Frostfire (10 page)

“What?” Linus glanced down at the book, then back up at me. “I feel like you skipped
a step there.”

“Each animal in the story represents a different tribe.” I tapped the picture of a
cougar, his eyes red and fangs sharp. “The cougar is the Vittra, who were starving
and suffering. So they began attacking and stealing from the other tribes, and soon
the Omte, who are the birds, joined in. And it wasn’t long until everyone was fighting
everyone, and we’d completely broken off from each other.”

“Which one are the Kanin?” Linus asked as he stared down at the page.

“We’re the rabbits. That’s literally what
kanin
translates into.”

“Really?” Linus questioned in surprise. “Why rabbits? Shouldn’t we be, like, chameleons
or something?”

“Probably, but when the trolls named themselves, they didn’t know what chameleons
were. Not a lot of reptiles in northern Canada. So we went with rabbits because they
burrowed deep, ran fast, and they did a good job of blending in with their surroundings.”

Linus stared sadly at the books in front of him. “I don’t think I’ll ever be able
to remember all this stuff, especially not with all the different tribes.”

“Here.” I grabbed a thick book from the bottom of the pile and flipped through its
yellowing pages until I found the one I was looking for.

It had a symbol for each of the tribes, the actual emblems that we used on flags when
we bothered to use flags—a white rabbit for the Kanin, a green flowering vine for
the Trylle, a red cougar for the Vittra, a blue fish for the Skojare, and a brown-bearded
vulture for the Omte.

Next to each emblem were a few short facts about each of the tribes. Not enough to
make anyone an expert, but enough for now.

He grimaced and stared down at the page. “Great.”

“It won’t be that bad,” I assured him.

As Linus studied the page in front of him, his brown hair fell across his forehead,
and his lips moved as he silently read the pages. The freckles on his cheeks darkened
the harder he concentrated—an unconscious reaction brought on by his Kanin abilities.

“Bryn Aven.” A sharp voice pulled me from watching Linus, and I looked up to see Astrid
Eckwell. “What on earth are you doing here?”

Her raven waves of hair cascaded down her back. The coral chiffon of her dress popped
beautifully against the olive tone of her skin. In her arms she held a small rabbit.
A smirk was already forming on her lips, and I knew that couldn’t be a good sign.

“Working with Markis Linus Berling,” I told her as I got to my feet. Linus glanced
at both Astrid and myself, and then he got up. “You don’t have to stand.”

“What?” He looked uncertainly at me, like it was a trick. “But … you did.”

“Of course she did,” Astrid said as she walked over to us, absently stroking the white
rabbit. “She’s the
help,
and I’m a Marksinna. She has to stand whenever anyone higher up than her enters the
room, and that’s everyone.”

“As the Markis Berling, you only need to stand for the King and Queen,” I said, but
Linus still didn’t seem to understand.

“Bryn, aren’t you going to introduce us?” Astrid asked as she stared up at him with
her wide dark eyes, but he kept looking past her, down at the rabbit in her arms.

“My apologies, Marksinna. Linus Berling, this is Astrid Eckwell.” I motioned between
the two of them.

“It’s a pleasure to meet you,” Linus said, and gave her a lopsided smile.

“Likewise. Are you going to the anniversary party tomorrow?” Astrid asked.

“Um, yeah, I think so.” He turned to me for confirmation, and I nodded once.

“He will be there with his parents.”

Astrid looked at me with contempt in her eyes. “I suppose that means you’ll be there
too.”

“Most likely I will be assisting Markis Berling and the Högdragen,” I said, and I
didn’t sound any more thrilled about it than she did.

“You better dig something nice out of your closet.” She cast a disparaging look over
my outfit. “You can’t go to the party wearing your ratty old jeans. That might fly
for the trashy Skojare, but you know that won’t do for the Kanin.”

I kept my hands folded neatly behind my back and didn’t look down. As a tracker, I
had to dress appropriately for many different occasions, and I knew there was nothing
wrong with my outfit. I might be wearing dark denim, but they were nice.

