Dawn tipped the horizon.

Haakon leaned on the rail of the ship, watching the harbor. The wind had picked up since yesterday, and the ship rocked slowly beneath his feet.

"Well?" Gunnar asked.

Haakon breathed out a sigh. The skies were clear. Not a sign of her on the horizon.

There wouldn't be, you fool. She might not have managed to get the manacle off.

His heart skipped a beat. No. He'd made enough excuses. She'd promised him she'd find a way to free herself. She'd told him to go. Shutting down everything he felt, he straightened and tipped his head toward Gunnar. "The lady has made her decision. Push off."

Time to go home.

Men bellowed as they hauled in the ropes. A curse caught his ear. Sails unfurled with a sharp flap, and then began to bloom. The ship rocked.

Home.

He longed to see his mother again. It had been over a year since he'd docked near Viksholm. His nieces and nephews would be growing. It would be good to see them again.

And then what?

Haakon shied away from the question as he curled a coil of rope into a circle around his elbow and palm. He caught Tormund looking at him, and turned away, handing the rope over to Finn.

"Pay up." Perhaps it was the wind that sent Gunnar's words whispering across the deck into his ears.

"We've not left harbor yet," Tormund replied.

Hope, you cruel, capricious bitch. Haakon locked everything down inside him. He didn't dare set his eyes on the harbor as the ship began to move. He couldn't. Instead, he threw himself into labor, helping to set the sails.

"Ho!" A bellow went up. "Haakon!"

Tormund.

His head snapped around, and he saw his enormous cousin pointing toward the docks. Haakon's stomach dropped through his feet.

"She's there!"

He strode to the railing, leaning out over it.

A figure ran along the docks, coming to a halt at the end of it as she stared across the water at him. Her cloak flapped in the breeze, her braid gleaming. But it was unmistakably her, and she looked like she was panting.

She came back.

He felt breathless with the shock of it.

"Impeccable timing," Gunnar muttered, looking like he'd seen Ragnarök on the horizon.

Haakon didn't care. He strode along the side of the ship, running his palm along the rail. Árdís kept pace with him, and he saw her lips move, though the words were torn from him in the wind.

She came back.

He could barely breathe.

"Well, what are you waiting for?" Tormund demanded, slapping him on the shoulder. He turned his head and bellowed, "Turn the bloody ship around."

* * *

Haakon scraped a hand through his hair as he strode down the gangplank. He was leaving. Today. Without her. And then she simply swept back into his life, as if she hadn't finished toying with him. "What the hell are you doing here?" he demanded.

She hadn't run into his arms.

He hadn't dared hope.

But it filled him now, a whisper of everything he'd ever dreamed of.

Árdís opened her mouth, as if to say something, and then shook her head. "You said you would stay for three days."

The words took him by surprise. He felt breathless, slightly buoyant. "You came back?"

Instantly she seemed to realize where his thoughts had turned. A flicker of guilt swept over her face. "No. I'm sorry. I need help."

His heart fell.

Of course. The faint swell of hope broke like a tide within him, scraping the shoals of his heart raw. She threw him the merest scrap and a part of him leapt upon it like a starving beggar.

Well, he would not be that man anymore.

"Help?" His gaze raked her from head to toe, noting the mud on her cloak and the bedraggled hem of her skirts. "I'm done playing your games, Árdís. I want to go home."

"I'm not here to play games."

"No?" The very thought of being her puppet infuriated him, and he forced himself to harden his heart, despite the plea in her voice. Turning, he lifted one arm, gesturing toward the ship, and the rail full of interested sailors. "Then what do you want? Somehow I doubt it's to give my ring back."

"Will you just listen to me?" she demanded.

"You have five minutes. Convince me why I should help you."

"Because you're the bloody reason I'm in so much trouble!" she snarled.

He blinked.

"Remember this?" She shook the bracelet at him. "I cannot fly. I cannot shift shape, and I cannot touch my magic."

