As I turned, a tall soldier grabbed the shoulder of the man next to him and gestured toward our table with a frown. Something about that motion, or the sharp outline of the tall man’s face when he turned sideways, jogged my memory. My stomach plunged, and my muscles tightened with a deep, cold fear. I pulled away from the table as if it might bite.
“We have to go,” I said.
“What? Are you ill?” Fenris asked, the familiar line reappearing between his eyes.
“Please, let’s just go. Now!”
The tall soldier at the bar was the same man who had accompanied King Nøkkyn to my family’s cabin twenty days before the Reaping. He was the soldier who told me I’d better run to keep up with Nøkkyn’s horse as the king led me into the Ironwood to rape me.
The soldier had recognized me. I was sure of it. And he did not look pleased to see me.
“Fine,” Fenris said, his eyes wide. “I’ll go pay.”
I watched Fenris cross the room this time, heedless of the stares that followed him. Some people seemed amused by the presence of a wild, barefoot man in their midst. But most of them looked unhappy, and a few even seemed angry.
Bastards. I sank my fingers into the folds of my skirt and clenched my hands into fists. As if Fenris coming in here in a funny outfit was any offense against them. His gold was just as good as theirs.
Motion near the inn’s enormous hearth fire caught my eye; I tried to turn discreetly. The cluster of soldiers was moving together toward the door. A hard knot of panic settled in my chest, and my heart thudded against my breastbone. Cold air swirled through the room as the soldiers pulled open the doors and left in silence. I turned to watch their progress through the wide windows. The tall man, the one I’d recognized, moved his right hand in a series of quick, sharp gestures, and half a dozen soldiers melted into the shadows.
“Shit,” I muttered.
I tapped my bare feet against the polished wood floors, and my fingers tugged at the dress. It was uncomfortable, stupidly uncomfortable. Oh, how I longed to be back in the woods, naked and pressed to Fenris’s chest, the sleeping furs wrapped around us. The pastry-wrapped fish and potatoes shifted uneasily in my stomach. The room felt too hot.
I was a fool. This was not my world; it would never be my world. Fenris and I were like children playing a game, and we would be punished for it.
The murmur rippling across the room announced Fenris’s return. I was on my feet before he could reach the table.
“You sure you want to leave?” he asked, the line between his eyes deepening.
“Yes!”
I grabbed his arm and tried not to stare at the cold eyes following our progress out of the room. Before we made it to the door, I caught two comments about lowered standards. One woman in an elegant, beaded dress said, quite loudly, that this establishment had gone to the dogs.
Fuck you, I thought but could not quite bring myself to say.
Outside, the night air was cold. Night had fallen over the town of Evenfel. I tugged Fenris away from the doors then stared at the shadow-shrouded market square in confusion, trying to get my bearings. The little stands were all shuttered, and the narrow alleyways branching off the square were nigh indistinguishable from one another. They yawned with darkness; any of them could have easily been hiding an entire battalion of soldiers.
We were trapped.
My arms and legs trembled against Fenris’s body, and my stomach sank toward the cobblestones at our feet.
“Sol? What’s wrong?”
I tried to swallow. “Nothing. Just—The people in there.”
He shook his head. “Oh, they’re always like that. The citizens of Evenfel are arrogant bastards, you know.”
“No, the soldiers! I recognized one of them, Fenris, and I’m damned sure he recognized me too.”
The frown returned to haunt his beautiful face. “So?”
Absurdly, I felt the sting of tears behind my eyelids. “So, I just want to go home!”
“Of course,” Fenris said. I tried to ignore the confused and slightly wounded tone in his voice.
My mind spun as we crossed the square and entered the darkness of a narrow street. The rush of fear I’d felt in the White Bull now seemed hard to explain. I opened my mouth half a dozen times, but the words refused to come. We walked together in silence, my chest aching with the dull insistence that I owed Fenris a better explanation than what I’d just given.
We were almost to the guard tower in the wall ringing the city before I found one.
“It’s King Nøkkyn,” I said.
