Thomas sat trembling in the center of Godwin's study, Carac restraining the lad in his bruising, bear-like hands as Fendrel presided over the proceedings from Godwin's tall chair. I looked up at Lucian again and quickly averted my eyes for there seemed to be a billowing fury clouding his amber depths and turning them a frightful and unearthly iridescent gold.

When he had first laid those eyes on me and taken in my torn gown and unkempt appearance, which spoke volumes of the travail visited upon me, he had flown at Thomas, knocking him senseless in the process, before he was restrained by his father and brother.

I assured him, more times than I was wont to remember, that I had not been defiled, but Lucian would not relinquish the murderous rancor from his malignant scowl. It was still fixed on Thomas and had been since he attacked the boy.

"Anne, take Aria to her chamber. Have her bathed and inspected for... further damage. Once that task is completed, she may then return, if that be her wish." Fendrel, with nod of his head, thereby dismissed the both of us with sententious finality and all was silent as we headed towards the door.

All the while I moved thence, I could feel six pairs of cold eyes against my back — Thomas' unaccounted for as he still had his downcast, his right eye seeping brine and swollen shut from Lucian's blow. We left Godwin, Fendrel, Lucian, Caine, Carac and Warwick alone with Thomas and I could not help feeling, by doing so, that I had surrendered the lad to a pack of wolves.



❆



"Where are you off to in a hurry?"

I skidded to a halt as Rose stepped into view and blocked my way.

"I am wanted in Godwin's solar," I answered distractedly, attempting to walk around her, but she moved as I did and purposefully prevented my passage.

I had rushed at my toilette and changed into a fresh gown with a speed that must have impressed on Astrid my need to make haste, and now I was being detained by a woman I knew held me in no great regard; Godwin's sister hardly ever spoke to me unless it was to utter monosyllabic responses. However, I did not take this in the least bit personally for she conducted herself thus with each person that took it upon themselves to invite her to conversation. She was nowise mean-spirited or harsh, per se, but she was extremely odd and inhibited.

Rose was as taciturn as her brother, and nephew for that matter, but where Godwin affected a brusque stoicism, commanding reverence with merely his somber presence, there was still humor there, scarce though it was. Rose, on the other hand, had an ascetic aura about her that bespoke of her harsh austerity, but physically beautiful withal. I bethought the grim astringency about her mouth more suited to an abstinent abbess in a convent than to a duchess and mother. Furthermore, Fendrel struck me as a lusty sort, yet I was hard pressed to imagine that their connubial bed was anything but cold and little used.

"I had another dream about you," said she, shattering my risqué cogitation.

This was all she said before she pulled me into her chamber and closed the door. I was struck dumb and pliable by her actions, as well as my earlier introspections, and therefore did not object verbally or otherwise.

"Tis fortunate I have chanced upon you alone."

"Your Grace, I cannot tarry long-"

"Please, call me Rose," she insisted, closing her chamber door.

My eyes flew immediately to the large raven sitting outside her window, studying me with equal intensity. It had caught my attention the moment I had entered, causing my words to spill forth in a preoccupied manner and then cease altogether.

"Where is Ulfrlykill?" she asked.

"Ulfrlykill?"

"The necklace I gave you on your wedding day!" She pursed her lips impatiently. I watched as the bird cawed its farewell and disappeared from the casement in a blur of sable feathers. Rose shook me impatiently when I did not answer.

"I have it here!" I pulled the chain from beneath my gown, where it had settled atop my sternum, and presented it to her with a curious frown. "Do you wish me to return it to you?" I had no idea why she was now so adamant to see to its safety. I had done as she had bade me, when first she bestowed it, and kept it close for all it was, thus far, a useless gift.

"Nay," she replied with a deep sigh of relief, rubbing the blade of the key lightly between her thumb and forefinger ere she dropped it back into my waiting palm, the bow pulling at the silver chain still clasped delicately around my neck. "Your need is still greater than mine, my dear," she surmised.

I had never heard her speak so much at once except to admonish her sons when they were being particularly unruly, which they often were when Fendrel was not within sight.

She compressed her mouth before adding, "However, you must ensure that it is bequeathed to your first born daughter or, failing the birth of one, commit it to your eldest son's wife."

"What does it open?" I looked at her with bewildered wariness. I had wanted to ask this for a while, but the chance had not presented itself.

"It shall open whatever door is barred to you." Her eyes narrowed to slits, so I transferred my eyes instead to the object of our discussion. Rose hooked a long cold finger under my chin and tilted my face back to hers. "Carry it with you always," she warned again, emphasizing her meaning with a slight squeeze of my chin. "Whomsoever holds that key, holds the key to Nørrdragor." Those last words seemed to hold much weight, their effect all the more significant in light of her sharp gaze.

