SWNOVELS Court of Ice and Ash: Chapter 20
of Sven’s alehouse was a comfort. Halvar led us from the Black Tomb, shaken, and decided the thickets around the alehouse were clear enough to camp. Sven didn’t mind the added shim in his coffers when Ari’s guard took up refuge in his drinking hall. The old aleman greeted Valen as Legion, asked when he’d be returning to their business, then busied about adding charges for silly things like opening a window, or kicking feet up on his tables.
I stoked a fire on the edge of the trees, listening to the laughter from the guards and some of Crispin’s folk as they played and drank at Sven’s tables.
“Is she well?” I asked Halvar. He dabbed Kari’s forehead with a cool towel.
“Her fever burns,” he says. “But she is fighting.”
“You’ve taken an interest in caring for her,” I said. “Why?”
Halvar shrugged. “I don’t know. She is a fighter but has been forced to do things against her will. She has been mistreated, and even if she is Timoran, she did not deserve it.”
I smiled at him when he turned back to sopping her hot skin. What he meant was—she was like him. Valen had suffered, but so had Tor and Halvar. All had been trapped in the quarries, all had seen and witnessed atrocities against their people and families.
Curse them.
They claimed vengeance, but all three of the Ferus court had too big of hearts. They’d never succeed in their plans. They cared too much.
“Elise.” Mattis materialized from the trees, dragging Brant behind him. My friend tossed the raven down.
“Mattis, what are you doing?”
“I want answers,” he said, jaw tight. “This sod knew something about that place. You and the Blood Wraith saw something we could not see. What I want to know is how this raven knew the same things.”
“Mattis, you heard his reasons the same as me,” I said. “He guessed.”
“I’d like to think it was a bit more skilled than that,” Brant said, but went quiet when Mattis glared at him.
“Do you know him?” Mattis narrowed his eyes.
“No.” I furrowed my brow. “I’ve never met him before the sea caves.”
Mattis looked as if he might break through his own skin. “Who is the Blood Wraith! Why did something attack you two at that gods-awful place? These secrets are driving me mad. I care about you, Elise, but I don’t know how to protect you and S . . .” He trailed off, shaking his head.
“Calm down.” Junius stepped into the firelight. “I think I can answer at least a bit about our little guard here.” Brant straightened, intrigued as Junius kneeled beside him. She took out a small knife. “Hold out your hand.”
Brant didn’t question but winced when she made a little cut over the pad of his palm. I wrinkled my nose when Junius leaned over the bubble of blood and sniffed.
Brant pulled his hand away. “Uh, what are you doing?”
Junius lifted her head, grinning. “You’re not Night Folk. You’re part Alver.”
“Really?” I lifted my brows and scooted closer. A new scent hung in the air. Harsh and tangy, like a sickly-sweet rot.
“Have you never smelled your blood?” Junius asked. “It’s not a scent most can ignore.”
Brant’s face heated in red. “My family always believed I had weak blood, or some type of ailment. What is an Alver?”
“Me,” she said. “I am an Alver. Like your Night Folk, we have magic. You say you get feelings?”
He nodded. “I can’t shake them.”
“Yes. There are Alver Folk who have incredible senses. Sight, feelings, instincts. Even to the point of being visionaries. You are my Kind. A type of Profetik—that’s what we call folk with strange senses.”
“A Profetik?”
“Yes, I know many who have senses like you. It’s an impressive gift. I wouldn’t say you have the strongest mesmer—”
“Mesmer?”
“It’s what they call their fury,” I told Brant.
Junie tapped her chin. “Are your parents from this land?”
Brant shifted; his fingers tangled in his lap. “My father’s wife could not have children, so he took many consorts. Some were once serfs. But we were never told who our mothers were and were raised by his wife as if she were our mother. She was, in the ways that mattered, I suppose.”
“Ah, but one of those consorts might’ve come from a foreign land.”
Brant simply shrugged.
Junius folded her arms and grinned smugly. “The good news is you’re definitely an Alver. The bad news is now folk will hunt you like a wolf in the night. Welcome to the world of magic.”
Ulf and Frey joined our circle. Ulf crouched in front of Junius, glaring. “How do you know he has your twisted fury?”
“Mesmer,” she corrected. “And I know because his blood is potent.”
“And he was the one who saved us at the Black Tomb,” I said.
“I still don’t understand how,” Mattis pouted.
“Magic, carpenter.” Junie laughed. “Can’t you leave it at that? He likely saw a vision in his head and wrote it off as his own thoughts.”
“This is . . .” Brant shook his head and looked to where his sister slept. “Kari, wouldn’t she be an Alver?”
“No,” Junie said. “Not necessarily. Sometimes two Alvers don’t produce Alver littles. It comes to whomever fate chooses I suppose.”
Ulf pointed his frustration at the bindings on Junius’s wrists. “Can you still use your magic?”
“Oh, yes. I told you all this. To me, these are nothing but pretty bracelets.”
With a dangerous, cruel grin, Ulf took out a boot knife. “Then I say we cut out your throat. Who is to say you won’t turn on us? You first, then the raven.”
“Step back, Ulf.” Valen, and the rest of his guild broke through the trees. “You won’t touch her.”
