by Megan Crane
But Tyr was the war chief of the clan and she was a captive, and she could trust him with her family’s secrets and the fate of the world—but not her heart. Her poor, battered, delusional heart that should have known better.
“Maybe I will,” she said, but her voice was all wrong. And her face must have been too, because he frowned.
“Helena,” he said. “Don’t tell me you don’t know—”
But that was when the horns began to blow, sounding the alarm across the whole of the city.
* * *
The brothers assembled seamlessly, exactly as Tyr had trained them.
The watch had blown the sequence of blasts that meant ships had been sighted off the shore of False Harbor, the barren little way station the clan maintained on the exposed west coast of the island for precisely this purpose. Friends were expected if rare, and used the clan’s hidden harbor when they came for a visit. Everyone else was considered an enemy and treated accordingly.
Tyr left Helena in the Lodge’s great hall without a backward glance, much as that slapped at him. His job was to protect the clan. The clan, his woman, everything he held dear. And he had always prided himself on being good at his job. Today was the first time in all his memory—the only time—that he’d ever wished, for even a second, that he could shove it off on someone else. Just for a little while, so he could deal with that distance he’d seen in Helena’s stormy gray gaze.
He told himself that was his dick talking, and he was ready for battle and back down on the green within five minutes—because he was a grown ass brother who could keep the weakness in his thoughts out of his actions. Once on the green he divided the brothers into battle groups and dispatched them, one by one, as if he’d never had a moment’s pause.
One battle group to guard the fleet docked in their real harbor and another to hold the settlement. Still another battle group to take point on the headlands in case the sighting at False Harbor was a decoy. He’d just sent another battle group to guard the mountain pass that led inland toward the clan’s precious fertile valleys and farms when Wulf strode out to meet them. Roughly ten minutes after the first horn, the brothers were on the move.
It was a twenty- to thirty-minute flat-out run to the inhospitable western coast of the island. The brothers made it in time to see a single ship—squat and offensively ugly to raider sensibilities, which preferred smooth lines and sleek speed—lumber toward the strip of rocky shore.
They kept to the cover of the rocks and trees as the morning light eased from pinks and oranges to blues behind them, and arranged themselves all around the outer perimeter of the shallow cove. False Harbor was a trap, deliberately chosen for the high, slippery rock walls that surrounded it, impossible to scale, and the single, narrow, switchbacked trail that led up from the rocky beach and was easily defended.
The False Harbor watch—two brothers and three camp girls to while away the rotating month-long assignment—were already waiting at the mouth of the cavern halfway up the rock face from the beach, looking as disreputable as possible, particularly with the camp girls in full view. Enemies tended to imagine that the barbarian raiders lived in caves with their dirty whores, like animals. Wulf liked to encourage that misconception.
The king was crouched next to Tyr, gazing down at the boat through a pair of binoculars.
“Mainland scum,” he said, handing the binoculars to Tyr. “And a pathetic fighting force. They might have been blown off course by the storm.”
Tyr peered through the binoculars himself. He hated those ratty old boats mainlanders always seemed to use. Death traps, all of them. If a man didn’t respect the sea, she’d destroy him. Hard. That was her game. He didn’t know how the motley collection of mainland fools on that dangerous little boat down below had survived the ocean crossing. Much less the storm.
He counted a puny number of men, and estimated that even if double that amount were concealed in the hold, it was still an anemic attempt at an attack force. Idiots blown off course by the recent storm was a much likelier explanation. Unless, of course, this was a suicide attempt. They happened every now and again, in defiance of all reason.
And something about that thought caught at him as he dragged the binoculars over the boat one last time, focusing on a red-faced little shit in the center of all the much larger men. He remembered that pathetic courtyard in the rain, and this tiny kinglet glaring purple-faced murder at him.
Ferranti.
Ferranti, whose man had shot at a raider from behind, who hadn’t defended his own compound when it had been under siege, and who had chased the raiders down to the beach the morning they’d set sail.
