Veremund had only had the valkyrie for the one night, and he could already tell she was probably going to be more trouble than she was worth.
He’d give credit where credit was due, though. She had been clever enough to at least try to play dead. But since she’d survived, he was going to make use of her. Especially, since she was the Captain of the Guard, that meant she had to have some useful information.
But as they traveled, none of his men had yet been able to get anything out of her other than a few grunts. They’d barked questions at her before leaving the battlefield, but she just blinked up at them, a hazy look in her eyes like she couldn’t even hear them. She was most assuredly injured, but not so much that she was dying, just enough that she was suffering.
She’d be of no use to him dead.
At the beginning of their journey, she’d been too weak to fight off the elf he had attend to her most severe injuries. Particularly the broken leg and the gashes. While Veremund was skilled at moonlight healing, he decided it was better leave it to the professional for the major injuries, especially with a creature so completely unlike himself.
Veremund was elf through and through.
She was a valkyrie. The gigantic wings protruding from her back were likely not the only difference between them, physically. The other injuries Veremund would deal with later. Still, he spent the whole night watching her from the corner of his eye as they traveled, racing across the land to get out of the Sun Elves’ kingdom.
If they were caught in their enemies’ territory when the moon fell and the sun rose, they would be in dire straits.
This mission was supposed to be hard and fast.
There had been no other option.
The news of the Valhian princess traveling to the Sun Elves had come late from their spies. Given that and the valkyries’ ability to travel such great distances so quickly—thanks to their monstrous wings—Veremund had been entrusted with this mission.
Failure had not been an option.
He might not have gotten the princess herself, but he got her captain. Hopefully that would be enough to satisfy his father.
It wouldn’t.
Especially if she was going to stay silent the entire time.
Even if he had gotten the princess, his father wouldn’t be satisfied.
Her wings were still too injured to be used, and while she’d been healed it was clear their healer had not had much experience with valkyrie wings either as she was still bleeding from them.
Thankfully, they looked minor, probably not as many veins to bleed from, and as the night stretched on, the moon arcing across the sky, the bleeding seemed to slow. Although the valkyrie stayed extremely pale and shivered each second, sweating from where she was thrown over the back of a riderless horse.
Her hands were bound behind her back, entrapping her injured wings so they couldn’t be used either. Her eyes were closed most of the night so he was certain she was not fully conscious while they thundered across the earth and toward the plains.
There were brief moments where she stirred, and he could see her looking around, but she was securely attached. Even if she managed to get herself off the horse, she wasn’t going to make it far with her injuries.
They finally slowed as the moon fell and the sun began to rise.
Veremund could feel his own strength ebbing and his exhaustion setting in as the source of most of his magic disappeared. He could see the Moon Elves around him all beginning to lag similarly, but quicker than him.
He slowed his horse as they reached a rocky outcrop that would hide them sufficiently
until they regained their strength and pressed on. The valkyrie, on the other hand was stirring more and more as they lagged.
He was likely going to have to intervene to force her to stay on their schedule, but he was hoping her injury would do it for them, draining her so that she would have no choice but to rest while they rested and while they rode as well.
He reached the shadows first and felt his strength renew again and he breathed in the darkness.
The other elves eyed him warily but did not say a word.
As long as he didn’t make use of that side of his magic, they wouldn’t dare, and even if he did, in that event, they’d probably be too terrified to only do. It would only be in the most extreme circumstances. These days, his reputation did more than enough to ensure no sane elf would ever cross him.
No one had forgotten what had happened to the last elf who’d made himself Veremund’s enemy.
Once he was rejuvenated, he turned his attention to his valkyrie who was blinking to try and clear her gaze, longingly eyeing the sunlight out past the caves.
“Your Highness, what do you want us to do with her while we rest?” Lieutenant Alvar asked as he came up to Veremund’s side, a thick exhaustion to his voice.
Veremund had only worked with him a once before, but his brother, Emmerich, had more experience with him and had recommended him highly.
“Has anyone in our party had experience with a valkyrie prisoner?” Veremund asked.
Lieutenant Alvar shook his head. “We so rarely get them some subdued enough to capture. Usually our only option is to kill them, and the ones in the past that have been captured don’t last long. They find unique ways to eliminate themselves or they die while we try to break them.”
Interesting.
“Well, then my orders are these: add an extra man to the watch and have their eyes on her the entire day until we move out again. If they think she is at risk, have them send for the healer. Otherwise, they are to leave her alone. When we break camp, she’ll be riding with a guard’s eyes on her at all time.”
“Leave her alone? Are you certain, Your Highness?” Lieutenant Alvar’s voice pitched up just slightly and when Veremund narrowed his eyes, he tacked on, “Don’t you think that because she’s at her weakest right now, she ought to be easy to break?”
Veremund looked over at her. She was ignoring everything around her. At the very least he expected her to look around to see if there was any paths for her to escape. But maybe she truly was too injured to be able to think of trying. If that was the case…
“Don’t be foolish. She’s the Captain of the Guard.” Veremund shot him a cold look. “She most certainly won’t be easy to break.”
