Aghi doubled over and it wasn’t until he hit the ground that I saw it. The handle of my knife was lodged between his ribs. I swallowed a breath as bright, sputtering blood poured from his lips and when I opened my mouth, I couldn’t hear the sound of my own scream. I could only feel its burn in my throat, lighting my chest on fire as I ran to him.
I fell to the grass, catching him in my arms before he tilted forward, and his bright blue eyes looked up at me, his mouth moving around words I couldn’t understand.
“Aghi.” His name was strange on my broken voice and I tried to hold him up, but he was too heavy.
He sank to the ground as more blood dripped from his lips and his hands clutched onto my tunic. He pulled me down toward him, but he couldn’t speak. The light was already leaving his eyes.
“Don’t…” I whispered. But his gaze was unfocused, lifting to the sky above us.
He was already gone.
My mind tried to grab hold of it, frantically sifting through the raging flood of thoughts, but I couldn’t think. I couldn’t pull myself from the grass, my hands clutched so tightly to his armor that the bones in my fingers felt as if they might crack. It wasn’t until the glint of a blade shone ahead that I blinked, coming back into myself.
I looked up, focusing my vision past the hot tears in my eyes, and Bekan ran before me, taking a Nādhir down with one arm, the other still bleeding badly at his side. I stood, yanking my knife from the bones in Aghi’s chest and paced heavily toward the trees, headed straight for him. He didn’t see me until I was already gaining on him. His axe flew at me and I sank onto my heels, letting it fly over my head before I jumped back up and bolted forward, the knife clutched tightly in my hand, slick with Aghi’s blood.
I roared, the battle cry tearing from my throat as I reached him, flipping the knife in my fingers to come at him from the side. I cut into his other arm, dragging the blade down, and he fell back into the shade of the trees. Another cry broke behind my ribs as I came over him, clutching the handle with both fists as I raised it before me. I screamed as I brought it down with the weight of my whole body, plunging the blade into Bekan’s heart.
His head rolled back and he gasped, coughing on the blood coming up in his throat, and I suddenly felt too heavy, the earth pulling me toward it as a whistle rang out. I looked back to the glade, where the Svell were cutting down the last of the Nādhir standing. At the very center, Espen lay in a bed of red-painted grass.
I turned in a circle, the world spinning around me. Espen was dead. Aghi … I tried to breathe past the strangling vision of his face going slack as he died in my arms. The breath wheezed in my lungs as more Svell came from the trees across the glade and what had just happened sank into place.
The Svell chieftain’s brother had come to Ljós with a plan. We were never going to leave this glade alive.
My side hitched and I tilted, wincing against the tilt of the world around me, willing the earth beneath my feet to steady me. I clutched at my side, where a steady stream of hot blood was seeping from a cut in my armor vest I didn’t remember getting. My hand slid over the wet leathers as I pressed, trying to slow it. But a guttural roar made me look up to the glade, where Vigdis was staring at me, eyes wide, as I stood over the body of his brother.
CHAPTER SEVEN
TOVA
The morning frost covered the ground around us as we moved through the trees. It glittered in the early light, turning everything to crystal. The days had been warm and damp with the spring storms coming in from the sea, but the cold had crept in during the night.
It was a warning, just like the nighthawk.
The Svell checked their armor and weapons in silence as we lined up before the glade, where Bekan stood before the sunlit grass. I studied the serene look on Vigdis’ face as he took his place beside his brother.
He and Jorrund had spent the morning speaking in hushed whispers, their breaths fogging between them as they rode side by side ahead of me. The chill crept up my spine as I watched Jorrund from the corner of my eye. There was something buried deep beneath the calm on his face. Some unsteady, wavering thing in his eyes that I could just barely see.
Gunther took his place in front of us, leaving me for the first time since Vigdis ordered him to watch me. He’d been careful to not so much as look at me as we rode through the night, keeping his distance. The truth was that even though Vigdis had meant his presence to be a looming threat, having Gunther at my back made me feel safer. And now, as we stepped into the glade and Jorrund’s smooth exterior seemed to be crumbling, I found myself taking a small step closer to where Gunther stood.
