Page 26 of Blood Beneath the Snow

He chuckled at my silence, placing a hand on my shoulder. I tensed under his touch and he sighed, letting his arm fall at his side.

Was he raised to be like this—kind to a fault? Or was he the exception to a rule?

The question burst from me without warning. “Are the godtouched and the godforsaken equal in your country?”

Volkan raised an eyebrow, clearly surprised. “Mostly, yes. Those with Lurae—magical abilities—are given jobs where they can use their gifts to better the world around them. We’re an agricultural nation, I’m sure you know. You don’t need a Lurae to farm.” He shrugged. “There are occasional skirmishes. But there are also no gods—and no religious leaders to insist our abilities mean something about our worth.”

Equal enough. Far more than here, at least.

I nodded firmly. He wasn’t trying to get under my skin, worm his way into my trust until I caved. Godforsaken and godtouched were the same where he came from. He was unlike the rest of us, predisposed to our prejudices by the priests.

Freja would want to meet him. And despite my general attitude toward the godtouched, I trusted him. “Then come with me.”

He followed obediently when I approached the guards. “I’m here to see someone,” I told them. The prison’s location was so isolated, their jobs required little effort. Any escapees would struggle to make it out of the valley quickly enough to avoid capture.

The first guard tilted his head. “Leave your weapons. And make it quick.”

They unlocked the door, pushing it open enough for me and Volkan to squeeze through. We stepped into the darkness and the entrance closed behind us, leaving us to let our eyes adjust.

“Only two guards?” Volkan asked, looking back over his shoulder. The whites of his eyes shone in the dim light. I didn’t miss his hands curling tightly in the fabric of his shirt.

“Silencers,” I explained as we began our trek. The layout of the prison was simple, with a single winding hallway making up each floor. My ancestors designed the layout purposefully, with only one way in and out. I beckoned for Volkan to continue following me and we walked through the first level, lit dimly by lamps. Guards stood watch every so often. I nodded to the first one I saw, but he ignored me completely. “That’s what we call them, at least.”

Volkan hummed. “We call them silencers, too. I’ve always thought it was strange that some people were given the magic to…well, prevent magic from being used.”

My eyes adjusted slowly. Cell after cell lined the walls and a horrid groaning floated through the tunnel, the sound of something inhuman crying out in pain.

I walked a little faster. Volkan’s footsteps sped up behind me.

“Maybe the gods were trying to even the playing field,” I suggested. My voice dropped to barely a whisper. I peered briefly into each of the lower cells looking for Freja. The winding hallway went on forever before we reached the staircase. Part of me wanted to call out her name, but the silence of the prison felt too reverent to break. In other ways, it was suffocating, as if any speech would be drowned out under the weight of it.

“You do believe in the gods, then?” Volkan’s voice was tinged with curiosity.

The staircase spiraled and I focused on watching every step. “No. Even if they are real, for them to create a world like this would be horribly cruel, don’t you think?”

He didn’t answer. I had the sense he agreed but was lost in thought.

Iron bars stretched to the ceiling, only a couple of inches apart. The dirt floor was rough beneath my boots. We were almost all the way down the hall when I finally spotted her, crouched in the cornerof a tiny cell as if huddling against herself might provide enough warmth to be comfortable.

“Freja.” I slid to my knees in front of the metal bars, wishing I had a godtouch that would let me bend the metal to reach her.

She crawled forward, a flicker of hope lighting her face. “Revna? Is that you?”

I reached my hand through the gap in the bars and she took it, our palms pressed together. Only when she squeezed my hand did I realize it trembled.

“Volkan is here, too.” My fiancé stepped forward into the dim light, nodding at Freja.

She gasped, clutching a hand to her chest and glaring at me. “The Prince of Faste! Why would you bring him here? This is not how I wanted to meet my best friend’s future husband for the first time.”

He chuckled and sat cross-legged beside me. “I wasn’t invited, don’t worry. I tagged along against Revna’s will.”

Her smile was exhausted but genuine. “I bet she loved that.”

I rolled my eyes. “Enough about us. How are you?” My voice remained low; I didn’t know who else was in the nearby cells and I didn’t want to find out.

I took in her now limp curls, the shadows taking residence under her dark eyes. Her clothes were covered in a layer of dirt. “Alive.”

It was the first time I’d ever heard Freja speak without a spark of laughter in the back of her throat. Something inside me wilted and shriveled in on itself.

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