“It is done?” asked Kassandr, pausing to wipe cold sweat from his brow. As night had fallen, so too had the cold, and his dampened hair was now frosted white.
“Rovgolod?” he demanded.
“Elisava leads the elders and the injured into the tunnels,” Rov panted, driving his shield into the gut of a charging warrior. Kassandr finished the stunned man off with a brutal slash to the neck. Steam rose from the wound as hot blood met frigid air.
“Good,” said Kassandr, then paused. “What is it?”
Rov’s face held a strange expression. “If I am to die, then I willown my truth,” Rov proclaimed, slashing his blade through an Urkan’s neck. As he turned to face Kassandr, his brown skin was flecked with blood, but his smile was wide. “I am in love with your sister.”
Kassandr blinked, then lunged, intercepting a warrior coming for Rov’s flank. “My sister?”
“She is the most beautiful woman in Zagadka. Most pleasant disposition—”
“You are certain you speak ofElisava?”
Rov’s smile had somehow grown wider, and though it was mad, Kassandr grinned right back. “I am glad for you, my brother,” he said, slapping Rov on the shoulder. “Will you take the Rurik byname and become my brother by marriage?”
But Kass’s smile suddenly faltered. “You made no mention of Saga. She too is in the tunnels?”
Rov’s expression tightened.
“AndSaga?” Kassandr repeated.
“She has not been seen for many hours.”
Kassandr’s beast smashed against his ribs in a burst of searing anger. Not seen. Notseen? “What does this mean?” growled Kassandr.
“It means,” grumbled Rov, sinking into a defensive stance as a trio of berserkers lumbered forward, “that she has not been seen. Nothing more and nothing less. I am certain she is well, Kassandr.”
Kassandr’s mind whirled for an explanation. Saga’s transformation over the past days had been remarkable. She’d gone from cautious and fearful to a woman his people turned to. Kassandr’s pride had grown with Saga’s increasing boldness, but this latest development had him worried. Had she pushed too far? Gone from bold to reckless?
Again, he glanced toward the fortress’s defensive walls, difficult to view through the snowfall. “She is not atop the walls?” he barked at Rov while trading sword blows with a slavering Urkan.
Rov slammed the rim of his shield into a berserker’s mouth, sending teeth flying. “Not,” he agreed.
Kassandr blinked rapidly, trying to understand, but inside, his beast grew more and more frenetic. Where was his Saga? Wherewas she? His beast snarled and yipped, desperate to be free of its cage as his mind tormented him with dozens of possibilities of what might have befallen her.
Beside him, one of his best Druzhina—a warrior who’d been with Kass for eight years—fell with a cry of agony. The man’s voice joined the screams of the wounded and dying, as his people were cut down around him. Kassandr threw himself at the Urkan who’d killed his man, stabbing and hacking with rage and sorrow.
Through the thick flurries of snow, a barrel soared through the air, landing with bone-rattling impact. The toll of a bell and screams from behind him told Kassandr its mark had been true. Yet still, nothing could quell the shock he felt as he glanced over his shoulder. The barrel had collided with the fortress bell tower—the crown jewel of Kovograd city, and the largest entry gate into the fortress. The seaweed and hides, even with a layer of snow upon them, did little to stop the flames, which now spread along the roof and ate down the timbered walls.
For the first time since the Urkans had landed, Kassandr felt true despair. This was all wrong. His people were falling. His home was burned. And Saga was missing.
His sword found purchase in the joint between an Urkan’s snarling bear shoulder plates and breast armor, and the warrior crumpled to the ground. The rage of Kassandr’s beast nearly clouded his vision, but through it he caught sight of a smaller figure with a familiar face.
With a shout of fury, Kassandr barreled toward Prince Bjorn, cutting down warriors without mercy.
“Kassandr!” shouted Rov behind him, the rest of his Druzhina scrambling to keep up.
Kassandr’s anger burned as it had never before. He cut down Urkan warriors with alternating swings of his sword and cunning slashes of his dagger. He was death incarnate, the feeder of the wolves and ravens. Tonight they would feast, not only on hiscountrymen, but on the corpses of his enemies. Blood rained down on the snow, and Kassandr saw the moment the princeling recognized him. Bjorn’s pale, freckled face pulled into a look of pure terror.
At thirteen winters, Bjorn was too young to be in this battle, too young to be blamed for any of this. Yet Kassandr knew if he captured the prince, it could change the tides of battle.
But a familiar red-bearded warrior stepped between them, smashing Kassandr’s plans to ruins. Half a head taller than any warrior on the battlefield, Thorir the Giant’s armor was spattered with blood and gore.
“Kassandr Rurik is mine!” bellowed the giant, thumping his chest plate with the broad side of his blade. “We have unfinished business.”
Kassandr gritted his teeth as Prince Bjorn was ushered away, any hopes of a ransom along with him. Rov and his Druzhina gathered around Kassandr, panting with the exertion of hacking their way to him.
