“We were never on good terms,” said Inge. “Some people just can’t get along.”
Signe nodded knowingly. “Still, I would have expected him to be more personable now that he knows who your father is—your birth father, I mean. The castle guards all worshiped Torvald Geirson. Do you remember, Leiv, that time he came to visit, and you—”
“Signe,” Colonel Raske interrupted. He fidgeted, color rising up his neck.
Her eyes danced. “You got to spar with him, and then you bounced around like a little boy for weeks afterward. And then the next year, when he brought you one of his swords—”
“Signe.”
His distress only encouraged her impish delight. “You walked around with your chest puffed out for months! And now you get to guard Inge, his child! How much fun it must be for you!”
Raske was almost beside himself. “What did Baron Adelborg say to you?” he asked, desperate to change the subject.
The princess scowled. “Oh, pooh! He wanted me to invite Lina to stay here—didn’t outright say it, of course, but just hinted over and over again. ‘She’ll be so bored, stuck with her mother and me out at the estate.’ As if that concerns me! She can rot out there, for all I care!”
“The Adelborgs are leaving court, then?”
“The sooner, the better,” said Signe. Inge had not expected such blunt words from the docile princess, and it showed. “Have I shocked you, little brother? Like you said, some people just can’t get along.” She ruffled Inge’s short hair and, with a mischievous giggle, skipped away up the corridor.
Inge shifted confused eyes to Colonel Raske. He conspicuously did not meet her gaze, his shoulders taut with forced dignity.
“We should be on our way as well,” he said.
His earlier blush lingered around his ears.
“You sparred with my dad?” Inge knew that her father had visited the south of the country in years past—he had left his family for a month every summer for the excursions—but she did not know that he had come to King Halvard’s castle.
Raske still would not look at her. “I did have that honor once.”
She knew she ought not to provoke him, but it bothered her that Signe could elicit such familiar, telling reactions from him, and so easily. Thus, with a light note in her voice, Inge asked, “And you bounced around like a little boy afterward?”
He glanced reprovingly at her. “I already told you that your father was one of the greatest men ever to live, Your Highness. He didn’t spar with just anyone, either. It was my honor.”
His use of her false title put her rightly in her place, especially because he had used Signe’s given name only moments earlier. Inge turned her thoughts a more sober direction. “I suppose Captain Bergstrom sparred with him too.”
“Yes.”
It was shocking how a single word could plunge her spirits into darkness.
She stewed all that afternoon and evening. Discontent ate at her the following day as well, gnawing at her heels wherever she went. Colonel Raske, perhaps in an attempt to lift her mood, suggested a visit to her brother in the smithy.
They went in the evening, toward dusk, and found Gunner soot-covered and happy in his restored position. When, during their conversation, Inge muttered a disparaging remark against Captain Bergstrom, her brother instantly rebuked her.
“He has a Virtue Sword, Inge. That means our own father acknowledged him as a worthy man.”
“What virtue could Dad possibly have seen in him?” she asked, uncaring that Colonel Raske stood guard just within the doorway.
“Strength,” said Gunnar, and he turned his back on her to stoke the fire.
“Then Dad didn’t think much of him either.” This declaration earned her the startled gaze of not only her brother, but of Colonel Raske. “Any soldier can build up his strength,” Inge said, scorn thick on her voice. “What kind of virtue is that? It’s brute force and nothing more!”
Gunnar scowled. “I would’ve expected a weakling like you to understand better. Only a girl would think that strength isn’t important. Go away,” he added before she could reply. “You’re in a foul mood, and now so am I, so just go away.”
She didn’t argue. She simply swept out the door with airs that perfectly befitted her new status.
Raske followed. “Captain Bergstrom’s sword is his most prized possession. Perhaps you don’t grasp how important strength is to a true soldier.”
