Page 58 of The Ever King

“You think you know things about the gift I offered King Thorvald; I assure you, there are pieces you do not understand.” Narza looked out the window. Unspoken burdens shadowed her features. “I will meet the earth fae, so you can know her magic. But only if you’re certain it was not a trick of the eye—see that she does it again.”

“I plan to,” I said. “It’s the reason we’re here.”

Narza hummed softly in her throat. “Good. Then I will remain. Do not make my presence known.”

I was hardly listening. My scalp prickled, and somewhere in my chest a foreign sensation burned. In the beginning I dismissed it as my own irritation, but the longer Narza studied me, the more focused I grew on the slow building tension.

A slight quiver inside shifted to something more potent.

I tilted my head, lips pinched. “Are you doing something to me?”

She narrowed her eyes. “Of course not. What is it?”

“I feel . . .” My hand pressed to my chest; breaths came in sharp, haggard rasps. My shoulders tightened, as though I were bracing against a force unseen. Sweat dampened my palms, and my pulse quickened to the point my head spun.

Fear was a weakness, one I fought to conceal, but this fear . . . it was detached. It didn’t belong to me.

A sort of maddening power clung to me where an emotion separate from my own had taken hold as though I should be feeling it, but I wasn’t afraid. The room grew musty, like damp soil burned my nose. I coughed on the grit of it in my throat. The musk of sweat followed. A hot breath of apple rum filled my lungs.

“Erik?” Narza studied me.

“How is this possible?” My head throbbed; I rubbed it away. “I feelher.”

Narza’s painted lips turned down into a frown. “Gods of the tides. You feel your pawn?”

My fists pressed into my skull as a flurry of moments flashed through my mind. Music, a slow, eerie tune. Need. Desire. All around me was laughter and slurred, ale-heavy words. Then a face—a haunting face. I was terrified and captivated all at once as he played a pan pipe. He whispered something. I couldn’t make it out.

“What have you done, Erik?” Narza’s countenance was one tangled in both heady concern that dug into the smooth angles of her face, and anger, like I’d damned us all.

I startled back, but the moment my hand reached out for the latch, a heavy knock sent my blood to my head.

“Erik!” Larsson spilled into the room, Tait behind him. “Come quickly. There’s trouble.”

I yanked a knife from my boot, uncertain what was happening here, and pointed the tip at the sea witch. “Keep your word and remain at the Tower, and I will prove what I say about her magic. Until we meet again, Grandmother.”

CHAPTER21

The Songbird

“Keep your head up.” Celine smacked the back of my shoulder. The woman was brisk, but I was starting to think it wasn’t entirely because she hated me. More that she was on edge around all the cutthroats as much as me.

Hair stood on my arms and my blood ran too hot. No. Fear would not take me now. I bit down on the inside of my lip to keep my breath steady.

Unfamiliar tunes strummed over lyres. Savory hints of pungent herbs and sauces covered the reek of sweat and unwashed clothing. Loud, barking laughter rattled from rafter to floorboard.

I took in the leaning doorframe, the dim flickers of tallow candles nearly burned down to the wick, the slap of paper cards from playing tables in the corner. I picked out what was familiar and kept those in my focus. This was nothing more than an alehouse like the ones near the docks at the fort. Loud, pungent, and vulgar.

When the flutter in my veins subsided, I fell into step with Celine and Larsson.

Bloodsinger had abandoned us with Tait to some upper room. He’d hardly spared a glance at anyone in the rugged township beyond the confines of the sticky, boisterous tavern.

“This way.” Celine swatted my arm and gestured toward a table in the corner. “We’ll be out of the way. No one’ll pay you much attention.”

“What if they do?”

Larsson chuckled. “Hope they don’t. The king would be forced to draw blood and he’s in his best coat.”

They were mocking me, but I suspected they were also warning me. A bit of truth to their taunts. I was in a strange realm with different customs and laws.