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Maude accepted the peace offering, and they sat together on the grass in quiet companionship for a time before Liv spoke, “Eydis, do you mind running some of this food over to Gunnar? I needed to speak with Maude for a moment. ”

Liv held out some bread and apple slices drizzled in honey that were wrapped in a cloth to Eydis, who nodded and ran the goods to Gunnar, sitting with him while he ate. The sounds of Gunnar’s booming laugh echoed over to where Maude sat with Liv, breaking their awkward silence.

“I wanted to apologize for attacking you at Thora’s inn the other day,” Liv started, long fingers twisting together in front of her.

The thick braids from her hair had fallen over her shoulder and were blocking her face from Maude, but she could see that she was uncomfortable with the apology dropping from her lips.

Having felt the same before, Maude understood that humility didn’t come naturally to everyone. She had always run from someone before she’d had to apologize for something she did or said. Maude knew then that Liv was the better person to find her first.

“You don't have anything to apologize for. You were protecting your family, and I was the threat,” Maude said, keeping her eyes down. “I don't think anyone is upset with you for defending the people you love.”

“Everyone else can hang; you didn’t deserve the anger I put on you,” Liv argued, still twisting her fingers in knots.

“I deserve plenty of that anger,” Maude sighed, looking up from her own twisting hands. “I’ve done plenty to deserve nothing but hostility.”

“Listen, I know what it’s like to feel like it's only you against the world. I’ve fucked up plenty in my lifetime, too.

Before I met Herrick and Hakon, I lived a lot like you did.

I was a nomad who went from town to town, working as a mercenary after the Kingdom of Flame burned down my entire village.

I was the sole survivor from the town that found a way for me to live while they all died,” Liv trailed off, her past lingering in her eyes as she looked past the trees into the Lamenting Woods.

“When the brothers found me, I was trying to sneak myself into Veter under the bridge that separates the city from the forest. It’s a natural barrier of protection because the river is so wide and runs deep, so if someone were to fall in, they’d be lost. I had managed to scale underneath it and make it to the city just in time for the brothers to arrive to fight off the threat. ”

Liv chuckled at the memory.

“I pulled myself up and started going over all the faults in their defenses and said that if a nomad like myself could figure it out that quickly, then they were screwed if an army came by. They looked at me like I had six heads but ultimately allowed me to work with them to fix their pitfalls and strengthen their defense. I didn’t want what happened to my town and my people to be the case for anyone else, and they had shown me kindness when all they needed to do was lock me up and forget where they put the key.

So I chose to fight with them, to fight for what they stand for. ”

Liv was quiet for a time, but Maude didn’t dare break the trance that Liv was in.

“I carried the guilt of their deaths with me for years; I still do. But now I get to decide who I fight for and why I want to fight for them. I get to try to make this world a better place in the memory of those people in my town. There is a freedom in letting go of your guilt and forgiving yourself when you’re ready. ”

Maude was unsure of where this confession was coming from, but if it meant that she and Liv would coexist peacefully, she wouldn't ruin it with her snark.

“Why are you telling me this now?”

“Because I think we are the same, Maude. I think that we both fight each other so ruthlessly because we see the worst parts of ourselves in the other,” Liv said as she stood and offered her hand to Maude.

She took it and pulled herself up, standing face to face with Liv. Equals in more ways than they realized, Maude could not deny that she had thought at times how she felt like she was arguing with herself when she butt heads with Liv.

“If we are the same, then we are all screwed,” Maude joked, cracking a half grin.

“Oh, these boys won't know what hit them,” Liv returned with a sly smile of her own.

The two women laughed together, the tentative bonds of a strained friendship forming between them. The brothers walked over to where they had been standing together and gave each woman odd looks, which only caused Maude and Liv to fall into further hysterics.

“I knew this would happen once they put their blades down and actually spoke to each other,” Hakon grumbled, taking off in the direction of Eydis and Gunnar, who were also chatting companionably.

