Page 9 of Artemysia

“I’m on the verge of violence again.” - Riev

S ilence falls over the war room for a beat, offering me sweet relief from these assholes’ worthless opinions.

All eyes are drawn to the crack in the table left by my dagger jamming into the colonel’s finger as if it were a spoiled piece of meat that needed to be excised. The crimson stain is still wet.

In another beat, everyone starts to yell over each other.

I tip back in my chair and fold my arms across my chest, my anger simmering down to a low boil, tempered by my delight over the chaos I’ve triggered. Fuck Colonel Jorgen. He doesn’t know shit. He had it coming.

I can’t help but watch Delphine, her silver hair woven with black ribbons, her rosy cheeks blotched while her large brown eyes flare at me in disbelief. She looks like a fucking angel.

A pissed-off one.

One who I can still imagine tasting on my lips. Her kiss was unlike any other. Soft. Affectionate. Unafraid.

Real.

But right now, her scathing glare pins me to my chair. She looks like she has half a mind to haul out the two short swords sheathed next to her shapely ass, if only to carve my head off.

It’s all very distracting…and more interesting than anything else in this useless meeting.

She presses on. “Throgmorton and I accept—”

“But Riev, you agreed—” a colonel sputters, cut off when I snarl at him.

“Does refuse mean something else in another language you think I’m speaking?” My palm goes to my temple in an attempt to scrub away the anger. I’m on the verge of violence again.

The imposing ogre next to Delphine smirks. At least he appreciates my wit.

King Galke slams his fist on the table. The crack as his knuckles hit the wood renders the room silent.

Never in my wildest dreams would I have thought I’d see the king lose his shit. While I’ve never been called to Stargazer until now, Galke has traveled to Academy outposts. In the twenty years I’ve known him, I’ve never seen him break.

Not when I slit the throat of an assailant charging at him with a knife, who blamed him for the death of his family by Syf.

Not when he discovered his best colonel had plotted against him.

Not even when his carriage was attacked by a band of Syf and his fiancée, murdered.

He had me, and I took care of the perpetrators.

When he lifts his fist and extends his fingers, blood oozes from his broken skin. He winces.

The situation must be dire.

There’s a bit of pride swelling in my chest that I’ve been the cause of two bloodstains on the war room table in the last ten minutes.

“Riev, may I ask why you refuse?” His jaw clenches before he reverts to the calm, kingly demeanor befitting the crown he wears.

Smug prick.

The king and colonels may pretend to care about my opinion, but only because they need me to do their dirty work for them. Otherwise, it’s easier for the king to give his bloody orders from afar, to keep me faceless and rankless and operating outside official capacity.

I let out a sigh, paired with a hard roll of my eyes, hoping they’ll get stuck in that position so I don’t have to see any of these fuckers anymore.

Why do I refuse? There are only reasons not to do this. Certain death, for Delphine and Throg, that is. But not for me. Ever since I mapped out most of the way through the woods, I had a plan.

There’s only one reason I signed on to do this, again and again.

With my old team dead, my plan was to escort the new team as far as possible through Artemysia to give them the best chance at survival, and then ditch them to escape this life. Run off and live on the other side of the forest, where no one could ever find me again.

This was going to be it. My last mission. Whatever is on the other side has to be better than being a king’s pet.

A captive assassin.

That was my secret, cowardly plan. But now? With Delphine involved? Could I do that to someone like her?

Anyone but her.

I don’t care about saving the world.

I want only to live a life unbothered, and not die an assassin. Not be used as a weapon forever.

I’m not noble like Delphine. Shit. Can I get them through alive and still make my escape?

No. No way.

I can’t let anyone in the war room see my disappointment—my sheer panic—over my ruined plans.

Instead, I make eye contact with each colonel, letting them know there are more fingers to be lost. They take turns shifting papers, shoving their hands into their pockets or taking a long, nervous drag on their cigars.

They are not only afraid for their fingers, but also terrified…because I’ve killed one of them before.

They believe if I lose it right here, I’ll slaughter them all. This brings me a bit of joy, so I go with that feeling instead of the regret and insult that lies underneath, because this is how they’ve always viewed me. Their dirty little secret weapon of mass destruction .

