Winterskin (Book One of Wrath & Winter)

They Come at Night: Part One

I swore by the All-Father that Giroux would limp into the guardhouse at dawn, cursing me while granting me a shield.

The gathered crowd whooped and hollered, their knuckles pounded the sky, hit the earth, or kicked up mud and browned snow. The wooden well before the longhouse shivered at their thunderous roars.

Heat beneath me struggled as a brigandine vest bit into my thighs. His heartbeat was entirely too calm for him to be losing. Straddling the Commander, I twisted his head to the right and dug my elbow into the crevice at the side of his leathery neck.

This is it, if I complete the movement, pin him, and make him cry out for mercy, the Guard will have no choice but to accept me. They'll need someone like me.

"You had enough, sir?" I laughed and smiled, for once I had gotten him down into the earth, the heels of his boots digging between the stones of the well before the jarl's longhouse.

"Fightin' dirty, Katell—"

"Fighting just like I've been taught, sir." I twisted my elbow, drilling it into the soft flesh of his throat, "Does a man no good to keep his balls if he can't protect his throat." I dug deeper, "Ain't that what you taught me?"

"Ooooh!" the half-way armored men cawed and hissed, drumming their mucked up boots into the snow like chimeras on the verge of charging.

Boots slammed into the muck and the shadows hanging over us suddenly got wispy before they departed.

Can't look up, there's one more thing I've got to do to prove I'm ready.

It should be fluid, an easy maneuver that'll flip him and give me complete command of his spine. Hand on his shoulder, knees in the mud, a throat ripping grunt and his weight totters over.

"Maeva—you better—" He spat up spittle and mud and old snow. With his knees thrashing against the mud I dug my knee into his tailbone and wrapped both hands around his ankles only to yank them back with as much might as I can muster—

Pop! Crack!

A shower of sparks. Redhot pain thundered through the back of my head as jagged nails raked across the back of my scalp.

"Hagen? Listen—"

Her? I groaned inwardly. Dammit, should have known she would come at the sound of the commander losing. The crowd went quiet all of a sudden—why didn't my body warn me?

"Katell." Her voice was thick and matronly, I could imagine her scarred face smirking at me, her scars writhing and twisting, "Even your ego is taller than you."

More pain, a rush of it shrieked up and down the back of my skull as she pulled my head back and left my chin jutting toward the pale silver sky.

"Defeating Giroux will not earn you a place in the Guard." Hagen dropped my head, chin to chest, the ashen wood rolling in waves along the outer perimeter of the jarl's longhouse passed by in a muted blur.

Below me, her boot slid through the mud, kicked my legs wider.

This is the correct way to do it, of course the eldest shieldmaiden would know. My heart sank, plunged into a tub filled with ice-water.

My face met the ground and cold, slimy, mud crept over my nose. Both of my shoulders rose as supple hands gripped my wrists and yanked them back with a violent tug.

Don't scream. Don't scream. Don't sc—

"Dammit!"

Her chest rattling laugh is the last thing I need. "The Commander is too slow to beat you now," Hagen said, easing up, "and fat."

"I can outrun you." The Commander snapped.

"Katell," Hagen turned to me, but my eyes were not on her, "you cannot prove that you belong in the Guard if you cannot even report for your post on time." She clicked her tongue, "Woodcutters belong on the outskirts." I felt her pull away, "You should get there. Now."

Though their words might as well have been lost in the silence that followed, the quiet only broken by my gasps and a tingling touch spider-walking its way up my spine and into my ears, blowing them full of cold.

Sometimes I can't control it.

"Neige?" a voice said.

"No, ice." Another decided.

Shutting my eyes tight, I willed my ears to do the same. But they aren't long enough and my thoughts aren't forceful enough.

The weight ripping my arms backward let up completely and mud collided with my knees, that and ice-packed ground. My lower jaw rammed against the upper with the impact and I shut my eyes tight, tighter still.

"Cursed."

"Leave her be before she calls a blizzard."

"Back to your posts!"

"Cursed."

It cut my earlobe like a double-edged dirk, cursed.

Opening my eyes, it's like they were never there, cheering me on against their commander, screaming that I could do it, that I could finally prove I do deserve my shield and ax despite what my mother said.

But her promise hung heavy like a noose.

****

Author's Note: Thank you so much for reading! Winterskin is a rewrite of an earlier work with the same title, it was one of my first novels. I'm putting the unedited version of Winterskin up for all of you fabulous readers to check out and tell me what you want more of and what you want less of. I hope you enjoy the story =)