Page 53 of The Girl the Sea Gave Back
But I knew what he needed. I’d known since an attack on Hylli was first ordered. He wanted me to cast the runes before battle. He wanted to paint my hands with blood again.
“No.” The word was weak, and I didn’t even have the courage to look at him when it fell from my lips. It was the first time I’d ever said no to Jorrund. It was the first time I’d ever denied him anything at all.
He stilled before me, speechless.
“The last time I cast the stones, you killed every man, woman, and child in the glade and in Utan. I won’t do it again. Not ever. If you want to take Hylli, you’ll have to do it alone.”
My fingers brushed over the axe head in my lap, tracingthe shape of the yew tree etched into the shining steel. I wouldn’t do it to Hylli. And I wouldn’t do it to Halvard.
“Tova…” Jorrund struggled to keep his voice even.
“I told you.” I looked up at him from the top of my gaze. “This is a mistake.”
But he couldn’t hear me. His face was twisted with his own thoughts, his mind racing. “I saved your life. I’ve treated you as my own.” He murmured, “I’ve given you everything.”
“Everything except the truth,” I amended.
His lips pulled back to reveal his teeth. “What?”
“What did the Spinner tell you about me? Who am I?”
“She told me nothing about you.”
“WhoamI, Jorrund?” I pressed. “Please.”
“I don’t know!” He tucked his shaking hands into his robes, surprised by the flare of his own temper. He closed his eyes, breathing before he spoke again. “The only thing I know is that Eydis brought you to us. Tome.I’ve told you the story.”
“There’s something else. Something you’re not telling me. I’ve always known it. But I thought, in time… I thought I could trust you,” I whispered.
“Tova.” His voice softened. “Listen to me.”
“No.” I said the word again, and this time, it wasn’t small. It filled the air between us.
A sharp glint flickered in his eyes like the strike of fire-steel. “I have done nothing but care for you since the day I found you on that half-burned boat. Your own people—”
“What?” I rasped, his words trailing off in the suddenstorm swirling in my mind. I got to my feet, my hands finding the rune stones. “What did you say?”
“I said that all I’ve ever done is—”
“You said half-burned boat.”
“What? No, I…” He stumbled over the words, trying to pull them back away from me.
But it was too late. “You never told me the boat was half-burned.”
“I’ve told you about the boat a hundred times.”
“You just said it was half-burned when you found me. You never told me that before.”
“What does it matter?” He flung a hand at me. “Your people didn’t want you, Tova. They cast you off.”
But something about those words didn’t feel right anymore, even though I’d said them a thousand times myself. I closed my eyes, seeing the water again. The silver stream of bubbles. A string of bones glittering in sunlight.
Thatfelt real.
I held my hands out before me, my palms down so that the marks were between us.
Yarrow and henbane. Life and death.
