by Amy Pennza
Now his mouth fell open.
“Glad we settled that.”
He snapped his mouth shut. Then he drew himself up. “I didn’t come here to be insulted.”
I shrugged.
“You’ll make a terrible wife.”
“Probably.”
He looked like he might say more, but then he muttered something like “no time for this” and lifted his arms, palms together as if in prayer. Electricity sizzled around the backs of his hands, as if he held a mini Tesla coil. The smell of ozone grew thick in the air, and sparks pinged against my skin.
“Apertio.” He spread his hands apart. As he did, the air between them stretched and blurred. A rectangle formed in the air, its borders smudged with gray.
It was a decent portal. Only he knew where it led. That was the nature of magical travel, and one of several reasons Fiona had lectured me constantly about never entering a portal with a stranger. Some led off plane, to realms where the environment was wholly different and often dangerous.
Einar’s portal widened a bit more. He shot me an irritated look, then stepped through. Residual electricity rushed over my skin, raising the hairs on my arms and making my nose itch. The rectangle collapsed behind him, snapping out of existence as if it had never been.
As if Einar had never been.
I could live with that.
Quiet descended over the room—the hush so absolute it was hard to believe my standoff with Harald had happened just moments before. I hugged my arms over my midsection.
What was I supposed to do now? Einar might be gone, but Harald would be back any second. He wasn’t going to be happy when he learned I scared off his chosen son-in-law.
A knock at the door had me whirling around, my heart racing.
Hauk stuck his head in. “All right?”
I let out a shaky breath. “It’s fine. He’s gone.”
He came all the way inside and closed the door. “I spoke to your father.”
Even if I couldn’t see it, I knew my smile was bitter. “Did he tell you his exciting plans for me?”
“You can’t go through with it.”
“No kidding.”
“He left for the night, but he’ll return. When he does, he’ll expect your cooperation.”
I rubbed my upper arms, which were suddenly pebbled with goosebumps. “Well, he’ll have to live with disappointment, because I just threatened to emasculate the groom.”
A ghost of a smile tugged at Hauk’s mouth, and his eyes gleamed with a little of his usual humor. His obvious approval made relief wash over me.
But then he sobered. “Harald won’t give up so easily. You know that.”
The relief vanished, blipping out as completely as Einar’s portal. “I know,” I said.
“And you can’t continue at the academy.”
“I know.”
“I have a great deal of authority here, but I can’t change the rules.”
“I know.”
“You nearly killed Maja—”
“I know!” My voice rebounded off the walls. I glanced around and lowered it. “I know all these things, Hauk. My situation is really shitty, okay? I know this.”
He was silent. My outburst didn’t seem to have angered him. His expression was as calm as ever—patient, even.
For some reason, that only made things worse. The strain of the last few hours, along with my disastrous confrontation with Maja, rushed at me. I’d been holding it together. Now, the dam broke.
I flung up my hands. “Fine. Just stand there. That’s helpful.”
No reaction.
“If my choices are death or an arranged marriage, you might as well just execute me.”
Still nothing.
“Damn you!” I crossed the room, until I was close enough to see the tiny laugh lines at the corners of his eyes.
He didn’t move.
I shoved him. “Damn you!” And again. “Damn you!”
He took the blows, his body barely moving.
I beat at his chest, screaming my frustration. “You’re no help! There’s no help. I’ve never gotten any fucking help!”
Strong arms encircled me. He pressed my cheek against his broad chest, one big palm on my head, the other spanning my back.
My anger dissolved like frost in sunlight. I collapsed against him, sobbing.
“Hush now,” he murmured. His fingers stroked my hair. “Hush.”
We stayed like that for a while. Maybe minutes. Maybe an hour. He was so warm and so good, and he smelled of leather and some kind of rich spice. My sobs quieted to hiccups, then an occasional sniffle.
“Hush,” he said. “It’s okay.”
I pushed at his chest.
He released me right away, and I stepped back. Embarrassment flooded me. Had I really just screeched at him like a banshee and then snotted all over his shirt?
Yep. There was a damp spot.
He didn’t seem to mind, though. His gaze was as steady and patient as always.
I swiped at my eyes. “It’s not okay,” I mumbled. “I can’t stay here, and I can’t go home.”
He rested light hands on my shoulders. “What if there’s a third option?”
I froze mid-swipe. “What do you mean?”
An unfamiliar emotion burned in his eyes. “You could accept a quest.”
“A quest? Like a berserker’s quest?”
“Exactly.”
“I’m not a berserker. I haven’t graduated the academy or—”
“There’s no requirement that says a berserker has to complete the academy. Anyone can take an oath and accept a request to kill.”
I thought it over. He was right. But . . . I shook my head. “I’m not trained, remember? I can’t control my rage.”
The emotion in his gaze grew more intense.
Nervous.
He was nervous? Little alarm bells clanged in my head. Something was wrong. Hauk Sigridsson didn’t get nervous or anxious or anything of the sort.
But he was really nervous right now.
I took a step back, and he dropped his hands.
“Hauk? What aren’t you telling me?”
He swallowed.
The alarms shrieked.
“Hauk?”
