8. Chapter 7 Svenn
Chapter 7 Svenn
R aindrops glisten from the leaves and barks of the sea of trees around us. I could be kissing Rhianelle right now, but here we are, traversing through the thick woods to find the source of the noise.
“Please don’t kill me. Oh, it hurts, it hurts…”
Rhianelle winces at the trembling voice behind the shrubs. But the girl doesn’t rush blindly to the desperate plea. We both know where we are right now. This forest is close to the fae border and the Red Road. The sound we’re hearing can very well be a lure from the monsters in the forest.
“Let see if faeries do bleed silver.” A harsher voice resounds, and at that Rhianelle steps out from the wild berry bushes into the open.
The cruel voice belongs to one of the black-armored elven knights. He looms over a small bearded man, no taller than my knee, wearing an oversized brown cloak and a pointy hat.
The fae spirit within me immediately recognizes the creature as its kin.
A gnome.
He is held against the tree, his face flushed red from the assassin’s tight grip around his throat. His elven assailant has another creature trapped beneath his heel, a small boar.
The animal cries in pain when the assassin swivels to face us.
“Your Highness, this is a surprise.” The male greets Rhianelle with a curt nod.
I should kill him right then for the blatant disrespect. I repress the urge for the sake of earning Nel’s trust.
“Carver… what are you doing?” Rhianelle asks him in a small voice.
Is she acquainted with this foul person?
The little creature thrashes against the assassin’s grip in the hopes of getting a bit of attention from Rhianelle. If it is mercy he is expecting, he won’t be getting any. The elves have no love for the fae and their kind.
“We didn’t mean to trespass. I am Ymir and that is Emyr,” the stout creature explains frantically, fumbling for something in his satchel. “We lost our way from the Red Road.”
Carver snatches the envelope from his hand. The assassin’s mouth curls into a cruel smile.
“Look what we have here,” Carver muses, easing his foot from the pygmy boar slightly. “There is to be a wedding for Lord Dalton, the Castellan of Reírse Fortress. This old thing must be someone important to receive such a grand invite.”
“But—but… everyone is invited,” the gnome cries. “Spare us please.”
I cross my arms and lean against the oak tree to watch the spectacle.
“He is no one, a common folk attending a wedding. Let him be on his way,” she says, her voice firm.
I rarely hear that tone from her. A queen’s order.
“This pig spilled his guts over my shoe. One pays with their life for lesser crimes in Tiamat,” the male says in cruel amusement.
He raises his blade high to slaughter the animal under his boots.
In the fraction of a second before the butchery, I do feel an ounce of pity for these victims. But the strong will always devour the weak. Such is the nature of life. The Grimsbane’s cruelty does not surprise me.
It is expected of this wretched world.
What I do not expect is for my wife to grab his blade before it touches the small creature.
“Then be glad we are not in Tiamat,” Rhianelle whispers calmly, looking straight into the assassin’s eyes. “Let them go.”
I blink at the sight of blood.
Her blood.
Red and vibrant.
The male loses his hand before the first drop hits the forest floor.
Flame ignites low in my gut, blazing into an inferno the longer he is breathing. “What have you done to my wife?”
An inhuman sound leaves his throat as he stumbles to the forest floor, clutching his hand. His arm is mechanical and appears to be made of some kind of metallic prothesis.
No matter.
This male is finished.
“She’s the one who came between my knife and my target!” the dead elf reasons.
Maybe he’s right. Too bad for him I fucking hate it when people touch what is mine. He didn’t just touch, this fucker made her bleed.
The scent of her blood whetted my wrath into something sharp and lethal. Rage trembles through my body, I can barely breathe, I can barely think—
A soft hand latches onto my arm, gripping my hunting leather tight. “Svenn, don’t.”
I glance down to find Nel looking at me. Her eyes are pleading me to spare this low life. “He’s my uncle’s hire, just like Shade.”
This one is called Carver, is it?
That name alone inspires me creative ways to deal with him. My claws elongate, ready for the kill.
Rhianelle tugs me again.
The savage beasts in me start a goddamn conversation in my head over that soothing touch.
He doesn’t deserve a quick end .
This one needs to suffer.
We’ll rally all the hounds of hell and the devil himself to torture him.
I won’t be satisfied until I shred him to fucking pieces.
Not here.
Not in front of her . We’ll get him later.
Yes, I agree with them. I want to pull his teeth one by one, gauge his eyes, rip his spinal column from his body. I certainly can’t do any of that right now.
The assassin scrambles to his knees and runs for his life. A deadly calm settles over me as I watch him scarper into the trees.
The dark beasts are right.
Retribution will come. I don’t let the anger consume me and turn to my girl.
I should tend to her first. My gaze slides to the slash mark on her palm.
