Chapter 7 #2
I quickly made my way around the long tables towards the one where Father Benedict sat looking self-important. He practically leapt from his seat when I dropped a hand onto his shoulder. By then Bastian had caught up to me, looking alarmed.
I leaned down to Father Benedict’s ear, letting my lips brush against his lobe. “There’s a spiritual matter I’d discuss with you, Father. Meet me in the cathedral at moonrise. Come alone.”
His eyes bulged as he flinched away from me.
He wanted to chastise me in front of the whole court, but he didn’t trust me not to publicly shame him for coming all over his holy robes.
Any association with me was bad, so he took the predictable path and said, “As you wish, Princess.” He jerked his head to dismiss me.
I didn’t have to look at the king to know he’d seen the exchange. Everyone had seen the exchange.
The rigid set of Bastian’s shoulders told me he was furious. A Viking would’ve let his rage erupt, allowing everyone to witness the fight we were about to have. Bastian put a gentle but firm hand under my elbow and escorted me somewhere private.
As soon as we were tucked into an enclave outside the Great Hall, his calm started to fracture.
“What was that?” His tone was quiet but tight.
“I have things to discuss with the good priest.”
He pinched the bridge of his nose. “And you don’t think my father is going to become suspicious we didn’t consummate the marriage if you keep acting like that?”
“No, but he might if you say it aloud in front of your mistress again…”
Bastian had been too worked up to notice Eleanor approaching. He whipped around to face her, then turned awkward, looking between us like he’d been caught doing something bad.
Eleanor surprised me by saying, “Do you remember the faces of all the people you’ve killed, Sigrid Thorvald?”
Every last one. They’re like ghosts lingering in my mind, appearing anytime I forget to keep them at bay.
“How could I possibly remember them all? And why would I bother?”
She jerked back. “Because they mattered! My brother mattered!”
So did mine, cunt.
Bastian made a move to gently escort Eleanor back to the hall.
“Was he on Ocracoke?” I asked, and she pushed around Bastian to scowl at me. If he was one of the bastards who’d killed Axel, she’d join him in Hel.
“No. Long before Ocracoke, he was sent to the Viking court as an emissary with an offer of peace. Your king charged him as a spy and sent him back in pieces. You were the one who tortured him!”
I remembered the soldier she was talking about, a young man with huge brown eyes just like hers.
He’d been innocent, so I’d given him a swift end, the only mercy within my power at the time.
If I’d spared him, my father would’ve executed him some other way.
I’d only been a teen, not yet the warrior I became and still afraid of my own powers.
If he’d been sent back in pieces, it hadn’t been my doing.
“I don’t remember such an execution,” I said, coldly looking away. These people’s feelings couldn’t be my concern, or I’d turn into fucking Bastian the Soft, and then Axel would suffer for eternity.
Bastian’s eyes held something that looked dangerously close to pity, and I had to assume it was for Eleanor because if I thought he pitied me, I was going to take his head off here and now.
The urge to apologize slid through me like something oily that didn’t belong. It had to be his fault. I’d never felt the need to apologize before.
His expression hardened when I stayed silent, like he expected things from me that he had no right to ask for.
Her brother was already dead. I couldn’t help him anymore. I shouldn’t have wanted to help her, but the unfamiliar desire was there. It wouldn’t help her if I pandered to her weakness.
She needed someone to stoke her strength. There was power in hatred.
I squared my shoulders. “And here I thought you were just jealous I’d taken your man…”
Bastian moved to block her from me like he could shield her from the hurt.
But she was having none of it. Her trembling lip turned to a tight line. “You might’ve married him, but you didn’t take him from me. He’ll never love a heartless monster like you.”
“Eleanor…” Bastian said in a voice that sounded more like he was apologizing than chastising.
Fuck both of them for their weakness. I didn’t have that luxury, and neither did they, even if they couldn’t see it.
I took a step closer to them to whisper, “Do you know what happened to my first two husbands, Lady Eleanor?”
Bastian’s face shuttered.
Eleanor’s eyes grew wider. “Everyone knows you killed them.”
I nodded with satisfaction that my exploits had managed to reach even the most sheltered Saxon ladies. “Then you’ll know why what you just said is foolish. This is a temporary arrangement, and love couldn’t be more irrelevant to me.”
I’d avoided looking at Bastian as I said it but didn’t want to examine why it was so difficult.
Eleanor reared back in shock. “Temporary? How can a marriage be temporary?”
I looked at the ceiling, seeking patience from one of the gods. “We just went over this, Eleanor. The same way my first two marriages were temporary.”
Her polite mask morphed from confusion to shock to terror, until her face settled into an expression of outrage. “You can’t kill him. He’s a good man.”
If he’d loved her back, he wouldn’t have left her here to run off and become a pirate, so why did it bother me that she was trying to lay claim to him? More importantly, why was my berserker rumbling deep within the cave where she slumbered? Was there danger nearby that I was oblivious to?
I instinctively reached with my powers to taste Eleanor’s fears, to learn something about her. I clenched my jaw when nothing happened, feeling the first true frustration at my berserker’s absence. It was a sliver of what it would feel like to go into combat and find my abilities had changed.
People filed out of the Great Hall, and Arnulf approached Bastian, throwing a wary look in my direction. He held out the weapons he’d confiscated. “Time for training, my lord. I’m to escort you down.”
I finally looked at Bastian, and he flashed me a glare charged with frustration and heat, promising this conversation wasn’t over. He strapped his sword belt back on and sheathed the two smaller daggers at his side.
“Run along, Prince. Lady Eleanor, why don’t you come back to my chamber and teach me to play Castles?”
It was a test to see if she’d run away in tears, but she raised her chin. “Is a brute like you capable of learning anything but violence?”
I fought a smile. I was certain she was scared of me even if I couldn’t feel her fears, but she refused to cower from me like almost everyone in this court did. Since I didn’t want to fuck her, that made her simpler to be around than Bastian.
He was turning into a complication I didn’t need.
Bastian looked between us frantically, clearly conscious of Arnulf watching. He was so conflicted about what to do that a laugh slipped out of my mouth. “Don’t worry, darling. I’ll behave.”
Just as he hadn’t noticed Eleanor’s approach, he failed to realize that when she put her petite hand on his arm, it was merely to distract him as she pulled a dagger from the scabbard at his hip.
It was impressive the way she batted her eyes at him just long enough to tuck it into her skirt.
Then she turned back to me with a gesture to lead me down the hall.
Surely, the little wench doesn’t actually mean to fight me…