The Girl the Sea Gave Back(43)

I sank down beneath the surface and let the hum of the current drown out everything else. The sunlight cast the water into a jeweled blue and I let the air burn in my chest, my heart beating in my ears. The sound of Aghi’s voice returned to me, the deep rasp of it like a fire. His clear eyes and auburn beard streaked with silver.

War is easy.

The moment we walked through Hylli’s gate, the Nādhir would look to me. But only I knew what Espen and Aghi and the others had failed to see.

They’d chosen me for peace, not war.

The aging leaders of the villages had placed their faith in me for the wrong fate. And as soon as the Svell arrived, ready and able to take everything we had, they’d know it, too.

When my lungs couldn’t take any more, I shot up out of the water with a gasp. The sun was warm, the smell of winter no longer on the wind. Spring was coming. The ice was melting. And there was nothing to slow the Svell from the battle they wanted.

“We should sleep an hour.” Asmund sank down at the river’s edge to take a drink. He arched an eyebrow at me when I didn’t answer. “You’d rather fall off your horse?”

His eyes dropped to the covered wound at my side. If I didn’t clean it, I’d be half dead before the Svell arrived at the edge of our forest. But I wasn’t the only one Asmund was thinking of. Bard’s face was painted a pale white from the blood he’d lost. He needed rest if he was going to have a chance at making it to the fjord.

“One hour. That’s it,” I said.

I unwrapped the bandage beneath my armor vest carefully, wincing as I pulled the last of it back from where it was stuck to the raw, open skin. It hadn’t even begun to heal, the flesh around the opening inflamed and swollen where it had torn.

Asmund pulled Bard’s saddle down and dropped it in the dirt before his own and he came to sit beside me, reaching into his vest for a bundle of dried venison. Dark blood streaked two deep cuts carved into the back of his hand.

“You’re hurt,” I said, holding the tin of salve out to him.

“It’s fine.” He didn’t take it, looking down at his hand as if he’d forgotten it was there. He tore a piece of the venison in two and put it in his mouth. Behind him, Bard lay back onto the saddle and closed his eyes.

He let out a long breath, chewing. “What will happen? When you get to Hylli?”

“I’m not sure,” I admitted. I’d been careful not to think about it.

“They’ll initiate you, won’t they? As chieftain of the Nādhir?”

I leaned my elbows onto my knees, staring into the dirt. “I don’t know if he’ll accept me.”

“Who?” Asmund’s brow pulled.

“Latham.”

He shrugged. “He has to.”

But Latham wasn’t the kind of man that could be made to do anything. After Espen, he was the oldest leader of the Nādhir and if he rejected me, I knew the others might follow. Maybe they should.

“I would understand if he didn’t.”

“They chose you, Halvard. They agreed.”

But that wasn’t what I meant and he knew it. Espen and the other leaders hadn’t chosen me for this.

We sat in silence as Bard fell asleep, and Asmund watched him, crossing his arms over his chest as he leaned back against the tree. He was worried. “Will he be alright?”

“He won’t fight,” I said, “but he’ll be alright.”

“He won’t like that.” He laughed.

I spread the salve over the burned skin and rewrapped it carefully as Asmund settled down to sleep and Kjeld took the place against the tree beside me, cleaning the blood from his axe.

“Who is she?” I asked again, sucking in a breath as I tightened the knot of the bandage.

Kjeld wiped the curve of the blade against the thick wool of his pants. “Someone who’s not supposed to be alive.”

He let the axe fall back into the sheath at his back and rolled over, and I looked up to the sky, still shrouded in thick cloud cover. We’d be back in Hylli before the day was out. Back to the salty smell of the fjord and the silvery light on the water. I tried not to close my eyes. Sleep held too many faces I didn’t want to see. Voices that made my insides ache. I stared at the glitter of light on the rippling water of the river until the sun was overhead, painting everything in yellow light.

And as the warmth of the sun came, so did the remembering. It wedged its fingers inside my ribs and grabbed hold of my heart, squeezing. Because those days were gone. For all of us. So many mornings, Asmund and I had drifted out into the current as boys and thrown the nets against the wind. We’d sat around fires at night, laughing and listening to the stories my brothers told. And I wondered if this was my last story. The thought lifted like a wall of fog creeping toward me.

I was a torch in the wind.

I was flickering out.





CHAPTER NINETEEN


TOVA


There were no omens for this. No signs or rune stones or prayers to be uttered.

I walked through the forest, Jorrund and Gunther at my back, with the cold weight of the head in my hands. I clutched it to my chest, the blood staining the front of my dress and the face turned up at me. Mouth open. Skin yellow and gray.

He’d known me. The Kyrr’s eyes had held recognition when they met mine. I didn’t know why he was on the mainland or why he was with Halvard, but he’d known me. And if he knew me, then he knew my story.