“Oh dear, oh dear, oh dear.” The gnome and his boar unhelpfully panic around her.
“It’s not deep,” she says to calm them down.
“Let me have a look,” I say, gently taking her wrist. The girl barely winces in pain when I open up her palm to inspect the damage.
Once again, I have to suppress the urge to hunt the bastard who did this to her.
“I can instantly close this wound with a bite,” I offer the option to her.
It’s how I will drip my venom into her system. The Rhunhraefn is a fucked-up curse but I’ll always be grateful for this one small gift.
A touch of nerve surfaces in her eyes. “Will it hurt?”
I’m glad little fawn asks.
“At first,” I admit. Her injury is superficial enough, it will need less than a drop of the venom. More can cause tingling, or worse, a burning pain at the bite site.
Rhianelle considers it for a moment. She doesn’t have a good experience with my bite after that incident in the tent. I appreciate that she is careful and aware of what I am. Most of the time it feels like she has forgotten I’m a Strigon.
After a long thought, she nods her head in silent agreement.
I don’t bother asking her if she’s ready. It’s better to finish this quickly. She’s losing more blood by the second. I drive my teeth into her wrist, ripping her skin.
A sharp gasp leaves her throat and she instinctively pulls away. I wrap my arm around her waist, pulling her firmly against me. My eyes shutter and I revel in the feel of her blood filling my mouth.
Fuck me.
My heart thrums at the first taste. I’ve never had something so pure, so divine. Then again, forbidden fruit always tastes the sweetest. As I drink the rich essence of hers, images flow through my mind, Nel’s memories.
Every little happy feeling she gets when she has a book in her hand, her sparks of joy at the sight of food, her frustrated attempts to bait the cats in court, her delight in her friend’s company, and her plans for her bakery.
I swallow another mouthful of her blood and relish the visions that flow with it.
Damn, I was right.
She was touching herself this morning. My cold heart pumps with hot desire at the sighs of pleasure she makes. I should unlatch immediately after giving her the venom, but I linger for more.
I need to have more.
The injury from the assassin’s blade has long healed, but I can’t stop drinking her blood. I keep swimming through her memory lane, captivated by the scenes.
What’s this?
There is a reflection of a silver-haired child in the water. I could recognize those lilac eyes anywhere. This is my Nel when she was younger. Dirt covers her face, her hands, and her ragged clothing. She is so small, ghostly-pale, and… skinny.
I watch her as she harvests water into a pail and carries the heavy thing across the forest towards a campfire where another girl awaits. Nel places the water into a metal pot and throws two stones into it.
“Do you think if we boil the stones it will soften like potato?” she asks the other girl.
The malnourished blonde-haired girl stares at a distant for a while. “Maybe.”
And so, the two girls keep waiting for the stone to melt. From morning to evening, from evening to nightfall, from night until it’s dawn again. They wait patiently until the next day, and the next.
The stones do not convert to potatoes.
“Perhaps if it’s just one stone it will go soft,” Nel suggests, removing one stone from the pot.
Her friend seems to know the truth by now, but still she says, “Maybe.”
And they wait by the campfire once more.
Nel pokes at the stones again but they remain unpalatable. Tears stream down her face as she holds it helplessly.
“Don’t cry, Rhianelle. We can just drink the water,” the friend says, stroking her hair. Nel touches her stomach and I feel her hunger deep in my bones. The girl was starving to death.
Another vision flashes.
Rhianelle hides inside a tree trunk from the presence of something dangerous. I feel the bitter taste of fear in her throat.
More piecemeal images flow…
Little Nel is lying in the mud, her body battered and broken. She is so small… so vulnerable, weak, and scared.
Fuck this shit.
Something in me breaks so violently that I finally tear my mouth away from her wrist. My jaw clenches as I look at Rhianelle.
The girl is innocently unaware of the terror that grappled my heart a second ago. I release her from my hold.
“Nel…”
She is safe, she is here with me. No one is hunting her here. I tell that to myself over and over to calm my senses. Those were just memories.
My gaze drops to the commotion below.
“Stop hurting her!” The gnome and the pygmy boar are tackling my feet, telling me to stop.
He is cursing me in faerie tongue. I hardly feel their punches and strikes. My focus remains solely on the girl in front of me.
Rhianelle slips from under my arm and rushes to the small creatures.
“It’s all right. He was trying to help.” I hear her comforting the gnome and the brown boar.
“He was trying to eat you!” the tiny bearded creature accuses.
“No, he wasn’t. See for yourself.” She shows him her hand. The distal cut on her palm has fully healed from my venom. There is still some redness around the area, but it will dissipate soon enough.
The gnome empties his wineskin to clean the injury to be completely certain. True to her words, her wound has closed. Though the fae is still giving me a skeptical eye.
The little guy had it right. I lost complete control earlier.
It’s humiliating.
