DISCOVERING HER HEART’S greatest desire was proving to be more vexatious than Rurik had thought.

The next two days passed with little sight of her. Freyja was adept at maneuvering on silent feet, and spent countless hours tending to her home, or to the flock of animals that relied upon her. Every time he found her he was either handed a broom or a shovel and told to earn his keep, or several dozen bleating sheep rousing into a sudden panic sent him fleeing before Freyja could question their terror. Rurik himself was forced to keep an eye on the skies. There’d been no sign of the other dreki in the area when he arrived, but he knew they were out there somewhere. He strengthened the wards on his lair, watched curiously as Haakon led fruitless expeditions around the volcano, then subsided at Freyja’s to wait the other dreki out.

Two could play at this game.

And he was patient, for a dreki.

Or at least, he thought he was, until he encountered the might of Freyja’s will.

It didn’t help matters her father, Einar, insisted on sitting with him for hours, inadvertently playing the part of chaperone.

“You’re distracted,” her father said one afternoon, as they sat over the small chessboard he’d dusted off and brought out. The little fox that lived with them sat on the side of the armchair, his dark amber eyes unblinking. Loki knew what he was, and when he realized Rurik watched him, he bared his teeth in a faint growl.

Fair enough. The little beast was only trying to protect his household. At least he didn’t run and bleat like Freyja’s sheep did whenever they saw him.

Rurik eyed the spread of ivory pieces. He enjoyed this game, and the old man had clever wits, despite his blindness. “I was thinking of the dragon hunters in the village. They seem to be making little progress.”

“Is that why you watch the window so often?”

Caught. “No. I’m watching for your daughter. She is doing her best to avoid me.” He didn’t ask how the man had known. Einar seemed attuned to each rustle of cloth, and all of his other senses were exceptionally good.

“Ah.” Einar coughed faintly into the stained handkerchief in his fist, then reached for his knight. His hand quivered. “You have an interest in Freyja.”

The stale scent of encroaching death emanated from the old man. Rurik stilled. “She is intriguing,” he admitted. “She is beautiful, and clever, and stubborn, and utterly relentless.”

“I need not remind you your intentions had best be pure? I might be old and blind, but I can still be a force to be reckoned with when it comes to the daughter I love.”

Rurik respected the old man’s position, though he could swat him like a fly if he wished. “You can remind me, but Freyja has already lain down her rules. You might be a force to be reckoned with, but she is a force of nature.”

The old man chuckled, a sound that slowed, then died with a faint hush. “Aye, she’s proud and wary.” He scratched at his jaw, clearly upset by some thought. “It bothers me to see her so long unmarried. My health fades with each winter. I... I worry....”

Rurik surveyed the board, then moved his bishop and told the man what he’d done. “Freyja can survive without you, I assure you of that. She is independent and strong enough to rule her own life.”

“I know,” Einar replied. “But she has always been so isolated. You’ve seen her eyes?”

“They are beautiful eyes.”

“Some claim they are sure sign of a witch.”

“It’s a small village,” Rurik replied, lacing his hands across his middle. “I expect the people here to be sheltered.”

“Unfortunately, others don’t share your lack of qualms.” Einar looked troubled. “I always sought to spare her from their censure, and so Helga and I kept her close, and rarely invited strangers to the house. Or even guests. Maybe that was a m-mistake—” He broke into another hacking fit of coughs.

Rurik fetched the old man a glass of water. “Here,” he offered, sending a thin tendril of his power through his fingertips to energize the old man.

“My thanks.” Einar slurped the water down, and settled back in his chair, but at least his skin bore some faint signs of color now.

“Has she never had a suitor before?” he asked, as he waited for the old man to recover.

“I keep pushing her toward that Benedikt boy,” Einar admitted, “but she will have none of him.”

Every hint of the predator within him arose at the name. Benedikt. He was the man who threatened Freyja. Rurik’s voice turned silky. “He is local?”

“His father owns half the village.” Einar coughed again. “He’s not the sort of lad I’d normally choose for Freyja, but....”

He was the only man who showed interest in her. If only Einar understood what sort of interest Benedikt showed....

Not for him to mention. No. Rurik had other ways of confronting his rival. Still, he couldn’t say nothing, “Sometimes it is better to live alone, than to wed someone unsuitable.”

