Chapter 14 Aura
AURA
Toftlund City, Treland
Aura matches Calder’s long strides as they nearly run back to the longhouse. Through his beard, she can observe the strain in his jaw. His gaze is slightly narrowed and focused. Typically, she is comfortable in his stoic silence, but tonight, he exudes an uneasiness that has her on edge.
“Why are we abandoning the corpses? Should we not summon a guard or a Drengr?” She asks when he continues to ignore her.
“They are for your father to sort out. Your safety is all that matters to me.”
Aura stops walking.
He looks over his shoulder with an urgent growl. “I need to return you to your family.”
“What is happening?”
Her mind shatters like a glass pane, and her poise disintegrates as she gazes at the bloodied man who prominently appears in her dreams.
“Why did Jarl Guy wish to kidnap me? What does any of this have to do with the Queen of Skalor? And,” she shivers, then realizes. “She is your mother!”
She shakes her head aghast at the whole fucking situation.
This cannot be true!
Everything that has happened since she left Isabel’s house on the day of the Trial feels unnatural. And now, Calder appears at the docks in time to rescue her from Guy.
“You were in the longhouse with some drunken woman in your lap!” Envy bites in her words, but she has stopped caring. Tension in her temple throbs while the earth spins under her feet.
“I saw him lure you outside and decided to follow after taking care of the distraction he sent me.” He cracks his neck. “She will not be bothering anyone anymore.”
The crushing heartbreak of the past month feels like a boulder pressing against her heart. She winces from the pain.
“You chose to carry me home that night aboard your ship. You found me on the roof. Why do you continue to attach yourself to me only to decide that you don’t want me?” She strides up to him despite the traitor tears burning in her eyes. She slams a fist against his chest. “I deserve answers.”
His thumb wipes the tears from her face. His touch lingers along her skin, stroking her cheek. “Beautiful girl,” he whispers. “I am so sorry-”
A commotion further down the street interrupts his apology, forcing them apart. Her father marches with a contingent of heavily armed Drengr.
“Where the fuck have you been?” He directs his rage at her. “Someone said a fucking Skalor Jarl took you from the longhouse, and they were right.” As he turns his crimson-tinted gaze on Calder, Aura dives between them.
“It was not Jarl Calder!” She shouts, raising her hands in his defense despite their tense passion. “Jarl Guy and I walked around town, and he… tried to…” She focuses on the cobblestones to gather her thoughts. “Calder rescued me.”
“There are several bodies on the docks.” He jumps in before her father’s fury can build. “I was fortunate to intervene.”
Sigvid snaps his fingers, commanding a group of Drengr to explore the docks. “Aura!” His voice bellows, ricocheting off the exterior walls of the surrounding shops.
She stands firm despite the power of his simmering berserker, which causes her legs to quiver.
“After everything we underwent to hunt down your ex-bedfellow, why in the name of the Briny God would you ever place yourself in a questionable situation? You are godsdamned lucky Jarl Calder sought fit enough to follow you and your poor fucking decisions.”
“How was I to know Guy would assault me? Are you blaming me for this?” She spits, her hands balling into fists.
“Of course not! I am questioning why you didn’t have enough sense to ask anyone to accompany you with that guy at an event involving people from all over the continent.
Did you ask a Drengr, your siblings, your uncles?
We have strangers in our kingdom. You should be utilizing the utmost care in your actions.
Instead, you allow him to walk you to the fucking docks! ”
Aura cowers, backing into Calder’s chest.
“Lord Commander,” he places a firm hand on her shoulder with a sharp squeeze as if warning her not to speak.
“In defense of your daughter, the Farewell Feast has had your desired effect. People from all over the Endless Shore are mingling. There was no reason for her to suspect ill will from one of our Jarls.” He squeezes her slightly.
“I recommend she return to Blackwood for the night out of an exercise in caution. I think we would all feel comfortable knowing the heir to Treland is safe.”
She remains deadly silent while Sigvid strokes his russet braid.
“Fuck, you have a point. If one of these fucks thought it was a good idea to try something, others might as well.” He whistles, and the nearest warrior races to his side. “I will be escorting my daughter to Blackwood. Gather the nearest group and double the presence around our home.”
The Drengr shieldmaiden’s Salt braid cascades over her shoulder as she nods before instructing the warriors standing nearby.
“Good work, Advardsson.” Sigvid pats the Iss Drengr on the back. “I shall return shortly to share a horn of mead.”
Aura does not look over her shoulder at Calder. There are too many unspoken questions she cannot bear to confront him with.
Not now.
At least she would be safe with her father.
In utter silence, Sigvid and Aura trudge the remaining distance to the carriage. She rehearses various apologies and conversations that might prevent her from being locked away in her room indefinitely.
“In.” Sigvid opens the carriage door, glowering at her with more frustration than she has ever seen from him.
Her shoulders slump, and she bites her lip to keep the tears at bay. She detests crying, and between nearly being raped, the heartbreak caused by Calder, and the disappointment from her father, she feels in a precarious emotional state.
Once he takes the seat opposite her, the door slams shut, and the carriage rattles toward home.
She leans forward, “Father, I-”
“Stop.” He takes a deep breath. “I am disappointed in you.” His tone is firm.
“You are a bright girl. In some ways, you are more clever than your mother. What I have watched of late is recklessness. I do not know what has changed in you, but this ends. Your siblings have never acted in such a way. Both of them use their common sense.” He massages his temples.
“I cannot believe you are my daughter.”
Her anger evaporates, leaving her with nothing but a soul-crushing feeling that tears her heart apart. All her life, she has wanted nothing more than the approval of the man sitting across from her.
Father is right. I have not been careful.
Hot tears trail down her cheeks while she fiddles with her fingers in her lap.
