by Alice Wilde
“Roan?” I call.
“Over here, lass!”
Roan is in the process of putting together a small meal of salted meats, dried biscuits, and pickled vegetables. I miss fresh fruit and the variety of foods I used to eat, but this is hardly the time to complain.
“Hungry?”
“Yes, although I can’t say any of this looks particularly appetizing,” I say with a small smile.
“I’ll have to disagree with you there,” Roan says as he leans back, admiring his handiwork. “This is perhaps the best meal I’ve ever made on my own.”
I laugh, realizing how true this probably is.
“Perhaps I’m not the best to judge,” I say, catching my breath. “I don’t think I’ve prepared a single meal in my entire life.”
“We’ll have to change that then,” Roan says, pulling me to his side and handing me some of the dried biscuits. “Place them wherever your heart desires.”
I shake my head at him but do as he says, carefully laying out the biscuits on each of the plates.
“There. Now you’ve helped prepare a meal,” Roan says softly, turning me to face him.
“I don’t think I’d go quite so far as to say that,” I say, my face flushing.
“But I would,” Roan says, watching me for a moment before leaning down to kiss me. Instead of balking at his touch, I welcome it. Melting into the tenderness of the moment. This…this is what being with someone is supposed to feel like. No terror, no fear, only us against the world. I have to try to remember this feeling.
“Should we take the food upstairs?” I ask breathlessly as he pulls away from me.
“I couldn’t care less about the food right now,” Roan says, searching my face for a sign.
“Neither could I.”
Roan smiles at me, tucking a strand of hair behind my ear before picking me up and carrying me to one of the nearby hammocks. Everything about this moment with him is perfect.
“Ahh!” I squeal as Roan and I try and fail to find our balance in one of the hammocks, toppling out of it and onto the floor.
“I guess those things weren’t really made for two,” Roan groans.
“Or it’s a sign that we should be doing something more useful with our time,” I say.
“I don’t know what could be more useful than spending time with you.”
I smile at the thought but know our moment here has passed.
“We need to eat, and so do the others.”
“Okay, wife, you win. Let’s take the brutes some food.”
Roan and I gather the food and head back out into the open air.
Something about that small moment with Roan breaks the ice that had been growing in my heart over the past couple of days. It is as if I have been reminded what life could be like. Why I am fighting so hard to take back my kingdom and save my people. It also reminds me that these three shifters are my people, and I can choose to let Damien destroy them and come between us, or I can choose to fight for them.
For us.
For Ero.
Ten
Ero
Seeing how afraid Annalise feels around me cuts me to the core. It reminds me of the way my mother looked at my father the day he killed my family, and the way I’d looked at him as he slit his own throat. It was exactly the reason why I swore never to love or be loved. There was too much risk involved with attachment. And yet, I’d somehow still managed to impart fear to Annalise.
I’d become her greatest nightmare and one of her only chances for freedom all rolled into one.
“Ero?”
Annalise’s voice startles me. I hadn’t expected to hear her my name fall from her lips for a long time, if ever again. I turn slowly to face her, but she’s not looking directly at me.
“Yes?”
“I think we need to talk.”
I nod, and then answer in agreement when I realize she wouldn’t have noticed the action.
“After breakfast, then?”
“Yes, of course.”
She holds out a plate of food toward me, and I take it gratefully before she turns and walks back to where Roan is waiting for her, seated on the steps leading up to the hull. I eat my meal slowly, thinking carefully over what I should say to her, or what she may want to say to me.
A sudden thought pops into my mind. What if she wants me to leave? She can barely stand the sight of me, so the request wouldn’t come as a surprise.
I contemplate what my course of action should be whether or not she does. I want to help her, and more than anything, I want to destroy Damien for his part in all of this. Never again do I want someone else to have so much control over me. But I don’t know how that will be possible considering how little control I seem to have over myself.
All I can do is try to keep Annalise as distant from me as possible and hope it will keep her safe. I pick at the food left on my plate, my appetite gone, waiting for her to approach me once again. The minutes feel like hours, but I watch out of the corner of my eye as Roan gives Annalise an encouraging hug and then takes her plate. I toss my own to the side and stand as she draws closer to me.
“Where do you want to talk?”
“Here, in the open.”
I nod in understanding and follow her toward the bow of the ship. I lean against some of the riggings while she takes a seat on top of a crate. We stay there together in silence for a long moment before Annalise finally opens her mouth to speak.
“I need to understand what happened,” she says. “I know that Damien was trying to use you, but I don’t know how he managed to get as far as he did. I don’t know why you didn’t fight harder.”
“I did fight,” I say, my tone coming out more defensive than I had intended it to be. “You don’t know what it’s like.”
Her eyes flash angrily at me, and I immediately realize that what I said isn’t true, but I can’t bring myself to correct the mistake.
“I know very well what it’s like to be under his thumb,” she says in a rigid voice, “but I’ve never tried to take advantage of anyone against their will.”
“Neither have I,” I growl. “You know what Damien is capable of. I would never take you, and never against your will.”