“Unless someone else who is suitable comes along?” Einar suggested unsubtly, his hand hovering over his rook. He moved it. “I believe that is check.”

So it was. Rurik frowned. It was the first time the other man had beat him.

“Your attention has been elsewhere,” Einar mused, even as the door to the kitchen creaked faintly.

Rurik was suddenly all senses. There was a light footstep in the kitchen. Then another.

“And now you are distracted again.” Einar chuckled, clearly hearing Freyja’s entrance too. “Go,” he said, waving toward the kitchen. “You have my best wishes. I can tell she likes you.”

“I am not so certain of that. But we’ll continue our game later,” Rurik replied, pushing to his feet and moving after his fascinating adversary.

He had to move quickly. He could hear Freyja heading for the door again. The swing of her golden plait came into view, and Freyja snagged her shawl, reaching for the door handle with one guilty glance cast over her shoulder—

“Where are you going?” he demanded.

Freyja paused in the shadows of the kitchen doorway, her shawl in her hand. “For a walk.”

Lie. It ignited every single one of his senses. “May I come with you?”

“It is rather boring,” she said quickly, and he knew she was up to something. “You will not enjoy it. Muddy, smelly... I daresay it will ruin your boots.”

He was inclined to argue, but merely smiled. “Not my boots. Whatever would I do?”

Freyja shot him a narrow-eyed look, as if she couldn’t quite work out whether he was being sarcastic or not. She tucked the shawl over her honey-colored hair, then headed for the door. “I shall be back later.”

“I can hardly wait.”

That earned him one last twitch of the brow, before she vanished.

Troublesome female. If he were in his dreki form right now, his tail would be lashing. But then, if she thought to dissuade him from the chase, she thought wrong. Nothing stirred his interest more than a woman who refused to fall at his feet. And there was no reason for her to lie to him about where she was going, unless....

Rurik waited for all of two minutes, realizing Loki had followed him and watched from the corner of the cupboard, like some small chaperone.

“I am not going to hurt her, little brother,” he told the fox.

Those amber eyes narrowed.

Rurik reined in his predatory impulses, and headed out into the yard to see if his suspicions were correct.

That small light-footed figure headed out across the moors, her green shawl wrapped around her shoulders as she made her way directly toward the smoking volcano in the distance.

Easy enough to guess where she was going. What he didn’t know was why, or what she was up to.

His blood was up. Perhaps she was wary of Rurik the man, but she seemed to have reached a truce in her mind with the dreki.

It seemed she would be meeting him sooner, rather than later.

Rurik paced along the stone fence that housed her sheep. They bleated and scurried out of his path, pressing in a frightened huddle against the far wall. Freyja might not recognize him in this form, but all of her animals did.

He sighed. “I’m not going to eat any of you,” he pointed out. “She’s barely forgiven me for the ram.”

He’d never live it down if he sampled another of her delicious morsels.

His stomach chose that moment to growl. The bleating grew louder. Rurik bared his teeth at them, and then stomped around the corner of the stables. Idiot sheep. And frustrating shepherdess.

He’d given her more than enough time for a decent head start.

And the dreki itched within him, wanting to taste the wind on its face.

Plus there were his boots to think of....

* * *

Rurik glided across the skies, his shadow rippling over the tiny figure far below that trudged determinedly across the glacial moors. He felt utterly relaxed in his natural form, as though he’d been contained in a form far too small for him for too long.

Wind whipped beneath his wings and he soared on the thermals, delighting in the warmth of the sunlight on his scales.

Not a sign of another dreki anywhere. He’d made careful forays over the past few nights, but there’d been no hint of them. Which suggested they’d taken to ground....

Where though? What was their game?

And who had his mother sent to challenge him?

Silver scales. That bothered him, because while the color was popular among his clan, there was one particular dreki who gleamed silver, and his mother knew Andri would be a weakness of his. A part of him hoped she hadn’t sent his younger cousin on this mission, even as he knew better. Of course Amadea would exploit any weakness.

As for the bigger dreki, he hadn’t gotten a good look, but thought he’d caught a glimpse of a dark shape. Darker dreki were more common than the lighter or jewel-tinted shades, and the bigger dreki could have been any one of his uncle’s warriors.