“Stay beside me.” Jorrund spoke lowly in my ear.
The Svell stood like statues, their eyes watching the tree line across the glade. Jorrund’s gaze was fixed on the brothers, his arms crossed over his chest and his fingers tapping his elbows nervously. He was worried. Scared, even. The weight of the rune cast had settled down on every aged bone and sore muscle in his body and it all came down to this moment.
The warriors shifted on their feet and I looked up just as movement in the shadow of the trees ahead appeared. Bekan lifted one hand into the air, mumbling something to Vigdis, whose jaw clenched as the Nādhir appeared across the stretch of dead winter grass, still half-hidden in the trees.
Bekan reached for the clasp on his chest and unbuckled it, taking the sword sheath over his shoulder and holding it out to Vigdis, but his brother only stared at him.
“You started this. Now, you’re going to finish it.” Bekan looked him in the eye, his face streaked with the blood of a raven Jorrund had sacrificed to Eydis at sunrise.
Vigdis gritted his teeth, insulted. It was an order that took Bekan’s rebuke even further. One that he made before the other leaders and one that Vigdis’ dignity wouldn’t recover from easily. It was a foolish move for the chieftain, stoking the flame of his brother’s anger when he needed him most.
After a moment, Vigdis took the sword, fitting the sheath to his own back. It was Siv who didn’t take her eyes from him, her lip curled over her teeth, but Vigdis didn’t meet her gaze. He stared ahead to the opening in the trees, and a strange feeling pulled in the back of my mind. There were too many unspoken words between them—Bekan, Jorrund, Vigdis, and Siv. They were like steam trapped in a kettle, the lid rattling.
Bekan looked back to Jorrund before he gave the signal and we walked forward, leaving the cool of the forest and stepping into the warmth of the glade. I let my hand hover beside me, the tops of the grass pulling through my fingertips, and watched around us for any sign of the Spinners. But the clearing was quiet. And maybe that was the omen I’d missed. It was too quiet.
The Nādhir stopped in the center of the clearing and we walked until we’d met them, the line of Svell keeping back as Bekan and Vigdis moved ahead. They stopped before the Nādhir chieftain and a man with a braided beard the color of an autumn sunset. He let his weight sink into one leg, the other obviously weak, but he stood up tall, his chin lifted.
The two clans that made up the Nādhir were mixed together, their armor and weapons blending almost seamlessly in the line of warriors. My gaze drifted over them until it stopped on the face of a young man clad in red leathers. His dark hair was pulled into a braid over his shoulder, the stray pieces tucked behind his ears. His pale eyes were on the red-bearded man, his angled jaw tight.
But there was something strange about him. Something …
Bekan began to speak but a deep hum sounded in the glade, growing like a hive of bees. No one seemed to notice, their attention on the men before us, and I tilted my head, trying to listen. It reverberated like the crash of a waterfall, growing with each breath until it filled the inside of my skull.
My attention went back to the young Nādhir and as if he could feel my stare, he suddenly turned, his eyes meeting mine. A sharp prick rolled over my skin, my hands clenching into my linen skirt.
Because he didn’t look away.
His stare bor
ed into mine, making me feel suddenly unbalanced on my feet.
“What is it?” Jorrund whispered beside me, but I could barely hear him over the sound in my head.
A hissing, like water over coals. And it was getting louder. “Do you hear that?” I pressed my palm to my ear and the Nādhir’s brow furrowed, his eyes falling from my face to the marks on my neck.
Jorrund’s hand clamped down on my arm as Vigdis unsheathed the jeweled sword, and I pulled my gaze from the Nādhir when Bekan began to speak. But something about the look of Vigdis was wrong. The coil around his bones that had been there since Bekan reprimanded him in Liera was no longer there. He stood tall, his shoulders drawn down and his face smooth. Like the still calm that settled before death.
