Chapter Forty

Torch the ships.

Poison the generals.

These plans were getting worse and worse. I should tell Erik. But…

Katrina. Did I want to implicate her?

And despite everything, Stefan was my friend, too—more like a brother than my real ones. We’d fought, we had, but I didn’t want him dead or imprisoned or worse.

I couldn’t tell Erik.

I had to tell Erik.

The rain slowed to a drizzle, sheening off the cliff faces and the birds nested there. Pocks dappled the sand and droplets gleamed, clung to cook spoons and cast irons, the silver-orange coats of cats. In the dim and dizzying dark, their eyes flashed.

A hiss, a yowl, the cluck of chickens and shapes of the Sanokes rose wild. And there were the cliffs, the sea, everything hard and heavy, hewn from mountain stone. And me, a whisper, a ghost, there then gone.

If we stole the boxes, it wouldn’t matter. There would be no need to murder the generals. Either the Volds would leave to attack Larland, or Erik and I would release whatever was in there and drive them out.

If we stole the boxes, everything would be okay.

If we stole the boxes.

And if we failed?

Icy winds threaded through my hair. Black waves tumbled down the beach.

If we failed?

We couldn’t fail.

I had three days.

The vents in Lothgar’s tent had been peeled back, letting in the ocean, the scents of salt and lightning, fresh and clean, but beneath them hid the ripeness of unwashed skin and the sour stench of death.

Lothgar was laid out on a mass of bedrolls, the great general tucked between layers of pelts and silver furs. His beard had been shaved and his hair combed out of his face, making him seem younger.

Signey sat at one side, her fingers laced through his, squeezing tight. Erik sat at the other, a bowl of water at his hip.

His gaze flicked to mine.

My heart stuttered.

I won’t let them do this to you.

I won’t let you die.

Three days.

“How’s he doing?” I asked, settling beside Erik.

The heat of his leg brushed mine and he shrugged. “He’s…how I expected.”

“And you?”

Another shrug.

I laced my fingers through his, felt the thrum of his heart. It was easy, so easy to sink into this, into the rhythm of the past few days.

Pearls of water pilled on the canvas, a scattering of stars.

“We’ve been telling stories,” he said after a moment. “Signey just told how she got her honor bead.”

“Tormod’s Keep,” she added, pressing Lothgar’s hand to her cheek. “And you got yours from catching a horse.”

“A very big horse.”

“Tell me about it,” I said. “The horse.”

Erik stiffened. “Catching Heggi? Alright.” He released my hand and pulled the leather cord from under his shirt, showing me the two silver beads I’d seen him fiddling with. “Heggi is Volgaard’s heart.”

“Volgaard’s heart is a horse?”

He traced his thumb along the lattice of the beads. “All places have hearts, Isabel. Don’t you know that?”

I shook my head.

“Heggi came by our house every morning, trailing smoke and stars. I watched Dad watch him, and I knew he wanted him. Wanted Heggi. So I decided to catch him.”

Signey wet a rag and wiped it over Lothgar’s forehead. “This is when you find out Erik is really stupid.”

Erik shot her a glare. “I was fourteen.”

I placed my hand between the furs, the silken strands slipping through my fingers. “So let me get this straight. You caught the heart of Volgaard when you were fourteen?” Somehow, I wasn’t surprised.

He tucked the beads back into his shirt. “That’s the first time I ever Sent. In my panic, I made a second version of Heggi. The real Heggi stopped to look at the mirror one, and I put the halter on. Dad was so proud, he gave me two honor beads. One for Heggi, one for Sending. But I didn’t care about the beads. I cared about Dad. I wanted him to…” He scrubbed a hand over his face. “Well. It doesn’t matter. But that’s how I caught Heggi.”

The distant roar of waves filled the silence.

“Hey, Erik?”

His gaze cut to mine. “Yeah?”

“It matters.”

He let out a shaky breath. “Thanks.”

“So, what happened?” I asked. “Where is Heggi now?”

Signey shrugged. “Dad rode him once and decided he liked not having a broken neck. Plus, I don’t think things like that are meant to be owned. So we let him—”

Lothgar’s breathing fell out of rhythm. Dry sucks became rasping exhales. One hand went limp, the other spasmed, his knuckles flushing red. It opened and closed.

“Something’s obstructing his air,” I said. “I need a knife. Some alcohol and…and poppy.”

For a moment, the tent dropped away, and I saw it growing along the base of the cliffs, ruffly petals corrugated with wrinkles, delicate veins that seemed to connect everything and there, the heartbeat, the pulse, and I was reaching for it, grasping, crawling on my knees, and the world seemed to be a hand, gentle and smooth, fingers outstretched, a mother reaching through the darkness.

Reaching back.

The breathing stopped. Lothgar’s hand stilled and fell, lifeless, between the furs.

The thoughts of the poppy, of the reaching mother dropped from my mind, fish wriggling free from a net. I leaned forward and placed my fingers at the base of Lothgar’s throat. There was no thrum of a heartbeat, no throb of a pulse, only the cooling touch of a body just dead. I went to find Erik’s eyes, but instead, I met the fragile gray of Signey’s.

