Page 85 of Heart of Winter
Assassinations like that of Revna’s husband.
Erik paused, and gripped the mantelpiece, rings winking as his hands flexed. He glared into the flames and said, “Someone’s told them about our Drakewell visitors. It’s the only possible explanation.”
“And we shall find out who,” Birger said.
“In the meantime, I’m going to question the little shit personally,” Bjorn said, cracking his knuckles.
“It can wait until morning,” Birger told his brother. “Let the lad stew awhile, and he’ll be more talkative with an empty belly.”
Bjorn sighed, but nodded, reluctantly. “I’ve doubled the guard, and we’re running patrols outside the walls, every hour.”
Erik nodded.
“We should get some sleep,” Birger said. “Tomorrow’s to be a long, grand day and we’ll all want to be fresh for it. We’ll be awakened if there’s an emergency.”
Oliver contemplated his solitary chamber, with firelight shadows dancing up the walls and frost on the window panes. Near enough to the royal apartments that a shout would bring a guard running, should anything threaten him.
And, judging by the sneer the young Beserkir had shot him in the cell –pretty places to put your cocks– hedidfeel threatened.
Earlier, down in the baths, he knew that, if not for Bjorn’s interruption, things would have progressed farther. And where would that have led? To Erik’s bed? Or, perhaps, more accurately, to going their separate, though satisfied ways after a hot springs tryst?
Either way, there could be no question of sleeping alone, now, not with doubled guards and the potential for a midnight alarm.
He cleared his throat and said, “Are we safe? In the palace, I mean,” he explained, as all eyes turned toward him. “If there is a traitor in your midst – if there are others waiting to pick locks and slip into doors…”
Bjorn puffed out his chest and said, “My men have it handled.”
But Erik’s expression softened, fractionally, and his head tilted to its earnest angle. “I promise that you are quite safe within these walls, Mr. Meacham. No harm will come to you, or to Tessa.”
Oliver held his gaze, skin alive with the fresh memory of his touch; he would have known his hands by feel alone, in the dark, at this point. “And what about you? Will you be safe?”
His lips curved, faintly. “If a man makes the mistake of coming at me with a knife, it will be his last mistake.”
Oliver wanted to believe him.
~*~
Bjorn personally escorted Oliver back to his room, with promises of stationing extra guards in the corridor. Erik offered him a smile, before he turned away and slipped out, hating that he could not do more to ease the worry in his gaze.
An ache started up in his chest, and he cursed their prisoner to every level of hell, because he’d had him, finally. Had him soft, and sweet, and eager in his arms, under his mouth, and if not for Beserkir machinations, Erik would be even now–
Birger cleared his throat. Unobtrusively, but it cut off Erik’s line of thought, and brought him back to the present – revealed to him that he gripped the mantel so hard that his rings were gouging the wood. He released it, shook out his hand, and turned to his old friend and advisor.
“Something you’d like to say?”
Birger looked chagrined. “No. I was encouraging you, after all.
“But…”
Erik sighed.
Birger took the chair Oliver had been using, and nodded to the one across, until Erik finally sat, hands forced flat on his thighs to keep from fidgeting.
Birger said, “When the first break-in happened, I had my suspicions. It was no surprise, in all honesty, to find a Beserkir creeping into our halls.”
“Nor to me.”
“But I thought it would be the old petty grievances. A bit of mischief, even, them wanting to botch our yuletide plans.” His expression grew more troubled. “But they know about Drakewell.”
