Page 38 of Tarnished Crown
The others emerged behind us, everyone besides Evander and the caretakers. I lunged for my towel to cover myself.
“Everyone, line up!” Igor shouted, and the men lined up on either side of me and Kirill.
“You’ll want to keep your towel dry, your Highness.” Kirill said, pointing toward a large rock by the lake. “You can leave it there if you like, when you jump in the water.”
Igor yelled for us to go, and soon there was a line of naked-man-butts running away from me. One by one, they leaped over a snowy mound before jumping straight into the icy water, emerging as quickly as they went in.
I squeezed my eyes shut, my legs refusing to move. I had done this before, in the river with Mila.
It would be the same, right?
“I thought you were tough, Princess!” Dmitriy cackled. “Prove it!”
When in Socair...
I repeated the line over and over again, as I took off running wildly through the snow. Even when the gaping maw in the ice made me want to run in the opposite direction, I didn’t falter.
But I did scream the entire way down.
As soon as I went crashing under the icy water, my lungs seized, and my limbs locked up.
For a split second, I panicked, just before breaking the surface and taking a gasping breath of air once again. Despite the shock to my system, I felt more invigorated than I had in ages.
The men all cheered and laughed from the shore as they wrapped themselves in robes. Someone had even thoughtfully left one on the rock for me near my towel. I threw the robe around myself, grateful for the coverage while I twisted the towel around my hair.
Part of me debated going back into the sauna to warm up again, but my attention was yanked in another direction.
“Hey, Princess! Come judge our butts!”
A cacophony of laughter erupted from the men at the guard named Paavo’s request.
Surely, they don’t mean their actual arses.
A sigh of relief escaped me when I saw they were all still fully robed.
The nine men stood in a line in front of strange indents in the snow. Even grumpy ol’ Taras was there, looking extremely uncertain about having been caught doing something even remotely fun.
When I neared the indents and registered what I was looking at, I howled with laughter.
There, in the snow, instead of the angels my sisters and I would make, were nine perfectly shaped indents of buttocks.
“You have to judge. Which is the superior arse?” Dmitriy asked, and I laughed again.
It felt almost wrong to be laughing so much when everything was a mess, and I missed Davin more than I could put into words. I could perfectly picture him fitting in here, merrily sinking his butt into the snow and teasing me for being the reluctant judge of this unusual contest.
Was he having fun in Elk, or just homesick and miserable? At least I would get to ask him tomorrow, and hopefully go with him after that.
If Evander actually let me go free...
I shook the feeling off. There was nothing I could do about it now.
Instead, I made a show of thoroughly studying each individual indent, finally determining that the second from the left would be the winner.
The men shoved Taras forward, hollering and laughing. I was surprised to see a smile crack his usually hardened features. Picking a small branch from a nearby pine tree, I handed it to him with a dip of my head.
“All hail the victor!”
Taras’ mouth pinched shut, but amusement danced in his eyes.