I half expected her to cry. After all, that would be the normal response. Instead, she nodded once and left the tent, coming back a few minutes later with a knife and a fresh water bowl. Together she and Erik stripped the blankets and Lothgar’s yellowed clothes. Signey sponged down his arms, his legs, cleaned the grime from his nails. She eased the knife into his chest cavity, then used the flat of her hand to crack the ribs.

She peeled them open and pulled out his heart.

And the way she cradled it, it felt too bizarre, too intimate. I pushed myself out of the tent and let the cold air wash over me.

Waves beat against the rocks and sand. I should have gone back to Erik’s tent, but I needed to crawl out from the clog of sickness. I needed to breathe.

I stripped off my shoes and stockings and walked barefoot up the moon-beamed beach, leaving behind a string of footprints that were pearled away every time the waves rushed the shore.

She’d carved out his heart.

She’d cradled his heart.

I wasn’t sure what that meant.

Wet sand glittered like glass as foam blew across my feet. The sky stretched black and endless.

No stars tonight.

When I came back down, a lone figure sat in a scoop in the rocks, his face toward the horizon. I climbed next to him, blew on my freezing fingers, and stared out at the wild sea.

“You okay?” I asked.

“Yes.” No. Erik squinted at the sky.

I wished I knew what to say, but I wasn’t good with words, didn’t have Hans’s easy heart. I couldn’t make him laugh or smile or smooth away the pain.

I could just…be.

Here.

With him.

And maybe that was enough.

“He was the first person who believed in me,” Erik said after a while. “As soon as he realized I could Send, he took me in and made me—” He clenched his fist. “I should be grateful. Instead, all I want is to make him hurt.”

“You’re not—” I followed his squint to the sky. “That doesn’t make you a terrible person.”

He glanced at me, wary. “He wanted me. You’re telling me I’m not terrible for hating that?”

“I’m telling you, you’re human. At least, I’m pretty sure—” I reached up to pinch his cheek, but he caught my hand.

I waited for him to release it.

He didn’t let me go.

I laced my fingers through his and pinched the soft webbing with my thumb and forefinger.

He sighed. “That’s for panic attacks.”

“I know. Tell me something. About you.”

“So many personal questions.”

“You like them.”

His eyes flashed, greedy, a little raw. “After Lothgar learned I could Send, he would…train me. Days without food, pushed to the brink of exhaustion.” Erik slid his hand away. “Reykr is like a muscle, it has to be worked. It’s why the men… Well, it’s why they cast stupid things for each other. It’s why I had the forest in the bedroom.”

“And the ships?”

“Which I dropped.” Erik shook his head. “Yeah, he wasn’t too happy about that.”

“Weren’t you Sending for six days? Did you even sleep?”

“Sleeping, eating, Sending. That was about it. Lothgar…he didn’t just make me work my reykr, he—” His fists tightened. “He said he was making me strong.”

“I don’t blame you for hating him.”

“I was being honed into, I don’t know. Something .” Erik laughed, short and bitter. “He treated his dogs better.”

“Is that how you lost the tip of your finger?”

The corner of his mouth lifted. “Oh. That. Trying to impress Signey. You know, little brother stuff.”

Ocean spray dappled our clothes, our hair.

“We were close once,” he continued. “If you would believe it. She helped me sneak out of Lothgar’s house on more than one occasion. She’d stand guard while I went swimming.”

“Swimming?”

He shrugged, one-shouldered. “It was the only place I felt like myself. Lothgar was making me into…whatever he was making me into, and I liked the feeling of water—of not being able to tell where I started and the lake began. I guess that’s a funny way to feel like yourself. But yeah. Swimming.”

Swimming . I hadn’t been since…well, a long time. Maybe before I left Hjern. But I knew what that was like, not being able to unravel into your own skin.

And swimming.

The only place he felt like himself.

Waves broke, dark and wild, a little unsteady. A clutch of puffins floated offshore.

Reckless and suddenly brave, I ducked out from the scoop of the rock and tugged my sweater up and over my head, tossing it on the sand beside us.

His brows pinched, a question, and I knew what he saw—the knots of scar tissue beginning beneath my chest and disappearing into the folds of my skirt, the discolored skin so ugly, so raw.

“How did you…?”

They’re terrible. I know. “Don’t worry about it.”

He blinked, shook his head. “ What are you—”

“Swimming.”

“You can’t go swimming. You’re in the middle of my camp.”

“You’re right. Which is why—” I loosened the buttons of my skirt. One, two, three. I shimmied out of it, tossed it away, and I was standing in front of him in nothing but my underthings.

Cool air whisked my legs, made gooseflesh pebble. Another wave licked the shore, a spray of mist settling over us like a shawl.

“You should come with me.”

His eyes raked over my body, his gaze molten, and now he wasn’t looking at the scars… He was looking at me .

