32. Peace and Protection
Peace and Protection
Larissa
Larissa pinched the bridge of her nose, counting out her breaths as Masai went from sentry to sentry, checking their vital signs. In concise words, Anara explained how Kiah refused her request, but that Masai had offered his help, prompted by the Norn.
“But to bring him with us? Couldn’t he just have given us the directions instead?” Larissa hissed at Anara.
“Trust me, I asked. You need to find the Norn. Darien needs to get back to Safír. We don’t have the time to argue this.”
“How can we trust him?”
“I never said we could.”
“How did you even get him out of the city without him being noticed?”
“You know I can hear you, right?” Masai knelt beside one of the sentries who lay on the dirt. “And I’m the Regent’s son. I can go wherever I please.”
Anara crossed her arms. “Must be nice to be in such a place of privilege.”
He scowled at her but returned his attention to the sentry that Anara had knocked out with his own gun.
Blood trickled from beneath his hair. Masai spoke softly under his breath, then Larissa watched in amazement as the broken skin on the sentry’s head knitted itself together.
Halla’s breath of astonishment was accompanied by a soft “wow.” Even Kai seemed moderately impressed, though it was always difficult to tell.
His eyes were quick to hide his emotions.
“You do realize these men work for the Empress?” Anara drawled.
Masai rose. “You do realize not all of these men were given the choice.”
Anara waved her hand. “Everyone has a choice besides rolling over and playing dead.”
As though sensing the incoming danger, Darien stepped between them. “If you’re on their side, then why are you here?”
Masai looked at Darien, the anger in his face abating. “I never said I was on their side. I just don’t want to see innocents hurt.”
Anara leaned against Helga’s side door. “Then your mother should have put up a better fight.”
Darien threw her a look that so clearly said that’s not helping that Anara smiled and raised her hands in surrender. He turned back to Masai. “Why are you willing to help us find the Norn if your mother isn’t?”
Larissa caught the tightening of his stubbled jaw and the way Masai flexed his hands at his side. “My mother is protecting our people as best she can. I’m doing the same thing.”
“What do you mean?” Larissa asked.
As if noticing her for the first time, Masai let his eyes linger on the scar on her face.
“There’ve been rumors about the lost Perlian Princess for decades, of course, but never anything concrete.
What was the point in fighting a war you knew you couldn’t win?
But things changed after what you did in Perle. ”
A pit grew in Larissa’s stomach. “How do you know about that?”
Anara eyed Masai. “The Empress disabled all forms of communication.”
The Smaragdian shook his head. “Not amongst the Regents. She allows a single radio frequency to be opened between herself and the Regents. It’s primarily so that she can communicate with them, but Hammon broke protocol when your rebellion attacked.
He sent a message to all of the other commonwealths warning them you were in the city.
When my mother didn’t hear from him again, she assumed the Vienám had been successful. ”
Darien’s face paled, Larissa resisted the urge to steady him. If the other Regents already knew, then so would Calder. And so would Regent Omiros of Safír. The Empress would send more than just sentries to greet the Vienám in Safír. Their timeline had shrunk even further.
“Fine,” Larissa said. It didn’t matter if they couldn’t trust him. He had directions, and apparently the approval of the Norn, so that had to be enough. “But if we doubt your sincerity for even a moment, we won’t hesitate to do whatever needs to be done.”
Masai chuckled, a deep throaty chuckle. “And here I thought you were supposed to be the princess of peace.”
“Do you know what peace comes from?” Anara asked sweetly. “War.”
Masai frowned but turned toward Darien, perhaps sensing that he was the most amenable of the group. “We should go. My mother didn’t exactly know I was leaving.”
“Great,” Anara mumbled. “Now she’s going to think I kidnapped you.”
Masai raised an eyebrow, looking down at Anara from his towering height. “As if you could, little wolf.”
Before Larissa could blink, Anara had shoved Masai up against Helga’s side. “Call me that again, and you’ll find out just how big my bite can be.”
Larissa groaned. “Enough, both of you. Load up.”
Halla and Kai scrambled up into Helga’s tailgate while Darien wedged his way in between Masai and Anara. With a smirk, Masai walked away and mounted his bike, the engine roaring to life under his touch.
