Page 16 of Vow of the Undead (The Bloodrune Saga #1)

“I meant it. Your life has value and you’re bold enough to recognize that beyond what the law says. It’s admirable.”

A blush warmed my neck and ears. He knew I murdered two of his courtiers, and he admired that about me? What the fuck was wrong with King Drakkar?

What was wrong with me?

My shoulders had eased back and my spine straightened a little taller. This wasn’t a compliment, even if it sounded like one. Half of me craved to bask in the feel of it though, to relish it. I’d done a terrible job keeping this darkness locked away with the memories.

Something about King Drakkar coaxed them out. He triggered me to both stay calm and react with fire at the appropriate times, almost like he already understood parts of me I couldn’t even comprehend.

“We’re the same,” he whispered, unprovoked.

My neck prickled with goosebumps as his fingers tightened at my waist. I told myself I only liked his hands on me because he kept me from sliding off the horse. There really wasn’t room for both of us.

We’re not the same.

“We both see that we’re meant for more,” he said.

“Every life has value. Even the witch who did that to your eye.” I shouldn’t have said it.

He could throw me off this horse and force me to be dragged behind in the mud.

He could call the Grimward to bind me again and force me to my knees.

He could do whatever he wanted—-but if we were the same, as he claimed, then I could too.

“You’re not wrong, but order is necessary, and for that to be maintained, we must make sacrifices.”

“And what have you sacrificed?” I asked, speaking through my teeth again.

He laughed. This time it came out cold and cutting and it sent a shiver through me. He drew his hands away, and I shouldn’t have missed the steadiness of them. I didn’t expect him to respond, but when he did, it was only a single word.

“Enough.”

What could a king know of sacrifice? My mind sat with that to keep from spiraling.

If I thought too long about why I enjoyed his touch, panic would grip me.

I was already shaking from the bone-cold of persistent dampness, and if I passed out, I didn’t know if King Drakkar would catch me. But I hoped he would.

I shook off that thought.

Only a wicked fool would be attracted to a king who just sanctioned the beheading of the witch from Stormdal.

I hate him.

But I liked his voice, his bold questions—even if they dug into the places I didn’t want to explore.

It was selfish of me to let him live. Ragna could have killed him. I’d stripped our chance for hope, for a new sovereign ruler who was brave and humble enough to accept the existence of the Gods and allow witches to exist openly.

Selfish and cruel.

He left me alone long enough to spiral twice and then pull myself out of it by listing every sensation one by one, so it was a relief when his deep voice overpowered my thoughts until they vanished completely.

I drew in a full breath for the first time in hours.

“Do you ever feel there is someone else inside of you?” he asked, even though the rain began to pour again and almost drowned out his voice. Even with his mouth so close to my ear. His warm breath broke up the constant chill.

“I’m not sure what you mean.”

How was I supposed to answer that? Yes, the sinister side of me is her own person. That simply wasn’t true, I’d wanted to stab Astrid. I hated that she threatened me and I’d wanted to shut her up, even if I didn’t plan to kill her.

Perhaps he was trying to bait the confession from me—get me to admit I was a witch who had visions of others, and heard voices from the Gods. Even if he already knew what I was.

“Do you ever have voices in your head?”

I didn’t respond.

“Fine, how about this?” King Drakkar leaned in closer. “Do you want someone inside of you? Not a voice, someone real. Your preference suggests you like to be filled.” His palm landed on my thigh and a small gasp escaped me.

The suggestion in his question became obvious as his fingers pressed against the soft flesh of my leg. I should have recoiled at his touch, but there was a fine line between hatred and heat, both inspired by flickering passion.

A fevered blush crawled up my neck, a welcome warmth in the persistent storm. He brushed his knuckles down the side of my throat, having pulled back my cloak’s hood enough to bare my skin. Rain trickled down from my forehead to my collarbone.

I shivered, but was no longer cold.

“Answer me, Silver.”

I’d lied about a lot in my life. My life itself was a lie, really. I wasn’t the witch I was supposed to be. As a seerborn, I should have been able to see how to protect my fellow witches. I didn’t feel like lying about this too, and I knew exactly what he implied.

It’d been far too long since I felt the ripples of pleasure that came with being filled. Bjorn was a kind man, loyal to my father, and loyal to our arrangement to delight in one another on a physical level, but that was where it ended. We were a means to an end, nothing more.

“Yes.”

The king sucked in a sharp breath and I felt his body tense behind me. “Silver, have you ever lied?”

The heat of his last question quickly vanished with a sudden and painful chill that washed over me. It was as if he’d heard my thoughts. Or did he know the secret I’d kept buried since I was just a girl?

Lies had poisoned my lips ever since.

I couldn’t respond. There was no right answer, so when he spoke again, I welcomed the sound of his voice. “You value life, but I’m willing to guess you value truth more. Perhaps as much as I do.”

I opened my mouth, but it was a guard’s voice that cut into our conversation.

“It’s time to make camp,” the guard said. “The winds are changing, and the chill has dropped. We need cover before frostbite sets in.”