But that taste was an ambush I wasn’t ready for. And the memories… fuck.
What the hell happened to you in the past, little fawn?
Rhianelle’s gazes back and forth at the gnome and his boar. “Let’s get you back to the Red Road, all right?” she says, offering him her hand. He takes it and they thread through the woods together.
Shock jars within me for the things I had just seen. All I want to do right now is hold Rhianelle in my arms. But the girl is already walking away deeper into the faerie woods with two strangers. I trail behind them quickly before my wife is spirited away forever.
“Do they really grow to the sky?” she asks him.
I’m not sure if she’s talking to the gnome or the boar. They chatter about rowan berries, beard braids, and festivals, things I do not care about.
There are times when I want to interrupt them and ask Rhianelle about her past. But I haven’t seen that cheerful, genuine smile on her face in a while. My amusement tempers some of the anger and confusion running in my head.
We walk into dense thickets of a lush forest, deeper and deeper into Duskwood.
“Be nice. You’re scaring my new friends,” Rhianelle whispers to me after a while.
She should tell that to Ymir and Emyr. They are the ones still casting daggers in my direction. But these weaklings risked their lives to save Rhianelle from me. That earns them considerable respect, so I rein in the intimidation as much as I can.
“We’re here now,” the gnome says, pointing ahead to the crimson gravelly track ahead. The scarlet stones that make up the road seem to have fused together, making it easy for the movement of carriages and wagons.
In the past, the Red Road was used for the fae to bring in their annual tithe to the fae king. Now it is used as a trading route from Avalon to Darvan and Myrkheim.
Peculiar beasts from every forest, river, and marsh join the procession, some crawling, some slithering, others hopping. Rhianelle watches them in fascination, her eyes curious and wary.
My fangs burst spontaneously over the incoming threat. “Rhianelle,” I say her name in warning.
Two shadowed figures stand a short distance away from us. Dressed in light leather armor, cowls, and cloak, they look almost human in appearance except for the pointed ears.
People of Aelfheim call them the savage fae.
The name derived out fear of their ruthlessness, or perhaps the fact they are godless. Unlike the elves, orcs, and dwarves who bow to the seventy-seven deities, the fae worship no one but themselves.
Both fae carry identical dwarven-made swords strapped to their waist. Simple in its design, yet lethal. A fool might have mistaken the blades as the most threatening thing about the two warriors.
It doesn’t matter.
All I see are two dead bodies if they try to harm Rhianelle. They shoot their dark eyes at me. I hold each of their gazes, waiting for them to make a stupid move.
Go on, be stupid.
Rhianelle touches my hand. “It’s all right, Svenn. They’re the Red Road sentinels.”
Her lilac eyes train on them cautiously, but they remain unafraid.
The stare down goes on for a long beat until one of the sentinels motions with his hand for the gnome and the boar to move forward.
“I guess this is goodbye then,” Rhianelle says to Ymir and Emyr. She gives them a warm hug before their departure.
Ymir passes a small hairpin in the palm of Rhianelle’s hand. “For the girl who spilled her blood to save my friend.”
“Be careful, stay safe,” he whispers in her ear. The gnome casts one last disapproving look at me before waving Rhianelle goodbye. The fae sentinels welcome them, greeting the two like long-lost friends, and they disappear amongst the sea of wayfarers on the Red Road.
The ground reverberates from the march of various tribes of orcs. They may be larger and bulkier, but they look no different to me than the elves. Then again, all preys share similar traits. I study the Elf Queen’s enemy silently as they pass down the road. It will add to the information I’ve gathered these past weeks.
“I thought the elves hated the fae,” I mutter absently, surprise to see some elves among the journeying travelers.
“They’re the retinues of Prince Ywain of Tiamat. And those are the delegation from Kashran,” she whispers, pointing towards a vagabond of elves is colorful feathers and clothing.
“My cousin Kahedin mentioned in his last letter that he got an invitation as an honored guest. Avalon is only hostile towards Aelfheim.”
I catch the lamentable regret in that soft voice over the last remark.
“Can we watch closer?” she asks softly.
I silently nod.
Don’t worry, Nel. I’ll raze this fucking forest if they make a move towards you.
We trail carefully on the soggy soil. I keep my senses alert on the fae guards.
“What the f—” I move aside when a porcupine bristles at my feet. It waddles towards the Red Road with the royal envelope in its mouth.
A pair of sparrows soar past our head with the same invitation. Even the reclusive sloth on a distant branch is trudging along ever so slowly towards the road.
“I hope it will make it in time,” Rhianelle prays silently beside me.
Her wish is immediately answered when a dwarven lord allows the animal to hitch a ride on his shoulder.
We stop moving as an army of ants marches by us, carrying the throne of their queen. Rhianelle nods respectfully at the termite sovereign from one queen to another.
