Page 103 of White Horse Black Nights

“Folke?” I ask, surprised.

The last I saw him, he was unconscious outside the Manywaters Inn while the townspeople of Blackwater attempted to put out the fire. Now, he leans heavily on a new cane. He doesn’t look good—his face ashen and deeply lined—but it would take a lot more than a fire to bring his bones down.

“He arrived an hour ago,” Rian says evenly. “Through the old tunnels.”

As a former Golden Sentinel, Folke is familiar with Sorsha Hall’s secrets. He jabs his cane in the slumped man’s direction. “I brought you a present, Wolf. For saving my hide.” His grim tone is anything but festive, and it curdles something in my stomach.

I glance at Rian, but his face betrays nothing. So, crouching, I pull the hood off the man’s face. It reveals blood-matted fair hair and a face that, while hard to make out with all the bruises, is so familiar it stabs me with rage.

The man wheezes, his eyes fluttering as he mumbles something in pain.

I shoot to my feet. “One of the fucking raiders?”

This broken and bloodied man is familiar to me becauseIwas the one who broke and bled him. It’s the raider who tried to rape Sabine. Maks—that’s what the others called him. Myst trampled him, and I can’t fathom that anyone could survive the bone-shattering beneath her hoofs, but apparently, I should have checked the bodies better. I was in such a damn rush to get Sabine out of there to safety.

Folke digs the end of his cane into an oozing wound in the man’s side, eliciting a pained moan. Folke smiles in dark delight. “When I woke up in Blackwater, I followed your trail. Enough people saw you riding a white horse to point me in the direction of the river. And the Old Innis Mill is a known haven for raiders. Eventually, I found the cottage. Your mark was all over the carnage. This one was still barely alive.”

My muscles quake with fury that this scum still lives.

“Folke thought we might be interested in questioning him,” Rian explains, though I’m sure Folke is collecting a handsome bounty for bringing him here, too. “There’s a chance the raider can tell us why they targeted Sabine. What business King Rachillon has with her and the other godkissed he’s abducting.”

A vein ticks in my neck. It’s a challenge to tame my temper, when all I want to do is borrow Folke’s cane to stab it deeper into every one of Maks’s oozing wounds until he’s screaming, but I need to be smart. I don’t need Maks to reveal why King Rachillon wants Sabine. Iknowwhy he does. And if Maksdoesknow Sabine’s secret, then it isn’t his answers I need, but his silence.

Still, I have to play along for now.

I give a hard nod. “Good.”

Rian pulls me a few feet aside. His eyes have the dark gleam they get when he’s plotting something. “You wanted back in the business, Wolf? Here’s your chance. Use those fists like you used to.”

Torture him, Rian means. Interrogate him. Beat the answers out of him.

I flinch, then try to mask the reaction by smoothing a hand down my jaw. “You made it pretty clear thatoutmeantout.”

“Things change,” Rian murmurs, glancing distracted in the direction of the abandoned tunnels that stretch beyond the dungeon. In a low voice, he confides, “I sent a dozen of our best sentinels to the border wall to look for breaches. It’s been four days. None of them have returned.”

Dark omens drift on the cold air coming from the direction of the abandoned tunnels. The Golden Sentinels are among the most skilled mercenary army of all the neighboring kingdoms. If a dozen of the best didn’t return, it means we’re all in big fucking trouble.

“So, we need answers,” Rian presses, his eyes jerking toward Maks. “Before King Rachillon makes his next move.”

My hands tighten into fists. I know what I have to do, but I don’t want to do it. I had to move fucking mountains to get out of this line of the Valvere business, and into something respectable. I swore to myself I wouldn’t kill again in the name of Valvere greed.

But someone has to keep Maks quiet.

Folke watches me with a knowing, piteous gaze as he eavesdrops on our conversation. He, more than anyone, knows how badly I fought to get out of exactly what Rian wants me to do now.

I feel like I’m damning myself to hell as I quietly whisper, “I’ll get you answers, but I want some of my own. Be straight with me. What do I need to know about King Rachillon? I know you know more than you’ve told me.”

A muscle pulses in Rian’s jaw as he leads me further down the hall, out of Folke’s earshot. In a quick whisper, he informs me, “All of Volkany is shut off, even from their neighbors to the north and east. Only portions of the western coast are open. My brother Lore encountered a Volkish sailing vessel in neutral waters. He took captives. They told the story of how King Rachillon rose to power out of nowhere thirty years ago. Some claimed he was a monk living on an isolated island in a giant lake. He gained followers when he claimed to be godkissed with the power to wake the sleeping gods. No one believed it at first, but then he awoke the fae’s mythical creatures—”

“So the goldenclaw I told you about,” I interrupt sharply. “You fuckingknewit was real?”

He snorts dismissively. “You were out of the business, Wolf. You only wanted to hunt. That information was for the inner circle.”

My fists squeeze even tighter. My heart thunders. Peeking back down the hall, I see Folke kick Maks a few times until he coughs to show he’s still alive. As much as I want to throw a punch in Rian’s smug face for not telling me this, I have only myself to blame.

I asked to leave—he granted it.

“So Rachillon plans to wake the gods? Fucking hell.” All those stupid street preachers prophesizing the gods’ return will shit their pants when they realize they were right. They’re going to lose a lot more than their bowels, though, once they learn what’s truly coming for them under the gods’ capricious reign.

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