“Éibhear! Celyn!” she cal ed out. But her cousins were too busy shoving each other, poor Austel once again trying to separate them.
“Éibhear! ” she screeched, stil running, stil trying to catch up.
Her cousin turned, looked at her.
“Stop him!”
Confused, Éibhear blinked, but then he caught on. He and Celyn dove at the Elite, but the Iron slipped past them and shot out the entrance.
“No!”
“We’l get him!” Nesta and Breena yel ed, the pair charging after the Elite.
Fed up, wishing Rhona was here, Edana turned her attention to the two idiots who’d been—once again!—fighting while everything fel apart around them.
Getting to his claws, Éibhear quickly apologized. “Edana, I’m so—”
“I don’t want to hear it. From either of you!” she said before Celyn could add his apology. “That is it.” Nesta and Breena returned, shook their heads.
“They must have been waiting for him,” Nesta said. “Once he took to the skies—”
“—arrows rained down. No way we could get through that to get to him,” Breena explained.
“Sorry, Edana.”
“You didn’t do anything wrong. It was these two!” she accused her cousins.
“Edana—”
“I don’t want to hear it.” She began to pace in front of her cousins. “Do you see what you did with al your fighting? Do you? ” She stopped in front of the two males. “This centaur shit ends here. Do you understand me? Or I swear by al the unholy gods that when Rhona gets back—”
“When Rhona gets back from where?” another voice asked from behind her.
Edana briefly closed her eyes at the sound of that voice. Damn.
She did try lying, though. “Oh, Mum, yeah, Rhona just—”
Bradana yanked Edana by the neck of her chest plate and pul ed her close.
“Where is she, girl? And don’t you dare lie to me.”
After spending al day at the forge, Rhona was glad for a break. She washed off in the lake that Annwyl showed her and then returned to the alcove she was sharing with Vigholf. As soon as he saw her, he smiled, surprising her with his tenderness.
“Here,” she said, handing him his hammer and ax. “It didn’t need much work, but after that time with the wyvern, figured it couldn’t hurt.”
“Thank you.” He examined the weapons, nodded. “Excel ent. What did you do for Annwyl?” Rhona tossed her own weapons to the floor and sat down on her bedrol beside Vigholf. “I did as much as I could for her, trying to remember everything new my father showed me when we were at Garbhán Isle. And Annwyl seemed happy with what I came up with.”
“But?”
“But what if it doesn’t work? What if it fails her just when she needs the damn thing most?” She shook her head. “I wish my father was here. He could have done so much better.”
“Centaur shit. I know you made something wonderful.”
“Such faith in me.”
“I know what I’ve seen. I have faith in that.” He put his weapons aside. “What is it, Rhona? What’s bothering you?”
“That we sit here, planning what’s sounding more and more like a suicide mission, while our kin . . .” Rhona closed her eyes. “I haven’t been able to get in touch with the triplets. Or any of my siblings.” She smirked. “Didn’t bother with Mum, though.”
“I haven’t been able to reach any of my brothers or Meinhard either. Or my mother. I doubt that means the worst, though.”
“I know. But the triplets are alone, yeah? On their own. Who’s going to watch out for them?”
“They don’t need anyone to watch out for them.” Vigholf leaned in, looking her in the eyes. “Have you not watched them, Rhona? Have you not seen the skil with which your sisters kil ? You’ve trained them wel . Better than anyone else.”
“We should stil be there, by their side.”
“But we’re here.”
“And we’l be dead before the suns set tomorrow.”
Vigholf lifted Rhona onto his lap, his arms around her waist. “That’s not a positive outlook.”
“How can you talk to me about positive anything?” Rhona lowered her voice and added, “Rumor is that Annwyl is going around tel ing people a wolf licked her head.”
“What?” Vigholf asked on a laugh.
“That’s what she said. That she felt better because a wolf licked her head. And that’s who we’re fol owing into the Provinces tomorrow.”
“Was it a big wolf? Or just a good-sized dog?”
Rhona tried to get off Vigholf’s lap, but he held her in place.
“I was just asking,” he insisted.
“No. You were making fun, but that woman scares me!”
“She scares everyone.” He thought a moment, then added, “Except Izzy. She doesn’t scare Izzy.”
“If you knew Izzy’s life story before she came to Briec and Talaith that realization wouldn’t make you feel any better.”
“So you’re just going to give up?”
“I can’t give up. I’m a Cadwaladr. We foolishly push on until our last breath. Like most diseases . . . it’s in the blood. You know, like idiocy.” He frowned. “Idiocy isn’t a disease.”
“It is to me.”
Bradana paced in front of her twins . . . er . . . triplets.
Damn girls. Protecting their sister without thinking about the consequences.