I tried to hear their words, watching Bekan’s lips move, but the hum in the glade was now a guttural roar, drowning out everything else. When a shadow moved over the grass at my feet, I looked up to the sky, where the nighthawk was soaring over us against the glare of the sun. Its spotted feathers gleamed across its wingspan as it tilted, coming back in a circle above us.
I blinked, a sharp breath catching in my throat.
The buzzing stopped.
“The All Seer,” I whispered, stepping forward.
This was wrong. Something was wrong.
“What?” Jorrund’s hand found my wrist, pulling me back.
But it was too late. Sunlight gleamed on the blade of the sword in Vigdis’ hands and I looked to Bekan just as Vigdis spoke words I couldn’t hear. In the next breath, he was pulling the sword back behind him and driving it forward with a quick step, catching Espen’s gut.
My mouth dropped open, my eyes going wide, but Jorrund was already pulling me away, walking with quick steps back toward the trees and towing me behind him.
“Wait,” I cried, pulling against him as the Nādhir chieftain fell to his knees. “Wait!”
I freed my hand, pushing back into the tall grass, but Jorrund wrapped his arms around me. “Tova!”
Every blade lifted in the clearing and the full-throated screams of the clansmen ripped open the silence around us as we made it to the cover of the forest. I wrenched free of Jorrund’s grasp again, turning on him. “You didn’t,” I whispered, searching his eyes. “Please say you didn’t…”
But the traitorous answer was there on his face. He’d betrayed Bekan. He’d sided with Vigdis against the chieftain and sanctioned his betrayal. “You have to trust me.”
“How can I?” I shouted. “Bekan trusted you and look what you’ve done!”
“You saw it!” His voice rose. “Destruction is coming for the Svell. We have to act. Now.”
I looked back to the clearing, where battle was spreading across the grass, painting everything red. Swords and axes swung and warriors fell, Vigdis driving the charge to the far side of the glade. I pressed my fingers to my lips, watching as the the fallen Nādhir chieftain stopped moving. He lay facedown, the tip of the jeweled sword reaching up to the sky from his back.
And then without even realizing it, my gaze moved away from him, looking for the young Nādhir with the pale eyes. The one who’d met my gaze. I searched the running bodies for the red leathers, but there were too many and they were moving too fast. My chest tightened around my breath as I realized he’d probably already been killed. But just as I thought it, he appeared, standing up out of the tall grass and setting his eyes on Bekan. He walked with heavy steps, blood smeared across his throat, a knife clutched in his hand.
Bekan threw his axe but missed, and the Nādhir broke into a run, launching himself forward to tear across the grass toward the trees.
The shadow of the nighthawk slid over us again.
“This is wrong,” I whispered.
Bekan made it to the forest but the Nādhir was too fast. I knew what was going to happen the moment he stepped into the shade of the trees. It was too late. The Nādhir drove his knife into Bekan’s arm and when he toppled backward, I closed my eyes, flinching when I heard the hollow pop of the knife plunging into Bekan’s chest.
Jorrund gasped beside me, his hand flying to his open mouth.
The Svell chieftain was dead.
And when I opened my eyes, looking up to the clear blue sky, where the thin spread of clouds was pulling in delicate lines, the All Seer was suddenly gone.
Vigdis screamed in the distance, his face broken in two as his eyes found his brother. And then they were running. All of them.
And it reignited—the sound. It rose around us, filling the forest until I could feel the pulse of it under my skin.
The young Nādhir stood, his hands hanging heavily at his sides, his chest rising and falling beneath his armor vest. He took a step, hitching to one side, and when he looked down, he stilled. Blood seeped from a tear in his vest where a blade must have cut him.
He was the only Nādhir left standing and I watched the realization sink into his face, his chest heaving with breath as every Svell in the glade ran toward him. The swarm of bees in my head screamed, ringing in my ears. I pinched my eyes closed against it and when I opened them again, arrows were flying. But not from the glade. From the forest.
