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It was hard to remember that first night without shivering at the mere thought of it.
The storm continued to pick up speed as though we’d offended it, thrashing and wailing in the dark branches above us, before sweeping down in sudden gusts that tore at our hair and skin. If it was possible, the rain was even worse. There seemed to be no end to it. It was constant and cold, seeping through each layer of clothing, until we could do nothing but tremble and wait for it to end.
Never in my lifetime had there been such a storm. In the winter, perhaps, but not in the warmer summer months. It seemed a bad omen. At any rate, we would surely drown.
“Twisted hells...”
I cast a glance at the man standing above me, bracing all his weight against a slab of wood that had been leveraged in a ceiling above us. A meager attempt at shelter, but given the relative sparsity of the forest, it was the best that circumstance would allow. For many hours, we’d been fighting through a dense underbrush of ferns and shrubs, but the place we’d settled boasted little except the massive trees themselves, spearing from the ground like an ocean of restless spears.
If I hadn’t caught my foot in those rocks, there was a chance Erik might have continued walking until sunrise. Luckily, he’d looked at it and determined it wasn’t broken. Sprained yes, broken no. Some rest would do it a world of good. I couldn’t believe he’d stopped. I was sure he would have pushed us to continue. There was a grit inside him that went beyond our heritage, a determination that was his alone, rising above the boasts and hardiness of Viking blood. But a rolled ankle wasn’t a problem one could will away, and it was no longer possible to see the ground beneath our shoes. Instead of trying, he’d merely squinted into the surrounding forest, and picked the easiest possible tree. It was wide with large roots, the kind we could shelter inside if we crouched together for room. In the time since, he’d dragged over several larger branches for a canopy, anything that might help keep out the rain. But the wind kept shifting directions, and we couldn’t risk piling too many lest they become conspicuous. For no matter the distance we’d traveled, or the storm that followed, or even the screaming chaos inside our own heads, a single truth was impossible to forget.
We aren’t the only people in this forest.
“Come on,” he muttered beneath his breath, pushing even harder as the wind used all its strength against him, “just a little bit—”
There was a violent splintering as the branch snapped in his hand.
I flinched at the sound, and lifted my eyes to where he stood in front of me. For the length of a single breath, he was stock-still, staring with a stunned lack of comprehension, as if he could not believe this simple thing, too, had turned against him. Then he let out a blistering oath, the likes of which I’d never heard, and hurled the shards still in his palm towards the shadowy trees.
“Really?” he cried, lifting his eyes to the heavens. There was a fire in them I’d yet to see, a feverish burn of betrayal. “Are you entertained? Are the gods laughing in Valhalla?”
I grabbed his arm without thinking, casting a terrified look towards the windswept canopy, a silent apology in my eyes. “Peace, Erik. There are more listening ears in these woods than only the soldiers. Leave the branches,” I added, tugging entreatingly on his wrist, “it will be all right without them. You see? With our backs pressed in the hollow, the trunk keeps away most of the rain.”
This was a bold-faced lie. It didn’t even come close. But the bannerman was either too tired or dispirited to argue. Instead of answering, he dropped to the ground beside me, drawing up his legs and wrapping his arms around them with a wearied sigh. Thin rivulets of water ran down the sides of his face, and all the blood had been washed clean of his hair. It was a meager improvement.
Most of the damage we’d sustained in the village was only just beginning to show.
“I’m sorry,” he said after a long silence, staring unblinking into the forest. “I should not have spoken so. And you’re right about the tree...it keeps away the worst of the rain.”
I nodded in silence, then threw him a sideways look. His face was blank, but the corners of his mouth were twitching. A breath of laughter escaped my lips, and they curved into a grin.
Yep—we’ll be dry in no time.
“I should probably hunt,” he added suddenly, turning to me for the first time. His gaze lingered on the gaunt hollows of my cheekbones, the tired bruises beneath my eyes. “When is the last time you’ve eaten anything? I cannot imagine your jailors brought you much.”
