19. Maren
Maren
Aegir and his Naiads approached slowly. Cautiously. Perhaps even respectfully. They edged in only enough so that the light from their torches kissed ours, then waited.
Nori was at Kye’s side in an instant. “Foolish,” she hissed, though she took me in with a gleam of relief that rivaled Kye’s.
Aitne circled my other side, gently pulling me from Kye’s warmth. “Injuries?”
“None,” I sighed, unwilling to look anywhere but the golden hearth of Kye’s eyes. “Just tired. My back and lungs are sore.”
“How’s your leg?”
“My leg?” I glanced down at myself in surprise. It hadn’t pained me since I’d crossed into Perpetuum. I hadn’t even considered it.
“Yes. You broke it fighting Sidra.”
Ah. I’d forgotten. That was in another life. A past life. It felt like hundreds of years ago now, but to Aitne, it would have only been a couple weeks. “It’s fine.”
My healer raised a brow, but I cut my attention across her to Nori. “Is everyone accounted for?”
“No.” Her face remained passive. Hard but guarded. “Olinne and Selena are counting everyone, but I’m estimating we have seventy Naiads.”
I threw a sharp look in her direction.
We’d come with one hundred. And all had been alive before I dove to the depths of Sylus Lake to barter with Darkness.
I’d traded thirty Naiads for Kye’s life.
Nori’s mouth was tight as she angled a glance sideways at the Venusians, who stood a short distance from us. Not quite inside our circle of communication, but close enough to hear everything we said. Most were water-callers. A few incanters. One water-mapper. And four of our healers.
“How many healers did you bring?” Aegir asked, as though he knew exactly what she was relaying to me.
“Five,” I answered, scanning my one remaining healer for injury from the side. “I’m fine, Aitne. See who else needs healing.”
Aegir turned to Sindri. “Send whoever is available to help any wounded Juileans.”
I stiffened. More debt that I might owe Aegir. But I wasn’t in a position to turn his hospitality away.
“Rivean forces were on our tail until around twenty minutes ago,” Kye said. A deep cut across his temple painted half of his face lustrous red. “Are you the reason they broke off?”
“That and the twenty feet of snow over their heads.” Aegir said as though he’d just laid the world’s most prized wisdom at my feet. “The mountains provide their own means of attack.”
I pressed my teeth together. “What an intriguing concept.”
“An avalanche was Princess Maren’s idea,” Leal cut in. The whip-shaped man sidled beside Kye, a half-eaten cucumber in his hand. He chewed thoughtfully. “The Riveans were closer than we realized when they attacked.”
Aren blinked at him. “Where the Darkness did you find a cucumber?”
Leal looked at the fruit as though he hadn’t realized what it was. He paused to swallow. “Dead body.”
“We should move.” Dimas emerged from behind Nori. She frowned up at the quiet man briefly before glancing back at me for my order.
Fog streamed slowly from my nose as I offered her a nod. Make sure everyone is ready to leave within five minutes. Nori whispered to Olinne, who turned on her heel, disappearing through the dim faces behind us.
Kye slid his hand down my arm for my hand but stopped at my wrist. “What?” I heard him mutter before lifting my arm with the silver cuff still chained to me. “The fuck is this?”
Aegir studied him coolly before turning his focus to me. “Your heart rate was increased. I could taste the electricity around you. You were gearing for attack. This was precaution.”
“Take them off,” Kye snarled.
Kye, I snapped. But he stared Aegir down as though he might call lightning himself.
The Venusian Naiads shifted on their feet. All patience wore away from Aegir’s expression as he examined Kye’s hand on my wrist. He was tall enough to look down his nose at most people, though he stood nearly toe-to-toe with Kye now.
“Kye, allow me to introduce you to Aegir.” I punctuated the words, snapping each one from my mouth with intention. “Monarch of Venusia.”
“Are you expecting a fucking please?” Kye added without looking at me, his voice a sharpened dagger.
Across from me, Nori narrowed her eyes at the Venusian, thumb rolling over the knife at her side. Leal’s attention darted between Aegir and Kye.
Aegir sighed, ignoring him, aiming his words again at me. “We meant no offense. If we had, we wouldn’t have delivered you to your cordae. Keys, Sindri.”
Sindri glanced at the Naiad in a way that clearly stated, Are you sure?
But he fumbled in his pocket, handing it to Aegir the reluctant way he might have offered his Videre a hammer to pound a precious jewel to dust. Aegir crossed the divide between our armies with a silver key, reaching for my hands.
“Cold,” he murmured, eyes tracking the dark red crusted over my side and hip. “Make sure you warm up soon. And sleep. Especially if you spilled blood.”
His fingertips were warm in the center of my palms. Fingers curling, Kye leaned his weight into his heel. Aegir massaged heat into the fleshy pads below my thumbs before releasing me, silver keys and cuffs jangling as he pulled them away. He made to step back, but something made him pause.
Selena.
She stood between Aren and Dimas, arms crossed against the winter chill, caution woven into the lines of her face. Aegir didn’t smile—though something in the corners of his eyes and mouth relaxed. He gave a soundless chuckle. “Didn’t bring your gnat, Selena?”
“Not this time,” she said softly. Her throat tightened, then she pulled a deep breath into her lungs. “I have something else.”
His brows raised in friendly interest. But she looked over her shoulder, sending everyone’s gaze to the Naiad standing behind her. Teal eyes peered back through the dark, sleek blue-black hair gathered over a shoulder.
Aegir’s mouth parted. He stared. Cebrinne stared back, the smallest trace of a smile on her lips. “Hello, Aegir,” she said. “It’s been a long time.”