"You said you'd remove it somehow."

"Well, I cannot."

A knot formed somewhere in his gut. "I never meant to trap you like this."

"And yet, you did."

"So you want me to remove it?"

"Yes!"

And then she'd be free to soar out of his life forever.

Haakon captured her hand, trying to ignore the sensation of her smooth skin in his. He looked down, into her heart-shaped face. It didn't matter how angry he was with her, in that moment, all he could see was what they'd had together. Tormund was right. He would love her forever. There would be no other woman for him.

But he could not force her to stay.

Swallowing hard, he never took his eyes from hers as he murmured the words of release, "Er þér sjálfrátt fararleyfi...."

Light sparked against his fingers. His heart twisted in his chest. Árdís licked her lips, as if to say something, but then heat flared and both of them jerked their hands apart as the links of the bracelet began to stretch, and then snapped back together and fused as tightly as ever before.

It hadn't worked.

Árdís tried to pull at it. "Why is it not working?"

Haakon stared. It had almost broken apart, but something stopped the spell from releasing her at the end. "They were the exact words he told me to speak."

"And you didn't think perhaps he was lying? You didn't think he might find it amusing to trap a dreki princess into her mortal form?"

"I wasn't... I wasn't in the best frame of mind at the time."

She looked up.

"It was barely a week after I'd discovered the truth. I was angry"—furious—"and I wanted to get the truth from you." He closed his eyes for a moment, hating the depths to which he'd stooped because of her. "I'm sorry. I truly am."

Árdís pressed a hand to her forehead, and turned to stare sightlessly at the docks. Haakon reached for her.

And then stopped.

A man hobbled his way toward them, leaning heavily on his crutch. Árdís's stare locked upon him, and her resolve seemed to firm. "I need to know where to find the sorcerer who gave this to you is. Perhaps I can get him to remove it."

That would take her days. "Can you not ask one of your dreki friends to take you there?" He looked to the north. "There's bad weather on its way."

"I know. And no." She drew her cloak tightly around her, as if she felt the chill coming. "I cannot ask another dreki for help."

"Why?" The tone of her voice gave her away.

Árdís glanced up from beneath her lashes, and he saw there the ghost of the woman he'd once known. The one who looked to him for reassurance once upon a time. "Because I'm fleeing the court."

A gull screamed as they stared at each other.

"Fleeing the court," he repeated softly.

Despite his anger, he couldn't help starting to think now. Three dreki had been "sent" to find her the other day. And none of Árdís's actions had been that of a woman who wanted to return with them.

"Are you in trouble? Nobody's going to hurt you, are they?" His voice thickened.

"No, they won't hurt me." She tucked a loose strand of hair behind her ear. "I'm a princess, and the last of my mother's direct descendants." Bitterness soured her voice. "If they hurt me, then they cannot get what they want from me."

"Which is?"

"My mother wants me to mate with Sirius, one of the males at court. The mating ceremony is set for tonight."

The years fell away, a stew of jealousy simmering within him. He had no right. "He's the one who came for you the other day."

"Yes."

"And you don't wish to mate with him?" After all, she'd told him to find another woman. What did he expect? That she would never replace him?

"No, I don't! This is my mother's doing. I just.... All of my life I've obeyed her rules. I won't do it, not this time."

Running away. Again. The same as she'd done when she swept into his life and tore it apart.

"Where are you heading then?"

She looked out across the harbor, tendrils of blonde hair brushing across her pale forehead. "I have only one place to go, where my mother and her court won't come for me. They won't risk facing Rurik, and he would take me in. I know it. I could be free to make my own choices in life."

The implications made his mouth tighten. "His lair is days away from here."

"I know."

"You cannot fly."

"I know." She looked up then. "I'd hoped...."

"That I would remove the manacle. And then you'd be on your way." Curse her. Curse her for giving him a moment of hope, and then dashing it across the cobbles.

