“Iwill,” he insisted. “I’ve spent my entire life wanting you by my side. I made an oath when I saved you—I’m responsible for keeping you safe.”
“I made an oath, too,” she said quietly. “I’m responsible for your life as well, Rangar. So, you’d better come back to me in one piece, if you have any hope of me believing in fate.”
His mouth twitched in a brief smile. “You’ll believe, Bryn Lindane.”
He sealed the promise with a soft kiss.
As he disappeared into the darkness, Saraj came to sit beside Bryn, wrapping an arm around her back as the fire crackled. Far off in the distance, a lone wolf howled.
Chapter 6
BONFIRE TALKS . . . berserkir beasts and fairy tales . . . science and magic . . . a welcome sight . . . departure
“There’s something unnatural about those wolves,” Bryn said as she and Saraj huddled in front of the bonfire. Out of the corner of her eye, she spied on the cadaver of one of the fallen beasts.
“They’re the biggest wolves I’ve ever seen,” Saraj voiced her agreement. “And did you see how their eyes have some black substance in them?”
“I thought they were crying black tears. Have you ever heard of such a thing?”
Saraj shook her head. Her hands knit in her lap as the crackling fire painted an orange glow over her face. In a low voice, she said, “Do you know the legend of the berserkir beasts?”
The name alone gave Bryn enough of a chill to pull her blanket tighter. “My nan told me a lot of stories growing up, but not that one.”
“I’m not surprised,” Saraj said. “I imagine the bedtime stories they tell princesses tend to be pretty fables about rabbits and wishing wells. Common folk tell their children darker tales meant to warn them away from dangerous acts, such as wandering too far into the woods on their own.”
Bryn glanced at the two dead wolf carcasses. A puddle of blood had spread from their bodies toward the fire. She shivered and moved her foot away from the encroaching puddle. “Go on.”
“In the orphanage where I grew up, the older children told the younger ones that berserkir beasts were wild creatures who had been possessed by evil spirits and patrolled the places where two environments meet: forest and field, or sea and village, that kind of place. The evil spirits inhabiting the animals granted them astonishing strength and size. Berserkir bears could easily tear down a redwood tree. Berserkir foxes could slaughter an entire stable of sheep. They had a vicious bloodlust; they rarely even ate their victims. They were only after the violence.”
Bryn squeezed her hands together tightly. “You think these are berserkir wolves? They’ve been taken over by an evil spirit?”
Saraj shook her head. “It’s only a made-up story. There were never any real berserkir beasts. And even from what I know of mages who practice dark magic, I’ve never heard of possession like that.” She took a deep breath as she, too, studied the wolf corpses. “I’ll admit, however, that the first thing I thought of when I saw those wolves was the old stories.”
“So, if berserkir beasts aren’t real, then what arethose? Could they be sick?”
Bryn stood up and moved apprehensively toward the closest dead wolf. She crouched a safe distance away in case it did have some sort of contagious disease, and used a stick to examine its lifeless body.
Saraj joined her with a lit torch to shine light on the carcass. The two women inspected the dead wolves as best they could from a distance.
“I don’t see any rashes or sores,” Saraj noted. “And they weren’t foaming at the mouth like dogs who havelyssa.”
Bryn used the stick to push the fur back from the wolf’s eyes to get a better look. “That oily substance almost looks like it’s coating its entire eye. I’m surprised it could even see.”
Saraj nudged the beast’s hindquarters with her shoe. “It has muscle on top of muscle. Not at all like regular wolves, who are lean and bony.”
Bryn tossed the stick into the forest, wiping her hands on her dress. She’d never wished for warm water and soap more in her life. An owl hooted far off in the woods, and Bryn and Saraj returned to the fire. They shared a humble meal of hardtack and cheese that Saraj supplemented with some late-season dandelion leaves she found on the roadside. As they sat in silence, Bryn’s mind filled with worries about the wolves and Rangar being out there on his own.
She glanced back toward the carriage as a new fear entered her head. “Val was badly bitten; if the wolvesaresick, he could be infected.”
Her own arm had been injured, but the wolf hadn’t sunk in its teeth as it had with Valenden, and from what she knew of diseases from animals, a solid bite was usually required.
“He hasn’t shown any sign of illness yet,” Saraj pointed out.
“Still, we should take the wolf carcasses with us to Barendur Hold so the healers can examine them in case he does sicken.”
“That’s a good idea, but the healers in the Baersladen aren’t like the ones in the Mirien,” Saraj said. “Your people rely on science; we look primarily to magic. Our healers can bandage scrapes and make fortifying teas, but most of our people go to mages for any grave health concerns.”
As part of her education, Bryn had been taught the fundamentals of biology and the human body. It surprised her to think the Baer people might not have such basic knowledge, and she wondered if perhaps the Baersladen could gain as much from studying science as the Mirien could from embracing magic.
