Romantasy Rebels

Chapter 1

The tower seemed surprisingly harmless.

Egill squinted at the building as he made his way over the winding mountain path, confusion dimming the moment’s triumph. More than harmless—hell, it seemed accessible.

No door to be seen, admittedly, as the stories said.

But the gaps between the rough blocks of granite were deep enough to accommodate his fingers, the windows large enough for an adult male to climb through.

No towering fences, moats, or trenches. Really, after the weeks he’d spent braving the windswept tops of Orin’s mountains, he’d expected the god to have made a better effort to protect his little gem mage.

He reached the foot of the tower without incident, however.

An incredulous laugh escaped him as he glanced up, resting his palm against the cold stone. If he was lucky—and he generally made sure to be lucky—he’d reach his destination within the hour.

And thanks to his magic, the journey home would be much, much easier.

No sense in waiting; the day was young. Limbs buzzing with the prospect of victory, he checked his knives and the buckle on the sheath of his sword, Heartfall.

He didn’t expect the little wench to put up much of a fight, but an alf could never be too prepared.

Taking off his coat and bag, he scanned the wall for the best handholds.

That deep crack above his head looked like an excellent start. Satisfied, he lifted his hand—

“I wouldn’t do that if I were you.”

He snapped up his head. On the second floor, a young human woman leaned out of a window, dark hair bound into a thick braid, round face undeniably amused.

It took Egill a moment to believe what he was seeing.

After weeks of traveling—wrestling through snow, fighting off lions and valley wolves—it would almost be an anti-climax if it were true. But the girl looked human. She resembled the farmers of Lyckfort, where the famed gem mage had been born, with freckles and upturned nose and a deep golden skin.

“Lady Hadewych!” he said, stepping back to look up at her more easily. It took an effort not to laugh. “I’ve come to save you!”

Hadewych blinked, her eyebrows quirking. “I beg your pardon?”

“I’ve come to save you,” Egill repeated slowly.

The girl was likely a little simple, he realized, after years in solitary confinement.

“I’m Egill of Gjalheim, champion of the Linne tournament, favorite of Raghnar, head of the great house of Svirla.

I’ve come to free you from your captors’ claws and—”

Hadewych raised her eyebrows even higher. “Have you, now?”

He suppressed a groan. “It must be hard to believe, but yes—after all these years, your torment is finally …”

“An Alvish warrior? Here to save me?”

“Just so, my lady.” How often would he need to repeat it? “Just give me a moment to enter your prison, and we’ll be—”

“Oh,” Hadewych said, revealing more of her short, curvy body as she leaned out further. “That sounds highly unnecessary to me, Lord Favorite.”

Egill blinked. “My lady?”

“Saving me,” she repeated, tasting the words on her dark red lips. “Makes me wonder what horrific tales of my suffering have spread. What cruelty did you plan to save me from, exactly?”

“It’s commonly known you were stolen from your parents at a young age,” Egill said smoothly.

As commonly as the powers that had driven those poor farmers to give up their daughter—Orin’s blessing, the god’s mercy that had saved her life at birth, and inadvertently given her the power to turn matter into gemstones, too.

The unfortunate fate of the girl’s aunt Gertrude, turned into pure diamond by an infant lacking control, had been the talk of the day throughout the archipelago.

“I would be honored to finally reunite you with your family.”

A lie, of course. As soon as he managed to grab her hand, he'd fade the both of them out of this place and transport them into the grand halls of Raghnar’s house.

But Egill doubted the wench would cooperate if she knew.

He could afford a little lie to finish this mission—the hand of Raghnar’s daughter and a position as his successor would be enough of a reward.

“It took you fifteen years to cross some mountains?” Hadewych said, pursing her lips. “Some champion you are.”

Orin’s eye, the lass was even less civilized than she looked. It took some self-restraint to soothe his hurt pride and say, “Greater obstacles than mountains lay between you and your family, Lady Hadewych. It’s my pleasure to brave them and bring a little more joy into the world by—”

“Oh, yes, yes,” she said, waving his words away. “Very moving, very heroic, they’ll love that quote in the history books. I must kindly decline, though.”

