“Like I’m going to tell a Saxon.”
I squeezed her thigh over the blanket. “What does it matter if I’m a dead man anyway?”
She sighed like she was giving in. “He’s never told us how it works, but he has powers of compulsion. Most people don’t even know it’s been used on them. It took us a long time to realize what he was capable of.”
Shock rattled through me. “He can control your mind?”
“Not like a puppet, no. More like single actions. Like getting you to drop a weapon and put a pair of shackles on instead. Or to turn your weapon on yourself. Or to share a secret you’d never tell him. He doesn’t use it often because it’s more powerful if people don’t realize he’s done it. If he does it overtly to someone, it’s a sure sign they’re about to die and take the secret with them.
“I learned to resist him…most of the time. But none of us have been willing to put it to the test when he was fighting mortal peril and his berserker threw his full powers behind it.”
My mind raced with the possibilities of things he could’ve done to her…and she hadn’t always known.
“Don’t look at me like that.” she said, pulling her hand away. “Don’t make me out to be an innocent victim. If he compelledme, I still did those things. I could’ve resisted him if I’d been stronger. I could’ve found a way to spare innocents like Eleanor’s brother.”
I had to swallow my anger so my tone wasn’t harsh. “Sigrid, you were a child.”
“Maybe by Saxon standards, but I was a teen by then, trained as a fighter. The truth is that I chose my brothers over hers. I imagined my father forcing Thorin to cut his own throat, and all thoughts of disobedience went up in smoke. I chose knowing it meant an innocent would die. And I’d make the same choice again, so don’t even think of making me out to be helpless in this.”
I ached to reclaim her hand, but I didn’t dare try to take what she didn’t offer.
“How did you escape?”
“I vowed never to set foot on Viking lands again while he lived. I made a blood offering and asked the gods to choose between us if it came to that. He fears they’ll take him, but he doesn’t want to lose his heir either, not before I produce an heir of my own that he probably wants to use as a puppet.” She turned pensive. “Unless taking Layla was an elaborate way to lure Thorin back into his clutches so he can make him the heir and force them to provide the next generation.”
“What would that mean for you?”
A shuffling sound in the adjoining room to our left made both of us freeze, but Sigrid quickly resumed talking, her voice never changing tone as she picked up the knife she’d left by the bed. “He can pick a different heir now that I’m a Saxon royal. Maybe he married me to you to move me out of the line of succession. The Viking people would never truly accept me now.”
She nodded, and as one, we rolled from the bed, padding silently across the room towards the noise. I picked up my sword and stood to one side of the doorway as she stationed herself onthe other. She signaled with her hand that she’d enter first, but I held up my sword to demonstrate that my weapon had greater reach and better defensive capabilities if it came to it.
She rolled her eyes and swept her hand to invite me to enter first.
My mind raced with visions of eyeless assassins lurking in the dark, but I drew in a breath and charged into the room. A dark figure huddled against the wall, and I raised my sword to strike before they had a chance to act.
A bloodcurdling scream tore through the silence.
CHAPTER SIXTEEN
SIGRID
I’d allowed Bastian to go first, but I immediately regretted it when I collided with his back because he hesitated. He was going to get us both killed!
The screaming didn’t register until I lunged around him to gut the intruder, but Bastian threw his weight into me, taking us both to the ground.
“The fuck?” I snarled, pushing him off me to roll to my feet and try again. Had he turned on me?
There wasn’t time to feel, but still his possible treachery lashed at me.
“Sigrid, no!” he shouted as I brought my blade down towards the figure. At the very last instant, they raised their face, and even in the shadows, I recognized Eleanor’s loveliness. I jerked my wrist, embedding the knife into the wall next to her head instead of into her throat.
She screamed again and scrambled away across the floor with her limbs moving too quickly, so she got tangled up inherself. When she made it to Bastian, he dropped his sword and allowed her to melt in a sobbing heap into his arms.
“She almost k-killed me!” Tears streamed prettily down her cheeks.
I pulled my knife from the wall with a firm tug, and she jerked closer to Bastian in terror.
I rolled my eyes. “Shestill might kill you if you don’t explain what the fuck you were doing sneaking around my chamber in the dark. Who sent you?”
