Page 80 of Storm of Fury
It was what she’d expected.
Tormund unsheathed the massive war axe he carried and dropped a pair of knives on the table behind the guard.
Bryn started unsheathing her knives. “Don’t touch the sword,” she told the guard. “It’s Valkyrie made and won’t appreciate it.”
She could feel Tormund’s eyes upon her as she started divesting herself of weapons: the six knives she had secreted about her person; a pair of brass knuckles with sharp little points one could flick open for extra pain; the bone flute she could shoot a poison dart through; a set of ten darts painted with leviathan blood; the pair of pouches she wore at her belt that were filled with ground dragon bone and vials of lindwurm tears; and finally, the small box full of pigments and needles that she used for her art.
Thedrekiguard peered down his nose at her.
Bryn sighed. “It’s hardly a weapon.”
But she drew the cord over her neck and laid her amulet next to her sword. The falcon amulet winked at her in the light, and though the sensation of Freyja’s blessing was less than it had once been, she could still sense it.
“Enter,” the guard said, swinging the door open. “But mind your step. For the shadows are long and full of teeth.”
“What a lovely welcome,” Tormund muttered as they entered the little hovel. “Positively sets the mind at ease.”
At the far end of the hovel stood a golden ring nearly ten feet high that was covered in runes. It appeared to be set into the wall, but the faint shimmer of the air within it hinted at the entrance to another world. Ripples of eerie green light played through the shimmer.
Chaos magic.
Once used to createdrekiportals, until their practitioners were deemed too dangerous to survive. And now the curse that dogged her every step.
“Through here.” Bryn sucked in a deep breath and strode through the shimmering green curtain.
The portal slid over her skin like a shock of cold water, leaving her breathless for an instant.
And then she was through and stepping down into the heart of theSaduclan court. Two guards stood at attention, but though their narrowed eyes recorded every inch of her, they let the pair of them past.
The soaring roof of a natural cavern greeted her eyes.
An enormous pair of stonedrekihad been carved guarding the overhang beneath which they stood. Stairs wound their way up, up, into the gallery above them that would lead into the heart of theSaducourt.
It was warmer here than it had been. Tormund stripped out of his oiled coat, slinging it over his shoulder. “Which way to the king?”
“Follow me,” she told him. “And be humble.Drekiare full of a sense of their own pride, and Harald’s court is larger than the one you have known. This is their world, and the warriors will not take lightly the presence of an arrogant stare.”
“I have known a fewdrekiin my time,” he replied mildly. “I’ll treat each and every one of them as though they’re Sirius.”
“The Blackfrost likes you,” she reminded him.
He winked at her. “By the end of the day, this court shall like me too.”
Bryn climbed down the stairs slowly, regret filling every step. She shouldn’t have given into this decision. To present Tormund to the king meant betraying Solveig, and even if Solveig’s actions thrust Bryn into an uncomfortable position between the war marshal and her father, Bryn knew whom she’d rather cross.
But the second Tormund had asked she’d been unable to say no. She’d long thought herself used to such condemnation, but seeing the look of betrayal in his eyes lanced straight through the shields she’d erected around her heart, revealing a heretofore unknown weakness within her.
Damned no matter which way I look….
Find a missing dreki prince….
“I should never have taken this job,” she muttered. But the offer of absolution had been irresistible.
* * *
The drekling handmaidexamined her letter, then moved toward the door. “I will present your letter to the king, Brightfeather, though it shall be at his discretion whether he replies. In the meantime, avail yourself of the food and wine.”
And then they were locked inside the antechamber alone.
