by K.E. Rodgers
***
Hin Feroast - The Journey
The ride to the capital city, Laeradberg, was now a two days ride by primitive means. At the moment that was all that was left to them. The once great cities of the east had fallen into disrepair after the final battle; leaving them to molder and decay by the elements of nature. A strong animal, the hross was needed to move the able bodies of the followers on their now nine month journey home. Those who could not continue were left along the way. It was cruel at times, but a necessary sacrifice.
“What do you think your family is going to say when they see you?” Finnr spoke up as he came up alongside of Kári, his hross breathing heavily in the chilly northern air.
Several inches shorter than Kári, with deep red hair and cheeks that blushed crimson when he was agitated, Finnr made up for his lack of height with girth and muscles. Only the foolish challenged such a man and lived to regret his blunder.
He was from a family of dream-speakers, those that could walk freely in the dream world and speak to the Norns, the weavers of fate who did much of their work or mischief while the unsuspecting humans slept. He was also a valued and dear friend of the Haldis family. Finnr was all that was left of his family’s lineage; a solitary branch in his family tree.
Kári turned to look over at him, a smile that didn’t quite reach her eyes plastered on her beguiling and youthful face. That innocent and naïve looking face belied the aged creature inside. While she might appear to be a young woman, she was in fact many years older than that. A gift from her father was the extension of her life’s threads.
“They will say ‘who are you’ and ‘get off my land’,” Kári remarked with a sour note in her lyrical voice.
Finnr’s thick eyebrows drew together in a sympathetic frown. “You don’t know that for sure, Kári.” His voice, unlike hers, was deep and sometimes his unusual accent confused the others with its odd cadence. She had been around him long enough now to never have such difficulty.
The Black Woods was fast approaching them and soon they would be immersed in the thickness. It was said that strange creatures inhabited the dense foliage and that the unwary traveler could easily become lost in them. The stories of the forest creatures were told as bedtime stories to youngsters to get them to sleep at night. No grown-up would think to be frightened of the woods. However, even grown-ups can easily fall into the lure of superstitious folklore.
Eymundr came up on the other side, taking his place on Kári’s right side. They thought they were sly in their tactics, positioning themselves protectively around their princess. But Kári was aware of this maneuver, yet she didn’t reprimand them. Though she was more than capable of defending herself should someone be foolish enough to try to attack, she had to admit that some small part of her felt comforted by the protective gesture. Growing up the step-daughter of a proud Viking lord and the eldest child of a strong-willed mother, she was reared to never allow someone else to manage her life. It was the only way she knew how to survive.
“I for one will be glad to be home so I can finally sleep in a real bed instead of the cold hard ground.” Eymundr remarked wistfully. He asked for little in life. All he needed or wanted was a soft warm bed to wallow in. Sleeping was his favorite hobby other than fighting and he had perfected the art to a tee. However, he rarely got to engage in this treasured activity. In a land turned on its side from battle and enemies constantly tailing their every move, sleep was dangerous. “What I wouldn’t give for a feather tick and blankets that aren’t scratchy and worn.” He closed his eyes imagining the feel of soft fabric against his body.
Eymundr was of equal height with Kári, but unlike Finnr his build was sinewy rather than bulky. His hair was black as the midnight sky with streaks of glossy silver. The silver was a hereditary trait from his mother and her family and was a mark of divine wisdom. Both he and Finnr were of the peasant or working class, a station to which most of the country’s population resided in. For that reason, neither carried a last name. If not for the influence of the Norns, the three paths of these individuals would have never crossed.
“You talk as if you’re thinking of a woman.” Finnr said with a chuckle, revealing dimples in his round face.
“For me they’re one and the same. What’s the first thing you’re going to do when you get home, Kári?” As he asked the question, he noticed Finnr shaking his head at him in disapproval.
Kári clutched the reigns of her hross tightly in her gloved hands. She rarely thought about the capital city as home any more. It had been so long since she thought of calling any place home; such a concept was almost foreign to her vocabulary. Her family knew nothing of this return journey with what remained of the war party she had left with many years earlier. For all they knew she was dead and buried as her step-father and mother now were. It was a reasonable assumption after they had stopped receiving correspondence. The reason for that was the person who had thought to keep the family abreast of Kári’s whereabouts and the state of her health had died on a quiet field two years earlier from a plague that had swept through her followers. Now they were in for a massive surprise when the prodigal son – in this case daughter – returned to them. Would they forgive her last words to them or would they throw her out on her ass as she deserved?
Kári squelched a momentary weakness to cry as the image of her younger sister flashed into her head. She had been a toddler just learning to walk, stumbling around furniture and falling down regularly onto her padded behind. By now she would be a woman full grown with no memory of her older sister, merely a ghost to her; a faint recollection with no face or history to warrant tender feelings for.
Sefa Haldis was Kári’s half sister through their mother and the legitimate heir to the Eastern Nation. As Kári was the product of a deity and a mortal woman, her odd conception was not legitimized in the eyes of her people. Even though her step-father, Sefa’s father, accepted her as his daughter, it was not enough to please the countries politicians who were suspicious of a woman who could claim the Allfather as her true father. The Allfather didn’t step in to change their minds, nor did her step-father, who despite his usual aggressive and independent nature let the doubts of his political followers to decide the fate of his step-daughter. If not for her mother’s interference, who was a princess in her own right from one of the once ally Western Nations, Kári would have been banished or sent to live with her father in the frozen north.
In two days time she would either see shining and happy faces or faces full of mistrust or even worse apathy. It was on them now to welcome her back into the fold of family love or eject her back into a cold and broken world.
