Page 19 of A Light So Blinding
There wasn’t much in the cup. Just enough for three mouthfuls, most likely. She sipped as much as she dared before handing the cup to him.
He shook his head, then tried to give it back. “Drink, Priestess.”
“You need water as well.”
“Not as much as you.”
“You were the one who fought off countless men for an evening with me.” She swallowed. “More than an evening, I suppose. From what the guard said, I am yours now.”
Bjorn seemed uncomfortable with that. He shuffled where he was, the muscles of his shoulders bunching and releasing before he set the cup down on the ground by her foot and retreated back to his corner.
His movements were awkward, so very inhuman but also unlike the trolls she had seen before. Even now, he tapped his head with a fist right below his horns and said, “People can’t own people. I remember that much.”
She was about to argue that the king quite literally owned all of them, but his words made her thoughts catch. “You remember? What do you mean by that?”
He shook his head, more animal than man. Anxiety seemed to ride him so much she could see the little wavering lines of emotions pulsing out of his body. There were lines of tension around his mouth. His brows were drawn down, and his movements were still odd. Twitchy, even.
She wanted to use her magic to peek inside his head. She didn’t need to know what he was thinking or how to fully manipulate him, but this was a different version of the Bull than she knew. The man she had seen in the arena was terrifying, bloodthirsty, capable of killing anything and everything in front of him.
This man crouched in a corner, desperately trying to make himself seem smaller, was not the Bull. Perhaps who she was seeing right now was... Bjorn.
If she was going to get anywhere with this, she would need to confirm if there were trolls looking for him. Or, at the very least, if there was a way for him to know if her sister was with the others.
Perhaps now wasn’t the best time. But she’d already taken the leap into being locked in this dungeon. She could at the very least tell him why she’d done it.
He had killed for her, after all.
Removing her mask, she reached down for the cup of water, noting that it was dented many times over. She sipped again, and the muscles on his shoulders seemed to release. As though the mere act of her accepting his care was important.
“I do not know your culture or your people,” she said. “If I do something wrong, or if I somehow insult you, I need you to tell me.”
He nodded. “My memory is not what it once was. But I know that a good troll takes care of women before himself and that a priestess’s needs are far more important than my own.”
What a strange way to say that. “Do you have priestesses where you come from?”
He nodded. “We do.”
A voice came through the wall, startling her so much she almost dropped the cup. “They’re terrifying.”
Bjorn reacted as if someone had slammed open the door. One moment he was in the back corner and the next, he’d launched himself at the cot. She froze, uncertain if she’d done something wrong, only to realize he wasn’t coming for her at all. He had put himself between her and the wall, his teeth bared and a snarl ripping out of his throat.
Was he protecting her? From someone on the other side of the wall?
“Hush,” the voice said, and she realized it had to be the strange yellow troll who had come up with the plan that had gotten them out of whatever the king had wanted from them. “It’s not like I can ignore you.”
Bjorn seemed to deflate a bit, but there was still rage running through his body. In this small space, it was so much harder for her to be brave. A voice in her head told her to place her hand on that rippling back. She could convince him to relax beneath her, though. But then another voice, one much louder, shouted that she needed to keep herself safe.
So Astrid shifted away from him. She gave him enough space that if he was going to explode again, then she wouldn’t be caught in the crossfire.
He didn’t. Bjorn pulled himself back together, piece by visible piece. She watched him as he struggled to get himself under control. But then he looked over his shoulder at her. His gaze swept from the top of her head down to the bottom of her feet, and she had the distinct feeling he was measuring to make sure that she was all right.
Then he grunted. With slow movements, he pulled the blanket up over her shoulders again and then retreated to his corner.
“I, uh...” She tucked the blanket around her shoulders a little tighter. “I didn’t just end up here. I received a letter from, um...”
She hadn’t struggled to speak like this in such a long time. She had to just blurt the damn sentence out.
“I was contacted by who I believe to be trolls that know you. They said you need help to get out of this place, and that if I do, they’ll return my sister to me.” Her heart stuck in her throat. “My sister’s name is Rose. I had hoped that maybe... maybe you would know her. Or know if she was really with them.”