Inge stopped to look at him, but she couldn’t quite meet his eyes. She knew better than to openly criticize the Captain of the Castle Guard in front of Colonel Raske, who held him in high esteem. “It’s not that I think it’s unimportant,” she uttered. “Of course strength is important. I just think it’s common. And easily abused,” she added, boldly lifting her eyes to him at last.
“He was only following the king’s orders.”
“With brute force,” said Inge, and she resumed her path.
“So you’ll hold a grudge forever?”
“I don’t know. He’s holding one against me.”
“Master Jannik just doesn’t like to be bested. The guards here are all very loyal to him. Be careful that your attitude doesn’t deter them from performing their duties.”
She stopped again, his words rolling over her. “What do you mean? That they might turn their backs on me if I were in danger? Or abandon post if they’re to guard me? Is that a threat?”
“It’s a warning. If you make an enemy of Bergstrom, you make an enemy of the castle guard. Isn’t it better to let your grievances drop? Isn’t it better to show m—” His voice clipped on the telltale word. Frustration chased across his face.
“To show mercy?” Inge finished. “You think he deserves it?”
Raske shook his head. “None of us deserves it. That’s the whole point.”
A smothering silence fell between them. She was relieved when, at last, they reached her bedroom and she could part ways with the taciturn colonel.
He was right, much as it bothered her to admit. And yet, she couldn’t forgive.
Bergstrom may have been following King Halvard’s orders to confiscate her father’s legacy, but his method was her true complaint. If she hadn’t returned to her room in a fit of pique, he would have carried the whole lot away to the armory without her knowledge. His unrepentant attitude, his aggression, his superior high-handedness in the matter all raked across her soul every time she remembered it.
And yet, Raske told her to consider mercy.
She slept fitfully that night, waking every hour or two, as though a restless spirit hovered over her. Whether by coincidence or intuition, she finally awoke in the hour before dawn—the same hour as that ominous scratching at her door—to a tumult in the castle. Shouts echoed through the halls beyond her room. She scrambled from her bed, snatched one of her father’s daggers from beneath, and pulled the door open.
The guard stationed there stood in her way. “Stay inside, Your Highness.”
“What’s happening?” she asked.
“I don’t know. It’s not safe. Stay inside.”
An inhuman roar pierced the night air. It caught the guard by surprise; instinctively he glanced up the hallway, and Inge took this opportunity to dart past him.
“Hey! Wait!” he cried, scrambling after her.
Horrifying sounds reverberated against the stone walls. Logically she should have holed up in her room, but she didn’t feel safe there. She didn’t feel safe anywhere in the castle. Rather than cower beneath her covers and wait out this nightmare, trusting that the untrustworthy would keep her safe, she wanted to glimpse the source.
Otherwise, she might go mad with terror.
She was wise enough not to run headlong into danger. As her steps slowed, her guard caught up to her. He grabbed at her arm to pull her back, but she shot him such a dirty look that he decided not to force her. Together, they crept toward an adjoining corridor that led to the great hall. The shouting came from that direction. Another roar s
ounded, but it was further off in the night air, as though whatever monster it belonged to was already in retreat. Heart in her throat, Inge peeked around the corner.
Torches blazed. Directly in her line of sight, a soldier lay upon the ground, a heavy wound in his shoulder. Colonel Raske knelt over him, shouting orders to the others as he tried to stanch the flow of blood. More wounded lay beyond. The hall was a wreck. Raske called for a head count of everyone in the castle.
“Come back, Your Highness,” Inge’s guard insisted, and he pulled at her arm again. “It’s over now. Come back to your room.”
“What did this?” she asked.
His voice trembled. “It looks like another night-walker. Come back. If you’re not in your room, they’ll assume the worst.”
Dumbly she allowed him to guide her away, back through the corridors. He shut her chamber door behind her; she caught a flash of relief on his face as it closed. Soldiers lumbered up the hallway only moments later. She heard through the door as they spoke with the guard there, verifying that everyone was safe in the aftermath of the attack.
