Page 69 of A Darkness So Sweet
The old man was right about one thing. He was getting older. Ragnar narrowed his eyes as he tried to figure out the best way to phrase what he needed. “She’s rather good at taking care of a home. She’ll clean up in here for you.”
“I can do that myself. I don’t need someone else’s troll wife to do that for me.”
“She was a gardener in the human realm.” Ragnar threw that out there despite knowing it wouldn’t convince the old man.
As he suspected, Birger scoffed. “I don’t care what she knows. Humans cannot convince anything to grow well. She’ll just insult the plants and then they’ll spite me by not giving us any food for the year.”
Rubbing his chin, Ragnar tried one last time. “She’s kind, Birger. I think if there is anyone who can put up with your surliness, it would be her. You could yell and scream and scold her all you want, but she’s not going to flinch from any of it. I’ve never seen a woman more capable of handling anything that I throw at her.”
There it was.
The old man stilled, his breathing even stopped as the challenge burned through him. Birger had never met a person he couldn’t get to leave the garden. He was famed throughout all of Trollveggen for being an absolute beast of a man, and anyone who stepped foot in the garden left with their ears blistering and their pride bruised.
If there was a single person who wouldn’t let him get to them, though, Ragnar was certain it was his Maia. The woman knew how to let words roll right off her. Her father and the other humans had taught her that much.
Hopefully, she could do the same with this ancient troll.
Birger finally looked at him, the calculating expression on his face one of pure glee. “So you say?”
“I’ve never once been able to make her upset with me.” The lie rolled off his tongue with ease. “She doesn’t seem to fear our kind at all.”
“Bring this human to me, then. I’ll remind her that trolls are not something to fear just because of our size.”
Ragnar hoped he hadn’t just made all of this worse.
ChapterTwenty-Nine
MAIA
They didn’t talk about how Ragnar had killed a group of her people. Maia wasn’t sure why a voice inside her head screamed for her to not confront him about what he’d done. Maybe there was some sense of self preservation in there, and the recognition that she wasn’t sure she’d be able to deal with it.
She knew what trolls did to the humans they caught. She’d grown up with the stories, and unfortunately, that meant she was now faced with the reality that those stories were very much true. The trolls really did skin people alive. They really made their bodies look like strange omens hanging from the trees. Those weren’t rumors—they were true.
It made something in her quiver with fear to face that reality. Her husband, the one she couldn’t get away from even if she tried, had participated in those acts.
“Justify it,” she muttered to herself as she walked to the garden with Gunnar at her side.
“What did you say?” he asked, though he didn’t look at her.
None of them did these days. Ragnar was the only one who could look her in the eye, but he was rarely home. He wouldn’t even walk her to the garden, or explain how he had convinced the owner of said garden to let her onto the property. All he’d said was that he was busy. He didn’t have time to bring her, but she was going. Whether she wanted to or not.
“I didn’t say anything,” she replied.
At least Gunnar looked at her then. It was more of a glare, really, but at least he wasn’t pretending that she wasn’t standing right next to him. “Trolls have good hearing.”
“I know.”
“Then you know I heard what you said.”
“If you heard what I said, then why are you asking what I said?” Maia wrinkled her nose up at him. “It was an internal thought, Gunnar. One that shouldn’t have slipped out. Leave me to my thoughts, since you’re so determined to pretend I’m not here, anyway.”
“I’m just trying to make sure no one attacks us, woman. Good lord, do you always think the worst of people?”
“I don’t know. Do you blame me for the attack on your city?”
His expression became grim, and she knew the answer without him saying it. Some part of him blamed her. She could see it clear as day on his face as he turned his features away. He might not have wanted to admit it to her, but there was that ugly underbelly she’d been so good at pretending wasn’t here.
Blowing out a long, frustrated breath, she turned her attention back to the path. “I had nothing to do with it, you know.”
