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THE FREY SAGA BOOK V:
SHADOW AND STONE
By Melissa Wright
copyright 2020
Thea
Thea had been a sentry for exactly
one day when she was thrown into the biggest conflict the North had seen in
centuries. The dark elves had nearly gone to war with the fey, and Junnie, the
new Council head, rode side by side with Thea and her childhood friend Steed,
who had become one of Seven to the Lord of the North, as light and dark elves
joined forces to overcome traps laid by the fey. Thea had stood upon the stones
of the high fey court with her blade in hand and her life on the line. She’d
been terrified but had felt no less than a warrior. Thea had found her calling.
She’d not seen a lick of action
since.
She dropped the bucket of muck she’d
been carrying with a muttered curse, glaring up the pathway to her superior’s
leather-clad back. He wasn’t even the head of the guard. He was a subordinate to
a subordinate of the head of the guard, and he’d been riding her like a stolen
mare.
Thea ran the back of her hand across
her forehead, unsurprised when it came away wet, not with sweat so much but
with plenty of the black gunk they’d had her scraping off the base of the
stable block. She didn’t even rate high enough to tend the animals.
It wasn’t as if she’d had lofty
expectations. Before she’d left home, she’d heard all the criticisms: “You’re
too skinny. You’re too young. You can’t even wield a proper sword.” They
weren’t all wrong. It was true she was thin, but she could hold her own. She
wasn’t much, but what there was of her was strong. And she was young, at least compared
to those who’d warned her, but she was nearly as old as Steed, Grey, and the
rest of the guard.
The sword wielding, though, she
couldn’t really defend. She glanced at her dirt-smeared hands, which were long
and lean but scarred by the mistakes she’d made for the whole of her life.
Thea had worked with the animals in
Camber, an occupation she’d loved. She’d been a healer, too, first for the
animals, then the townspeople, and eventually for the occasional rogue. Word
had gotten out, and she’d garnered a host of rogues, fighters, and ruffians as
patients.
Her father had not approved. Thea
had a bad habit of sticking herself in situations that didn’t come out clean.
It wasn’t that she was clumsy, but she tended to go in headfirst—and in most
unpleasant circumstances, feetfirst was the only good way. Her father used to
tell her that it didn’t hurt to turn tail and run once in a while.
She hadn’t run, though. No matter
how terrified Thea might be, she was always more afraid of running and of being
called a coward than she was of fighting.
It was foolish, really, and immature,
but there was no question that it had gotten her to where she was. And she had
stood among legends, fighting beside the high guard to the Lord of the North.
Well, she hadn’t done much fighting, but she’d stood with them.
She swiped her hands on the sides of
her pants. “Done,” she called up the pathway toward her superior’s back.
He didn’t acknowledge her. He was
fool-headed and arrogant above his station, but Thea didn’t tell him so.
Instead, she trudged up the dark stone pathway to address him as he expected to
be addressed. “Done,” she said, “sir.”
He glanced at her sidelong then back
at the haze of a hidden horizon.
She waited. “Shall I—”
His glare cut her short.
She bit back her next retort.
“The blocks aren’t clean,” he said.
“Start again.”
Thea’s mouth tightened for one long
moment before she opened it again without regard for her better judgment. She
was jerked to the side by a sudden pull on her arm, her curse heading for the
source of the tug instead of her superior, but she drew up short. A stout
black-haired boy in full leathers stared down at her.
“Thea,” he said. “I’ve just finished
my shift. Let me give you a hand.”
He nodded at the guard, drawing Thea
away from the man and back down the path. Thea had seen the boy before and had
known him in Camber. Well, known was
maybe a strong word. But she’d heard about him. Those dark eyes held a story as
unhappy as any she’d ever been told. His name was Barris, and he was from a
well-loved family—Thea’s father and the entire town had thought highly of his
parents.
They were gone now. His father,
Burne, and his mother, Camren, had been killed in a single season when the new
lord had fought for her throne. Thea wondered what made people give their lives
for a person. For a cause, she could understand—for the North. But to lose so
many for a single life…
Dreamer. Her father’s word slammed into
her, the way they often did when Thea lost sight of the present. She’d joined the
cause, and she was present, even if it did mean sacrificing many to protect one.
