Snow-Walker

by Catherine Fisher

  “Idiot!”

  Letting her go, he drank again.

  Skapti glanced at Kari. “And you, runemaster. How are you?”

  “Oh, well enough.” But Kari was watching the thralls who tended the fire, their terrified sidelong glances.

  “You can go,” Jessa said to them sharply. They hurried out.

  “Don’t mind them,” she said. “They’re new here. Wulfgar’s own men. Most of the people here won’t have seen you before. They’re bound to stare.”

  “I know.” He gave her a quiet smile. She saw again that stunned silence in the mead hall, the crowd staring at Gudrun’s son, her image, the other Snow-walker, the sorcerer from the world’s end. For years only rumors about him had spread from hold to hold, about a creature kept prisoner in the uttermost north, and even when he’d come here before with herself and Wulfgar and Skapti, hardly anyone had seen him. Sitting here now, Jessa remembered his struggle with the witch that only she had watched, in this very hall—the blazing flames, the rune snow, the exhausting matching of two powers. And after it Gudrun had gone, walking into the night, leaving Kari her curse, and scars on all their hearts.

  “They will never love you,” she said, “never trust you. Power like ours is a terror to them.”

  Looking at him now, Jessa knew he was remembering that too.

  Just then Wulfgar came back, and Vidar with him, walking with exaggerated care. The priest still looked pale, but his eyes were focused. He too stared at Kari.

  “Vidar,” Wulfgar said coolly, “these are two of my greatest friends. This is Brochael Gunnarsson, and Kari Ragnarsson.”

  Vidar’s eyes flickered briefly to Brochael. He nodded. “I’m honored. I’ve heard much about you … both.”

  The big man slapped him amiably on the arm. “Feeling better?”

  “A little.” Vidar moved away stiffly. “The aftereffects of the trance echo in my mind for a time.”

  “I’m sure they do.” Brochael leaned back and stretched his legs out to the fire. “One soul is enough for any man, without inviting the gods in.”

  Everyone hid smiles, except Vidar, who stared at Brochael coldly.

  “Have you eaten everything, Brochael?” Jessa asked him. “Because it’s about time you told us why you’re here. Not just to see me, I suppose?”

  He laughed gruffly, but she saw him look quickly at Kari. “You tell them.”

  Kari turned the cup in his thin fingers. He seemed to be searching for the right words. At last he said, “We came to warn you.”

  “You too?” Wulfgar leaned forward. “What about?”

  Kari looked at him strangely. He looked so much like Gudrun that Jessa felt cold, and suddenly uneasy.

  “Something’s coming,” Kari said slowly. “Something evil. She sent it.”

  “Your mother?”

  Vidar asked that, and they all frowned at him.

  But Kari only nodded after a moment.

  “How do you know?” the priest persisted.

  “He’s seen it.” Brochael flung a bone to a hound under the table.

  “Seen it?”

  “That’s what I said.”

  Nobody spoke. Jessa knew well how Kari could see things—in water, in shiny surfaces—things that were happening far off, or in the past. She also guessed he had some strange remote knowledge of Gudrun, wherever she lived out in the wilderness of the north.

  “Kari,” she murmured, “we’ve already heard of this thing. Men came from an outlying district yesterday. They said it had killed a man up there, and livestock. They seemed to think it was coming here.”

  “It is.” He rubbed dust and a smudge of mud from his face. “She’s formed it out of spells, deep spells, and runes and cold, out of snow and the dark between the stars. Out of her anger with us. I know it’s coming here—something here draws it. I’ve come to find out what. I’ve seen it twice, not clearly, blurred, but each time closer to the hold. It’s changing; I think it’s growing stronger.”

  Vidar stirred. “I cannot always remember what the god says through me, but did not Freyr himself speak of a pale approaching evil?”

  “He did,” Wulfgar muttered.

  Vidar looked dubiously at Kari. “It might be this creature.”

  Jessa looked up quickly, caught up by something in his tone. She saw he was staring at Kari in fascination. It made her angry, and the memory of the thief ’s face in the doorway leaped back into her mind. She wanted to be rid of him, to talk to Kari.

