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CHAPTERONE
THE NIGHTRENDER
The Howl Seastretched on like an endless abyss. Light from the torches and lanterns across the fleet of approaching longships was the only hint that anything beyond the shores of Skítkast existed at all.
“Mal.” My brows pulled together in a look of concern. She was frozen at my side, hardly breathing, hardly moving. Fear soaked my tongue with every beat of her heart. “This is what we needed.”
Malin nodded mutely. Where was she in her head? I could taste her fear, true. But her thoughts were something different. I wanted her to do nothing more than burden me with the worries of her heart.
I placed my hand on the small curve of her back and glanced again at the shoreline.
An army. The Northern Kingdom had come to fight with us in a war I wasn’t so sure we’d win. An entire battle fleet armed in axes, short blades, arrows, and magic.
We needed it. We needed every blade to even have a glimmer of hope of taking the East for our own.
“Naïve of me,” Malin whispered. She kept her eyes trained on the approaching ships, and for a moment I wondered if she’d meant to speak out loud at all.
“What is?”
“To think I could keep dreaming of the day warriors would descend upon the Black Palace, of the great victory we’d take. But we were all safe in my daydreams. Now, those warriors are here. Blood will spill. Theirs, and ours.”
“Mal—”
“Will it be Gunnar’s? Hagen’s?” She faced me at long last, the collision of gold and green burned as if a flame flickered in the darkness. “Will it be yours? I cannot watch you fall, Kase. Icannot.”
I pulled her into my arms, crushing her to my chest.
Malin would hate this; she’d hate others witnessing her crumble. Nights in the hayloft when she shed a tear, I alone had witnessed those moments. If anyone stepped through the door, she’d burrow her face into my chest, and I’d hide her. I’d let her break, but no one else would know.
It seemed some things would never change between us.
With one hand cradling her head and the other holding her against me, I shielded her from the guilds, from the approaching ships. I let her gasp, let her fight the emotion she wasn’t always skilled at releasing.
“We should’ve gone.” She curled her fingers around my tunic. “We still can. We’ll find refuge in the North.”
I pulled back, meeting her glassy eyes as I ran the rough pad of my thumb over her trembling lips. “Fear is talking, Mallie.”
She scoffed. “I hate your mesmer sometimes.”
“I might sense your fears, but I’d rather hear you voice them to me. You do not need to be forgotten and silent like in the hayloft anymore. Never again.”
Malin pulled her bottom lip between her teeth before she went on. “I cannot bear the thought of more funeral pyres.”
“Look at me.” One knuckle tilted her head up, so her neck arched to meet my gaze. “I swear to you, this is not where we end. I will frighten the piss from Death itself should it try to take either of us.”
She proffered up a weak smile and wrapped her arms around my waist.
With my chin propped on her head, I turned toward the sea. “We have lands to explore, Mallie. Where good kings and gods’ magic reigns.”
“Where we are not hunted or afraid,” her soft voice followed.
“Think of those future memories, and not of funeral pyres.”
For the first time in my miserly existence, I dared to dream of things to come. I had the woman I’d always loved at my side. I allowed myself to dream of laughter, of simple nights, of humble longhouses. Of a family. Littles that would take after her. A turn ago, I would scoff at such thoughts. Now, I wanted them all with her.
Another bellow of a ram’s horn rattled the night.
A strange tangle of emotions knotted like thorned vines in my chest. One side was overwhelmed with the thrill of knowing a kingdom had answered our call. But the fear of what it all meant would always be there, bubbling beneath my skin until this fight was over.
