Chapter 39
Chapter Thirty-nine
Aevar held his breath as Jorund knelt again, fingers skimming over the turned-up soil. The silence was thick with expectation. Even the trees seemed to lean in, waiting. For a moment, no one moved.
Then Jorund straightened. “Very fresh. An hour old. Maybe less.”
Finally. Ten days of chasing shadows. Ten days where every heartbeat hammered his chest like a countdown to the worst. But Aevar could feel it. She was near. So close he swore the air still carried her scent. The need to reach her roared through his veins.
Fathir raised his voice. “We don’t know what we’re riding into. Ingvald, take Njal and flank left through the trees. Kodran, Brodir, go right. Stay hidden. Cut off any escape when we engage.”
The men melted into the forest.
Jorund returned to his horse and was about to swing into his saddle when he froze.
His head tipped toward the wind. Everyone went still, listening, and Aevar caught a faint thudding echo.
Hoofbeats. He tensed. This far north, one wasn’t likely to come across any but enemies unless some of Jarl Gudrik’s men were on patrol or hunting.
Everyone waited in silence as the horses drew closer.
Aevar leaned to the side, straining to see through the trees.
Movement flashed through the brush ahead, and the riders appeared.
Three of them. The leader jerked his reins, pulling up short.
The others skidded to a halt behind him.
Aevar’s heart turned to fire in his chest.
Recognition struck them both at once. Aevar caught the flicker in Sig’s eyes, first of shock, then calculation.
The two riders behind him stiffened in their saddles, but Aevar only spared them a glance.
He kept his gaze fixed on Sig as every instinct screamed at him to ride over and rip him off his horse.
He had no doubt in his mind Sig was part of Eadlyn’s abduction.
Had probably led it. But where was she then? Why was she not with them?
Sig’s attention darted to Fathir, mockery dripping from his voice. “Quite a ways from Fjellheim, my lord.”
“Where is she?” Aevar demanded before his father could respond.
Sig eyed him, something cruel and twisted in the way he smiled. “Who? Have you lost someone?”
Heida rode up beside Aevar, her voice sharp as a blade. “They’re the ones. I recognize them. That one grabbed Trygg—” she pointed her axe at the man to Sig’s left, “—and she cut me.” Her weapon turned toward the woman. “And now we know who wore the mask.”
Sig’s smirk vanished. For a moment, fear cracked across his face. Then he wheeled his horse around, back to the north. But it was too late. From both flanks, Fathir’s men burst from the trees, blocking the path.
“Drop your weapons and dismount,” Fathir ordered.
The three riders eyed the men surrounding them as if contemplating whether to comply or try to fight their way through. But at three against more than a dozen, they didn’t stand a chance.
Even so, Sig turned his horse toward Aevar again, and that was when the mask fell. A feral look claimed his expression. He bared his teeth like a beast and yanked his sword free, spurring his horse forward in a reckless, furious charge.
Straight at Aevar.
Aevar moved on instinct. He threw himself from his horse as Sig’s blade carved through the air, slicing a whisper from where his head had been.
His feet hit the forest floor with a jarring thud, and he bent his knees to absorb the shock.
Sig’s horse screamed and reared, almost crashing into Erik’s.
Sig toppled from the saddle, slamming to the ground with a crunch.
But he was up again in a blink, eyes blazing.
Aevar yanked out his sword and stepped forward to meet him.
Sig fought like a man possessed, each strike brutal and wild as if his blade had no edge and only blunt force would work.
He didn’t block or counter. Just swung with both hands, overhead chops and wide, sweeping arcs meant to cut Aevar in half.
He fought with the fury of one who knew he was a dead man and had nothing left to lose.
Aevar gritted his teeth and met the onslaught.
With each blow his arms numbed, the clang of iron ringing in his ears.
But he moved with purpose, striking back with tight, focused slashes, using Sig’s recklessness against him.
The circle of onlookers blurred at the edges of his vision.
Nothing existed but Sig. Sig, who had taken Eadlyn.
Who might have harmed her. Might have killed her.
This was no heated competition. This time they were out for blood.
Sig’s sword whipped low and narrowly missed Aevar’s leg.
He staggered back. Sig lunged, grinning, and drove a horizontal strike toward Aevar’s shoulder.
Aevar shifted, and the blow glanced off his jerkin.
He turned the momentum into a brutal counter, hammering his blade down onto Sig’s wrist. Sig cried out, but then bared his teeth like a rabid dog and switched his sword to his left hand, slashing blindly.
