Honor Among Orcs (Orc Saga) (32 page)

No. The only possible misunderstanding was the cause of his death, and Arianna had not shared that with anyone but himself and Fossegrim. The Hrimthursar, Bolvarr, they had only known she felt him die, that he was dead. And Vanadis seemed to have believed it too, by some trick of the Ancestors.

If anyone had been confused by dreams, it was Vanadis, or she could not have believed the orcs would let her enslave a race, no matter what their sins. Arianna would not suffer dishonor for the Vala’s arrogance, Gothi or not, Bolthorn would see to that.

And he would not doubt her. After everything he had asked of Arianna, the least he could give her in return was his faith.

Eistla brought them hot bread baked with goat cheese and sausage. A hearty morning meal and better than they’d had since leaving Tiveden. Arianna sighed with pleasure after her first bite, and Bolthorn grinned. Even if she did not care for the darkness, at least she enjoyed the food he might offer her.

“Will you teach me?” she asked his mother.

“Today, if you wish. While Bolthorn meets with the elders.”

He grunted, his mood souring as quickly as it had soared. “With Vanadis?”

“Hyndla packs her things and her mother curses the Vala. The whole village grieves for Bolvarr, but with your return, I am not certain they trust that Vanadis speaks the truth. And they remember Bolvarr’s warning, before he left. They remember what he said of Vanadis’s intentions for Arianna’s people.”

“Even though Vanadis means them to believe I bewitched Bolthorn and Bolvarr, both?” Arianna asked.

“They will not believe it for long,” Bolthorn growled. “If they have at all. Once Bolvarr returns, it will not matter.”

“But you cannot be certain he will,” Eistla said. “You were lost to us beyond the mountain for months, Bolthorn. By then Hyndla will be gone.”

Arianna dropped her gaze. “That was the king’s fault. Bolvarr will not suffer his fate.” But her expression was troubled. He had not noticed before that she rarely referred to the king as her father, but he wondered how he could have missed it now. “I only knew Bolvarr for a short time, but he did not seem so careless to me,” she continued. “Could he truly have fallen into such a trap at the passage mouth? Would he not hear them long before they knew he was there?”

“Almost certainly,” Bolthorn told her, hoping it would reassure his mother too. “The guards of Gautar do not move with any stealth. They are heavy with armor and loud with talk, and even a soft-footed hunter would be given away by his heartbeat. Bolvarr could not have died as the Vala said, and I will tell the council the same. Unless Vanadis holds him against his will, he lives still and will return to us, I am certain of it.”

“You would accuse her of denying him his freedom?”

“Has she not already proven herself capable?” Bolthorn asked. “The Vidthursar could have protected Arianna, but chose instead to give her to the Vala—the council acting where they had no right to interfere, and Vanadis refused to allow Arianna to remain with the Gythja. Whether the Hrimthursar wish to keep me as their Gothi or not, our people will not make the same mistake. Not when old Nykur himself delivered her from Tiveden and Vanadis’s grasp.”

Eistla’s smile was thin. “A strong argument, Gothi.”

“I thought you did not wish to mention Fossegrim?” Arianna picked at her bread, her face pale. “That it was too great a risk?”

“She already knows he took you in, and that he sent you away,” he said. “It does him no harm to repeat that much.”

“The council will not let me speak, will it?” She didn’t lift her gaze from the food in her hands. “For fear that I will bewitch them, too.”

Bolthorn met his mother’s eyes, but he did not need to see her face to know the answer. Hyndla’s response told him everything she did not say. Hyndla, who had known him better than any other, save Bolvarr and his mother. If she could believe it, the rest already would.

“It will not last,” he promised her. “Once Bolvarr returns, none of this will matter. They will not mistrust you forever. I will not let them.”

“But as long as they mistrust me, they cannot trust you. You cannot lead them without their faith, Bolthorn, and they need you.” She looked up then, holding his gaze. “Especially now, with Vanadis whispering in their ears. They need a Gothi who will not be bent to the will of the elves.”

He shook his head. “This will pass. Once Vanadis believes she has convinced them, she will leave, and even if the Hrimthursar of this village have been fed on her lies, the other three will not all agree with the council. There is hope, still.”

“Not if Hyndla turns openly against you,” Eistla said. “Every orc knows how close you have been to her. If she speaks against Arianna, claims you are bewitched, they will believe her. You will lose the confidence of the females and even as Gythja, I will not be able to change their minds.”

