Page 30 of A Darkness So Sweet

RAGNAR

The rage among the trolls was palpable. Ragnar should never have let them trail along in their path. Being followed by other trolls was always tricky to discover, but he’d chosen to let them in the hopes that it would give others some peace. But he hadn’t trusted his gut that something was off about this redheaded beast they’d been given so easily.

The humans never were honest. They wouldn’t have handed their princess over so quickly, not to a troll. Not to someone they deemed little more intelligent than an animal. Of course King James had done everything in his power to fake this alliance, although Ragnar couldn’t understand why this king didn’t realize that he was risking his entire kingdom by tricking them.

Still, Ragnar had fallen for it. They all had. Perhaps it was her pretty hair, or those wide eyes that welled with tears whenever she was being yelled at. He’d wanted to protect her, even though it was against everything his people were.

He had failed them all.

The rage that boiled in his chest became a mist that hid everything in front of him other than her. She had lied to him. She wasn’t the princess. There wasn’t a chance that she was. The princess was half elven. She had more power in a sneeze than this woman did. And now he was bound to the weakest wife he could have been given, all because the blood witch had frantically finished the ritual.

This woman was a stranger to him. He had no idea who Maia was, if Maia was even her name, and now he knew better than to trust her.

Grabbing her by the back of the neck, he drew her up and thrust her toward the door. The rest of the war band waited for them. Trolls who would tear her limb from limb. This had to be a mistake. The seers had claimed she would be his troll wife, but they had been looking at the princess. Not this woman. Surely they hadn’t looked at this fire haired creature and deemed her to be the person for him.

He would throw her to the other trolls, would enjoy watching them torment her. For the lies and for all the things that her king had done to them, they would exact their revenge. It would be easy for him to pull out her hair. Then the others would rip out her nails, both from her fingers and her toes. Only at the end, when she was begging for mercy, would they start to pull off her limbs. One by one. First her arms, then her legs, making her stay alive until the very last moment when she bled out at their feet.

The blood witch’s voice raised, and he stopped halfway to the door. The rest of the trolls hovered there, unable to enter without the witch’s permission.

“She’s still yours, you know,” the blood witch said, her old voice shaking with the effort after the magic she had cast. “She’s yours, Ragnar, more than I’ve seen in a hundred years. That woman was made for you and you for her.”

It made every inch of his body turn ice cold. It wasn’t possible. He was meant to have a powerful bride, to serve his people in a way that only he could do. He was the healer who would deny death itself.

But not with her. Now, he would be forced to walk a different path. Ragnar had known his future since he’d been a boy. Changing that now was terrifying.

He stared down at the shaking creature in his grasp. Maia shuddered with fear as she froze in his grip, her eyes locked on the enraged trolls who waited for her beyond that door. She knew there would be punishment for what she had done. She knew there was nothing she could do to stop that judgment from coming.

And yet...

In the black tongue, he answered the blood witch. “How can it be her? How am I supposed to have a troll wife who would make our children even more weak than I?”

“Your prophecy may speak of your son, not you. She will not make your children weaker, she will keep your bloodline as strong as it is now. But perhaps it is not you who needs to be stronger.” The blood witch stood, bracing her hand on their mingled blood. “You will give her strength, Ragnar, just as she will give you a place to rest.”

He swallowed hard. The decision he had to make was not an easy one. His people wanted their revenge, and so did he. But he also did not want to deny a troll wife if she was... his.

A choice had to be made. Finally, he released his hold on her neck and instead stooped to grab her waist. As he had before, he slung her over his shoulder and charged out through the door.

He was certain his people were confused by his actions. Likely, they wouldn’t understand it for many weeks to come. But he bolted through them, ignoring the claws that raked down her back and grasped for her hair. He felt them tugging at her, heard her screams of pain as they tried to rip her from his arms, but he would not allow that to happen. Not when he was owed answers.

Ragnar darted through all of them and wriggled free from the crowd. And then he was off. Sprinting through the woods as the howls of his people trailed after them. The trolls in this war band were good hunters. They would follow him for a long time yet, but he knew how they hunted.

First, he took her over the stream, making sure his feet were soaking wet so that his scent wouldn’t linger in the area. Then he took off up a steep incline, allowing his feet to slip and slide over it before hopping up to the top of the ledge. Crouching low, he took his time slithering through the woods until he circled back on himself.

He stayed still and quiet as a small group of trolls headed up that steep incline, and then he was off again. Throughout it all, Maia was suspiciously quiet. Almost as though she had passed out on his back. She might have, he supposed. It was a terrifying thing to be hunted by trolls.

But finally he didn’t hear the others for the better part of the afternoon and he knew he had shaken them. Heaving her off his shoulder, he let her hit the ground harder than he should have. He heard the breath wheeze from her lungs and tried not to see the blood that now stained the shirt he’d given her. There was more of it than he’d expected. His people had cut through the cotton and left harsh streaks of blood in their wake. They’d torn into her flesh while he’d run past with her, and he hadn’t even noticed.

Perhaps he’d smelled it, but he had ignored the pain she had been in. The healer in him screamed out for him to heal her. First, though, he needed answers.

She backed away from him, scuttling like a crab as she tried to get away, only to find her back pressed against the side of a mountain. There was nowhere for her to run. Nowhere for her to escape.

“Who are you?” he growled, his voice thunderous.

“I tried to tell you?—”

“I don’t want to hear any of your excuses. Speak, woman. What treachery were you part of?” He knew it had to be something devious. The human king wouldn’t have done this without a plan.

“I don’t know.”

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