Chapter Seventeen
A Fitting End
I was surprised, in my dreams, that I wasn’t already dead.
For a long time, there was no sound, only those disjointed images. When the sound came, there was something else wrong. It was like… like I wasn’t alone. Someone else was there, dreaming with me, and I could see their dreams. They mixed with mine, creating chaos.
There were faces I didn’t recognize and those I did.
I dreamt of Steed, winking conspiratorially… mine.
A large and frightening dark-haired man in leather and armor… not mine.
My room in the old tree, my mother’s pendant casting rainbows on the bed… mine.
A long, damp stone corridor lit with torches… not mine.
There was Junnie, her blonde hair shining in the sun as she greeted me at her door on the west side of the village. And Junnie, mysterious under a hooded cloak, fighting with magic and weaponry, killing members of the council guard.
We sat around a fire, telling stories. Someone was ribbing Ruby. Her eyes narrowed when she replied to him, matter-of-factly, “Your mouth is very small. It’s unattractive.” And her head bobbed side to side as she smiled, pleased with herself.
Anvil laughed and his tongue wagged. He was holding someone by the arm, preventing them from running away. Suddenly, my vision changed and I was a hawk, attacking, tearing a piece from his tongue.
And Chevelle. He was in so many of my dreams. We were sparring sometimes, clashing swords. Sometimes he was pummeling me with rocks. Other times, the moments would have surely made me blush, if I could have felt my cheeks. He held my face in his hands, declaring his need for me. “I have wanted you since the moment I first saw you.” But the word burned. Wanted. He’d used the wrong word.
Occasionally, I watched as a third person. My vision would change and my perspective would be off. Like when I saw Fannie. She was razing the village, slowly tearing it apart. Fire and wind and destruction as she cackled and taunted the villagers. She dropped them as they ran, sometimes snapping their necks, sometimes breaking a leg so they would have to stay alive to watch their homes burn, their families die.
There was a large man who forced me to do magic, testing me until I was on the brink. He was fierce and wore a long scar across his brow that touched his cheek. He kept his hair cropped short, not wanting to hide any part of the damage.
And my mother, though my dreams gave her two names. Dark hair, blowing in the wind, arms outstretched, the pendant hanging at her neck glowing fiercely. Fire, flames, burning.
And then water. Drowning. Over and over and over. It almost made the cliff dreams more bearable, to be away from the repetitive drowning.
I swam around in these impressions for what seemed like an eternity. Eventually, they became so familiar they all started to seem like my dreams, not someone else’s.
Then the dreams stopped. No images flickered behind my lids, yet my eyes did not open. The muffle in my ears from the drowning dreams was gone. I could hear clearly, clearer than I’d ever heard. I hadn’t found my body yet, but I heard conversations, voices I knew. They were whispers but they were clear. I listened, hoping to gain clarity… but something was still wrong. Nothing fit. They discussed Junnie and Anvil and Fannie, but those all felt like two sets of people now.
They were worried; I could hear the stress in their tones. How long had I been like this? It seemed so long, trapped here.
I remembered the vines. I tried to feel my arms, see if they were still there. Was that why I couldn’t move? Was I still tied to a wall? No, no, I wasn’t tied. Had the thorns been poisoned? Was I dying now? I worked to calm myself. No, I was getting better, not worse.
I felt a light pressure on my forehead and my eyes flew open instinctively, though I’d had no response from them all the hours I’d struggled to force them open.
It was Ruby. She sighed with relief. “Oh, Frey.”
I was suddenly surrounded and the sight made my head spin. I closed my eyes tight in an attempt to stop it. “Get her a drink,” someone commanded. I felt the hand in mine then, as it was pulled away, replaced with a glass. I grimaced; I doubted I could hold a glass up, let alone myself.
“Don’t worry, it’s only water,” someone reassured me.
At the word, I realized I was parched, bone dry. I forced myself up, keeping my eyes tight as I concentrated on getting the glass to my lips. They were rough, cracked; I could feel them against the rim of the glass. I wondered if it was dried blood or if I had been down so long they’d simply split. I drank the full glass and felt it exchanged for another.
