, comets, and other symbols that Edmund doesn't understand present themselves to him, inlaid with gold and silver and all the gems that the earth can offer. It stands there, silent.

"The Forged Clock," Tamarack explains, although he does not need to. "We've noticed something about you, boy, you are gifted, the Ticking Path has chosen you, a rare thing, but a sacred thing. You are to begin your training when your body is able to handle it, but until then..."

"What?" Edmund's face snaps over to the Provost, his eyes cagey, on edge. A younger witch would be scared of the boy, all raw power and loneliness, but Tamarack Frost did not become the leader of the Seasonal Lyceum by being a fearful man.

Edmund doesn't feel the cold until he realizes that he can move. Delicate crystals dust over his legs, move up his arms, and he becomes too stiff to move. Tamarack, tall and brilliant with his slicked back hair, white or blonde, it doesn't matter at his age, approaches Edmund with something like kindness.

"You shall stay with me, I shall raise you in my home. I will choose your tutors, guide your lessons, and with that, you will truly become mighty."

Frozen, shivering Edmund once again did not look surprised. "What do you want in return, Sir?"

"It is rumored that those particularly gifted on the Ticking Path can hear the Forged Clock begin days, weeks, perhaps even years before it actually begins to tick, the echoes through time perhaps. All I ask if that when it starts ticking to you, you let me know."

As the cold recedes from Edmund's limbs, he cannot help but start to laugh. The sudden change in attitude comes as a shock to Tamarc, who is almost prepared to freeze him again, but Edmund just shakes his head.

"That's a deal, Provost," Edmund says, rubbing the life back into his skin. "But don't take away all the prizes if I give up my end of the deal right now."

It's not panic that runs through the Ascendant Provost's mind as he listens to the boy, but that may be a component. Relief, horror, excitement, that is all there too, if he admits it to himself.

"What do you mean, Edmund?" Tamarack's eyes move to the silent, beautiful Clock.

"Sir," Edmund says. "I've been hearing the ticking of that thing from the moment I was born."

Coda. Frost Manor. Seven Hours Later.

Being an orphan, Edmund has always felt that it's a cliché to have dreams, so imagine his annoyance when all of the normal dreams an orphan dreams actually come true for him. He can't deny that it's a pretty good move, he's been wasted here from the moment they started teaching him and the others the Core Rites, and while everyone means well, and he has always meant well back, there has always been a small part of Edmund that has spent the last ten years screaming that there might be something better.

Now, after a whirlwind of paperwork, an extremely small window where Edmund was allowed to pack his meager belongings, and absolutely zero time for Edmund to say good-bye to the people he had known all of his life, he's being shunted once more through the streets of Stalra's End, and going upwards, away from the bottom, towards the very seat of power. Frost Manor.

Rags to absolute riches, what a cliché indeed.

Ticktickticktickticktickticktickticktickticktickticktickticktick.

The ticking of the Forged clock reaches out to him through time, reminding him that it's there, that his fate is, for some reason, bound to it. Edmund shuts his eyes again it and allows the carriage to take him forward.

He is just a kid, but he is not just a kid. As a powerful witch, he has been blessed with the permission use however much magic he wants...as long as he can pay, and with a Grand Amortization coming something, at any time, Edmund already knows at the age of ten, long before the Clock has actually begun to tick, that he has already been marked for that slaughter.

The thought makes his head swim as the carriage drives up, up, up the mountain.

He can throw it, he realizes, he could tear it all down. He could help another College Ascend...he could...

The carriage stops, drawing Edmund out. He waits, unsure of whether or not Tamarack is there to greet him, or if there will be servants. What use does he have with a servant?

Outside of the door he hears a small thump, then the turning of the handle. Edmund holds his breath, hoping that his thoughts are not written on his face as the carriage door opens and reveals a creature that, at first glance, seems to be made entirely of snow.

Then she smiles, and Edmund realizes that it is a girl of about his age. Her skin is pale and she is dressed all in white, her pale blonde hair trimmed with white ribbons. The Frost family crest is sewn into the bodice of her dress. When she raises her eyes to his, he notices that they are the darkest brown he has ever seen. She looks like a wraith.

She is the most beautiful thing that Edmund has ever seen.

"Are you the new guest?" she asks, cocking her head. "You don't look like you are from the north."

"I was born here," Edmund replies, feeling idiotic as he does so. This seems to be enough for the little girl, and she pops her head out of the carriage. Edmund follows.

They are at the very top of the mountain, the very heart of the city of Stalra's End. Frost Manor is a vast place, built of white marble and limestone. Everything is white and it blinds Edmund, who is at least used to more earthy colors. The girl he is with dances down the halls as she leads him somewhere, and even his pale grey orphan's rags make him stick out like a sore thumb.

"That's fine then," she says as she sits down at their destination, a vast courtyard in the middle of home. There is a garden here, white rose bushes, but the girl stands with a secret smile and reaches around the back of one of the bushes. She gasps in pain, but continues to work, pulling something forth. She holds, in her bloodstained fingers, a red rose.

"I was sick of all the white," the girl explains. "So I told one of the gardeners to do a secret hybrid just for me, they grow over by the wall so Father doesn't see."

"Father?"

"Don't you know? I'm Arabella Frost."

A silence hangs in the air as the girl looks at him, waiting for the response. Edmund looks back at her.

"I'm Edmund Barrow," he replies.

Arabella bursts out laughing, and it is a musical thing, unlike anything Edmund has ever heard. She looks at him, those black eyes filled with a harsh and wonderful light.

"You do not know who I am? Oh, that is a wonderful thing. We are going to be the best of friends, Edmund Barrow. I can see it."

And as Arabella hands him her rose and her blood, Edmund realizes that there is nothing that he would not do for Arabella Frost.

And he would become the King of Winter if it would make her smile.