He turned toward his father with a questioning gaze. The look on Eirik’s face was unusual, almost pained. Concerned. Apprehensive. But Marius had known his father long enough to know nothing scared him.
“Marius,” he said, “are you sure you’re feeling up to this? I can always send another vivid.”
Marius frowned, resisting the urge to jerk his arm away. “I can do it, Your Grace.”
“Perhaps, but are you feeling up to it? Will you be okay if something goes wrong, if you start to feel weak?”
After all this, his father still doubted him. Marius’s chest ached deeply, and he couldn’t look at his father’s face anymore. After everything, after proving time and time again that he was an accomplished vivid, his father still thought of him as a child. Nothing he did would ever be good enough, would it?
“Marius, please. You worry me.” Eirik squeezed his arm gently. “I can’t lose you.”
“Don’t worry. I’m fine.”
His father studied him for a long moment. Then, he released Marius’s arm and eased back. “Very well. Go to your task, then.”
Without saying anything else, Marius turned back to the pyre and climbed the stairs. As he passed through the fire, he thought he heard his father say a prayer for him.
Chapter Seven
Mid-morning light filtered through the windows of the cozy apartment above Harbinger Trinket & Tome, the scent of a newly lit vanilla candle and fresh laundry wafting through the living room. Curled up on her couch, book in hand, Satara listened to the quiet noise coming from the street and the nearby harbor.
It was a modest apartment with small rooms, but it was private, clean, and quiet. Most importantly, it was all hers—the only one in the building besides Astrid’s, which was on the first floor. The living room was decorated simply, with a comfy couch and overstuffed armchair, a television on the far wall, and some shelves and side tables for plants and knickknacks. A handful of decent paintings hung on the wall at intervals, a testament to one of her long-time hobbies.
A few weeks ago, Edie had come for a visit and expressed surprise that Satara lived so normally. Satara thought that was silly. Just because Astrid was old-fashioned didn’t mean they were both completely cut off from the world. Satara might not have any social media, but she had a cell phone; at home, she watched movies and some television. And while Shipshaven was small, there was still a library, an ice cream stand and diner, a hairdresser, a comic book store, and plenty of shops owned by craftsmen and artists.
Of course, even though Satara had lived here for a decade, she still preferred to socialize as little as possible. She’d been like that since she was a child, well before she’d come here. She was much more interested in scouring the library for something good to read, whether it be history or adventure or simply a good romance. The warriors her parents had expected her to train with bored her. She much preferred the warriors who lived within the pages of her favorite novels. She had the skill to be a shieldmaiden, but not the passion. Her mother and father’s twin vocations, death priestess and undertaker, had always appealed more to her. After what had happened with Darras, though, she’d had little choice but to follow the path her family preferred.
Darras. She pushed him out of her mind quickly and tried to focus on her book.
Aevana turned with a small gasp as she heard someone enter the library, but her view of the doors was obscured by the tall, ornate bookshelves. Who could it be, she wondered? No one but her was supposed to be in the reliquary tower at present. Her master would be furious if he found out someone had gotten in on her watch. She would have to scare them away.
The tome-keeper lifted the hem of her robe—rendered sheer from the rain she’d run through on her way to the tower—and started toward the end of the aisle to confront the interloper.
She halted abruptly when he stepped around the corner instead, his frame filling the space between the shelves almost completely. He stared her down, cobalt eyes as frigid as the grave as they searched her face. His countenance—bluish and gaunt, yet somehow impossibly, beautifully preserved—struck Aevana’s heart with an emotion she could not begin to describe.
Satara winced as she realized she had bitten her thumbnail to the quick, the pain pulling her out of her story. She had thought reading something would calm her nerves or at least distract her from her current anxiety, but no such luck.
Edie had called yesterday to tell Satara and Astrid that Indriði had finally contacted her for a meeting. Valkyrie and shieldmaiden were now on standby should something go wrong. Satara had been texting Edie every so often, checking up. Though Astrid had assured her everything would be fine, she couldn’t shake the feeling that something would go wrong.
Her eyes scanned the page, but she didn’t retain any of the words. She set her book down for a moment to send a quick text to Edie, asking her how it was going. Then, she set her cell phone down, trying to put it out of her mind.
Aevana had traveled so far to separate herself from him. There was no use being close to a man she could never have; the pain was unbearable. That was why she had come to the Court of Stars in the first place. And now he was here. Against impossible odds, he had come for her. Why?
“Commander Coldheart,” she finally breathed. Beneath her wet robe, her whole body shivered, and she could feel her nipples harden as his freezing aura caressed her skin.
Coldheart’s eyes fell down her body, and her blood heated at the thought of what might be visible to him. The proper thing to do would be to cover herself as best she could … but she could not bring herself to do it.
She kept her eyes locked with his. “You’re not supposed to be here.”
He rasped, “I know,” and swiftly closed the gap between them.
Satara’s cell phone buzzed on the coffee table in front of her, and she almost jumped. Of course Edie would answer right when Commander Coldheart was about to forsake his deathless army for the woman he loved (surely he and Aevana had to end up together).
