Chapter 3

The morning bell echoed through the mountain. I blinked open my eyes and rubbed my puffy skin, sorely regretting the fifth—or sixth—ale I'd downed before bedtime last night. Ragnar and Lilia had stayed for hours. One drink had turned into another, and before we all knew it, we were happily slurring our words and shout-singing our favorite bard tunes.

Now a rock in my head pounded the backs of my eyes, like someone was taking a pickaxe to it.

Ignoring the mess of tankards scattered throughout my kitchen, I rose and tugged on a fresh change of clothes before ambling out onto the pathway. My next-door neighbor, Yulla, was watering her flowers, her curtain of brown hair frizzing from the humidity. She paused and sent me a friendly wave, then she froze. Her wide eyes darted to the pin on my tunic. I hadn't put it there, of course. It had vanished from my previous day's garb and had reappeared on this one. Damn magic.

"You entered the competition?" Yulla asked, her face paling.

"No, someone else put forth my name," I said, shrugging. "Not that it matters. I won't try to win."

Visibly, she sighed, and the color returned to her cheeks. A prickle of irritation went through me. I'd have the same reaction in her place. Me? Competing? It was a recipe for disaster. I knew that better than anyone. But that was the rub, wasn't it? It was one thing for me to recognize my inadequacy, but it was quite another for a friend to see me that way, too.

For a moment, I had the unexpected urge to prove her wrong, but that feeling quickly dissipated. The competition, the trials, showing off my nonexistent skills? None of that mattered.

Yulla leaned back on her heels, wiping her hands across her deep green dress. "Where are you heading off to at the crack of dawn?"

Down here in The Deep, we had no know way of seeing the sun rise and fall, but we had a watchtower at the top of the mountain that provided a view of the world beyond. Most of us took turns up there, so we could signal the beginning and end of another day to everyone else. I was the only dwarf to have never done her duty in that regard.

"There's a tunnel I want to check out," I told her.

She arched a brow. "You think you might have a lead on your stone?"

"Something like that," I told her.

"You don't have your pickaxe on you," she noted.

"I don't need it today." I nodded to her flowers. Like me, she needed another box. "Looks like they're flourishing. Mind watering mine while you're at it?"

Yulla beamed. Flowers to her were like chocolate to me. She yearned for the days when she could get more than just green daisies, moss, and vines to grow in our underground village, but try as she might, nothing else survived. But still, she kept at it. Yulla was a stubborn little thing. A lot like me, I guessed.

"I'll do you one better than that," she countered with a beaming smile. "I got some new flower boxes the other day. Want one? I can move some of yours over to it."

"That would be lovely, Yulla. You really don't mind?"

"‘Course not. On one condition. You got that chocolate for me, right? Don't think I missed that silver-haired elf going into your house last night. And who was that hunky man with her?"

With a laugh, I lifted the gold-wrapped square of chocolate I'd set aside for her. "You mean this?"

She snapped her fingers together like claws. "Gimme."

I tossed the bar. It soared from my front door to her ledge, where she caught it in her open palm. With a wink, she unwrapped the chocolate and popped the square into her mouth. Her eyes practically rolled back into her head.

"So delicious," she said around a mouthful of food.

"Enjoy!" I twisted on my booted feet and traipsed across the bridge leading across the chasm. Wind whistled through the cavernous space, jingling the bells wound into my braided ginger hair. With a bounce in my step and a smile on my face, I wound through my little village and waved at every dwarf I passed. It took several hours for me to span the distance between the cheerful homes and the eerily silent mining tunnels three caverns over and ten ledges down.

I pulled a sunstone from my pack and held it aloft before me, my hand slightly shaking. This part of the mountain was so dark, I'd trip on stray rocks without a light to lead the way. Despite our overwhelming curiosity and stubbornness, us dwarves rarely ventured into this pocket of the mountain. No sunstones were found here. Only the rustle of scraping feet or the scent of rotten meat. Something else lived in these tunnels, and no one knew what.

No one except for me.

I pressed forward, my heart banging against my ribs. When I came to the fork in the tunnel, I stopped short and leaned against the cavern wall, waiting.

A tall demon with curved black horns emerged from the darkness I'd left behind me, the sunstone glinting against his dusky skin. Unlike the day before, he donned linen trousers and a simple black tunic that cut a sharp V in the front, revealing the hard planes of his well-muscled chest. Impressive. Not that I noticed.

"How long have you known I was following you?" Tormund asked, slowing to a stop and folding his arms over said chest.

I lifted my eyes to his face. "I thought I heard you one ledge up. Might have noticed sooner, but I'm not used to men stalking my every step."

"No?" His lips curved into a suggestive smile. "I assumed you had to scare them away with your pickaxe."

I flushed. "Flattery will get you nowhere with me. I'm not going to tell you where to find the Everstone."

"Only because you don't know where it is," he countered before lifting his gaze to scan the forked tunnel before us. "But you have more information than I do, and it brought you here. Which tunnel are you taking?"

"I have no idea what you mean," I said sweetly.

"You came straight here after I confronted you last night," he said. "I know you must think it's down one of these. Tell me which one."

