“I have to go to the maze for something Bastian and I discussed. If you’d rather stay here alone, by all means. But the maids know you’re in here, so you’ll be an unprotected sitting duck.” I could lose her somewhere in the maze and talk to Talon, then retrieve her again.
She narrowed her eyes. “Bastian didn’t mention going to the maze.”
I tossed her sewing onto the nearest table and tugged her to her feet. The longer we stood here talking, the more likely someone was to find Talon out there.
“Are you staying here or coming with me?”
She studied me a final time, then sighed with resignation. “I’ll come with you.”
CHAPTER NINETEEN
SIGRID
We reached the maze without incident. Eleanor had even proved to be useful a few times, showing me a faster path and lying artfully to one of the guards who offered to escort us.
The entire walk down, my every instinct continued to scream that something was wrong. The bright daylight and gentle birdcalls mocked me as we stepped into the shade of the tall hedge maze.
It was dangerous for Talon to be here, so I wanted to believe that was the reason for my unease, but there was something more to the feeling.
My berserker was restless and angry, angry with me for not sensing whatever had her riled.
Has Ocracoke been attacked again?
Did my father kill Layla?
If Layla was dead, Thorin wouldn’t be far behind her. He couldn’t lose his mate.
I had a knife hidden in my skirt, but my fists clenched with the aching need to find a proper weapon. Worry drove my feet to haste. A battle-axe wouldn’t help with whatever news Talon was about to deliver.
I shook my head at how easily Eleanor had trusted me. I could’ve been taking her out there to gut her for coveting my husband. Maybe I should’ve done that, but I couldn’t help liking her.
I noted every turn around a hedge we made, making sure I could quickly find my way back. When we’d wound our way into the thick of the maze, I pulled Eleanor to a stop. “Let me climb up and see if I can find the direction of the middle. I’m all turned around.”
It was a complete lie, but I was hoping to spot my brother. He wouldn’t do something so predictable as waiting for me in the middle, but I needed to make sure Eleanor didn’t cross his path. My heart raced with nervous excitement that I was about to be face-to-face with the reckless fool. I was livid he’d left Ocracoke, but I was also more desperate than I wanted to admit for any sliver of home after being trapped in this dreary place for days.
The instant my head breached the top of the hedgerow, I spotted a Viking two rows over…but it wasn’t Talon. He was turned partially away from me, but I could still see the eerie markings that covered where his eyes should have been. His eyelids were sewn shut and had been tattooed with the mark of Odin.
He was a Banamaðr.
In my haste not to be seen, I all but threw myself from the branch I’d been clinging to, brushing Eleanor off when she tried to check that I wasn’t injured. I instinctively started to push her back towards the entrance to the maze, frantic to put distance between us and the beast who had once been a man. Some primitive part of my soul quaked at the sight of him.
Holy gods.
The last time I’d faced one, I’d been fully armed and barely escaped alive, even with the powers of my berserker.
Odin gifted them with his sight, but no one knew if that meant they could still observe the world as we did. I suspected it was more like the visions I had of people’s fears. They existed on an otherworldly plane that was removed from reality and yet felt as real as the hedge I’d just gripped in my hand.
I’d gone charging into a maze with a Banamaðr, barely armed and isolated from my berserker. I would’ve laughed if the circumstances hadn’t been so dire. I’d asked for a low-stakes situation to properly test my limited powers, and this couldn’t have been further from that. Whatever god I’d angered had a sense of humor.
I was disgusted to feel the gnawing grip of fear twisting my guts. It was the kind of terror I was used to feeling as an outsider in other people’s minds.
Was it possible he’d been sent to murder someone besides me?
He cast an illusion to summon me to the maze, pretending to be Talon.
You didn’t send a Banamaðr to deliver a message, and there would be no reason for the assassin to forewarn me of his plans if he meant to kill someone else.
Movement in the opposite direction from the Banamaðr made my muscles lock up. I dared a quick look through the hedges and felt a tighter twist of fear when I caught a glimpse of a second Banamaðr in that direction.