Ferranti, who had been in Krajic’s company and was a little too interested in Helena.
Tyr motioned for Riordan to join them and handed him the binoculars. “You’ll never believe who’s come all this way to hang out with us.”
Riordan took his time, then let out a laugh. “I would have told you that fool couldn’t survive the crossing. But fools always do, don’t they. It’s the tragedy of this world.”
The three of them watched as the obviously weak ass sailors tried to bring the ship in for a beach landing, which had about a fifty percent chance of ripping a giant hole in the hull and making all of this irrelevant. But that was never how things like this went, as Riordan had just pointed out. The most unlikely idiots always seemed to survive.
Sure enough, the bathtub of a boat managed to miss the rocks entirely and slide up against the beach instead. Too bad.
“That’s the self-proclaimed king of that shithole back in Atlanta,” Tyr told Wulf. “Last seen chasing us down on that mainland beach.”
Wulf smile went a little bit evil, his eyes back on the dumpy ship. “Krajic’s friend,” he murmured. “I think it’s time we asked him why he’s so desperate to retrieve one woman that he’d take on an entire raider clan to do it, don’t you? Especially since we already know the answer. Let’s see if his story matches.”
Tyr nodded once, hard, anticipation surging through him. He told himself it was all about a battle after too much storm-enforced-rest. But he knew it had a whole lot more to do with Helena. He lifted his hand to summon another battle group to take the beach, but stalled when Wulf shook his head.
“No,” the king said, that wolfish smile of his deepening, his eyes on the men below as they staggered into the surf and tried to deal with the disaster of a landing they’d just made. “Just you and Riordan. To indicate my level of alarm at this invasion of my territory.”
And Tyr had to grin at that. Because there wasn’t much he liked more than when his king decided to play head games with idiots.
He and Riordan headed down to the beach, sauntering down the trail like they were out for a morning stroll. They nodded at their brothers on watch as they passed, but took their sweet ass time getting down to the water. By the time they did, laughing uproariously at the stories they were telling each other, all of which they’d told each other a thousand times before, the ship full of dumbasses had spilled themselves onto the relatively dry land. They came to a stop at the bottom of the trail and surveyed the laughable fighting force before them. Tyr counted twenty idiots, all of them green, in evident skill and around the face.
There was no sign of Krajic. Tyr couldn’t tell if he was relieved or disappointed at that.
For a moment, no one said anything. The mainlanders looked uneasy. Some looked up at the sheer face of the cliffs that surrounded them and looked faintly ill. Those were the smart ones. Some looked around, no doubt for more raiders. Those would likely be the ones who fancied themselves warriors, and would soon be dead.
The puny king, dumbass that he was, looked directly at Tyr.
“I’ve come for the woman you stole from me,” he announced grandly.
Tyr and Riordan stared at him. For a long moment there was nothing but the waves surging against the shore and far above, the sound of a single gull.
“I bet he practiced that,” Riordan
observed.
“They always practice.”
“All puffed out chest and that voice, like if he’s loud enough we might not notice he’s some knee-high little bitch jumping up and down in the surf like a kid.” Riordan shook his head. “We notice, douchebag.”
Ferranti’s eyes practically bugged out of his head, while the men standing closest to him eased away. Just slightly. But enough that Tyr had to bite back a smile.
“Are you the king of this place?” the small man demanded, waving his hand at that grotty old cavern and the brothers waiting there. Tyr enjoyed the look of contempt on his face. “I am Ferranti, king of the—”
“I know who you are,” Tyr interrupted him. “You’re no king. And you’re lucky, because neither am I.”
“Our king is sound asleep in his bed this fine morning, draped in a pile of women, the way the ruler of this clan and these islands should be,” Riordan added helpfully. “He doesn’t race down to the beach every time some mainland ship blows off course and some vagabond decides to call himself an equal. That would get boring.”
