Chapter 37
“So, when do you actually recite any poetry?” I ask in my most innocent voice. I feel energized. I did it. I performed actual magic. After my conversation with Ylvin I practically skipped back to camp. I ate with vigor as I planned my speech to Jarl Sigurd.
Ari has been walking in front of me in silence for a while.
His mood is much heavier than mine. I don’t know why.
To be honest, I don’t really care. Whatever brooding sadness the skald has allowed to dictate his outlook is but a drop in my ocean of satisfaction.
He doesn’t answer my question, just keeps descending the bush-covered slope.
“So? When?” I repeat.
“I sang to you yesterday,” he says without humor.
“A children’s song, a lullaby.”
He stops, turns, and stares me dead in the eyes.
“It put you to sleep,” he says.
“Yes, and?”
“Either you are a child or it’s fitting for adults.”
What’s up with Ari? So stern, so boring. No fun.
“Is something wrong?” I ask.
“Don’t be silly,” he says as he keeps walking.
Ari is a man. What was I expecting? That he would share his worries and fears with a woman?
A thrall girl at that. I realize how caught up I’ve been in my own life.
How my focus has solely been on my own work with Ylvin.
It paid off. I’ve become an enchantress, sure.
But I haven’t asked Ari how his lessons with Elof have been, not once.
“Did you learn anything useful during our stay?” I ask, keeping my voice chipper.
“Sure, sure, I learned some slave girls can’t cook and can’t swim.”
“Oh, come on,” I howl, exasperated. “I’m trying to get to know you.”
“Right.”
“Besides, I can swim. Okay? Cooking? Fair enough, but I learned a lot from you.”
“I’ve yet to see you cook anything at all.”
“Tell you what, you tell me what you learned with Elof, and I’ll cook you something back at the farm. I can’t promise it will be edible, but at least it—”
He stops abruptly, making me almost crash into his back. Tossing your legs out mindlessly down a steep decline while chatting freely doesn’t leave you prepared for a sudden halt. He speaks without turning.
“Listen, Kilda, I don’t ask you about Ylvin’s teachings. You don’t need to ask me about Elof’s. It’s a little late to be polite.”
He continues downward. I’m confused. He seems serious about all this. It’s not a playful conversation to him. After our shared moment yesterday, I was expecting us to be more… friendly. He saved my life, dried my body. We shared body heat, by Odin.
I refuse to concede defeat.
“Ylvin taught me to empty my mind. To commune with my feelings, my memories, and expand them out into reality. Release them.”
“Commune?” he says. “Big word for a thrall girl.”
The flame of irritation burns to a wildfire. I won’t let this piece of shit ruin my moment of understanding, my awakening. So rude.
“At least this thrall girl can read runes,” I say, trying to offend the man’s honor and intelligence. Ari just laughs at my insult.
“You really think I can’t read runes?”
“What? But that’s why—”
“I’m a fucking skald, Kilda. Think a little.”
“So why did Sigurd send you?”
“No idea. To keep an eye on you, I presume.”
I snort. What the fuck?
“And did you keep an eye on me?”
“If I hadn’t, we wouldn’t be talking.”
“You’re just Sigurd’s spy?”
“Sigurd never requested anything from me. He said I should learn runic magic, no?”
“He did… and?”
“That’s all he told me.”
“So did you learn runic magic?”
“Elof can read, of course, but he isn’t an enchanter.”
“So what did Elof teach you?”
Ari stops, releases a loud sigh, and sits on a tree trunk. I’m irritated at how rude he can be, but I control the impulse to hurl insults his way. I seat myself next to him, breathing deep and briefly enjoying the scent of the dew-covered blueberry bushes that carpet the forest floor.
“He taught me… taught me to face it.”
“Face what?”
“The frost. It’s hard to explain. The glacial pai—”
“That’s what I learned too,” I say, louder than planned. I’m thrilled by all the things I have learned. About feeling the pulse of my environment, being a part of it. My heat colliding with the cold of our harsh world. He goes on.
“Trust me it’s not the same. I—”
“How is it different?” I ask. He doesn’t even know what I’m talking about.
He turns to me, his brow furrowed.
“Do you ever let people speak?” he asks.
My mouth gapes. He’s right. I asked him about what he had learned and instantly took over the conversation. I can’t help it. I’m so excited about my new talent. I haven’t even told him yet.
“Sorry,” I say.
“Anyway.” He stands and brushes off his leather. “Let’s keep moving.”
“Okay, but, tell me, please, I won’t interrupt. Promise.”
I give him my sweetest, roundest, most innocent eyes. Irresistible, surely. Our eyes connect. He carries sadness. Something he harbors and protects. Something he controls and suppresses. Buries, hides.
“Please,” I whisper, enthralled by his icy blue gaze. “Tell me.”
“It’s hard to describe,” he says. I’m surprised he’s opening up to me after I’ve been so belligerent. I was expecting him to tell me to fuck off.
“Try,” I say, keeping my tone soft and low.
“You burn with heat, Kilda. You melt everything around you.”
“Is that a compliment?”
“If you want. But me, it’s different. I can’t let anyone come close. I can’t release, like you do. We all have our burdens.”
“Sharing a load makes it lighter.”
“Perhaps, but you are not a donkey.”
I snicker.
“That’s definitely a compliment.”
“Even the brightest flame can be quenched, Kilda. Even you.”
What does he even mean? Strange thing to say.
“You would kill my flame?”
“Not on purpose.”
“By mistake?”
The skald looks away, avoiding my eyes. What is he hiding? Why does he build that wall around himself? He hides behind words of mystery. I take his hand in both of mine, instantly regretting it. It’s the hand I cut last night. But when I look down…
“What… but… Where is your wound?”
“You didn’t cut deep,” he says as he pulls back his hand.
“I’m so sorry, Ari, I—”
“You didn’t cut deep,” he says again, but with a sharper tone.
The blade sliced him open. I’m sure. Wasn’t there blood at the river? But come to think of it, he had no wound when he dried me off. Maybe it was my imagination. Maybe I was confused by the rush of the chase.
“I don’t think you would kill my flame,” I whisper.
“We are born as we are. I was born with ice in my veins.”
Must be some man-thing. Icy veins, the frost…
surely metaphors for his feelings. I don’t understand, but I want to help.
I grab his arm, trying to comfort a man who apparently has more layers than I’d thought.
Earlier he was a charming, mangy crow. A player in the game of cheap love. A seducer of women.
“You heated me yesterday,” I whisper.
He gives a hollow smile, pulling back his arm.
“Wrong, Kilda,” he says as he walks away from me. “You heated me.”