Sorrow's Peak (Serpent of Time Book 2) (17 page)

“Well, I still say Dáinn was a fool to leave Jora with his brothers the way he did. If he really loved her, he would want to stand and fight beside her. Otherwise why did he spend so much time training her as a warrior in the first place?”

“Dáinn loved her so much he would confront the very thing that sought to kill Jora,” he countered, “and see the monster to its end before it ever came near her.”

“Men are such stupid fools,” she decided. “They think us all weak because we are born with space between our legs for filling, and yet all they ever think about is filling that space.”

In the last six days he should have grown accustomed to her brashness, but sometimes the things she said both shocked and delighted him. There was nothing prudish or weak about the woman in front of him, no topic too bold for her to broach in animated fashion, and yet everything about her was feminine and soft. She was a woman who backed her opinions and knew exactly what she wanted from the world; he just wished sometimes he knew whether she wanted more from him than the stories he’d been entertaining her with.

“Only Dáinn could never be with her in that way,” he corrected. “His mother’s punishment would not allow him to know physical love with a woman, and most especially not a daughter of Foreln.”

“That doesn’t mean he didn’t think about it constantly. After all,” she lowered the blade in her hands into the cooling bath and Vilnjar watched the steam rise between them like cloud, “if he really loved her, that would be the one thing he wanted most, wouldn’t it? The one thing he could never have from her. Her body.”

There was unspoken teasing in those words, as if she knew he thought of her that way more often than he would like to admit.

“There is more to love than the physical aspect of sharing bodies.” His tone was quiet, almost dismissive, and then he squinted up at her. “Are you going to listen to this story, or tell me how you think it should go?”

“Listen, of course.”

“On the road to Bragnoldun, Jora and Dáinn’s brothers came upon a small fishing village, but the people in that village would not make time for travelers because they did not trust them. They especially did not trust the strange men from the mountain, but there was one, an old woman all the children called witch, who lived near the edge of the village in a rundown shack all alone. She invited Jora and her Dvergr into her home and offered to break bread with them and ladle bowls with stew to fill their bellies if they promised to hear her story. The Dvergr did not trust the witch woman, and they tried to warn Jora, but her kind heart would not deny an old woman the company she longed for. Dáinn’s brothers followed their princess into the old woman’s house reluctantly.”

“Was she a cruel witch?”

“If you would listen to the story, perhaps you will find out when the time is right just what kind of witch she was,” he scolded, delighting in the lingering smile teasing at the corner of her mouth.

He wasn’t given much time to admire her grin. Broehn Black-Hammer was making his way across the road from Hodon’s hall and Vilnjar nearly jumped out of his skin when the large, bear of a man bellowed, “I did not agree to this.” Glaring down at Viln, his blue eyes narrowed with contempt. “The two of you lazing about when there is work to be done. Do you have any idea how much there is to do?”

“Oh Father, please.” She barely acknowledged the man’s ire, instead turning back into the bath and withdrawing the steel she’d been cooling to admire the snaking patterns that formed inside the metal. “I have done more work this day than you have done all week. And besides, you are interrupting a very interesting story with your senseless bellowing. Go on, Vilnjar. What did the old woman do to them? Did she poison the Dvergr? Was she Yrsa in disguise?”

“Uh…”

For a moment he could not find his voice, as Frigga’s father glowered at him from the edge of the porch, his large hands clenching and unclenching into fists at his sides.

“Finish the story, Vilnjar. I would hear what became of Jora and the Dvergr in the witch’s hut.”

He would never have thought Logren to be his savior, but the man shouted his name from the street as he jogged across it, distracting his attention from the bellows and the man who wanted to pound him into pulp. Logren darted through the foot traffic passing toward the market square, stopping out of breath just at the edge of the blacksmith’s awning. It wasn’t a long hike from one place to the other, but it seemed he’d made it in haste.

“I’m sorry to interrupt your…” Logren looked between the three of them while he caught his breath, then went on, “…work,” he finished. He’d come from the direction of the overseer’s hall as well, and Vilnjar couldn’t help but wonder if he was party to the same meeting Broehn came from. “Hodon needs to see you straight away, Viln.”

