Page 88 of Crown of Wings and Whispers

“None for me, thanks. I was just going to take a nap.”

“Don’t let me interrupt. I will restock, and as soon as I am warm, I will be on my way. Pretend I am not here.” He sucked down some coffee, glanced at my crotch and turned his back to me.

Ignore that? Not bloody likely. And I wasn’t going to pretend otherwise. “Just leave the batteries and go.”

He glanced back at me and nodded, vaguely, as if he hadn’t been listening. While he pulled our rationed batteries out of the cabinet, I concentrated on the firepit and encouraged the flames to raise the temperature.

He was cold? Not for long.

“Good fire,” he finally said, after putting the stash of batteries back.

I’d been watching. He hadn’t touched anything from the bag he brought with him. He sent me a smile when he went to the main hanging light and pulled it down. With his height, he reached it just as easily as Griffon had. Then he took it back to the kitchen.

“You get used to dim lighting because it dies so slowly. When the sun is gone, you will find it brighter than before. Of course, it will be dark for a moment, while I change it out.”

He switched off the lantern, but the firelight still reached far enough to tell me where he stood. I gravitated to the back of the room where the lamp still burned next to the book. The threatening, Andy-Weaver-vibe I was getting now was no joking matter, no matter how capable I was of defending myself.

But more than that, I wasn’t about to let him taint my memories of the place. So I would stay on my feet until he was on the other side of a locked door.

I grabbed my dagger from the drawer under the lamp. When I straightened, Timo was coming around the fire straight for me.

“I never showed you how the beds connect,” he said, cheerfully. “I don’t know how the two of you have managed to warm each other all this time. Here. Let me show you.” In the shadows, he never noticed the dagger. He turned his back to me and started dragging the bed away from the wall. He pointed at something along the lower rail. “You see this?”

I glanced where I was expected to but didn’t move any closer. It didn’t matter. He grabbed me anyway, used his hip to throw me off balance, and pushed me onto the mattress, knocking the lamp onto the floor in the process. My heart raced, but from anger, not fear. I was sickened by his willingness to hurt me, to risk everything in his life to do this.

While we struggled, I kept waiting for him to change his mind, to come to his senses. But he didn’t. Then it struck me—this couldn’t be the first time he’d attacked a woman!

That was all I needed. It wasn’t in me to punish an innocent man.

My dragon freaked out.Mark-a!

Kivi! Don’t come!This was between me and him.

Timo was a giant, a heavy skeleton made of thick bones, covered in flannel. Without his winter gear, he was surprisingly quick. He pinned my shoulders to the bed with one forearm while he fumbled for my clothes. To give him fair warning, I held my blade out where he could see it, but he never looked.

Then I tried talking, to distract him, to give him one last chance. “You do this to all your tenants?” My voice shook from adrenaline. He mistook it for fear.

He smirked, grunted, but said nothing. He found the zipper on my jeans, but I twisted my hips and he lost it again. With the muscles born from riding a dragon, I could probably buck him off. And if I concentrated, I could maybe roast him from the inside…

He and his wife had spent a lot of breath warning us about the laws of survival. The line between life and death, in Lapland, was delicate, they’d said. And now Timo had crossed to the wrong side. He threatened my survival, so he would forfeit his.

Before I could decide how I would end him, his fingernail gouged my chest. Instantly, heat shot up my arm, flooded my torso, and poured down my body. I no longer felt his groping hands, no longer felt his crushing weight. A golden, fluid armor now covered me, protected me, and made me untouchable.

He clamped his hand around my wrist and pushed off me, not yet willing to give up. In the light of the fire, he looked me up and down. That Andy Weaver smirk faded fast. I wiggled the dagger to get his attention. His eyes bulged and he flung my wrist away like it was a hot coal. I rolled to my feet and faced him across the bed.

He was pissed. “Who are you?”

I shifted the dagger to my left hand, then back to my right. “Your judge, jury, and executioner.”

I could tell by his expression, he didn’t believe me. The smirk was back, and he glanced around, trying to figure out how to regain the upper hand. He grabbed a pillow by the corner and eyed my blade.

I clicked my tongue on the back of my teeth. “Griffon’s going to be disappointed he missed the chance to kill you himself. But maybe, if he hurries back, he can help me get rid of your body. Are there bears in Lapland?”

Timo sneered. “Reverend has got him cornered. He will not escape for an hour.”

“So, you knew he was gone.”

He snorted. “Guilty.”

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