Lieutenant Alvar nodded. “Very well, Your Highness. We’ll focus on getting her to Selene where Prince Emmerich will be able to break her.”
“Keep your commentary to yourself, Lieutenant,” Veremund snapped, leveling him with a glare. “I said your orders are to leave her alone, not that I will. The only words to leave your mouth should be ‘yes, Your Highness.’ My brother might put up with mindless prattle, but I will not. See to it you remember that.”
Alvar stepped back, paling. “Yes, Your Highness.”
Veremund dismissed him with a wave of his hand, directing his gaze back to the valkyrie. His men hadn’t gotten anything out of her before, but Veremund wasn’t arriving back in Selene with nothing of use.
She was perfectly still on the ground where the guards had dumped her. It certainly didn’t look like a comfortable position. Although, nothing really looked like it could be comfortable with her hands behind her back, trapping her wings in that awkward position.
Actually, he didn’t really understand how the valkyries could do anything comfortably with those abominable growths out of their backs. Surely such massive limbs got in the way of everything?
But with them somewhat contained, he was able to get a better look at her. She didn’t look nearly as large or intimidating as before. She was shorter than most elven women, but of the valkyries they’d just slain, she had been average in height compared to them. Her wings were an interesting pattern, cream and tawny with a little bit of dark brown. They reminded him of an owl he’d seen once.
As he approached, the sound of his boots on the stone caught her attention. She dragged her eyes away from the elusive sunlight and blinked again to focus on him in the early dawn.
Veremund was fairly confident he was skilled enough in her tongue not to need any magical assistance, especially because he’d quite enjoyed the shocked and horrified expression she’d had when he’d revealed he could speak in hers before.
He could see her guard go up as he approached. He took his time, slowly, moving toward her.
Her expression was impassive. He assumed she had to fear him.
She would be a fool not to. But if she was, she wasn’t showing it.
He liked that.
There was a reason she’d been the captain of the princess’s guard. Despite what the lieutenant said, Veremund knew she would not be easy to break despite how much he hoped she was going to make this easy for him.
It was as he knelt in front of her, taking a good long look at her, that he realized why all the other elves were taking turns pretending to be occupied with their work when they were actually sneaking looks at her, mostly a disgusted fascination, others…
He’d known that the valkyries were not a modest people by nature, but he had not taken much notice that it extended to their armor as well as their everyday dress, until now.
The girl’s legs were exposed from her knees down. She had bracers on her calves, but they did little to hide the shape of them. The leather skirt of her armor was impossibly short, especially as she was sitting down.
He would have thought for such a combat-oriented species, they would take better care to protect their legs, but he supposed they did not go to any lengths to protect their most important limbs, their wings.
There was no armor on them, but he supposed it would likely interfere greatly with the asset those limbs provided, the ability to fly.
The handful of valkyries that had broken off to attack them had done quite a bit of damage before they killed them all. The seven valkyries, even exhausted from a full day of flying, had managed to kill eight of his men.
It was disgrace. He shouldn’t have lost any men when the moon was in the sky.
The valkyries had moved so quickly, his men had struggled to keep up, even at their strongest. Veremund did not much like his people’s odds in this war, if the valkyries continued supporting the Sun Elves the way it seemed like they would with Princess Ragna going to visit their king.
If the valkyrie princess especially entered into a marriage alliance with their close allies that would mean even more than the troops the valkyries had already sent to provide aid to the Sun Elves.
It would mean an official declaration of war and a full mobilization of their army, which would then put the Sun Elves, the alchemists of Chymes, and the Southern Valkyries of Valha against the Moon Elves.
His father was up for the challenge, but with an over a century long conflict, the valkyries escalating from support here and there to an outright declaration of war would drag this thing out longer.
His eyes skimmed over the rest of her and he was surprised again at how poorly protected and covered she was.
Hopefully they had an extra cloak or something to cover her up with. His fingertips brushed his cape. He supposed he could sacrifice his.
It would not do if his soldiers got distracted looking at her. He would not have his guards watching her for the wrong reasons.
She was silent as he took her in, and he could tell she was doing the same thing, albeit focusing less on the modesty of his clothes and armor, but more on the distinctions between his and the other elves. Then her eyes flicked up to his hair, his most unique feature, to be sure.
But the second her eyes landed on the strands of black and silver, he snapped his fingers in front of her face and said in her language, “You are lucky.”
She blinked again at the use of her language, but she didn’t startle like she had before.
For a moment, it seemed as though he was going to receive the same silent treatment his men had before. But then she sucked in a soft breath and her lips parted like she couldn’t stop it. The words came out soft and rasping, but unmistakable.
“The lucky ones are currently rotting on that field.”
He’d been right.
She was not going to be easy to break.
If he didn’t do it now, then she was going to be in a world of suffering when Emmerich took over in the capital.
But he had no doubt she would eventually break.
* * *
Thanks for reading Chapter Two of Chains of Moonlight! Read Chapter Three here!
Find all the chapters here!