The shock on his face when she had gotten to him during his escape had almost leveled her. It was like he had seen a ghost, and Maude knew she couldn’t blame him for the reaction. He would likely begin to spiral after they all had a moment to calm down, so Maude took these few moments of peace and savored them.
Tentatively, she ran her fingers over the sculpted muscles of his chest, tracing the head of the dragon that scaled his arm by memory. When her fingers tripped over new divots and overly smooth skin, Maude paused. She ran her fingers again over the scarred skin and opened her eyes again, dread filling her.
Maude lifted her head slowly so she did not wake Herrick and found the horrible truth permanently branded into his skin.
In neat, even lines the length of someone’s finger on each side of his chest were burns that descended from Herrick’s collar bones down to the lowest ribs. The deep purple of freshly healing burn marks screamed at her, the puckered wounds cutting through the beautiful artwork and runes that had once been inked into his chest.
Some of the scars were older and healed more than the others closer to his stomach, but the newer ones looked like they had been treated with some sort of salve. She sniffed and detected aloe vera still saturating his skin despite the obvious signs that he had cleaned up a bit.They were almost completely healed— to the naked eye, they wouldn't see anything amiss with the flow of his skin. But Maude knew his skin better than her own.
The marks that disturbed her the most, though, were the long, thin scars that had been seemingly healed multiple times. The location of these wounds ranged from his wrists to the side of his neck and down to the tops of his thighs. She wasn't sure what they indicated, but they had certainly not existed before his imprisonment.
He flinched at her fire, she remembered. When they had been in the servant's halls, Herrick had reeled away from her flames as absolute terror gripped his features. She felt like the air had been stolen from her lungs when she saw the dread and the crippling fear that shadowed his usually glowing golden irises.
From his jaw all the way down to where his trousers hung low on his hips, Herrick's skin had been permanently branded by the things he had endured in those cells just as much as his soul had. At the order of her father—
No. She would never claim that monster as her kin again after what he did to her beast. Nausea roiled in her gut for a second before all-consuming wrath burned in its place, chasing the sick away.
She was going tokillhim. She woulddestroyhim for what he did to Herrick.
Her skin began to heat, the blood in her veins boiling with outrage toward Helvig. Maude hastily untangled herself from Herrick’s grip and leaped for the door. She needed to be in the open air; she was too close to erupting.
Barely sparing a moment to check that Herrick still lay asleep on the bed, Maude sprinted toward the stairs that would bring her up to the deck.
A few curious eyes followed her movements, but they all let her go, probably seeing the crazed look in her eyes as she ascended the narrow stairs. The salt from the ocean hit her first, then the starlight from the night sky above her. A few shouted her name as she surfaced, but Maude ignored them all as her eyes found the tall mainsail in the center of the longboat.
She quickly climbed to the top, not stopping for a moment to look out over the pitch black water or see who had been calling for her. It wasn't until she perched herself on top of the sail that she finally took deep, gasping breaths and tried to center herself.Hergalderwas threatening to explode out of her, but she couldn’t be sure that she wouldn’t burn the ship down in her rage. Maude tried to focus her fury into the shadows around her and found a soothing sense of peace in the void that exploded out of her.
Too disturbed by the feel of burnt skin under her fingertips, she couldn’t feel impressed by how she managed to wrangle the shadows around her. Instead, the sight of the even burn marks on Herrick’s chest flashed behind her closed eyes.
It was her fault. He had gotten close to her and had gotten hurt because of it. He had beentorturedbecause he followed her into the palace. It always came back to her.
What kind of horror had Herrick been through because of how he felt for her? Maude understood that he was a valuable prisoner because of his role as General of Rivers, but she also knew that her father was aware of their connection with each other. Reason tried to tell her that Helvig had to think she was dead and, therefore, Herrick’s imprisonment was political instead of personal, but something nagged at the back of her mind that there was more to his imprisonment than she could see right now.
She wouldn't know until Herrick spoke to her about it. If he ever did.
The cool air from the ocean curled around her like her shadows did, content to rest against her inflamed skin as her anger burned within her. No matter how hard Maude tried to push the image of Helvig from her mind, she kept circling back to how she had failed spectacularly in ending him.
He had played her like a fool, and she had been too stubborn or angry to see it.
The Bone Dagger, not thedalkr Hela, had been personally delivered to him at no cost to himself. But Maude had lost.
She failed in bringing down a tyrant, protecting her friends from his cruelty, and saving Eydis’s life. Maude had done more to hurt herself and Ahland, all because she was angry about her fate. She had run away from it; now, she was being punished for it.What was worse than her punishment was the fact that the people of Ahland were suffering under Helvig’s rule because of her selfishness. Because of her cowardice.
Maude’s thoughts raced until even the darkest part of the night couldn’t cool down the burning anger she had for herself. So she stopped trying and let the grief and rage devour her whole.
Liv watched as the thick swirl of shadows swallowed up Maude's form at the top of the mainsail. Her friend had ignored everyone on deck when they asked her if she was okay, choosing to scale the tall beam at a speed that betrayed her Elven blood. She wasn't sure what had prompted Maude's panicked state, but she quickly went below deck to find Herrick and make sure he was still in one piece.
The last Liv had heard from the others, the Heir of Shadows had still been unconscious from wielding earthgalderat the palace.
Ducking below the low beam at the bottom of the damp, wooden stairs, Liv entered the space where thevitkishe had freed were resting. Most seemed to settle in quite easily to the dark space while some had begun to rekindle their courage and make their way to the top deck for some fresh air. Yuri, one of Aeric's most trusted sailors, was handing out fish soup to those who accepted.
The tall male had the same dark skin as her, the color absorbing the shadows of the lower deck as he made his way through the cramped space. His hair, however, was a stark white that matched his light silver eyes, the thick curls braided into neat rows and tied into a knot at the base of his neck. Though his tall frame was similarto the build of a warrior, he moved with the shifting longship with the ease of a seasoned sailor.
"Yuri," Liv called out to the familiar face. "What can I do to help?"
The male sighed and pushed the trolley of food he had been carting around toward her.
"See if they will accept the food from you," Yuri said as he turned away from another group of prisoners who trembled with fear. "You might have better luck since you convinced them to leave with you."