Fenris stumbled, then caught himself. “Nøkkyn?”
“I don’t trust him. And I don’t trust his soldiers.”
“You were afraid? Of them?”
I twisted my fingers together in the darkness, struggling with my words. Evenfel’s houses were spaced further apart now, and I could see the gleam of the rising moon gilding their tiled roofs. Just ahead of us, a fire flickered near the guardhouse. It had been empty when we’d entered through the wall surrounding Evenfel, and I hadn’t given it a moment’s thought. Now, the dull gleam of the low fire seemed somehow threatening.
“My Sol.” Fenris brushed my cheek, and I turned to look at him. “If you’re afraid of the men following us, you should have said something.”
My entire body stiffened against his, and I felt as though I’d been plunged into cold water. I turned around, watching the street behind us, but it was cloaked in darkness. It could have been empty. Or there could have been an entire legion of soldiers there, hidden in the dark spaces between the buildings.
“How many?” I whispered.
Fenris shrugged. “Half a dozen,” he answered, making no attempt to hide his words. “They’re trained, by the sound of them. They move in unison. And they’ve got swords.”
“Shit!” I hissed, my fingers sinking into Fenris’s arm.
“They’re ahead of us now,” he said, nodding toward the fire. “I think they’re waiting for us.”
My heart hammered against my breast, and my throat suddenly felt too small. I gasped, trying to pull air into my lungs.
“Sol,” Fenris said, forcing me to meet his eyes, “I will protect you.”
Fenris pulled me to his chest, covering me with his arms. He brushed my hair back and pressed his lips to my ear.
“Did you forget who I am?” he whispered.
I shook my head mutely against the solid warmth of his chest. Of course I shouldn’t fear six soldiers. I’d seen the Fenris-wolf, over and over again, in all his terrifying glory. He could leap the walls of this city.
But I was very aware that he could also bleed. I had King Nøkkyn to thank for that knowledge.
As I thought his name, Nøkkyn’s face arose in my mind as if summoned—his thin, pale lips and sharp, black eyes. I remembered the last time I’d seen him, after he had bargained with Fenris, trading my life for his own. There had been a strange fire in his eyes, almost as if he were trying not to smile.
I hadn’t trusted that look. Or perhaps I’d feared it, as I feared those soldiers wearing Nøkkyn’s sigil.
“Just be careful,” I whispered back. My hand tightened around his back, pressing his chest to mine. “I love you.”
He kissed me slowly and sweetly, as if we were in the snug privacy of our cave and not in the middle of the darkened streets of Evenfel. Warmth tingled through my arms and legs, and some of my fear dissipated. Fenris pulled back and offered me his arm, just as he’d done on the hill overlooking the city.
“Shall we?” he said. It was too dark to know for certain, but it sounded like he was smiling.
THE MONSTER’S WIFE: CHAPTER EIGHT
As we approached the small fire outside the guard’s station, my chest felt tight, almost as if my already ill-fitting dress had grown even smaller. It slowly dawned on me that the street was far too quiet. The sun had set as we entered Evenfel, and we’d spent hardly an hour in the White Bull. Yet the street around us was now as quie
t as a tomb. No lovers kissed in the shadows; no merchants shuffled home from a long day on the streets. No one was walking to visit a friend or returning from a night of wine and celebration. We were alone, and the facades of the white stone houses echoed with the sounds of our footsteps.
I decided quite suddenly that I did not much care for Evenfel after all.
“They’re just through the gate,” Fenris whispered, pulling me close. “Don’t be afraid.”
Despite his warning, I still jumped when the soldiers materialized from the gloom after we stepped beneath the portcullis of the city’s walls. Fenris took my hand as they surrounded us, moving silently, six men with their hands on the scabbards of their great swords. Six snarling bear sigils flashed in the firelight, reflecting the unquestioned might of King Nøkkyn.
One of them pulled a sword from his scabbard and held it just below my chin. “Well, well, what have we here?” he drawled.
