Runes and Red Sails (Queenmaker Book 1)(75)

She heard the wind still howling. But there were cracks of daylight through her eyelids now.

Time had passed but she did not know how much. She had drifted in and out. At least once she had lurched awake to vomit up stinging hot seawater and reeking bile.

A cold nose pressed against her cheek, and she heard Embla’s whine.

“Good girl,” she croaked and ran her fingers through the hound’s salt-bristled fur. “Good, good girl.”

Gingerly, she rubbed a palm against her puffy face. Sand, salt, and flakes of what she guessed to be blood fell away as she rubbed in slow circles. Beneath the swelling she could feel bruises spreading along the bone.

Every thread of muscle in her body ached. Every joint was creaking stiff. Her tongue had swollen to push her jaws apart.

Little by little, she worked an eye open. Sunlight split cracks in her skull, but she was still glad to see it.

The storm was over.

They had sheltered in the mouth of a cave along a narrow, sandy shelf. It looked as though the tide was high now, and the waves washed up to the edge of the boulders at her feet.

Joints in her back popped as she turned. It was less a cave than a tunnel, sloping up to a shining circle of sky above. The wind whistled at the edges of the hollow as it swept through.

Eyvind was in rough shape. What little of his skin was left unbruised was pallid and clammy to the touch. His breathing was shallow. Embla lay at his side and whined.

Aelfhild risked standing. It took more than one attempt.

There was nothing outside their cave, little wreckage besides a few floating boards and some sailcloth. And no other survivors.

Her swollen throat could produce nothing over a whisper. Yelling for help would have to wait.

She imagined Ceolwen nearby, hurt and alone.

Her mistress needed her.

Shaking Eyvind’s shoulder got no response. His lips were chapped bloody and broken.

Water. Find water, then find the others, she thought.

Ceolwen is alive, Ceolwen needs water. She chanted to herself as she limped into the cave. Ceolwen is alive, Ceolwen needs water.

The tunnel ran at a steep angle toward the ground above. She shimmied along the rock face despite her protesting muscles. The exit was narrow, but she wormed her shoulders through one at a time. Her hips stuck, and she swung in mid-air for a moment.

Ceolwen is alive, Ceolwen needs you.

Her fingernails cracked as she pulled at the earth in front of her and dragged the rest of her torso onto the ledge.

The chalky, sun-swept limestone of the cliffs was too bright for her smarting eyes, and she shaded her face with both hands. Delicate bridges of the white stone arched amongst the columns, islands, and canyons carved from the coast by eons of rainfall.

There were pits and caves all around, but she saw no other life from her perch besides the algae coating the rocks. And no water save for the sea below.

She stumbled into a puddle left by the storm. Dropping to her knees, she took a sip. The water was sweet and cold. She slurped until there was nothing but a stain left on the rocks.

She found another pool at the bottom of a shallow crevice. Eyvind needed water, but she had nothing to carry it. Lifting him through the tunnel was out of the question.

She cast her eyes around.

You are dead, girl, and you know it. This is all just wasting time.

She tried to push the voice down.

Look at the grand adventurer now! How could you ever think you were more than a mere servant?

“Not now,” she hissed. She shook away the tears that blurred her vision. “Think!”

Her gaze dropped to the hem of her tunic. It was torn along the lower edge.

She had an idea.

What she could not tear, she cut with her beltknife. When there was a sizable enough ball of wool in her hands, she dunked it into the water. It emerged sodden and dripping.

She slid back down to Eyvind and squeezed the cloth over his lips. Much had been lost along the way, but she was able to wring out a trickle of freshwater. The Thrym sputtered as drops fell on his tongue, and she propped a foot under his back.

It took her several trips up and down the cliff, but eventually he opened his bloodshot eyes. He sucked at the damp cloth before speaking.

“The others?”

“Not yet,” she said, ramming confidence behind every word for her own sake as much as his. “We will find them. Rest.”

He nodded and lay back.

She went back up to the clifftop and gazed out across the empty landscape.

We will find them, she repeated to herself.

Then she turned her eyes skyward.

“You will not beat me!”





It would have been easy to have died. To have lain on that beach and sobbed and waited and shriveled into nothingness. It would have been easy to let them win. “They” were a loose weave in Aelfhild’s mind, everyone and everything—Osric, Leofstan, Sindri, nobles, the world, Fate, the Gods.

But she stood on that thin spit of land washed by an uncaring ocean and vowed that they would not have an easy victory.

It had taken time, but Eyvind had his feet beneath him now and together they hoisted Embla through the tunnel’s mouth. Aelfhild had to brace both feet against the earth and yank Eyvind’s arm to get his broader frame through the gap. They had no destination but shuffled along the ledges and clambered around gaps in the stone in search of any sign of life or wreckage. The wind snatched any and all cries for help out to sea, so they relied on their eyes.