Page 100 of Blood Beneath the Snow

He shrugged. “Sure. It will be bloody.”

I forgot my initial excitement. Of course he wouldn’t want to talk about it. Battle destroyed him. He once described it as listening to the whole world scream directly in his ears.

We started riding, catching up with the marching army’s rearguard. Why had I been excited in the first place? I may have been anxious to use my newfound fighting skills, but this wasn’t the right place. Everything I’d learned from the Hellbringer was meant to bring my father down, not fight on his behalf.

I watched as Frode winked at me from his saddle and pulled a half-empty bottle of wine out of a saddlebag. My mouth dropped open. “Are you seriously about to get drunk before we go into battle?” I hissed. “I know you have a hard time, but that can’t be a good idea. You’re armed, for crying out loud.”

He rolled his eyes and uncorked the bottle with a dagger, then raised it to his lips and took a long swig. “I’m offended you think I can’t use my knives as well when I’m drunk. Besides, don’t you know how to fight now? Just don’t let me die.” He shrugged. “And if I did die, it would only be a couple days early.”

My mouth went dry. He was morbid, but…he might be right. This could be one of my last days with Frode. And Jac. One of my own last days alive. We had a plan, but there was so much room for everything to go wrong.

Frode reached over from his mount, nearly losing his balance, and shoved me playfully, laughing. “That’s why I drink,” he said, pointing to my head. “I can hearallllllof that. And it feels like shit.”

No. No, I couldn’t think about the Trials now. I needed to distract Frode or the whole bottle was going to disappear in an instant.

“Where are we going? For the battle.”

He frowned and thought about it. “I dunno,” he mumbled. Was he already tipsy? It hadn’t even been two minutes since his first sip.“Wait! I remember. A spy came and told us where to find some Kryllians.”

I sighed. “You drank the other half of that bottle before we left, didn’t you?”

“Yep!” He was far too cheerful for my liking.

With his focus entirely on keeping his balance, I was able to lean over and snatch the bottle from him. “Give me that.” While he protested, I dumped the rest of its contents into the snow.

“Revna.” Drunk Frode was usually out of it, but now he looked entirely too somber. “Gods, why are you being such a bitch?”

I would have taken the insult far too personally from anyone else. But this was Frode. “Because I love you.”

We rode for over an hour, not stopping for any breaks. The foot soldiers eventually fell behind, muttering obscenities at us under their breaths as we passed. We had the luxury of riding, so surely that meant something substantial. I rolled my eyes. They had no idea what it meant to be nothing.

Eventually, my father held up his fist to halt us. Our procession slowed to a stop. If I stood in my stirrups, I could see down a hill in front of us to where ten small purple tents were arranged.

Was this it? We had brought our entire enemy to fight ten tents’ worth of Kryllian soldiers?

“On my signal,” the king said. And then we waited.

The couple of times I peered into the valley, I saw a few figures walking, going about their ordinary business. The pines around us sparkled with icicles in the morning sun. My horse adjusted her feet, snorting impatiently. It could have been minutes or hours for all I knew, but the sun didn’t move far in the sky as we held our position.

And then, in a moment so ordinary I barely paid it any mind, my father raised his open hand, signaling our battalion to attack.

Battle cries roared out of every mouth and the horses galloped over the slope. Before Frode’s mount could follow, I took the reinsand led him over into the grove of trees, out of sight of the battle. “Stay here,” I ordered. I wasn’t sure if I was talking to my brother or the horse.

The foot soldiers charged, joining the fray. I felt bad for them—they’d had no rest before rushing right into the chaos. Though I wondered how it was possible the battle hadn’t ended already, with so few Kryllians at the campsite.

Then I peered over the hill and understood.

We weren’t the only ones lying in wait. The Kryllian army had known we were coming. Most of their soldiers had been waiting in the woods for us to charge. Now the colors of armor blurred together as a giant mass of soldiers collided.

Lurae were in action on both sides. I spotted Björn and my father at the head of our line of attack, breathing orange flames across the snow. Few soldiers came away with burns, though. They must have armor protecting them from fire. Smart.

Erik was on the other side of the front lines, his great axe effectively taking out masses upon masses of soldiers as he used his Lurae strength to annihilate them.

The Kryllian soldiers were as powerful if not more. I watched one summon lightning to his hands and use it to take out two Bhorglid soldiers on either side of him. Another pulled water from the patches of mud Björn and Father were creating and froze it over the hands of our soldiers. They’d cry out in pain and another soldier would step out from behind and decapitate them.

The snow brimmed with scarlet.

An explosion echoed across the valley and I whipped my head to the left to see smoke billowing like a cloud from a crater in the ground far too close for my liking.Shit.I couldn’t go down there, not when it meant leaving Frode alone. He was in no shape to fight. Any Kryllian who stumbled upon him would kill him instantly.

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