They dropped the Svell one by one and three riders appeared in the trees, their mouths open as they shouted at the Nādhir. He ran toward them, his hand pressed to his side, and more arrows whistled through the air as they shot them one after the other, finding their marks in the distance.
My heart stopped as my eyes landed on a set of pale hands clenched around a bow in the trees. Hands covered in black marks. I blinked, stepping forward out of a beam of bright sunlight, but this was no vision. A man covered in the marks of the Kyrr was crouched low over his horse, pulling another arrow from his back as the Nādhir ran.
I opened my mouth to call out, but no sound came. The beats of my heart tangled up, skipping so fast that my vision began to blur. The Kyrr man dropped the bow over his head as the Nādhir pulled himself up onto one of the horses and I held onto the tree beside me as they took off, disappearing into the forest.
And when I finally turned back searching for Jorrund, he stood frozen in the trees, his horrified gaze still fixed on the bloodied body of the Svell chieftain.
Lying dead at his feet.
CHAPTER EIGHT
HALVARD
Every Svell left standing ran toward me, swords and axes swinging.
The emptiness of the forest behind me stretched in every direction. There was no way to outrun them. No way to hide. Their chieftain lay on the soft earth before me and the only answer for that was death.
But as I watched them rush toward me, I realized that it was an end I’d welcome. It was an end that the gods would favor and that Aghi would be proud of. At the very least, I’d been able to avenge him before I took my last breath. And that was something.
I stood taller despite the pain widening at my side and pulled the axe from the sheath at my back. The breath in my chest calmed, lifting in white puffs before me, the scent of soil and sap thick in my lungs.
Mýra’s words came back to haunt me, the sight of her looking up into my face finding me as clearly as if she stood before me now. She’d been right. So had Latham. And when my family made it back to the fjord from the mountain, they wouldn’t find me. Like Aghi, I’d be waiting for them in the afterlife.
Just as the thought skipped across my mind, a whistle rang deep in the forest and I blinked, going still.
Vigdis and the Svell closed in on the stretch of ground between us, screaming, but arrows suddenly fell from the sky, arcing over my head and hitting their marks before me. Svell warriors hit the ground hard, sliding over the forest floor, and I turned, searching the trees.
I knew the call that echoed out, though I hadn’t heard it since I was a boy. It was an old Aska battle signal. But every Nādhir who’d come with us from Hylli was lying dead in the glade behind me.
Horses appeared in the thick brush, three riders hunched over their saddles with bows lifted and arrows drawn. That
’s when I saw him. Asmund.
I pivoted on my feet and ran for him, the agony alive at my side piercing deeper with every draw of breath. Asmund and the raiders tore through the forest ahead, their horses kicking mud and moss behind them, and I pressed the heel of my hand into the opening of my vest, growling against the sting, running faster.
I didn’t look back, weaving through the trees and pushing the swell of pain from my mind. I didn’t have to look to know I was losing blood too quickly. I could feel it in the weakening of my muscles and the stuttering flicker of my thoughts. I focused on the black horse ahead, throwing myself forward with the last of the strength I had left.
An axe flew past my head from behind, slamming into a tree, and the splinters hit me in the face as I slid to a stop. Bard’s horse slowed as it reached me and the bow rose before him, his back straight as he sighted down its line. He shot arrow after arrow over me as I hobbled past him, toward Asmund.
“Hurry!” He reached a hand down for me and I took his arm, pulling myself up onto the saddle behind him and throwing my leg over the horse.
In the trees ahead, the Svell chieftain’s brother stood still, his fists clenched at his sides and his black eyes pinned on me as his chest rose and fell with heaving breaths.
We took off and I looked back once more to the sunlit grass where Aghi lay dead. My throat tightened and I hunched forward, the searing pain in my side pushing black into the edges of my vision. A branch caught the sleeve of my tunic, scraping against my skin as we headed into the thicker trees and the glade disappeared behind us, the Svell with it.
The Girl the Sea Gave Back Page 6