She would be cursed if they thought they could keep her from her aim.
Thea wrenched her arm free, picked
up her steps, and leaned in so her narrowed gaze could target Barris’s. “I
don’t need your help, you know.”
Barris smirked. “Clearly. You were
getting along well. Seemed like you were about to turn over a new leaf with your
superior.”
She rolled her eyes. “With the wall.
I don’t need your help with the wall.”
She kept her hands from flying, matron-style, to her hips. “You don’t have to
do my work for me.”
“Oh, I’m not,” he answered. “I just
wanted to stop you from provoking our lead and getting our entire group thrown
in a hole.”
Thea stopped, making Barris glance
over his shoulder to see her. “They don’t do that,” she said.
Her words were too timid, and she
regretted them at once. Of course they didn’t lock recruits in the ground as
punishment—they wouldn’t. Besides, the castle tunnels were just a legend. She’d
not seen a single one.
Barris laughed. “No, they do not.”
He turned, crossing his arms over his broad chest. “But they do make you scrape
muck off the stalls.”
Her expression soured. “You’re
saying this is my fault? That
idiotic, arrogant—”
Barris shook his head. “No, I’m sure
you got sludge duty entirely without insulting your superior.” He tossed her an
empty bucket and looked at the pile of filthy rags, chisels, and short-handled
spades. “Why are you doing this by hand?”
“Because it’s virtuous,” she spat.
“Hard work is good for the spirit.”
Barris stared at her. It was
possible he was regretting stepping in to save her when she was clearly a loon.
She let her shoulders fall,
defeated, then gestured with a tip of her head back up the path. “He made me.”
Barris chuckled. “I see.” He brushed
his palms together, glancing surreptitiously to and fro. They were mostly alone
there, out of sight of the other castle staff. “How about you keep watch, and I
give you a hand. By the time he realizes you had help, we’ll be enjoying mess.”
Thea chewed her lip. She was hungry.
And her superior was a big-headed
idiot. “Whatever keeps you out of trouble,” she said.
Thea didn’t regret letting Barris
help. He’d worked quickly, and they were soon belly-up to the table, partaking
in roast pig and crisp apples with the other castle guards. It wasn’t her first
time at mess, but she’d rarely made it on schedule, thanks to the extra tasks
assigned to her by their lead.
The table was long with several
benches, all filled with loud and chattering sentries and recruits, on either
side. It might not have been her first time there, but it was the first time
she’d not been exhausted and exasperated. It was the first time she’d actually
enjoyed it. A few of the off-duty sentries laughed and told tales as dark-red
wine sloshed in their mugs. The younger few, all new recruits, watched,
laughing along but not joining in the drink, having quickly learned the rules
were different for the seasoned men. Occasionally, Edan passed through the
proceedings, but the head of the castle guard usually kept his distance during
their off hours. It kept him from growing too close, inadvertently becoming a
friend instead of the incontestable, or so the others had said. Edan was head
of command, and his word was law. Only a high guard, one of Lord Freya’s Seven,
could overrule him.
Steed was one of the Seven. Thea
plucked an apple stem from its core, annoyed that her thoughts had returned to
Steed. It wasn’t the first time she’d thought of him since she’d been stuck
scrubbing palace walls. She knew it wasn’t his responsibility to stick up for
her or to point out to the other guards that she’d stood with them on fey lands.
She didn’t need him to win her a place among the guard. Besides, he might have
thought she deserved her fate. Cleaning muck might be part of the process, an
initiation.
She dropped two apples into her
pocket as her eyes ran down the table to several dozen other guards. They’d not been cleaning stalls.
“Right.” She tossed another apple
into the air and caught it in a cupped palm before standing.
“Heading off?” Barris asked. He’d
been leaning close to another guard, deep in conversation, but the seriousness
seemed to melt from his face when he straightened to talk to her. Maybe she’d
been imagining it. Maybe she’d been reflecting some invented torment of her own
onto his face at the idea of losing either parent, let alone both.
“Yes,” she told him. “Thanks for
earlier.”