The low fire by the guardhouse cast enough light for me to recognize him. He was the soldier from the White Bull, and the one who came with King Nøkkyn to our cabin. He’d told me to run, I remembered. Briefly, I wondered what he would tell me now.
“I’m pretty sure you’re supposed to be dead, little whore. Not out here flashing your tits for all of Evenfel to see.”
His eyes traveled slowly over my chest, and a rush of shame burned through me. The way he looked at me made me feel dirty, as though I should have been a whore after all. Or perhaps I was a whore all along.
“You’re making a mistake,” Fenris said.
The soldier’s eyes widened. Fenris spoke with such calm authority that I almost believed him.
“Who the hell are you?” the soldier said, moving his sword to point at Fenris’s chest. He snorted with derisive laughter. “And what the hell are you wearing? You look like you robbed some rich old coot’s clothesline.”
The men surrounding us all laughed at that. My cheeks burned with the realization that Fenris had probably done exactly that.
“Just let us go,” Fenris said, smiling wide in the orange flickers of the firelight. “No one needs to die tonight.”
The soldier standing in front of us laughed again. This time, his men did not join him. “Big words from a man who’s all by himself, wearing stolen clothes. Just piss off, asshole, and leave the whore.”
Fenris pulled himself up taller. His features hardened. “Do not insult my wife.”
The soldier spat at my bare feet. “This slattern is no one’s wife.”
He shifted the sword, pointing it at Fenris’s neck. At the same time, he lunged forward, grabbing me. His fingers closed around my biceps in a grip as hard and cold as stone.
Fenris dropped my hand. The air around me cracked and hissed with a flurry of golden sparks. Men gasped and stepped backward as Fenris’s dark form filled the night, blotting out the stars. Color drained from the soldier’s face. His fingers froze, then went slack around my arm, and his sword clattered to the ground.
“Sol,” Fenris rumbled, lowering his shoulder for me to climb onto his back.
I yanked my arm from the soldier’s loosened grasp and grabbed a handful of Fenris’s fur. Before I could pull myself onto his back, my scalp exploded with pain. I screamed. A soldier had yanked me backward by my hair, knocking me off balance. I crashed to the street, falling hard across someone’s legs. There was a groan of pain beneath me.
Fenris whirled around, his mouth wide open, his white fangs gleaming. A low, angry rumble filled the night air; it took me a heartbeat to realize the sound came from Fenris. He was growling.
Something metallic flashed in the low firelight. A sword. The soldier I’d recognized stood between Fenris and me, his blade in his hand and raised high.
Fenris snarled, a fierce yowl so low and visceral I felt it in my bones, and the soldier rushed toward his chest. I screamed again as Fenris lunged forward.
Something hot and wet splattered across my face. I wiped my eyes and saw the body of the soldier collapse to his knees in the street. He looked shorter, somehow.
My stomach lurched as I realized why. He had no head.
The man who’d pulled me off Fenris panted as he shifted his tangled legs beneath my dress. I brought my arm forward and drove my elbow back as hard as I could into the soft meat of his stomach. He grunted, and then Fenris was upon him, closing his enormous white teeth around the man’s torso and lifting him high, high, high into the dark sky.
I staggered to my feet as Fenris flung the man to the ground, a row of fist-sized holes across his chest. Like the holes in our mattress, I realized dimly. The air was beginning to stink of blood. Beneath that sharp, metallic scent was something far darker and fouler. There was an unpleasant wet snapping sound, and Fenris spun to face me again. His jaws dripped with blood.
“Let’s go,” he growled.
Numbly, I pulled myself to his back, burying my hands in the thick fur at the base of his neck. It was so cold out I wasn’t sure if I’d ever feel warm again.
Fenris’s great body lurched beneath mine, and I looked back. Five men lay dead on the street behind us, their contorted bodies orange and black in the firelight. Five. That should bother me, I thought, but I couldn’t for the life of me figure out why.
It was so very cold, and getting darker. Stars, was it ever dark. The darkness seemed to be closing in around me, filling my vision from all sides. I tried to cling to the warmth of Fenris’s shifting back, but the darkness swallowed me.
