Chapter 15 Tamsyn
TAMSYN
WINTER CAME EARLY.
It brought more than the usual snow. Not the snow of the previous winter. Not the snow that covered the ground and rugged peaks year-round. There was nothing crisp and refreshing about it. This snow was brutal and smothering even for dragons who thrived in the cold.
An unexpected squall took everyone by surprise, forcing us inside and keeping us there, like ants hiding from a tidal wave. The storm made flight impossible and braving the ground on foot in such conditions was also not an option.
As the world outside howled, we hunkered down in our caves and stayed busy, waiting for the blinding whiteness outside to pass. Apparently even dragons, with all our many talents and adaptabilities, with an affinity for life in the Crags, had our limits.
Everyone was on edge. We were wild at our core, and this forced captivity, even with all our amenities and a surplus of supplies, went against our nature.
We needed to stretch our wings. Literally.
Training in the arena turned especially violent—an outlet for all our pent-up energy.
Bones cracked. Skin broke. Blood sprayed the air.
Brenna was there to mend and put bodies back together as best as she could.
The infirmary was always full, and the verdaberry wine flowed, a balm for the body and soul.
In the moments someone was carried out of the arena, I would look to Vetr to see if he would call a halt to it all and put an end to the brutality, but he merely watched on, thick arms crossed resolutely over his chest, his jaw locked tight, tension humming from him in a way I’d never observed, and I wondered if he, too, was feeling the restlessness, the desperate struggle from being penned in, trapped.
Or was it something else that made him look molded from the stony mountain surrounding us?
We could do nothing but wait.
Wait as it raged for days.
A week passed, and I was allowed to begin training again, although with limitations and the heavy weight of Vetr’s eyes on me, as though he would step in at any time if he thought I was overdoing it.
I continued about my duties, eating my meals in my designated seat and listening to Kerstin chatter beside me.
I worked my body to the point of exhaustion and drank deeply of verdaberry wine at dinner in the hopes that my sleep might be free of Fell-ridden nightmares.
I tried to ignore the whispering skin in my marked palm that continued to make itself felt.
Tried not to think of Vetr and his words.
Tried my best to stay beneath anyone’s notice in this fraught time when the air felt thin and tasted of ice, blood, and sweat …
as though if I faded into the background, Vetr would forget about me.
Just as I willed myself to forget about him.
I want to savor all of you.
I need you.
Easier said than done.
I PASSED THROUGH the gathering room with a basket of laundry balanced on my hip. In the damp cold, it took longer for clothes to dry, so I was glad to finally find my garments dry enough to take down off the line in the laundry chamber.
The mist was patchy, gusting low at my boots as I walked.
The perpetual fog had eased with the squall raging outside.
Vetr, and our other shader, Vestar, weren’t emitting the usual amount of vapor.
There was no need for that layer of protection in weather like this, when the snow provided more than enough cover.
No one would be venturing out to explore the Crags or wage an attack in such conditions.
Warriors from Veturland would not journey so far from home in this clime, even if they were accustomed to the cold.
In the summer months, we had spotted the lines of them in their signature winged helmets marching through on their way to Penterra, sent by their king to wage battle and strike their enemy to the south.
The truce we had entered into with the skelm seemed to be holding. There had been no encounters, even when opportunities presented themselves and members of each pride spotted each other.
The baby cried out, and I looked across the gathering area. It was nice to hear the sound. It made life feel almost ordinary in this place where ordinary did not exist.
I did not often see the child. Usually, she was already down for the night when we ate our dinner, asleep in a crib not far from the head table and Brenna’s watchful eyes, and I never crossed paths with her during the day as my tasks didn’t involve the nursery, where she spent much of her time.
The pride’s single child represented hope. The future. The next generation. I paused, craning my neck for a glimpse of her, my gaze searching. There. Brenna wore her strapped to her chest as she sat at the table, sorting herbs into bunches and then tying them off with twine.