For half an hour afterward, she paced her room, alone in the gradual light of the coming dawn. She wondered how much time would pass before someone came to retrieve her, before they would disclose the cause of the nighttime commotion—if they disclosed it to her at all.
When at last someone beat a quick rhythm on her door, she flung it open, eager for whatever morsel of information she could scrounge from her messenger.
She had expected Colonel Raske. Instead, his underling Lind stood before her.
“Your Highness, the king has summoned you to the great hall.”
Inge’s stomach dropped in confusion. Lind led her through the same corridors she had traversed a harried half-hour before. As they rounded the final corner, she kept her eyes open for signs of the strange event.
The wounded had been taken elsewhere. Physical evidence was more readily apparent: a torn curtain, a splintered door, a set of claw marks across the wall, gouged into the very stone. King Halvard sat at the head of the room, with Princess Signe on one side, pale and drawn, and an empty chair on the other.
Reluctantly Inge took her place. King Halvard watched askance as she perched on the edge of the chair, although he did not say a word to her. The moment she was settled, he shifted his attention to the soldiers in the hall and inquired, “Where is my colonel with his report?”
Inge expected Captain Bergstrom to step forward in Colonel Raske’s stead, as he had on her first day at the castle, but he was nowhere in sight. Instead, one of the castle guards replied.
“He is coming, Sire.”
Commotion sounded at the door. Soldiers scrambled out of the way as Raske strode into the room.
“The horses are ready and waiting, Your Majesty. I await only your order to depart.”
He looked harrowed beneath his solemn façade. Inge wondered at the meaning of his words.
“All the other castle guards and the servants are accounted for?” King Halvard asked.
“Yes. Six are gravely wounded. Several others have minor injuries. I have no fatalities to report. Yet.” He spoke that final word with a tenseness that betrayed his inner worry. “I hope there will be none at all.”
King Halvard leaned to one side to rest his chin atop his hand. “Strange hope,” he murmured. “But if he is alive, we must find him, and if he be dead, he deserves a hero’s burial. Yes. Go, Colonel Raske. Take whatever troops you deem necessary. Take my son with you as well.”
Raske and Inge both started at this final command.
“Sire, this is hardly—” Raske began.
Halvard, though, had turned his full attention upon Inge at last. “You’ve never cared much for Captain Bergstrom. Perhaps you will come to appreciate his true character by pursuing the creature that carried him off in the dark of the night.”
His words brought the situation into sharp focus. Inge’s breath caught in her throat as she realized at last what they were discussing. Captain Bergstrom, whom she openly despised, had suffered an unknown fate. Raske had organized a party to search for him. She was to take part.
Fearfully she turned her gaze upon the colonel, only to discover a shuttered expression on his face.
“Your Majesty,” he said, “under the circumstances, it might be wiser for your son to remain here, in the safety of the castle.”
“What safety?” Halvard retorted. “The Captain of the Castle Guard himself was carried away by brute force from here. How are any of the rest of us safe? No. Take Prince Inge with you. He may prove useful.”
Raske argued no further. Instead, he turned on his heel and left the hall. They heard him bark orders for another horse to be saddled.
“You do know how to ride a horse, I hope,” King Halvard said to Inge in an off-handed voice.
“Yes.” Her harrowed mind could offer no other response.
“Good. Strength may be a common virtue, but we cannot afford to lose it to our enemies.” His eyes flitted toward her, and in that instant he seemed far wiser than she had given him credit for. How he had come to hear of her remarks on Bergstrom’s sword—for that could be the only meaning behind his choice of words—she did not know. Colonel Raske must have told him. She blushed to the roots of her hair, ashamed of herself.
“Go on, my son,” he said, and he wagged his fingers toward the exit. “Colonel Raske is not a man known for his patience. Or his mercy,” he added wryly.
Dread pooled in her stomach, but she obeyed. As she crossed from the great hall into the early morning light, she wanted nothing more than to retreat back to her room. It was the first time since coming to the castle that she would be allowed to leave, but under the circumstances, she would’ve rather stayed.