It was true. There had been nothing but the formless brown goo since I’d been escorted into the tower. Once at the forefront of my mind, I had actually begun to forget. While this struck some distant part of me as a bad sign, I merely shook my head, glancing once more towards the storm.
“It can wait until the morning. I doubt you’d find anything now. Any creature with sense will have retreated to its den.” Except for us. “At any rate, you wouldn’t leave me alone, would you?” I continued with a bare smile. “I might do something noble and try to run. Save you from all this death and gloom you’ve brought down upon yourself. It would be very in character,” I added.
He smiled at this, unable to deny it. Without seeming to think, he released his grip on his legs, and stretched out his arms, working through the kinks in the muscles and easing them loose. It looked for a moment like he might slip one around me. We’d held hands often enough. He’d cradled after my fall with the rocks. Outside the door to my childhood home, he’d nearly kissed me.
He kept to himself, sitting quiet at my side.
“You couldn’t run,” he answered suddenly, shaking his head. “Whenever you attempt such a thing, you fall—rather dramatically. I can only imagine what might happen if you try to be noble.”
If I’d had the strength, I might have laughed again. Or simply punched him. As it stood, there was too much truth for a denial, and my arms were weighted like lead. The most I could do was gather a bit of the mud that had slid down my chin, collecting it carefully on my fingers, long enough to catch his eye, before smearing it with meticulous precision down the length of his arm.
It clung for a moment to his tunic, before falling with an unceremonious plop.
Nobility is a relative word.
“Thank you, for that.”
“You’re quite welcome.”
We sat there for a while longer, not speaking, just leaning shoulder against shoulder, and gazing out at the storm. There was little else to be done, though it still seemed a dangerous waste of time, given our current situation. At the very least, we should try to sleep. But even though I was dragging and exhausted, wrought to my very bones, it was the farthest thing from my mind.
There was no part of me that dared to look forward. Not when all that lay ahead was a vast stretch of wilderness and the constant ravaging of the storm. Instead, my mind drifted backwards, to those I had left behind in the settlement. Those fragmented pieces had come together clearer now, and it was easy to see the little things I had missed—those tiny impossibilities that shone all the brighter in the dark of the woods, with nothing else to distract or challenge them.
Henny let me go. He risked his life for me.
This might have been one of the smallest, but I felt it all the same. It had seemed like a death already, when Erik and I had rounded the corner and seen the red-haired servant; a boy so kind, I had tried to intercept his beating, yet I’d been terrified at the very sight. He would yell, and the men would come, and we would both die. Of this, I was absolutely certain.
Except, it never happened. He’d chosen mercy instead.
Just as quickly as his face had drifted into mind, it was replaced by another. An older woman, the same as I’d lived beside nearly my entire life. What had Edda done when she’d heard the news? Did she gather with the others in the courtyard? Or did she hang a curtain over her window and refuse to come out? We’d grown so familiar with each other, the three of us. There were mornings we walked together into the village, nights we shared a common supper. In the spring, I would help plant the tiny bulbs she liked to scatter in her garden. In the winter, I’d come over early in the morning and uncrack the ice that had frozen her door.
Who would do those things now?
The last face that came to mine was slow and shining, materializing like a fallen leaf, rising gradually to float on the surface of a pond. I allowed it to settle there a moment, allowed myself to look into those beautiful, familiar eyes. Then I turned my thoughts deliberately to something else.
“How many people do you think are out there?”
Not exactly an improvement.
Erik jumped a little against my side, having been wandering through deep thoughts of his own. I felt his arm tense against mine, but this, at least, was the kind of thing in which he was always steady. He didn’t shy from the question, but considered it with a thoughtful determination.
“Of all the king’s soldiers?” he asked lightly. “And all bannermen and their attendants? And the infantrymen and paid sailors that would have come in from the south?” He paused a moment, wondering if perhaps ‘thoughtful determination’ was a poor choice after all. The canopy rustled above us, as his eyes drifted to mine. “Oh, you know...all of them.”
A cold blast of silence fell between us.
“And thank you for that.”
“You’re quite welcome.”