“I demand that you fetch him.” Ferranti looked up at the cavern as if he suspected one of the brothers who stood there might be the king—and as if, hilariously, he believed any raider king would respond to a demand to be “fetched” in the first place. He scowled at Tyr. “You stole something that is rightfully mine. I want it back.”
“The king is busy,” Tyr said, making sure he sounded bored.
“He’s standing right there. That’s him, isn’t it?”
“Then, as you can see, he’s busy standing there,” Tyr told him. “Exactly what do you think I stole?”
“The woman is mine,” Ferranti snarled. “I want her back.”
And something fascinating happened. Everything in Tyr flashed red. Hot and furious. He wanted to cut Ferranti down where he stood, viciously. How dare he claim what was Tyr’s? How dare he do it to Tyr’s face? He might as well have sliced off his own head.
Only the fact that Tyr had not in fact claimed Helena yet—yet—stopped him from ending this conversation right now, in blood. That and the fact Wulf had given him an order and would not be at all amused if Tyr took the man out without first discovering exactly why he’d thought he could take on all these raiders in the first place.
And, given what they now knew about Helena’s family and the secrets she’d carried all this time, how much of that Ferranti actually knew. And even more important, what he’d planned to do with that information. Share it with his friend Krajic, perhaps, who’d sold his allegiance to the highest bidder?
There were too many questions. Tyr couldn’t kill him.
Yet.
Beside him, Riordan laughed.
“I don’t think the woman knows she’s yours, little man,” he told Ferranti, almost as if that made him sad. “Is this a real claim or is this some of that compliant winter marriage shit?”
“It doesn’t matter,” Tyr growled, getting a handle on himself. Barely. “Look around. Notice how there’s no snow? It’s still summer and she’s not pregnant. There is no claim.”
“Sounds like you’re out of luck,” Riordan murmured, his arms crossed over his chest as he glared at Ferranti and his men. “Leave now.”
Ferranti bunched his hands into fists at his side and stood taller. Through the red, murderous haze that still beat at him, it occurred to Tyr that the other man looked as furious as he had at back in his courtyard, all red-faced and panicked. Back then, Tyr had assumed the panic stemmed from the unpleasantness of having raiders sack his home. That was fair enough. But why would he have the same reaction now when he’d come all the way here? The same kind of panic? He must have known—or imagined—what he’d be walking into. A little late to get panicky about it, surely.
“I won’t leave without her. She’s mine. If you won’t produce her, then I demand you take me to your king. I don’t think he wants a war with the western highlands, does he?” Ferranti snarled at Tyr. “Over one woman?”
Tyr and Riordan exchanged a look.
“Apparently,” Riordan said after a moment, “our little man here is the mouthpiece for the western highlands.”
Tyr pretended to consider. “That’s, what? Ten kingdoms?”
“At least.”
“Big war for such a little man.”
He smiled at Ferranti, letting all his menace show, and was deeply gratified when the bastard took a step back.
“Okay, shithead. We’ll take you to Wulf.” He waited for Ferranti to puff himself up again, because that was inevitable in such a tiny, angry man, and sure enough, it took maybe one second. Then he let his smile go feral. “But I want you to remember this moment. That you asked for what’s coming to you, when we would have let you go. You sealed your own damn fate.”
Ferranti’s face turned even redder, if that was possible. Tyr enjoyed it.
“I’ll remember it,” the little man said, sounding bitter and vengeful at once. “I’ll remember everything about you. Believe it.”
Tyr started to make some kind of rude comment, the better to slap the dipshit kinglet even further down into his place, but Ferranti moved. He stuck his fingers in his mouth and let out a loud whistle, harsh and shrill, the kind of thing no one wanted to hear in the middle of a skirmish. Whistles were never a good sort of summoning. They were never a call to a feast or an orgy.
It wasn’t any different today.
Because that was when Krajic and two of his ghoul-eyed, shorn-headed henchmen climbed over the side of the ship, jumped into the shallow water, and strode toward the shore.
15
It was one of the hardest things Tyr had ever had to do in his life, but he didn’t draw on Krajic the moment he saw him.
