Twelve.
Something to Fight For
I suppose they were talking to me, but I heard none of it. It’s possible I was asked important things, but nothing after that blow mattered.
I mean, come on. If what they were saying was true, the magical world of Narnia had been around me my entire life without my knowledge. It was…everything was…
I guess there’s just no finishing that sentence.
Uncle Rick was saying something probably important, judging by the look on his face. Someone was patting my back.
Jamie.
Okay. I don’t mind Jamie being nice to me. His harem might stone me for being in arm’s length of him, but whatever. At this rate, I doubt I’d feel anything short of a bullet through the gut.
My mom and dad had lied to us. Our whole lives, there was a world we drew blood from that we knew nothing about. There was no Witness Protection Program or whatever that kept us moving. It was my parents running from Pesta, hiding the rake.
Did we have relatives here? Would their bone marrow have worked when mine wasn’t enough?
Nope. Not going there. That memory gets tucked away for a time when I can afford a proper mental breakdown. I don’t have time for that right now.
I stuffed all sorts of things away so I didn’t vomit all over Jens, who was in my face saying…something. Not that Jens didn’t deserve a faceful of chunks, but being that I was the first human most of these guys had met, I guessed some measure of decorum was a good idea.
So I sat, unblinking as Uncle Rick and Jamie talked at me. At one point, Uncle Rick picked up a wrist that looked like mine and slapped my face with the hand. I suppose that should make me mad.
But I felt nothing.
Nothing, that is, until Tor hefted me up, pulled me to his level by the front of my shirt and growled in my face. “Pull yerself together, female! Ya’ve got a choice to make now, so either get up and fight with me, or go home and bury yer dead. But anyone who sits there and does nothing is nothing.”
Finally my lips moved to speak to the abrasive dwarf. “I already buried my whole family.”
Tor looked me dead in the eye with so much resolve, it must have been transferred to me through osmosis. “Then it’s time fer ya ta stand up and fight with me.”
I nodded, righting myself when he released me. I took in the room around me and nodded. “So, what’s the plan?”
“That’s my girl.” Uncle Rick smiled through the pain of mine that somehow attached itself to him whenever I was too sad. “We have the rake, which is the tool to destroy the portal. We’ll go to each kingdom and petition peacefully the king to see if he’ll help us. If he won’t, we’ll do it ourselves.” He nodded to everyone around the room. “We’ll need someone from each race to use the rake to break the portal. That’s the only way it can be done.”
“I’m in,” Nik offered, spitting on his palm and shaking Uncle Rick’s.
“Ya know I love a good fight,” Tor chimed in, spitting in his palm and doing the same.
Jens and Jamie also did their gross man handshake with my uncle.
Foss hesitated. “The Tomten prince is going?”
“Yeah. What of it?” Jens challenged, puffing out his chest.
Foss’s terrifying, yet handsome face seemed to be permanently stuck on “murderous glare” mode. “Don’t play stupid. I know of his curse.”
Jamie’s cheeks turned pink, and he looked up at the ceiling as he growled out his frustration. “Wonderful. How many others have you told, Jens?”
Jens pounded his fist to his chest, his expression wounded. “That was a quick stab, brother. I never said a word.”
Foss’s body language was tense, always leaning forward as if readying himself to go into the ring. “I’m one of the four chiefs, prince. Information pays if you know what to do with it.” He spoke Jamie’s title like it was a jab. “Or do you forget I’m more powerful than you?”
I didn’t need to catch all the lingo to know I was witnessing their version of a cockfight.
Jamie sighed. “Yes, the curse is real, and yes, it still affects me. But Jens knows how to handle me when I need handling, so there’s no need for worry. My bow and axe are as good as anyone else’s. Take them or don’t.” He leveled his gaze at Foss and sniffed. “Unless one of the great Fossegrimmen chiefs is afraid of the dark.”
Foss growled, low and dangerous. His too-large muscles were tensed.
Jens moved to stand in front of me as we all watched with bated breath the verdict unraveling before us. “Easy, Foss. Jamie’s curse is manageable. Alrik and I’ll be there to watch him the whole time. Plus, it’s not like the Fossegrimens got away from Pesta without winning a curse of their own. You don’t see Jamie batting an eye at working with you.”
“My curse is nothing compared to Prince Jamie’s,” argued Foss, fists clenched. “And you and I’ve worked together before just fine,” he said to Jens, as if that alone should have nullified his apparent curse.
Jens nodded. “We work well together, Foss. You trusted me then. Trust me now in this. Where Jamie goes, I go.”
Guys are weird. They’d just been insulting each other and wrestling on the floor, but now it’s all oaths and loyalty.
Foss looked between the men warily, his mouth drawn in a tight line. Finally, Foss spat in his hand and shook Uncle Rick’s. “I don’t trust the prince, but I trust you and Jens.”
“Splendid. We’re becoming a team already.” Uncle Rick was unperturbed by the tension in the tiny cabin. He moved to me and placed his hand on my shoulder. “Lucy, dear? What say you? Will you help us?”
Why was I here? I wasn’t magical. Then it clicked. “Oh, you need me when it’s time to destroy the new human portal that’s not up and running yet. Gotcha. But why me?”
“Because you’re in a unique position to help us. Plus you’re sufficiently motivated, given what Pesta did to your family.”
I stared at my uncle and voiced the thing he would not say aloud. “And no one will miss me while I’m gone. If I die in all this, no one’ll ask any questions.”
Uncle Rick shook his head sadly. “I hope it doesn’t come to that. I would miss you terribly if you were gone. I am not ‘no one’, and neither are you.”
When Uncle Rick looked on me with that poor little orphan Annie expression I’d grown to hate from people, I postured, sticking my hand out to Uncle Rick’s clean palm. “I’m in.”
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