Page 47 of Master of Storms
Then fine.
He’d vanish into the winds and never come back.
9
Now
They arriveddeep in the heart ofZilittuterritory—far to the north of Norway—just as the sun reached its zenith.
The rest of theZinidelegation was waiting for them. Solveig circled lazily as Marduk suddenly swooped down toward his family. Truth be told, when it came to taking wing, she might not be able to match him. His aerial acrobatics showed adrekiwho’d spent many hours pushing himself to the limit in the skies.
Marduk was… playful in the air. Always circling her. Always trying to nip at her tail or tempt her into plunging through clouds. And part of the reason they were late was because she hadn’t been able to resist chasing him.
Herdrekimight despise the thought of being controlled by a male, but his playfulness was softening even herdreki’srage-filled heart.
Solveig landed much more gracefully and shifted into mortal form. The others were in various states of dress, so they couldn’t have been here too long.
“Well met,” Marduk called, hauling Árdís toward him for a hug as Solveig swiftly buckled herself into her leathers. He clasped hands with Ishtar, pressing a light kiss to her cheek. “You look well.”
The next in line was Sirius Blackfrost, and as Marduk laughingly turned toward him, she noticed both males drew up short.
There would be no hugging the Blackfrost, by the look of it.
“You’re late,” the enormousdrekiwarlord sneered.
“I’m never late,” Marduk replied. “I always arrive precisely when I mean to arrive. Haakon!” He moved on. “Let me help you with the packs.”
Solveig’s knife hand itched. The Blackfrost was the terror of the north, and nodrekiclan felt comfortable when he was in the skies. He could freeze adreki’sheart in their chest with a mere thought, and she’d heard tales of how he slaughtered one of the marauding German clans by the dozen.
He’d been flying under theZilittubanners back then, which was interesting. Granted, his father had come fromZilittu, but where did his allegiances truly lie?
“I promise he won’t eat anyone,” said a soft voice at her side. Malin. The Blackfrost’s wife. The pretty redhead had once been drekling—half-dreki, half-human—until she’d finally proven that she had enough magic within her to make the shift todrekiform.
“What?”
“The way you were staring at my mate….” Malin offered a faint smile. “You looked like a cat who was sizing up a large, ferocious dog. He won’t hurt anyone. I promise.”
“I swear you’ve been spending too much time with Freyja,” Árdís said irritably, hauling her extravagance of blonde hair over her shoulder and absently braiding it as she stared around her at the mountains. “I believe this one time you’ve gotten your analogies wrong. She was looking at him like a wolf eyeing a lion.” Árdís offered a smile to Solveig. “Malin’s right. She’s practically leashed him. Sirius is almost tame now. Like one of those little yapping dogs that the human ladies in London carry around with them.”
Solveig wasn’t sure what to make of the entire situation. The females of the party seemed to be trying to… take her under their wing?
“A yapping dog?” The Blackfrost looked affronted.
“You should put a bow in his hair, Malin,” Árdís continued, grinning at him. “He’d look so pretty with a bow.”
The look the Blackfrost gave his wife was a long-suffering one. “I’m trying to remember why you insisted that we save her.”
Malin’s smile slid off her face as the last two members of their party joined them, and Solveig realized that both Árdís and the Blackfrost had been bantering back and forth partly to settle his wife’s tension.
Andri was the Blackfrost’s younger brother, though you’d never know it to look at him. The gorgeousdrekiyouth was in his late forties, according to her intelligence, with thick black curls, tanned skin, and eyes the color of a field of lavender. He wouldn’t reach full maturity for another twenty or so human years, but there was something ancient about the look in his eyes, as if he’d seen enough hardship to make him older than he was.
But it was the woman at his side—Malin’s younger sister, Elin—who seemed to be creating the tension in Malin’s shoulders.
Solveig had become a master at reading body language.
Some argument dwelled between the two of them, and the way Elin clutched the book in her arms and stared at the mountains, pointedly ignoring her sister, argued for a cutting one.
“Good flight?” the Blackfrost asked.
