Chapter 24 Svenn #2
"I'm sorry."
"Don't be." He sets the sword aside, clean now. "Your wife isn't them, is she?"
"No," I whisper. "She isn't."
"Then that's enough." He meets my eyes. "Besides, hate's exhausting. I'm too old to carry it around forever. And watching you suffer is making me tired."
Hrolf returns to his space and we sit in our respective cells.
My wound continues to heal around the hole Eyepatch's blade left behind.
I try not to think about what happens if the blood doesn't match.
Time passes slowly. I want to pace, to move, to do something with this helpless energy. But my legs won't hold me yet.
"Tell me about your wife," Hrolf says suddenly after a long while.
I freeze. "What?"
"Your elven wife. Tell me about her." He leans back against his cell wall, settling in. "Might help pass the time. I'd like to know who I'm bleeding for."
How do I describe the essence of someone like Rhianelle?
"She's kind," I say finally. "She sees the best in people, even when they can't see it themselves. Even when there's no good left to find."
"Pretty?"
"Beautiful." The word comes out without thought, carrying centuries of longing. "But it's more than that. She has this way of making you feel seen."
Something in my chest pulls tight and doesn't release.
"You lose things, over the centuries. Slowly enough that you don't mourn them. You just forget they existed." I stare at the far wall. "Warmth was one of them. Sunlight. I stopped missing it because I stopped remembering what it felt like. And then she found me."
I hadn't meant to say that much.
"She's the first thing in a thousand years that's made me remember. Standing next to her feels like standing in a patch of sun used to feel. Before I became this."
Hrolf says nothing for a long moment.
"No wonder you're falling apart," he says gruffly. "Losing the sun twice would break anyone."
Despite everything, something almost like a smile finds me.
The sound of footsteps makes us both look up. Red's quick stride and something lighter. They appear at the cell door. Red and Lady Deirdre.
She stands beside him, carrying a healer's kit and wearing an expression that could freeze flame.
"It's a match," Red says without preamble. "The blood is compatible."
I sag against the wall, unable to speak. The relief hits first. Then the fear behind it, reminding me this isn't over yet.
"What is she doing here?" Hrolf's voice goes hard as granite. "We agreed this stays between the three of us. Guess your word is shit, elf."
"The situation requires it," Lady Deirdre says smoothly, before Red can answer. She sets her healer's kit on the narrow table outside the cell with deliberate care.
Red steps forward, addressing Hrolf's glare. "She insisted on meeting the donor. Lady Deirdre is the only one I trust to do this properly. She has decades of training and she knows how to keep a secret."
"Does she?" Hrolf doesn't look away from the noblewoman.
Lady Deirdre meets his stare without flinching. "I have kept far more dangerous secrets than this, Master Dwarf. I want that girl to live more than anything in this world."
A beat passes.
Hrolf leans back against the opposite wall, arms folding slowly across his chest. The hostility doesn't leave his face but something underneath it shifts.
"Open the cell," she tells Red.
"My lady, perhaps it's better if I do it—"
"Do you think I would let someone inexperienced bungle the draw and waste his generous offer?" She doesn't wait for his answer. "Open it."
The door swings open and Deirdre steps into the cell without breaking stride. Hrolf rises to his full height. She meets his gaze evenly and neither looks away.
"Sit," she commands, pointing to the stone bench. "And remove that leather bracer. I need clear access to the basilic vein."
Hrolf obeys, rolling up his sleeve to reveal forearms corded with muscle and scars. She examines his veins, fingers tapping to find the right one.
"You've ruined the good veins," she says with disdain. "Should have called for me immediately instead of this sword nonsense."
She unwraps her kit of needles, tubing, and collection bags. Everything laid out in precise order.
"This will hurt a bit," she warns, then slides the needle into Hrolf's arm.
Dark red blood begins flowing through the tubing into the first collection bag.
They don't speak for a moment.
"I'm sorry for asking this of you," Deirdre murmurs as she monitors the flow rate. "But thank you. You're giving us a chance to save a life."
"My daughter passed from the same," Hrolf mutters, watching his blood fill the bag. "Long ago. During the camp blockade. Your infantry wouldn't let the healers through."
Lady Deirdre's hands still for just a moment. Then she smooths her expression and continues. "I'm sorry for your loss."
"She was seven." His voice is steady but there's a mountain of pain beneath it.
"What was her name?" Deirdre asks quietly as she switches to a second collection bag. "Your daughter."
"Elena," Hrolf says.
The name settles between them.
"She wanted to be a baker," he adds after a moment. "Said she'd fill the lower halls with bread instead of forge smoke."
Deirdre keeps her eyes on the work.
"I lost a son too," she says softly. "Theo. He wanted to be a healer. Thought he could mend anything if he studied long enough."
Hrolf's jaw tightens. "How old?"
"Eight."
The silence that follows is not awkward. It is shared.
She adjusts the tubing, checking his pulse. For a moment, there is no noble and no dwarf. Only two parents who buried children too soon.
"This blood will give her a chance she wouldn't have otherwise," Deirdre says as the fourth bag fills.
Hrolf nods once.
He is still staring at her without blinking. But not at her face. I track his gaze upward to the slender band of silver in her hair. A narrow circlet, hammered thin. It's dwarven made. Hrolf's brow furrows faintly.
She lays her free hand briefly over his. Then she lifts his scarred knuckles to her lips. A few low words fall from her in a prayer.
I have heard it once before on Rhianelle's lips, spoken to me right before battle.
"Thank you," she says simply.
Hrolf nods, unable to speak.
When the fourth bag is full, Deirdre removes the needle with gentle precision. She bandages the puncture site, applies pressure, and checks his pulse again.
"Keep pressure on this for ten minutes. Drink water and eat something if you can." She packs the blood bags carefully. "You'll be dizzy for a few hours. Don't try to stand too quickly."
She pauses at the cell door.
"It will work," she says with quiet certainty. "This blood will save her life."
Then she's gone, moving quickly through the flooded hallways toward the healing house. The three of us sit in the silence of the prison.
Hrolf raises his free hand and touches his knuckles where her lips had been. "Gentle hands," he mutters. "Didn't think anyone still had that. For someone like me."
"Lady Deirdre's husband and son died in the bombing of Dunrovin," Red says quietly.
The air seems to thin. I watch Hrolf's face change as the truth settles in.
He was sitting across from a lady who lost her child to his work. Dunrovin was his operation and execution.
"I designed the Shatterstone," Hrolf says, his voice barely a whisper. "I placed them myself. I didn't know the impact would be that big. But I knew there would be civilians in the gathering."
Red says nothing. Neither do I.
"She should want me dead," Hrolf says flatly.
Red swallows and closes his eyes briefly. "Perhaps she did. But the prayer she spoke was not for vengeance."
The knight opens his eyes.
"It's a blessing against harm. For darkness to pass over."
Hrolf's gaze drops to his scarred hand. The same hands that placed the Shatterstone. The same hands Deirdre blessed. He closes them slowly into fists and says nothing more.