Page 12 of The Sun He Buried

Baldr looks across the little table at me. I take a sip of wine. He keeps looking.

“The kitten was crying,” I remind him.

“From a three-story granary.”

“A two-story roof.”

“That sentence hasn’t improved with repetition.”

I put down my cup before I laugh wine through my nose. Asta spent nearly an hour getting me ready for this dinner. Ruining her work before the second course would prove every opinion she has ever had about me.

Also, Baldr would see. I’d have to leave Sólvik.

“It had been up there since morning. The miller kept saying he’d fetch a ladder after the grain wagons were unloaded, but then the clouds came in and the poor thing walked onto the gutter.”

Baldr’s amber eye closes.

The pale-green one stays fixed on me.

“Why is one eye still open?”

“I’m keeping watch in case the story gets worse.”

“It gets much better.”

“For the kitten?”

“Eventually.”

He leans back in his chair. Firelight catches the damp ends of his hair where he washed after training. He’s wearing a dark-blue tunic, and I’ve been doing a very good job of looking at his face.

Mostly.

The west room is tucked behind the main hall, with one narrow window facing the sea and a small hearth. No court. No long tables. Just us, plus enough food for eight people because the kitchens have never adjusted a Skorvær supper for one human guest.

I point my fork at him. “You said you wanted to hear this.”

“I asked why your father banned you from the old granary.”

“The kitten is why.”

“The kitten made the rule?”

“No, the falling did.”

His other eye closes.

“You’ll miss the good part.”

“I am gathering strength.”

“That’s your bloodline. You should already have plenty.”

Both eyes open again. A grin pulls across his face, easy and bright. “There she is.”

I push a roasted carrot through the sauce before I ask what he means. Asta would call that growth. “Asta went to find the miller.”

“Good.”