Bradana was no fool. She knew the loyalty of her offspring was with their eldest sister. And Rhona had earned it. But the one thing none of them could say was that their mother wouldn’t do everything and anything to protect every last one of them. Even her stubborn eldest child!
“We’re sorry, Mum.”
“Yeah. Real y sorry.”
“But Rhona said she wouldn’t be gone long. Drop off Keita and Ren and she’d be back.”
“And that was the last you heard from her?” Bradana asked.
They nodded.
“But,” one of them added, “no one here has heard from a blood kin past the Euphrasia borders. We haven’t heard from Daddy in weeks.”
“Royals ain’t heard nothing yet either,” Bradana admitted. “They usual y hear from the queen on the regular—but nothing.”
“So Rhona’s probably okay, yeah?” one of them eagerly asked, needing to hear her sister was alive and wel . “We’re al just cut off somehow.” They were cute when they were that age. Ful of hope and a positive outlook. But Bradana knew it wouldn’t last.
“You going after her, Mum?” one of them asked.
“No. Your sister made this decision, chose this path.... She wants to go it alone, she can.”
“Mum—”
“I won’t hear it . . . uh . . .”
The child’s shoulders slumped. “Nesta. Me name’s Nesta.”
“Right. Nesta. I know,” she quickly added. She waved them away. “Go. Get out of my sight. We’l discuss this later.” Much later.
“But, Mum . . .” The girl pointed at herself. “Edana.”
“I know! What, Edana?”
“The Elites that were in here . . .”
The one thing that Bradana did know was that if her Rhona was here, not one of those bastards would have made it out of here alive. “What about them?”
“It’s just . . . we don’t think them Elites came from the outside.”
“What?”
“They suddenly came out of the alcove. Near the tunnels. But how could they get past al of us?”
“And we have every entrance in this place covered,” Nesta added.
And the one she assumed must be Breena said, “No way they just come in and no one notices.” Her girls were right. “You three set up a search party. Scour this place, see if you can find anything. But leave whoever’s on the tunnels there. We need to get that blasted thing done.”
“Right.”
They headed out and Bradana tossed after them, “And good work.”
Once they were gone, Bradana tried contacting Rhona, but she knew it wouldn’t work. But now, instead of assuming she was just blocking her—
as the girl sometimes liked to do—she was assuming that Rhona had been . . .
No. She wouldn’t think that. Not about her girl. Not about her Rhona. Soldier that she was, Rhona was also a survivor. A scrapper. She’d be fine.
And Bradana would have to believe that if she hoped to make it through al this.
“I just hope,” Vigholf said, “that you’re not going to spend what, according to you, is our last day on this planet sitting around sulking.”
“Wel . . . that had been part of my plan. The other part was to feel resentful and angry.” Vigholf pressed his forehead against her cheek to stop himself from laughing. “And what if I have a more entertaining plan than that?”
“More entertaining than sulking? I know of nothing like that, Northlander.”
“Then clearly you need to get out more,” he teased, stroking his hand down Rhona’s back, kissing her throat.
Vigholf was moving in to kiss her when she said, “I’m sorry.”
“Sorry? For what?”
“For getting you into this.”
“You didn’t exactly invite me along. I came of my own accord.”
“I know, but—”
“And,” he cut in, “no matter what happens tomorrow, Rhona. I’ve been honored to fight by your side.” Rhona pul ed back a little, brown eyes peering at him. “Do you mean that?”
Vigholf took her hand in his and lifted it to his mouth. He kissed the back of it, then turned it over and kissed the palm. “When it comes to war, death, and battle, I never say what I don’t mean.”
He could have said a lot of things to her. Told her how pretty he thought she was. How much he liked her eyes. How nice she smel ed after a bath.
How he didn’t find her scars disfiguring in the least. He could have said any of that, but none would have meant more to her than what he did say.
Because he meant those words. She’d earned his respect and he’d earned her trust. And with that respect and trust came loyalty.
Rhona slipped off Vigholf’s lap and while on her knees, faced him. He watched her with that I-need-to-eat expression again, and it only became worse when she pul ed her chain-mail shirt off, tossing it into a corner.
Vigholf scrambled to his own knees then, yanking his shirt up and over his head. He hurled it away, then reached for her, slipping his arm around her waist and pul ing her in close. He kissed her, his tongue teasing hers, one hand on her breast, squeezing and tugging the nipple.
Rhona nearly had her arms around his neck, but Vigholf lifted her up and stretched her out on the floor. He stripped the rest of her clothes off, his hands running along her flesh while his avid gaze fol owed. Rhona reached for him, but Vigholf pul ed back, and lowered himself until he could bury his face against her.