Total pages in book: 115
Estimated words: 112500 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 563(@200wpm)___ 450(@250wpm)___ 375(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 112500 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 563(@200wpm)___ 450(@250wpm)___ 375(@300wpm)
“I’m convinced you’re no infiltrator for Bloodreach.”
“Why? What changed?”
“Your work ethic. You rise before dawn, push past exhaustion, work until your hands bleed. Over the years, I’ve encountered evil, and I’ve never met an evil being with ironclad discipline.”
She swallowed hard. I do work hard. I love to work. Maybe I’m not creepy and wrong?
Training was going better than she’d imagined. She’d gained strength, muscle, color. She’d mastered basic sword work so well he’d advanced her to archery and close-quarter drills. She’d even joined him on a hunt.
“Why not?” he’d said. “You know the ravines, and winter is about to set in. With the way you’ve been eating, we’ll need to fuel you with extra game…” He’d trailed off, looking as though a thought had struck too close to the heart. She hadn’t asked why.
That day she’d dropped an elk with a clean arrow shot. He’d called her a born hunter, then bit his tongue as if the words tasted wrong.
Now Arctos continued, “I believe you’re honest, which means I believe you when you say you have no prey drive. And that means you deserve to be trusted by your own clan.”
The words should have comforted her. Instead, guilt scored her heart.
She parted her lips to confess—
The cave flap whipped open. A blast of snow rode in on Torben’s broad shoulders as he entered, a storm in the shape of a man.
He gave a curt nod to her, eyes troubled.
Torben was never cruel, nor openly hostile toward her. But he had no kindness in him for a vampire. She often wondered if bloodthieves had harmed him personally, leaving wounds she couldn’t see.
Lia had the same question for Arctos, but nothing could make that male shut down faster than asking him about his past.
Everyone here seemed to carry ghosts; some just wore them louder.
Torben addressed Arctos in Old Norse. “The clan’s newest member has been here for weeks. I want to know anything she’s told you about her kingdom.”
Anything? She’d revealed much to Arctos. Lia rose smoothly. “If you two need to talk, I can train outside.” She grabbed her coat and sword and stepped into the night, pretending not to understand a word.
But her pulse raced. Why hadn’t Arctos told his cousin about the enslaved Berserkers? Would Torben not wonder the same?
***
Arctos
He watched Emilia exit as if she had nothing to hide, yet he knew better. Secrets clung to her like shadow to flame.
But he had his own.
“Did you tell her about the banquet?” Torben asked, looking fatigued. He’d been stretched thin of late, seeming to see a threat in every shadow.
“I did.” Arctos stood and clasped his cousin’s forearm. Close up, the change in Torben was stark: dark circles bruised the skin beneath his eyes, and the bloodshot gleam in his gaze made him look dangerous. Unpredictable. “Our thanks to Dagny.”
Torben drew back. “Our thanks,” he echoed with a laugh as bitter as rust. “What a difference a few weeks can make.”
“Yes.” It had been mere weeks since the morning Emilia had demanded a place in the clan—since her trembling hand had touched the Channeler Stone, courage shining through her fear.
Maybe, in time, he and Emilia could be friends. But nothing more. His scars ran deeper than flesh. Truly accepting a vampire as his wife just wasn’t possible for him. And the queen had to have suspected that.
“Dagny decreed I must be civil to Emilia,” Torben said. “I suspect you also wish me to be. I am trying.”
“I appreciate that.”
“But you must know your wife will come to crave blood. All bloodthieves do.”
“She refuses it, has set her considerable willpower against such thirst. And she might not be alone. Inkletter and his new partner are looking for others like her.”
“You’ve forgiven the incubus too?”
“He’s useful,” Arctos said, unwilling to explain the quiet shift within him—the fading of old anger, the first thread of something like hope.
Torben’s tone hardened. “You’re keeping things from me. A rift grows between us, and I won’t leave till you mend it.” Berserker forthrightness coupled with Berserker resolve.
Arctos had hoped to stall until after Dagny’s labor, but Torben was a wall when he wanted answers. “I consider you a brother, and I want no rift between us.”
“Then tell me what you’ve learned.”
Arctos exhaled. “Very well.” Lowering his voice, he said, “Emilia told me vampire royals keep Berserker slaves in the castle. A hundred or more. Used for blood.”
Torben went still. Too still, like an animal before it springs. “Captured?”
“And bred.”
A terrible silence followed as Torben’s rage swelled. His fingers flexed open and closed, knuckles cracking audibly. A muscle jumped in his jaw, twitch-twitch-twitch. “How long have you known? How long has the queen known?”
Arctos admitted, “I told her soon after Emilia got here. She’s…investigating.” He’d kept Yrsa updated as she’d asked, but she’d put him off, telling him to dig more.