He couldn’t scent them around his territory. No, they’d glided on elsewhere, though he knew the foray into his domain could not been accidental. Every dreki male at court knew the territory lines. When a simple incursion might mean war and a battle to the death, it wasn’t the sort of thing dreki were careless with. Which meant they’d been looking for something—some mischief—and it bothered him he could not figure it out.

Circling Krafla, Rurik caught sight of the determined figure crossing the moors far below. This was a terrible time to be seducing an obstinate woman, but he couldn’t deny that he was enjoying the pursuit more than he’d imagined. Rurik banked with care, and alighted on the ledge outside the entrance to his cave.

Just what, precisely, did Freyja value most? Freedom? Gold? A crown, perhaps? A rich manor where she did not have to work all day merely to put food on the table? No. He didn’t think so. She seemed to enjoy the work, speaking with fondness to the creatures that inhabited her small farmstead. It was only when he was around that her tone became more careful.

Rurik tapped his claws on the stone, one after the other, as he sunned himself. Her challenge presented an intriguing mystery.

“You are early.” He sent the thought to her just as she locked eyes with him. “You are not due for another three weeks.”

Freyja hauled herself up the last stone climb, her dark blonde hair glowing like spun gold in the sunlight. “I know.”

“Why are you here then?” He stretched, and decided to tease her a little. “Have you bought me dinner?”

A scowl met the words. “You’re big enough and scary enough to fetch your own dinner.”

“Yes. But they frown upon that here. Something about rams and ownership, and tithes and not taking what is due to a creature of my magnificence....”

Definitely a scowl. “You think you are amusing.”

“I think you are up to something. Why else would you be here, hmm?”

Freyja looked away, the wind snagging strands of her blonde hair and tugging it free from her tight braid. He’d love to see all of that hair unbound. It was her true wealth. She stared over the valley below them, and he realized she was focusing on her village.

“I came to warn you,” she said at last. “Some of the villagers have pooled their money and hired a dragon hunter to rid themselves of you. Others don’t wish such a thing.”

He rested his chin on his claws, watching her sleepily. “I know.”

Those mismatched eyes widened. “What? How?”

“I am not stupid, little mouse.” Rurik snorted. “What sort of dreki would I be, if I let your puny villagers thwart me?”

Freyja’s lips thinned. “They will not seem so puny and insignificant when they bring that ballista up here and spear you with it.”

“I should like to see them haul their machines up through the boggy moors and along the cliff path. It should prove amusing. I might even drop a rock on it. Or perhaps I will merely pinwheel through the sky above them? I’ve seen the aim on that thing. The dragons they’ve hunted must stand very still for them.” Rurik spread his wings with a flap, enjoying the warmth on them. Freyja gasped and staggered, her back plastered to the sheer cliff face. He paused, realizing he’d startled her, and slowly curled his wings up against his sides. “You won’t fall.”

Freyja eyed the drop carefully. “You’re not the one who was nearly blown off this ledge.”

“And if you did lose your footing, I would catch you,” he continued. “I am not done with you yet.”

This statement earned him a narrow glare. “Saying such things does not ease my nerves one whit. What do you intend to do with me?”

“I intend to hear your words,” he replied. “I am interested in conversation. One rarely finds humans brave enough to come into my den, especially those who have no designs for my gold.”

“A dreki who wants only to talk?” she countered. “I’ve never heard of such a thing.”

“Surely you have heard the old tales?”

A snort. “Yes, I’ve heard the old tales. All of them. Including the ones where a capricious traveler ended up in a dreki’s belly.”

“I have no intentions of causing you harm,” he replied. “Dreki’s oath on that. I am merely curious about you. Most of your neighbors are fools. How did such a curious female come about, when most of the village flees at the sight of my shadow?”

Freyja eyed him. There was wariness there still, but also a certain sort of interest. As if, so starved for company and derided by humans, she could overlook the fact he was dreki.

“Stay,” he cajoled. “Talk with me.”

“Talk of what?” Freyja demanded, but the light in her eyes was back, her fear fading. Indeed, her tone had changed and she sounded more certain of herself when he was in this form.

Because you’re no longer a threat to her as a dreki. Only as a man.