It was quiet again, and I found myself smiling. Not brightly, or cheerfully. But almost without conscious thought. It was the same as the storm, same as the branch. What more could one do when such things were out of their control? He was smiling too, just a touch, but I saw it.
“Your uncle?” I asked.
He pulled in a breath, staring into the storm.
Whatever amusement had warmed him, vanished like a candle snuffed out in a flame. It was so quickly done, I immediately regretted mentioning it. Yet we couldn’t avoid the subject forever. Of all the people we’d left behind us, his frightening uncle was the last face we’d seen.
“I would imagine my uncle is searching as well,” he said slowly, as though he was choosing each word with great care. A strange expression came over him, gone before I could decipher it and settling into a slight frown. “There is much that happened last night, I have no account for. The company of guards that was training in the courtyard. My uncle, finding that bag of gold.”
He stopped there, like it was best to go no further. But he’d already cracked the lid off the thing, and I angled a little to better see him, studying the side of his face in the dim light.
It’s not the first time he’s spoken like this. He’s said things like it before.
I remembered the look of shock that had come over him the moment we burst through the tower door and into the courtyard. It would be empty, he’d assured me. The men drilling there had been sent beyond the southern wall. Yet, there they’d stood. Armed and marching. It was only by the grace of the gods, we’d managed to slip away out of sight.
The gods, and a convenient fire.
“Thank heavens for Trina,” I murmured, unsurprised by the sharp ache of longing that accompanied her name. “Otherwise we might have died right there.”
His face tightened again, clouding with an emotion I didn’t understand. It was so slight, at first, I thought that I’d imagined it. But sitting so close, there was no hiding the reflexive clenching of his fingers, the almost imperceptible hardening of his jaw.
“What is it?” I asked immediately, zeroing on his face.
He merely shook his head, dropping his eyes to his legs. The branches tangled above us, thrashing in the howling winds.
“What?” I insisted, twisting more to face him.
He hesitated a moment, long enough to draw in a single breath, before lifting his gaze evenly to mine. “It’s fortunate for us,” he replied tersely. “Not for the countless girls who died.”
I blanked in sheer confusion. “What girls?”
There was a further hardening of his expression, as his lips thinned to a line. His brows, far darker than the pale locks that surrounded them, arched in a caustic reply.
It took a second to understand.
The girls in the brothel.
“No one died, Erik,” I blurted without thinking, tripping over myself to reassure him, mildly horrified I hadn’t thought to do it before. “My aunt didn’t work at the brothel, she owned it. She would have made sure that no one was inside.”
He stared at me so long, I was half-afraid he didn’t believe me. But after a few seconds passed, a little of the tension eased from his face. “That is some happy news,” he said quietly.
Such news being in short supply.
That was the last of the talking. Without any better way to settle and keep out the weather, the pair of us merely closed our eyes; our legs drawn up in front of us, our backs to the steep grade of the tree. We had first settled on one side, but moved almost immediately so we were facing back the way we’d come. Perhaps we should have taken the tree as protection, the trunk was wide and might have momentarily blocked us from sight. But if the soldiers’ eyes could find us in the pitch of night and the wild of the storm, they deserved to catch us. At any rate, it felt a good deal safer to be keeping a weathered eye out for them ourselves. The moon hung like an orb somewhere above us, seen only in the fractured splinters of clouds, strewn about by the storm.
“You thought I would have taken it in stride?” I asked after a long silence, staring at him with a feeling close to dread. “More than a dozen women, killed so I could escape the same fate?”
He met my gaze in the darkness. Bright eyes, shining through the rain. “I didn’t know what to think.”
* * *
That was the first night I had the dream.
It came upon me slowly, like the budding of a sunrise, or the gradual fall of dusk. One moment I was in the forest, asleep beneath the same tree as before, and the next, I was flying on dark wings over the rain-drenched trees. My wings beat powerfully as the ground streaked beneath me, blurring into an endless canopy of silvering charcoals and greens. I could hear the river tucked beneath the branches, but had no need to follow it for direction. I knew the way by now.
The clouds parted before me. There was a light shining ahead.
Come to me...I am waiting.
It was the first night I had the dream.
There would be many others.