Gunnar stood when Hakon walked over to him and called out to everyone to saddle up as the line of red uniforms became clearer in the distance once more, the soldier's relentless pace matching their own.

“I see you two have finally found some common ground,” Herrick said as he beamed at them both while grabbing their packs to load again. “Let me guess, it’s about how dashing you both think I am.”

Liv snorted while Maude rolled her eyes and said, “Only in your dreams, beast.”

“You can count on that; you are always in my dreams, minn eldr ,” he returned lightly, but his eyes held a seriousness that stalled Maude’s response on her tongue.

Liv faked a gag and walked back to where her horse was grazing, ready to finish the journey to Veter, and said over her shoulder to Maude, “If you ever want to get away from the male stench of arrogance, I’m free for sparring. ”

“I’ll keep that in mind,” Maude replied, hopping up into the saddle once more.

Herrick eyed both of them and fitted himself behind Maude once more. “I don’t know if I love the idea of the two of you being friends.”

“How far are we from Veter?” Maude asked instead, avoiding a response to his comment.

“We should reach the bridge that leads into the city in the late afternoon,” Herrick replied as the mare started moving further into the Lamenting Woods.

Maude turned around to see the others closely behind them, horses slowly navigating the thick trees.

The further they got into the woods, the darker it became.

The sunlight was being consumed by the dense coverage of leaves above them, leaving the air around them cooler.

Herrick was quiet as he concentrated on navigating through the woods on a specific path that Maude could not discern from any other path in the winding tree roots.

An hour passed without a word spoken between them, and Maude began to relax a bit, telling herself she didn’t enjoy the repetitive movement that pressed her close to Herrick.

She had tried to forget the madness that had taken over her in the aftermath of the fight they’d had with the raiders when she had ground against Herrick but had often found her thoughts drifting back to how good his hand had felt on her thigh, and how his teeth had gently grazed her ear.

She shivered at the memory, but Herrick must’ve felt her because he shifted slightly behind her.

Maude smirked and decided to see how far she could push him.

She arched her back a bit and rolled her neck, her hood pulled tight against her head so Herrick got no ideas about bringing his mouth anywhere near her neck again.

She let out a small sound when she relaxed from her stretch, and she felt Herrick’s chest rumble behind her, sending shockwaves down her nervous system and into her core, heating it.

“You okay back there?” Maude asked innocently.

“Never better,” Herrick forced out, breathing through the minor rocking. Maude might have been exaggerating as her hips moved with the horse's movements.

“You seem bothered,” Maude pointed out, twisting a bit and arching her back again in the same movement. She felt Herrick’s hand move to her thigh again and tighten.

“I know what you’re doing,” he said, low and accusatory.

Maude’s voice took on a smoky tone that was foreign, even to her, “I’m sure I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

She faced the woods again as Herrick's fingers painted small circles on her leg that drifted ever closer to where she wanted his hands more than the breath in her lungs.

Just as she thought he would graze the hard seam of her pants that ran over the softest part of her, his fingers withdrew, and she blew out the breath she was holding.

“I think you know exactly what you’re doing,” Herrick said to her as his fingers resumed their swirling pattern, running them up and down the inside of her thigh.

“It wouldn’t matter anyway; you’re too nice.”

Herrick’s fingers stopped their teasing, and Maude wondered if she had said the wrong thing, their game over before it had even started.

His callused hands drifted up her arm, leaving that stream of ice water in its wake that seemed to cool her raging fire into a molten, slow-burning heat.

His right hand made it to her shoulder, while the left, holding the reins to the horse, stayed planted on her thigh in plain sight of those traveling with them .

“Too nice?” Herrick’s voice rumbled with his unchecked arousal, and Maude knew she had said exactly the right thing.

His hand, quick as lightning, wrapped around her throat and pulled her back so she was flush with his body. The angle of his hand forced her to look up at the canopy, and she became a bit breathless at the dominance in his grip.

Maude could feel his hard length at her back, telling her exactly how affected he was by the position as well. Her center pulsed in an aching rhythm— she could feel herself soaking through her underthings.