Turning to stare out toward the sea, he raked a hand through his hair. The knot in his gut was back. He'd been torturing himself for far too long. He wanted to go home. He wanted to see his family again, and hold his nieces and nephews in his arms. To taste his mother's cooking, and sweep out the dust in his home—the one that held such memories for him.

Or perhaps burn it.

But he was the one who'd put that fucking manacle upon her. She could have been by her brother's side by now. Safe. Free to chase whatever sort of life she sought.

One without him in it.

Árdís cleared her throat. "I was actually hoping... for a little more help than that."

He looked at her incredulously.

"You want me to take you there?"

"Just as far as the svartálfar. It would be a few days’ journey. That's all. I know it's out of your way, but I don't have a great many options at this point in time. If I could fly...."

But she couldn't.

Because of him.

He'd made so many mistakes in the past year, consumed by his quest for revenge upon the dragon he'd thought had stolen her. He was still making those mistakes, driven by hurt and pain. The gaping hollowness within him yawned.

"I know I ask for too much," she whispered. "But you don't understand. This is not just me asking for help." Árdís glanced toward the stranger who'd almost made it to their side. "Marek is one of the court. They sentenced him to death. If you won't help me, then perhaps.... Would you consider helping him?"

The stranger looked like he'd been beaten within an inch of his life, and a bandage covered most of his forehead. Haakon recognized fever when he saw it in a man's eyes, but he also saw the sort of look a man gave when he worshipped a woman.

One of the court? Was that all he was to Árdís?

Every muscle in his body locked tight. She couldn't be asking this of him. Could she?

"Who is he?"

"A servant," she replied, without a hint of anything more in her voice. "He is loyal to my brother and will pay the price for it, if I do not help him escape."

Relief. Sweet relief. For whatever this Marek felt for her, it was clearly unreturned. But how easily had jealousy stirred?

"This will only end in tragedy," he said, half to himself. A reminder, to steel his nerves.

"It doesn't have to," Árdís murmured.

He'd be better off cutting her from his life.

He'd gotten what he wanted; not answers, not truly, but a chance to stare into her deceitful eyes and tell her how he felt.

It wasn't anywhere near enough to slake his pain.

But....

"You still want me."

For a second he'd believed, truly believed, there was something left between them. And maybe that was another question he needed to answer, before he could bury her in his heart.

Perhaps Tormund had the right of it when he'd suggested Haakon had asked the wrong questions.

She'd married him because she hadn't truly understood what he'd meant when he asked for her hand, but why had she left him?

"We'll destroy each other," he said, though it was more a recitation of facts. "And I don't know how much of myself I have left."

He hadn't realized, until her face fell, how much hope there'd been in her expression. "I see."

No, you don't, he wanted to scream.

He'd dragged himself out of the depths of a never-ending tankard of ale. He'd burned for one purpose only in the last seven years: to find his wife and rescue her. To save her. To hold her in his arms one more time.

The truth of her deception had shattered him like a cheap vase, and he felt as though he might have glued the pieces together again, but the fracture lines still showed. All it would take would be one more blow and he'd fragment into a million pieces.

And this time, there would be no more putting himself back together.

"If you won't help me," she said, as she turned away. "Then I shall find someone who will."

Like hell. His hand locked around her wrist, and he belatedly realized he'd taken three sharp steps. "Who?"

Árdís froze and looked back. But the spark of defiance in her eyes told him she knew exactly how to play him. "It's none of your business. Sail home, Haakon. Live a wonderful life. I'm no longer your concern."

Heartless dreki princess. But the muscles in his gut clenched as a shiver of need trembled through her eyes, and she looked away. He was afraid some part of him would always twist in knots when he saw her, as if his very soul yearned to let her wrap him around her little finger once again. His only consolation was the fact it seemed he wasn't the only one so tempted.