The king clears his throat, expecting my reply.

“You can’t expect me to babysit these children and not get myself killed,” I argue sullenly. I shoot a furtive glance to gauge Delphine’s reaction.

She emits an annoyed cluck of her tongue. Her honorable, feisty face is screwed into a look that says she’s choking back a reply out of respect for the king.

My goal has always been to survive long enough in this role to find another way for myself.

The two men I lost last time planned on escaping with me.

It hurts to think of them. How we almost made it to a place where no one could come after us for deserting.

But when I failed to save them, the Syf pursued me the whole way back.

Pulled off my pack and destroyed all my supplies.

With nothing left, I was forced to return. Dammit.

Now, with my hand-picked shadow team decimated, the military is tightening their grip on me.

They’re assigning Delphine, their trained best, to keep me in check.

Someone to ensure I do as I’m told now that I’ve nearly found a way to the other side, and to make decisions they would make themselves upon contact with North Kingdom, if it exists.

In other words, they need to bring in the humans. There’s no doubt they see me as inhuman.

After all, they trained me after seeing my aptitude for killing when I was a child.

King Galke regards me silently, and no one else dares to speak to me, so I stare back at him defiantly.

“I can do this alone,” I hiss through grinding teeth. I’m about to break a tooth, so I slump back into my chair and kick out my legs.

Why risk her life? The big ogre, Throg, he can come. He’s standing there relaxed, not a care in the world. I’d be less sad if he died. Though he’s not as dumb as he looks; he recognized a suicide mission right away.

I’d resigned myself to not getting attached to my next team…

but now…fuck. Here’s someone who hoards candy and feeds an owl in a clocktower.

And I owe her one. There’s no question she’s a good person with a big heart.

That fucking kiss made her way too real.

I shouldn’t care. I should have kept my distance like I do with everyone else.

But now, I look at Delphine’s determined little frown and my heart tugs in a way that I haven’t felt before.

The need to keep her safe eats away at me.

Can I live with myself if Delphine is gutted by Syf, her face chewed off like the men I lost? The image sickens me.

The king interrupts my grim thoughts. “Riev, you’re a killing machine, are you not? We need you to protect these two, so the right decisions are made once you get through the woods.”

The way he emphasizes right decisions rankles me.

Clever bastard.

Perhaps, after all these years, he knows me too well and suspects my ulterior motives.

I can’t show him he’s found a pressure point. He’ll exploit it.

“This is elkshit and you know it. I refuse to go.”

They look the other way when I say such things. They allow me to be vulgar because it works out better in their minds to believe I’m a different kind of creature, so they don’t feel bad using me.

Delphine muffles a faint growl of her own. She’s entirely offended, judging by how tightly she purses her lips. Her fists are balled up next to her thighs. Captivatingly fierce.

I’m sure this isn’t how her war room meetings usually go.

“Throg and I will go. No one else is better at what we do,” she insists to the king, defying me. Such delightful enthusiasm, as if she hadn’t just eloquently pointed out their plan was shit. But she wants to try anyway. So brave and yet so foolish to trust that the higher-ups value her life.

Her brown eyes meet mine, shining with the intensity of her conviction. “I can succeed,” she says.

It both exasperates and arouses me, the monster that I am.

It can’t be easy to have that kind of optimism in a world like ours.

No one should suffer like that.

The king nods. “Riev, please provide the maps of the forest you’ve rendered. Captain Julian will put together another team and attempt the crossing.”

Fuck. What an asshole. He knows he has me by the balls, and now he’s twisting. He is willing to send Delphine to her death just to force my hand. He knows no one’s made it in and out of Artemysia without me. Delphine doesn’t know this, and they conveniently don’t mention it.

“They wouldn’t last half a day.” Realistically, I give them three hours, with a slow bleeding-out-death being one of the hours.

Delphine throws me a filthy look. “I can do this. I have a couple members of my team in mind. It sounds like Riev has risked enough, perhaps too much already, to get us this far. I can read maps. I’ll get to the other side.”

Something squeezes the shriveled pit where my soul might be.

Something I haven’t felt in a long time.