Something about her expression bothers me, but I’m not sure why, or what I’ve said to cause it.
“Is…is that why you…” She trails off.
“Why what?”
“You…Damien,” Annalise says correcting herself, “wasn’t able to finish what he started?”
“I don’t understand.”
“Your body wasn’t aroused when Damien tried to take me…and he wasn’t able to change that.”
I clear my throat uncomfortably as I try to decide how much I should tell her.
“You’re not going to like what you hear,” I say. “It was too late when I realized Damien had taken hold, but there was something very different about this experience. I, uh, I was still conscious inside my mind and body, but there was nothing I could do about it. I had no control over any of it.”
“So, you saw everything?”
“Saw, heard, felt…”
Annalise’s face flushes red as she realizes what this means.
“I have to admit that at first, at least physically, I wanted you. He could have taken you in those moments.”
Annalise looks up at me for a second, but I can’t read the expression on her face.
“You have to understand, I’m a man, and whether or not I want something, my body may respond in a different way,” I say defensively. “Besides, it didn’t last long enough for Damien to have his way with you. Thank your gods that my body knows well enough by now that I take no woman by force.”
“So, it was you?” Annalise asks, her eyes lighting up.
“What was me?” I ask nervously.
“There was a brief moment where I thought I saw your eyes instead of Damien’s, and it made me wonder.”
“It’s possible. I only really remember a brief moment of sa
tisfaction when I found my body responding to what I wanted instead of what he wanted.”
Annalise lets out a sigh deeper than any I’d ever heard from her and I realize she’s crying.
“What’s wrong?”
“Nothing, don’t you see?”
I look at her in bewilderment. This is far from how I expected our conversation to go, and I’m not even sure what’s happening anymore.
“It means that I can trust you again and that this was merely another of Damien’s ploys to turn us against one another for his own benefit.”
“I doubt he thought that far ahead,” I say carefully. “He’d have used Roan or Li in the same way if he could. But I think there’s a connection between Damien and myself that makes it easier for him to control me. But I don’t know what that connection is. Not yet.”
Annalise looks thoughtfully at me for a long moment.
“Perhaps it’s because you don’t share a bond with any of us,” she says. “Perhaps…perhaps his magic is stronger with those who have nothing to hold onto.”
“I have plenty of things to hold onto,” I snap. “Not everyone has to be fawning over the same woman to have a reason to live.” I immediately regret my words but tighten my jaw to keep from saying anything more.
“Really? Then where are we headed to right now and why?”
“Scandinavia.”
“But why?”
“I don’t know!”
It’s the first time I’ve admitted it. I don’t know how I’m going to get help, or who I’m going to ask. I may have been my father’s heir, but that was years ago, before everything fell apart…and I haven’t been back since. My people may not remember me, and even if they do, they probably will not accept me. Or worse, they may view me as an outsider. They are certain to have chosen a new leader by now, and it is highly unlikely that whoever that is will relinquish his place without a challenge.
“All I can do is try,” I say. “That’s the best I can do right now.”
Annalise drops down off the barrel and walks over to me.
“It’s a start,” she says. “But we need to be honest with each other. We all do. This is going to be hard enough as it is.”
“I know.”
Just then, the ship lurches to one side, sending me crashing into Annalise and the barrel she’s only just stepped away from.
“What in all of Hel is going on?” I shout before going quiet and pressing a hand over Annalise’s mouth as well.
Eleven
Annalise
The wind is knocked out of me as I’m thrown back against the barrel, Ero’s massive body nearly crushing me in the process. He clamps a hand over my face before I even have breath to speak, and it’s a good thing he does.
A thick fog has rolled over the sides of the ship, and previously clear skies are suddenly dark and foreboding. The ship lurches again as a wave hits the side, hard.
I look up at Ero, who slowly removes his hand from my mouth and then gestures for me to stay quiet. He gets up to move across the deck when he abruptly turns back to me and wrenches off the top of one of the barrels.
Before I can say no, Ero plucks me off the ground and places me unceremoniously inside the cask before jamming the lid back on. I shove against it, but it’s on tight enough that I can’t get out but can still breathe.
Pressing my hands against the sides of the barrel I find what I was hoping for, a small corked hole. After a minute I’m finally able to push the cork out and look through the hole, and I gasp.
Ero, Roan, and Li are standing in a circle, their backs against each other as the heavy fog swirls around them. I stare wide-eyed as the fog continues to thicken and slowly forms the shape of a giant woman.
“Ah, sailors,” the woman says in a watery voice. “What brings you into my realms?”
“Your realms?” Ero asks in a deep, loud voice. “Who are you to claim the ocean as your realm?”
“You’re a full-blooded one, aren’t you? I’m Rán, and this—” the woman says with a smirk, gesturing to the expanse of ocean— “is my realm. From here to the southern shores of Scandinavia, and you’d do well to know that.”
“Rán?” Ero says, his face blanching.
“Yes, my dear.”
“Who’s Rán?” Li and Roan ask in unison.
