The Cursed Queen (The Impostor Queen #2)(46)
She doesn’t try to pull away from him, but I can tell by the tension in her posture that she wants to. “If that is what is best for my warriors. I have not yet decided.”
“Nor should you.” He puts his arm over her shoulders and guides her toward the tower entrance. “Come inside and let your warriors settle their bones. Tonight we will feast. You will tell me what has happened, and I will tell you everything I have planned.” He turns back to all of us. “Are you ready to stuff your bellies full of fresh meat and warm bread?” he shouts.
“Aye!” Jaspar and his warriors roar, along with several of ours. My stomach growls at the thought of bread, in spite of the wariness in Thyra’s gaze as she looks us over. But then she jerks her head toward the tower, telling us to get inside.
I obey, along with all the others. Our trek to the south is over. All the Krigere warriors are within these walls or just outside the city, but as I see Nisse enclose Thyra in another embrace she cannot possibly want, I know our journey has only just begun.
*
We lay our blankets down in a dank collection of little chambers set along a stone walkway that Jaspar calls a corridor. My shoulders are hunched up around my ears the whole time—it feels like this whole place could cave in and crush us at any moment. All our own warriors look equally nervous, eyeing windows and arched doorways and staircases as if pondering escape. I share a chamber with four other warriors, one of them Tue, Aksel’s best friend, who slinks around like a whipped dog, eyeing me with resentment. Thyra has taken Sander, Preben, and Bertel into her own chamber, and she seemed to be deliberately avoiding my gaze as she made the assignments.
Once again I wonder if I should be here at all. My curse has been quiet today, and I have done nothing to call attention to myself, just as she asked. Despite his questions this morning, Jaspar seems to have believed my lies, though he sought out my eyes numerous times this afternoon. Sander hasn’t said a word or thrown me a single suspicious look all day. Things are as she wants them to be—I am just another warrior. I am nothing out of the ordinary. But she gives me no window or doorway back to her side.
Jaspar’s words return to me over and over again—she has had my loyalty, and what has she done with it? She’s treating me as one of her secondary warriors instead of her wolf, the one who has guarded her sleep and stayed by her side. The one she kissed. The one she was cruel enough to give hope to. She’s discarded me like a bone. She’s stripped away what was useful and tossed the rest. The hurt burns in me like a smith’s fire, low and hot and utterly unquenchable. It doesn’t help that the others look at me warily, no doubt wondering what has changed.
We wash the dirt from our faces and hands—not in a stream and not in the lake, but with water that comes from a metal tube stuck in the ground, which only flows when you crank up and down on a pump attached to its head. The others shiver, telling me that it feels like the water came from the heart of winter herself, but somehow, it simply feels cool to me. Thyra’s skin is bright red as she splashes it over her cheeks and hair.
The others change into spare tunics if they have them, but I remain in mine, as my other is stained with blood and smells like burned flesh and I’d prefer to keep my wounds from my fight with Aksel well covered. They itch and ache and are barely closed, and I clench my teeth as I tighten the sheaths on my forearms. We all keep our weapons strapped to our hips and calves and arms and backs by Thyra’s order. Until she is sure of Nisse’s intentions, she wants us to remain ready. We all know that fighting would result in death—they outnumber us three to one—and fewer than fifty of us are actually within the castle walls. But we would take a staggering number of Nisse’s warriors down with us, and Thyra is obviously hoping the threat is enough to stave off a possible ambush.
Jaspar appears long after the sun sets and our bellies have begun to growl. “Chieftain Nisse waits in the grand hall!” The bright look in his green eyes softens when he looks at me, and he frowns and glances at Thyra, who is deep in conversation with Bertel. I close my eyes and look away. I don’t want to see the confirmation in his expression that she has abandoned me.
We follow him down the corridor to another and another. This place reminds me of the ant mounds we used to dig up as children, searching for their queen so we could watch them scramble and scatter without her. Now I am part of such a mound, and I feel for those little ants, lost within their mazes.
The way is lit by torches, but it feels gloomy and close all the same. That is, until we reach a high arched doorway and enter a massive cavern of a chamber. Ten long wooden tables that seat at least fifty each are arrayed within, and at the front of the room, on a raised platform, is yet another long table. I look for where we will sit and realize that Nisse has already filled many of the places with his own warriors, but they have left spaces hither and thither to accommodate the few of us that Thyra brought inside the castle.
“How clever,” Thyra murmurs as she realizes what he’s done. United with former friends and kin they haven’t seen in a year, her senior warriors’ loyalties are about to be tested.
Jaspar starts to walk up to the head table, where Nisse stands, waiting for us to join him. Half the seats at his table are empty, allowing Thyra to have an equal number. She begins to call out names, the warriors she has drawn close. Sander, Preben, and Bertel are among them. I am not. As that group marches up to the table, Jaspar strides back to our group with a hard look on his face. “Ansa, please join us.”