I dutifully dropped the chain back beneath the layers of my gown so that it hung against my heart, the coolness of its weight puckering my flesh. It felt strangely reassuring to have it there, for I had grown used to its presence, but for the life of me I could not imagine why.

"Now, leave me," she said reverting back to her familiarly cold mannerism, her self-imposed duty thus dispensed. "I am tired," she sighed.

"What about the dream, Rose?" My voice was pleading and she seemed to take pity on me.

"I wish you good fortune child," said she as her teeth worried at her lower lip. "My dreams are not clear enough to take definitive shape; all they leave behind is an impression. I merely woke up, the morning of your wedding, with your name on my lips and the key clutched in my hand. This morn was much the same except but for..."

"Yes?"

"Tis nothing." She shook her head. "I am tired, that is all. You must let me rest now. Do shut the door when you leave," she implored, clutching at her head. I was loathe to trouble her further, though I longed to know more.

"Aria."

"Your Grace?"

"Rose," she prompted, "I said call me, Rose. Stay away from Niflheim..." And then she closed the door.

"Niflheim?" I breathed. What in God's name is the woman talking about?! But I had not the wherewithal to ponder Rose's arcane warning; there were more pressing matters that required my attention now.

It was a long walk, despite my brisk pace, back to Godwin's solar. Why Anne had had me bathed in my old chamber, I know not, but I supposed the reason to be that she wished me far from Godwin's solar and to keep me well away from the business at hand.

I knocked at Godwin's suite, only opening the door once I heard Lucian's call to enter. It was completely vacated of all its previous occupants except my husband. I sent him a puzzled frown and he turned from me to stare out the window.

"Thomas has been sentenced," informed me without emotion.

"To what?"

"Do not you mean where?" At my wary nod he enlightened me. "To the maze-"

"What?! No!" I gasped, but he pressed on despite my outrage.

"Along with the rest of the rapists and murderers." I was glaring at him the while he spoke, nevertheless it made no difference to him. "I see you know what that means," said he with a dark edge.

"That it barbaric, Lucian! He will die!" I knew all too well what the Greybacks hid in their labyrinthine prison — what they let out of the trapdoor of a night.

"Yes," was all he offered. "That is, after all, the idea."

"Will you not have mercy! Please, let him go and send him away instead," I beseeched from the other end of the chamber. I did not go to him for he stood resolute and unapproachable, his back rigid with choleric and his features, before he turned from me, had been sullen. There was no mistaking the dormant rage simmering beneath the calmness he had cloaked himself within.

"Let him go-" I tried again, only to be confronted with Lucian's fury.

"What the devil for!" he roared, slamming the wall beside the window with an iron fist. When I stared aghast, he hid his ire by facing the casement once again. "He has had his fair share of warnings!"

"What do you mean?" I said carefully. "This was a first offense-" I stopped myself as Lucian turned on his heel and prowled toward me in high dudgeon. He grabbed me to him so that I had to tip my head all the way back to keep eye contact.

"Do not insult my intelligence again, Ariana. You have more to lose than just my trust." He narrowed his furious gaze at me. "Though that is now in small supply."

I stared belligerently at him, wanting urgently to shout that mine too had dwindled — his iniquitous secrets having obliterated that tentative trust long before now. Wisely, I stood mute... for all of three seconds.

"It was a mere kiss! He meant no more harm than that!"

But I was still wholly unsure of the latter, and the falsehood tripped off my tongue awkwardly. I knew in my heart that Thomas was a good man. He had done wrong, but I could not, in good conscience, allow him to die for me; I still felt so responsible for him. I wish that I did not love the lad so dearly and that I could wash my hands of him, yet he was too much like a brother for me to treat him so coldly. There was also a nagging feeling that he would have stopped ere he caused me harm for he was not malicious.

"How naive you are," Lucian scoffed. I started from my reverie, thinking that he'd read my mind, but I quickly realized he was responding to my last assertion.

Then he pinned me with an accusatory scowl, as if something had just now occurred to him of a sudden.

"Do you love him then?" he asked. He'd bared his teeth in a disdainful grimace, the thought having evidently disturbed him.

"Yes, but only-" However, Lucian would not hear me and, instead, pushed me away from him.

"Enough!" He prowled back to the window. I gasped in the face of his cold and seething command. "Enough," he said again, although his second issuance held far less rancor for it had been uttered in dejection. "You petition not the right man. Fendrel is out for blood, and no amount of importunity will sway him from his decision."

"But surely-"

"Thomas' fate is irrevocably set," he continued as though I had not spoken. "Tis best you leave well enough alone. Let the boy's blood appease my uncle. Better his life than the one Fendrel truly desires..."





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