She picked the phone up again, and after assuring that Edie was okay and wishing her luck, dropped it into her pocket. As she was about to go back to her book, however, she felt a slight pull. Somewhere downstairs, Astrid needed her for something. Her connection with Astrid was of a different nature than Cal and Edie’s—and it probably wasn’t as strong—but Satara’s instincts hadn’t steered her wrong yet.
She slipped a bookmark into her novel, set it down, and headed out of the apartment. After descending a couple of flights of stairs and opening the old wooden door, she stepped into the shop.
Astrid was near the front. Her face and posture were rigid with stress, but she was busying her hands setting up a display of candles she’d poured herself a few days previous. A salesgirl was nearby, ringing up a pair of customers.
When Satara approached, Astrid looked up. “Ah, hello.”
“You needed me?” the shieldmaiden asked, smoothing out her shirt.
Nodding, Astrid straightened and waited for the two customers to leave before explaining. “I need to take care of something in town. Can you stay by the phone in case Edie calls?”
Satara suppressed a sigh. “All right.”
She had long given up trying to convince Astrid about cell phones; the valkyrie often forgot Satara even had one. Satara herself was no obsessive lover of modern technology, but it was silly to pretend that it didn’t have its uses. Astrid was just that stubborn.
“Are you sure it’s safe?” Satara asked after a pause. It was far from the first time she’d asked. The answer was the same every time, but she couldn’t shake her anxiety.
“The worst Indriði can do is say no.” Astrid walked to the sales counter and shouldered a leather bag that had been sitting off to the side. She turned, saw Satara’s uncertain look, and returned with an earnest one of her own. “I promise you, there’s no danger. There is even a chance she will say yes. Her anger toward me must have subsided by now, at least a little.”
Somethi
ng was wrong, though. Satara could see it in the way Astrid fiddled with the rings on her fingers, how she kept pushing her hair back. Stress created lines in her face. Then again, Satara had seen her stressed many times before, and it was never like this. Something strange was going on.
She didn’t say anything, however. She watched through the shop’s gritty windows as Astrid left, then drew her phone from her pocket to check on Edie. No update from her or Cal. Gods willing, that was a good sign.
“Satara?” said a soft voice from beside her. When she looked up, the salesgirl was looking at her from over a huge stack of art prints. “I’m sorry—do you mind helping me with stock? Jonne called out with a cold today, so I’m alone.”
“Sure,” Satara agreed after a moment’s consideration. She put her phone back in her pocket, grabbed a notepad and pencil from behind the sales counter, and got to work.
She worked in silence for a while. The salesgirl didn’t attempt to make small talk, for which Satara was grateful. Some people assumed that Satara was quiet because she was unfriendly or aloof, but that wasn’t true. She didn’t think she was better than anyone else, but she certainly wondered why she wasn’t allowed to be shy or private without being hassled.
She’d been working for about half an hour when she went into the back room to look for a box of items that needed restocking. As she lingered next to the door of Astrid’s living quarters, she swore she heard movement on the other side.
She stopped dead to listen. The sound was subtle, but … yes, that was definitely shuffling. Dread filled her chest. Someone was trying to keep quiet in there, and they would have succeeded if she hadn’t caught the noise at the right second.
Without another moment’s pause, she lifted the latch and threw the door open to confront the intruder.
Satara stopped inside the doorway, taking in the scene before her.
A tall, willowy figure stood by the far wall, looking over its—his?—shoulder at her. The intruder was dressed head to toe in battered black leather with several scarves of black gauze wound around his neck and arms, and a bulging cloth bag was slung across his chest. It took a half-second longer for Satara to realize the thief was poised to grab Astrid’s shield and spear.
Satara cried out and ran forward, but before she could reach him, the thief had started for the nearest window. She followed him closely, dodging to the side at the last second and just barely catching one of his scarves.
The thief was jerked back for a second as the scarf tore, but his reflexes were astonishingly quick. Seemingly without having to think of it, he seized a chair from the nearby table and turned, shoving it into Satara’s chest.
The shieldmaiden staggered back, breath knocked out of her for a moment. She recovered quickly, though, and grabbed the legs of the chair, which the thief still held in his gloved hands.
For a moment, Satara and the thief were locked, both straining against the chair. He wore a hood and a cowl that covered the lower part of his face, but a pair of slightly-too-large, narrowed beryl eyes glared out at Satara. A low, even voice hissed from behind the cowl: “You should never have pledged your loyalty to Astrid.”
Satara was so taken off-guard by the comment that she eased her hold on the chair—only slightly, but enough to break the deadlock. The thief shoved the chair into Satara’s chest again, then dropped it, darting away. He threw open the window and slipped out before she could stop him.
Adrenaline still coursed through Satara’s system as she picked herself up. She could try to go after him, but he had already proven to be a lot faster than her, never mind his head start. Trying to control her breathing, she glanced around the room to make sure everything was in place. Her heart stuttered as she realized that the hall door and the door to Astrid’s room were both open.