  “You two must be tired out,” she said quickly. “We can leave all the talk till the morning. Then we can decide what to do.”

  Brochael heaved himself up at once. “That’s the girl I know. Bossy.”

  “And she shows me what a poor host I’ve become,” Wulfgar said. He stood too, tall and dark. “You’re both welcome, you know that. And I think we’ll need you, Kari. There are still ghosts and echoes here, it seems.”

  Kari nodded.

  “And where are the birds, those strange followers of yours?”

  “In the roof.”

  Everyone looked up. Two hunched shadows shuffled on a high rafter. Their small eyes glinted in the red light. One of them gave a low croak.

  Vidar stared at them. “What are these? Spirits?”

  “Ravens,” Skapti said slyly. “That’s all.”

  “Indeed.” The priest turned slowly to Wulfgar. “Jarl, can I speak with you now?”

  As Skapti led the others out, Jessa glanced back. Wulfgar was sitting in his chair and Vidar was leaning over him, talking rapidly and quietly, his hands spread. What was he up to now?

  Upstairs, after some searching, they found an empty room with two sleeping booths built against the walls. Most rooms in the Jarlshold were empty, untouched since Gudrun’s time. This one was both cold and damp.

  “Never mind! It’s a palace after Thrasirshall,” Brochael muttered.

  “You weren’t expected,” Skapti said. “We’ve no farseers in this hold.” He grinned at Kari.

  “Freyr forgot to mention it, then,” Brochael said drily.

  “Yes.”

  They exchanged an amused look.

  “Well, you’ll need a fire lit.”

  Jessa turned to the door but Kari said, “No. There’s no need.”

  He squatted by the pile of sticks and peats in the square central hearth and did not touch them, did not even seem to move at all, but suddenly she caught the glint of flame deep among the kindling, and in a second it had caught and was a red line crackling down the edge of the dry wood.

  He looked up at her.

  “Now, if Vidar had seen that,” Skapti muttered, sitting down, “it really would have made him nervous.”

  Jessa couldn’t laugh. She was amazed and a little frightened. Kari sat back watching her. He looked tired. “I’ve been doing what you said. Remember? You told me once that I should know what my powers are. Find out what I can do. So I’ve found out.”

  Pulling her down beside him, Brochael gripped her cold hands. “You should see, Jessa! All these months, dreaming and sleeping and experimenting until I thought I’d never get a word out of him again! And then—fires lighting, yes, and voices and movements drifting outside the windows all night, as if visions hung there, or the Aesir themselves. Branches breaking into blossom.” He laughed gruffly, with a look at Kari. “And all sorts of things he won’t even tell me about.”

  There was a hint of worry in that look, she saw. “But this creature. What about that?”

  Kari stared at the new, noisy flames. “She may have sent it to destroy us. And it’s close, Jessa, somewhere very near. Yesterday the birds attacked it.”

  “And how do you know that?” she said.

  He gave her his brief, sidelong smile. “Because they told me.”

  Twelve

  Nor did he let them rest

  but the next night brought new horrors.

  The night had many small, red eyes.

  They shone, glinting and winking, far
off in the dark miles of land. Squatting in the loose rocks and rubble of the pass, the creature gazed down at them. They are fires, the voice instructed it. They are dangerous, a fierce pain, a spirit that leaves dark prints deep in the flesh. Keep away from them. They are all that can harm you.

  The rune beast nodded, scratching its face and eyes. It was weary; it had come a long, bitter way. And hungry. Always hungry.

  Below, a great stretch of water glinted under the moon; the creature could see the tide flooding in, the gleaming currents surging upstream. Sharp smells of salt and fish and seaweed drifted up to it; the bleat of goats on the shore made it stir with pangs of memory.

  Nearer, on this side of the fjord, a smoky huddle of dark shapes clustered on the fellside, with one bigger shadow in the center. These were the houses men built; the creature had prowled about several in the last weeks. But never so many together, nor huddled so close.