Haakon looked down, his thumb stroking the smooth skin of her inner wrist, and brushing against the cursed manacle. He couldn't, with any good intentions, allow her to remain shackled like this. No matter how much he didn't dare trust her.

"I will help you," he said, his gaze flickering to the stranger. "And your friend."

"And what will it cost me?"

"I owe you a debt for binding your magic like this. It wasn't my intent, but my honor"—or what remains of it—"insists I stay at your side until I can help you remove the manacle. I will help you, Árdís." His resolve began to form. "I will escort you to the sorcerer, where we can remove that shackle. Then you'll be free to fly to your brother's side. I owe you nothing else. And then it ends, you and I."

"Ends?"

"Yes. Ends. In exchange I want only one thing."

Árdís's breath caught again. "What?"

"My grandmother's ring," he told her.

Instantly her hand went to the valley between her breasts, where his ring no doubt hung. This time she looked troubled, and all for a fucking ring. "It's mine."

Haakon reached out, his fingertip caressing the silver chain around her throat. "Silver's never truly been your color. You always preferred gold, to match your mercenary heart."

Árdís snatched at the chain as he began to withdraw its length from her dress, her fist curled around the damning ring at the end of it. "What would you know of my heart?"

His face closed over. "You're right. I wouldn't know a damned thing, except to wonder if you even owned one. Regardless, the ring is not yours. It is, however, my price."

"I don't know if I...."

"It's just a ring, Árdís. My ring. I gave it to you with the intention of seeing you wear it for the rest of your life; however, that's not to be. Leaving it with you indicates there's something left between us. And that's not true, is it?"

He practically dared her to deny the truth.

She didn't.

Yet nor did she offer him an answer to that question.

"I need an end to this," he said roughly. "I cannot go on with even a shred of hope left. I told you that you'd ruined me. Perhaps that's a lie. I ruined myself. I've done things"—he thought of Rurik's mate Freyja, whom he'd used as bait in order to trap the mighty dreki, without a care for her feelings—"that I would never have done. I don't even think I like who I've become. But I cannot move on, not until I know this marriage is truly buried. And if you give me back that ring, then I know there's nothing left for us."

The wind blew Árdís's braid behind her, and she stared through his chest, as if trying to find some sort of answer herself.

Turmoil filled her amber eyes as she slowly lifted them. "If you help me remove this shackle, then I will do my best to hand the ring to you."

Done. It was done.

He nodded shortly. "I'll go tell the men our plans, and then we'll board."

"Board?" She shook her head. "We cannot go by ship."

"Why not?"

"Because they're dreki," she insisted. "They'll be looking for me in the air. The second they realize I'm not flying, they'll start searching elsewhere. They'll search all the ships leaving the country. On land we can hide, but on a ship we'll be too vulnerable. There's nowhere to run, and I cannot hide for they will feel my presence if they come close enough."

He considered the ride north. It was more days than he'd hoped to spend with her. "We're just as vulnerable on the ground."

"But unexpected," she stressed. "The last time I fled, I went to the continent. There's no reason for us to head north. There's nothing there—except your sorcerer. We have to be unpredictable if we're to escape unwanted attention."

"Surely they'll expect you to flee toward your brother."

"But not from this direction. I just have to make it onto the lands Rurik has claimed. If they broach his territory, it's an act of war, and he's powerful."

Far too many days of riding ahead of them, with her at his side. "What about your friend?"

"My name is Marek," the servant's eyes glittered watchfully, "and I will help protect the princess."

He'd be lucky if he could even fall at an enemy's feet if they attacked, judging by the look of him. Haakon assessed him. "You won't make it more than a day's ride north."

"I can," Marek said fiercely, "and I will."

"He's unwell," Haakon said, turning the question over to Árdís. "The ride will either kill him, or he'll slow us down. He needs rest and a healer."

"Marek, he's right. You have a fever." Árdís pressed her hands to her temples. "They won't sense him if they board the ship and he's hiding. He's a drekling, not a dreki. His lack of magic is a boon in this circumstance." She looked up. "Could he sail with your men?"