Anara watched him go in distaste. “I’ll keep watch from above. If Calder’s known about Perle all this time, his draugrs could’ve picked up our scent outside the city. He could be closer than we realized.”
Energy crackled between Larissa’s fingers at the thought of Calder finding them with Halla. She’d just gotten her sister back. She wouldn’t lose her again. Indecision and guilt rumbled in her stomach. “I never should’ve let Halla come.”
Anara shook her head. “Too late for that kind of thinking. Halla would’ve hidden in the truck anyway. One way or another, we would have found ourselves on the same path. Let Calder chase us; this time, we’ll be ready.”
With a feral grin, Anara shifted, darting off toward the sky on black feathered wings.
Larissa breathed deeply, forcing the galdr to fade from her hands.
Anara was right. Even if Calder did find them, it would be different than last time.
They were different. She hopped in Helga’s cab beside Darien, but her eyes held onto the rearview mirror long after they left the unconscious sentries behind.
“We’re not going north anymore,” Darien commented, his relief stark.
As Masai led them further into the Myrkvier Forest for hours, Darien’s agitation had only grown. Larissa understood. Each mile they drove north was a mile they’d have to backtrack to get to Safír before the Vienám’s invasion.
The sun descended as Masai guided them on the right path at the fork in the road. Larissa racked her brain, trying to remember the geography lessons her parents had instilled in her childhood. “I think we’re heading toward the élivágar River.”
“Makes sense, I guess. Weren’t those rivers supposed to exist at the beginning of the world?”
“Look at you”—Larissa feigned shock—“pretending you paid attention during history.”
Darien smiled. “Nope. That one was all Aagen; he loved the old stories.”
Larissa’s chest tightened. “So did Dal.”
Silence invaded the cab. Larissa’s eyes stung at the thought of Dal and Vern and their bodies burning on the farm that had been Larissa’s hiding place for a year before the draugr found her. “Do you think they knew?”
“About you being the Princess?”
Larissa twisted the pearl ring on her finger. “Yeah.”
“Aagen told me that when the woman brought me to his doorstep, he knew I was important. He didn’t know who I was. Maybe it was the same for Dal and Vern.”
Larissa frowned. “And Aagen said that the woman looked like my mom?”
“Hair like starlight and eyes as green as our apples is what he said. Sounds like Queen Stjarna.”
“She was dead, Darien.” Larissa cleared her throat. “By the time someone brought you to Aagen, she was dead.”
“I know.” He reached out, grabbing her hand and holding it in the seat between them. Larissa allowed herself the comfort. She was so tired of pulling away. His thumb rubbed over her knuckles, and Larissa squeezed his fingers in return. “Maybe the Norn can give us some answers.”
“They have a lot to answer for,” Larissa muttered.
Whatever Darien might have said in response was lost as the sight of the élivágar River ahead. He pulled Helga over at the bank where Masai had already disembarked. Anara swooped down, landing in the back of the truck.
Larissa jumped down from Helga’s seat. “Why are we stopping?”
Masai leaned over his motorcycle, lifting a strange pair of staffs and securing them to his back.
“The way to the Norn lies along the élivágar River. It runs into the Godafoss Falls. It’s said that the falls were created when óeinn’s horse placed his hoof on the canyon.
The waters pour into Undarbrunnk Lake, which fills the Well of Urer.
We find Undarbrunnk Lake, we find the Norn.
We’ll have to hike down past the falls to the lakeside; your truck won’t fit along the shoreline. ”
“We’re leaving Helga behind?” Halla asked, standing beside Larissa with Kai at her side.
“Looks like it, kiddo.” Darien clasped his sword. “Better grab whatever you need from the truck now.”
“How far is it?” Larissa asked, having already tucked her gun into the holster at her side.
“Not that far, but we don’t have much light left, so we ought to get going. Legend has it this canyon is home to the Huldufolk.” Without waiting for a response, he strutted along the river, his feet sure and steady on the damp soil even as the setting sun cast its rays across the foamy waters.
Larissa looked to Anara, who shrugged in confirmation. What other choice was there than to follow the path the Norn had laid out, even as hazy as it was? They trailed Masai down the shoreline.
“Huldufolk?” Halla asked.
“Pappa called them the álfar.” Larissa explained.
Her eyes shone. “Elves?”
“Don’t get your hopes up,” Anara warned. “They died in Ragnarok .”