An uneasy feeling moved through him as a thousand terrified thoughts plagued his mind. His brother? The letters he’d helped the other man write?

He took a step toward Logren, lowered his voice and asked, “What is it? Is it Finn?”

Gods, how quickly his mind always moved to the place in which his brother was in danger and his mother was scowling from beyond the grave because he’d allowed it to happen. He resigned himself to the fact that he couldn’t interfere with his brother’s life anymore, but that didn’t mean he was going to stop caring and certainly not simply let go of a lifetime of worrying overnight.

Logren avoided eye contact, his nostrils flaring outward as he inhaled and looked away. Damn him, didn’t he know such looks were enough to wrench the guts of men? “It’s word from the Edgelands.”

“So soon? Hodon said it would take days to reach them.” He didn’t guard his tongue, didn’t expect he had to, considering Broehn came from Hodon’s hall himself and probably knew far more about the goings on in Dunvarak than an outsider like Vilnjar would ever know. For a moment he glanced toward Frigga’s father, squinting eyes searching for what, he didn’t know, and then Frigga touched his arm and drew him back to the strange and comfortable place he’d come to know as her presence.

“You should go, Vilnjar,” she said. “It is best not to keep Hodon waiting if Logren says it is a matter of great importance, but I expect to see you back here first thing tomorrow morning.” The order made her father issue a throaty growl. “I would know the rest of Jora Dragonslayer’s story.”

Viln conceded with a nod, ignoring her father as best he could. “As you wish, Frigga.”

Broehn held his hand out for the hand-held bellows Vilnjar had been working and he yielded it before backing away from the smithy to fall into step beside Logren. They were several steps away before the other man elbowed him in the ribs and offered an uneasy laugh.

“Are you trying to provoke Broehn into killing you?”

Logren was only slightly taller than Viln, but his legs were longer and they carried him at a pace difficult to match. Matching his stride as best he could, they wove in and out of people heading to and from the market. His companion was fidgety, which wasn’t altogether unusual for Logren under normal circumstances, but the underlying nervousness surrounding his demeanor only served to disturb Vilnjar all the more. He kept wringing his hands in front of him as he walked, rubbing the dry skin and pushing in against the muscle across the span of his palm as if it ached.

“I would win his daughter’s hand.”

“I don’t think it is his daughter’s hand you need worry about. She seems content enough in your company, but her father… He protectively grips that hand, Viln, with a controlling amount of vigor unlike any I’ve ever seen before. I don’t think it helps your cause much that Broehn’s already decided he doesn’t like you.”

“In the end, it is not him who needs to like me.”

“So said the last man who attempted to court the fair Frigga of the forge.” His eyebrow arched playfully, but the humor in his jest did not meet Logren’s eyes. “Either way, it seems you’re determined to see this through, and as I said, she does seem to like you, though for the life of me I can’t figure out why.” His tone was filled with teasing mockery, the sharp elbow of his bent arm nudging into Vilnjar again and stumbling his steps as he tried to avoid it.

“I don’t know how well she likes me, to be honest. She does seem to like the stories I tell though, so I suppose that’s something.”

“I think she likes you far more than you give her credit for, my friend.”

Living under Logren’s roof brought the old friends far closer than Vilnjar expected. He supposed the absence of Logren’s mage friend was in part responsible for the amount of time the two of them spent together when they weren’t consumed with their daily tasks and duties, and long after Viina left them at the table for bed he found himself animatedly debating everything under the sun with Logren until the hour grew late and the mead barrels empty.

Among debatable topics of discourse, Logren made it his personal business to chide and ridicule the man he now considered to be his oldest friend by pointing out the audacity it must require to march into a city and set his sights on the most eligible woman in it, but Vilnjar didn’t bother trying to explain to him how it was so much more than that, as far as he was concerned.

He told no one, not even his own brother, he could feel the twining of Frigga’s soul with his own, the undercurrent of her heartbeat as it matched his rhythms whenever she was near him. He had a hard enough time trying to determine if she felt it at all; the last thing he needed was Logren poking and prodding into it before it made sense to Vilnjar himself.

