Chapter 11
Eleven
Astrid
The problem was that she had no idea where to go from here.
Astrid had been born in this city, and living on the streets with her sister had been one thing, but she’d never actually left the vicinity of the castle in all her time as a priestess.
She’d had no reason to leave when Lord Tolly ruled one of the castle districts.
He’d always had visitors come to him, never the other way around.
She closed the door of the labyrinth behind herself, sealing all those bad memories inside. She’d poke and prod at them someday, just to get the haunting images to stop, but for now she needed control.
Where were they going? She had no idea. How were they going to get food? That was also a very good question she didn’t have an answer to. How were they going to get her sister back?
Her hands were trembling against the wood of the door. They never trembled. Tucking them into her sides, she curled them into fists so no one would see her weakness before turning to look at Bjorn.
He’d tilted his head back, eyes closed, just soaking in the moonlight that played along his features.
Bliss, she realized. That was the expression on his face as the air cooled the sweat on his brow and tried to stir the greasy hair that tangled around his horns.
Out here, she could see how poorly he’d been treated.
They had exited through a side door. It was the discreet exit, so no one would see them behind all these bushes with a stone wall behind them that extended up to the castle itself, easily fifty feet or more. But the moonlight could still play across his features, and the wind could still touch him.
The shadows cast by his ribs alone were concerning.
There was a hollow above his belly as well, where his skin dipped in heavily toward his spine.
But he was still massive. His muscles were still bulging as he lifted a hand to his head and smoothed his hair away from his horns.
Those tangled locks needed far more than a good brushing.
She’d prefer to cut it, but maybe with patience his dark hair could be saved.
As she stared, a single tear leaked out of his eye and dripped down his cheek. It left a track of clean skin in the grime that covered his face.
Her magic stretched out, brushing against his skin just to see what he was feeling. And it broke her heart to see that he was glowing with a bright white light. Hope, she realized. Hope was nearly bursting out of him.
She’d never seen anything more beautiful than him. The moonlight turned his horns and figure into a silhouette outlined by the moon. A warrior, a survivor, a man who had been through so much and came out alive.
She removed the veil on her face, feeling the wind with him. It cooled the faint sweat on her face as well. Perhaps both of them could be free from their shackles now.
They didn’t have much time, though. They had to keep going before someone came to look for them. She tucked her shaking hands against her sides and resolved to take charge.
“I don’t know where to go now,” she whispered. “I didn’t... I should have thought this far ahead.”
She always thought ahead with every plan that she had ever conjured up in her mind. Why hadn’t she done it this time?
Astrid had been so wrapped up in trying to get them out that maybe she hadn’t really thought this would happen. Maybe some part of her had believed this was an impossible task and that no matter what she did, she was going to be stuck in that dark cell for the rest of her life.
But now they were out in the moonlight, and it all felt far too real. She was standing beside a troll. A creature who would be hunted down in this city if anyone saw him, and then they would both be thrown back into that dungeon before they had a chance to escape.
He took a deep breath, those harsh ribs flaring wide before he opened his eyes and looked at her again.
She hadn’t realized his ears were so big. She hadn’t really looked him over in the cell, or couldn’t in the shadows. But his ears were large and pointed, and as she looked, they twitched toward some sound she couldn’t hear.
“We go,” he said, turning confidently away from the bushes and toward a small path that led toward the village and away from the castle.
She supposed it made sense they would go that way, but it still made her heart skip a beat.
“Where are we going?” she whispered.
“You said you don’t know where to go,” he rumbled. The path led downward, and she was certain it popped out in the heart of the villages that surrounded them. But that wasn’t good, because people were always walking around the villages.
If he were any of the other trolls, she might have hidden him.
Tall men existed here, and she could easily claim he was her guard.
A priestess wandering about in the middle of the night was a woman on a mission, and no one would question what she was doing, at least until they figured out who she might be.
But with those horns, there was nothing she could do to hide him at all.
He would stand out with any covering, any helmet—even a blanket tossed over his head would be ominous.
People would either think they were dreaming about some demon appearing on their doorstep, or they would run away screaming, troll.
Both of which would get them caught.
“Bjorn, I don’t think—”
He turned to look at her with a scowl. Placing a finger on his lips, he made it very clear that she was supposed to keep her mouth shut. So she did. She trusted he would get them out of here, even though it made every part of her quake and shiver.
This wasn’t what she had thought it would be. The threadbare slippers on her feet made it hard for her to walk over the pebbles that covered the path. She tried to do so without complaint, but soon enough she could hardly keep the little grunts of frustration from escaping her lips.
It seemed every tiny pebble was getting underneath the edge of her slipper and jamming itself between her toes.
She had to stop to shake them out, and then Bjorn was just moving farther and farther away from her.
Astrid hadn’t done all of this to lose every part of her life she’d fought for and then not get her sister back.
So she rushed after him, inevitably getting even more rocks in her shoes.
When they reached the back of the first building, Bjorn went right into its yard. She tried to hiss a warning, but he completely ignored her.
He moved on his knuckles and haunches, looking almost ape-like as he traversed the person’s yard.
Strangely enough, it did keep him very low to the ground.
No one would see him even if they looked out their window.
The moonlight guided him, apparently, because she could barely see now that they were in the village. Everything was shadows and darkness.
The moon didn’t cut through buildings, and no matter how hard she tried to peer around the shadows, her eyes simply could not get used to this level of darkness.
Bjorn appeared at her side, looming out of the darkness with a sheet in his hands.
“I don’t think anything is going to cover your horns believably enough that someone won’t realize you’re a troll,” she muttered, glancing around them to make sure no one had seen him.
But he was already wrapping the sheet around himself. He’d folded it so it looked like one long string, and then he pulled another sheet out of seemingly nowhere. What was he doing? He bound them around his chest, crisscrossing them around each other, and then gestured for her to come closer.
“Get on my back.”
“Excuse me?”
“Get on my back,” he repeated, but slower this time, like she didn’t understand what he was saying. “Put your legs through these.”
She realized he was holding the sheets out at an odd angle. They had crossed along his lower back, creating almost a cradle for her bottom, and her legs would go through the sheets at his side.
She’d seen mothers walking around the market with slings like this. Their children were secure on their backs, and then the mother’s arms were free to gather whatever produce they needed from the market. She’d always thought it was a rather ingenious way to get around with a child.
He wanted to carry her like a toddler.
Cheeks burning with embarrassment, she did exactly as he said.
After all, there was no way for her to deny what he wanted.
She was slowing them down, and any minute people were going to start waking up.
At this rate, they’d likely only get through half of the village before people woke, and then what would they do?
They needed to move faster, and not waste so much time on her pebble-laden feet.
Astrid made quick work of climbing onto his back, although everything in her wanted to grumble about it. Hiking her skirts up as high as she could, she tightened her legs around his waist and wrapped her arms around his massive ribs.
His hands reached back, sliding up the bare skin of her thighs, and they both froze.
She had never had a man touch her like that.
The calluses on his palms abraded her skin, leaving behind what she was certain would be a red mark.
And his claws trailed up her skin so gently, leaving streaks of heat in their wake.
She’d never had such a visceral reaction to another person’s touch.
The danger in his grip made her entire body light up, and she.
.. she didn’t know what to do with that.
Bjorn seemed to stop breathing entirely. But her palms were on his ribs, and she could feel how hard his heart thundered.
He ripped his hands away, holding on to the thin fabric strips at his chest that held her weight. “Hold on tight,” he murmured, before darting off at a speed that left her breathless.