Which meant someone else had been that threat.

The thought made all sorts of possessive, violent male impulses whirl within him. Rurik contained it. He already knew he felt protective toward her, but the idea someone else had hurt her stirred the heart of the dreki spirit within him.

“Yourself. Tell me why Freyja Helgasdottir is no fool.”

Freyja gathered her skirts primly, and settled on a jutting rock. The look she gave him was faintly cunning. “And what will you give me if I do?”

Oho. Delight ran rampant through his veins. “For all your talk, you have heard stories of dreki.”

“Bargain with them at your own risk,” Freyja replied. “Keep your wits at all moments. And never, ever offer a truth for free, for they are curious creatures and cannot deny their interest. Next to their mortal form, their curiosity is their second major weakness. My mother told me many stories.”

All of it was true. “Did she also tell you a dreki’s second greatest strength is their patience?”

“No.” Freyja looked interested. “What is their greatest strength?”

“Now that is a secret.”

“And if I’m counting correctly, you owe me one.” Was that a smile that played around her stubborn lips?

“Perhaps. What do you want in exchange for your story? More gold?” He didn’t know how he felt about that. His gold was his gold. But would it be worth it, to learn the heart of Freyja?

Yes. And not simply because he was failing in his efforts of seduction.

He wanted to know her. She would be his lover—that was a foregone conclusion in his mind—but the fascination for him extended beyond the physical.

“A truth for a truth,” she told him.

Which was potentially dangerous. His eyes narrowed. Denial here could cost him any chance at bridging the chasm she’d set between them. “A truth for a truth. So be it.”

Freyja held up a finger. “And not a random truth, but you must answer a question I propose.”

“What if I do not care to answer it?”

“Then I may feel free to ask another question,” she countered. “Out of three questions, you must answer one.”

Trouble. But damned if he did not wish to play this game with her. His dreki nature loved the challenge. “Agreed. Now answer my question. Why is Freyja not afraid of me? Why did she dare confront me in my lair, when others would quail?”

“You can see my eyes, no?”

“Such wondrous eyes.”

Her smile stilled, but didn’t entirely die as she gazed at her lap. “They call me elf-cursed,” she admitted slowly, as if the weight of this secret weighed upon her somehow. “Or think I make deals with the devil. When I was a little girl, a priest came to our village, where my father was selling geese in the marketplace. I was playing and happened to look up, and the priest reared away from me and made a sign of the cross. He was horrified, and it scared me. It was the first time I ever realized I was different.

“I don’t fit in to my world, not very well. So perhaps that is the reason I am not scared of you, nor believe in provoking you. Because you are different and so am I, and maybe I understand what that feels like.”

“You make no mention of magic.”

Another of those slow, careful glances she was known for. “Is that another question?”

“Perhaps it is merely a challenge. For you gave half an answer. You know you have power, and that made you fearless when you came to confront me.”

“I was scared,” she admitted.

“But?”

“Mostly I was angry. And hopeless.” She threw the smooth rock she’d been toying with. “There is a point one sometimes reaches that is beyond endurance, and I reached it the night you stole my ram. You are big and scary, and could have killed me. But a part of me simply didn’t care.”

He fell into those eyes. Freyja had such depths to her he wondered if he’d ever see the entirety of them. “Now that tastes more like truth. A full truth.”

Freyja sucked in a sharp breath, as if uncomfortable. “Which means it is time for my question.”

“Proceed.”

She frowned. “I intend to, but first I have to think of... the question that makes me most curious. I don’t want to waste my chance.”

Rurik laughed, a rumbling purr deep in his throat. “So very female. Rest assured I have more questions for you. This doesn’t end with one.”

“Oh.” That little knot between her brows furrowed and she dragged her knees up to her chest, her skirts falling around her ankles. “Can you change shape?”

The one question he’d been dreading. “What is wrong with this shape?”

“Nothing.”

“Yes,” he conceded, scratching his head against a rock. “I can change forms. It is part of the goddess’s gift to us. But why would I? Humans are fools. They smell. And most of them are like brainless sheep. Then there are men here who wish to kill me, and I am slightly more vulnerable in human form—”

“More vulnerable?” she broke in. “I thought it was one of a dreki’s greatest weaknesses—the only time you can be easily killed.”