I finished it as well and started to lean back. There was a pillow behind me now, keeping me in a sitting position. It was soft. Everything surrounding me felt warm and smooth. I opened my eyes gingerly. I was in a bed. A very nice bed.
I looked up to see several people leaving. Steed? Grey? I fought panic as I wondered if they’d all made it. The worry throbbed in my head; it felt like my mind could splinter. I checked the faces close to me for stress but could see none. Ruby’s smile was soft. “How do you feel?”
I was having trouble forming a simple answer. There didn’t seem to be a word for it in the disorder of my brain. My silence was answer enough.
“It will pass.”
I hoped she was right.
Chevelle was watching me, anxious now.
“Is everyone all right?” I asked. My throat was raw, my voice sounded as if it had been through a grater.
“Are you?” he replied in a low tone.
I couldn’t be sure.
He hesitated, almost not wanting to ask the question he knew he must. “Can you tell me your name?”
“Elfreda,” I answered immediately. He waited for the rest. But I had two answers, didn’t I? I chose. “Of North Camber.”
It must have been the right answer, because he grabbed me, exultant, sighing and kissing my skin. He held me with a fierceness, a gentleness, that took my breath. His lips trailed my cheeks, murmuring words and careful of wounds as they swept to a temple, my eyelid, the corner of my mouth. He lingered there, unable to resist touching the broken skin of my lips, even if it were only feather light, the barest brush of skin.
He drew away slowly, feeling my shock, or seeing it in my eyes, and realizing his mistake. His expression fell, but he didn’t take his hands away. He swallowed hard, waiting for my confirmation.
But I wasn’t the other Elfreda, not the long list of binding words that had been my identity for so long. I couldn’t seem to reconcile the two lives.
“I… I think I’m just Frey.”
Chevelle’s hands slid to my shoulders, tension in his grip.
“That’s okay,” Ruby assured me.
“We will find the others,” Chevelle promised, his jaw tight. I couldn’t tell if the pledge was meant for me or himself.
The others. I had forgotten, lost for so long in my dreams, the bonds I’d hoped would break, the councilmen we’d need to free me. I wished I could think clearly. I tried to remember what had happened, but could only see flames.
A flicker of movement caught my eye and I turned to find a hawk perched on the ledge of a balcony. Suddenly, I needed fresh air more than anything.
Chevelle helped me to my feet and I walked, a little wobbly, to the door. I had been dressed in a vest of dark leather and slim pants, carved medallions adorning my chest, but my feet were bare as they crossed the polished stone floor of the bedroom, at ease in a place they seemed to know. I stepped out into the sun, and I had to steady myself on the stone ledge. Not because of the lightheadedness, though I was feeling faint, but because below me, before the steps to what I now realized was a castle, a thousand elves watched me. I sucked in a harsh breath, unable to get my mind to accept what I knew was happening.
I had been so oblivious. Reading the diary, learning of my mother and her ties to the throne. It had told of my own life, of what I was to become, a reality that would not be put to r
ights in my broken mind. But as I stared down, the assembled pieces of my shattered self held together by no more than tattered bits of string, I understood.
This was my place.
I heard Ruby behind me now. In a low voice she said, “They have heard of your return. They have come to see for themselves.”
Their rulers had burned, along with so many of their families. After the massacre, there had been no one. From the dead, it seemed, I had returned.
Chevelle stepped to my right side, placing something cold and heavy in my hand. My sword.
I knew what to do then. I took a deep, steadying breath as I raised the blade to the air. There was a faint pause, the briefest tick before the bird took flight, its wings hitting wind as the shift began, and then nothing could be heard but my name, roared in the song of the crowd below.
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Please look for book two in the Frey Saga: Pieces of Eight
Special thanks to Annie, who helped bring Freya to life.
More from Melissa Wright:
The Frey Saga
Frey
Pieces of Eight
Molly (a short story)
Rise of the Seven
Venom and Steel
Descendants Series
Bound by Prophecy
Shifting Fate
Reign of Shadows
Shattered Realms
King of Ash and Bone
Visit the Author on the web at
www.melissa-wright.com
Frey Page 25