Kári sighed outwardly, causing a breath of warm air from her body to escape her mouth which circled and wavered around her head catching light so that it twinkled and shone like an iridescent crown over her hair. Her eyes, which flashed a royal blue color when she was agitated or bright and icy on the rare occasions when she was happy, looked as deep and fathomless as the great northern seas. Kári closed her long blonde lashes, hiding the deep anguish in her eyes from her dear companions.
Several quite seconds ticked by with no interference from the two men who sat diligently on their hrosses beside her. They knew better than to interfere during one of her moments. These times happened rarely, but even still, when she was lost in her own head, it was best for all to let her work it out without them.
Only moments later, she finally opened her eyes and for the entire world to see Kári looked like a calm and content young woman. But the truth of her pain was never far from her companions minds. Both men wondered constantly if returning home was the best thing for her despite their own hopes of returning.
Finnr knew only so much about Kári’s last days with her family before they had set out to follow in the path of her step-father. Bergr Haldis had been a hard man, one whose own stubbornness and at times pigheaded behavior put himself and his family in hot water. In spite of this his step-daughter had ad
ored him and more importantly respected his decisions. When word had reached them that most of his followers had been taken down by enemy troops and news of his own mortally wounded body had reached the ears of the family, it was she who had gone out after him. Harsh words had been exchanged and then she had left them all behind expecting, in the heat of her anger, to never return to them again.
Kári’s mother, Ósk, slipped from this world several months later, dying from the effects of a crushed heart at losing both her husband and a daughter in such a short time. The family had managed to get this news to her eldest daughter while she was on the move west toward her father’s camp. It was a crushing blow to both the family and the entire country. When Kári had finally reached the side of her step-father his injuries seemed far worse than when she had been told of them through his messenger. Upon informing him of his wife’s demise, Bergr quickly found the world and his once treasured cause unimportant in light of her death. He left this world to join his beloved wife in the world of mist and shadows, leaving behind the daughter who had risked everything to come and save him.
Finnr had stood beside her as she held the hand of the only father she had ever known in this world. She didn’t cry as he expected any normal woman or even man would under the burden of a loved one’s coming death. Kári remained un-effected as the light of life dimmed in the great warrior’s eyes. In the last seconds of his life he whispered the name of his most beloved and then was gone. With her step-father and mother’s unexpected deaths, this woman who gave the world the impression that she was without weakness was left alone in the world. Only in her dreams did she let her weaknesses show.
“I’m going to have a warm shower,” Kári managed with a little humor in her voice. “That’s the first thing I’m going to do when we get to Laeradberg. I smell worse than my hross or possibly a troll and that is defiantly saying something.”
Eymundr leaned over and took in a great whiff of air. He scrunched his broad nose in response causing both Finnr and Kári to laugh because of the repugnant look on his face.
“You’re right; you do have a rather strong odor about you.” Then he lifted his left arm and smelled himself. He quickly drew back, blinking his eyes rapidly trying to get the sting out of them. “But I have to say, I smell a whole lot worse.”
Finnr reached his own arm across Kári, extending it toward Eymundr. “Smell me. I bet I smell much worse.”
Eymundr gave a tentative sniff of his friends arm, drawing back as he shook his head in the negative. “No, my friend, I have to say that I smell the worst. See this hair,” he said, pointing to his midnight locks, “When we first started out, it was as blonde as Kári’s, now it’s so dirty you’d think it was naturally this color.”
Not to be shown up by his friend, Finnr raised his bulky arms in the air showing off his muscular figure. “You see these muscles; you’d think that after living off of weak soup and stale bread that I’d be as skinny as a rail. I’m really a bean pole and all this girth is simply built up dirt and grime.”
“You think that’s something,” Eymundr contradicted with a great show as he brought up his right booted foot. “There is so much muck between my toes that a small tree has started growing on my big toe.”
“Big deal,” Finnr scoffed. “I’ve been growing a forest on my toes for weeks now. Your puny tree is nothing compared to the acreage I’ve got.”
“My legs look like the Black Woods in the spring time,” Kári interjected causing both men to look at her curiously and with obvious frowns.
“I find that hard to believe, princess,” Eymundr said, addressing her as princess in a sarcastic voice. “Even if you wallowed in the mud for months you’d still smell like sunshine and roses. You’re just not normal that way.”
“I agree, princess.” Finnr added, taking up using the title as well, “You don’t have the character that we do to get to the level of stink that we aspire to. In the sport of competitive rankness you are most definitely on amateur status.”
“It seems men stick together, even in stink competitions.” Kári looked from Finnr to Eymundr who shook their head in the affirmative at her statement. “That figures. Well then I suggest when you both get home that each of you takes a week long bath and have someone take an ax to your overgrown feet forests. And until we do reach Laeradberg, I suggest that neither one of you take off your boots. Let’s keep the infestation of whatever gnarly creatures are growing inside them away from our camp as we can’t possible survive another plague.”
“I felt the icy rancor of those words like a chill running down my back,” Eymundr remarked with a half grin. “I think the tree on my big toe just wilted a little.”
“I’m glad you can find comedy at this time. I only hope that you can keep up your jollity once we’re deep inside the Black Woods.”
“You’re not scared of the Black Woods, are you?” Finnr questioned, knowing without uncertainty that she would never admit to such a weakness.
“Scared, no, concerned for my followers, yes. There are more than just fantastical creatures in the Black Woods. We are easy targets for the Red Rebels or anyone who would think it great sport to attack a defeated band of the Eastern army.”
They said nothing more as the small stragglers of a once great army formed a long chain as they made their way into the Black Woods. Once they reached the clearing beyond the woods it would be only a short ride to the capital gates. Nine months of wandering and it would all be over soon, a deep thicket of trees was all that stood in their way.