“Easily is a matter of opinion,” he growled. “I am powerful beyond your comprehension, and my magic is available no matter what form I wear.”

“How often have you changed forms?”

He dipped a wing—the human equivalent of a shrug. “That is like asking me, how many times have I eaten? I do not count such things. Often enough when I was younger, because I was curious, but not very often since. There is little reason to do so.”

“Have you ever seduced a human woman?”

“No.” Not yet, anyway. “And,” he forestalled her, “you now owe me three answers, for you asked four questions and I answered all of them.”

Freyja frowned. “You answered with some questions.”

“But they were rhetorical, were they not?”

If he could smile, he would have, for she looked utterly captivating with frustration written all across her face. “I do not think that is entirely fair, but I’ll allow it.”

“How kind of you.” Turnabout was fair play. His eyes narrowed. “What type of creature are you? For it is clear you are not human.”

“Of course I am human,” she shot back, opening her arms wide. “Do I not look human?”

“You look human,” he admitted. “You smell human, though you smell better than most of them. But you are not human. They have no powers, nor magic, unless it is god-given, and you do not bear the stamp of any gods.”

“You can sense that?”

“I once met a man in Norway,” he admitted. “He used to chew berries and send himself into a trance, where he could communicate with his god. The strain showed on his aura, and I was... wary of crossing him. He smelled wrong.”

“That is a very old practice.”

“It is. But then, I encountered it when I was in my youth.”

“How old are you?”

“Hundreds of years,” he replied, with a faint shrug of his wing. “Dreki think in terms of cycles, not years, so I am not entirely certain. I am in my tenth cycle, however. How old are you?”

“Four-and-twenty.”

“Where does your power come from?”

She paused.

“Did you think I had forgotten?”

“No.” Freyja’s lips twisted. “It’s just... I don’t know where it comes from.”

Lie. It seared along his magic nerves, making him hiss.

“That’s not the truth—”

But Freyja wasn’t looking at him. Her gaze settled on a point behind him, her lips parting with a faint O.

Rurik craned his neck. And there, pinwheeling above the glaciers to the south, was the smaller silver dragon he’d sighted that night in Akureyri.

On the edges of his territory, practically daring him to retaliate.

“Go home,” he growled to her, his claws digging into the rocks as he drew himself to his full height.

“Wait!” Freyja called.

But Rurik wasn’t listening. Instead, he danced along the edge of the path, careful of her frail mortal body, and launched himself into the air with a powerful thrust of his wings.

“Go home, little mouse, while I take care of this visitor.”

“Be careful!” she called.

“Always,” he sent back. “After all, you still owe me the answer to that question.”

* * *

It had to be a trap.

He knew this, and yet he went anyway, because to ignore intruders in his territory went against dreki nature. His. This land was his. Bought and bargained for with blood and death, and he could no sooner allow this transgression than he could roll over and submit.

Screeching a battle cry, Rurik roared through the skies. The power of the land shivered through him, until it felt like he’d captured the power of a storm, bottled lightning in his belly.

Ahead of him, the silver dreki spun, his wings stiff as he banked. There was the flash of a paler belly, and claw marks across the dreki’s cheek, and then he withdrew in a dive that sent him fleeing.

“Andri.” The unexpected sight made Rurik’s wings skip a beat.

All of his earlier suspicions bore fruit. Of course his mother and uncle would send the kit he’d once considered a younger brother.

Rurik beat his wings as he dove after his younger cousin. Andri had been on the verge of adulthood, almost two cycles old, when Rurik left in exile. Now he was a dreki grown, though not quite as large as he himself was. A young warrior who would bear the mark of his father’s temper on his face forever.

“Go home,” he told his smaller cousin. “And I shall forget this trespass.”

Andri hissed at him as Rurik fell in beside him. The smaller dreki was fast, but Rurik’s strength and skill meant Andri would never lose him. “My father sends his regards.”

“His regards? Or his son as a sacrifice?” Rurik spiraled in a slow circle around the other dreki. Together they began a dangerous dance. Airborne battles were brutal, and a fall could shatter wings and bones, but he’d been primed for this fight since the day he was born. “Is Stellan so careless with his sons he would send one into a fight that is not his own?”