"And why in fate's name would I do something like that?"

"Because I'm handsome and charming, and you want to help me."

I snorted. "You are definitely neither of those things."

Except that wasn't quite true. With his cutting jaw and dancing eyes, Tormund was not bad to look at by any means. But charming he was not. In fact, he was the opposite—so much so that I would rather gnaw on a rock than tell him he was handsome.

But instead of taking offense, he just laughed. "Nice try, but you can't get rid of me that easily." He pointed down the left tunnel. "Shall I try that one?"

I shrugged. "If you'd like."

Tormund examined my face, his eyes sweeping across every inch of my skin—down my forehead and across my cheeks—until they landed on my pursed lips. Then his gaze dragged down the length of my body, like he wanted to memorize every part of me. It took all my self-control to stand there and let him do it. Everything within me wanted to waltz out of this tunnel and never look back.

I hated being in his presence, and I especially hated his stare. And his eyes. And that muscled chest he probably thought made women swoon. It definitely had no effect on me, and I had the urge to tell him exactly that, just to annoy him.

Basically, I hated everything about him, despite hardly knowing anything at all.

Finally, his eyes returned to mine, and I swallowed. "You're tense. I think I will be taking the left one, then. Coming along?"

"No, I planned on going down the right-hand one," I replied—as tensely as possible for good measure. Anything to confuse him.

He cocked his head. "Trying to throw me off the scent? Again, nice try, Astrid, but you're far too easy to read."

"If you say so." Without another moment wasted in his company, I turned to the right and walked into the darkness with my sunstone held aloft. I'd noticed he hadn't brought one with him. A shadow demon thing, most likely. I'd only met a few over the years, but I'd heard tales. They often lived in underground dwellings, like us dwarves, but they didn't light up the shadows with sunstones. They drew upon the darkness, fed upon it.

I shivered at the thought.

After walking for a good ten minutes, I paused and listened for the echo of footsteps. A faraway drip was the only sound, which could mean any manner of things. I hadn't been lying when I'd told Tormund I hadn't heard him until we'd nearly reached these tunnels. He was far stealthier than any dwarf, which meant he could still be lurking somewhere behind me.

But I had a hunch he'd taken the bait.

I smiled, retraced my steps, and made the return trek to Steingard. Tormund never once appeared behind me again. He'd probably found what lurked in those tunnels. Or they had found him.

Good.

That would teach him to follow me around.

When I reached the bridge, I spotted Jostein waiting for me on my front stoop with a basket of moss cakes hanging from his beefy arm. My stomach growled in anticipation. I'd been in such a hurry to trick Tormund into following me to that tunnel that I'd forgotten to break my fast, a mistake I'd not made once in my twenty-six years. We spent so many long hours sweating away in the mines that it was unheard of to miss a meal.

"Heard what happened. Thought you might be in the mood for some cake," Jostein called out across the chasm, brushing back his white-streaked hair, so long it tangled with his bouncy beard. The cavernous wind snapped his words and tossed them across the village.

Jostein was one of the keepers of the mountain, and he led the competition every year. He was also one of my oldest friends and had become something of a father to me, since mine had died the year I was born. He'd always looked out for me. Poor thing was likely worried I'd hurt myself in the trials, and he'd come to make sure I had no illusions of winning.

"I'm always in the mood for cake," I called back with a smile.

He arched a brow as I crossed the bridge and joined him by my door. "I thought you'd be more upset than this. If anything, you seem…pleased? Did you want to enter?"

"‘Course I didn't want to enter." I swatted his arm. "But the way I see it, there's nothing I can do to change it, so I might as well make the best of my situation. Since I can't see the sunshine, I have to be the sunshine."

Jostein chuckled. "You and your sunshine obsession. Would it help if I told you it's not all it's cracked up to be?"

"Sunshine? Or the whole bloomin' world?"

"Take your pick." He reached into his basket and extracted a cake. "Down here, we have everything we need. Warmth, light, and water, of course. But we also have each other. The best damn community there ever was, if you ask me. You don't need to travel the world to find something better than us."

I took his offered cake. The warmth of it soothed the chilly ache in my hands. "I know that. I'm not like Lilia, Jostein. She loves to wander. Her feet will always itch to roam. Mine don't. I just…"

"Want to see the sun," he finished for me.

"Yeah," I said softly, then cleared my throat. "But right now, what I really want is to eat this moss cake. Is it your usual recipe?"

He nodded enthusiastically. "Beet sugar, rum, stalagmite milk, eggs, and cave wheat flour. And moss, of course."

"My mouth is watering already. Can't wait to have one."

He passed the basket to me. "Take the whole lot of them. Eat up. You're going to need the energy for these trials."

"I won't be trying that hard, but thank you. I'll never say no to moss cakes."

"Well, I'll still be right in front to cheer you on tonight."

I lowered my arm, and the basket hit my thigh. "Tonight?"

His brow furrowed. "Didn't you know that's when it starts? It's all anyone has been talking about for weeks."

"I've been focused on finding the Everstone. I had no intention of even watching this year's trials."

Lips set into a straight line, he plucked a moss cake from the basket and handed it to me. "You best get eating, then."