Chapter 50
Roark
Darkness called to me.
It pounded against my bones, fueled my hate. The talisman was heavy against my chest, but Sindri’s craft was fading. The frenzy of the imprisoned monster within clawed and writhed, desperate to find a way out.
I took out the rage with my blade.
Every Stav wore the face of Virki. They fell back, gaping gashes in their throats. My bloodlust turned their features into Damir’s. I cut through their chests.
Fadey burned from behind their eyes. I ran at them, bringing them to the ground. Before they could fight back, my ax split their skulls.
I had two objectives in this battle: kill as many of the faces I kept seeing as possible, then find my wife.
Thane battled one of the Stav captains nearby.
In Stonegate, the prince was rarely able to use his prowess with a blade because of Damir’s protectiveness over his heir.
Thane yearned to fight alongside the Stav but was forced behind walls, left to fire his arrows no one knew about from our old tree fort.
Only I knew how formidable he could be. As boys we would spar in secret. As I improved, so did Thane.
This, though, this was a new man I’d not seen before.
The betrayal was written on his bloodied face, but it was his face that gave him an advantage. With each opponent, Thane shouted for them to heed his word to cease fighting. And each Stav who faltered then met the end of Thane’s sword.
At my feet a Stav held up his hands, begging for his life. I stepped on his chest, leaned forward just enough for him to meet the cursed shade of my gaze, then rammed my ax into his skull.
I straightened, blood dripping off my chin.
At my next step, a deep, hot spark of pain exploded across my ribs. I stumbled, glancing down where a bolt had rammed into my side. Blood coursed down my tunic. My hand went to the wound, my eyes scanning the field.
Damn.
I wrenched the bolt from my side, ignoring the sharp jab.
Virki was a coward. He stood behind his wolves. “It was never meant to be this way, nephew. If only my brother would have seen reason.”
I rolled my ax in my grip.
Virki frowned. “You and I will reconcile in Salur. You will understand when you see what we will become.”
My uncle let out a sharp whistle. His wolves lunged. Black and gray met them. Kyrre and òlmr leapt around me, teeth and claws gnashing at Virki’s beasts. Brynn shoved past me, with Darkwin nearby, slashing at another Berserkir. Bloodlust against bloodlust, it seemed an impossible fight.
More fara keepers followed Brynn. The wolves battled, but the keepers reached for their souls. Craft from a fara wolf keeper was soothing and firm, and the beasts found security in the particular touch of a keeper’s call.
Virki was a keeper. One of the strongest. But his constant shouts and commands were intercepted again and again by Brynn and the others. Kyrre’s jaw latched onto the haunch of one of Virki’s wolves and forced my uncle’s beast to turn off course.
My uncle roared his frustration and aimed his sword at Brynn.
I didn’t have time to think before I raised my ax and blocked a swift strike from Virki’s sword. He cut a dagger across my middle.
From the upper knoll where Hundur and Ingir watched, a Shield Rider beside the Myrdan king blew a ram’s horn and pointed at me. A line of Myrdan warriors stepped forward, round shields in hand. They came at me without end.
Seasons of being the Death Bringer served me well.
I crouched and moved with careful footing. Exact. Strategic. This many against one took sure strikes and steady motions.
One warrior lowered his shield, bellowed a shout, and lunged. Another came from the other side. I ducked between them. My ax cut at the ankle of one warrior. I straightened and had time to turn and stab the other in the back with my seax.
A third Myrdan cut at the gash across my ribs. A hiss slid through my teeth. The warrior went to strike at my chest. I swung the curved head of my ax, catching him beneath his chin. Virki hid behind his wall of warriors, a vicious grin on his face.
When I was surrounded, my uncle fled.
Comfortable as I was with the blade, too many kept closing in, tighter and tighter.
Somewhere behind me, I heard my mother shouting for Dark Watchers to come to my aid.
Battles were slow-moving at times, always caught in another fight, another blade to block.
Claws under my skin, hate in my heart, I drew in heavy breaths.
Gods, how I wanted them to bleed slowly.
How I craved to split in two, to devour their souls.
How I craved their screams, their pain.
My head was falling into the haze of the trapped darkness. I blinked, grasping for the blood craft in the talisman. I fought to see their faces, to see her, to stay lucid. Silver scars. Golden threads. A bright soul.
Blood dripped over my lashes. I rolled my ax in hand and pointed the blade of my sword down in the other. I was resigned to end this here. If I fell, then I fell to thoughts of her.
But I didn’t get the chance to strike.