If she is not the daughter of Sigvid Thordsson, she is not quite sure who she is anymore.
Only a fuck up.
Suddenly, the carriage clatters to an abrupt halt, tossing her to the side and slamming Sigvid against his seat.
“What the fuck was that!” He rubs the back of his neck and removes one of his blackwood axes from his belt.
The sharpened ebony blade is a deadly warning to all who dare cross him.
“Stay here.” Her father reaches for the handle, but it wrenches open before he can grasp it.
“Briny God!” She swears.
Framed in the summer night is a fair-haired woman with tight-fitting leather armor. The snowflake of Skalor burned on her chest.
“Good evening, Your Highnesses.” Isabel Kilton jabs a giant needle into her father’s hand, administering a blue liquid into his veins.
Aura slams her fist into the side of Isabel’s face, too little and too late.
“There’s that fire, Princess!” Isabel rips out the syringe and tosses it aside.
Immediately, Sigvid’s shoulders slump, and he falls forward, forcing Aura to catch him.
Azure.
Azure Blooms are blue flowers grown uniquely in Salt. Bottled into a potion, they become a potent sedation that can knock out a raging berserker. Thanks to Sigvid, the continent learned two decades ago that they could be used on a non-berserker without killing them.
His dead weight forces Aura to the floor of the carriage.
She slips out to find a battalion of soldiers. Some have the three-mountain crest of the Pike Hold of Skalor, and others have the snowflake representing the Skalor Royal Family.
Aura seizes her father’s discarded axe from his hand. He watches her intently, even with his body paralyzed.
“Sigvid is more predictable than we could have hoped.” Isabel sneers.
“How are you out of jail?” Aura demands.
Isabel paces along the inner ring of the circle of warriors.
“Good question, but not the one I will answer now. You see, your dalliance with the Iss Drengr.” She pauses to tilt her head in mock adoration.
"Awe, don’t look at me like that. Neither of you were subtle.
” Isabel winks as she strides toward the open door of the carriage.
Aura leaps in front of her, blocking the sight of her father. “You will not touch him!” She growls.
“I have no desire to touch the man who felled my father.” Isabel waves her hand dismissively. “I just want him to clearly hear how we bested him.”
Three warriors grasp Aura, tugging her away from her father and the carriage. She shouts and struggles to no avail.
Isabel kneels so she is at eye level with Sigvid. “Calder acted exactly as instructed. He seduced the Princess of Treland…”
Her struggle ceases.
Calder would never cross her family. Regardless, the hot knife of betrayal stabs in her heart as she realizes his words in the garden were truthful.
He never wanted her.
She was always a means to an end.
“...destroyed Guy and his troops, and then, Your Majesty, in your enraged state, brought her to us.” She taps him on the nose.
“Fuck you, cunt!” He bellows. “I will fucking kill you! I have been waiting for an excuse to hunt down your entire fucking family!”
She slaps him across the face. “Sleep with the stone, Your Highness.”
Sigvid loses consciousness as the Azure finally seeps into his bloodstream. Aura cries out, struggling against the soldiers. Another set of hands restrains her until she is immobile.
Isabel focuses her attention on a horse riding up the road. When the man jumps to the ground, Aura recognizes him as the Jarl she met outside the jail.
“Has he succumbed to the Azure?” He pulls Isabel in for a long, passionate kiss, weaving his hands through her locks.
“You planned this from the beginning!” Aura shrieks.
Jarl Rolf inspects her father while Isabel saunters over to her.
“Why, of course. My grandfather visited me in a dream. He instructed that I keep you on course to become a Drengr until he said otherwise.”
“Your grandfather? I thought you said most of your family were dead.”
Her smirk widens to a horrifying expression of vengeful joy. “Oh, yes, except one is very much alive. You might know him as Freyr, God of Stability.”
Aura’s face falls.
The Freyr, as in the father of Thrain, her uncle. The same uncle who tried to conquer Treland. If that is her grandfather, then that means Rendel was a halvgud, too. Which makes Isabel one as well.
“Are we ready?” Rolf returns, rubbing his hands together. “We must set sail before any other unwanted frost follows our way.”
“To Skalor?” Aura tries to distract them until a Drengr shows.
Isabel seizes her chin, tugging her face closer. “I provided the intelligence on the jail for Rolf to release me, just as I helped these men kill every Drengr protecting Blackwood.
“No, that’s not possible!”
“Oh, it’s possible. Just like the Queen of Skalor announcing the prophecy to save the country lies in sacrificing you to the gods.”
No, no, this is a nightmare from which I will surely awaken!
“All Jarls, including your precious protector, Avardsson, were offered anything their hearts desired in exchange for delivering you, alive, to Nightwall Keep.”
Aura prepares to retort, but Isabel shakes her head. “There is no love lost with the feral Iss Drengr. He made his bed in Treland with the Sigvidsson-Redwood clan. When he sets foot in Skalor, he faces something much worse than death.”
Aura gapes, feeling as if someone is squeezing her heart, hoping it will burst. “Why did you tell my father he seduced me?”
Isabel throws her head back, and a belly laugh overcomes her. “Oh? But did he not? The man who only entertains dalliances with women who he can toss out his door before the cock crows?”
Aura’s face burns with humiliation.
Isabel leans forward to whisper in her ear. “I needed the King to believe exactly what I suggested.” She brushes her curls behind her ear in a faux intimate gesture, reminding her all too much of Calder.
Isabel sneers with a tilt of her head. “Do you know what you are to everyone? A bounty to claim, Sigvid’s daughter.”
“I’m done with this.” Rolf approaches her with a familiar syringe full of a blue liquid.
Aura struggles yet manages to secure her father’s blackwood axe in her belt.
“Good night, Princess.” He jabs her with the needle, and the liquid pumps into her body, quieting her mind as she succumbs to the darkness.