‘But you might never get other chance!’ cried Sól.
Christopher tilted his head fondly. ‘I will,’ he said. ‘Razi has promised me. He always keeps his promises. I ain’t going to let him down.’
‘But . . .’ Sól gazed around at the unconscious Wolves, unable to comprehend Christopher’s decision to spare them.
Christopher left David Le Garou and crossed the tent. Crouching at Sól’s feet, he gently lifted the fallen guitar. The polished wood glowed like honey in the warm light, the silver frets and the silver snake-head pegs gleaming. He turned it to show the back. Inlaid in dark wood, a representation of two snakes twined around themselves, each biting the other’s tail. Wynter hunkered down by Christopher and gazed at it. It was very fine work.
‘This is beautiful,’ she whispered.
‘Aye. Hawk-worked. Da had it made at the Hollis aonach, the year I was adopted. The same man made it as made the trunk.’ Christopher smiled and ran his fingers along the segmented back of the snake emblem. He went to speak; then the sight of his mutilated hand seemed to halt him in his tracks. His breath caught in his throat and he frowned, staring at his fingers. He clenched his hand and stood abruptly, looping the guitar-strap across his shoulder. ‘Come on,’ he snapped. ‘Let’s go.’ And he strode to the door, dragging it aside and darting out as if afraid to stay any longer.
Wynter got slowly to her feet. Sól was glaring at the prostrate bodies stretched all around him, his face twitching with rage. Wynter knew exactly how he felt. Well, she thought, eyeing the vicious rings of scar tissue on his neck and wrists. Perhaps not quite exactly.
‘This is not your vengeance to take, Sól,’ she said softly.
‘How can he to walk away?’ he ground out. ‘How can . . . ?’
‘He’s not walking away forever.’
Sólmundr huffed and shook his head, his anger and disappointment palpable.
‘You think he is foolish to trust Razi?’
He did not answer, and Wynter wondered if he was as much hurt by Christopher’s rejection of his gift as he was angered by the Wolves’ close escape.
Christopher called for them to come on. He was crouched in the shadow of the awning, dragging his father’s bracelets from the slave’s limp arms. ‘Get out of there,’ he hissed, glancing in at them. ‘We need to get back before Razi returns from his brother.’
Wynter picked her way out to him. Behind her, Sól snuffed the fire-basin, plunging the tent into pitch darkness.
He came to her side, watching in silence as Christopher took his own bracelets from the second slave.
‘Will they die, Sól?’ asked Wynter, gazing down at the unconscious young men at her feet.
‘I hope,’ he said coldly.
‘Much as they aspire to be, they ain’t Wolves,’ said Christopher, standing and kicking the slave’s hand away from his foot. ‘So it’s likely the poison will do them in.’
‘Will it be bad?’ she whispered. ‘Sólmundr called it slow poison. That sounds bad.’
‘It just mean it sneak up slow,’ said Sólmundr. ‘It not . . .’ He made a spasming motion, reminding Wynter of Razi when Christopher had drugged him in Embla’s tent. ‘This one, it just pull you gently under. You almost not notice it until it too late, and then you die.’
Christopher huffed dryly. ‘It’s still too bloody good for them,’ he said.
Sól nodded in understanding. Wynter found their lack of compassion very strange. After all, did her friends feel no kinship to these two young men? As slaves, had they not all suffered the same things? Glancing at her, Christopher must have caught some of this in her face, and he looked away, uncomfortably shifting the bracelets in his hand.
‘You don’t understand what they’re like,’ he whispered. ‘You couldn’t imagine. These are two of the Wolves’ Boys. The Wolves have raised them from little children and . . . they ain’t normal,’ he said. ‘They’re savage. They’re horribly cruel.’
‘Some people,’ said Sólmundr, his eyes wide with unwanted memory, ‘they end up with not just bodies in slavery. Some people, their souls be slaves also.’
Christopher shuddered, then shook himself free of his memories. ‘Come on!’ he hissed, slapping Sólmundr on his strong arm. ‘Let’s go.’
Grimly, the warrior stepped over the slaves, heading for the gap in the army tents. Wynter moved to follow him, but hesitated as Christopher came to an abrupt halt in front of her.
‘Sól!’ he cried.
Sólmundr glanced back over his shoulder, frowning. ‘What?’