“Imustn’t?Gentlewoman, tell me this moment.”
“Please,” I said, the sound of tears threatening to break in my voice.“It’s not his fault.”
“I will break one person’s finger for every hour you delay telling me.You will have to watch and listen to their pain?—”
I was breathing too quickly.If I go home now, I’ll die.They’ll kill me.I felt dizzy and couldn’t blink enough, and the idea of people’s fingers breaking to protect Fell was awful, but seeing King Arik’s face… it wasn’t safe to tell him the truth.“Have mercy,” I said, tears burning the back of my eyes.
Ivar kept himself between me and the king which was a kindness no one present appreciated in the moment, but I did sometime later when I thought back on it.
Fortunately, no fingers were broken, because Jorn arrived with Dania at his side.The two had come when they’d heard the yelling.Her boys were running circles around the pair of them, making a kind of shrill noise that felt like it was scratching my brain.
“What has happened?”Jorn said upon entering, his eyes darting from tense person to tense person.
“The soten is opening a door,” one of the Norsern backed against the wall said.
Dania’s hands shot to her mouth, her eyes bright with shock.
Jorn’s gaze settled on me, bewildered.
“She will not say who fathered it,” Ivar said.He looked back at me, “Which is allowed.You need not say.”
“She bloody well does!”King Arik said.“And if I must force your fucking mouth to stop working Ivar, I will do it!”
“You will be happy I stayed you later,” Ivar said, though his expression didn’t seem like he entirely believed his words.
“You will not be,” King Arik said, his voice quieting but growing all the scarier for it.His eyes turned on Jorn.“And you will need to explain how you missed this.”
“Stop all this!”Dania came forward to stand between Ivar and the king.“Fell is the father.Obviously.”
I hated her for days for that.I hadn’t told her of what conspired between Fell and I, but she must have figured it.
“Fell?”King Arik turned to look at me.
I was as still as rock at the bottom of the sea.
“Fetch him,” King Arik said.
Fell arrived lightly—the same way he did everything—with a smile on his face.“I told you I don’t remember the shape of the mountain on Kierre.I was too busy with the fight—” He stopped when he saw King Arik’s purple face.The bulging veins.“Ah, I expect I have done something?—”
King Arik pointed at me.“Did you turn this womanvanurigk?”
“Uhh…” Fell looked at me then, his brows raised in the most adorable fashion.“Did I?”The sweetness of his tone brought tears to my eyes, and I had the urge to laugh the way Norsern did when many things in a row had gone wrong, but they still had their friends close by so it didn’t matter.
I didn’t answer, but I think that was enough of a response.
“Ah!”He laughed, and even though the hall contained a fuming king and many uneasy Norsern, Fell came to me, bending his neck so he could set his forehead against mine.He wrapped his arms around me—not around my waist as he usually did, but above my shoulders.His arms shielded our faces from those onlooking, and I did let a tear escape then, relieved by the false privacy.
“Please do not hate me,” I whispered.
He smiled.“I could not.”
And then he looked at me, or rather, into me.I knew he was trying to understand how I felt, but I couldn’t feel anything other than the relief of not having everyone able to see my face.
“From the head of a ship to the tail, where are you?”
This was a common way of asking how a person was faring.
“I am afraid.”Another tear dripped down the side of my nose, tickling my face.It was a rare thing to admit fear in the north.
