A thread of silence wound through the waiting contestants and their assistants. Sweat trickled down the back of my neck and into my oilcloth as the sun beat down on my head. I flared my nostrils, breathing in the collision of scents all around me. The sweetness of the flowers blooming along the bank of the lake. The intoxicating scent of Lilia’s brew from the hands of a pixie only a few feet away from us. The freshly baked bread from one of the market tents. I let it all fill me up until nothing else existed, least of all my fear.
It was a trick I’d learned a long time ago, every time Isveig sent me on a quest I did not wish to complete. Scents soothed me. They steadied me. They made me feel like I could take on any enemy, and win.
Just not Isveig. Never Isveig.
One day I will be free of him.
The drumbeat sounded, and everyone on the beach sprang into action. Rivelin grabbed the raft and shoved it out onto the water. A second later, he wrapped his arms around my waist and hauled me into the air. A squeak shot from my parted lips.
“What are you doing? This is not part of the plan.” I swatted at his arm.
He kept his grip on me, wading into the water and shoving the raft further out with his boot. “I knew you’d argue if I told you about it.”
“This is ridiculous.” Still, it was keeping me dry. He pushed the raft a little further, and then somehow flipped in midair, violently plopping the both of us on the wood. My teeth snapped together, but only a small rush of water spread over the logs. It receded just as quickly, barely skimming my trousers.
But only a moment later, the raft started bucking around like a wild horse as Rivelin tried to find the right position. I found myself with a death grip on his thighs. His strong hands enveloped my waist, and he tugged me closer. My backside slid right into the center of his crossed legs.
My heart fluttered through my chest. I tried to focus on anything other than the way his muscles shifted against me, the way his strong, powerful body pressed against my back. And I tried to shove away the thought that roared through my mind.
This was not entirely unpleasant.
All my life, I’d been on my own. I’d had to depend on myself. No one else. I liked it that way. Anytime I’d ever trusted someone, he’d betrayed me. Or used me. In Isveig’s case, he’d done both. But the way Rivelin had formed this protective cocoon around me to shield me from the lake’s water…felt nice. Even if he was only doing it so we could win.
“You going to help?” He barked the words and shoved an oar into my hands, breaking me free of my ridiculous reverie.
I blinked and dipped the large end of the oar into the lake, though I truly had no clue what I was doing. Rivelin used the rear paddle to steer us in the right direction while I put my brute force behind my row. Much to my surprise, this tactic seemed to work. Our little raft aimed right toward the opposite bank, where several deer scampered away from the rocks and vanished deep into the woodland. A handful of trees seemed to sprout from the very water itself, their reflections elongating their spindly forms and the kaleidoscope of orange, red, and green leaves.
It was a beautiful sight. Except for the fact every other boat but one was ahead of us.
I narrowed my eyes and rowed faster. Gregor was right at the front. In moments, he’d reach the shore far before everyone else. His assistant was a shadow demon, long and lean with shoulders the size of my head. He sat in front of the boat, rowing furiously, while Gregor lounged in the back barely breaking a sweat.
With a low growl, I paddled even faster, but we barely skimmed across the lake, even as my arms began to ache and the sweat thickened beneath the clammy oilcloth.
Rivelin leaned forward, and his breath whispered across the exposed skin on my cheek. “Keep rowing like that, and you’re going to flip us over.”
“We can’t let that bastard win,” I said through clenched teeth.
“Even if he wins this one, that doesn’t mean he’ll win the whole thing.” But despite his words, there was a sense of resignation in his tone, like he’d known the second we got on this raft that we’d never win. All the other contestants had split away from us almost immediately. I craned my head over my shoulder. The boat behind us must have broken just after leaving the shore. Nina, the purple-winged pixie, was paddling back to the festival while her assistant was trying—and failing—to rid the boat of water. They wouldn’t even finish the task.
“See?” Rivelin said in a too-calm voice. “We won’t come last.”
“I don’t know why you’re not more upset about this. This is your competition. Don’t you want to win?”
“More than anything,” he said quietly, his words nearly drowned out beneath the rush of my oar through the water. “But right now, I want to focus on getting through this without you getting hurt. So just row, Daella. I’ll take care of the rest.”
My breath stilled in my lungs. There it was again. That strange, intoxicating feeling that someone else besides my own damn self was looking out for me. But the strangest part of it all was who it was coming from. I shouldn’t like it. And I shouldn’t embrace it. Even now, I could smell the hint of dragon on him.
Still, I kept rowing, my eyes narrowed on the boats ahead. After a few moments passed by, Gregor reached the shore and sent his shadow demon assistant off into the woods to find the flag. It didn’t take long for the rest of the contestants to arrive behind him. Most left their assistants to wait while they dashed through the towering oaks.
By the time we reached the bank ourselves, one of the contestants—Viggo, the fire demon—had already returned with his flag. He leapt into his boat as his dwarf assistant shoved them back into the water. And then they were off. Gregor shouted obscenities in the air, his pale face growing redder as he watched.
“Don’t pay attention to him,” Rivelin murmured beneath his breath. “Focus on the shore and get ready to jump.”
“Jump,” I repeated, attempting—and failing—to keep my voice light.
“You’re going to aim for that rock and get off the raft as soon as you can. I’ll get in the water and drag the raft the rest of the way to the shore myself. You can keep guard of it from the rock.”
I nodded. “All right. I’ll do my best.”
“I don’t doubt you for a moment,” he said, his tone no longer sharpened by his usual gruffness. A little flutter went through my chest.
This part would be the hardest for avoiding the water. Everyone else could leap over the side of the boat and slosh onto shore. Rivelin would have been able to do that, too, if we weren’t on a raft only big enough for one of us. As it was, if he got off, I was going with him, whether I liked it or not.
But I was Daella Sigursdottir, for fuck’s sake. I’d survived the Elding when few did. Throughout my time working for Isveig, I’d fought a score of armed shadow demons, and I’d beaten every last one single-handedly. And far before those days, I’d hidden in the rubble when Isveig had attacked Fafnir. Many had suffocated. Others had been scorched.
I had survived all that and still come out fighting. I could survive a sprinkle of fates-damned lake water.
I put all my strength behind the next row, and that final push brought the front of the raft within a few meters of the rock. As I pushed up onto my feet, Rivelin gave me a tiny nudge, hand splayed across my backside. Heat stormed through my belly, but I forced myself to focus on the rock. And then I leapt.