Chapter 28 #2
“If you’re referring to magic, that kind is reserved for your revered shaman.” Darcke pressed his hand against my back. I refused to acknowledge Ivren and Viljan’s shared look. “You know very well I couldn’t have messed with her mind even if my powers weren’t dormant. Your gods made sure of that.”
“Your gods?” My mother ground her teeth. “Elvara, I—”
“It’s time for the trial,” Darcke said as if my mother hadn’t spoken at all. “We should get ready.” He rested his chin on my shoulder as if we were old friends, not new allies. “Best of luck, Solsken. And to you, second.”
Darcke truly had a skill for sounding like a cold bastard. The rage filling both Viljan’s and Mother’s eyes made the corners of my lips jerk upward.
“Elvara!” my mother snarled.
But I only dipped my head before spinning around and following Darcke to the horse we would ride, since it might take days for us to make it out of the wild woods.
“Safe to say I don’t have your mother’s approval,” Darcke said.
I cocked my head. “Were you looking for it?”
“No. I’m not the man you bring home to your parents.”
The lethal grin that followed emphasized his statement. I hummed as I fought with everything in me not to look over my shoulder, where I was certain at least my mother and Viljan were staring daggers after us.
“They are looking,” Darcke mumbled. “Don’t give them the satisfaction.”
“I won’t,” I said through my teeth.
“You look nothing like your mother,” Darcke observed as we passed Ottoh and his sister.
“I am nothing like her either,” I replied. “I think that’s why she’s always disliked me. I was…” I cleared my throat. “I’m much more like my father.”
Darcke nodded. When I felt him detach, disappearing into his own thoughts, I focused on keeping one foot in front of the other, my back straight and my eyes anywhere but on Ottoh and Geord as they shot me looks.
My mother’s body language probably hadn’t been too hard to read. I was sure they were very excited to see me scolded like a child.
We reached the onyx mare just as Guner, the king, and his shaman stepped forward.
I leaned against the warm horse, letting her round belly rock me back and forth until some of the heat in my blood from seeing my mother cooled.
Darcke settled beside me, so close our shoulders touched.
I frowned before silent laughter rumbled through him at the furious eyes tracking where his body lined up with my own.
“You should stop that,” I whispered. “People might get the wrong idea.”
“That’s half the fun. Besides, I’m used to giving people the wrong idea,” he replied too loudly.
I shook my head. “You’re hopeless.”
Something dark crossed Darcke’s face as Guner stepped forward.
The king’s second clapped his hands. “Heirs, seconds, chiefs, the royal court.”
The shore we stood upon, facing the thick forest, went quiet. Water licked the beach behind us where the king’s court stood in small groups. I tried to let the gentle sound of water and the horse’s rhythmic breathing soothe the nerves starting to spark within me.
“We are here today for the sacred trial of wood. Every Viking warrior must earn their ship to cross the vast seas surrounding the north and fulfill our people’s wyrd of conquering the unknown.
” Guner took a moment to acknowledge each of us, starting with Geord and his second to my right and ending with Ivren and Viljan farthest to my left.
“For our heirs, it’s even more important.
If the forest allows you to leave with a ship from Yggdrasil Bay, the wood that makes up that tree will begin to grow in abundance on your island when you take over as chief, and you and your people will be permitted to use it to build your fleet and homes.
This is why you are tested before the Hird formally begins and not in your first year, like all other initiates. ”
Leaves rustled and the trees before us stretched as they readied themselves to become our judges.
I huddled closer to the horse’s warmth. My father always said Morkskog fed on the weak, and if you weren’t found worthy, the trees would be the first to scream the truth.
Heirs had died in Morkskog before, and the forest used their bodies to grow even more unfettered.
But there was an even worse fate: there had been heirs who’d escaped only because the forest didn’t want their husks tainting the enchanted grounds, but they’d done so without the trees’ blessing.
That meant that the heir wouldn’t be able to build the additional ships their chiefdom would require with the influx of new blood into the fylki.
It was an incredible dishonor. One the gods would not forgive.
The king placed a hand on Guner’s shoulder, and the second instantly shrunk back.
“Seconds, you will be manning your heir’s ship, but you also need to be blessed by the spirits of the woods.
You’ll need to work together to survive until the bay.
” Gustief turned to the dark woods, and the strange leaves stirred fiercely in response.
“Morkskog feeds on fear. You will need to face your own, not run from it, or the forest will not offer you a way out.”
Geord turned my way, his brows raised in challenge as he mouthed, “Boo.”
“He’s a problem,” Darcke said. His eyes slid to mine. “I don’t like problems.”
Neither did I.
Cold whispered over my shoulders when a distant howl rushed through the dark branches waving for us to come closer.
It didn’t help when I felt a mirroring shiver of worry run down Darcke’s spine.
As the wind whipping through the woods whistled louder, a drumming started beating through the darkness.
I wasn’t especially eager to find out where it came from, but when the king motioned for us to mount our horses, I made myself do so with a steady jump.
Viljan turned my way after pulling Ivren onto the white horse they were to share, and I hated the lump that stuck in my throat at the hollow look on his face.
I had to talk to him. I was still furious that he’d suspected I had something to do with Lika’s and my father’s deaths, but as Darcke readied himself to join me on our mare and Viljan turned away, I shook it off.
I’d had to change at the Hird—and quickly. Viljan, on the other hand, would always be what he was: the proud guard of a chief’s eldest daughter, driven by duty and honor to protect the Sweengard name, although now it would be the Solsken name instead.
My mother stood a few feet behind Ivren and Viljan, anger still lining her shoulders.
I gave her a quick nod. She, too, was driven by duty. Whenever my father was gone on his conquests—which was often—she was the chief of our island, and that responsibility ate at her. Lika had also been her favorite, and while she’d never admit it, the rage she’d come at me with was fueled by pain.
“Don’t make excuses for them,” Darcke said as he placed a hand on the horse’s back, right behind where I made myself comfortable. “They hurt you, and you have a right to be angry.”
I shuffled forward on the mare. Perhaps I had a right, but I didn’t have the will.
Despite what my mother had said, I did understand the stakes, and there was too much at risk to linger too long on petty arguments.
I needed to get through the next few weeks without revealing my severed rune, and avoid getting attacked by our enemies again.
Given the information Viljan and my mother had just shared, I also needed to weed out a traitor in our midst.
Darcke pretended to gag. “I don’t know why you’re so worried. You’re too honorable.”
I stuck out my tongue at him, earning an eye roll as he climbed up behind me. His arms wrapped loosely around my waist, but his breaths came deeper—slower—than I was used to.
“Are you scared?” I teased, turning my head over my shoulder.
His eyes went between mine, and my body stiffened when his did.
“Of course I’m scared,” he replied in his low voice when the drums echoed louder. The mare started walking at the same time as the other four horses did, heading straight for the shadowed woods. “I like living far too much.”