41. Hector

CHAPTER FORTY-ONE

HECTOR

H is consort .

Oh, I wasn't sure we were anything so serious as that. I wouldn't have minded, and we'd certainly discussed what we were to each other while wearing serious, manly expressions.

You're mine .

I want only you .

I'll live if you will .

I didn't doubt what we meant to each other, but despite the way we'd spoken aloud, we'd made no specific promises. I wasn't his consort, but I liked the moniker. The numb, tingling feeling in my fingers since I'd swung that hammer disappeared at the warmth that rushed through me.

"Thank you," I murmured to Killian.

He huffed, his jaw flexing in annoyance, his glare darting to the southerner like he posed too much of a risk to ignore. "I don't like this."

"Which part?"

Grumbling, he dropped his head and pressed his cool mouth against my shoulder, sweaty and overheated from a day spent in front of the forge.

"That they are here," he finally admitted, glancing up at me from beneath the fan of his pale lashes.

My breath caught, and I forgot the horror of only minutes before—the stranger, sword in hand, lunging for Nym. Swinging my hammer at his side without thinking. The worst of it—a moment of work and contemplation, interrupted by murderous intent.

"We'll figure it out. I promise." It seemed impossible, that the southerner would come here by chance, stumble his way into the smithy after miraculously slipping past every guard and soldier on the wall and beyond. This felt more pointed than that.

Killian nodded, but he didn't leave the forge until the prisoner had been taken away and every smith had given up work for the day.

That night, I wrote to Helena.

In all my wondering about how to solve the problem at hand, I had one large blank space around what the south was actually like. If I would solve this, I needed to get a better handle on what we were dealing with.

Helena said the Raven collected stories.

Days ticked by while I waited for their reply—while Killian waited for me to ask my questions of our captive.

In the end, it was Helena herself who came. All night, we sat up discussing what she'd learned of the south. The Nemedans were very sure that the southerners were brutal, selfish to the point of being self-destructive, and desired nothing more than Avianitis.

Perhaps they were right, but having survived the illness myself, I couldn't imagine risking life and limb for the opportunity to die at the hands of someone who loved me. There had to be more to this than the bird form that Nemedans rarely even used to fight their unending war.

The next morning, after only a couple hours' sleep, I woke as Killian sat up. It was like I'd been waiting for him, and my eyes simply popped open.

"I want to go and see him today."

It'd been days of waiting, holding us all in this stasis while I tried to puzzle it out—not just this one man, but the southlands as a whole. Understanding still eluded me, and the only recourse was hoping that in speaking directly, this one would be as frank and honest as Carlyle had been.

Killian's cheeks puffed out before he let out a slow breath. "I'll go with you."

The Crane palace was not well arranged to hold prisoners. In fact, the very idea seemed contrary to how Nemeda functioned. People weren't tucked away and problems forgotten. Instead, they held each other, bound to oaths of honesty.

Since the war, I suspected there'd simply not been reason to keep many prisoners alive.

The room they'd kept this one in was more pleasant than any in Urial's palace, to be sure. It had a large, open window that overlooked a stream, cut so artfully through the garden that it must've been intentionally made.

Guards stood over him, kept him bound and on his knees, but all of this—it was still at odds with what I'd assumed war would look like.

With a jerk of his head, Killian sent the guards away. The southerner was still bound, and I crouched before him.

"I'm Hector," I said, pleasant as I'd ever been in Urial's court. "I'd say it's a pleasure to meet you, but..."

The southerner grunted.

"If you're here for Avianitis, perhaps I could find someone willing to fuck you?" Yes, it was up in the air whether the illness took without some affection, but if we didn't know the specifics, neither did the southerner, and I wanted to see something.

The southerner caught his breath, his eyes wide. "My feet belong to the earth."

Behind me, Killian shifted his weight.

I ignored him. "So you, at least, don't want a bird?"

The southerner's jaw flexed. He did not answer, but the way he withdrew was clear enough.

"What do you want?"

The man sneered, but he provided no answer.

"We could slit your throat here, leave you with nothing. I would prefer to speak with you."

The man shot his glare back at me. "We watched."

"Watched what?"

"When you raised your giants' bows."

"The bolt throwers?"

The man scoffed, turned his head, and spat on the ground. "Coward weapons. Bad enough, those spears the birds use." He threw his chin at Killian behind me. "Too fearful to face us like men. But there is no honor in your bows. You mean to shoot us down like dogs."

"We mean to protect Nemeda," Killian growled.

I held up a hand, and I heard him shuffle behind me and sigh.

"We mean to protect our people," I said.

The man sucked in his cheeks and glanced away. Perhaps that, at least, he could understand.

"That's what we fight for—the people."

"And as you hide behind your walls and bows, the gods will strike you down. They will burn your very soul to ash for your cowardice."

My lips twitched. "Not my gods."

The southerner jerked back. " Your gods?"

"In Urial, there are gods in every snowdrift. They don't care for us any more than they care for the grass they cover in winter. They burn nothing—not souls, not brush."

He looked at me like I'd gone mad. "You do not fear your gods?"

I shook my head. "I fear losing the people I love without rhyme or reason."

He grunted. "You will lose them in this life and the next."

"Do you mean that as a threat?"

"Truth is no threat."

"So you mean to take those I love, no matter what I say here?"

"The gods," he said. "I take nothing."

"I want to understand. Would you please elaborate?"

His voice turned sharp and annoyed, like a teacher who'd given the same lesson dozens of times. "If you do not prove you are brave of heart and strong of fist, the gods will burn you away. Your mothers and daughters may see the other side, but you will be gone. You will lose them."

"And that is why you fight—to prove your bravery and strength?"

"It is why we will take the birds," he sneered between his teeth.

He was so ardent, so sure, that it overwhelmed me. I stood, and when I turned toward the door, Killian followed. He already knew everything he needed to about the southerners.

In the corridor, he touched my back between my shoulder blades. "You see now? We can't reason with them. Brutality is too intrinsic to their culture. It won't end."

I looked up, but Killian had averted his eyes. Disappointment fell heavy over him. Perhaps he could wage war, maybe win it if he set his mind to vengeance, but that was not his nature. No god pressed Killian to war.

"That is not acceptable to me," I said.

Killian scowled. "I'm not sure you get to decide."

His face was smooth beneath my palm when I cupped his cheek. "I cannot wait to see who you are without the burden of bloodshed on your shoulders."

Killian blinked, wide eyed. His lips fell slack when I brushed my thumb across them.

Then I turned away. I needed to see Helena, speak to someone who hadn't been trapped in this since birth. I would find a way to end this, and I would live the rest of my life knowing that the people I loved were safe.