The baby made a grab for her mother’s hands as they moved before her, but Brenna dodged the little one’s grasping, chubby fingers. It slowed her progress, to be sure, but from the gentle smile on Brenna’s face, she did not mind.
I felt my smile slip as Vetr approached and stopped beside them. They exchanged a few words, inaudible at this distance. Then he was reaching for the baby, his big hands sliding around her little body and lifting her up out of the harness as though it were the most natural thing for him to do.
I watched as he tucked her close to his side, smiling down at her.
Little Mirja grabbed his nose, but he didn’t seem to mind. He let the baby grab and explore his face as though he were a toy made just for her.
“Well, I think my womb just did cartwheels.”
My gaze whipped to Kerstin. I hadn’t even heard her approach, so riveted by the scene of the pride’s oldest engaging with the pride’s youngest.
“What?”
She nodded to Vetr, her mouth curling in a grin. “Watching him with a baby … the idea of pushing one out is not nearly so objectionable. I’m certain the making of it would be a good time.”
I snorted out a laugh and shook my head. “You’re too much.”
“At least if the father was Vetr,” she added, as though that was an important distinction.
I stopped laughing and stared across the large gathering area at the duo, imagining the child in his arms was his. What kind of father would he make? I gave my head a small shake. The question should not have entered my mind, as the answer did not matter. It had nothing to do with me.
“Isn’t he a little old for you to think about him that way?” I asked, nodding once at Vetr.
“Oh. He’s not that old. And I’ll be of age soon enough.
” Twin lines formed between her eyebrows then, as though being old enough to choose a mate wasn’t necessarily a prospect she wanted.
I could well understand that. It was not a fate I had wanted, but I’d accepted it.
And that was what I heard now in Kerstin’s voice.
The sound of it unsettled me, tossed me back in time to when I’d been told what my duty would be.
“You’re only sixteen,” I offered. “Surely you have time.”
“Not as much as you think.” She looked away, consternation still on her face as she glanced at the group sitting near the fire, their deep voices talking and overlapping on the air as they went about cleaning weapons.
Nayden was in that group, for once not casting me a glare.
“But it’s not as though Vetr has any interest in me.
I will have to settle for one of them.” This last thing she uttered with heavy disgust.
I swallowed, trying not to think about the fact that Vetr had declared his interest in me very distinctly. I held that inside myself, close to where I kept all things secret.
Staring at Kerstin, I thought instead of Alise. They were of similar age and Alise had already been tossed into marriage. It was too late for her, but hopefully Kerstin had time before giving herself over to matrimony … or motherhood.
But when you were young and female, no one asked for your preferences.
Was that the fate of young women everywhere?
Here. In Penterra. North of the Crags in Veturland.
Across the Dark Channel in Acton. In the far-off Isle of Meru.
Tying yourself to someone not of your choosing.
Your worth only measured by the effectiveness of your womb.
And yet I knew that not everyone was subject to this.
I had a flash of the valiant Mari, one of many sword maidens in Fell’s army.
No one forced any of those women to take a husband.
In the Borg, women seemed to have more autonomy—at least they had. Before Stig.
Kerstin looked away from the group by the fire and back to Vetr across the room again. “Wouldn’t you choose him? If you had to choose someone?”
If I had to choose someone—
Was that what it had come to? Would I eventually have to choose someone in order to stay here and be part of this community, this family as Vetr called it? Was I only now realizing that? Grasping what this girl of sixteen already understood to be true?
I worried my lower lip with my teeth and nodded distractedly. “I suppose.” I forced my gaze away from Kerstin, looking down at my basket of neatly folded clothing as though it was a thing of fascination.
Kerstin pressed. “Obviously you think he’s attractive.”
My gaze snapped back to her, alarm skittering at my pulse points. “Why … obviously?”
Had I done or said something to give anyone the idea that I thought of Vetr that way? As a potential mate?
She looked at me as though it was the most logical thing in the world, saying with a shrug, “His twin brother was your mate. They looked the same.”
Of course. My alarm subsided into a steady rhythm at my throat.