Page 23 of Stealing the Troll’s Heart

I work hard for the rest of the winter, trying every day to lose myself in my daily tasks. But eventually we run out of raw materials, and the first ships won’t be arriving for a few weeks still. We tidy up the shop, try to keep ourselves busy, but every day feels like one more step in an endless slog forward. Why do I always insist on spending winter miserable and up to my ass in snow?

As the ice starts to break apart and thaw out, it’s finally time to run. For all I know Raz’jin got on the first ship back from Kalishagg, and one day soon he’s going tostumble down the pier to Sden’s shop and bring his hand axe to my throat, asking,Where is my emerald?

I pack up all of my gear, and as soon as the first ship comes in from Culberra, I’m on it. I drag everything back to the human city with me, and I feel like a dog with its tail between its legs. I find a note waiting for me at the post office from Deleran.

“I went back home,” he wrote. “Whenever, or if ever, you want to meet me there.”

I have to admit that after everything that’s happened, I miss my friend. So the first thing I do is find a storage locker for all of my gear, then head to the train that will take me far out west. Once I’m in the king’s city, it’s a matter of taking a carriage the fifty miles to Great Oak.

I’m not looking forward to seeing my parents, but what can you do? Sometimes you have to go back home.

The whole trip I keep the emerald in my pocket, reaching in to turn it over in my hand whenever my thoughts stray back to Raz’jin. Sometimes I wonder what I could have done differently, but it all feels unavoidable, as if the cultural clash was bound to happen at some time or another.

It wasn’t meant to be, and I knew that. I wish he had known it, too. Maybe we could have kept doing what we were doing until we grew tired of it.

But I have a feeling that would never happen.

My parents are shocked to see me when the carriage dumps me on their front doorstep. I haven’t been home in a decade, not since Deleran and I left together to explore the world and find our place in it. My father is the first one to hug me. He’s always been a softie.

“What brings you home?” Mom says, arms crossed. “You haven’t even written to us in years.”

Oops. I’ve just been getting in tussles, fucking trollkin, andalmost dying while I was hung from my hands in an orc village. Not to mention ruining my apprenticeship because I couldn’t bear to let Raz’jin go without taking a little memento for myself.

“Sorry,” I say. “I’ve been busy.”

“That’s to be expected when you leave home to make it on your own.” Dad gives Mom a look that says,Come now, welcome our daughter home. I can still read them like books. “What have you been doing with yourself? You look quite well.”

It’s the nice clothes and all the fish I ate while holed up in Eyra Cove. After making up a story that explains why I’ve temporarily left my successful craftsman’s life behind, I go to find Deleran. He’s probably bunking with his parents, too.

I wonder what brought him here. What trouble of his own is he escaping?

Raz’jin

I’d thought that by the time two weeks had passed and I returned to Kalishagg, at least some of the sting would have faded. But I’m just as furious as when I left Eyra Cove. I don’t acknowledge the other thing, the deeper thing: The blinding hurt that lies inside my ribs like a lump of iron.

It’s easy to find Blizzek, because he’s sitting on the same stool at the bar as when I left. When I drag myself in, his eyes go wide.

“You look like you’ve been through hell,” he says.

“Thanks for the warm welcome.” I sigh as I order a drink of my own.

“So, did you find any?” he asks. I know what he means—the emeralds I went to the Frattern Islands to find in the first place.

I want to tell him everything, but I can also predict exactly what he’ll say and do in response, and that doesn’t bring me any comfort.

“No. You were right. Pointless.”

Blizzek squints at me. He clearly doesn’t believe a word I’m saying, but he’s never been the type to pry. “Not my business,” he always says.

Much to my surprise, he’s been seeing an orcess regularly, and that’s why he’s still here. But his coin is running out just like mine, and we both know that means it’s time to cut ties and go prospecting again.

“The Southlands,” I say immediately. I want to get as far away from contested territory as possible. I can’t risk any chance of seeing her again. She wouldn’t be foolish enough to stick around Eyra Cove after robbing me blind—she’s not that stupid—so there’s no point going back after the ice thaws. Besides, the south is a great place to spend the winter, as warm and humid as it stays nearly year-round.

Blizzek frowns. “The pickings will be slim.”

“Maybe we won’t hit it big, but we’ll stay warm. There’s day laborer work there, too.”

“Day labor?” He studies me, like there’s a mystery on my face he just has to figure out. “What the fuck happened, Raz?”

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