As he says it, I see love shine from his eyes now. Captain Olander Mortensen was never chosen as one of Maryse’s mates when he was young—but I see how he wished he was, back when he was training with her.
Love lost pummels from him in waves before he puts it away. His gaze is barren now, bleak, as he stares at me. He gives me one last deep nod before turning and walking away.
And I know we have an ally in Jarl Oggi Magnussen’s court.
Even if he can’t come out openly to save us.
2
KINSLAYER
I’m dressed in black buckled fighting leathers and tall shitkicker boots from the Old Palace, my long Swedish blonde hair done half-back in braids now, as I wait for a summons to the Magnussen Jarl’s court. As I sling my polar bear pelt around my shoulders to keep warm in the chill, I feel grateful Captain Olander Mortensen was true to his word and brought me all my things from the dragon-cairn.
After a brief inspection, none were deemed to be helpful in breaking me out of my cell, so I got to keep it all. My ancestor’s silver ring is back on my finger; I feel vastly more like me to have it back, and to be dressed in Blood Dragon warrior’s garb, even if it is borrowed.
I had a cell phone from the Old Palace, which I was going to use to call my uncle, King Huttr Erdhelm, to brief him on everything that’s happening. It’s dead now, though, with a massive crack running through it, thanks to all the magical craziness in the dragon-cairn. I toss it aside on the cot, a useless hunk of junk.
As I stand in my cell, ready to face the Jarl.
My King’s Blood Seal is in an inner breast pocket of my leathers. Thefirst one he gave me was lost in the fires that destroyed Jurggadden, but a second one was delivered posthaste to the Old Palace a few days ago.
That little piece of vellum gives Bjorn, Ström, and me full access through any lands to continue our hunt for the Black Dragon and a group of enemy Bone Mages we believe are wielding it.
I feel that slim piece of gilded vellum—penned and signed by my King in his own blood—bolster me now, like a living fire at my heart. Though Bjorn, Ström, and I are all high-ranking members of King Huttr’s Kingsguard, we’re also prisoners, and I don’t know where we stand in Magnussen country.
I chew on my worry now, though I know my Second Drake, Ström, is likely to be let go by Jarl Oggi Magnussen. Not only is Ström a high-level officer in King Huttr’s Kingsguard, he’s also Jarl-Heir to the powerful neighboring Eriksson Clan to the east—someone the Magnussens don’t want to tussle with.
I’m also likely to be escorted to the border, since I’m the King’s niece and our Lineage’s Hög Skjaldmær, High Shieldmaiden, which is sort of like a princess. Not only am I second in line for the Blood Dragon throne if my uncle dies, I have permission from him to investigate anything related to the Black Dragon, his signed Blood Seal in my pocket.
The Blood Seal also mentions Bjorn, and this is what I’m gambling on now as I wait to face Bjorn’s father. Because the King’s Blood Seal is Bjorn’s only chance at freedom.
In a situation where his father might just kill him.
I don’t know if that would be in an hour, a day, or a year; but I know that powerful clan Jarls like Oggi Magnussen are not above making brutal examples of their own children, if an example needs to be made.
Bjorn’s broken not just one, but two major clan laws by returning to his homeland as an Outcast, then desecrating a dragon burial-cairn that is not only a sacred site, but a place of deep superstition for the Magnussens.
I know now that those superstitions were warranted. Something evillived in that place which was once called Seerselen, now known asUnhaemmerten—the Cursed Place.
Some ancient evil related to the Black Dragon—an utterly malevolent energy—had woken four massive dragon-wights out of stone tombs to assail us. It nearly killed Bjorn, Ström, and me, except that a powerful fluke in our magic saved us when we had sex in that altar, thinking it was our last moment alive.
That evil energy got out when our magic blasted a hole in the top of the underground cathedral, all the way to the sky. With those four wights, that evil escaped—gone now.
I don’t know where.
At last, the Jarl’s summons comes. I straighten as a Magnussen Guardsman arrives to get me, not Captain Olander but someone else on my detail. He double-checks the magical silver manacles at my wrists to make sure I’m secure, and then I’m escorted out of my cell with him in front and another guardsman walking behind.
I don’t have Captain Olander with me now, but I get the sense these two guards are dragons he trusts, as we wind down a long corkscrewing staircase from the tower cell.
True to the captain’s word, no one has frisked me or tried to take my Blood Seal from me. Not only that, but I find I’m grateful for my escort now, as we traverse countless stairwells and long halls, then head up and down even more stairs, leaving me turned around by the sheer warren of this ancient place.
A vast castle, thousands of years old if it’s a day, I at last realize we’re inside the Magnussen Clan court palace, rather than some other outlying stronghold in their territory.
The hulking behemoth is a fortress rather than a thing of comfort, like the palaces in our more southern climes. No tapestries adorn the cold, white stone walls, and there are no rugs on the floor. Sconces are filled with torches rather than lamps, burning from a resin that pops and gutters in the chill high north wind.
That wind sneaks through the stones just about everywhere; the fortress is drafty, bone-chill, and devoid of frivolity. I feel a lifeless hardness in it all as I’m escorted through.
As I now understand far more of Bjorn’s childhood than I ever expected to.