Gunnar watched him from the ship, as if wondering what they were talking about, and a thought occurred. "He can rest in the passenger cabin. I'll send the ship north, to meet us in a cove near where the sorcerer dwells. If anyone sees it leaving Reykjavik, their search will turn up nothing. Then you can hand me the ring, I'll board the ship, and you can fly east. The subterfuge might work."

Árdís bit her lip thoughtfully, and he was struck by how familiar an expression it was.

Haakon shook himself. He could not allow himself to fall for her charms.

"It might work," she whispered.

He nodded abruptly. "Stay out of sight while I unload the horses."

She obediently tugged up her hood.

"Oh, and Árdís?"

"Yes?" She looked up warily.

"The second you have your wings back, I leave with the ring. Until then, I'm your guard. Nothing else."

"Agreed," she said softly.

It was the only way he could protect himself from the inevitable heartbreak, for it seemed she wasn't the only one skirting the truth.

His heart still belonged to her.

A part of it always would.

But he didn't dare let her know.

* * *

Malin hit the stone floor of the cell and rolled, turning to face the prince.

Sirius loomed in the middle of the cell door, his broad shoulders almost filling the frame. There was no way past him. No way through him. And the implacable expression on Sirius's face told her she wasn't going to be able to distract him.

No, he was just like his father. Stellan and the Queen sneered at those like she who were born with impure blood, and couldn't manage the transition to full dreki form. Malin knew the dreki was within her—she could feel it whisper through her veins at the sudden implications of danger, and sometimes she almost imagined she could make flame wield to her whim—but it wasn't enough for those who preferred purebloods.

Like the prince before her.

If not for the old laws the Loremaster insisted had to be maintained, Malin knew she'd have been outcast from the clan, or worse, made to vanish.

She had the terrible suspicion she was going to discover where it was certain dreki vanished to. She found her feet, her knees bruised. There was no way in Hel she was going to greet her death on her knees. Not for him. Nor for his bastard of a father.

"Do you need any help, my lord?" one of the guards asked, peering around Sirius with a leering quality to his gaze.

"I can handle this," Sirius said coldly.

"Are you certain—"

"Certain." He slammed the door in the guard's face and turned toward her. "Let me make one thing very clear. Your life is mine, right now—"

"Then take it," she declared, lifting her chin and meeting his eyes. "For I won't betray my princess, even if I had any idea of where she'd gone. Though I don't blame her for leaving. What sane woman would ever mate with you?"

If anything, his alpine blue eyes narrowed to slits. He glided toward her, the menace radiating off him and sucking the heat from the air. All dreki had some power over the elements, though their abilities varied. Sirius was pure frost, brought to life in dreki form. A demon of ice, who cared for nothing and no one. Malin trembled, but she wouldn't step back.

She would not cower.

Even as her breath began to fog in the suddenly frigid cell.

"If you don't tell me what you know, then you're condemning Árdís to death—or something worse," he said, his hand coming up to grip her throat.

"Why should you care? And what's worse than being sentenced to a life as your mate?"

He held her there, but the grip was not harsh. No. She almost thought he flinched. Once again his thumb made that odd stroking gesture it had in the throne room. Malin gasped as the prince's face lowered toward her, so she could hear his whisper. "I'm trying to help you survive this," he hissed under his breath. "Why are you making this so difficult?"

"Why should I not make this difficult?" She grabbed a fistful of his shirt, trying to gain her balance. "You call me a 'nobody' but I'm a woman with my own hopes and dreams, and I'll be damned if I'll go down without a fight."

The entire court looked at her as if she were filth. Only Árdís had never pitied her for the lack of the ability to shift, and to fly. Only Árdís had ever treated her as if she were an equal.

"I will never, ever," she snarled, "reveal a single one of Árdís's secrets."

