Chapter Thirty-Three
Rey
“What’s up?” Rowen crosses his arms and leans in. “You’re not really squashing down the whole I was in your room and we broke a bed rumor right now.”
My eyebrows shoot up as I self-consciously look around the dining hall. People are staring. Great. Perfect. “There’s a rumor about us?”
He nods. “Though in the rumored version, you were naked.”
I slap a hand over his mouth, then drop it. “That’s ridiculous.”
“Welcome to college.” He almost seems sad when he says it. “You’re young and pretty, and I’m not a troll, so people put two and two together. And I mean, the bed was broken. It doesn’t matter, anyway. Better than them talking about you and Aric.”
Fair point.
I hold up my phone. “Keep yours on you. I kind of told Aric we could do our assignment now. Field trip to the Ice Caves.”
“Brilliant idea, Rey.”
“Appreciate the sarcasm.”
I know Rowen’s right, but it’s all I have, and as much as I would love to enjoy the delusion that this is normal, that I’m just attending classes, starting my own rumors, and headed toward a sex tape scandal all before streaking through the quad—that’s not the case.
Lives are at stake.
“I’ll be fine. I know how to handle myself.”
“Hope you’re right about that. Because here he comes.”
Aric’s dark eyes meet mine, and without a word, he nods.
I force a smile for Rowen. “That’s my cue.”
I follow Aric out of the building, toward the parking lot just as storm clouds muscle their way across the sky, thick and heavy. The day dims in an instant, the kind of wrong darkness that feels like a bad omen written across the heavens.
It wasn’t supposed to rain today. Definitely not thunderstorm tonight.
I shiver and keep my eyes locked straight ahead, but my gaze still catches on Aric’s fists—white-knuckled, clutched tight at his sides like he’s one second from putting them through a wall.
Lightning suddenly charges across the clouds, jagged and sharp.
He stops short, spins on me, voice breaking, raw. “Do you have any idea what you’re doing to me? What being near you feels like? You think this is some kind of game?”
I reel back, breath catching as a cool wind whooshes across my cheek. His chest heaves once, twice, and then he drags a hand over his face like he’s trying to shove the words back inside.
“Forget it,” he mutters, voice lower now but no calmer. “I know we have to ride in the same car. But if you could just…stay away from me. Unless it’s absolutely necessary. That’d be great.”
The storm deepens overhead, growling.
By the time we’re settled in his black Defender, he’s gripping the steering wheel so hard, the leather groans. His jaw is locked, eyes fixed forward like he’s holding on by a thread. He keeps blinking, shaking his head, like he’s losing focus.
My pulse spikes.
And for the first time, I wonder if I’m trapped in this car with him—or if he’s trapped in here with me.
I haven’t had a chance to fully look at the map, so I haven’t mathed how far we’re actually going. I assume I have a few hours for a partner breakthrough.
Aric apparently doesn’t trust me to navigate. He takes his phone out of his pocket and pulls up a navigation app, then types an address and waits for it to sync on the car’s console. I try not to let my irritation show.
Playing the long game is going to be the death of me.
“The Ice Caves are old,” Aric starts. His voice is low, clipped, but steady enough to sound like a lecture.
“Thousands of years old, some of the oldest glacial formations in the Northwest. People have used them as shelters, burial sites, even meeting grounds. That’s why Dr. Tyrson assigned them.
We’re supposed to take notes about the structures themselves, how they’ve lasted this long—”
I cut him off with a sharp laugh. “I, too, have a syllabus, professor. And guess what? I can read. You don’t have to tell me what to do—we’re partners, remember?”
His jaw ticks. “I just don’t trust you. And one of us actually cares about grades. Graduating. Escaping.”
The word hits harder than it should.
I keep my eyes fixed on the storm-tossed road ahead. “What makes you think I don’t want to escape, too?”
Silence fills the car, heavy and suffocating.
Finally he mutters, “You had the chance to run. You didn’t.”
I let out a shaky breath, trying for a heart-to-heart I’m not sure I have the courage for.
“You’re right. I had a chance once. A moment of hope.
A cruel, fleeting moment in my life where what my father planned for me seemed almost like an escape.
I dared to hope…” My throat tightens. “I saw it like a crack in the void, a slit of light I thought I could slip through.”
He doesn’t respond.
So I keep talking, words scraping raw on the way out. “But I forgot about the chains. The ones still wrapped around my legs. My mind might be free, my heart, too, but my ability to run? Frozen.”
He doesn’t say anything, but I swear I hear it anyway—the faintest whisper of wind in the car, carrying words he’ll never admit aloud.
Just like me.
I glance at my phone, desperate for distraction. Three missed calls from my father. Three unread texts. My pulse spikes.
Shit.
“So…the four big Ice Caves, right?” I ask, forcing my voice steady.
“Yup,” Aric answers without looking at me. “We’re going to the ice.”
A shiver runs down my spine. I plaster on a smile I don’t feel. “All right. To the ice.”
My phone dings again. I take a deep breath and finally gain the courage to check my text messages.
Odinfather: In class? Updates?
He rarely says please, so I’m not sure why I’m expecting one now.
Odinfather: I’m sure you’ve already made contact with Rowen. I sent him in so you’re reminded of what you will lose if you don’t succeed. The ice is very thin, daughter.
A choking sensation wraps itself around my neck. Dammit. This is one time I did not want to be right.
Odinfather: Rowen just told me you’re off campus. I didn’t send you there to play their games. You aren’t one of them. You never will be. You have a job to do. Do not disappoint me.
Rowen told him I’m off campus? It’s a school assignment! Whose side is he on? But I guess he had to tell his boss. And Rowen would describe without any detail, so it’s not totally his fault.
My phone goes off again.
Odinfather.
A picture of Laufey.
My stomach clenches. She doesn’t look hurt, but that doesn’t mean she isn’t.
I don’t need the reminder that she’s waiting, that the clock is ticking. That her life hangs in the balance. I’ve seen Father kill. He’s heartless. Laufey risked the very real and unhinged wrath of Odin to give me that note. It has to be significant. I refuse to believe otherwise.
I read off the runes again in my head.
Raido. It was there, in the Hall of Ormir. It means journey.
Is this going to be my journey, then?
I turn my gaze to a very still and focused Aric. I’m used to disappointment, I bathe in fear of my father, but the last thing I need is to develop a weakness for my enemy and wish for the one thing I’ve never truly had.
A friend.