Ulf barked a laugh. His breath like sour ale. “And what can you do to stop me, Blood Wraith? You’ve got those pretty bindings on. We’ve got your lover—” He gestured to me. I didn’t flinch. “You’re nothing but Ari’s mutt.”
“Legion,” I warned.
I wasn’t fast enough, or he didn’t care, it was hard to tell.
Before the name finished leaving my mouth, Valen threw a straight blade knife (where he kept getting his weapons I didn’t know) and the point narrowly missed Ulf’s neck. It thudded into the corner post of the alehouse.
Ulf was stunned into drunken silence. Valen crossed the space between them, the cool, collected, sly grin on his face.
“I tire of you.” He took a deep breath and patted Ulf’s cheek. Hard. “I may be the mutt, but I wonder what your precious king will think when he learns at every turn you have threatened to kill or disobey those he put in charge. We are here at his word, are we not? Leave the raven, leave my guild alone, and—” Valen tilted his face near Ulf’s, close enough he could kiss his cheek if he wished. “Stop threatening Kvinna Elise in front of me.”
The thick guard tensed. Veins bulged in his arms. He was barely holding his rage in place as Valen disappeared, his guild at his back. Frey went to Ulf, only to be shoved back before the burly guard stormed off in the opposite direction as the Guild of Shade.
The Night Prince said nothing to me, and I wanted to strangle him. Last night I drifted to sleep to thoughts of his mouth on mine. His hands claiming my body. His desire for me that he resisted. Gods, I resisted him, too, but continued to fail miserably.
I tried to be sympathetic. I didn’t know what wretched memories lived in his head now, but I saw the fear in his eyes. Heard the pain in his voice when he admitted nightmares haunted him of what Ravenspire would do to me.
What he did not realize was I shared the same nightmares.
More than once, I had laid awake imagining what Calder might do if he learned the Night Prince had returned. The sort of torture Valen would endure should he ever be captured again.
Fear, though, did not numb the pain of my longing for him. While we walked free—all I wanted were moments with him. It won’t last. I tried to shake the cold, intruding thought away and failed. Even if you survive, he is a prince. You are nothing.
I jolted when someone touched my arm. “Oh, Siv,” I said, holding my chest. “You startled me.”
“How are you?”
I flicked my eyes over her shoulder. Mattis pouted with his back against a tree near Brant, but they weren’t close enough to hear us. Frey had followed Ulf with a defeated curve to his spine. Still, I kept my voice soft. “How much longer do we go on serving a king when we know the true heir is among us, angering everyone he speaks with?”
Siv’s face twitched. Ah, she thought it was funny. I found no humor in any of it.
“Elise,” she said when I turned away. “We cannot force him. I have faith that when the time is right, he will realize he can do more, be more, if he accepts the path fate has chosen for him.”
“I wish I shared your optimism.”
“Come with me. There is something I wanted to speak to you about.” Siv pulled me into the shadows of a large white aspen. “The Black Tomb was cursed again, and I think it was done by the same girl witch you met.”
I shake my head. “No, Calista wanted to be free.”
“I’m not saying she did it by choice, I’m simply saying Ravenspire might understand better what she can do.”
“Do you think they know the truth about Valen?”
Siv shrugged. “I don’t know, but Elise, if they are using this girl to alter fate, if the raven spoke true, what other dark magic are they using?”
Possibilities scraped across my brain until my head throbbed. “We ought to be prepared for anything. Calista is sly, though. She hates them. I don’t think she’ll sabotage us—at least not intentionally.”
“Who is this witch?” Mattis stepped between us. He’d moved so silently I hadn’t heard him approach.
Siv looked at him, a heavy shadow in her gaze. A thousand things unspoken between them. “She is a prisoner we met before the coup. A slave to entertain the royals with her magic. But she can predict fate, even alter it. It’s a gift that could prove dangerous to us.”
“Then we should send an assassin to kill her,” Mattis said. “Maybe the Blood Wraith since he is so fond of killing.”
“Stop being so sour,” I said with a glare. “We’re not killing the girl. She is not free there. But I would not turn away a plan to rescue her.”
Siv nodded her agreement.
“I’m not sure if it matters,” Mattis said, “but I have an idea of when we might get a chance at finding the witch.”
“Really?” Siv said. “When?”
“It will be risky, and it will take us into Ravenspire again.”
“This fight will inevitably end up at Castle Ravenspire,” I said.
Mattis smirked. “True enough. I’m talking about the vows. In a short time, Calder and your sister will take their royal vows. Already there are caravans moving across the land, filling the docks, with the finest things for their bleeding ceremony. We go in then.”
“How? There will be countless ravens on guard.”
“We must be creative.” Mattis stroked his chin. This moment made me long for carefree days when we would spar at the bell tower, when we’d mock the traditions of nobility, and eat milk cakes as if there were no ranks between us.
“We’ll need Ari’s support and his command,” Siv said. “But I see the logic. We find a way to go in undetected and cut them at the knees. Lift their skirts and see what they’re hiding underneath.”
For the first time in weeks, Mattis grinned at Siv. He tipped his chin in a deep nod. “Exactly, my bloodthirsty Siverie. Exactly.”