Page 45 of A Light So Blinding
He would go to the end of the world for her. She just didn’t know that yet.
Bjorn slipped his hand into hers and allowed her to tug him back to the others. They were all huddled in groups, some recognizing each other and others who did not. She set Bjorn down by one of the fires that was surrounded by many trolls. Hesettled in, trying his best not to look at the others. Some trolls were uncomfortable around trolls like him.
But the young man to his right reached forward to rotate the rabbit on a spit and asked, “She yours?”
He shook his head. “Bringing her to the other priestesses. Seeing if they can sever our bond. It was a mistake.”
The young man handed him water and then nodded toward his hands. “Clean up. You’ll need to eat to get there. You have many days of travel to reach that distance.”
“I know.” He washed the blood off his hands, though. Soon enough, he’d have to sniff out a stream to get the rest of the blood off him.
Then he saw Astrid again, this time tugging the little girl with her. The troll was nearly up to her shoulder already, and he knew the child had to be terrified. She was quaking the moment his eyes locked on her.
But Astrid brought her right up to Bjorn and then sat down beside him. She was still holding the child’s hand, who now stood before them, as she said, “Did you have something you wanted to ask him?”
He looked at the girl, not moving a muscle. He didn’t want to frighten her any more than she already was. She was a cute little thing, with a fine dusting of feathers on either side of her nose and through her hair. Very little elven blood, then. But still beautiful nonetheless.
“Did it hurt?” the little girl asked.
“Did what hurt?”
She nodded toward his hands.
Now he could see all the wounds covering his hands. Slices in his palms where he must have caught blades and knives. His claws were cracked even worse. Bruises already mottled his skin.
Sighing, he shook his head and held them out for her inspection. “I hardly feel it. I’ve fought my whole life, little one. These are just scratches.”
“You saved us,” she said, and his heart stopped in his chest.
“I’m sorry I scared you while doing so.”
The little girl looked him over intently, her gaze marking every single one of the cuts before she nodded. “My mum is a healer. I can have her look at you.”
And just like that, he was home again. Surrounded by trolls who would do anything to help their own. All because one priestess had brought a child over to him.
The child in him, the one who had been so alone for such a long time, settled down beside him. He swore he could almost see the boy he used to be, sitting on the wooden log with him. But now, that child wasn’t quite so afraid.
Seventeen
Astrid
They stayed the night with the other trolls, but Astrid couldn’t sleep. The people they had saved continued to call him “berserker”, just like the people in the labyrinth had. But she didn’t know what that meant.
She knew what it meant in terms of her own people. That men sometimes were overwhelmed with their own anger and bloodlust, that they were suddenly able to perform feats they shouldn’t have been able to do. Except, that couldn’t be what Bjorn did. She’d seen him fighting. She’d followed after the men who’d run to save their own people, and Bjorn hadn’t even been a troll in those moments.
Yes, he’d been angry, but he’d been bloated with that rage. His body had seemed larger, stronger, and more capable. He’d been terrifying in the way he’d moved through crowds of human men like they were as fragile as sticks that he’d shattered with his massive fist. And then he’d turned upon his own people.
She understood why he was afraid he would become his father. Whatever overtook him when he was fighting was clearlyuncontrollable, even to him. Without her touch, he might have kept bashing himself against those cages until they’d finally snapped under his grip. They were all lucky that he had been so enraged that he wasn’t thinking straight.
If he had, then he likely could have peeled those bars open, and there wouldn’t have been anywhere for those people to run. They’d have been stuck in that cage, just waiting for the swipe of his claws to reach them.
She pretended to sleep for a while, but then sat up to watch the faces of all the trolls around her. It was surreal in the moonlight to see all of their features. Some of them had horns, like Bjorn. Others were feathery. Some even had a fine dusting of scales up and down their backs. They were not like the trolls she had seen in the labyrinth.
Astrid was used to the trolls who were, for lack of a better term, more human. They had prettier features. Less angular and more pointed. They were clearly creatures who had been honed by magic and softened by time. But these were harder beasts. Trolls who were more used to bashing themselves against the world and chipping away at their own souls.
Then her gaze turned to Bjorn, and she was confused all over again. In his rest, he didn’t look like he was capable of what he had done. His body was so thin, his face so troubled even in sleep. He looked like a man tormented by actions he could not control, and she wanted to shelter him from that.
No one had been kind to him. Clearly.
