Page 41 of Heart of Winter
“Rune!” Leif shouted.
Another flicker of shine, a blue disc, like an animal’s eye.
Oliver’s pulse picked up. “Tessa?” he called.
A high, faint sound answered. It could have been the wind, but…
“Rune!”
“Tessa!”
“…here.” That was definitely Tessa. “We’re over here.” And coming closer. Bjorn raised the torch, and the horse’s eye shine became clear; the glow of the flame touched the white on his face.
Oliver heeled his horse forward, past the others, and was the first to meet them.
Tessa had hold of the reins, shivering, teeth chattering, her hair dark and wet and plastered to the sides of her too-white face. Rune rode behind her, slumped awkwardly, his forehead resting on her shoulder, and his arms dangling at his sides. “I think he passed out,” she said, and then Rune started to slide, and though she grabbed at his lifeless hand, he tipped over and fell face-first into the snow.
12
“I promise I’m fine,” Tessa insisted, then ruined the stubborn set of her chin with a great loud sneeze.
“Yes, yes, you’re very fine,” Oliver said, draping another blanket across her shoulders, noting the way she plucked it up closer around her throat with still-pale fingertips.
By the time they’re returned to the palace, the whole place was in an uproar, and Tessa was blue with cold. When her horse had thrown her, she’d been all but buried in a snow bank, and had struggled so long to get out of it that the wet autumn snow had soaked right through her clothes. Revna had met them at the door with her own personal maid, and bundled Tessa right upstairs and into a hot bath.
Her hair was nearly dry, now, curling as she sat by a roaring fire in her chambers, and she’d been wrapped in all manner of blankets, her feet bundled into a fur with a hot brick from the hearth underneath.
“I’m worried about Rune,” she said.
“Rune’s head is harder than most,” Revna said handing first Tessa, and then Oliver, hot mugs of cider. “Olaf says there’s no signs of distress, and he just needs a good night’s sleep.”
The prince, riding in front of his brother on the return trip, Leif’s arms holding him upright, had roused a few times, mumbling about Ris – his horse, Tessa had explained, one he’d been forced to destroy after a terrible fall – and, once, Tessa, his drowsy, half-conscious voice full of worry and pain.
“You should go to him, my lady,” Oliver said. “He may need you, and we want for nothing.” He offered a pathetic smile, and plucked at the front of the heavy fur-and-velvet dressing gown he wore. It was of a deep crimson stitched with blue and silver, its buttons set with gems, the sleeves trailing off his hands and the hem pooling on the floor around his feet. He’d caught one look of himself in it in the mirror and hadn’t dared asked who it belonged to, afraid he already knew the answer.
Revna propped her fists on her hips and said, “I’ll see to him later. I want to make sure the two of you are settled, first. My boys are used to all this cold – they were bred of Northern stock. It’s you two I’m worried about. Are you chilled? Can you feel your toes?”
He’d been given thick, ankle-high slipped, leather lined with soft fur, and he wiggled his now-warm toes inside them. He hadn’t had a bath, too worried about Tessa to take Magnus’s advice about the hot springs down in the caves. But he’d toweled his hair, and his dressing gown was a dream, and he could feel the heat of the fire on his face. “I’m quite well, my lady.”
She arched a single, dark brow.
“Revna.”
She nodded. “Good. Drink your cider.”
It was heavily-spiced, and spiked with some strong liquor; it burned his throat in a good way.
The maid, Astrid, put another log on the fire, turned down Tessa’s bed, laid more bricks to warm, and, after Revna had asked if they needed anything else, finally left with her mistress, closing the door on their way out.
Oliver dropped down into the chair opposite Tessa’s, and that was when he realized just how exhausted he was. Adrenaline had kept him sharp for the ride out and back, and through those first, frightening moments after their arrival, when they hadn’t known if Rune was going to be all right; but, now, afterward, he could feel himself flagging.
He took a few long swallows of cider. “Are you sure you’re well, Tess?”
“What? Oh.” She cradled her mug in both hands, staring down into its depths, but lifted her head at his question. “Yes, fine. Much better, now that I’m dry.”
He inclined his head. “I know you want to make a good impression on our hosts – you never did like to bother anyone. But this is me. Are you sure?”
“Yes–” She sat forward. “Ollie,yes, I wouldn’t lie to you. I was very cold, and very tired, and very frightened. And – oh, gods, you should have seen Rune. Poor Rune.” Her gaze skated toward the door, and her fingers drummed on her mug, and he thought that she wanted to go to him, to check that he was well for herself. “He’d had to kill his horse, and he’d climbed up this awful hill, and he wasn’t making any sense. He’d hit his head, and…” Her voice choked off, and her swallow looked painful. “It was terrible. But.” She offered him a wavery smile. “I’ll be all right, now. And hopefully Rune will, too. That’s what matters.”