Sirius glared at her, and it was only then she felt some trace of heat radiating off him. Her fist clenched in his shirt, and her knuckles brushed against his chest. His skin was warm against her fingers, and his thighs crushed her skirts. It left her feeling remarkably off-balance, in more ways than one.

"You care for her." He sounded surprised.

"She's my princess, my hope." Malin shivered, for the way he was looking at her was not at all the way he usually did, as if she were some insect to be crushed beneath his boot. "She's the only true heir left in this rotten court, and when her people rise, they'll crush you and the cursed blight of your family from existence."

Dark lashes fluttered down to hide his eyes, and his mouth softened. "Careful sweetheart," he murmured. "You're starting to talk about rebellion, and if my father catches a glimpse of it, he'll crush every bone in your body to discover the truth."

"What little is left of me," she whispered, finally feeling the nerves bubble up within her, "once you're done with me."

The Blackfrost was not the sort of dreki one denied. Sirius lurked in the shadows, as his father's personal assassin.

Or so it was said.

"I'm not going to hurt you."

That hand softened, and slid around to cup the back of her neck. Suddenly Malin was clinging to him in truth, to avoid falling flat on her backside.

Her heart started beating a little faster.

None of this was going the way she'd expected.

"No? You heard what your father said. And if he thought you were harboring a traitor, he'd string you up beside me. Why should you care?"

Sirius glanced behind him, and she knew he could sense the heartbeat pulsing beyond the door. Dreki ears were sharp, but their words were barely a whisper. Even so, he leaned closer, breathing in her ear. "Because you don't have to tell me Árdís's secrets. I know she left last night, using the southern cellars that lead to the servant's portal. I know she's going after her mortal husband. I was there. I let her go."

Malin staggered back as he released her.

Splayed against the cell wall, she stared at him. He'd let the princess go? "You're lying."

"You know I'm not."

A silky whisper.

He knew too much about the princess's plans... Or had Stellan's spies seen the princess leave, and Sirius was using that information to trick her? No. Dreki couldn't lie, which meant he had to be telling the truth.

"Why?" Malin whispered.

Sirius glanced again at the door, and she gained the impression she wasn't the only one keeping secrets. Again he loomed closer, resting one hand flat against the cell wall beside her face. Her body tightened as he leaned closer, but it was only to brush his lips against her ear. "Because I did not wish to mate with her, nor her with me. It seemed the only way to avoid the situation. But I think it wise if we both keep our voices down. My father wouldn't appreciate knowing I allowed Árdís to leave. If you cannot trust me, then trust that. You hold this secret over my head."

Malin could barely breathe. She turned her face to the side, and her lips almost brushed against his stubble. None of this made any sense, and her heart pounded as she sought to work her way through it all.

Could she trust him?

The Blackfrost?

"I just need to know where she's going," he said. "That's all. And I shall take you with me. If you help me, then I shall set you free."

"You're going to bring her back," she blurted.

His lips thinned, as he drew back fractionally, just enough to look into her eyes. "I like this little more than you do, however, I'm running out of cards to play. This has not gone as expected. I need the princess back, and I'll mate her if forced to do so. Or would you prefer that Roar finds her first? Neither of us wants him named as heir."

He had a point.

He also had to be playing some sort of game. But what? He'd given her his secret, after all, one that could see him torn apart by his brethren if they knew he'd had a hand in Árdís's disappearance.

If she couldn't entirely be certain she could trust him, then at least she had something to hold over his head. And she needed to help Árdís. The princess couldn't escape an entire hunting party of dreki males intent on claiming her for Roar. The stakes had changed.

"There's only one place for the princess to flee to," Malin said, her heart trembling at the choice she was making. "Only one place she's safe from those who might follow."

The prince's pale blue eyes raced. His face suddenly paled.

"Rurik."

"Yes," Malin breathed, feeling like a traitor in her bones. "She's going to find her brother, Rurik."