“Thank you for the tip, Marksinna, but I’m certain that you won’t be speaking derogatorily
of the Skojare anymore, as their King, Queen, and Prince have already arrived in the
palace for tomorrow’s anniversary party,” I replied icily. “You wouldn’t want them
to hear you speaking negatively of them, since they are King Evert and Queen Mina’s
guests.”

“I know they’re here,” Astrid snapped, and her nostrils flared. “That’s why I’m dressed
properly today, unlike you. What would the King of the Skojare say if he saw you running
around like that?”

“Since he’s a gentleman, I’m sure he would say hello,” I said.

Taking a deep breath through her nose, Astrid pressed her lips into a thin, acrid
smile. “You are just as impossible as you were in school. I can’t believe they let
you be a tracker.”

When she spoke like that, it wasn’t hard to remember back when we’d been kids in grade
school together. I couldn’t have been more than six or seven years old the first time
Astrid pushed me down in the mud and sneered at me as she called me a
half-breed
.

For the past century or so, the Kanin had been trying to reduce their reliance on
changelings. If there were multiple children in a family, only one would be left as
a changeling. It wasn’t uncommon for particularly wealthy families to go a whole generation
without leaving one.

And in Astrid’s case, both her parents had been changelings, so they were freshly
infused with cash from their host families and didn’t need their child to bring in
more of an income.

So, unfortunately, that left me forced to deal with Astrid all through grade school.
There were many times when I wanted nothing more than to punch her, but Tilda had
always held me back, reminding me that violence against a Marksinna could damage my
chance of being a tracker.

That hadn’t stopped me from hurling a few insults at Astrid in my time, but that had
been long ago, before I’d joined the tracker school. Now I was sworn to protect the
Marksinna and Markis, which meant I wasn’t even supposed to speak ill of them.

Astrid knew that, and it pleased her no end.

“Linus, if you ever need any real help, you can always ask me,” she said, with her
derisive gaze still fixed on me. “You mustn’t be forced to rely on an inferior tutor
like Bryn.”

“Markis,” Linus said.

Startled, she looked up at him. “What?”

“You called me Linus, but I’m your superior, right?” he asked as he stared back down
at her. “That’s why I didn’t have to stand when you came in?”

“That’s…” Her smile faltered. “That’s correct.”

“Then you should call me Markis,” Linus told her evenly, and it was a struggle for
me not to smile. “If I’m understanding correctly.”

“You understand it right, Markis,” I assured him.

“Yes, of course you are, Markis.” Astrid gave him her best eat-shit grin. “Well, I
should let you get back to your lessons. I’m sure you have much to learn before tomorrow
night’s ball if you don’t want to make a fool of yourself.”

She turned on her heel, the length of her dress billowing out behind her. Once she
was gone, I let out a deep breath, and Linus sat back down at the table.

“That chick seemed kinda like a jerk,” he commented.

“She is,” I agreed, and sat down across from him. “We went to grade school together,
and she was always horrible.”

“She wasn’t a changeling?”

“No, she’s been here every day for the past nineteen years.”

“What was the deal with the rabbit?” Linus asked. He sounded so totally baffled by
it that I had to laugh.

“Oh, it’s kind of a tradition. They’re Gotland rabbits, and legend has it we brought
them over with us when we came from Sweden. Supposedly they helped us find where to
build Doldastam and helped us survive the first cold winter.”

“How did they help the Kanin survive?”

“Well, they ate them,” I explained. “But not all of them, and now people raise them,
and we’d never eat them because they’re like a sacred mascot. Some of the Marksinna
carry them around now, like rich American girls used to do with Chihuahuas. The Queen
has a rabbit named Vita. You’ll probably see it.”

He laid his hands flat on the table and looked me in the eye. “Can I be totally candid
with you?”

“Of course.” I sat up straighter, preparing myself for any number of inflammatory
statements he might make. “I’m your tracker. You can always speak freely with me.”

“You guys are super-weird.”

NINE

regret

“I can’t do this,” I announced as I threw the office door open. It swung back harder
than I meant for it to, and when the doorknob banged into the brick wall, Ridley grimaced.

“If by ‘this’ you mean knocking, then yes, that’s very apparent,” he said dryly.

