“Morning, Freya,” she said, giving me a look that told me we’d not been half as discreet as I’d hoped. “Blood running hotter this morning? Fingers and toes still attached?”
“Yes.” The word came out as a squeak, for I was intimately aware that for all Bodil was close, Bjorn was closer. “I’m quite recovered.”
Bjorn snorted, then sat up, using the motion to pull my trousers up over my naked arse. He then reached under the furs to extract my hands, which he examined in the growing light. My skin was reddened and my fingertips were white and waxy, but I still had sensation. “Can you grip?” he asked, and I was tempted to point out that he knew damn well that I could, but instead I squeezed my fist. “Yes.”
“What about her feet?”
All three of us looked up at the sound of Snorri’s voice. He picked his way through the rousing warriors surrounding us, furs pulled up around his head so that his face was cast in shadows. I reluctantly extracted one foot, knowing from the pain that my feet had not weathered my ordeal as well as my hands. As I pulled off the two pairs of woolen socks I wore, my stomach sank. My feet were well enough, but my toes were purple, the pain growing the more I stared at them.
“Can you walk?”
I pulled the stockings back on, relieved not to have to look at my toes any longer. Bjorn rose next to me, then reached down to catch me by the arms, lifting me upright. I clenched my teeth as my full weight pressed down, the pain intense but manageable. So I took a step, then another, my balance precarious.
“Freya can’t fight in this condition.” Bjorn’s voice was low, anger simmering beneath the surface. “I hope you are content, Father, for this is your doing.”
I bit the insides of my cheeks. Bjorn was trying to protect me, I knew that. But if this truly was a test set for me by the gods, I had to keep going. Even if it wasn’t, the people of Halsar were counting on us being victorious. On us winning them homes and walls that would protect them from the long winter.
“I sent for my healer before we left Halsar, but he’ll be two days in reaching us,” Bodil said, examining my feet. “Yet perhaps worth waiting for.”
“I’ll be fine,” I said. “Eir is more likely to grant favor and heal me if I prove myself in battle, so I will fight and see your healer after.”
“You’ll risk your life for the sake of a better chance of a god sparing your toes?” Bjorn crossed his arms, glaring at me. “I think your wits froze worse than your feet if you’d make such a decision.”
He wasn’t wrong, but I didn’t see what other choice we had. Timing was everything if we were to be successful in this siege, so this was a risk I was willing to take. “I won’t jeopardize the lives of everyone in Halsar to protect myself.” Rounding on Snorri, I said, “How long until we reach Grindill?”
* * *
—
Three hours, Snorri had said.
It felt like an eternity.
Sweat ran in rivulets down my back, making me long for the frigid winds of the prior day, but the sky was clear, the morning sun cutting through the boughs of the trees and giving me no respite as it melted away the prior day’s snow. Though the tips of my toes were numb, the rest of them throbbed unmercifully with each stride across the wet earth, the full belly of food Bodil had cajoled me into eating threatening to rise.
“You look ready to spill your guts,” Bjorn said under his breath from where he walked at my left. “You’re going to get yourself killed.”
“You said I wouldn’t die today,” I reminded him. “Besides, once the battle starts, I won’t feel the pain.”
“The former was said while very little of the blood in my body was servicing the part that does the thinking,” he hissed. “As for the latter, who the fuck told you that bullshit?”
“Probably you.” I winced as my toe caught against a tree root, pain lancing up my leg. “The source of all bullshit.”
Bjorn kicked a rock, sending it flying through the trees and nearly hitting Bodil, who turned around and shot him a glare before disappearing into the distance.
“Everyone is in position,” I reminded him. “If we delay for the sake of my toes, we risk discovery. We need this fortress. Not only to house our people come winter, but to protect them when Nordeland tries to attack.”
“I’m aware of the stakes.” He caught hold of my arm, pulling me to a stop. “You don’t attack the strong when you’re weak, Freya. You bide your time.”