The sound of music cut through my thoughts. On stage, the minstrels were thumping their feet against the wood and playing their instruments with gusto. Nearly the entire village had spilled out of their homes to fill the street. Helga and Valdar were spinning around each other, a wild light in both their eyes. It seemed the blanket picnic I’d set up for them had gone well, then. I beamed.
Suddenly, I was overcome with the need to let go of all my worries and ignore the path ahead, just one last time.
No matter what the future threw at me, I could have tonight.
I held out my hand. “Dance with me, Rune?”
“And risk me stepping on your feet?” he asked wryly.
“Don’t make me beg,” I said.
“I’d never make you beg, Frida.” He took my hand and twirled me under his arm. With a surprising gracefulness, he pulled me against him, our bodies swaying in time with the beat. Our dance was not the frenetic jumping and leaping, like so many others, but I didn’t dare complain. Not when my heartbeat was a roar of thunder in my ears and my breath felt trapped in my lungs.
Rune leaned down and pressed his lips against my ear. When his breath caressed my skin, I shuddered. “I’m sorry it’s not raining.”
A full-body shiver went through me. “You remember me saying I like dancing in the rain?”
“Frida, I remembereverythingyou’ve said.”
I swallowed, Rune’s steady warmth pulsing against me. When I tipped back my head to look up at his face, I found him already staring down at me. Something in my chest tightened. My mind raced. His words were what I’d always dreamed of hearing, but surely he didn’t mean them the way I wanted. Surely the intensity of his gaze was only driven by…friendship?
I looked away, but Rune took my chin between his fingers and turned my head back toward him. His eyes were full of heat.
“Frida,” he said. “I know I have no right to ask this, and dammit, I know I shouldn’t. But I can’t fucking help myself when it comes to you.” His thumb caressed my jaw. “Some might say dragons are the most magnificent creatures alive, but they’ve got nothing on you. So before you leave my life forever, can I kiss you?”
My breath shuddered out of me. Inside my chest, my heart felt near to bursting, and his words repeated in my mind like a prayer. I tried to speak, but my voice felt trapped in my throat. So I answered him the only way I knew how. I gripped his tunic, pulled him down, and kissed him fiercely.
He groaned, his fingers tightening on my chin. His lips caressed mine, and a tumultuous need tore through me. Everything around us fell away. And as our bodies collided, it was as if time itself stood still. I poured everything into the kiss, pushing up onto my toes to get even nearer to him. He responded in kind, his free hand sliding around my waist and tugging me into his chest.
Too soon, the sound of clapping cut through the moment, bringing the world around us back into focus again. Sucking in a breath, I released my grip on Rune’s shirt and tumbled back. A few folk had caught sight of our kiss and were clapping and cheering, like we’d just won at life. My cheeks flamed.
“All right, all right,” Rune called out to the gawkers. “You’ve made your point. Move along now.”
Our audience laughed, then drifted away, leaving me and Rune staring awkwardly at each other. My lips felt hot and swollen, even though our kiss had only lasted for a moment. It didn’t feel nearly long enough. If anything, only briefly giving in to my feelings made them that much more potent, like flames were licking my skin.
“Sorry about that,” Rune said, running a hand along the top of his head. “It’s such a sleepy little village that it doesn’t take much to get people excited.”
Shyly, I asked, “Should we have another round of ale?”
He motioned toward Lilia, who’d just emerged from the tavern with a tray full of drinks. “After you.”
We got another round. And then another. The sun soon vanished from the sky, giving way to a darkness that was speared through by an abundance of stars. After we settled onto a bench beneath the drooping leaves of a willow tree—Rune had built it years ago, of course—several of the villagers approached us and welcomed me to their island. I’d met a few last time, but only briefly. All were far more welcoming than they ought to be, givenmy secrets, and my uncertain guilt began to creep up as the night wore on.
There was a bone-crushing truth I was wrestling with. A life spent within the cold, sterile guild-hall, tasked to aim my bow at whoever I was commanded to target, no longer called to me the way it had before. In fact, I was quickly realizing it had never really called to me in the first place. Deep down, I’d always known it, but I’d ignored that feeling. My family meant everything to me.
Except I hardly knew them.
They hadn’t come for me when I’d run away. A year after I’d fled into the night, a note showed up on my front porch. They’d finally found me. But instead of asking me to come back home, all they did was wish me luck and tell me that my mother had passed away from her illness. It wasn’t until years later that my brother came to pitch the idea of me joining the guild. Even then, my father kept his distance.
Rune shifted on the bench beside me, watching the minstrels pack up their things for the night. The street had emptied. Only Ragnar and Lilia remained. They carried empty tankards into the tavern, where hearth-light cast a luminous glow into the growing darkness.
“I suppose we ought to head back home,” he said. “Are you all right? You’ve been quiet for the last half hour.”
“Just taking it all in.” Tipping back my head, I closed my eyes and breathed in the scent of the forest. “I love this place.”
A moment stretched between us before he said, “Come on. There’s something I want to show you.”
The route to the cottage was shrouded in darkness, but Rune walked confidently, like he’d trodden this path a thousand times before. The forest was starting to feel familiar to me, too. So when we reached a fork, I expected us to turn left. Instead, Rune steered us to the right.
