Chapter 37
Roark
First light came far too quickly. Lyra rubbed sleep from her eyes, weary from all that thrashing during the night. She’d mentioned that her dreams were haunted by Fadey but insisted that we move swiftly, even more desperate to reach Nivek’s hidden bone.
There were passes on both Myrdan and Draven lands, narrow canyons with old switchback trade routes that were once used when Unfettered clans still ventured into the lands of Stìgandr often. Centuries before my birth.
All my life Unfettered Folk were the mysterious clans, their laws, culture, and any hint of craft unknown.
No mistake, some sort of power lived in their soils for seers such as the Gammal woman. She’d unraveled lands and crafted wars, all from her words. How she convinced kings and queens of such things, I still did not comprehend.
The journey over the ledges would not be simple, but it was not so treacherously guarded that we’d be unable to reach the borders. In truth, my unease came more from how we’d be received once we reached the clans.
“Nivek was able to leave his shard. He was the one who arranged for Gammal to take me,” Lyra said when I confessed as much. “Whether they will admit it or not, the Unfettered Folk have a part to play in all this. We simply need to find out what.”
And it was that unknown that I despised.
Lyra had been hunted for her craft since her first breath—I’d been one of her hunters—and I did not relish the idea of my wife facing a new threat in a new land we did not understand.
Outside, mists rippled over the damp grass like the tides on the fjord. Thane and his Stav worked together wrapping the fur bedrolls and weapons. One of the guards kept looking at the prince, as though discomfited by his royal charge working side by side with him.
Must’ve been new to the Stav.
Thane did not believe any task beneath him, not when being beyond the gates of the keep did not favor royal lives over low-ranked warriors. Everyone risked greeting the halls of Salur in the wood.
So to the prince, everyone worked together to stay alive.
Gunter leaned against a thick oak, a twig between his teeth. He jutted his chin at Thane and the Stav Guard. “And where were you, my royal sod? We’ve already secured our packs. Take a lesson from the Jorvan, Roark.”
I clapped the side of his neck, grinning. I spent most of my life as a servant. I plan to take advantage of shouting orders at others instead.
Gunter squinted, watching my hand speak, but when he chuckled, I assumed he gathered most of the words.
“Gods, you’ve become a tyrant. You could be, you know. Threaten those who stand against you by tearing out their souls. You could control the world. Think on it. If this goes sour, I’ll be the dark blade who brings your subjects to cower at your feet.”
I shoved his shoulder, shaking my head, and went to help Lyra and Emi secure the horses.
Emi’s braid was not as tightly kept and hung loose over her shoulder.
Red lined her eyes, but when I tried to press her on if she was well, my cousin simply shook her head and turned to fasten another satchel to a spotted mare.
By the distance Yrsa kept across the camp, it was not hard to guess what troubled Emi’s soul.
No mistake, Yrsa felt betrayed by Emi for keeping my secrets, but Lyra heard me, and Thane found understanding. What kept the princess from doing the same?
I feigned the need to inspect the tents once more, but when I strode near Yrsa, I paused. The betrayal was mine. Not hers.
Yrsa had a good heart. I’d known the woman since I’d gone to live in Stonegate. Her friendship with the prince was heartening, and when she loved my cousin, I accepted her—unbeknownst to anyone—as part of my folk too.
She’d even learned my words when she did not need to.
Yrsa’s jaw tightened. “Yes, and I am furious with you as well.”
But you will not let her explain.
“Have you ever wondered why Thane and I have never kept secrets from each other?”
I shrugged.
“I caught my father bedding a young servant woman. Barely a woman, really, and she looked terrified. But he was her king. He made me vow never to speak of it to my mother. From then on, he would force me to be what he called his little liar.”
For what?
Yrsa’s features hardened. “When he took more mistresses, when he mistreated our folk, he forced me to go with him, forced me to stand nearby, to hear everything he did.” She let her eyes close.
“Then he would say, ‘Now you know this dark truth that will ruin your mother. She is already weakhearted, and to know this might send her to the gods with pain.’ ”
I’d always thought Hundur was more twisted than even Damir. Deep in the shadows of my soul, I could feel the click of a name added to a list of those whose souls would die.