Barris rolled his palm upward and
gave her a smile that appeared entirely natural, not broken by grief or
irrevocably scarred. “All in service to the guard.” His brow shifted the
slightest bit, his eyes sharing in his smile. “Stay out of trouble, aye?”
“Wouldn’t think of it.” She winked,
tossing and catching the apple once more before she turned to go.
She was no longer hungry, not quite
tired, and a day’s ride from the haunts of her old home. Thea walked through
the castle courtyards, still unfamiliar with the layout of the grounds. Edan
had shown them the important paths, the battlements and balustrades and
armories that pertained to their duties as guards. But Thea had yet to memorize
the insignificant bits—nooks and crannies where one might be able to sit and
hide, the smaller courtyards with leafy trees and garden shelves, and the
overhangs that could keep one out of the rain. Thea loved a good hideaway,
somewhere to stand outside of the bustle to watch the goings-on.
The castle had a lot of dark corners
and more than its fair share of mysterious passages. She’d rarely been indoors
for her duties those last weeks but would not have been surprised if the newly
appointed castle staff got lost more than they found their way. It didn’t help
that Thea had practically lived out-of-doors before. When her parents had
forced her inside, it had been into a four-room cabin, where she and her sister
shared a single room. Cora had been the opposite of Thea in nearly every
possible way. Growing up, Thea climbed trees and learned to shoot with a bow,
while Cora sat indoors, sewing and singing and mixing perfumes for her hair.
“Wouldn’t hurt you to wear a little
perfume,” she would tease Thea, her nose scrunched at some imagined outdoorsy
smell.
Thea could always be counted on to
return the favor, though, bringing in a speared fish or dumping a satchel of
earth-covered mandrake root onto her sister’s freshly prepared table. “Wouldn’t
hurt you to find a little food,” she would say, parroting her sister’s tone.
They’d grown up eventually, to their
mother’s great relief, and Cora’s hobbies had paid off. She had developed a
talent—her embroidery and needlework were among the best in the land.
Certainly, they’d surpassed anything in Camber. Cora had moved out of their
small cabin last season, finally attaching herself to a trader their father had
thought merely sold her wares. Thea’s father had often been blind to the difference
between Cora’s business relations and those relations who were not, despite
Cora’s plunging necklines and red-painted lips. She’d been sly with more than
just needlework, come to think of it, and had let Thea bear the brunt of her
father’s disapproval.
Cora had once had an eye for Steed
when they were younger. She’d worked her magic with her soft, scented hair and
blossom-pink cheeks. She’d even tied feathers and baubles into the two braided
strands that crowned her dark curls. The attempt hadn’t succeeded in the least.
Back then, Steed had other things on his mind, such as the responsibilities his
father had left behind, the horse trade, and a half-fey sister. Thea was
surprised the boy had managed at all. But he’d had Grey. And he’d had that
half-fey sister.
Given everything he’d been through,
Steed had managed quite well.
Thea tossed her apple skyward as she
ambled through an open stone archway. Maybe all the guards had some tragic
history. It probably wasn’t as bad as Barris’s or Steed’s, but the massacre had
affected most of the families in the North in some way. Thea’s family had been
fortunate. Her father had kept them from getting involved.
She took a narrow stone corridor
from one courtyard to the next and found herself once again on familiar ground.
Low walls surrounded a large square of grass, the enclosure one of two where
the horses could roam. Steed’s stock there was limited, she’d heard. It had
been discussed in town so many seasons ago, back when he joined the high guard.
He couldn’t bring them all in, so a few of the men from Camber had been put in
charge of managing the remainder of the herds. The horses kept in the castle
courtyards were lovely, the best of the best. She watched them graze, their
coats slick and dark over thickly muscled frames.
Foot traffic had been walled off,
and the atmosphere was quiet and peaceful and cool. The evening sun was fading,
and a lone bird drifted across the darkening sky. Thea leapt onto the fence,
hooking the heel of her boot over the stone to pull herself up. She landed in
the grass on the other side, and a young gelding raised his head. Thea cooed,
showing him the apple she held.
“There’s a good boy,” she told him,
watching as he strode her way. “Someone’s taught you about treats.” She smiled
when he nudged her with his head. She gave him a bite of apple, brushing her
fingers over his neck. It was what she’d imagined when she’d come to serve as a
guard. Thea had thought, foolish dreamer that her father had always said she
was, that she could work in the stables, spending all day brushing and feeding
horses.
