Page 109 of A Dagger of Ice and Intrigue
I gawked at her. Giving me her name, just like that.
“I’m Geryll,” he said quietly, almost unsure.
I didn’t know what to do with the silence that followed–or how a small part of me seemed to ache and restitch at the same time.
In the Protectorate, someone giving you their real name was a sign of deep trust.
“I’m Allie,” I said. Allegra–the heir and future of the Protectorate–was still curled up in the depths of my soul, licking her wounds and crying over the shards of her broken heart.
“I like The Huntress better,” Nadya said, adding a half-smile.
I couldn’t mirror it, not right now. So I turned back to the target, the pressure to perform now even grander.
“You shouldn’t trust so easily,” I muttered. For themselves, for me, for this entire crater.
But as the words slipped from my lips, so did an arrow between my fingers.
I released a soft breath as I cocked the arrow, eyes trained on the wooden target. The same as the other thousand targets I’d stared at back in Aquila.
The bow was new.
This world was different.
I had changed.
But the simple act of cocking an arrow and releasing it had not.
Before I hesitated even more, I pulled the string back with all my might. It fought me for a few moments, still stubborn in its newness, but it relented under my trained grip.
Arrow. Target.
That’s all I needed to concentrate on.
With a sharp exhale, I let the arrow go.
Its hiss through the air sent unwanted shivers down my spine as the screams from the wedding echoed in my ears.
But the unmistakable thump as it pierced the wood soothed me. A whisper from my former life, proof that I was still there somewhere underneath the hollowness and despair.
The screams dulled until they receded in the back of my mind, where they’d taken permanent residence and would probably haunt me for the rest of my days.
But for now, for just a moment, I felt like myself again.
I refused to let that awful day steal anything else from me, even this small joy.
Perhaps The Huntress wasn’t totally dormant.
“Mrs. Thornbrew says you have a good heart,” Geryll said just as I reached for another arrow, freezing me once more. He sounded like someone who hadn’t had his faith fractured yet.
Hopefully never, but I’d seen too much of this life to truly believe it.
I shook off the sudden shivers down my spine and faced the target again. “She’s barely met me.”
“Same as all of us,” Nadya said. “But the Commander’s the one who’ll marry you and he said you’re harmless.”
The arrow almost slipped from the string.
Not only did Nadya talk about my marriage like it was some inevitable, done thing, but he’d called meharmless?