Not when the black-eyed monster drew close, a smirk on his pig mouth. And not when he stood with Ferranti, dwarfing him, right there within reach at last.
Tyr’s blood fury was a heat in his veins, the jarring beat of his heart. Every part of him called out for vengeance. Here. Now. An end at last to the life of this mercenary whore and Tyr’s own shame that he continued to draw breath.
But he thought of Helena, and was still.
She was reason enough to kill this fucker slowly. She deserved the pleasure of seeing the scum who’d murdered her family pay for his sins with his own blood.
He didn’t question himself about why her feelings on the subject should be that important to him. He had a feeling he already knew the answer.
“I know you,” the enemy said, his gaze on Tyr and a faint sneer on his lips. He had soulless black eyes and no beard beneath that giant beak of a nose, which made the ugly scar Zyron had left on one side of his face that much easier to appreciate. Tyr stared at it and let his lost blood brother’s handiwork calm him, let it soothe that screaming in his bones.
“I doubt that,” Tyr growled after a moment. “I count no mercenaries among my friends.”
“I didn’t say I counted you a friend.” Krajic’s black eyes were ferocious. It made Tyr want to put them out, but this wasn’t the time. Yet. This was the usual game of posturing and pretending, as if they weren’t all draped in weapons. Tyr usually enjoyed this part—but nothing about Krajic was remotely enjoyable so long as the bastard drew breath. “I want a word with your king and honorable, safe passage to and from his throne. You raiders care deeply about your precious honor, I hear. Don’t you?”
Tyr itched to draw his blade. Burned to sink it deep into Krajic’s jugular. But raiders were indeed men of honor. That was what separated them from garbage like Krajic. They did not cut men down simply because they felt like it—if they did, there would have been far fewer men wandering this ruined earth.
And even scumbag mercenaries like Krajic were given safe passage if they asked for it.
If Tyr’s vows hadn’t been tattooed all over his body, he thought he might have broken them then and there for the sheer, animal joy of wiping that smug look off Krajic’s face.
Beside him,
Riordan sighed as if bored silly.
“Our king is a popular man. Maybe all you little drama queens should have sent a message before showing up on the wrong side of the ocean.”
“I did.” Krajic smirked, his smugness blending into something sharper. Darker. “How many of his settlements must I burn to the ground before the coward answers me, I wonder?”
It was a very brave man—or a deeply stupid one—who called a raider king a coward at all, much less on the island he ruled.
Death howled all around them then, like a stiff wind off the disgruntled sea, though no one moved an inch. Death for that insult. Death for all the brave men and women this monster had killed for sport and barter. A swift and brutal death for a creature so lacking in honor, Tyr could not bear to call him a man.
Death roared in his blood, his hands, every well-trained muscle in his body. It beat at his head and screamed in his ears, yet Tyr said nothing. He did nothing. Because he knew better than to let himself be goaded, even by scum like this, into betraying himself.
A warrior of the brotherhood was his word. He was his blade and the honor of its swing. If he was not, he was nothing.
If he was not, he might as well be Krajic.
That was a fate far worse than a terrible death.
Tyr no longer wanted to execute this sorry excuse for a man to avenge his blood. Oh, he wanted Krajic’s blood, and he’d have it. But Helena was wrapped up in this, too, now. A weight in his chest next to Zyron. He wanted to take his vengeance on the creature who’d killed his blood brother, and that he’d been unable to deliver that justice swiftly had enraged him for too many years. It had eaten him alive that Krajic had walked free. It had made him weak, and there was nothing Tyr loathed more in himself than weakness.
But it was more complicated now. He also wanted, once and for all, to prove to Helena that she really could trust him, despite her suspicions and her secrets and that way she sometimes looked at him, as if she expected him to hurt her at any moment. He hated that. He was Tyr, the war chief of the raider brotherhood. He could not only keep her and her family secrets safe, he could cut every last one of her nightmares in half with a single swing of his blade.