Arianna’s jaw tightened, but when he reached for her, she rose from her place beside the fire. From her place beside him. He watched her as she retrieved her cloak, pretending concern for a fraying hem.

“What would you have me do, Mother?” His heart ached, and though he willed her to raise her eyes, Arianna kept them on the cloth in her hands. If Arianna had been orc, would Hyndla have been so hurt? Would she have sought to divide the Hrimthursar, to turn them against his bride? “I cannot stop her if she will not see truth.”

Eistla too, turned her gaze to Arianna. “Vanadis herself said that keeping you from one another would break the spell. I realize you could not bring yourself to turn from her when you did not know her fate, but now you know her safe. Perhaps if you promised the council not to speak with her—”

“No,” Bolthorn growled, glaring at his mother. “I will not betray my wife. We are bound, with the blessing of the Ancestors. That should be enough to appease any of them!”

“Bolthorn, be reasonable.” Arianna’s voice made his stomach twist. She looked at him now, her expression grim and determined, and then her gaze slid to Eistla. “Will it convince them? If we both agree not to see one another.”

“I think it will prove Bolthorn’s loyalties are to his clan and yours as well. Vanadis cannot claim you are bewitching him if you are kept apart. If Hyndla bears witness, it might be enough to give her pause.”

“I will not give you up again,” Bolthorn said. “I will not do this!”

Arianna smiled, but it was filled with pain, tightening around his heart. “You will. We both will.”

“It will not be forever, Bolthorn. Just until the council sees reason again. Until Vanadis believes she has won. And I will care for her myself. She can stay in my hut. There is much she must be taught if she is to become Gythja, and while you fight with the council you will have little time to spend at her side, regardless.”

He growled again, the room yellowing with his anger. That she would ask this of him at all brought dishonor. Arianna should not be caged, locked away and kept out of sight. It was no better than how Gunnar had treated him, imprisoned behind the glass. And he had promised her freedom. He had promised her a better life than this, thought his people so much better than hers, and encouraged her to believe the same..

“Bolthorn, if it will convince them that is all that matters. If it will convince Hyndla not to join the Vala—” Arianna’s voice broke and she cleared her throat, not meeting his eyes. “She is important to you, and to Bolvarr. That would be reason enough, without the threat of what she might say against you. If this is what your people need me to do to prove myself, I am not afraid to do it.”

CHAPTER TWENTY-SIX

There was no arguing with either of them. Bolthorn cursed his mother for suggesting it, cursed Arianna’s stubborn honor for seeing the wisdom of such a ruse, and above all, he cursed Vanadis. Vanadis who had already caused him more pain than Gunnar’s poisoned knife between his ribs.

And how long would it take the fool elders on the council to believe he had not lost his senses? How long to convince them that Arianna was nothing more than a woman, innocent of everything but love for him? All she had done had been for his people, and if they would only see the truth—he would shame them all with it, before he was through. Until they begged her for forgiveness!

He entered the council hall stiff with anger, and it did not improve his mood to see Vanadis inside already, her hand upon the arm of one of the elders as she spoke earnestly with him. Bolthorn narrowed his eyes, and pressed his lips together to keep them from curling in a snarl. The low conversation of the council faded to a hush.

“Bolthorn,” Vanadis greeted him with a smile, crossing the room with her hands outstretched. He ground his teeth, and the look on his face stopped her before she reached him, her hands falling back to her sides. “You are still angry.”

“Should I be otherwise? You shame me and my wife, and by your words, my people have become twisted.” He let his gaze pass over the others, who grouped in threes and fours. “Since when have the Hrimthursar let the elves think for them? Or do you wish to change your loyalties? I am certain those of you who wish it would be welcome among the Vidthursar, even after their Gothi is replaced.”

That caught the attention of more than just Vanadis. Thrudgelmir, the oldest of the elders, thumped his stick against the hard packed earth, the sign for the rest of the council to be seated on the benches that ringed the hearth on three sides. The Gothi’s place was at the open end, upon the armed chair. Arianna would have thought it a throne, perhaps, but it was low backed and modest, and Bolthorn had always made a point of sitting off to one side or another, leaving room for others to join the circle as his equal. Today, there were two chairs, and Vanadis took the second, as she had often enough in the past. Bolthorn had no choice but to let her.

“What news is this of the Vidthursar, Bolthorn?” Thrudgelmir asked when they had all been seated. “Bolvarr brought no word of it.”

