“You’re not the only one I heard it from. Thrain wasn’t shy about telling everyone how I’d betrayed him.”
“He was drunk.”
“I wish I had that excuse.” Cali hitched her knapsack over one shoulder. “I would love to explain away my momentary insanity with too much whiskey.”
“And you’re certain this isn’t more momentary insanity?”
She shook her head. “No. This is me getting some distance from my mistake.”
“By chasing down that mistake?”
Cali frowned. “By making up for my mistake.” Then she grabbed her bow and quiver of arrows, running one claw along the fletching. “Besides, I need to know why it’s so crucial for Bonnie One-Eye that she retrieve her jolly boat.”
Vaskel cocked one eyebrow. “It feels like there’s a story there.”
The hairs on Cali’s arms tingled, and the tip of her tail quivered. “I think there are lots of stories to be had on The Cruel Mistress.”
Vaskel grasped her by the shoulders. “Then I expect you to return safely and share them all.”
Cali’s throat tightened, but before she could answer, her friend pulled her into a bone-cracking hug.
“I’ll be back before you can miss me,” she said.
“Aye, we will!”
Vaskel released her, and they both turned to see Thrain standing in the shadow-drenched hallway of the inn with a pack slung onto his back. The leather coat that brushed the tops of his boots was buttoned up to the point of his wiry beard.
“What are you doing?” Vaskel said, eyeing the dwarf’s greatcoat that was sugared with snow.
“What does it look like?” Thrain’s dark eyes glinted as a grin flashed white from within the tangle of his brown beard. “I’m going with Cali, of course.”
The pantheri exchanged a glance with Vaskel, whose expression looked stuck somewhere between shocked and amused.
She bit back a groan. This might be worse than fighting a duel.
Seven
Cali hitchedher knapsack higher onto her shoulder as she stepped gingerly onto the ice-slick road that ran in front of the Wayside Inn. The village slumbered under a blanket of snow, but the rising sun had already begun making puddles of the hoofprints and turning the wagon wheel ruts into meandering rivulets. Frigid droplets freed themselves from the shiny icicles that clung to the thatched roofs, and the nearby stream churned with snowmelt.
She took in the market stalls that remained shuttered and quiet near the town square. No one would travel in from nearby farms to sell their wares today. There would be no beekeeper with golden jars of honey or farmer with baskets of brown eggs. Winter was never as busy in the market, but the morning after a blizzard meant slumbering stalls and slumbering villagers.
Whatever hope Cali might have had that the hush of the village meant she would have a quiet departure was shattered when Thrain stepped out behind her and stretched his arms overhead. “Tis a good day for a journey.”
Cali slid her gaze to him, wondering if there was still time to convince him she would be fine on her own. “You don’t have to?—“
He held up a calloused palm. “I won’t hear another word about it, Cal. You and I have some fences to mend, and this is the perfect time to do it.”
“I told you I don’t hold any grudges because of what happened with Marina. We were both taken in by her.”
He grunted, his cheeks reddening under his whiskers. “But you didn’t want to fight a duel with a friend over her.”
Cali patted his back, which was laden with a leather pack and an axe. “You wouldn’t have gone through with it because I would have refused to fight you.”
She didn’t say that she wouldn’t have dueled him because she would have won—easily. Dwarf bravado and axe-swinging were no match for the pantheri’s reflexes and skill with a bow.
Thrain shuffled his boots in the snow. “We’ll have plenty of time to discuss it on the ship.”
Cali sighed and started walking, her warm breath creating a visible trail in the frigid air. “I thought dwarves weren’t made for water.”
