Finaan
Chapter thirty
He's the Reason
Wregen trapped Panta. He’s the reason we suffered for three centuries, and the dragons still do.
I’m so fucking glad, so gods-damned deliriously happy, that I never bonded with him.
“How long have we been traveling together, Wregen?” I’m trembling, the struggle to hold in my fury—to not end his miserable existence right now—nearly breaking me. The heartbeat pounding in my ears is so loud, I’m surprised I can hear anything else.
“Long enough for me to have told you,” he admits with a shrug. But his eyes are full of shadows, and his leg has started to bounce the way it does when he’s uncomfortable or anxious.
“Make no mistake, my skjaldmaer,” he continues, dropping a hand to the shaking thigh, which grows still.
“I’m not a good male. I never claimed to be.
I’m telling you now because I must. You need to know what’s going to happen.
I have another secret, and I’ll give you that one because I want you to have it.
But I won’t do it yet. You hate me enough in this moment.
We’ll travel to the dragons without the utter and irrevocable contempt you’ll hold for me when you learn what I’ve done to you. ”
“There’s something worse?” I demand, my thoughts turning cloudy as my limbs shift into rubber.
I need to get away from Wregen—to shut off the spigot of words he’s barfing out—but I couldn’t stand right now if I tried.
“You’re the reason we were trapped and the dragons still are, but that’s not the worst thing you have to tell me? ”
“My beautiful mate,” he murmurs, “I’ve hidden so much from you.
You don’t know me at all, and you’d never have let me kiss you, never trembled in my embrace, if you did.
You have no grasp of the depths of my depravity in Helheim.
I will open my soul to you, purge my conscience in this, at least, and give you the knife to wield against me if you choose.
But not here. Let me help you reach the dragons first. When you’re ready to mount your beast and leave these caves, I’ll set all of us free. ”
“So, you expect us to just go on together? Travel to Panta as if nothing’s happened? As if I don’t know you’re the reason I spent three hundred fucking years trapped in that place.”
He shrugs again, and the urge to punch him gives my legs the strength they need to stand. “That is exactly what we’ll do,” he decrees as I stride over to him.
I don’t hold back, and he doesn’t try to stop me. The first punch sends him flying to the floor and he grins up at me, blood dripping from his cheek.
“That’s my warrior princess,” he whispers before my fist closes the mouth that changed everything I thought I knew about this male.
I drop to my knees, straddling his chest, and his hands grip my hips, as if to support me while I destroy his face.
I can’t feel anything except the skin breaking beneath my knuckles, my blood melding with his while I paint him in my fury.
I’m destroying everything I see, all the beauty that attracted me to this hideous male, and I’ve never felt so alive.
Every few seconds, Wregen laughs and says something to spur me on—“Fuck me up” or “Don’t stop” or “I deserve all your hate” or “Give me your rage”—and I think I might kill him now.
Svend’s hands on my shoulders, and then around my gut dragging me away, pierce the inferno Wregen’s unleashed in me. He manages to pull me off the asshole who isn’t nearly as destroyed as he should be before I can fight back.
“What the fuck are you doing, weasel?” Wregen rasps, blood spurting and dripping from him. “Let her finish.”
“She was about to kill you,” he whimpers. “You said you want to take us to the dragons.”
“I also told her to take everything she needs from me,” he grunts. “I don’t require much life to reach the dragons. If she wants most of it now, it’s hers.”
“No, I’m done,” I tell him, standing up and striding over to spit in his face. “I won’t waste any more time on you.”
He nods, trying to catch my gaze. “As you should be,” he says. “For what it’s worth, I am sorry.”
But I’m done. “Fuck you,” I mutter as I give him my back.
The arrow slams into my leg before I’ve turned fully away, a spray of blood splattering across the stone around me while I fall to my knees.
Fuck.
Just … fuck.
My thigh feels like it’s been crushed by rock, every nerve and muscle obliterated. I’m suddenly freezing, so much blood spilling from me, it can’t give my body the heat it needs. Wregen is yelling in the background, but I can think of nothing except the agony rippling through me.
I need to snap the fuck out of this.
I refuse to die here.
I refuse.
Sucking in a deep breath, I snap my head up and try to understand what’s happening. Who attacked us.
What I see terrifies me.