I flopped in the chair across from his large oak desk. A wide-screen monitor for his
computer was tilted toward the edge of the desk. Being trolls, we craved all things
shiny and new.

Our love of such things extended to the latest gadgets and fastest technology, but
once we had them, it seemed that we usually preferred the old ways of doing things.
The Kanin royalty collected computers and tablets the way others did baseball cards—storing
them in boxes and closets and out of sight.

That’s why the Rektor’s office contained a high-speed computer, a massive printer,
and all sorts of devices that would make his work so much easier, but it was rarely
used. Stacks of paper covered the desk, since, inevitably, most things were done by
hand.

A bulletin board on one side of the room was overflowing with flyers. Reminders for
meetings and trainings, sign-up sheets for less glamorous jobs like cleaning out the
garage, and missing persons posters for the rare changeling who ran away.

Behind Ridley’s desk were two massive paintings of King Evert and Queen Mina. The
rest of the wall was covered in smaller eight-by-tens of the latest changelings who
had come back, as a reminder of why we did the job.

Outside the office, classes were in session, so I could hear the muted sounds of kids
talking.

“I can’t stay here,” I told Ridley.

“Like in this office?” He scribbled something down on a piece of paper in front of
him, then he looked at me. “Or can you be more specific?”

“I can’t stay in Doldastam,” I said. His shoulders slacked, and he set the pen down.
“Linus is safe. He’s fine. There are tons of people here to watch him. I have no reason
to stay.”

“That’s true,” he said sarcastically, then he snapped his fingers like something had
just occurred to him. “Oh, wait. There is that one reason. The King
ordered
you to stay and personally watch Linus.”

I rubbed my forehead, hating that he was right. “I need a break.”

“A break?” Ridley asked in confused shock, and for a few seconds he appeared speechless.
“You’re a workaholic. What nonsense are you going on about?”

“I’m not asking to do nothing,” I clarified. “I need a break from here. I just got
done breaking in the last changeling, and that went fine, but I was stuck here for
weeks and weeks. And then I just got to go out after Linus, and I had to turn around
and come back.”

He ran a hand along the dark stubble of his cheek. “What’s going on?” he asked, and
his tone softened. “What happened?”

“Nothing.”

“Bryn.” From across the desk, he gave me a look—one that said he knew me too well
to let me bullshit him.

Instead of replying, I turned away from him. I twisted the silver band around my thumb
and looked over at the bulletin board, eyeing the wanted posters.

Any fugitive who was still at large had their picture up, even if they’d escaped years
ago. The incident with Viktor Dålig had to have happened fifteen years ago, but his
picture was still prominently displayed at the top of the wanted section. The bright
red font for “wanted” had faded to more of a dull pink, but his picture was still
clear and visible. The heavy dark black beard, his cold eyes, even the scar that ran
across his face from just above his left eye down to his right cheek.

There were two new posters that popped out on crisp white paper with fresh ink. An
updated one for Konstantin Black, and a brand-new one for Bent Stum. Even in his picture,
Konstantin seemed to be smirking at me, like he knew he’d gotten away with what he’d
done.

But his eyes caught me. Even in black-and-white, they appeared livelier than when
I had seen them in real life. It was the look he’d had when I’d last seen him standing
in the crowd in Chicago, and the same look he’d had when I saw him standing over my
father. And it was his eyes that had haunted my dreams last night, but I struggled
to push that back, refusing to replay it in my head again, the way I had been all
morning.

“Bryn,” Ridley repeated, since I hadn’t answered him.

Reluctantly I turned back to look at him. “I just ran into Astrid Eckwell in the library
at the palace.”

Ridley shrugged, like he didn’t know why that would bother me. “Astrid’s an idiot.”

“Yeah, I know.”

“You never let her get to you.”

I inhaled deeply. “I usually don’t.”

“What’d she say this time that got under your skin?”

“Nothing, really. It was just the same old crap.” I started bouncing my leg up and
down, needing to do something to relieve my agitation. “And usually I’m over it. But
this time it was really hard for me to not punch her in the face.”

“Well, I commend you on not doing that. Because that would’ve been very bad.”