The name Siren followed Freya Helvar around like a curse from the moment her powers first manifested in a raid on her village. With the image of her father's charred corpse and her brother's disgusted face on her mind, she is hauled to the Little Pa...
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IT HAD TAKEN the rest of the morning for them to get to a Ravkan military encampment and the next day they were off with Freya seated in a coach. There were only two people in the coach with her: the Zemini woman and the man that had healed her arm. She knew their names now, Imani and Erik. It turned out that Erik truly was from Fjerda, though she had not had any doubt about that. Imani, in turn, was not actually from Novyi Zem, but her mother – who was also a Grisha – was from there. She had been born in Ravka and had never seen her mother's homeland.
Freya might have found that upsetting had Imani not had a hand in the burning of her village and the subsequent death of her father. She could never imagine not seeing her parents' homeland. She had been gone from Fjerda for only a week at most, and already she missed the tall pine trees surrounding her village, the hardness of the permafrost and the soft cold of the snow.
Throughout their journey, Erik tried to teach her some more about Ravka. The language, the customs and everything about Os Alta. She learned of the different coloured robes – keftas, as she had been told – and the Grisha who wore them. She learned about the classes she would take, and the examinations she would undergo. Everything Erik said was just an estimate of his, as she was something entirely new. That's why when they arrived at the Little Palace, she would be taken straight to the Darkling.
Erik called him General Kirigan and spoke of him with respect. It was strange for Freya to hear. No one from Fjerda spoke of the enemy general with any sort of fondness. They all spat his name in disgust, cursing it, or whispered the word 'Darkling' with fear. But Erik, born in Fjerda, in Djerholm itself, did not seem to fear him, nor hate him.
"You will address him as moi soverenyi when you are brought to him," Erik said on the twelfth day of their travel. They were close now to Os Alta and had been travelling along the main merchant road known as the Vy for a few days. Their travel had been greatly hastened, as the road was much smoother and wider than the paths they had taken up until that point. "You will know him by his black kefta. He is the only one who wears one."
"The only one?" Freya asked in confusion. She had learned quickly during the journey to allow herself to be interested. It was better than being afraid. Erik nodded and shifted in his seat slightly. He looked tired and annoyed, not that Freya could blame him. Being a coach with her and Imani must've been exhausting in and of itself. The nearly two-week journey where they rarely stopped to rest would only add to it.
"For now, yes." Freya raised a brow questioningly. Erik sighed. "The General has a son, but his Grisha powers have not manifested yet. He is perhaps a year or two younger than you." That made sense, Freya supposed.
"And if his Grisha powers manifest and he isn't in the same order as the General?" She didn't know where the question came from, but the words barreled past her lips before she could think to stop him. Erik froze, earning a concerned nudge from Imani at his side who did not understand Fjerdan. Why she was stationed at the Fjerdan border if she did not speak the language, Freya did not know. Perhaps so she could not understand her victims as they pleaded for mercy.