“Bolvarr did not know of it when he returned to you,” Bolthorn said. “But I have spoken to the Vid-Gythja herself, since. Menja speaks against her husband, and the women join her. Thiassi and the council chose to follow Vanadis’s will over the traditions of his people, of all our people, denying Arianna the right to raise our child among the orcs and sending her to the elves against her wishes.”

“For her own protection and safety,” Vanadis said.

“The decision was not yours to make, Vala,” Bolthorn said, forcing his voice to remain even. “Nor was it the Gothi’s. Children are the Gythja’s domain, and as my blood, the babe belongs to the Hrimthursar. Any appeal you wished to make should have been heard here, by Eistla.”

The elders mumbled among themselves, and Thrudgelmir leaned forward. “Your wife carries a child?”

Bolthorn shrugged. “So Vanadis has told her. Arianna will know with certainty before the sun rises, but she says the Nykur agreed.”

“The Nykur exiled her,” Vanadis corrected him. “For the half-blood child she carried. Had she remained with my daughter, she would have been kept safe and been well cared for.”

“Against her will,” Bolthorn countered. “Denied the right to freedom for herself and the child the Ancestors have seen fit to give us. Perhaps among the elves this is not so great a sin, but we orcs remember what Sinmarra intended. We remember how it began. Surely you recall, Vanadis? Your husband was among those taken from his people. Stolen from his family.”

He would not cheapen what those elves had suffered by saying more, but he need only glance at the elders, stiff and glowering to know the parallels had not been lost. Good. The more they questioned Vanadis, the better.

“It was not safe to leave her among orcs,” Vanadis said, undisturbed. She even smiled. “I know you cannot see it, Bolthorn, but I wished to protect you from her influence. Or would you allow Sinmarra to walk free within your village, knowing she would use that freedom to enslave your people?”

He ground his teeth, his nails digging deep into the wood beneath his hand. “Arianna is no witch.”

“Of course you would not believe it when you are already held within her thrall.” Vanadis looked to the others, her eyes wide with concern. “He will not be free as long as Arianna remains at his side. Whether she carries his child or not, she is still a threat. To all of you. How long until she bewitches more than just Bolthorn? Until more than just Bolvarr’s life is lost?”

“Do you truly believe Nykur would have sent her back if she were such a threat? The Nykur of all elves has only wanted to protect the orcs!” Bolthorn turned his anger into a sneer instead of a shout, though he wanted to roar. “Or do you mean to suggest
he
was under her power as well?”

Vanadis flushed. “The Nykur is old and addled.”

Thrudgelmir snorted. “The Nykur makes a show of his age, but he has not lost his wits. Even the orcs know that.”

“And who among you has not been taken by a pretty face?” Vanadis demanded. “Who among you has not been fooled, even without a witch’s magic?”

“We have all been fooled,” Bolthorn said. “By the beauty and grace of the elves, all these years. By you, Vanadis, when we trusted that you served the Ancestors, even in this.”

“She has turned him against me, against you,” Vanadis said over his words. “With every whisper in his ear, every touch. Will you risk it? Will you risk the birth of Sinmarra among your own people? Bolthorn will ask you to speak with her yourself. He will bring her here, and she will cast her spell over all of you. Then who will stop her? Who will protect your children? Can you blame me for taking action, knowing what I did?”

“Knowing nothing!” Bolthorn shouted. “How could you have known what she was even before she crossed the mountain? How could she have bewitched me, frozen near to death in the cold? She was not even conscious when you took her!”

There was a murmur of argument, the elders all speaking at once, and Thrudgelmir thumped his stick again for quiet. “It is true the Nykur may have been deceived, and we have seen with our own eyes the cruelty of the girl’s people in the scars marking Bolthorn’s body,” he said. “But you have been deceived as well, Vanadis, and Bolthorn’s wife too, believing he had died. Now you tell us Bolvarr is dead, that it is the girl’s fault, though she spoke with him only briefly. How have you escaped her influence if she is so powerful, so dangerous to all of us?”

“My brother and I are strong,” she said, lifting her chin. “How else have we survived so long? How else could he have survived Sinmarra for so long?”

Bolthorn snorted. “Ingvifreyr’s survival remains to be seen.”

“We agreed already,” Gymir said, the same orc who had tried to stop Bolthorn from entering the Gothi’s hut. “Before Bolvarr told us he died, when he left to chase the Vala and the girl. We agreed if he returned, we would choose a new Gothi. If that is so, what difference does it make if he wishes to throw his life away to this witch-woman?”

