Baldr had begun to stand, his hand still bleeding profusely from the wound. Soon, it was wreathed in flames to burn it closed.
“Next time I see you, General, Iwillkill you,” Herrick said as Hakon started to drag him down the hall toward the sound of more shouts and fighting. “I swear to all the gods that the last thing you’ll see before you die is my face.”
Baldr launched a fireball at him, the heat from it stinging the side of his face with how close it had come.
“Soldiers! Bring me the prisoner!” Baldr roared as he struggled to his feet.
“Until next time,” Herrick taunted with a mock bow before he turned and sprinted after his brother. Hakon erected a wall of thick ice behind them to buy some time so they could escape, but he knew they had only minutes.
“It's good to see you,” Herrick huffed as he kept up with Hakon’s fast pace, the walls of his throat threatening to clog with the relief of seeing him. He was starting to tire more rapidly and he knew he didn't have a lot of time left before the iron around his neck took the last of his strength. He just hoped he could make it to wherever Hakon had come from before he collapsed.
The dark hall of the dungeons was littered with dead and dying Flame Soldiers that Hakon had cut down. The number of soldiers guarding his cell was staggering.
“Did you do this all yourself?” Herrick asked as they slowed to turn a corner.
“I had some help,” Hakon replied, his hand going to Herrick’s chest to stop him from rounding the corner. “Herrick, I need you to keep your head long enough for us to get to safety. Can you promise this?”
Dread filled him. “Of course.”
His brother nodded once before edging around the corner again, looking toward where the fighting was thickest. A flash of copper, like a burning flame, peeked out from between the new black uniforms belonging to the Flame Soldiers.
Bryn. Maude’s sister was here fighting with Hakon.
Relief flooded him. He had kept his promise to Maude. By allowing her to escape with his friends, Herrick had kept her safe. Now she was here, risking her life to free him in exchange. Herrick wasn't sure how to deal with that, but it didn’t seem impactful enough for Hakon to have warned him ahead of time.
“It would be helpful if you swung that axe and helped, Kolbeck!” Bryn shouted to him, shooting them a feral grin as she sliced through the solder in front of her.
If she regretted cutting down the men and women she had trained, it didn’t show on her face.
Herrick threw himself into the fight, his axe and dagger showing no discrimination between the soldiers who put themselves in the way of his anger.For weeks, he had stewed in his hatred, letting it consume him. He had withstood torture, and never once had he given up his friends or his family. Now, his blood sang at the sight of Flame Soldiers falling beneath his strength.
The tang of iron was heavy in the air as their group fought their way through the contingent of soldiers that had responded to the brawl. Herrick didn’t care if he made it out of the palace walls; he only wanted to join Maude in Valhalla as a warrior who went down fighting.
He was facing off with one of the last soldiers when a trick door opened behind him. He had fought his way through the thicket of soldiers and had become separated from Hakon and Bryn, so there was no one to warn Herrick of the soldiers who had burst through the servants' halls into the fight. Herrick couldn't turn in time to stop the blade that was aimed to slice through his neck, ending his chance at freedom before it could even be within his grasp.
But no blow came.
Thetwangof an arrow releasing from a bow came a split second before Herrick’s neck was coated in a Flame Soldier's blood.
“The next one to touch him will meet the gods before they can draw another breath,” a voice that burned with a rage that matched his own came from behind him.
Shock paralyzed him enough that the soldier he had been fighting saw an opening to cut him down. Before he could, an arrow shot through his throat, the soldier choking on his blood before he fell over.
“Anyone else want to call my bluff? Touch him, and you die,” that beautiful voice came again, a hint of humor in her threat.
Herrick couldn’t believe it. He wouldn’t. She had been cut down, and he held her as shedied— had felt the life leave her body as he screamed over her.
“Herrick, you have to keep moving,” she said, closer now than before.
Heat burned behind him, the feeling so familiar that it should have been impossible.
A hesitant touch on his shoulder spurred Herrick back into the moment. He spun to face her, his eyes searching her face like it was the first time seeing her.
Deep green eyes ringed by black. A heart-shaped face with full lips that always seemed to be twisted in disdain except when he was kissing them. Wine-red hair braided back with a few loose strands framing her face. The scar in the shape of the runeansuzcarving through the left side of her face and through her eyebrow. The only thing missing from his hallucination was the indigo fabric she usually had wrapped around her and fashioned into a hood. The one casting her face in shadows now came from the simple cloak she wore, obscuring the rest of her body from view .
Annoyance flared in those green eyes at his lack of movement, and the sight threatened to choke the last remaining breath from Herrick’s lungs.
“Maude,” he whispered, stepping closer to her.