  The still air stank of men, of smoke; the rank smell of crowded cattle rose up to it. And something else: the thing it had searched for, all the long miles. Attentively it considered the minute sounds of the night: the water’s lap, the cluck of sleepy hens, a rattle of pebbles. Then, silent, moving from rock to rock, it began to edge down the fellside. Marshland lay to its right, silver pools among black, broken reeds, soft bubbles of unknown underwater stirrings. Skirting the soft tussocks and the mud, it prowled over a black slope scattered with boulders, down to the track that led in among the houses. There it waited, breathing harshly.

  A man moved among the houses, a shadow in shadows. The moon lit the sharpness of metal in his hand. Without moving, the creature watched him pass.

  This is the place, her voice said. The voice was cold and remote. It seemed to come from a great distance, and yet it was close, somewhere inside, heart-deep. The words held hidden, fierce delight. This is the place. Go on! Go in!

  Stirred, the creature shook its head, rocked itself, shivered. It felt eager, and afraid. Something was there that burned with power.

  But later, when the moon had slid under a great swelling of cloud, the thing moved down into the settlement. It prowled silently among the shadows, from house to house, drifting like a ghost by shuttered windows, the rattling doors of byres, to the very walls of the stone-built hall, where the grim dragon heads roared silently down upon it. All the windows were barred, the doors secure, a building of blank eyes, holding secrets. Here was the end of its long journey. But the hunted thing was safe, locked in here, untouchable.

  Wrathful, the rune beast swayed upright. Its eyes glinted; moonlight touched its snow-pale hands. Then it turned, swift as thought, and crouched in the lee of the wall.

  When the watchman came around the corner, he had no time even to scream.

  Thirteen

  Along the wide highroads the chiefs of the

  clans came from far and near to see the foe’s footprints.

  Jessa opened her eyes and lay stiff. Not again, she thought. But the hold was silent. Across the dark room the brazier threw a dim light into the rafters. She lay there a moment, trying to find the small noise that had woken her; then she turned over and curled up, comfortably warm.

  Outside, something shuffled and slid in the wind.

  She thought about Vidar. Tomorrow she would tell Kari all about it—about the thief in the inn and the man who had opened the door. As she remembered, the cold point of an invisible knife touched her throat. She rolled over angrily. Yes, Kari would be able to help. They could certainly try that house again.

  Below the window something scraped along the wall. She thought of Wulfgar’s men, watching the fences and gateways, their swords sharp in the frost. Then she thought about Kari. He had grown, somehow. He was more silent, though he’d never said much, and there was a new aura about him, a hidden tingle of power, an invisible coat. It reminded her of something, and sleepily she searched caves and hollows for the memory until the shock of it made her open her eyes in the dark. Gudrun. Of course.

  Then she sat up. For a moment she thought she had heard a low sound outside, almost a moan, an eerie murmur.

  Pushing the bedclothes aside she went to the window and tugged open the shutter. Moonlight flooded her face; a cold wind blew her hair back, and putting out her head she looked down. The stone wall of the hold glittered with frost; at its foot a pool in the dark mud glinted.

  No one was about.

  The houses were dark masses of shadow, the sky overcast, dragging cloud over the moon. For a moment she waited there, listening, but the wind was too cold, and soon she latched the window, slammed the shutters, and leaped back into bed, shivering, her feet like ice. It took her a long time to get back to sleep.

  In the morning she was halfway into her coat when the door thumped wide. Skapti called, “Jessa!” and was gone, racing along the wooden floorboards. Grabbing her boots she ran after him, into Kari’s room.

  Brochael, bare chested and tousled with sleep, had the ax in his hands already. “What’s wrong?”

  Hurtling in behind him, Jessa heard the skald say, “Your creature. It’s been here.”

  Kari jumped down from the windowsill, the ravens rising outside.

  “Not ours!” Brochael snapped.

  “Listen!” Skapti’s hiss silenced him. “There are tracks, all over the hold. Big, spread prints. And one man is missing.”

  Brochael flashed a glance at Kari. They all did.

  He shook his pale hair quickly. “I don’t know anything.”

  “We still need you.” Skapti turned. “Wulfgar’s going after it now, while the trail is fresh. He’s furious.”

