Page 105 of The Heartless Archer

She crossed her arms, raising her chin to look at him. The witch hunter sighed, before ducking under the iron bars and hopping off the pedestal. Noora already raised her clutch to keep him at arm’s length, even though it slightly threw her off balance.

“Do relax, humans can grow with their tasks, are you aware of that?”

“Mortals can but Sosye cannot.”

Kekoa threw her an angry look but to her surprise, he stayed calm. “I am offering you a truce, witch, no more threats, no more sabotaging.” He held out his dark-skinned hand, littered with small blisters and peeled-off skin.

She slowly let the crutch sink, staring at his hand. “I did not poison you.”

He raised a brow. “If you want to look at it that way.”

“I did not poison you, you bastard. Do you think I’d need Wolfsbane to defeat you? I can do that just fine on my own,” she snapped. Now she knew what the queen felt like days ago when she accused her of sabotaging the tournament.

“I am well aware of that hence my peace offering.”

Noora blanched. Was he being serious? How could she ever accept a peace offering from someone who was wired to despise her and hunt her down? Her gaze flitted to Pika who had a similarly surprised look on his reddened face. When he shrugged his shoulders, she turned back to look at Kekoa, who was now reaching a hand down to her.

“I do not mean that I suddenly like you. I want to win this tournament and if that means beating you, I will. However, I will not defile my honour and bring shame to my clan by sabotaging anyone. This is not an act of kindness, witch, but an act of honour.”

His hand was still hovering in front of her and she eyed it for a moment. What advantage could he get out of this? Even if she did agree on a truce, she did not need to believe him. She stepped forward and steeled herself as she slipped her cold hand into his. Kekoa’s skin was warm and calloused, his shake was firm and short. She tried not to think about where his hands had been and who they were responsible for killing.

It was quiet in the training room, just for a moment, something shifted in the air. Noora could not pinpoint what it was and to be honest she would rather not.

“Well…” Pika trailed off and Kekoa shook his head slightly.

“Let’s go for another round.” He turned and started to instruct Sören again who seemed more confused than usual. Pika and Noora went a little offside the ring so they could warm up for when it was their turn to fight. Noora leaned the crutch against the cobbled stone wall and slowly started to squat her right leg, so her injured calf could rest for a while longer. Pika started with his arms and even though she only told Tyra yesterday that they were not friends she could not help but probe.

“What do you think about it?” She asked.

“Kekoa’s truce?” He shrugged. “Kekoa is a lot of things, many of them that are unacceptable but he is not a coward. I do not think he is the one who sabotaged your shoes or poisoned himself. How would that bring an advantage to him? He failed the second task with barely any points.”

Pika switched arms as she nodded slowly. “That was the same thing I thought and told the queen. The question is who would even gain anything from sabotaging the tournament?”

Even though she did suspect the queen in the beginning, and whatever strange thing was going on with her hands covered in black ink, in hindsight it would not make any sense to be her.

“I would not know but it has to be someone knowledgeable,” Pika said. “It’s rather calculating to poison a witch hunter with wolfsbane.”

“But why not poison us all? Why only Kekoa? My skates might have been sabotaged but it was not that of a hindrance and you were followed by Hel knows what’s in that forest. It feels all too arbitrary, like there was no thought behind it.”

“Does it? Maybe that person did it that way on purpose for it to look like a matter of coincidence. In the end, we have all been hindered in some kind of way. You almost died.”

Noora nodded, staring into the air as she stretched the hamstrings of her thigh. This made no sense at all. The fact that they did not know the purpose of the perpetrator made it all the harder to figure out who it was. What was the motive? What was the goal?

“What did the king say?”

Her head snapped back to look at Pika who eyed her curiously. She stood up slowly, her muscles screaming at her. “Why would he say anything to me?”

Pika raised a blonde brow. “I am quite aware of the fact that the king has formed a liking towards you, Noora. No need to pretend.”

“He has not. And he also did not say anything about the sabotage to me besides the fact that they were looking for the person who did all of this.”

A small grin formed on Pika’s lips.

“What?” Noora snapped.

“Nothing, you are the one who is being defensive.”

“I am not being defensive, I am only telling you that you are mistaken regarding the prince’s supposed interest in me.”

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