Maude tilted her chin up and bared her teeth at him, their noses almost touching with how close they were. "Anything I've lied about has been to protectyou.I didn't ask for any of this."
She motioned between the two of them with one hand, her frustration beginning to boil over. Herrick saw the moment her rage grabbed the reins of her control and braced himself for what she would say next.
"Youjumped into that pit with me.Youfreed me from that cell and convinced me to find that weapon with you. You lied about who you were just as much as I did. After everything that has happened, after all the loss and heartbreak, you don't suddenly get to decide that this is all my fault. Not when you were right there at my side every step of the way, even when I tried to do this alone," Maude growled, her skin growing hotter with every word she spat. "I left you in Dagsbrun to protect you. It was all in vain since you ended up a captive anyway."
Herrick placed his hands beside either side of her head on the wall behind her, his chest slowly heaving with breath as he tried to control his growing fury. Every word she threw at him was true.
"Yes, there are things that I've kept from you since we rescued you. I plan to tell you everything, but you have no idea what I am feeling or thinking about. I don't have the words to tell you yet, and you just have to respect that," she finished, her hand inching toward the dagger on her thigh as her golden flames started to twirl around her fingers. He wasn't even sure she was aware that her anger had sparked in her fire. "And as for Baldr, I came down here to bring you back up to the deck where I was going to tell our friends who I suspect he is. But since you don't trust me, it's clear you already disagree with whatever insight I have to offer."
Herrick glanced down, only seeing the twisting fire and how it burned just as hot as Baldr's flames. Any anger that had been building left him as swiftly as it had arrived, smothered by the intensity of his need to get as far away from the golden fire as he could.
He inched backward slowly, controlling his movements and not giving Maude his back, until the length of the cabin separated them and crossed his arms over his chest. The flames seemed to burn brighter for a moment before they turned to smoke when she realized he was backing away from her not only to put emotional distance between them, but also because of her fire.
He needed the truth from her— any truth. Maybe if she could only tell him what she was trying to protect him from when she disappeared from the tavern that night, maybe he could start to trust her again, he reasoned with himself.
"Tell me why you left me in Dagsbrun that day this all went to Hel," he finally said once the air between them stilled.
"No."
Herrick was quiet for a moment before his face hardened. "Then I have nothing left to say to you."
Maude felt like she had been slapped the moment she saw Herrick back away from her without taking his eyes off the fire that had sparked in her palms. She hadn't summoned them, they responded to her flare of emotion too convoluted to name when he had cornered her against the wall.
The air in her lungs thinned as her heart stuttered, seeming to stop for a moment before kicking back up into a high-speed gallop. The fire in her veins turned to ice, sharp and numbing until she felt her body vibrate with shivers. Numbly, she turned to the door and let herself out of the smothering cabin. A hollowness spread through her chest until she was sure that she was only a shell that held a cruel soul.
She couldn't tell him about her fate telling, the damning runes that now saturated her skin. There would be no hiding once the truth was out there. In a moment of weakness when Herrick had balanced their relationship on the truth of why she left him in Dagsbrun, she had chosen herself. And gods how she loathed herself for it. Already, Maude wished she could take the denial back, but her pride wouldn't allow it.
Instead, without another word, she closed the door to the cabin, sure that she had left the remnants of her shattered heart to bleed on the wooden floor behind her.
"Will you finally tell us what the Hel happened over there?" Liv shouted to Maude as she resurfaced onto the deck. "On the Flame ship?"
All at once, she shielded her heartbreak from showing on her face as she turned to answer the question on all her friends faces. Hakon didn't stick around to listen to what she had to say as he headed below deck to find Herrick. It seemed both the Kolbeck brothers were washing their hands of her filth.
The pieces of information that Maude was missing started clicking together as she truly began to process Herrick's reaction to seeing the new General of Flame. There was a history there that she did not know of, memories that plagued him even in his regained freedom. The burns on his skin, the utter focus on killing the new General, the betrayal when she took that kill from him.
"I—," Maude started to say, but her throat was bone dry despite the lingering water in the air from the storm. "I can't be sure, but I may have saved the life of Aeric's spy in the Kingdom of Flame who also happens to have been Herrick's torturer."
Liv reeled backward while Bryn stopped short next to her friend as she caught the end of Maude's statement, her own shock clear on her face. But Maude could not stop the waterfall of words that continued to pour from her mouth.
"He's the new General of Flame. He had the correct uniform and pins to indicate his position, but he was taking his own soldiers down while Herrick was trying to kill him. Isawhim shooting fire at his men. He never took a shot at Herrick, but I don't think he could tell because he was too busy trying to kill him. More than that, he had every chance to kill me and Herrick if he wanted to, but didn't. Every move that man made was a benefit to us, not the Kingdom of Flame. The corridors surrounding Herrick's cell was empty of guards, the path in and out of the palace so direct and free of patrols. Why else would he have attacked his own men? He is a total stranger to us. "
"If you're right, this changes everything," Liv murmured, her eyes flaring with excitement. "The cells with thevitkiwere also surprisingly empty beyond a few men. Hakon didn't have to free Herrick from chains, he said that he was already released and attacking the General when he found him."
"Did you tell Herrick?" Bryn asked as the suspicion grew smaller in her eyes the longer Maude and Liv reasoned over everything that had happened in Logi.
Maude shook her head numbly, the space where her heart used to be somehow crumpling more.
"Still," Bryn mused. "That is a tough role for someone to play. It won't be for very long that this man can keep his identity a secret from Father. He is in as much danger as everyone else."
"The new General of Flame is Aeric's spy inside the palace," Liv said, her grey eyes flaring.
Unable to partake in any of the conversation between Liv and her sister, Maude only shrunk into the growing shadows of her foul mood as she stared out over the dark line of the horizon.
"We need to find out who he is," Liv continued, turning to Bryn, who nodded once before they both walked away together to discuss the soldiers that had been working under Bryn during her time as Lieutenant General, leaving Maude alone at the bow of the ship to process the monumental wedge she just drove between her and the only man she ever trusted.
17
Baldr leaned one hand against the wall of his cabin on board the longship he had sailed to find the Kolbeck brothers under the order of the Flame King, breathing deeply as his nausea and dizziness washed over him. He had used too muchgalderthis morning, the effort it had taken to fend off the Rivers Generalandthe Flame Soldiers had strained him, but the sickness he now expected from his actions had bubbled in his stomach until it had almost overwhelmed him.
