“Anything that looks out of place.” Skadi paused. “But it probably is a bloodfly nest. And there may be more than one. Go. Hurry. Get as many men as you need.”
The guards hurried out, leaving Omar smiling in the center of the room. “I always said you were a very clever woman, Highness. Intelligent, educated, shrewd, suspicious, and untrusting. But you’re still playing the same games by the same rules, aren’t you?”
“What do you mean?”
“I mean that you’re still dealing in power and control.” Omar winked at Freya. “Always trying to protect what you have while trying to get a little more for yourself. And that’s perfectly reasonable, as long as that’s what everyone else is doing, too. But I don’t think you’re prepared to deal with someone who wants nothing for himself, and cares nothing for what you have.” He reached into his sleeve and pulled out a small ball of dried mud.
Skadi drew back behind Thora as though preparing to use her as a shield against the brown lump in the man’s hand.
Omar laughed. “Are you really so afraid of-”
Leif snatched the ball from his hand and ran down the length of the hall and out the front door. Omar spun, staring after the one-armed youth. “No! You idiot!”
Freya gave Omar one last worried look, and she ran out the door after Leif.
Chapter 24. Truths
Freya flew out the door, across the courtyard, and into the streets of Rekavik. Despite the late hour, there were still dozens of people in the lanes, standing in knots around the torches and open doorways, talking and glaring as they shivered in the night air. As she ran by, Freya saw curious and angry and exhausted eyes rising to follow her, and mouths opening to speak to her, but she had no breath for them.
Leif wasn’t far ahead. She could see him darting left and right around the people in the road, only thirty or forty paces ahead, but the warrior ran with the tireless strength of youth, and of one who had not spent the last two nights slaughtering reavers.
My spear!
Her hand felt light and naked at her side, bouncing along with no warm, sweat-slick steel clutched in it.
Maybe it’s a blessing. I don’t think I could make it very far with the extra weight.
Her legs were beyond tired, beyond burning, beyond shaking. They were cold and hollow, almost numb from the unending abuse. A lifetime in the eastern hills tracking deer and bear and birds had made her a tireless walker and hiker, but not a runner. Before the first reaver appeared in Logarven and attacked Katja, the last time she could remember running was when she spooked an old snow bear and had to bolt from its den and let Erik take the animal down with his spear.
Erik…
She stumbled around a corner, losing a pace or two. But the chase went on, and on. The people of Rekavik had barely a moment to look up before the black shadows of Leif and Freya flew past with the heavy rhythm of their huffing breaths and thumping boots.
Dimly she was aware that they were running north through a part of the city she hadn’t seen before.
Not south to the new wall, not east or west to the seawalls. North. What’s north except the bay? The bay!
Damn it!
“Leif!” She screamed with what little wind was hovering in her tired lungs. “It’s a cure!”
The youth ran on in silence.
That stupid bastard!
She could see him pulling even farther away, leaping lightly over sacks and rocks and holes in the road as gracefully as an elk.
“Leif!”
He dashed around a corner, out of sight, and for a moment the echoing beats of his footfalls vanished, leaving Freya to hear only her own boots on the stones and the soft shushing of the bay on the nearby beaches and jetties. A heavy wave crashed up on the rocks, and over the roof of a small house Freya saw the white spray sparkling in the starlight.
“Leif!”
She drew her knife in her shaking hand and turned the corner and saw the young warrior stumbling to a halt at the end of the lane where the stones ran down into the dark waters of the bay. He leaned back with one arm, and she realized he was about to hurl the bloodfly nest into the sea.
She hurled her knife with a desperate prayer in her heart and a broken scream on her lips. “NO!”
There must have been something different in that last shout, something ragged and raw and vicious that startled the youth, because he hesitated in mid-throw to look back over his shoulder. He hesitated, and Freya’s knife ripped into his thigh. Leif snapped backwards with a wordless cry, slamming down onto the foam-kissed stones, twisting and shuddering.
Freya leapt the last few steps and crashed down on top of him, crushing his wrist and fingers in her two hands, sinking her jagged nails into his flesh. “Give it to me,” she gasped, struggling to catch her breath. “Give it to me!”
“No!” He twisted and rocked and kicked beneath her, but without a second arm to grapple with her, he had no leverage to push her off or get control over the muddy nest in his hand.
Freya bore down on his neck with her elbow as she kept both hands digging deeper and tighter in his arm and hand and fingers until dark beads of blood glimmered on his pale skin and trickled down over her nails.
Almost.
His fingers cracked open, shaking.
Almost.
Leif shrieked and kicked with both legs, rolling both of them together in a vicious tangle into the cold sea foam, and he smashed his hand down on the wet stones. The mud ball burst apart and Freya saw the dark splatter of tiny legs and wings glistening in the starlight.
“No!” She yanked his arm back up to stare at the dead bloodflies with every frayed nerve in her body screaming out, It’s isn’t fair!
But a sharp buzzing whine in her ear made her jerk to the side, almost rolling off her prey. And then something bit her bare hand. And something bit her neck. And her ear.
Freya leapt up and ran back from the water’s edge, trying to swat away the flies without smashing them.
Damn, that stings!
Leif jerked from side to side before getting his feet under him and staggering up and away from the smashed nest. He limped and hopped with Freya’s bone knife still hanging from the gash in his thigh as he tried to shield his head and swat away the flies. Freya grabbed a damp tarp from a pile of fishing tackle, waved it through the air once to fan away the flies, and then threw the tarp over Leif as he stumbled to his knees. She also reached down under the tarp and yanked her knife out of his leg, and was rewarded with a pitiful yelp and moan.
A stiff breeze blew in off the bay and the buzzing of the flies faded into the distance, and she hoped that they were moving back toward the center of the city, and not scattering out to sea to die.
When she was sure they were gone, she pulled the tarp off of Leif to reveal the shivering, coughing, bleeding wreckage. The blood shone brightly on his leg, and his arm was shaking as he tried to hold himself up with it.
After a moment he leaned back and looked at her. “Am I supposed to thank you?”
Freya glanced at the tarp and tossed it aside. “I didn’t do it to help you. I did it to save the bloodflies. I didn’t run all this way just to watch you swat them to death.”
She took a long, deep breath and exhaled slowly. The burning in her lungs was gone and the throbbing in her legs and back were fading quickly. She was still bone tired, but the edge was gone. She didn’t feel as raw and miserable as before. She took another breath.
The sea air can do wonders, I suppose.