Warriors dropped their blades. Some scraped at their faces, as though trying to dig out something festering in their skin. Others cried out in pain when someone danced around them, touching their shoulders, their arms. Bones cracked and bent. Necks snapped.
More warriors screamed, clawing at their arms and legs.
Darkwin, blood on his lips, kept brushing past the warriors. Before he was forced to be Berserkir, Kael Darkwin was a bone crafter. Under his touch, bones shifted, snapping, twisting, breaking.
He winced. To harm them would harm him; it was the consequence of bone craft. But Kael only grinned a little wider, a little more maniacally, as though the brutality made the bloodlust of the Berserkir rage more.
A Shield Rider stumbled, screaming about knives behind his eyes. An illusion. Blood craft.
“Yrsa!” King Hundur roared from up the slope. “Stupid girl, get out of there.”
Princess Yrsa tossed back her hood, her eyes ablaze. She threw more pouches of herbs at the foot of a fleeing Stav Guard. At once, the man stumbled, clawing at his skin in terror from her hallucinogen.
Yrsa claimed not to be skilled with blood craft, but I was beginning to believe those might’ve been her father’s words all along.
“Tell me, Father,” she shouted back. “Did Baldur tell you his true name? Did he tell you what he’s after?”
Hundur glared at his daughter. His fists curled, the hooked bones Lyra had melded onto his knuckles in Stonegate gleamed like jagged claws. “I know what we seek. It will only strengthen our alliance. And you are ruining it all.”
“Think so, Hundur?” Thane materialized through the mists. He wiped his bloody mouth with the back of his sleeve, glaring at his mother. “Do you know? Do you wish me dead so fiercely, Mother?”
“What are you talking about?”
“You killed my father,” Thane roared. “Now you wish to kill me. Get off the horse, Mother, and do it, then.”
Ingir’s brow furrowed. “There are things you do not understand. Your father would be ruthless with the bones. We will restore the first kingdom.”
“By slaughtering your children!”
“No.”
Thane barked a laugh. “Ah, Fadey didn’t tell you. The bones are within us, Mother! That is how he gathers them. Did you never stop to wonder why he wanted Yrsa at the palace the moment you decided to kill the king? The bones, Ingir. They are buried within your heirs.”
Ingir’s face paled. She shook her head. “No, that isn’t…that isn’t true. It is our blood that will lead the melder to them.”
“By spilling our blood!” Thane’s voice boomed. “Look at all you’ve lost for greed.”
A figure slunk closer to Hundur. The king did not turn. He did not see.
Movement in the trees came from the side of Ingir. Pain shadowed Thane’s bright eyes, as though he knew what was about to happen. As though he’d reconciled with it, but the sorrow could not be helped.
Thane’s sword lowered. “Will it be worth it to send me to Salur? Perhaps you and Fadey can make a new son.”
Ingir shook her head. “You’re wrong, Thane. You must be.”
“You know, you still have not said that you wouldn’t do it.”
“You are my son.” She was frantic. “You must be wrong.”
“I’m not, and I do not call you kin any longer.” The prince lifted his blade and used the tip to point at me. “But he is my brother, and you poisoned him.”
The queen shot her disdain toward me. “You are ensnared by soul craft, and when he is gone, you will be free.”
“Is that what Fadey told you? The folk who stand against you, the clans I thought were my enemies, are more kin to me than anyone at Stonegate. Farewell, Mother.”
Hundur’s cry came first. Emi had moved behind the king like a wraith in the night. One touch to his leg and her craft jerked the bone of his thigh to twist and snap into a sickening angle.
When he doubled over, Emi made quick work of clasping his neck between her palms.
The snap of the Myrdan king’s spine seemed to echo across the battle.
Ingir screamed and rammed her heels into the belly of her horse, desperate to flee. When she turned, the point of a spear rammed into her heart. Blood dribbled down Ingir’s lips. Her body convulsed, once, twice.
She toppled off the horse in a heap onto the knoll.
Thane closed his eyes. Yrsa was silent, but tears fell onto her cheeks.
Jordis let her hand drop from the throw of her spear. My brother’s wife pressed two fingers to her own brow, then bent to the soil.
Old studies from boyhood drew out a memory of the custom, an old ritual in battle where the one who sent a soul to Salur would point their head, acknowledging they knew they’d done the killing, then touch the earth, a symbol for the soil to now take the body back to dust.
Before Jordis could stand again, some force, some power in my chest doubled me over. As though a fist curled around my lungs and squeezed, I could not draw a deep enough breath.