He stepped toward her. “It’s been a lifetime.” Memories sparkled behind his eyes, and he shook his head in slow disbelief.
Cebrinne’s mouth twitched. “The beard is new.”
Aegir rubbed an open hand down his face to his chin as if just realizing it was there. “It worked,” he said in an awed whisper. “You did it.”
Are you okay, Leihani? I nearly jumped at the sound of Kye’s voice inside my head. He watched just over my shoulder, his thumb sliding across the center of my palm. You look like you just caught a whiff of week-old sewage.
It’s nothing, I tossed back, waving an arm as I turned away. The heat of Cebrinne’s gaze seared into my shoulders, but I ignored it, almost bumping into the person behind me—Hadrian.
I let out a sigh of relief. “You’re safe.” Though glancing him over, he hadn’t been safe for very long. Bruises lay across his temple in green and blue blotches, a shiny black ring encircling his right eye.
“From Rivea, yes,” he mused, taking Kye’s proffered hand in a warm shake. “Luckily, the Riveans were less dangerous than the other thing I was traveling with.”
“The other thing?” Kye raised a brow.
Hadrian peered over his shoulder at the young woman walking along the Venusian line. The Naiads eyed her in silence as she stood nearby, glaring down the long shaft of a Rivean arrow, six more shoved into the lacing of her corset.
“Diara,” I murmured, giving Kye’s hand a squeeze as I left his side. She didn’t look up, her attention claimed by the fletching of the arrow in her hands, until the very last moment. By then I had all but fallen into her, my arms wrapping her back as my face buried in her dusky goldenrod hair.
She clapped over me just as fiercely. “Stars above,” she gasped out, pulling away far enough to sweep hair from my face and cup the sides of my jaw.
Her arrow lay beside us in the thin snow, and she sniffled from the cold.
“You nearly gave me a heart attack, walking into the midst of Rivea while I was sent the opposite way.”
“Sorry,” I burst. Her skin wasn’t as peppered with color as Hadrian’s was, though a violet haze loomed under her cheekbone, a small cut in the corner of her mouth. I rolled my finger around her braid, bringing it to rest over her shoulder. “How did you end up with Rivea?”
“We got out of our carriage when the road turned to snow. Our driver was pulling the wheels off to convert it into a sleigh, and I decided to take a walk while I waited.”
“And Hadrian went with you?”
Peridot eyes slashed a line through the air in the crown prince’s direction. “That’s one way of putting it.”
I bit back a smile. Something to needle out of her later. “How long ago was this?”
“Two days. We were walking under the trees and suddenly we ran into an army.” She clicked her tongue. “What I get for bringing home a man I don’t even like.”
I finally stepped back. “I’m sorry, Diara. I never would have sent you had I known.”
“No, no.” She waved my apology away. “I’d been aching for the chance to see my mother, to come home. She’s not well, and we’re not sure if she’ll survive the winter. But Aren told us Winterlight was evacuated, so I’m assuming Pirou was as well.”
I nodded. “Evacuees were moved west to Merriam. Are you going to try to find your family?”
“No,” Diara sighed, her attention veering a second time to the deep voices behind me. “If anything, they would have traveled south to Ochire. My cousin lives there.” She hesitated. “I’m worried that if she dies, my family will lose Pirounesse. I haven’t told anyone she’s sick.”
I glanced at the heir to the throne, standing beside his brother under heavy ash trees. “You weren’t worried Hadrian might notice?”
Diara scowled at the man in question. “I was hoping to keep him busy. Distract him.”
I released a short bark of laughter. “Distract him how, Diara?
“My mother isn’t bedridden. She’s just… frail. Weak. Someone who doesn’t know her well might never realize she’s sick.”
I opened my mouth and then bit back any words I might have said.
They squirmed in my belly instead like small fish, rippling and wriggling.
Diara had grown up believing the worst about the royal family, but I couldn’t help but feel that like Kye, Hadrian would be willing to shield secrets from the King, if she only asked him.
But her secrets were hers, not mine, and she’d invited Hadrian to join her in Pirou only because I’d asked her to. So I clamped my mouth shut. Perhaps she sensed my reluctance to comment further, because she asked, “Will you be heading back to the City of Towers?”
The answer should have been a fast and ready yes.
My colony was south. My island home; the father I hadn’t spoken to in months.
Thaan—not that I believed with any ounce of confidence that Thaan lay in wait within Calder City.
Though wherever he was, he wasn’t here along the fringe of a mountain.
On its own, my gaze slowly scraped the snow-capped tree-tops in search of a flash of feathers, a cruel twist in my belly.
“I don’t know,” I said. “I suppose it depends on—”
Shouting pulsed through the numb dark, anger punctuating through the cold like an axe hefted against the trees. Mute surprise flashed across Diara’s face before her brows gathered low over her eyes. I turned toward the sound as a man was thrown at my feet.
Dark hair like red ink, mussed with mud. Or blood. The absent moon left the distinction ambiguous. The strands slicked flat and matted against a browbone as he lifted his head and spat toward my boots.
Kye blazed across the divide between us, violent thoughts flying like arrows in his mind. But Sindri, who had tossed the man down, grabbed a fistful of his dark hair and hauled him to his knees. Aegir watched calmly at Sindri’s side. “Apologize,” the Videre murmured calmly.
One arm hung strangely from the man’s side. He hurled a single word in Rivean, staring hard into my eyes.
I straightened, gazing down at him, my chin lifting. “Interesting way to lose a war, isn’t it, Kazimir?”