Page 68 of Soul of Fire

“What does it say?” Arik was looking at me with one eyebrow raised.

“Here.” I handed him the letter, frowning over Sigrid’s message. ‘Gone home to be with the Goddess’ sounded ominously like death, but she must have meant a physical place. I had no idea what the symbols meant, or what she meant about a mirror, but they must be a clue of some kind?

And how did she know that Arik would be my mate?

Arik frowned, then folded the paper up and handed it back to me. “I think I know where she is.”

“You do?”

Arik nodded, his eyes flicking to Anders as he returned with tea.

He placed a cup in front of me, looking anxiously at the paper. “So did she say where she went?”

I shook my head, folding the paper away into the pocket of the overdress. “Just that she planned to go home.”

Anders looked disappointed, but rallied quickly. “So what’s it like being a drage?”

We indulged his questions until the sky grew pink.

Finally, Hilde appeared from the kitchen with a disapproving look on her face. “Let the drage sleep, Anders, and get all of this cleaned up before customers start arriving.”

The boy looked so crestfallen, I almost thought about begging Hilde to let us stay, but Arik stood and gripped his shoulder. “We owe you a debt. You have done the drage a great service.”

Almost as quickly as he had deflated, Anders puffed up with pride at my mate’s words, and he let Hilde shoo him away into the kitchen.

Theatticwastinyand full of cobwebs, but it was dry, and I’d happily take spiders over soldiers intent on hunting us down.

“You certainly won Anders over,” I commented as we settled onto our makeshift bed. It was more a pile of blankets than an actual mattress, but it was warm, and my bones were grateful to have the chance to rest.

“Jealous, Kjære?” Arik had removed his wet shirt and jacket, leaving them to dry on the railing that surrounded the opening to the ladder on the floor below.

He wrapped me in his arms, his skin colder than usual, as if Baldur’s disappearance had also sucked the heat right out of him.

“A little, although I’m also relieved to have not had to answer a majority of the questions he asked.”

“A trait he certainly learned from you.” Arik pressed a bristly kiss to my cheek and guided me toward our makeshift bed. “I’m surprised you’ve held on to the one you’re thinking of as long as you have.”

I scowled at his twitching lip. “How is it you always know what I’m thinking?”

He pressed a kiss to my nose. “Ask it.”

“Where is Sigrid?”

Arik groaned as he lay back on the blankets. He placed his free arm behind his head as a pillow, then pulled me to him with the other. “I think she’s at one of the old temples of Elysia. On Àsynjaheimr.”

I frowned as I settled into the crook of his shoulder. I’d never known that Elysia had any temples. “What is Àsynjaheimr?”

“A small island in the Elfr. The river that runs past Hovedstaden. It’s maybe half a days’ flight from the castle.” Arik huffed. “The name literally means ‘Goddess home’.”

“Goddess home,” I murmured, biting my lip. “Are there priestesses there?”

I’d never met a priestess, and Sigrid had never spoken of knowing any. Arik had mentioned one when declaring he’d marry me beforehis father, but if they were common around the realm, I had never seen one enter Henrik’s tavern, nor had I seen one in Stormhold.

But Sigrid must know someone at the temple if she sought refuge there. Why hadn’t she just stayed here with Anders, if she suspected I’d be coming?

Arik shook his head. “The temples were abandoned when sorcery was outlawed. If Sigrid is there, she’s in a ruin.”

I frowned, wondering why Sigrid would go to an abandoned temple. “Where do the priestesses live then, if there are no temples?”