“You … what?”

“Why would I want to be saved? I’m living a rather pampered life here, under divine protection.

” Her smile dazzled like a diamond. “If you want to bring some joy into the world nonetheless, they’re dealing with terrible socio-economic inequality to the south.

You could save those poor sods in Morhall instead. ”

Egill stared at her.

“Of course,” Hadewych added reassuringly, “I don’t mind having a chat, if you could quit all that obligatory blathering.”

Blathering? He? A powerful lord’s right hand, the finest warrior of his generation?

“Oh, dear,” Hadewych said, snickering. “Did I offend you?”

“You’re a rather opinionated young woman,” Egill managed. “One wonders where you picked up all these ideas.”

“Oh, my companions.” She gestured at the road behind him. “Orin’s priestesses. Very pleasant company. They keep me informed.”

Her smile was a knife stab. I know where you come from, it said. I know the stories they tell about the world behind these mountaintops—the quarreling gods and the wars waging on the Fae Isles. I am perfectly content to stay far from it.

Well.

So much for the heroic rescuer’s guise he had donned that morning. There was little to rescue if his opponent wasn’t the god that had locked her up, but the razor-tongued wench herself. But if he couldn’t be a liberator—so be it. The kidnapper’s role fit him just as well.

He stepped forward, raising his hands to start climbing. Getting in couldn’t take long, and with no priestess in sight, he doubted she’d scream loud enough to alert her guardians.

“I told you,” Hadewych said, leaning over, “that it would be wiser not to do that.”

He almost scoffed. “I suggest you leave the strategy to me.”

“Oh, I’ll happily watch you blow yourself to pieces,” the girl said brightly, “but Gothel always gets in such a mood when she has to scrape the guts off the stones again. I suggest you spare her the effort.”

That gave him pause.

Gothel. If she was behind this defense—Orin’s most devoted priestess, and a fine godsworn mage herself—perhaps he should re-evaluate the tower’s harmless look.

Always, Hadewych said.

He raked a hand through his long blond hair, recalculating. “I’m not your first visitor here?”

“I’m a pretty woman with a talent for turning things into gems, Lord Favorite,” she said, as if he was the idiot here. “And men are all the same.”

She wasn’t going to lump him in with every provincial sod to find his way into this valley, was she? Yanking back his hand, Egill glared up at her and snapped, “Don’t underestimate me.”

She chuckled.

For fuck’s sake. He glared at those nondescript stones and added, “Gothel needs to reach you with food and water. Does she risk blowing herself to pieces every time?”

“Oh, don’t worry about Gothel. She has her own ways to get in.”

Ways this little hellion knew, judging by the smugness on her blushing face. Egill forced his frustration down. No sense in antagonizing her, if she held the key to her own freedom—the freedom she wasn’t willing to take.

“And what magic do those ways require?”

“You’re a funny man, Lord Favorite,” Hadewych said dryly. “It’s a shame Lord Raghnar didn’t make you his jester.”

For the bloody gods’ sakes. Egill suppressed the urge to tear her from that window with a dagger to the face and willed his voice into its politest territories.

“You misunderstand me, Lady Hadewych. It isn’t my intention to free you by force.

” Like hell it was. “But you must have wishes your tower does not provide for, and if I can be of service in fulfilling those …”

“So helpful.” But for the first time he detected something other than dry mockery in her tone—a hint of doubt, of some forbidden desire worming into her heart. “I hardly know why I would trust you with any of those wishes, though.”

So they existed. Egill suppressed a grin as he folded his hands below his back in the most subservient posture he was capable of. “Why don’t you first tell me what you’re thinking of, and we’ll discuss the details later?”

She cocked her head, causing that chestnut-colored braid to slide along her shoulder.

A lot of hair, he vaguely registered. It had to reach to her waist, at least. As she put her elbows on the windowsill and rested her chin in her hands, her doe-like eyes took a highly un-doe-like expression sliding over him—like a shrewd housewife examining a large pumpkin at the market.

“You see, Lord Favorite,” she said, sounding thoughtful through the cheerfulness, “this tower doesn’t provide me with men.”