Aevar growled and struck again, once to Sig’s ribs, slicing through his tunic. Sig stumbled, panting, eyes manic. Blood ran down his side, wetting his trousers. Still, he fought.
They clashed again, harder. Aevar met him shoulder to shoulder, sword to sword. The impact jarred them both, and for a moment they grappled, faces inches apart, sweat and blood and hatred between them.
“You’ll lose her,” Sig spat. “Just like the last one.”
Aevar slammed his forehead into Sig’s with a crack. Sig reeled back, dazed, and Aevar kicked his leg out from under him, driving him to the ground. However, Sig rolled, scrambling to his feet, sword raised high for an overhead strike.
But he was too slow.
Aevar saw the opening—Sig’s exposed belly, wide and vulnerable.
He stepped in and swung. The blade tore through wool, skin, and muscle.
Sig gasped. His sword slipped from his fingers, clattering on the ground.
He bent forward, hands flying to his abdomen, trying to hold his insides in.
Blood gushed between his fingers in dark streams. Staggering, he bumped into a tree and slid to the ground with a hissed breath and a curse.
Aevar stalked toward him. Blood roared in his ears. He yanked Sig’s seax knife from his belt and tossed it aside. Then he seized him by the front of his tunic and hauled him upright.
“Where is she?”
Sig laughed, a wet, choking sound. “She’s gone.”
The heat of battle evaporated into ice. Aevar’s heart failed to beat for a moment.
“I very much enjoyed her company…”
The filth that came out of Sig’s mouth burned through everything inside Aevar.
He couldn’t even understand the words. Just the sound of his own blood rushing with the urge to kill him.
To kill him right now. His vision darkened.
He gripped his sword tighter, one heartbeat from plunging it straight through Sig’s throat.
“He’s lying.”
A woman’s voice sliced through the haze.
Aevar spun. The woman they’d captured knelt beside her fellow prisoner, flanked by Braan and Heida.
“He didn’t touch her,” she said flatly. “He tried. I didn’t let him.”
Sig hurled a curse at her, but Aevar barely heard it.
“Where is she?” he demanded.
The woman hesitated. “We handed her off to a group of Kalgorans. Less than an hour ago.”
The earth seemed to tip beneath Aevar’s feet. Every muscle in his body locked into place.
Heida yanked the woman to her feet. “You’d better show us.”
Aevar shook himself loose and turned toward his horse. They had to move. Now.
But the woman called out again. “Wait. Check his pouch.”
Aevar stopped and turned back to Sig, ripping the pouch from his belt. He dumped its contents into his hand. Eadlyn’s silver arm ring fell into his palm. His breath left him as if he’d taken a blow to the gut. The symbol of his vow. Stolen from her.
“What about him?”
Aevar tore his gaze from the arm ring to see Ingvald motioning at Sig.
Everyone looked at Aevar. Anyone else would have killed Sig right then and there.
The urge seethed inside him, but he remembered something Eadlyn had read in Scripture.
Something that had made no sense to him but now echoed in his mind.
Vengeance is mine, I will repay, saith the Lord.
Indecision held him in place, rage and uncertainty wrestling inside him. He turned to his father as if he might find an answer there. Though his father couldn’t know what he was thinking, he seemed to understand Aevar faced some sort of dilemma.
Shifting his attention to Sig, Fathir eyed him with contempt. “Leave him to the wolves.”
Sig made a strangled noise. In the end, whatever they chose, he was a dead man.
Not even a skilled healer could have done anything for him in this condition.
His fate was sealed. He might last an hour or two, but eventually he’d bleed out if a wild animal didn’t finish him first. This far north, wolves and predators were plentiful and always hungry. They’d find him before nightfall.
For perhaps the first time, the arrogance drained from Sig’s face. He looked around frantically until his gaze settled on something behind Aevar.
“Give me my sword. Or my knife. Something.” His voice trembled with desperation.
To die without a weapon was to be denied Valhalla. A Nord warrior’s greatest fear. Aevar didn’t move. Worthless as the peace was, he couldn’t find it in himself to give that to Sig. Not after all he had done.
When Sig shifted as if to crawl toward his weapons, Braan snatched them from the ground. Sig reached out with one bloodied hand, but Braan just glared at him.
“I think I’ll give these to Eadlyn when we rescue her.” He turned and carried them to his horse.
Sig howled as they mounted. Curses. Pleas. Cries for mercy. But no one looked back. With Heida, Jorund, and the captured woman in the lead, they rode on as Sig’s final screams faded behind them.