It was ridiculous, her parents had
said. And of course she’d known there would be battles, and of course, she’d
realized she’d have to defend the castle on
occasion. “Surely,” she’d told them, “you don’t believe they will stick
a sword in my hand and throw me to the wolves.”
Gooseflesh rose on Thea’s arms at
the word and the not-so-distant memory of the new light elves’ Council head and
her wolves. At first, Junnie had only moved the one of them, bringing it to the
forest’s edge to meet Thea and Steed. That had been disconcerting enough. But
when they approached the fey lands, Thea had seen the truth of it and the power
behind the light elf who had broken the old Council.
Freya had the same power, Thea
understood, the ability to walk in the mind of a beast.
And in humans.
She shook off a chill, running a
hand over the gelding’s back. She walked forward, crossing the grass court, and
pulled a second apple from her pocket. “Here’s a pretty boy,” she murmured,
drawing another horse from his crop. The second horse bit into the apple,
splitting it at the core with a snap that echoed through the courtyard. The sky
had darkened further, but Thea sensed a shadow too dim to see. She glanced up
as the bird circled lower and spread its massive wings. It was a hawk. The
gelding nudged Thea, searching for the apple’s other half. She laughed, gave it
over, and rubbed between his ears.
“The stable yards are off limits,”
said a voice behind her.
She jumped, bumping the pair of
horses on their heads as she turned. One of the geldings nickered.
“Steed.”
He was too close. She’d not even
heard him. Her heart hammered in her chest, and then she remembered he was her
superior. She was on forbidden ground.
“I’m sorry,” she told him. “I—” But
she didn’t have an excuse. She’d known where she was and wasn’t allowed to go.
Her shoulders fell. “What’s my punishment?”
A gelding bumped her, knocking her
arm out of the way to search for the last apple.
“You shouldn’t treat them here,”
Steed told her. “No one wants to be headbutted every time they’ve got”—he
gestured toward her side—“what is it you’ve got there?”
She held the small, ruddy fruit
aloft. “Apple.”
The gelding reached his long muzzle
up and took it from her hand.
“That was the last one,” Thea
assured Steed.
“Good.” He nodded. After a moment,
he asked, “Is everything well?”
She shrugged. “It isn’t exactly what
I expected.” He must have thought she was homesick, that she’d come to the
horses because she’d missed it and wished she hadn’t joined the guard. “I
wouldn’t change it,” she added quickly. “Muck cleaning and all.” She hated the
way she raised her chin in defiance.
“Muck cleaning?” He chuckled. “So
you’ve been getting on well with your lead.”
Her posture, that challenge in her,
immediately melted away. She’d deserved it, then. And Steed hadn’t known. “They
don’t”—she cleared her throat to squash the emotion tightening it—“they don’t
report to you?”
He shook his head. “Chevelle
oversees all that.” Steed looked at her, his expression entirely solemn. “I’ve
been asked to steer clear of the guard. Apparently, I’ve been a bit too
approachable, and there’s some concern that my natural affability might bring
about some problems.” He glanced over Thea’s shoulder at the darkened arches
that led to the stables. “Wouldn’t do if I let slip someone breaking the
rules.”
“I see,” Thea murmured. Steed had
been reprimanded, and she’d put him in a spot. “And so”—she swallowed—“I should
probably…”
Steed stared at her.
“…go?” she said.
Steed’s brow lowered in a warning.
She bit her lip, trying to hide a
smile. “I promise,” she told him, but her words ran out, because the first rays
of moonlight caught his eye, and she wasn’t sure exactly what she’d meant to
say. She would stay out of trouble—that would have been a good promise but one
she couldn’t keep. She would stay away from the horses—no, probably not. She
would try. She could have said that. I
promise to try.
She let out a breath that was nearly
a laugh and ran past Steed to the wall. Her heart was alight with relief at
narrowly escaping another rebuke, and she leapt to the top in a single bound.
When her feet hit solid stone on the other side, she knew for certain that the
castle was the only place she ever wanted to be.
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