“The killer has yet to be found,” Kael said.
“You were in Stonegate, how did King Damir respond to losing his prized consort?”
“I did not see much of the king, but I’m certain he is filled with rage and vengeance.” A muscle pulsed in Kael’s jaw. “Fadey’s death is unfortunate, and I know you like to think this, but that life is not in your future, Ly.”
“Ah, are you one of the Norns of fate now?” I shoved his shoulder.
Kael chuckled. “Your fate is to live a long life free of stone walls.”
A ram’s horn blew from the distant gates, stalling Kael and me on the slope. My pulse thudded in my skull.
We didn’t move, simply stared, frozen in fright, as canvas sails of two longships beat in the sea wind at the docks.
“The Stav.” My teeth were on edge. “They’re here.”
4
Lyra
We managed to bribe Pukkidown the hillside without toppling the baskets of herbs, roots, and berries much at all, and stepped through an opening in the crooked gates at the back of the longhouse.
Smoke billowed through the hole in the sod roof and through it I could make out the bustle of watchmen across the village towers.
I made quick work of untethering Pukki from his cart and took hold of one of the plum baskets, while Kael slung a canvas pack of thistle roots over his shoulder and took a basket of dewberries in his arms.
The jarl’s longhouse was nearest to the outer gates. There, Thorian, an elder of the groundskeepers, greeted us.
Thorian kept a wooden pipe pinched between his teeth. His body was made of more bone than meat, but his aged, knobby fingers worked swiftly as he secured every pen for hogs and hens around the jarl’s farm.
The old man lifted his head at the clatter of wheels approaching. “Been a while since you’ve left us,isdotter. Seems our lost boy found you just in time.”
I grinned when the old man plucked his pipe from his lips and pecked my cheek as always. Thorian called me a daughter of ice since I came to the longhouse in winter.
Kael was the lost boy for what was done to him when he was discarded.
Loyal as the old man was to House Jakobson, Thorian shared my feelings that Kael had been wronged grievously by the jarl and his household.
Thorian drew in a long pull of his pipe, then freed the smoke in a cloud. “Be on watch, sweet ones. Selena is convinced the pond has been invaded by a fossegrim and is ready to sacrifice old Pukki to see the water spirit gone.”
“Pukki would not be an adequate sacrifice.” I schooled a glare on the old goat already gnawing on his grass. “He’s too stupid.”
Thorian waved me into the longhouse and turned his talk to Kael as they unloaded the spades and shears from the cart.
A door to the cooking side of the longhouse clattered open. “Lyra. Where have you been? Girl,hurry. Do you not hear the horn?”
Selena, hands on her rounded hips, leveled me in her most grisly stare. Try as she did, it was never enough to hide the tenderness in her soul.
Selena was a widow who believed in every vein of lore, and spent her days filling the table of the jarl with savory feasts and blessing each corner and rafter to keep the house free of haunts and trickster creatures.
Beyond Kael, Selena and Thorian were my favorite souls. Kindhearted and strong-willed. They looked after the both of us like an odd pair of makeshift parents.
When we needed guidance, Thorian would guide.
When we were ill, Selena would fill our stomachs with her teas and herbs until fevers faded.
“Thorian told us you’re fretting over a fossegrim.”
“I told that old fool I can hear the creature plucking those strings trying to lure us in.”
