It began to get steadily darker as we made our way through the forest, towards the mountains looming in the distance. We kept to the trees, even though Eli kept looking longingly towards the road that wound through the smaller hills, and every time a car would come by, and the headlights would flicker through the trees, he would sigh heavily.
“We can’t get a ride, do you know how strange that would look?” I glanced down at myself again. A tall, blonde woman in a slinky gown and a dirty, half-mad looking human with a bag of seaweed would certainly raise questions. And when we asked them to drop us off in the middle of the rocky mountains, in front of an invisible house, they would certainly wonder what was going on.
No, we had to walk, and stay away from the road. There was no other option.
“I know,” Eli said, and I could hear him chewing on a piece of seaweed. “These are surprisingly not disgusting,” he said a moment later, and I bit back a smile.
We were both already so tired, half dead from being dragged around the ocean and chased through the forest, so it took longer than I would have liked to find the safehouse. It was nearly pitch black, and the only thing that kept us from becoming permanently lost in the dark woods, was the light that suddenly flickered, barely visible through the thick trees.
“There,” I said, and let out a sigh of relief. “There it is.”
Eli sighed too, trudging behind me, his steps clumsy and loud in the silence. “Thank god.” He looked surprised when I rounded on him.
“Listen to me carefully. We’re about to enter a safehouse. These Jotun are not servants like me, they’re warriors. They’re bigger and meaner, and their job is to keep people out and report suspicious activity. They’re looking for a fight. Understand?”
Eli blinked at me. “But you’ll tell them what happened and it will be okay, right? I mean, they’re going to want to help you.”
I was thankful that the darkness hid my face from him, because my cheeks began to grow hot. The truth was that not one guard had ever looked my way twice. I was smaller than them, weaker than them. They were a class above the servants. So there was no guarantee they would listen to me, or even let me in. I had no guarantee they wouldn’t throw me out of the safehouse and laugh. The king and queen didn’t hold for that sort of thing, they treated everyone the same, which is why we loved them. But Queen Megan couldn’t be around all the time. She couldn’t manage each individual guard to make sure none of them were ever mean to servant girls.
“We’ll see,” was all I said to Eli.
I made sure we approached the safehouse openly. The last thing I wanted to do was to look like we were sneaking up to it. There would be guards outside the doors, and they had sharp ears. We stepped through the trees, and the house finally came into full view. It was a tall, skinny mansion, something that looked like it was right out of the spooky stories my mother used to read me as a child. The windows were mostly shuttered up, and the paint was peeling, but there was a single flickering lantern hanging from the front porch, to guide you through the woods if you were lost, and you were sharp-eyed enough to catch the glimmer through the trees.
Sure enough, there were two guards on the porch, one on either side of the door. They were easily three or four feet taller than I was, and each one was incredibly beefy looking, the one on the left especially, looked like he might crush me as soon as look at me, and I bit the insides of my cheeks so hard I tasted copper.
Suddenly this didn’t seem like such a good idea. Perhaps we should go straight to the palace and not have to rely on the kindness of royal guards I didn’t even know. But one look at Eli was enough to convince me it would be worth it. He looked like he was about to sag to the ground and sleep for days. He was probably starving too, since I was pretty sure he hadn’t touched much of the seaweed.
“Stay behind me,” I said firmly. “Let me do the talking.”
Eli nodded, his eyes fastened on the guard on the left. He didn’t look like he was going to argue.
I paced forward carefully, raising my voice over the faint sound of the wind. “Hello? We come in peace, I have a message for the queen.”
Both guards snapped to attention, eyes scanning the forest, coming to rest on me as I moved out of the trees. I made sure to keep both hands within view, and to walk slowly and carefully. They had to see that I wasn’t carrying a weapon.
Both guards stared with wide eyes, and the smaller of the two began blinking, as if he were trying to clear his vision. I resisted the urge to look down at myself. I’d forgotten how strange I must look, emerging from the woods in a gown that rippled like water, even though my hair was tangled and messy and my face was probably pale and smudged with dirt, the dress was perfect, shimmering and beautiful. Like I was heading for some kind of ball.
I must look ridiculous to them.
Behind me I could hear the snapping and cracking sound of twigs, and the dull shuffle of Eli’s feet on the forest floor. He wasn’t exactly subtle, so the guards would know I had someone with me right away.