She rushed into the bedroom and nearly gasped at the sight of it. Everything was upturned, all the drawers and the wardrobe flung open, their contents strewn across the room. It looked like a cyclone had swept through.
Hastily, she crossed the room, locked the bedroom window, and drew the curtains. She moved through and did the same for every other window, too. If the thief had set off any of the shop’s wards, Astrid was probably already on her way back. Until then, Satara had to make sure the intruder didn’t come back.
As she hurried into the shop, the door swung open with a chime, and Astrid stepped through. A look of confusion twisted her face, but when she saw Satara’s expression, it turned to anger. They didn’t exchange a word as the valkyrie hurried into her rooms, shieldmaiden at her heels.
When they reached her bedroom, Astrid stood in the doorway for a few moments, scanning the damage. Then, she began to rifle through the mess, probably trying to find what had been stolen. As she did, she asked, “What exactly happened?”
“I was helping Keir with stock, and I came into the back room to get something.” Satara glanced behind her, into the hearth room, as she recalled the scene. “There was a person dressed all in leather. He—I think it was a he—was reaching for your spear, but I interrupted him before he could take it, and they disappeared out that window.”
“Did you see what he looked like?”
She racked her brain. “He was tall and slender … and had vibrant blue-green eyes. The leather was dyed black, scratched and worn in some places … he wore scarves the color of shadow. I couldn’t see anything other than that.”
Astrid was practically panting in frustration as she tossed things over her shoulders. “I will find him. A shade can’t hide from me.” She looked up from where she was bent and fixed Satara with a serious stare. “No one is to know about this, understand? Do not tell anyone what happened.”
The shieldmaiden nodded. “Did he take anything?”
“I don’t know yet. Dammit.” Astrid cursed again under her breath and stood. “I’ll need some time to figure this all out. Go wait for Edie at her apartment. See what Indriði said, and report back to me soon.”
Satara nodded and left for her apartment. With a head full of questions about the mysterious thief’s motives, she donned her armor and set to her task.
Chapter Eight
Mercy fluttered her fingers in the afternoon light streaming through the living room window, admiring the shimmery violet nail polish as she filed the edges. Fisk was curled up in the bathtub, napping, so she’d decided to do her nails before her mom came to pick her up for dinner. After the hospital, it hadn’t taken her long to figure out that the armrest of her wheelchair was the perfect height for nail-painting … so at least there was that.
Besides occasionally going out with Mom or Dad, who had come up from the Cape to be with her, she didn’t have much to do anymore besides stay home and take care of Fisk. She’d adapted to the accessibility issues of going out pretty early on, but she found herself fatigued easily, and now that the Gloaming was walking around? Yikes. She was doing her best to avoid another run in with one of those cuckoos lest they crunchify her upper half, too.
Besides Edie and their new friends, Mercy visited with her family only. It was a shame that they could never visit her. What if they had to use the bathroom? Too risky. She just told them her landlord was weird about visitors.
Satisfied with her nails for now, she screwed the cap back on the nail polish bottle and hoisted herself out of her chair. Her crutches were never far away, and she’d become pretty good at getting around with them. She was certainly getting a workout. Soon, she might only need a cane on good days.
Mercy smiled a little, looking down at herself. Yes, she was hurt—maybe permanently—but she’d had a lot of time to think about it. Honestly, her accident had brought her closer to her friends, and even more important, it had chased away all the fakers in her life. The people with her now? They were worth keeping around.
She was about to go check on Fisk when, suddenly, someone began pounding on the door. It was so loud and close that she started, nearly dropping herself in the process. Her heart fluttered, but she took a d
eep breath. It was probably Satara, or maybe Cal coming to pick something up. Neither of them had a key—everyone had agreed it would be too risky to have so many apartment keys floating around.
Considering Satara knocked like a normal person, it was probably the stupid meathead. Mercy still hadn’t completely forgiven him for the way he’d treated her when they had first met, or how tedious he was in general.
“Coming,” she called out, crutching over to the door with a sigh. Just to be sure, she stretched her neck to look into the peephole. Sure enough, Cal stood there, staring at the door with his arms at his sides.
Mercy sighed again and flipped the lock, unlatched the chain, and nudged the doorstop out of the way. Then, she opened the door.
“Hi,” she said wearily, turning as soon as he was in view and going back toward the couch. “Is Edie still at her thing? Did you leave something behind?”
Cal shut the door, but didn’t say anything.
Mercy paused, turning to look at him. He was a jackass, but he didn’t usually ignore her when she was talking to him. Either something was wrong, or he had reached a new level of assholery. But he didn’t look angry or even anxious about something. He just stood there, staring at her. Then, he took a step closer.
“Are you okay?” she asked, looking him over. Bizarrely, he was wearing a T-shirt, not the same thing he’d been wearing this morning.
He took another step closer, and Mercy took one back.
“Are you all right?”
As she watched in horror, his eyes traveled down from her eyes to her lips, then to her chest.
Mercy was suddenly gripped with panic. She couldn’t imagine why, but for some reason, Cal was going to hurt her. Her heart thumped against her ribcage like it was trying to get out; her breathing came faster, shallower.
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