  Lacing up her boot, Jessa said, “I’m coming too.”

  Brochael gave a quick snort and grabbed his shirt and coat. “There’s nothing to eat, I suppose?”

  “No time.” Skapti was already halfway down the stairs.

  Brochael scowled after him. “If I was as thin as a worn-out bowstring, I don’t suppose I’d care either!”

  The courtyard was chaotic. Ponies were waiting, men were running, shouting. Wulfgar, on his black Skarnir horse, swung around and looked down at Kari. They could see how upset he was.

  “Your warning was barely in time,” he snapped. “Look.”

  But Jessa was already crouching over the prints in the mud. They were close under the wall, large and splayed, five toed. As Kari kneeled beside her and touched the spoor lightly, she whispered, “I think I heard it.”

  He looked at her.

  “In the night. I was half asleep. I heard a sort of … whimper.”

  His colorless eyes looked through her for a second.

  “Hunger,” he said.

  “What?”

  “Hunger, Jessa.”

  Puzzled, she wondered if he was talking about himself, or Brochael, or … but there was no time to ask. Wulfgar was bitterly impatient, and when they were all on horseback, he led them out at a gallop, their hooves ringing on the cobbled track.

  The morning was cold; the grass and mud stiff with frost. The prints were set hard, leading into the marshy land behind the hold, but once in there the horses sank fetlock-deep into the soft mud, stumbling over tussocks of wiry grass. Finding the trail here was impossible, the riders spread out in a wide fan and moved quickly up to firmer ground, the dogs running and snuffling in all directions.

  Jessa stayed close to Kari, but neither of them spoke. He was unused to riding, but the pony seemed to understand him; Jessa noticed how it moved and paused when he wanted it to, without rein or spur.

  A shout from the left brought them all galloping over; one of the men pointed to the prints. Half full of water, the marks were still soft, recent. Something heavy had been dragged here; the grass was flattened, its stems broken, the mud scored smooth.

  Brochael leaped down and tugged something from the mud. He wiped it on his sleeve and saw it was a sword hilt, snapped clean in half. There were dark stains on the leather grip.

  Grimly Wulfgar stared down at it. Then he looked ahead. Before
them the ground ran uphill to the edges of the forest; boulder-littered turf with a small stream leaping down over the stones.

  “Up there.”

  The dogs slithered and slunk around the rocks. Jessa knew they were behaving strangely. Most of them would have been racing into the wood by now, barking and yelping.

  “They’re scared,” she said to Brochael.

  He leaned over and looked at them. “You’re right. They’ve got the scent and they don’t like it.”

  The trail led high into the hills, winding along the bank of the stream. At the end of the valley they climbed higher, and all the way up, the horses were nervous.

  At the fringe of a dark rank of trees they stopped.

  “Spread out,” Wulfgar ordered. “But stay within sight of those on either side.”

  “We’ll just drive it out ahead of us,” Vidar muttered, peering into the green dimness.

  “Maybe. But I don’t want to corner it. There aren’t enough of us here for that. It’s Halldor we need to find.”

  He knew, they all knew, that the man was dead. No one said it. Anger and a cold fear hung over them all, subduing the dogs, unnerving the horses. Riding close to Brochael, Jessa moved her horse among the narrow, silvery trunks of birch, hearing the unnatural silence of the wood, no breeze, no birdsong.

  They rode slowly, the horses crushing the new shoots of bracken, tall bare stems curled at the top like shepherds’ crooks, cracking the winter’s fallen twigs. The smell of fungi and cold damp soil rose among the fresh growth; above, the leafless trees let gray light filter down.

  On each side of her, riders moved: Skapti far off to the left, and nearer, on the right, Brochael, and beyond him Kari. The big man was keeping them both close to him, and that was wise, Jessa thought, because if the creature came roaring out of the wood, they’d need him and his ax. Her fingers tightened as she glanced nervously around. The ground was uneven. Now the trees were mixed; spruce and fir massed in heavy banks. The light became gloomier, greener. She lost sight of Skapti and called out to him in alarm.