“You can Send and—”

With one decisive motion, he waved his hand and the camp pearled away like dust. He stripped off his shirt, pulled off his boots, and dropped them into the sand with a thud . It was just the two of us, alone on a sweeping beach. Grass thatched. Moonlight spilled.

I see you, I see you , said the wind.

“Isabel.”

“Yes?”

His mouth tipped up, whatever spell between us broken. He grabbed my hand and pulled me toward the waterline.

A white-tipped wave swirled around our ankles. Followed by another so frigid it made my entire body constrict, but he pulled me deeper into the belly of the ocean, through the bend and break of waves, and into dark waters. When our feet no longer scraped the sands, he let me go.

“There’s Fiski,” he said, paddling into the freezing black. “Can you see it?”

The ocean curled around my body, stung my eyes.

I squinted to where he was pointing, but all I saw was the moon, waxy and full, the night sharp as steel. No stars. There hadn’t been since—

It hit me. I laughed. That’s what the Lover’s Box took.

I couldn’t see the stars.

Waves slapped around my shoulders, the water salty and cold. I paddled toward him. “Can’t see it.”

“It’s right there,” he said, gesturing at the empty sky. “There’s his boat, his pole.”

I stopped a few feet away to tread water. “Mmm, still can’t.” Not that I’d ever tell him why. “Why don’t you—”

He hooked his arm around my waist and spun me to face him, and suddenly, my hands were pressed against his chest, the heat of him cutting through the chill of the waves.

“I can show you,” he said. The words were hot, a little breathless. Spray dappled his cheeks, freckled his lips. Dark water lapped around us. “With reykr. I can make them brighter, connect the lines. Fiski…it’s so beautiful.”

He wasn’t looking at Fiski. His eyes dropped to my mouth. His breath hitched and he reached up, smoothed a strand of hair behind my ear. His thumb lingered on my jaw.

I leaned forward and kissed him, a quick peck. There, then gone.

He startled, his eyes going wide.

Shit. That hadn’t been what he wanted. I’d thought— shit . I tore out of his grip and paddled toward the beach. “It would be great if you could show me Fiski. I—”

He caught my wrist, pulled me back. “Isabel Moller,” he growled. “You are not allowed to kiss me, then awkwardly swim away.”

His mouth found mine and suddenly, I could taste it—the hurt, the pain, the longing—everything he kept locked up, and I could see him, all of him, and I kissed him back, clutching his chest, his skin taking and taking, and—

His teeth scraped my lip and he nipped. I nipped back. He groaned, his knee coming between my thighs, one hand cupping my hip. The other pressed against the small of my back, guiding me closer. He pulled away, lips swollen, before dipping his head and trailing kisses down my neck, stopping at my collarbone and sucking lightly.

“You like that, don’t you?” he asked, dragging his tongue over the spot and sucking again. “You like when I mark you.”

Yes, I liked it. A lot. Too shy to say, I tilted my head back, exposing more of my throat to him.

He trailed kisses along it, stopping sometimes to nip and suck, and I was absolutely going to need a lot of complexion cream after this. A lot , a lot.

“Your body is so responsive,” he murmured. “Which I love.”

He anchored me to his leg and hoisted me higher, cold night air washing my shoulders and chest. He nuzzled down my breast band and trailed kisses toward my—

Wow.

Yes.

Okay.

He could suck there.

A soft whimper escaped my lips.

His eyes flicked up, his mouth still on my skin, and he sucked harder, his lashes dark, making me gasp and shiver while he watched . Some primal part of me wanted to rub myself against his leg, but he held my hips, keeping me in place as his thumbs traced little circles over the bones there.

I wanted to melt.

He lowered me into the water and caught my unharmed ear between his teeth. “So fucking responsive. But as much as I like making you make those cute sounds, I think I’d rather…”

“Rather…?”

“Get back to this.” He traced his fingers down my cheek, tilting my face toward his, and capturing my mouth in another searing kiss.

I tangled my fingers through his hair and kissed him back, pressed my body against his chest to steal some of his warmth. He moaned, and something in me surged because his body was so fucking responsive too. I deepened the kiss, letting my tongue dart out to meet his.

He must have read it as a request to set the rhythm, because he slowed and let me take the lead, but my technique was clumsy, my inexperience showing. A familiar thing clawed at my chest. Was I doing this right? I’d had pecks on the lips, brief and chaste. He’d kissed Helene in the Merchant’s Market, and who knows how many girls before that. Suddenly, I couldn’t breathe and maybe—

He pulled away, eyes dark, a little hazy. “Are you okay?”

Was I okay? I searched for that doubt, for the things that whispered you’re not enough , and they were there, were lurking, were shadows sitting beneath the surface, but Erik was looking at me now like I was an angel, a dream, the answer to every prayer he’d ever whispered. And with that look?

He

chased

the

doubt

away.

“I am.” The words came out a little breathless. “Okay. More than okay.”

Water splashed around his shoulders. He loosened his grip, letting me slide off his leg. “You sure? We can stop.”

I crawled back onto him. “I don’t want to stop.”

Then I gathered the pieces of my heart, scarred and broken.

And I gave myself to him.