Total pages in book: 146
Estimated words: 137226 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 686(@200wpm)___ 549(@250wpm)___ 457(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 137226 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 686(@200wpm)___ 549(@250wpm)___ 457(@300wpm)
“Is this why you called this family meeting?” I ask. “Are you legitimately worried about her?”
“Yes.” Vidar nods. “I also think we all need to have a frank discussion about what happened out there in the Banished Land.”
I take a long sip of my beer, preparing to get the third degree from my older brother. “I told you what happened. We were ambushed.”
“But by whom?” he asks.
“Again, I don’t know.”
“Well, Brynla must have some idea. Have you asked her?”
I give him a steady look. “What do you think? Of course I’ve asked her. But she’s inconsolable. She’s lost the last person close to her. Her whole family is now gone. She wasn’t even paying attention while the attack was happening, she was trying to prevent her aunt from dying.”
Although that’s not completely true. Brynla was paying attention. She helped kill two of the attackers. But she doesn’t know if they were sent by the Black Guard or House Dalgaard. It could be either. The Black Guard might have been tipped off that Brynla was stealing eggs for us, perhaps by Dalgaard themselves. Or maybe the assassins were hired by Dalgaard to take her—and me—out of the picture.
It doesn’t help that Brynla refuses to talk to me about it. My siblings think I’ve been spending a lot of time with her, but the truth is more that I’ve been trying to spend time with her. She’s giving me the cold shoulder, pissed off at me for drugging her the way I did and bringing her and Lemi back on the ship.
I don’t blame her; I know I violated her trust by doing that, but I didn’t have a choice. I wasn’t about to wait in the Dark City for the next ambush, one that we probably wouldn’t survive.
I had to make some quick decisions since I hadn’t planned on needing to drag her out unconscious. Luckily there was a cart parked a little way down the alley, filled with water.
Unluckily, the cart belonged to her neighbors, an elderly man and woman, who had gathered in their doorway having heard all the commotion with the assassins. They didn’t do or say anything when I dumped out the water, but when I reemerged from Ellestra’s house with Brynla in the cart, buried underneath a mound of blankets, they grew suspicious. Thankfully Lemi seemed to understand that I was trying to help Brynla, and he barked at the neighbors to stay back while I quickly wheeled Brynla away.
Getting out of the Dark City itself was another story. I took lower passageways back, finding my way on instinct and assuming that goods had to be constantly carted in and out of the tunnels instead of the stairs. There weren’t as many guards that way, but when I did run across them I had to dispatch them quickly or risk discovery. Thankfully, I’d had enough forethought to prepare the syringe with more drugs. It meant I didn’t have to kill more people than I already had that morning. Not that I would have hesitated.
“I assume whoever the assassins were, they knew the social system of the Dark City well enough to get through,” I tell Vidar, bringing my focus back to my brother’s intense gaze.
“Do you think they knew you were with her?” Steiner asks. “Strange coincidence for them to attack the moment you get there.”
“No question they knew Brynla was on her way back and waited for that moment.” Dalgaard has spies everywhere. “I can’t say if they were after me—perhaps they would have sent more men if they knew.”
Vidar snorts at that and I stare at him steadily until he seems to retract his derision. He clears his throat. “So then someone intercepted Moon—”
“Not possible. Moon would have told me,” Steiner says.
“Or,” Vidar continues, not wanting to get into an old debate of whether his raven really understands him or is capable of lying, “Brynla’s aunt got careless.”
I appreciate him not bringing up the accusation that Ellestra was behind all of it, which was what he’d been saying when we first arrived back.
“Careless or confided in the wrong person,” I point out.
“That’s the same thing,” Vidar says.
“So what does this mean?” Solla asks, tucking her hair behind her ears. “Are we in danger?”
“We’re always in danger,” I tell her. “It’s just that we’ve always had an enemy we knew—House Dalgaard. If they killed Ellestra, then that changes nothing for us. But it if was the Black Guard, and we’re now enemies of the state of Esland, well, that might change a few things.”
“Everyone is their enemy,” Steiner says. “They know how the syndikats deal and what they deal with. I wouldn’t worry about Esland coming to Norland and trying anything.”
“Even if they did, we would be ready. They wouldn’t get far,” Vidar says sternly.
“And Dalgaard is already our enemy anyway,” I say, finishing the rest of my beer. I set it down and stare at my siblings with as much gravity as I can convey. “What I mean is that this changes our plans a little. If we’re being looked at more closely by Esland’s Black Guard, we’ll need to make an adjustment.”