“Get back,” Orka growled at him and the young man stepped back into the shadows.
“He’s been in there a long time,” Lif muttered. “Too long.”
Orka ignored him.
Three days had passed since Lif and Mord had carried her from the fight with Drekr, during which she had bought rings and rivets from the farmer they were lodging with, repaired her brynja, sharpened her blades, and plotted with the two brothers. A seed of doubt lurked deep in her gut about their abilities, about whether they had the skills and hardness of hearts to do what had to be done. Also, she did not want their deaths on her shoulders. She carried enough of that weight with her already. Some nights she thought she heard the voices of dead friends muttering to her and she would wake with a start, her heart thumping and sheened in sweat. Sometimes she heard Thorkel’s voice, or Breca’s.
And another voice whispered that Mord and Lif would slow her down, pull her away from what she had to do. That she was better off alone.
But they stayed to warn me of Sigrún, even sold their boat in an attempt to save me when they could have just rowed away and saved themselves, she thought. On the scales of honour, Orka owed them a debt. And she did not like that, either.
It is what it is. I will take one step at a time, kill one enemy at a time. They have made their choice and are in this, now. They know the path we are walking, the steel-edge of it, where life and death are closer than lovers.
The tavern door opposite her opened, and Mord came out into the street, his fair hair and beard glowing amber in the rush-light. It was the tavern that Orka had first seen the burned man in. Mord looked both ways, then walked right, taking a quick glance at the alley Orka and Lif were in, giving a curt nod even though he could not see them and then he was walking past them, on down the street.
Orka waited.
“He’s not coming,” Lif whispered.
Orka made a sound in her throat, like a wolf would growl at an annoying cub.
The tavern door creaked and a figure stepped out, looking both ways then focusing on Mord’s back.
The burned man.
He walked after Mord.
Orka and Lif watched him as he strode past the alley they were in, Orka gripping Lif’s shoulder as he started to move.
She tutted at him.
The burned man walked on, fading into the shadow-filled street.
Orka let go of Lif and stepped out into the street, making sure her cloak was tight about her, hiding any glint or gleam of her brynja, and her hood was pulled to hide her face in shadow. She walked along the street, limping a little, more from the kick Drekr had given her than the axe-cut below her knee. She had washed and stitched her winnigas so there was no sign of blood and used her spear as a staff to speed her walking.
People in the road thinned as they moved through the streets of Darl towards the canal district where Orka had found Drekr. She followed the burned man, slowly catching up with him until she could see the shape of Mord beyond him. Mord turned into an alley, disappearing, and the burned man followed.
Orka picked up her pace. Heard voices. A scuffle. She broke into a limping run and turned into the alley, gesturing at Lif to stand guard.
Mord was standing with his back to a wall, clutching his right arm to his chest, a seax at his feet. The burned man stood in front of him, a short axe in his fist.
“I won’t be asking you again,” the burned man said. “Who are you?”
“He’s a friend of mine,” Orka grunted, pulling her hood back, and the axe man spun around. His eyes flared in recognition and he swung his axe as Orka lunged, but she dipped her blade beneath his wild parry and stabbed on, her spear blade slicing his bicep. The burned man squealed in pain as his axe fell from his fingers and he stepped back, reaching clumsily with his left hand for the hilt of the seax at his belt.
Orka drew back with her spear, carving a red line across his cheek, and then Mord clubbed him across the shoulders, sending him to his knees.
Orka stood over him, spun her spear and punched the butt into his jaw. He toppled into the mud like a sack. With a quick step forward, Orka kicked the axe away.
“Pick it up,” she grunted to Mord as she crouched and drew the seax from the burned man’s belt, tossed it to Mord, then bound the unconscious man’s wrists and ankles with twine. She stood and dragged his limp body deeper into the alley, Mord and Lif following.
“Wake up,” Orka said as she sat the burned man against a wall. They were close to the far end of the alley, open ground beyond and then the ripple of the canal. Clouds parted, starlight leaking out, silvering the burned man’s scarred face. His front teeth were too big for his mouth, protruding from his lips. Orka slapped him and he blinked.