Page 490 of Flirting with Darkness

Whatever Father’s reason for it, he’d made his decision and he would not release Fenrir as long as he lived. Fenrir might walk free among the other warriors now, but that was only because his grave, carved out of the rock on the small islet where they had spent that one blessed, cursed night, was closer to home than this lonely pass these new warriors were to guard.

Finally, the burial was over and Astrid trudged after her father, down from the windswept plateau. Warriors before and behind her, and Fenrir’s eyes boring into her back. They couldn’t get to the islet fast enough, where she would have to command him to return to his slumber, before her father’s warriors placed the cover stone back over his prison.

4

This was her father’s punishment for daring to favour a man without her father’s permission, Astrid knew, as she trudged up the beach to Fenrir’s stony prison. She hadn’t kissed another man since that night with Fenrir, and she almost wished she hadn’t kissed him. Perhaps if she’d restrained herself, he might still be a man, instead of a monster, and Father wouldn’t have forced her to sacrifice warriors to become his invincible stone army. She’d once dreamed of being a warrior maiden, but if she never had to cut another heart out again…

Fenrir stopped at the edge of the pit. He was going to make her say it, wasn’t he? Instead of going willingly, he was going to wait for her to command him, like the enchanted slave he was.

He definitely regretted that kiss, all those years ago. She only had to see the murder in his eyes to know that if the curse ever broke, she’d be his first target.

She could almost feel his deadly claws closing around her throat, squeezing until she could scarcely breathe, so strong she couldn’t pry him off…

No, wait, those claws were real, sharp points burning as they drew blood, just a drop to tell her he was serious.

How…?

“Stay back, or I’ll tear out her throat,” Fenrir growled, his grip tightening.

If she couldn’t breathe, she couldn’t speak, and she certainly couldn’t order him into his prison.

“Let the girl go.”

Astrid’s vision was going grey, so she couldn’t be sure which of Father’s warriors had spoken. She reached down and drew her dagger. It couldn’t kill Fenrir, but it could certainly hurt him. Hopefully enough to make him let her go.

“I’ll only go back in that hole if she comes with me,” Fenrir snarled.

Buried alive? She’d die. Even if he didn’t slice her to ribbons first.

“Traitor! You swore you’d protect her!” That was Father.

“That was before she cut out my heart. Now, she is my price. I will return to my prison, but only if she goes with me.”

Astrid had her dagger out now. She angled it so it would catch him low in the belly. She might not be a warrior, but she knew how to gut a fish. She rammed her fist backward, until the blade could go no further, expecting blood to flow over her hand, but there was nothing.

Instead, the blade clattered to the stone.

“Stop fighting me,” he hissed in her ear.

As if she would obey him.

“Your father means to give you to Orm when you get home,” Fenrir whispered.

Astrid stilled. Orm was Njal’s bastard half brother, the man who’d betrayed Njal to Father the night of the attack. So Father had been warned, and victorious. Orm had fought among Father’s warriors ever since, bringing back women on every raid. Women who did not live long after they arrived…

Fenrir loosened his grip around her throat, as if sensing her sudden cooperation.

Astrid swallowed. “I will go with him.”

“No,” Father said. “My daughter is mortal. If she goes with you, she will die.”

The witch appeared, as if by magic. “I will enchant the girl, so she will survive.”

Fenrir did not let go of Astrid as Mistress Kun marched forward, muttering something as she daubed first her own blood, then Astrid’s on the necklace Astrid had inherited from her mother. “Don’t lose it, girl,” the witch said, before stepping back. “There. The spell is complete. When the wolf man wakes again, so shall she.”

Astrid had only a moment to sigh in relief, before Fenrir’s arms wrapped tightly around her. Then he jumped into the pit.

Father’s warriors rushed forward, throwing buckets of ice and water down on top of them, and everything went dark.

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