“I have lied to my mother all my life.” Yrsa scoffed bitterly. “Not that she doesn’t know. I’m certain she does. But the extortion of breaking her heart with the truth has kept me silent. I despise liars, Roark. Truth was my one condition for all my relationships.”
I folded my arms over my chest. Emi is not your father.
“But trust is lost.”
Because of me. My eyes narrowed. I am her prince, Yrsa. I was the only soul willing to save her when her father prepared to sell her to a damn brothel in Myrda. To keep my curse hidden was a debt she felt she had to pay.
Yrsa winced. She knew why Emi had fled Dravenmoor, why she had tried to slit Virki’s throat before the traders found her. She had run and not stopped until she reached the Phantom Forest, where she had sent word to me.
I crowded the princess, my gestures slow, almost threatening. If you wish to blame someone, place it atop the shoulders that deserve it. Mine. Not the woman who loves you, soul deep.
Without another word, I turned away from the princess.
Emi studied her boots in the dirt, but Lyra stood beside the tall gelding we’d share. A faint grin teased her lips, a secret knowing; she squeezed my palm three times, then took her place just past the withers.
I settled behind her, one arm around her waist. With a simple signal at Thane, he nodded and we tore through the northern wood, the looming slate peaks of the Night Ledges in our view.
—
We were nearly to the pass. Twice we’d made camp for the night, and twice Lyra tossed and thrashed in her sleep.
Our mismatched crew spread out across the wide paths honeycombed across the land. Kyrre could not help but pester the horses, nipping at their hooves, and found a bit of enjoyment bothering one of the Stav. The fool kept cursing in pitchy old-language dialect, and the wolf found it delightful.
I never called him off.
Gunter, Auki, and Thane did most of the hunting. Strange how quickly the Jorvan prince got on with my childhood playmates. Then again, proud as Thane was about his Jorvan blood, he never let something so small as borders change his opinion of others.
Show him their character, and the prince would accept people or not.
Brynn and Emi kept close to me and Lyra, trading tales of childhood and growing up in different lands.
Nights were spent with watch duties while the rest of us slept huddled together for warmth. No flames. Not this near the ledges, not when Jorvans and Myrdans would be tracking their missing royals, no doubt.
On the second night, Yrsa even handed Emi one of the fur mats without recoiling immediately. Still, she had not spoken to my cousin, and the weight of a rejected soul bond was evident in the pulpy circles beneath Emi’s eyes.
Time. All there was to do was hope that in time the princess would at least hear her out.
This far north, Dravenmoor was a land of knolls and hillsides topped with frosted evergreens and dark-leafed oaks.
“If Selena were here, she’d force us to don totems to ward off troll folk from stealing us away to their caverns beneath the knolls,” Lyra said.
I chuckled. My father took me hunting here in my eighth season, when his mind was not so divided.
He told me the hills and valleys were made from the first pawprint of the gods’ fara wolf.
The enormous beast howled and shifted the whole of the realms until new, smaller wolves clawed through the cracks of the soil.
Lyra leaned into me with a sigh, letting her head fall to my shoulder. “You were close with the king?”
I hesitated, speaking against her heart. For the first seasons of my life, yes. The deledan took him farther away from us as time went on. Near the end, it seemed as though he could only speak with the queen.
“Is that why you resent her? Because her craft split his soul, but hers was the only one who could still reach him?”
Resentment had built against Elisabet for seasons.
From sending me away, using me as a pawn in bloodshed, for the loss of my father.
I grew up in Stonegate never truly understanding my past. But I am beginning to see that as ruthless as her actions have been, they were done to protect what was left of her family.
I am not so certain I wouldn’t have done the same.
Lyra tilted her head to look at me. “You already have. Before we even left Stonegate, you have shown there are no lines you will not cross for me, Roark.” The silver in her eyes flashed as though a fiercer piece of her craft awakened. “I hope you know, there are no lines I would not cross for you.”
I pressed a kiss to her hair and tightened my hold around her waist.
“Roark.” Thane materialized beside us, slowing his skittish horse. “The pass is ahead, but the wolves are snarling. And on this, I trust their instincts more than mine.”