“State your name and rank,” the smaller guard snapped, and his hand drifted to his belt, to the hilt of his sword.
“My name is Valka. I have no rank.” I came a few feet further before he raised his hands, and then stopped, heart beating hard in my chest. “I was a servant at the palace.”
The bigger guard, the one who I’d thought looked especially frightening, blinked at me, his eyes round. “Valka,” he said suddenly. “The servant girl who went missing weeks ago?”
Relief rushed through me, making my shoulders slump. He’d recognized my name. And more than that, they’d missed me. It wasn’t just my mother who was concerned about Kalda and I going missing. Hope surged in my chest.
“The guards know about it? Were they looking for us?”
The big guard’s face began to flush slightly. “Er…not exactly. I’m seeing one of the girls in the servant’s quarters, they’re pretty torn up about it.”
Disappointment choked me. For a moment I’d dared to hope that someone other than the servants had noticed us missing, but clearly I’d been wrong. The council had probably dismissed it as an accident or something, and hadn’t even told the king and queen about it.
So I had a lot of explaining to do.
“I have been missing, for weeks now,” I said, and I couldn’t keep the hint of anger out of my voice. “And Kalda…Kalda is dead.” My voice cracked, and I heard Eli shift behind me.
The big guard’s blonde brows creased. “What news do you bring? What happened?”
“That’s what I have to tell you. I have an urgent message for the king and queen. Jotunheimer is in trouble, humans have found a way to get in, and they’re taking Jotun. They’re experimenting on us.”
The smaller guard answered before his comrade could. “Please, what a ridiculous story. More like a servant girl looking for attention.”
Disbelief and anger clashed together, and I had to stand very still to keep myself from launching at him. It would be foolish to make him angry. “Look, you have to believe me. Where do you think I’ve been for the past few weeks? And why would I come all the way here, to the safe house, just to lie to you two? Why wouldn’t I go straight to the palace and try to see Queen Megan?”
“She has a point,” the bigger guard said, and he darted a sideways look at his friend. “We should let her in.”
“Don’t be stupid, Bifky.” The smaller guard folded his arms over his chest, and his narrow, cruel face reflected his sense of humour. He was enjoying this. My pulse picked up, anger making my face feel hot. This was the same type of guard who’d made fun of Kalda and I. The same type of guard that had enjoyed taunting us when we’d walked past them. Someone who shouldn’t be a guard at all.
“What’s your name?” I said sharply, and the smaller guard glanced up at me, startled. Then his lips curved in a sneer.
“Bolthur. And what are you going to do about it, servant?”
‘Nothing, Bolthur, but let me tell you something. My friend is dead and there are humans getting into my kingdom, and they’re probably on their way now, maybe even sending an army with guns and tanks after us, who knows. I’ve been to hell and back, I’ve betrayed one of my friends, I’ve run away like a scared rabbit and fought off things under the sea that I’d only heard about in the darkest bedtime stories, all in order to get here, and I’ll be damned if I’m going to let some uppity safehouse guard get in my way.”
Bolthur’s face went red, and he reached for his sword. Eli moved behind me, grabbing my arms, obviously ready to throw me out of the way if the guard came charging down the steps. But Bolthur didn’t get a chance to draw his sword. His fellow guard, Bifky, reached out one massive hand and grabbed his wrist. Bolthur jerked his hand up, trying to break his grip and pull the sword out, but Bifky shook his head.
“Stop that, you’re being stupid.” He looked down at me, and I was surprised to see him smiling. “Don’t mind my friend here, he’s…passionate.”
That was a nice way to put it, since I was pretty sure that the accurate way to describe Bolthur was “asshole” but since Bifky seemed to be on our side, I just nodded and returned the smile. If it got us a warm place to stay overnight, and clothing and food, I’d nod and smile and push the anger down.
Eli released his grip on my arm with a sigh of relief.
Bolthur was swearing at his friend now, but Bifky simply picked him up and moved his sideways, out of the way of the door. “Go on in,” he told me. “Just wipe your feet on the mat.”
I looked over my shoulder, exchanging a disbelieving look with Eli, before we both walked up the stairs and onto the porch. I thanked Bifky as we went by, but made sure to stay well out of range of Bolthur, who had been released, and was now standing at the edge of the porch glaring at me.