Pieces of Eight (The Frey Saga, #2)(23)

Ruby looked at me, perplexed. I smiled and squeaked out a nervous laugh. She glanced back and forth between us a few times before she shook it off and resumed her original announcement. "We've decided to move on. Frey, I'll get your things together. You can keep practicing until we have everything ready."

She threw one distrustful glance back to Grey, an eyebrow raised inquisitively, before bouncing off in the direction of my tattered hut.

When I turned back to Grey he was watching me. I felt my shoulders come up in shrug.

"Do it again," he commanded and I wondered if I heard a hint of excitement in his voice.

Almost too fast to see, his fist was coming at me again. And then it stopped as my palm came up to meet it automatically.

Grey smiled.

My hand still blocking his, he twisted to take my fingers, leading me by the hand as he walked from the center of the temple. Further from the others.

He spoke in a low voice. "When did your instincts return, Freya?"

I just stared at him. I had no idea what he was talking about.

His smile turned apologetic, but at the same time unrepentant, a face I was sure only Grey could get away with. "Seems the wicked Francine is helping you out more than herself."

I shivered a bit at the mention of Fannie. I had plenty of awful memories of her, mean as she was, but nothing had compared to the simple look she'd given me in her panther form. Just a dream, but the way she looked at me...

The words came out almost as a thought. "What does she want with me?"

He looked incredulous. I couldn't understand why. I was missing something obvious again? She intended to punish me for what I'd done, my imagined part in her binding and imprisonment?

Grey turned to me and placed his hands on my arms. "Frey, you are the leader of the North."

What did that have to do with anything?

He could see he wasn't getting through. "Do you remember what you read of Fannie in the diary?"

Had everyone read it? I waited.

I could tell he felt as if he were explaining something to a child. "Fannie is in line for the throne, Freya."

I let that sink in.

"After you."

Instead of the shock or pain that should have followed the revelation that my mind took its sweet time getting to, anger flooded through me. "She plans to kill me?"

Grey tried to shush me anxiously. But I couldn't be calmed. That crazy bitch was hunting me down in beast form to kill me? That thought hadn't even crossed my mind. Punish yes, some form of prolonged torture probably, but kill? And then a hysterical laugh escaped. For the throne. Grey glanced nervously toward the others. They’d not want me to know this, my fragile brain couldn’t take it.

"Wait, wait, wait." I tried to push past the anger and hysteria for just long enough to understand. "This doesn't make any sense. It's not in line. Why am I even leader?" In my rush, I forgot that I hadn't spilled my complete knowledge of the situation to anyone. "Why isn't Asher?"

Grey looked back at me, entirely astonished. He started with a stutter and then avoided my direct question by answering in general. "It… it doesn't work that way, Frey. The leader can choose the next in his line but... in a conflict... power is the deciding factor."

I was lost. Again.

He knew it, and he threw another quick look at the others before he continued in a hushed tone. "Fannie is not as powerful as you are, Frey. You would have to be... out of the picture... for her to rule."

"She's stronger than Asher? I'm stronger than Asher?"

"She's counting on council disposing of him." I didn't miss that he'd avoided my part of the Asher question again.

My hands were shaking, I tried to calm myself before the blackness came. Grey waited, uneasy.

"Why am I the leader? If Asher is alive, why would I be ruler?" I looked directly at him. "Am I stronger than Asher?"

His tone was severe. "No one is stronger than Asher."

That threw me. "Then why?"

"It's very complicated, Frey. Grand Council intends to take him out again-"

I cut him off. "Again?"

He was frustrated now. "Frey, just..."

Grey trailed off as he heard someone approaching and then abruptly concocted a new conversation. "So you'll want to try and anticipate where I'll strike... oh, hey Ruby. Ready to go?"

I had to work to conceal my growl of irritation. Ruby eyed me suspiciously.





We rode late into the evening and the group was silent as darkness fell. We were deep in a forest when we finally stopped. I slid down from my horse and found a downed tree to lean against. Ruby brought me a blanket and then cornered Grey, something I was sure she'd been dying to do since the afternoon's practice.

I had started to doze off when Chevelle sat on the tree beside where my head rested and I immediately sat up, alert.

"Sleep, Frey."

Yeah, right. I sighed and tried to settle back in to the comfortable spot I'd had before.

It wasn't happening. I had to work to keep my thoughts from returning to questions about Fannie and Asher. About me. That was possibly the most disturbing part. It was starting to sink in that I was expected to be a ruler, and that it was something people wanted. Enough to kill me for. I had always disliked Fannie but it was still hard to believe she'd be so selfish, so... evil. Not that I hadn't wished her dead a few times, but geez. And if it was so important, why was Asher not the one? At least he had his mind, for Elvin's sake.