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Hekla silently cursed herself as she peeled away from the warm firm body wrapped around hers. There was an art to extracting oneself from a bed companion—an art Hekla had never needed to learn. She had rules for dealing with her paramours, after all: No soft sentiments and no spending the night. But above all else, Hekla never allowed a man to have power over her.
Releasing a long exhale, she slunk from the bed. Her first thought was that she was utterly naked and without her prosthetic arm. Her second, was that brigands must have broken into the room. Bleary-eyed, she blinked at the chaos before her. A chair overturned near the hearth, fur rugs bunched and jumbled about.
Where in the gods’ sacred ashes had her arm gone?
The man’s eyes brightened. “The fact that you’ve a keen enough eye to notice tells me you’ll be a worthy adversary.” He reached for the buckle of his battle belt. It fell to the ground with a thunk that Hekla felt in the pit of her stomach. She itched to do the same. Two weeks stuck in this hovel; two weeks with her every move shackled by Loftur; two weeks without her sparring partner. Hekla had kept with her morning routines but felt herself slipping. She needed an opponent. Someone to give her the challenge she craved. “Very well,” she said, reaching for her own belt.
“So perhaps,” he said softly, “all the scars you worshipped—” “And the dragon.” “And the dragon.” His lips pulled into a smile. “Perhaps they weren’t earned from a life well-lived. Perhaps, they were a plea for attention. An attempt to get my father to see me as more than the person who took his love away from him.”
“It is hard to learn that sometimes those we love most are undeserving.”
She didn’t fight to feel bigger, more powerful. She fought for those who could not. For the girl she’d once been.
“The past two months have shown me a long life is far from guaranteed. I’ve travelled far and wide within this realm. Have tasted adventure and earned my share of scars. Now I am ready to rest my feet, to build a home and a family. And I would do it with you by my side, Hekla Rib Smasher—”
Thrand let out a dramatic exhale. “Eyvie. It is clear there’s no leaving this one behind. I don’t know what it is between you, but this job with the mist is far from over. You owe her the truth about your betrothal.” The ground seemed to fall out from beneath Hekla’s feet. Betrothal.
It’s better to bruise now, she told herself, than to break later.
Only the Protector can defeat the dark thing.