She actually thinks I should sit this one out because I’ve done enough.

Is it because she saw me at my worst yesterday?

Injured, dirty, sad. Does she feel bad for me?

She’s basically telling them she’ll take my place.

No one ever cares about me.

Why does she?

Because she cares about the people around her, even a surly stranger she just met.

No, I can’t let this happen. They’ll both die, and I’ll never see her lopsided smile again.

I slam the etched table with both palms so hard that it hurts, forcing me to second-guess my dramatic gestures.

Graying heads turn to me.

I stare glumly at the map of our lands and the base of the fish-shaped peninsula surrounded by rough ocean east and west. Our kingdom never had a successful naval program, because we don’t make it far offshore.

The history books say other countries have visited us in the past, but it was so dangerous traversing the seas around our lands that they gave up.

We are isolated. While this means we have been safe from invasion from outside lands, we are subject to the attacks of the Syf without aid.

The mountain range that connects us to the mainland to the south is impassable, its height and labyrinth of passes thwarting any attempt to cross. But it provides us with endless minerals and metals, and our valley is fertile, so we’ve had no real need to leave or expand.

My dagger’s mark struck the middle of the landmass, a long line of thick forest. Artemysia. The colonel’s blood seeps into the East River, which flows from north to south across the entire peninsula .

Delphine’s wide brown eyes search my face, but I refuse to meet her gaze.

I don’t want her to see my defeat, my fury, bleeding out of me.

The large blonde monstrosity beside her cocks his head at me, his nostrils flaring as if he can smell that I’m about to capitulate.

“If I go,” I begin. “ If …” I emphasize, “I will need Ivy Morrigan.”

A muscle in the king’s neck flinches, but he says nothing. I’ve made him uncomfortable, and he’s used to difficult decisions.

“Ms. Morrigan is a murderer,” the colonel on the other side of the king reminds the room. “She led a mutiny and killed her commander.”

I scoff. “Ivy is more capable of killing Syf than any other man or woman you’ve sent with me before. I’ve requested her in the past, but I insist now.”

“Again, her killing capabilities are not in question,” the colonel says dryly.

“If I’d had her last time, I’d have come back with two more men. I want her released and with me on this impossible mission.”

I know it’s negotiable. Especially for what they’re asking me to do.

The king lets loose a loud breath, seemingly weary of the whole thing and wanting to be done with it. Our meetings always end with that look, like a disappointed jail warden irritated that his longest-kept prisoner hasn’t reformed.

“Riev Wolfgang, if you’re willing to control her and you don’t think she’ll turn on you and kill you, you’re welcome to take her. I hear she has the dungeons in a constant riotous uproar. She’s been a pain in the ass for the guards.”

That sounds like Ivy. I almost smile, but it’s too much effort to fight my natural frown.

But Delphine interjects. “Sir, I would like someone from my squad to be the fourth.”

Oh, no. She has no idea what she’s getting into. Bringing someone else from her team is just more work for me.

Luckily, I’ve used up all the king’s patience for bargaining.

“No one else from your company, or any other company, has been recommended. The colonels agree you’re the only ones with any chance of survival and success…if you work with Riev,” he says grimly. “If this doesn’t work, there’s no one else. ”

The colonels bob their heads like brainless pigeons.

Finally, the truth. I glance at Delphine to gauge her reaction. She should be frightened by now. It’s a hopeless task with little chance of reward. Endless risk, infinite danger. It’s not too late to back out, but I already know she isn’t one to back down from a challenge.

Her soft face falls, but she recovers quickly and squares her jaw. “But—”

“We’re done here. Captain Julian, you will act as superior officer of the team. You may decide on the chain of command.”

I won’t even be leading this sorry band?

They have no experience in the woods, and I will have to follow her orders?

At this, I finally stand upright and tower over the king.

My mouth opens to protest, but he reaches up and grips my shoulder with a heavy hand as a warning, and even I know better than to defy him now.

“Return to the feast,” he says with an authority that comes from two decades as king. His face is grave, the lines as deep as I’ve ever seen. “Thank you for accepting the mission. You’ll leave a week from tomorrow. As I said before, the fate of humanity rests in your hands.”