The giantess snarls, but Ero raises his hands to try to calm her.
“Let me try to explain,” Ero says. “Rán, this woman before us, is said to be the wife of Aegir, the Lord of the Sea—”
“That I am.”
“—and the captor of souls drowned at sea.”
“How exactly were these souls drowned?” Roan asks.
Ero doesn’t answer, instead looking up at the giantess.
“Drowned is one way to put it,” Rán says. “Most of them don’t know they’re drowning until it’s too late, willingly following me to the bottom of the sea…as will be your fate.”
“Who would willingly follow you to the bottom of the sea?” Li asks bluntly.
Rán scowls down at him.
“I’ve heard,” Ero says, “that she lures men to their deaths. Their hearts, more likely their dicks, drawn by the promise of a lovely maiden.”
The fog suddenly begins to condense once again, and I watch as Rán’s image transforms before my eyes into that of a completely naked, red-headed maiden. Her eyes are the ever-changing colors of the sea, her face lovelier than any I’d ever seen. If I wasn’t trapped in this barrel, I might actually follow her to death myself.
“Oh, I see,” Li says, cocking his head to the side.
Panic rises in me as I grasp what she’s trying to do. Is this the last moment I’ll see them before she drags my men to their watery grave? Will she take the ship as well?
“Impressive,” says Ero, not hiding the fact that he’s enjoying the view. “But, you see, none of us have time for that. Regrettably.”
“What—”
“You see, lassie,” Roan says, “we’ve still got a way to go, and I don’t think any of us is interested. I hope we can come to some agreement so that we can be on our way.”
“You should be fawning over me! Follow me into the ocean this instant!”
Li, Roan, and Ero share a look and then start moving about the deck as if there wasn’t a strange naked woman begging them to drown themselves and have sex with her on the middle of the deck.
“Sorry, we’ve just got more important things to do,” Ero says.
“Fine, then I’ll ravage your ship!”
“Wait!” Li snaps, stepping toward her. “Perhaps we can come to a compromise.”
“What sort of compromise?”
“We’ll give you the ship and whatever cargo is aboard if you allow us to sail safely the rest of the way to Scandinavia.”
Rán looks thoughtfully around the deck, doing her best to expose herself to my men as much as possible in the process.
“It is rather a nice ship,” Rán says finally. “Your woman must be one of a kind for you to reject me.”
“She is,” Roan and Li say in unison.
Rán looks over her shoulder curiously at them and then sighs and glides to the edge of the ship, as though she is floating on a layer of fog.
“Very well, I’ll grant your request, but not for your sakes,” Rán says. “I can’t say I’m not intrigued. In the centuries I’ve been calling men to their deaths, not one has ever resisted me.”
“There’s a first time for everything,” Ero says casually.
“You wicked man,” Rán says with a laugh. “Leave the ship on the southern shores of Scandinavia. I’ll collect her there. Don’t try to cross me, or I’ll send my husband to finish the deed…Oh, and if you ever escape this woman’s grasp, I’ll be waiting.”
As suddenly as she had appeared, the woman vanishes, jumping off the side of the ship and evaporating in a cloud of mist. The skies clear once again, as if nothing had happened.
“Well, that was fun,” Ero says.
“He
y!” I yell as loudly as I can, but none of them can hear me.
I would be perfectly content never journeying another day in my life at this point. When things aren’t going wrong in every way possible, the days simply seem to blur together. My body aches, my clothes itch, and what I wouldn’t give for a hot bath and a pleasant, meaningless conversation. And preferably fewer naked fog women.
“We’re ready, Annalise,” Li says.
“Finally,” I mumble to myself.
They’d left me in the barrel for nearly half a day before Roan went to look in the captain’s quarters and noticed I wasn’t there. It was only then that Ero had realized he’d left me trapped and hurried to let me out. He apologized—once.
I’m still furious with all of them for forgetting about me and leaving me trapped in a barrel again.
I climb over the edge of the ship and hold tight, carefully maneuvering my way down the rope ladder and into the rowboat below where Roan is waiting for me. Ero and Li join us soon after, and we begin the journey to shore.
As soon as we are close enough to land, Ero and Roan jump out and pull the boat ashore. Li helps me out of the boat, and I nearly collapse to the ground with joy. I’d be content never to set sail on a boat again, although I know that isn’t going to be possible.
“Alright, Ero, this is your land,” Li says. “You take the lead from here. Just tell us where we need to go and what we need to do.”
Ero nods, and we follow him off the beach and into the unknown.
It’s significantly colder here than it was back in England, and I can’t help but hope we can find warmer clothes soon. Perhaps here we can actually stay at an inn for once.
We walk silently for the better part of the afternoon before we come upon a small town.
“Is this your home?” I ask, curiosity finally getting the better of me.
“No,” says Ero. “We’re still a few days’ journey from it, but I know this town, or at least I did. Mostly farmers and craftsman, a trading village. We should be able to find a place to stay, and perhaps some necessities for our journey.”