Garmr’s free, and he’s not alone. A dozen of the large males Wregen called jotnar surround him, all of them aiming arrows at me.
“She’s not your target,” Wregen snarls. He’s already standing—although I have no idea when that happened—and stalks over to plant himself between them and me. “I’m the only one here you’re allowed to kill.”
“You’re not allowed to kill anyone,” I cry, pushing myself up to stand next to him. “These beasts will pick you apart and eat your bones. Back off while you can.”
Garmr growls, deep in the back of his throat, and I can’t speak “dog”, but I know exactly what he’s saying.
“Get the fuck behind me, Finaan,” Wregen grumbles as he shifts to place himself between the jotnar and me again. “I don’t need to leave here alive. You do.”
“We’re both leaving here alive, asshole,” I hiss as I drag myself to the left. “You’re leading me to my dragon to make sure she breaks free, or I will chase you down in Helheim and kill you myself.”
“Fucking stubborn female,” he mutters under his breath. “Ruxi knows the way and I’ll be dead, so your beast will probably meet you halfway. Stop being so gods-damned difficult for one minute.”
“Hel wants you alive, elf,” the tallest of the jotnar yells as he shifts his bow slightly, leveling his arrow at me. “We’re free to kill anyone else we’d like, but I think I’ll hold onto this one. She’s too pretty to kill right away.”
I feel Wregen’s fury at the jotunn’s words, his red-hot resolve to destroy anyone who’d lay hands on me. It burns nearly as hot as mine. The blade is out of my hands, flinging through the air, before I’ve taken a moment to consider whether I should be the one to attack first.
But they started it. The agony in my leg hasn’t abated a bit, and I’m not sure how I’m still standing. While I am, though, I’ll take as many of them down as I can.
The asshole’s big mouth is wide open when the knife lands in the center of his throat.
He grasps for it, shock in his eyes evident even from here, and gurgles something that might have been a command.
The others don’t need his direction. They pull back on their strings and loose arrows at Wregen and me.
He shoves me aside, grunting as one of the arrows pierces his arm, and rolls me in time to avoid the shaft still sticking out of my leg. “Sorry about this,” he mutters as he grabs the torture device and breaks it in two, leaving enough to dig out of me if I’m still alive later.
The scream rips up from the bottom of my soul, shivering my teeth as it pushes its way out of me.
I almost wish they’d kill the bastard, because he needs to suffer for what he did to me.
My body shakes as if I’m in a fierce storm, and it takes every ounce of strength I can muster to stop from curling in on myself and escaping the torment pounding through my bones.
“Svend can put you to sleep and get it out when we’re done,” he says. “Don’t die. I’ll be angry if you join me in Helheim before you’ve lived many more centuries in the sun,” he adds with a wink, his eyes dark and bright. And then he pushes himself up to stand above me.
That felt so much like a goodbye, my fury settles for a moment as I realize that might be exactly what it was.
I hate him, but I’m not sure if I can live without him. Which pisses me off even more.
“Don’t you dare leave me, Wregen,” I grunt through my clenched teeth. “We’re not done.”
He shakes his head once but doesn’t answer right away, and I get it. None of us will go easily to our deaths. But then he shakes his head again. “Stay put,” he mutters and turns to throw himself into the fight.
I watch him go, trying to convince myself that he can survive this, even with Wrath bound inside him.
My leg is shaking so much, I’m not sure if it will ever stop, but he was right to break off the arrow.
I couldn’t risk doing more damage if the tip got shoved in deeper or jostled around.
The pain has settled into a steady throb, and I’m more clearheaded than I was.
If the others have any hope of beating back the jotnar and Garmr, they’ll need my help.
Shoving myself to my feet, I take a second to look around and figure out where I’m needed.
Everywhere. They’re losing everywhere.
Garmr is fighting Ruxi and Glow, and I don’t think they can beat him. They’re dripping blood and tears, Ruxi’s feathers scattered around like a blanket ripped to shreds. I nearly throw myself at them, but before I can, one of the jotnar takes my choice away.
He aims an arrow at my chest, sending me spiraling sideways and to the ground. As I struggle to get up, he runs toward me, dragging his enormous sword from the sheath on his back. I’m barely on my feet, my injured leg almost useless, when he swings his blade at my neck.
But I’m still a gods-damned good fighter.