King Drakkar sighed but nodded. “Set the canopies.” He directed our horse to the left where the dense trees protected us from the wind. He slid down from the mount and offered me his hand as if he wasn’t a witch-hunting king, but a kind and gentle man.

After hesitating, I slipped my fingers into his hand where his fist covered my blue skin. His hands weren’t especially warm, but they blocked the wind, and with the way his thumb brushed over the numb tips of my fingers, heat unfurled through me.

He led me to the base of a towering tree where he pointed for the guards to set up ‘our’ canopy. Each order barked from his mouth like a demand, but I didn’t flinch at the sound. As rough as King Drakkar was, he’d stopped my execution. For now, I had nothing to fear .

Travelers slowly drifted off the path beaten by hooves and mirrored the guards’ work setting up camp.

Once our canopy of animal fur and leather skin stretched between the trees, King Drakkar left me with a demand.

“Stay here where the wind can’t reach you,” he said. His gaze dropped to the hands folded in my lap. I sat at the center of the tight shelter. “They’re blue again.”

I followed his line of sight to my achingly numb fingers. I’d hardly noticed. “I’m used to it.”

“Yes, so you’ve said. But I’m not. I will not have you suffer needlessly. I’ll be back to…” his lips twitched. “To help keep you warm.”

“Where are you going?” I asked, but it didn’t matter, he’d already disappeared into the shadows. The darkest part of the night came before dawn, and the king was slinking through it for reasons unknown.

I didn’t know how much I cared. Exhausted, I lay back on the furs. Despite the well-built canopy, wind still howled through the openings.

I drifted in and out of a fitful sleep, seeing Ragna’s face, the witch’s head fall to the ground, and then the ink on King Drakkar’s chest. Was it Yggdrasil?

Why would a king who hunted witches paint himself with the tree that connected us to the Gods?

And what had given it the glow of the moon?

It made as little sense as my congealed nightmares.

Shivering, I woke to the wind bellowing like the wolves battle-weary men shifted into from the ancient sagas. I curled within myself, tucking my aching hands between my legs when a figure appeared at the opening of my canopy.

Red caught my attention, and I thought I’d fallen into another nightmare, another dark dream about the creatures with glowing eyes the color of blood following my every step. I blinked and sat up when the king ducked into the canopy.

Without a word, he stepped over me and lay down, molding himself to the shape of my body. My pulse pounded loud enough to wake the entire camp.

“You’re shaking,” he whispered. “Come closer.”

It wasn’t a suggestion. King Drakkar palmed my stomach and gently pulled me flush against him. He plucked my wrists from between my legs and blanketed both of my hands with his. His fingers were surprisingly hot, nearly burning.

Without thinking, I squirmed to press more firmly against him, soaking every bit of this unexpected warmth. He’d just come from outside where he should have been wind-bitten, not carrying the fiery invitation of a flaming hearth at the tips of his fingers.

I didn’t know when or how I fell asleep with my heart skipping so erratically, but I woke to the king’s nose buried in my braids.

As much as I wanted to pull away, he was still warm. Not fiery anymore, but enough to keep me comfortable.

I squinted at the world beyond the canopy. The embers of an evening sunset blanketed the trees in gold. We’d slept the entire daylight away. Soon, the guards would wake and rouse King Drakkar.

I closed my eyes and felt his breath on my neck, telling myself I only liked the warmth of it, nothing more.

We resumed our journey though the wind made it nearly impossible to resume our conversation. The king could no longer interrogate me with the wind carrying our voices away. The air whipped around us, violent and needling my nose and cheeks.

By mid-night my thighs were sore from riding, and all the heat I’d maintained after the night of curling into King Drakkar had been sucked from my bones. Even in summer, the wind was relentless. Winter would claim twice as many souls as last year. Of that I had no doubt.

King Drakkar leaned into me and did what he could to protect my hands from the wind, but curiously, he was no longer able to keep the heat he’d somehow gathered the previous night.

One of the king’s guards stopped the travels at the front. He swung one leg and hopped off his horse, handing the reins to another guard as he fixed his eyes on us.

King Drakkar sighed as he slid his palm down the curve of my torso before he dismounted, but it wasn’t enough to cause any heat of friction other than the traitorous heat building at the base of my belly. The cold grew worse when the king dismounted and left me alone on his horse.

He met the approaching guard halfway.

“Time to split parties.” The guard said. “The king enters Mara first. Three days ahead. Three riders together. Three kingdoms combined.” The guard spoke in a monotone voice as if having recited this a hundred times like the Grimward relaying the execution announcement.

King Drakkar released another rough breath. “Bring me a new horse, Silver will stay with this one.”

The guard gave him a single curt nod before turning around. After a few minutes, he reappeared on his horse with a riderless horse cantering at his mount’s side. The king climbed into the saddles and flicked his icy eyes toward me one last time before directing his horse away from me.

Without another word, he took off on his new horse, a guard at one side and an owl-masked executioner at his other.

And though I was surrounded by guards and members of the Grimward, I was alone, the cold air slicing through my animal furs and cloak.