The gnome was not lying. Every creature, big and small, from across the continent is invited. I move aside to avoid stepping on a pair of grumpy honey badgers. They fear nothing, not even a vampire.
Since the fae sentinels mostly ignore our presence, we make no effort to remain unseen. Rhianelle keeps walking closer and closer towards the track. She halts before a towering oak, her ears twitching in the cold. “I’m going up for a better view.”
She scales the tree smoothly, despite her limp and the slippery moss from the rain. I wait until she reaches her desired branch before climbing after her.
Through the thinning foliage, I finally see their destination at a distant. A fortress built into a mountain, Reírse. Even from here, I can feel the force of the invisible wall pulsing. It’s the fae’s strongest bastion against the elves.
Even if Aelfheim could topple that thing, more than half of the elven army will be annihilated before they reach Avalon.
It’s near damn impossible.
Rhianelle is biting her nails beside me in contemplation. She’s probably trying to find a weakness or a way to breach the colossal structure too.
“I should have liked to join them,” Rhianelle mutters dreamily.
What?
“A wedding in the land of the Fae is always a grand celebration. A revelry of its own kind,” she says, the corners of her eyes crinkling with longing.
Is that what she was thinking about…?
I’m racked with guilt when I remember our wedding. What a pathetic, sad occasion it was…
“Come join us!” one of the younger female orcs shouts out an invitation from below.
Rhianelle waves right back. “I can’t. Send my best wishes to the bride and groom.”
This girl is supposed to be fighting the fae, dwarves, and orcs. Instead, here she is, waving and wishing them a safe journey. Most of them return her cheer and wave back. Even the fae sentinels on duty can’t help but smile at Rhianelle, unaware that their demise is imminent should they linger their eyes on her for too long.
I look at the Elven Queen beside me, and something twinges in my chest.
My sweet Nel is not made for war…
Life has not been kind to her. I’ve seen the cruelty she had to endure, the pain and sorrow from her past. And yet here she is, smiling happily as if the horrors never touched her.
Why aren’t you angry at the world? I almost ask her.
Fate is a cruel bastard. She fought so hard to survive that forest only to die three years from now because of me. I’ve never despised my existence more than I do right now.
“I heard that the forest lights up with faerie lights at night,” she muses.
I allow myself another smile at that.
“Yes, it will. We should at least stay until twilight,” I suggest.
“Aelfric will get mad—“
Thankfully she doesn’t finish talking about Eyepatch when the forest lights up like a sky full of stars.
“They’re fireflies…” she whispers, her silken silver hair catching the soft glow. After everything I saw in her childhood, that sweet innocence of hers remains intact instead of turning bitter.
I marvel at her silently in the dark. She’s so full of life compared to the cold, twisted being that I am.
I move closer to her without really noticing it. “Do you regret saving me?”
The question came out of nowhere.
“No,” she answers without a pause or hesitation.
That has to be a lie.
“Even knowing you will die in three years?” I ask her again.
“Even if I had to do it all over again, I would still free you from those chains,” she says easily.
A foreign, warm feeling stirs in my chest. I didn’t have to drink her blood to know that she meant every word.
I don’t deserve this kindness. I don’t deserve her.
“Besides, I won’t die in three years…” she drawls. Her head tips to the side and I see the steely determination on her face. “I would destroy the Rhunhraefn by then.”
A chill treads at the back of my neck. The fierce conviction in her voice never fails to surprise me. It makes me want to believe the impossible too.
Maybe I already do.
I believe in her, Coinneach interrupts in my mind. The other beasts join him, murmuring their trust.
I inhale the fresh scent of the forest deep into my lungs. It feels like the first real breath I have taken in a long time.
“Is everything all right?” she asks, her lilac eyes bright with concern.
“Yes.”
Everything is all right as long as you’re with me.
I see the sparkle of relief in her eyes at the answer.
“Come look,” she whispers, gently opening her hands to show me two fireflies resting on her palm.
The bugs blink and signal each other in their courtship ritual. Rhianelle’s eyebrows dance upward in pure awe and astonishment.
“Did you know they flash each other to find their mate?” she says.
I simply shake my head, repressing the urge to make inappropriate comments. I fucking hate the way the bond lets my cock do the thinking most of the time.
The pair of glow bugs suddenly shoot to the sky, surprising us both.
Rhianelle tips back her head and giggles until she almost slips from the branch. I have never seen anything more beautiful. I slide my hand around her waist to keep her from falling.
She suddenly tilts her head to look at me. “Thank you, Svenn.”
My heart stills the moment my eyes meet hers.
That’s it for me.
One look and just like that my resolve to stay away is shattered. I thought I can let her go, I thought I can cut her away from my life for her own good.
Well, too bad, little fawn.
You’re mine now.