“You aren’t trained,” he said. “But I am.” He put out a hand, as if he feared I might bolt. “What if there’s a quest that doesn’t require you to fight? You can fulfill your oath simply by showing up.”
“What are you talking about?”
He shoved his hand through his hair, mussing the strands. “Aww hell, I’m bad at this. Remember the curse I told you about? How I can’t turn down any requests?”
I gave a tentative nod.
“There’s one I’ve been putting off for a while. It’s a dangerous one, Elin. And for the first time, I haven’t been sure I can make it out alive.”
My breath hitched.
He gave a humorless laugh. “Coincidentally, Harald was already on his way here to remind me of it when I summoned him about your, ah, incident.” He touched me again, his fingertips on my upper arms. “I’ve been stalling because I thought I might not survive. Until now.”
“I don’t understand.”
“The Mythical I’ve been tasked with killing is Radegast.”
“The Slavic god? He’s a high Fae.”
“And extremely hard to kill. Even more so because he possesses the Eternity Stone.”
I’d never heard of it, but I could guess what it meant. “It makes him invincible?”
“As long as it’s on his person, yes. Its most famous power is immortality, but it can also be used to bring someone back from the dead. The Rage Lords want the stone recovered. Mythicals as a whole rarely agree on anything, but several high Fae have started to see Radegast as a threat. The stone gives him too much power. And he’s started to show signs of madness. Lately, he’s taken to killing humans and . . . using their bones to decorate his palace.”
I shuddered.
; Hauk went on. “I can’t kill him, not while he has the stone. My only hope is to disarm him. I’ve tried to learn as much as I can about his weaknesses.” He took a deep breath. “That’s where you come in.”
“Me?” I touched my chest.
“Yes.” He hesitated, then said, “In all my research, one thing kept popping up. Radegast has a deep fondness for nymphs. His orgies can last for days.”
I stayed still. In some part of my brain, I think I knew what was coming. But another part of me—the part that had thought Hauk liked me for me—refused to acknowledge what my brain already knew. So I stood there, a weird numbness keeping me rooted to the floor while he continued.
“I couldn’t believe my good fortune when Harald asked to enroll you at Bjørneskalle. Here I am, in need of a nymph, and one just falls into my lap.” He gave my biceps a gentle squeeze. “Even better, you can hold your own in a fight! I wasn’t sure your nymph half would be strong enough to lure a high Fae like Radegast, but spending the last week in your company has removed all my doubts.”
Pieces began to click together in my mind. Somehow, my voice came out calm and normal sounding. “You spent the week with me to see if I was sexy enough to help you defeat a god?”
He looked sheepish, which proved he wasn’t stupid. “It wasn’t like that, Elin. Well, maybe at first, but—”
“The pizza, the one-on-one training . . .” I jerked out of his hold. “Gods, I almost kissed you!”
A tough of arrogance entered his eyes. “You wanted to. You can’t deny it.”
“I didn’t know you were conducting a job interview!”
He frowned, all male frustration. “Dammit, I told you it wasn’t like that. Yes, I wanted to see if you were a real nymph, but then I go to know you.”
Charming. He’d singled me out for one-on-one training so he could get an up-close look at my body. Then he’d decided I wasn’t such a sex-crazed bimbo, after all?
I waggled my fingers at him. “How do you know I didn’t just ensnare you with my seductive nymph powers?”
“Don’t make jokes.”
“The only joke in here is you, Hauk. You claim you’ve gotten to know me. Do you really think I would agree to help you seduce Radegast? Do I strike you as the type of woman who hops in and out of beds for fun?”
His jaw tightened. “I’m not asking you to sleep with him.”
“Then what, exactly, are you asking? You just said he has days’ long orgies! You think I can distract him with small talk?” I tapped my chin and pretended to think. “Tell me, what does a three-thousand-year-old god like to talk about?”
“I don’t know!” He spoke in a burst of obvious frustration. “All I know is I can’t fucking think when I’m around you. It’s like all the blood rushes to my—” He snapped his mouth shut, then took a deep breath and lowered his voice. “If you have that effect on me, you must have it on everyone. It’s like you were built to tempt men.”
I sucked in a breath. Did he think that was flattering?
But he wasn’t done yet. “You’re gorgeous, Elin. You must know it. You have these legs that go on forever and eyes a man could get lost in. Your lips are full and pouty, and you do this little thing where you bite the lower one when you’re thinking or frustrated, and it’s sexy as hell.” He’d frowned as he talked, as if he was annoyed by what he described.
He dragged in a breath. “You’re incredible. A-And I thought that was all there was to it, but I was wrong.” He took a step toward me, his gaze earnest. “Radegast is my chance—my only chance—to throw off my father’s curse and reclaim my immortality. I swear to you, I don’t think of you as just a nymph. I haven’t since that first day. If you help me with this, I’ll spend the rest of my life trying to prove it to you.” His mouth quirked in a grin. “If we’re successful, I’ll have plenty of time to do it.”
For once, his grin didn’t make my heart skip a beat. All the pretty words in the world couldn’t erase the fact that he’d lied to me. Even if he was telling the truth now, his plan still required me to use my body to help him get what he wanted.