“Weren’t the giants supposed to have died in Ragnarok ?” Kai asked.
Anara tilted her head. “Fair enough.”
Though Larissa gave Masai space, Halla had no such inhibitions. She raced up to walk beside him, her short legs doubling the pacing of Masai. Kai trailed at a slower pace behind them, Halla’s constant shadow. Her voice floated behind her over the gentle lapping of the waves.
“. . . but why did Smaragd surrender?”
Larissa winced; beside her, Anara laughed out loud. Count on Halla to ask candid questions. Larissa increased her pace, wondering if she ought to pull Halla back, but Masai looked down at her unconcernedly. “Smaragdians are peacekeepers, healers, and holders of knowledge.”
Anara mimicked gagging at Masai’s words, while Darien tried to cover his snort with a cough.
“Besides,” Masai continued, pointedly ignoring Anara’s antics. “We had no army to push back Shiko’s advances even if we wanted to.”
“But didn’t Safír send people to help you?” Halla argued.
At that, the gaiety in Darien’s face fled. All but one of Aeron’s entire company had been slaughtered in Smaragd, but now Larissa wondered if that survivor had been a spy of Shiko all along, planting false information about Aeron’s death.
Masai sighed. “Sometimes there isn’t enough help.”
Anara side-eyed Larissa. “Not when people are unwilling to help themselves.”
If Masai heard, he ignored her.
“How do you heal people, like you did with the sentries?” Halla continued.
“It’s our galdr ; it comes as naturally to me as breathing does for you.”
Halla sighed. “Lucky. Just one more person who has powers when I don’t. At least I’ve got Kai, and we can be boringly normal together.”
“Kai, huh?” Masai appraised the dark-haired boy walking behind him. “That’s an unusual name for the south.”
“Pretty sure you know I don’t come from the south,” Kai muttered.
Larissa’s lips twitched. Despite her misgivings, she had to give it to him; nothing rattled the quiet boy.
Masai inclined his head. “True, but it’s never polite to assume.”
As if emboldened by Halla’s questions, Larissa found herself asking, “What are the staffs on your back?”
Stopping, Masai reached for his back and pulled out the short staffs.
One was heavier, while the other was sheathed on one end.
“These are the weapons of my bloodline. Every kingdom had them.” He held out the thicker of the staffs.
“This one is called Grie, and this”—he held out the other, unsheathing the end to reveal the sharp blade underneath—“is called V?re.”
“What does it mean?” Darien asked.
“ Peace and Protection .” Masai twirled the staffs then capped the one and returned them both to his back.
“Before Smaragdians were considered pacifists, we were protectors. We protected the forest and each other. My mother always believed that the best way we could protect our people was in our servitude to Shiko, and although my people have survived, they’re not living.
Not really.” His eyes pierced Larissa. “I’m counting on you to change that.
It’s the only reason I’m willing to take you to the Norn at all. ”
Larissa held his gaze. “Lead on, then.”
Masai turned, but his foot hesitated mid-step as the snarling screech shattered the serene lapping of the water. Birds fled from the nearby trees. Blood drained from Masai’s face.
“Kings and Queens,” Larissa hissed, drawing her gun and racing up to where Halla stood frozen, panic written across her face.
Larissa scanned the trees as the others gathered in a tight circle around her.
They knew the sound all too well. Somewhere in the forest, a draugr was hunting. “Masai, how much farther?”
He gripped the staffs in his hands, readjusting his grip and licking his lips. “I’m not sure. I’ve never been this far.”
Anara growled. “What?”
“The Norn showed me where to go, but they didn’t give me specific mileage!”
“You tell us this now ?” Larissa demanded.
Kai shook his head. “We’re doomed.”
Larissa clung to Halla’s hand, wishing she’d thought to give her sister some kind of weapon.
As another screech rang out, Larissa whipped her head to the forest behind her, certain that she could see the treetops in the distance quivering as if some monster was thrashing through them, hunting their prey.
Darien drew his sword. “What are the odds this is a draugr out in the wild that isn’t actually looking for us?”
Anara’s hands shifted into claws as her yellow eyes peered through the trees. “We’re not that lucky. The screams are still farther than they seem. We run. Masai, you lead. If the draugr finds us, we fight. Go!”