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“What, and just stay here getting harassed for the rest of the day?” I snapped. “Let you play hero some more?” His face immediately fell. My shame intensified. “I’m sorry, Byrgir, I didn’t mean that. Thank you for sticking up for me, really. I appreciate it, and it’s touching that it bothers you so much. Especially because you don’t know me well.”

He shrugged off my apology by saying, “Carrying someone’s unconscious body through the woods solidifies a friendship pretty fast, I suppose.”

“I do appreciate your friendship, Byrgir. I do. But it’s easier for me, and for you, if I just go. No use starting a fight we can’t win.”

“Better to fight for the right thing than to keep an immoral peace,” he countered.

“Let me know how that fight feels after twenty years. Maybe you’ll be sick of it then too,” I said, just as we reached Eilith’s cart and saw that she had befallen the same ill attention as I had.

Two more Paragons of the Light, a blond man and a wiry woman, were arguing loudly with her.

“Your practice is false and your potions are snake oil!” the woman yelled at Eilith. “You deceive and endanger these people with your Sourcery!”

“How dare you!” Eilith’s voice was heavy with indignation. “I have served the town of Skeioholm far longer than you’ve been alive, young pup. Longer than that High Priestess of yours has been around! I’ve been here since long before your Lord of Light, and I won’t be leaving!”

“You have been warned, Miss Morceran,” said the blond man next to the woman. He spoke with the same pompous toneas the preacher. “You have been told before not to bring your fraudulent Sourcery here. Not to this market. Yet here you are, peddling these lies.”

“Is there a problem here?” I asked as we approached.

The Paragons of the Light turned to look at me, and their faces twisted in disgust. Behind me, I felt the rage roll off Byrgir like heat from a fire. I had kept my awareness hemmed in close, but his proximity and the intensity of his emotions made them palpable.

“In the company of the fae-touched, no less,” the woman spat as she saw me.

“You are both to leave this market square at once,” the man said. His voice carried authority but his countenance did not as he looked over my shoulder at the hulking, fuming figure of Byrgir.

“If you remove them from this square, I’ll remove you with them,” Byrgir said. His voice had returned to the menacing calmness he had spoken with before. Sharp as a blade, cold as ice, and disturbingly dangerous.

“You do not frighten me. You may cavort with fae-touched creatures of shadow, but I walk the path of Light!” the man declared.

“Then I suggest you follow your path of light away from this place. Quickly,” Byrgir said.

“I will not be intimidated from my duties by threats from the dark,” the man said, turning back to Eilith. “Sourcerer! Pack your wares and take your cart from this market! Or I will remove it for you!”

“I have served this village since you were sucking your mother’s saggy tits, young man.” Eilith glowered at the Paragon, who could not have been less than thirty-five. “This isn’t the first time someone has tried to run me off.”

“Then I have no choice but to remove your wares by force!”

The man grabbed a tincture off the table and smashed it on the ground. The glass shattered, the contents leaking into the dirt. He seized another, but he was on the ground next to the first smashed bottle before he could release it. Byrgir held him by his collar, having swept his legs out from under him and slammed him down with both speed and control. The man looked up at him, eyes wide. Byrgir’s other hand was under his cloak at his hip again.

“Take your merry band of self-righteous assholes and get out.” Cool, calm, and sharp as steel. Byrgir stared into the man’s eyes as he held him on the ground.

“Y-y-yes, fine, we will go.”

Byrgir let him up, and the man rose shakily. But as he and the woman scurried away, the Paragon called back.

“Follow the Light, young man! The Light will guide you from her guiles! Follow it from your path of darkness!”

“Fuck you and your light!” Byrgir called after him.

“Aah ha ha ha!” Eilith cackled as they ran. “Very good, boy, very good. Thank you, dear.” She patted Byrgir’s arm.

Eilith sold no more medicaments that day. I stayed by her cart until it was time to make the long trek home.

CHAPTER SEVEN

Spring slipped into summer, and early summer brought the abundance of the land and sea. Green blankets of grass for the goats and horses, and multicolored rows of vegetables, herbs, and flowers in the garden. Fresh hunks of honeycomb in cool goat’s cream with globs of blackberry jam, gleaming silver salmon from the river, and fresh eggs with thick golden yolks.

The sun set later and later each night, until soon it barely set at all. It dipped below the horizon and soaked the sky in crimson twilight before rising again. We slept less and less, naturally, fueled by the midnight sun and energy of summer.