No matter how he dressed it up, he was asking me to play prostitute to his pimp.
I’d heard my mother called a whore my whole life. More than once, people had hinted I was one, too. I wasn’t going to prove them right. The fact that he couldn’t see that hurt more than I could say.
But his betrayal hurt worse. And it came on the heels of my own father trying to sell me to the highest bidder based on my supposed “talents in bed.”
Done. I was done.
I stepped around him and went to the door.
“Elin, wait.”
I turned at the threshold. “You’ll have to fight your quest on your own. I guess I’m not really nymph enough, after all.”
“The quest would help you, too,” he said. “You forget, you have nowhere to go. You need this.”
Soft light from the chandelier touched his hair, turning it to gold. Despite his challenging words, there was something imploring in his expression. With his warrior’s build and head-to-toe black leather, he couldn’t have been more out of place in the studious-looking room.
It would have been easy to say yes. To walk to him and pledge myself to his scheme. A smart woman would have done it.
Because he was right—I had no other options.
But the easy way out wasn’t always the right one.
“I’m sorry, Hauk. I can’t be what you want me to be.”
His shoulders slumped.
I left before my tears could fall.
9
I flew through the castle, my boots making staccato clicks against the stone as I navigated the twisting and turning corridors. The windows outside revealed a full moon in a black, starless sky. It had to be close to midnight, and the castle was hushed and still, with no one in sight.
Good. I didn’t want to see Olaf or Professor McBride or any of the others who’d made my time at the academy difficult and uncomfortable.
A little spark of anger flared in my chest. That was good, too. Anger chased away tears. For once, I could seize my anger and let it fuel me.
And fuel was exactly what I needed—or whatever the emotional equivalent might be. I couldn’t stay in the castle. Harald would soon learn I’d ruined his alliance with Einar, and there would be hell to pay. After tonight, I no longer harbored any illusions that he felt affection for me. Only hate could compel him to force me into a loveless marriage.
He knew firsthand how miserable such unions could be. That he was willing—even eager—to doom me to one told me all I needed to know about his paternal instincts.
So I couldn’t sit around and wait for him to show up and take another crack at ruining my life.
That meant leaving Bjørneskalle as soon as possible. Like tonight.
I entered my room, then shut the door and leaned against it. My heart raced, and I had to take several deep breaths to slow my galloping pulse. After a second, I faced the wood and pressed my palms flat against the surface. I hesitated, then rested my forehead against the wood and closed my eyes.
“I need your help, old friend. Can you find Asher Greenleaf and tell him his niece needs him? It’s urgent.”
The wood warmed against my skin. In my head, a movie reel of images flashed. A deer leaping over fallen logs. Leaves rustling in the wind. A flock of birds rushing into the air and taking formation . . .
A smile tugged at my lips. Trees were elegant, if verbose, communicators. Even when a simple “yes” would do, they chose to speak in poetry. I opened my eyes and patted the wood. “Thank you, brother spruce.”
I turned and walked to the middle of the room, stopping at the foot of the bed. Should I grab my duffel and make a run for it? But then how would Asher find me?
What if the door couldn’t reach him? He wasn’t always easy to find. If he didn’t appear, I’d be totally on my own.
A little voice spoke in my mind. “You’re on your own now.”
Tears burned my throat. I bent and pulled my duffel from under the bed, then threw it on the rumpled blanket. I wasn’t taking my academy wardrobe, which made packing easy. I tossed the T-shirt I wore for bed on top of my other clothes, followed by my hairbrush and the toiletries I’d scattered across my desk. I opened the single drawer tucked underneath.
My mother’s mirror lay inside, its silver case reflecting the moonlight streaming through the window.
I hadn’t touched it all week—not since I’d started meeting Hauk at the Dragon Tower.
My hands seemed to move of their own accord, and I wasn’t really conscious of lifting the mirror or walking to the bed. I sank onto the thin mattress and opened the filigreed case.
She sat on the tree stump, but this time she wore a brilliant green dress. She faced away, her head tilted to one side, her reddish-brown curls piled high on her crown. The gown’s corset boning was visible through the fabric, which shone as bright as an emerald. Her full skirt fanned around her, and a ruffled edge of white petticoat peeped from the hem.
She did that sometimes—wore clothes from previous centuries. No matter which era she dressed herself in, she was always stunning.
“Mom?”
She jumped to her feet and spun around, her skirts dragging through the leaves.
“Elin!” She clasped her hands together. “Oh, I’ve missed you, sweetheart.”
“I know.”
She grabbed up the sides of her skirts and settled on the stump. “You must tell me what you’ve been up to. I want to hear everything.”
“The headmaster pretended to be interested in me so I’d help him defeat a god who has the power of immortality. I also accidentally made some nettles attack a Proven who hates me because she likes the headmaster. So that sort of got me kicked out of the academy. Oh, and Harald has gone medieval and wants to auction me off like a mail order bride.”
Her gaze was steady, her features calm. “Tell me more.”
I swallowed. “That’s pretty much it.”
“I’m glad you told me.” She gave me a dazzling smile. “I want to share something with you. May—”
“I don’t mind. Go ahead.”