Thrudgelmir grunted. “If he was bewitched, and we might free him, why should we lose our Gothi?”

Bolthorn growled. He had never had much patience for being talked about as if he were not present, but hearing them discuss Arianna as if she were only an inconvenience to be disposed of frustrated him even further. They had supported him when he wanted to make peace with her people. Why could they not see her as a person, now? Why could they not see her courage, to come this far, to abandon everything she had known for love?

“If it is my wife you object to and not my leadership, perhaps there is another way.” He had not wanted to make the offer and the words were bitter on his tongue, but this was what she had asked of him, what she had insisted upon, and he had run out of other arguments to make. “Let Arianna stay with my mother, kept from the rest of the village. Until we have earned your trust, I will not see her, nor speak with her. As Vanadis said herself, she cannot bewitch me if we are kept apart. Will that satisfy the council? Will you accept it as proof, willingly offered, that we wish only to serve? That my wife is innocent of any wrong.”

Vanadis made a sound of protest, and the other elders all spoke among themselves, but Thrudgelmir pounded his stick, shouting for quiet. “What of the Gythja?” he asked. “Is she willing to place herself in the power of this witch?”

Bolthorn met his eyes, his own glowing yellow with anger. “The Gythja, unlike the rest of the Hrimthursar, has not lost her good sense. She offers herself as a show of faith in me as Gothi, and in the Ancestors who gifted me Arianna as a bride. Do you accept?”

Thrudgelmir gathered the others in by the eye, and Bolthorn watched as each orc gave his sign of assent. A nod, a thump of a fist against the wood of the bench, a drumming of fingers against the thigh, a wave of the hand, each movement a ripple of agreement, tightening around his heart, cutting through him like daggers. He almost wished they had refused, for this—this was like a death. The Hrimthursar were better than this, better than Gunnar, better than the elves.

Or they had been, once. Before Vanadis had meddled in their affairs.

“We accept,” Thrudgelmir said at last. But when he met Bolthorn’s gaze again, he looked aged, the wrinkles of his face grooved deep as canyons. “You must part before the moon sets this night.”

“Until I have proven myself,” Bolthorn said. “Until you are certain I speak my own mind, or until it is clear to me that you have lost the use of yours.”

And then he left them. For if he only had until moonset to be with his wife, he would not waste another moment arguing with old fools.

She stood when the door opened, knowing by the bow of his shoulders and the ache in her heart that the council had agreed. Bolthorn lifted his head, looking into her eyes, his own expression lined with grief. He opened his hand, palm up, empty. Empty.

“Forgive me,” he said, his voice broken.

Arianna went to him, taking his face in her hands, smoothing the lines from his brow, from the corners of his eyes, from the edges of his mouth. “We will breathe the same air, walk the same earth. It will not be forever, and at least I will know that you live.”

His amber eyes closed as his forehead dropped to hers. “I wanted to give you more than this.”

She curled her fingers into his hair, holding him near. Not for the last time, she told herself. They were bound. Marked and married. Not even Vanadis could keep them apart for long. The Ancestors would not allow it, even if Bolthorn would. And she knew his mind in this, if nothing else.

“This will pass, Bolthorn, as you said. It is only that they do not know me, that I am strange to them. Give them time to trust.”

“I will not wait for them forever.” He held her tightly, his fingers pressing hard into the softness of her waist. “If they do not find their wits, we will leave. You and I. We will live apart, and Vanadis can cloud their minds with lies to her heart’s content.”

“Shh.” She pressed a finger to his lips. “They will know the truth. When Bolvarr returns, none of this will matter.”

Unless he had been taken prisoner, as Bolthorn had. Perhaps Bolvarr had not died so quickly as the Vala said, for Arianna could not believe any orc would fall into such a trap, but if he had been seen and captured, there was little hope he would return without help. Bolthorn searched her face, and she knew he saw the words she didn’t say, felt her fear for his brother. His lips formed a grimmer line, thin and hard.

“As long as he lives there is hope. The Ancestors want peace, not war. They will protect him from whatever comes. Even if it is the Vala themselves who threaten us.”

She closed her eyes and hid her face against his neck. She did not want to think of Bolvarr or the Vala. She did not want to think of what Bolthorn’s love for her had cost him. She did not want to think at all. This was not the last time he would hold her, but she did not know when she would be free in his arms again.