Raske was already astride his horse. A castle guard supplied Inge with a cloak and led her to her designated mount. She hefted herself into the saddle and waited for the call to move out. Quickly she realized that the other soldiers were waiting for her to take her place at the head of the company, alongside Colonel Raske.
This was not going to be the most comfortable of outings.
They left the castle at a gallop, following a trail of broken branches and torn underbrush into the forest that bordered the capital city. It seemed almost as though the creature wanted to be tracked, so obvious a path it had left behind. The company maintained a moody silence as they went. As the forest grew thicker, they slowed their pace. Raske ordered a couple of guards to go ahead on lookout for anything suspicious, for any signs of Captain Bergstrom. As the sun climbed the sky, what little hope they carried with them dissipated.
Close to noon, their quest came to an end.
“Colonel!” one of the advance guards called as he returned to the company. His face was grave, communicating his news without the need for words.
Raske, stalwart and grim, urged his horse forward, ready to meet whatever awaited him over the crest of the next hill.
The land descended toward a swamp on the other side. Insects buzzed in the warm sunlight. Scum and bracken laced the gloomy waters, and the air carried a stifling, rank stench. Their path descended to the mire’s edge where, amid the mud and weeds, lay a mangled body, torn and lifeless.
Inge pulled her horse to a halt, sick inside. The soldiers around her pressed forward. She heard their words: the corpse was savaged, its head missing, its limbs broken. The armor, though, the shreds of clothing left—there was no doubt to whom they belonged.
She fought the rising lump in her throat. She had hated this man, to be sure, but she had not wished him dead. Her hatred precluded her from any compassionate feeling whatsoever, though. How could she mourn for him when she had held him in such contempt, when she had denied him even the smallest trace of mercy?
And yet, she was sick with grief, with regret at her petty grudge. Even steeped in arrogance, Captain Bergstrom had not deserved such an ignoble end.
In the sweltering midday heat, the soldiers lashed together
a litter to carry the body—what parts of it they could find—back to the castle. There Bergstrom would receive the honor he was due. Inge dismounted her horse, but she stayed near the trees as they worked. She kept her eyes anywhere but the grisly scene by the water.
Suddenly, to her surprise, she realized that Colonel Raske stood beside her. Shame welled within her anew. “I’m sorry,” she said, burdened by the weight of those words as she spoke them.
Only the day before, she had belittled the Captain of the Castle Guard. She had declared him unworthy of mercy. Now she was mourning him. What a hypocrite she was.
Raske’s response startled her all the more. “How far does your father’s circle spell extend?”
“What?” Inge croaked.
“How far? What’s the range? A hundred yards? Two hundred? His sword is not here.”
Inge’s gaze swung across their overgrown surroundings: the stinking mire below and the lofty woods through which they had come. “It might be anywhere along the path,” she said helplessly.
“How far does the circle spell extend?” Raske pressed.
“Two hundred yards, give or take. But you can’t really mean—”
“If we cannot find the blade, it’s better that it be destroyed,” he interrupted, his voice steady. “Don’t you agree?”
In theory she did, of course. A Virtue Sword did not belong lost out in the woods. She had never cast the spell to find one of her father’s swords, though. If it was hidden well enough, they might never know whether it was affected or not. Or they could very well start a fire in the middle of the forest. Inge wasn’t sure which was worse.
“Did he even have his sword with him when he was taken?”
“The scabbard is with the body. The sword is gone.” Raske drew his own weapon. “You can invoke the spell without me having to sacrifice my blade, can you not?”
He was serious. Inge glanced around again, her mind racing to find some other solution to this dilemma. There was none. Reluctantly she uttered the magic words.
“Sverthin brenn.”
As the spell took effect, she touched her fingertips to the flat of Mercy’s blade. The budding warmth there wicked away to steely cold. “Have your men spread out,” she said, unable to meet Raske’s gaze. “Keep a lookout for any sign of smoke or burning.”
The Legendary Inge Page 14