Andri refused to comment. And Rurik began to grow suspicious. Was Andri here on his father’s terms—or did some part of the youth want to reach out to one he’d once trusted?

“I won’t kill you,” Rurik told his former squire, making a decision. “Unlike others, I made an oath to protect you and I intend to keep it. You shouldn’t be here. This is not your fight.”

“I have a duty to fulfill,” his cousin replied.

“If you come against me and I am forced to protect myself, I’ll knock you from the skies, but I won’t kill you,” Rurik warned.

Andri soared high over Krafla. “You’re a fool then. You’re my clan’s enemy.”

“You’re my cousin,” he shot back, “And you were always mine, more than you were ever Stellan’s. You’re the one good thing he ever created, and you have more honor in you than any of your nestlings.”

Andri broke the thought-thread between them, veering away. Rurik ignored his distress and went after him. There were only two reasons Andri could have sought him out today. Either the youth meant to lure him into a trap, or his guilt had driven him to make contact.

“And where’s the other dreki?” Rurik caught up to his squire swiftly. “Who did your father send? Vargur? Grimold? Magnus? T—”

A shock of connection betrayed Andri’s thoughts, and made Rurik’s heart thud in his chest. “Magnus,” he repeated. “Of course he sent his heir.”

He and Magnus were of an age. Kits raised together, but never friends. Never allies.

Magnus was everything Stellan hoped to produce. A dreki with a heart as black as his hide. When Stellan and Amadea married into Iceland’s Zini clan, they’d brought all of their Norwegian clan’s prejudices with them. The intermarriage was meant to be a treaty between the Zini and Zilittu clans to broker peace, but all of Stellan’s sons—bar Andri—thought of themselves more as Zilittu than Zini. And with Amadea sitting on the throne her husband, Reynar, once owned, it seemed the treaty had been more of a long-seeded plot than an honest reconciliation.

As Amadea and Reynar’s eldest son, Rurik was the only dreki who could thwart their ambitions to rule both clans. His brother, Marduk, was too young to be a threat, and though Marduk was considered an adult, he wouldn't have the strength to combat Magnus. Would he?

“Tell your brother I accept his challenge,” Rurik said slowly, thinking of his brother. Magnus would want his path to the throne to be unhindered, regardless of whether or not Marduk could ever actually beat him. Then there was Andri...“We can settle this between us. You don’t have to be involved.”

“He’s not offering challenge.”

Of course not. Magnus would consider himself the strongest male now, and hence the rightful heir, which meant Rurik was the one who had to offer. And he would let his cold dead body sink into the seas before he ever condescended to those who’d plotted against his father, then blamed Rurik for the king’s death.

“Even if you offered, he would not accept it,” Andri said quickly.

So this was not to be an honorable duel. “Why are you here then? Does your brother know where you are?”

“I wanted to warn you,” Andri said, after a long hesitation. “And no, he doesn’t.”

There was the hint of his old squire: Andri, whose sense of honor would forbid an ambush.

“I knew you were here,” he replied. “But thank you. I had hoped they hadn’t corrupted you completely.”

The skies gleamed blue around them as Andri broke the mental connection between them. Even so, Rurik caught the faint mournful taint of the younger dreki’s emotions. This could not be easy for the youth. He’d followed Rurik around the court as a kit, like an enamored lass. The day Rurik took Andri as his squire had been the most joyful either of them shared.

The day his young squire lied and said he’d seen his prince in the king’s quarters the night the king was murdered, had been the worst.

“I don’t hold you responsible for my exile,” Rurik sent, in a thought-thread. He could almost feel Andri’s guilt through the thread. “You were never the sort to fall in line with your father’s plots, nor were you ever interested in his bribes. I know he must have threatened you with something in order for you to betray my trust.” Andri tried to shy away, but Rurik wouldn’t let him break the thread. “I forgive you,” he told the youth. “But you should have come to me the moment Stellan made his threat. I would have protected you.”

“You couldn’t have,” Andri whispered.

“I would have tried.”

“I know.”

The smaller dreki broke away, and this time Rurik let him go, hoping the words had been enough to sway Andri from this fight.

Because if Magnus was involved, then this only ended one way... with someone dying.