Page 45 of Vow of the Undead
Now I sounded like my father.
Draugr, or the undead people, tore the living apart, eating them like a wild animal would. At least that was what wesuspected based on the poetic language of the only saga to mention such creatures. My mother believed they ate their prey’s flesh, but Ragna had said she thought Draugr siphoned their existence simply from the joy of killing the living. A living being’s breath was offensive to the undead. We believed the Undead, like all other monsters, once bled over from the other realms relative to Midgard.
I didn’t have time to consider the reality of what I saw or the implications of my reaction. After the guard responded with a curt nod, he marched forward and straight toward me.
I spun and darted up the staircase as quickly and as quietly as possible. Following the directions in reverse, I went left three times, counting how many halls it broke off into to be sure I turned down the right one.
Ahead, I spied the light of the candles in the bedchamber. Tracking my way back was easier than I thought. Perhaps King Drakkar was right about my skill with observation, though this, too, was tied to my survival—or rather, my mother’s.
Footsteps echoed in my wake. I was already breathless, but I shuffled faster, careful to keep my feet low and quiet against the stone.
The guard must have been in a hurry to end his night. Each heavy footfall gained on me. If he turned the corner, he’d see me. I broke into a desperate run for the mantle when a hand hooked around my arm.
Another hand slapped over my mouth before shock had me crying out. The shadow pulled me into the darkness of another, narrower hall just behind the fireplace.
My heart slammed thrashed against my ribcage as I squirmed to free myself, but my captor merely hushed me and tightened their hold. Their voice was low, belonging to a man, and barely audible at the edge of my ear as he tried to shush me.
The guard marched past, ducking through the fireplace.
I quietly squirmed against my captor, but his hold grew firmer and firmer with every muscle I flexed. Panic gripped my throat and I suddenly couldn’t draw enough breath through my nose. His fingers dug into my cheeks until I couldn’t so much as part my lips.
Had King Drakkar seen me? Did he take a quicker path to beat me to the exit?
Those fangs flashed in my mind.
Every story my mother told resurfaced. Draugr dragged their victims into the privacy of the shadows where they ripped off their flesh. Ragna’s theories were worse. Images of the king tearing me to shreds just for the sheer entertainment of it clouded my mind. I refused to believe the latter, but my resolve did nothing to comfort me.
I’m starving.
A shiver rippled through me.
His eyes had turned red, just like the Draugr, like my shadows. I’d never heard of red eyes on the undead before, my mother claimed they didn’t have eyes, just open sockets of sinew and hollow bone, but the sagas didn’t confirm this. King Drakkar had both the fangs of the undead and the eyes of the figures who’d lurked at my heels.
They were one in the same—a king, my shadow, an undead monster—and he’d finally dragged me into the shadows to devour me.
Once the door to the bedchamber slammed shut behind the guard, my captor finally spoke.
“Don’t scream.” His whisper was a mere suggestion of voice, so low and quiet I would have thought him a ghost.
This wasn’t how King Drakkar said his commands. His bold, unbothered nature never broke. Even his whispers were rough, and his beard scratched against my throat when he spoke into my ear.
The one who’d dragged me into the shadows carried none of this same energy.
Before he released me and spun me around, his hands forcing my shoulders toward him, I knew I’d been wrong. This wasn’t the king.
I swept my gaze over him in the dim light, scouring for anything recognizable. Based on the green cloak, this was the same red-eyed man who’d tried to stop me from entering the throne room when I’d first arrived in Mara.
Curiosity mingled with fear, and rippled through me with the prickle of goosebumps.
The man’s wheat hair was cropped short with the swoopof a wave that hung down over one side of his forehead. Unlike the king, his facial hair was close to the skin, shadowy but without a true beard.
His eyes were nearly as dark as mine, two brown abysses beneath the sunny hair that didn’t match the grave demeanor of his furrowed brow and the ragged scar that went from his eyebrow into his hair. The scarred skin cut through his cropped style like a sideways lightning bolt.
He was shockingly handsome for a man who crept through the shadows. If he hadn’t dragged me into the darkness, my heart would be skipping for an entirely different reason.
“I won’t hurt you,” he breathed.
Astrid had said nearly those exact same words when she sank her fingernails into me and then threatened to taste my blood. Both she and Sten spoke about me like I was a tool or toy to be used, and then when I tried to run, they were faster. When I pulled away, they were stronger.