They were temporarily parted by a group of women carrying water jugs through the street, and by the time they came back together again he found the courage to change the subject to the matter at hand. “Something has happened?”

“Indeed, it has,” he nodded. “I’m afraid the wind brings dark tidings, old friend.”

“Dark… tidings? What do you mean? Not enough time has passed for a response to Hodon’s proposal.”

“The letter never arrived.”

When Logren turned to look at him, his amber eyes were narrowed almost guiltily, but what reason would he have for guilt? There was no time to ask, as they arrived at the entryway and proceeded into the receiving hall. Sourness churned in Vilnjar’s stomach then as he listened to the scuff of their boots across the wooden floors. Neither of them said a word, not even as they navigated the hallways to Hodon’s private chamber.

The old warrior paced the floor, heavy boots tromping against the wood with every step, boards occasionally groaning under his weight. At the sound of the doors opening, he pivoted in to face them, his stern face stiff beneath his pale, yellow beard. Vilnjar didn’t like the look the man wore, it made him feel more nervous, especially when his blue eyes stared. What was that look? It was the same look he’d mistaken for guilt on Logren’s face, as it was not quite guilt. It was something deeper. Chagrin, perhaps. Helplessness?

“Overseer,” he lowered his head respectfully. “Logren said you wished to see me?”

Turning his gaze downward, Hodon stared into the lower corner of the room for a long time, only the heavy sound of his vexed breath filling the air. The uneasiness in Vilnjar’s gut doubled, a pang stabbing at him from within. Over his shoulder he could hear Logren’s breathing, the heat of every exhale warming the back of Vilnjar’s neck he was so close.

“Have you word already from Drekne?” he prodded the silence for answers, not wishing to endure another moment of the growing tension, but Hodon still did not reply.

His mind turned toward worse outcomes. Perhaps Logren saying the letter never arrived meant he simply didn’t know, and the real reason they brought him was because his brother was dead. Gone just seven days, part of him wanted to doubt there was time enough for his mad and reckless sibling to have gotten himself killed, but what if he hadn’t?

No, it couldn’t be Finn. He would feel such a loss long before word ever arrived… Wouldn’t he?

At last Hodon drew in a heavy breath, and upon sighing he said, “As I’m sure Logren’s already told you, the word we sent to Drekne did not arrive.”

“He did mention as much, yes.”

“The riders I sent barely crossed through the mountain pass when they were intercepted by a ragged pack of survivors. Were it not for our mage among them, they might have torn our people apart in their savagery, but she was able to stay them and force them back into their human skins.”

His sour stomach lurched with panic. “Wolves from Drekne?”

Hodon replied. “Nine of them, severely wounded. They claimed to have barely escaped with their lives, and remembering what their seer said before she passed from this world they made for Rimian in hopes of finding the Light of Madra.”

“Escaped? Escaped from what?”

“Soldiers marched into Drekne under cover of darkness five nights past, sent by King Aelfric to reclaim his
daughter
.” That last word was spoken with such distaste even Viln’s tongue grew sour with it. “When Lorelei was not found there, they set fire to the village. People still in their beds,” he said bitterly, “women, children, those who would never have been able to stand and fight for themselves, and when they were sure none survived they moved on south toward Breken.”

“We did not even pass through Breken. We skirted around it. Perhaps their search ended there.”

“We can only hope.”

“The nine survivors… are they all that remain? Where are they? I would see them.”

“They are lodged in the mountain pass,” Logren said. “The severity of their injuries prevents them from making haste, but we will send horses to retrieve them.”

“Nine,” he swallowed the word until it was little more than a whisper. “Men or women?”

“Three men, four women, two children.”

Children. That brought him the slightest glimmer of hope. “My sister?” he asked, not daring to look at either of the men in front of him for fear their eyes would betray his fears. “Was my sister, Ruwena, among the survivors?”

“We will know who the survivors are when they arrive,” Hodon promised, though he did not meet Vilnjar’s eyes when he did, “but I would not hold onto hope your sister is among them.”