“Would you like to know who you will marry?”
“Enlighten me.”
“Omelyana of Gor.”
He blinked. “Ah. It seems I will require the Gorynian Guard in the future. But why would they seek an alliance with Selva?”
“There will be an earthquake along the White Beard Strait. It will drown their main port.”
He rocked his head back and forth, mulling it over. “Makes sense.”
“You will manipulate her until she falls in love with you. She’ll live for the crumbs of your attention. Your presence will become her reward for anticipating Selva’s needs.”
“Mhm.” He bent toward me slightly. “But will she be happy in my presence?”
I opened my mouth. Shoot. “Yes.”
Deliriously happy, in fact. Giddy. Thrilled.
“Well, that’s something to keep in mind, then, isn’t it?”
You arrogant ass.
He swung the door open and offered me his arm. “Let’s see what we can squeeze out of our guest.”
CHAPTER31
Last week, while recovering from their training sessions, the Magnars had remodeled the basement. They’d trashed the child-sized bunk beds and hung a door for the latrine. Gort had whitewashed the walls, and we’d used some of the lye I’d bought to banish the bloodstains.
The basement looked completely different now, with two plain wooden tables and benches on both sides and hooks and pegs on the walls that supported weapons. When Everard was Reynald, he’d planned to turn it into an armory/ last-stand room. It still made me slightly queasy, but I would get used to it.
Gort sat at the left table on a bench. Lute was next to him. He was looking two shades paler than usual and as he turned to glance at us, he winced a little. Will leaned against the other table. The prisoner sat in a chair in the middle of the room.
His hood was down, revealing short brown hair salted with silver and the face of a man in his early forties who’d lived a rough life. A small scar marked the flesh under his right eye. Another crossed his nose and three more cut his left cheek, all old and healed but still clearly visible. A short beard hugged his jaw, dark and touched with gray. His brown eyes were worried, but his expression said this was a man who knew he was screwed, and he wasn’t surprised because that was the way his life rolled. He’d accepted it but he was bitter.
Everard helped me to a bench. I sat down. He leaned against the table next to me, arms crossed on his chest.
Tillmar looked at him and swallowed.
“How do you and Gort know each other?” I asked.
“Gort was my kir years ago, my lady,” Tillmar said. “Then we fought for the same mercenary company for a while.”
“The Strikers,” Gort said. “It was a decent outfit, up until the Galador campaign.”
“What happened?” I asked.
“Lost half the people and all of the officers in one battle,” Tillmar said. “Everyone went their separate ways after that.”
“Why didn’t you fight tonight?” I asked.
Tillmar sighed. “I’ve known the kids since Will was twelve. I’ve got two daughters and a son. I wasn’t going to fight Gort’s boys. A man has to have a boundary he won’t cross.”
“And yet, here you are,” Everard said. “Breaking into a house of someone you don’t know in the middle of the night to kill everyone inside.”
The mercenary didn’t quite cringe, but he came close to it.
“Who sent you?”
