Page 102 of Blood of Ancients

Chapter 28

Ravinica

WHEN I STEPPED INTOthe stone circle, my hand in Magnus’, I was greeted by the same vague light-tunnel that had led me here. Magnus’ warm touch faded away, and then I was alone and cold in the green and blue ribbons. Running, panicked, fearing things deep in my belly butfeelingnothing.

I saw the same floating, luminescent light from before—the sign of my exit—and listened to the chattering, confusing voices of my mates in my head, mingling together as streams of words that didn’t always make sense.

Touching the light brought the world back to me, streaming in with a rush of sensations—not all of them unpleasant.

I was spit out into the cold darkness of Midgard, light snowfall glazing my pale cheeks as I stumbled out of the cottage onto my hands and knees.

Breathing heavily, head bowed, I closed my eyes to fight off a rush of nausea and bile building in the back of my throat.

“At least I wasn’t dropped from the fucking sky this time,” I murmured under my breath.

“Thank the gods for that,” said a voice to my left, also knee-deep in the snow.

I smiled over at Magnus, who got to his feet and staggered over on wobbly legs before helping me up with an outstretched hand.

The others were in and around the lodge, gathering and orienting themselves, rubbing their heads of the aches the portal travel brought on.

Arne wrapped his coat tight around his blue tunic, his teeth clattering. “I’ll miss the warmth of your homeland, Corym E’tar.”

“As will I, Arne.” Corym shook his head. “Elves were not meant for this weather.”

“Neither were skinny-ass iceshapers, no matter what my title might infer.”

Sven and Grim chuckled as they approached from the sides of the lodge.

Hersir Kelvar was the last to show, around the back of the cabin. He held a black trench coat in his hand, dusting it off. “Here,” he said, handing the garb to the shirtless bloodrender. “You’ll be needing this, boy. Probably should have asked the Skogalfar for a shirt before we left.”

“Didn’t really think that one through,” Magnus grumbled, taking the coat and putting it on. He glanced away from Kelvar. “. . . Thanks.”

My mate looked like his old self again, stoic and cold in the twilit night, with his coat brushing near his feet, the hems catching snow from the ground.

Before stepping away from the lodge, everyone’s faces grew serious. Bodies littering the wintry landscape reminded us what we were coming back to. For Magnus, he was returning to the scene of the crime.

On our way back to the portal in Alfheim, I had asked him what attacked him and the Huscarls. Magnus had been disconcerted and unsure. “They were darker than the white of the snow, all I can say. Moved like blurs.”

Arne confirmed it was essentially as Huscarl Grayon, the survivor of the attack, had reported to Gothi Sigmund in the conference room.

At that, Magnus had scoffed. “Grayonwas the only one to escape? That dead-legged bastard? I’ll be damned.”

I’d asked Magnus, “Hoping it would be someone else?”

His face had grown dark and he’d replied with a noncommittal, “Not really.”

I knew the attack hurt him, more than it did physically. Even with the Huscarls as presumed enemies, he still traveled with them for days to get here. Probably had conversations over late-night campfires with them like normal people. Possibly even befriended some of them.

And now they were dead. That quickly, and so needlessly.

I kept my hand close to my spear as we huddled together and made our way out of the elven camp. Our eyes were a-swivel, moving like turrets to the gnarled branches of whistling trees and snow-packed hills ahead of us.

No one said a word. We listened to the song of the wind, the scurrying of animals coming out from their hibernation.

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