“SOL!”
My head lifted with a snap, forcing my eyes open. My entire body shivered, and my teeth clanged together like an iron gate.
“Damn, Sol, I’m so sorry!”
My vision slowly swam into focus. The moon must have risen while Fenris fought the soldiers, because now I could make out Fenris’s expression. He was frowning again. Always frowning.
“F-Fenris,” I whispered.
“I’m sorry about what happened back there,” he said, speaking quickly. “But Sol, please, you need to wake up. Can you do that? Can you wake up?”
I nodded. It felt like it took a lot of effort.
Fenris looked up, and something dark flittered across his features before his eyes returned to me.
“Sol, you need to climb on my back, and hang on. Can you do that? Because if you don’t—”
His voice cut off as he turned back to the woods. When he spoke next, it was in a whisper.
“Because there are a lot of people looking for us right now. And if they try to take you, I’m going to kill them.”
Something acidic rose in the back of my throat. “No,” I stammered. “No more killing.”
He nodded. “That’s right. Let’s just leave. Can you do that? Can you hold on?”
I tried to sit up. The dark forest swam before my eyes, and Fenris wrapped his arm around my shoulders. After a few jagged breaths, the world stilled.
“What happened?” I whispered.
Fenris’s face contorted. He turned to stare into the darkness above us.
“You fainted,” he said. “I didn’t want you to fall. I tried—” He bit off his words, then turned back to me. “I’m sorry.”
I tried to shake my head, but the sudden flash of pain across my temples stopped me. I remembered the last thing I’d seen in Evenfel, the tangle of contorted bodies awash in firelight. And, suddenly, I remembered what had been so wrong.
“Five,” I whispered. “There were only five bodies. There should have been six.”
Fenris’s hands clenched, pulling the fabric of my dress tight in his fists. “I know. One of them ran into the city. It didn’t seem important to chase him.”
Beneath Fenris’s fists, my stomach churned. It seemed like it had been a very long time since we sat together in the White Bull.
“Why are they chasing us?”
“I have no idea. It makes no sense! We shouldn’t be this important.” His voice cracked, and his fists began to tremble against my chest. “Please, Sol. Can you hold on? C
an we go?”
“Yes,” I whispered.
Fenris helped me to my feet. The pain in my head ebbed, and the darkness of the forest flickered for only a moment before snapping back into focus. Fenris’s eyes were wide in the moonlight as he stepped away from me, vanishing into a haze of golden sparks. As the little, gleaming specks of light rose through the night air, I heard a cry from behind us.
The soldiers. I hadn’t realized how close they were.
Fenris didn’t need to ask me again. I leapt on his back, hardly waiting for him to bend down. I pressed my body into his thick fur.
“Go!” I yelled.
He went.
I’D NEVER RIDDEN FENRIS at a run. The moonlight-dappled trees blurred past us. His muscles rippled beneath me as his massive paws hit the ground. The air felt cold as it whipped my hair behind me, and I wished it could carry off my memories as well. The soldier’s cries faded almost as soon as Fenris began to run, the undulations of his body at a canter almost smoother than a walk.
It was like dreaming, riding the monster Fenris-wolf through the darkness of the Ironwood. His breath filled the air, leaving no room in my ears for anything else. Fenris slowed suddenly, his sides heaving, and sank to the ground in front of our cave. My stomach churned again as I slipped from his back, and I tried to steady myself with deep, slow breaths as the golden light again engulfed him.
When the light dissipated, Fenris stood before me, naked, with an expression that was almost afraid. Of course, I realized. His ridiculous clothes would have been shredded as he transformed. No wonder he’s always naked.
“I’m sorry.”
His voice was almost a whisper. It was impossible to tell if he was apologizing for the run through the forest, or the soldiers, or the entire trip to Evenfel. Or perhaps he was apologizing for approaching me at all, finding me naked in the stream last summer beneath the shadows of the Ironwood.
The Complete Fenris Series Page 19