Ahead, Kyrre and òlmr paced frantically, their attention on the bend in the path. Have bows ready. Keep watch on the trees.
Thane gave a curt nod and handed a bow to Lyra with a leather quiver. “Plenty of bone arrows there, Ly.”
He rode to the front, informing the others.
“Roark,” Lyra whispered. “I’ve dreamed of Fadey these last few nights. In every dream he speaks like he knows where we are, what we’re doing.”
Dreams can be nothing more than our minds reminding us of our fears.
“But what if they are not dreams?”
My blood quickened. I kicked off the back of the horse and drew my blade. One palm on the neck of the beast, the other out so she could read my every word. Then remember, there are no lines with me, wife.
Lyra dismounted and readied her bow. I tilted my head to one side. The searing burn cut through the scar across my throat. Craft, cold and thick, roared in my skull. Before I recalled the truth of my past, I hardly sensed the pull of my darker soul when Dravens had used its power.
When my own cruelty reared its head, the burn was there, a doorway I could unlatch, but I had no power to truly command the split.
Now it was a rush. A frigid tide spilling from navel to nose, pouring out of me like stepping free of my own shadow. Two of the Stav Guard still shouted in stun when the fully shaped form of the deledan poured out of me.
The others hardly noticed.
Thane merely shook his head, muttering about wasted opportunities, and loaded his own bow.
I had hardly taken a step before the first arrow shot into our camp, the point sinking deep into the throat of one of Thane’s Stav.
The man coughed, blood spilled over his lips for a few heartbeats, then he fell facedown. Dead.
Shouts broke the silence. More arrows arched toward us in an ambush. At once, my darkness divided into murky rivers of shadows and wove deeper into the trees, hunting any hidden souls. Lyra, Brynn, and Thane fired their arrows into the darkness.
Sick thuds sounded when a point found the heart. Lyra fired at a slower pace, a white gleam to her eyes as she melded her arrows to hidden archers, but every shot brought a man down from the trees.
Stav Guard.
Thane barked commands to cease the moment he recognized the emblem of the white wolf across gambesons of the dead.
The attack did not cease.
Five. Ten. Shadows hunted the trees, finding the taste of souls. They all left a briny layer on my tongue, harsh with hate. It was what first connected the darkness to Lyra; she tasted warm, sweet like nectar.
Around the bend in the path more Stav Guard ran for us, blades at the ready. Gunter bellowed, shouted, and laughed a little maniacally. He swung one sword in each hand, slicing at throats and bellies.
Auki was different. Smooth movements, almost gliding across the clearing like a dancer. The man could cut through a heart, then spin around and ram the point of his knife through a throat.
Brynn shouted short commands at òlmr while Emi took to slamming her knives into the ribs of Stav Guard, short, quick, deadly strikes.
Twice, my cousin pressed her palm against the arm of a Stav to use her bone craft.
She despised snapping bones, for the consequence would bring her pain.
Still, when the Stav’s screams rose over the fight, when his bones bent and cracked, my cousin’s lips split into a vicious sort of grin.
When using craft grew too much, Emi slumped.
Before the blade of another raging warrior could strike down Emi, Yrsa stepped in front of her, the princess’s knife ending in the man’s heart.
I favored my ax in times like this. Killed faster with more brute force. It offered me time to focus on the craft of my soul to chase hiding Stav.
Kyrre! I summoned the fara in my thoughts. No one gets near her.
Black fur darted across the path. Stav Guard who aimed for Lyra and her arrows were pummeled to the ground by heavy paws and dripping teeth.
Ice ran down my spine, blood splattered on my face, and my ax lowered to the side. Slowly, my attention went to the curve in the path. My darkness tasted a soul, almost…almost familiar, but changed. Parts were harsh and burned against my tongue. But beneath it was a warmth, like Lyra’s.
Steel clashed against steel at my back. I looked nowhere but at the broad, hulking form walking through the murky shadows.
I stumbled back when his features—bulky and a little misshapen—came into view.
“You really going to let her kill me, Ashwood? She’d never forgive you.”
Ten paces in front of me, Kael Darkwin flashed a cruel, unfamiliar smile right before he drew his blade and lunged for my heart.