Dolor and Shadow

by Angela Chrysler

  An archer fell to the ground impaled by the precision of Rune’s arrow, and Kallan threw her dagger into the heart of a second man. Rune unsheathed his sword and speared the third war-man, sliding the corpse off his blade while Kallan slammed the base of her palm into a face with hazel eyes, filling her hand with blood. He fell limply to the ground as the last war-man stared, stunned stupid, his eyes wide with fear as he read his fate moments before it came.

  With hand glowing red, Kallan seized his throat and fired a blast through his neck. His lifeless body hit the ground with a thud.

  “Erroneous?” Rune said. “Really?”

  Kallan and Rune’s breaths punched the air, neither aware of the single set of hazel eyes still watching from the ground.

  Thick red flowed down Kallan’s arm, mingling with the blood that covered her hands. After wiping the blade of his sword, Rune sheathed the weapon and came to stand before Kallan.

  “Are you hurt?” Rune asked, taking her arm and inspecting the shallow wound from the arrow.

  “I’m fine,” she said, taking back her arm before he could inspect the wound further. “I don’t even require a spell.”

  Rune scowled.

  “Great,” he said, bending down to a corpse and pulling off a pair of boots. “Then you’ll have no trouble keeping up. Here.” Rune tossed the boots into Kallan’s chest. “And don’t use your Seidr here. The last thing we need is more attention, princess.”

  While hopping about on one foot, Kallan slipped on the boots. An accompaniment of grumbles followed Rune as he kicked about the corpses and gathered up as many of the swords and daggers as he could find. After looking over each sword, he selected the best of the bunch and bundled the rest in the time it took Kallan to lace up the boots.

  “Here,” he said, extending an iron sword to Kallan.

  She snatched the weapon as Rune took up the reins, pulling Astrid into the forest.

  After looking over the mediocre sheath and its blade, Kallan fastened the weapon to her belt. Once the sword was in place, she shuffled the contents in her pouch and withdrew the golden fruit. Kallan sank her teeth into its flesh, and, after a quick examination to ensure her cut was on the mend, she scrambled along over stump and stone in the shadow of Rune’s footsteps.

  “Where are we going?” she asked as they bounded away from the road.

  “Off the trail,” Rune said. “When these men don’t return, more will come looking for them.”

  Kallan added a skip to her step and ate through the apple as Rune grumbled from within the darkness.

  “It’s a fine pickled mess you’ve gotten us into.”

  “I’ve gotten—” Kallan said, oblivious to the pair of hazel eyes that dilated at the shimmering apple. “You’re the one who feels the closest route to Alfheim lies in the opposite direction!”

  “And put that coat on,” Rune said. “I’m tired of seeing you shivering. You’re making me cold.”

  “I won’t—”

  The coat landed in her face.

  “Hurry along, princess.” Rune resumed leading Astrid through the dark, not bothering to see if she followed. “I don’t have time to compensate for your feminine weaknesses.”

  “I am not—” Kallan released a high-pitched growl.

  Breathing steadily through a pair of swollen eyes already blackened from a shattered nose, Olaf’s war-man focused on the fruit clutched in Kallan’s hand as he watched their figures fade into the darkness.

  * * *

  Olaf burrowed his gaze into Tarn. A fire rolled between them, casting shadows over the spacious tent, illuminating the dried blood that covered the whole of the warrior’s chest.

  A table and chair served as a prop for the several swords and shields strewn about with the finest armor of Eire’s Land. Fine furs and feathered pillows buried the makeshift bed. Polished trays of fruits and meats, breads and meads, stretched along the far side of Olaf’s tent.

  The cast iron fire pit rolled with flames in the center of the room where Olaf sat, his fingers woven and his elbows propped on the armrests of his chair. Sitting beside him, a large elkhound rested its head on Olaf’s knee, his dark brown eyes half closed with drowsiness.

  “She’s Seidkona,” Tarn said. His eyes remained steadfast with certainty. “I have no doubt she’s the one you’ve been looking for.”

  “And you’re sure of this?” Olaf asked.

  He unfolded his fingers, allowing his hand to fall onto the top of the elkhound. The large dog lifted his eyes in adoration as Olaf ruffled the top of Vige’s head.

  “She fired the Seidr through Varg’s neck,” Tarn assured him. “I watched her mend the wound from Njord’s arrow with an apple as gold as the flakes sprinkled into your imported wines. She is the one you seek.”

  “And she’s an Alfr peasant, you say?” Olaf peered from the hound, his hand resting immobile on Vige’s head, his attention captivated by Tarn’s report. “It seems you were right,” he muttered to Thorer standing in the shadows behind him. “Did you happen to catch of what clan?”

  Tarn shook his head. “They didn’t make mention of it. Only that they journey to Alfheim.”

  “By passing through the Dofrarfjell?” Thorer said.

  “It’s entirely possible they journey to Nidaros.” Olaf rewove his fingers and returned his elbows to the armrests. “All roads lead to Nidaros.”

  A suspended silence thickened the air within the tent.

  “So she’s Alfr.” Olaf turned a curious eye to Tarn. “What of her companion?”

  Tarn nodded.

  “He is also. At first I thought him to be a guide, but he spoke too boldly to be a servant and she was dressed too poorly to own a slave.” Tarn recalled the Seidkona’s objections as she followed through with her companion’s directions.

  “Thorer.” Olaf turned to his shoulder and Thorer straightened his back at attention.

  “Sir.”

  “How many days are we from Nidaros?”

  “Four.”

  “We risk losing their trail if we delay.” Olaf gave the dog’s head another gruff mauling. “Send a scout and twelve armed men. They are to take her alive. I want the scout to report on their whereabouts as soon as we have them within sight. I will lead a group of my men and provide aid once they have her in custody.”

  “And the men here?” Thorer asked.

  “Have them break camp, but lead them on as planned to Viken. We can not divert our road to Aeslo. I have messages meant for Dan’s Reach that can not be delayed.”

  * * *

  “Rest here.” Rune shoved Kallan onto a large rock within a small clearing. The long day was visibly wearing on them as the midnight hour crept steadily by.

  Without argument, Kallan shifted her weight on the stone before pulling off the boots too big for her feet. At once, she set to work tearing off strips from her pant legs and fashioning herself foot wrappings as Rune gave her a discreet once-over from the corner of his eye.

  Her bloodied, bare feet had been sliced and healed again. A layer of dried blood, caked and crusted, clung to her neck, her hands, parts of her face, and most of her arms, and, although the large, leather overcoat kept her shielded from the dropping temperatures, its constant weight had to burden her.

  Whether she admitted it or not, the journey was taking its toll.

  Exhausted, Rune settled himself down on the boulder beside Kallan.

  “We can’t stop to sleep,” he said, exhaling some of the weariness. “Not until we can guarantee a few hours between us and the locals.”

  “Then what?” Kallan said.

  Rune shrugged.

  “Then you’ll sleep.” Rune stared at the night sky.

  “What about you?” she asked.

  Detecting a touch of concern that eased his irate mood, Rune studied the placated Dokkalfr. Her eyes glistened beneath sleepiness.

  She was exhausted, and, if he pressed her, provoked her to lash at him, even rile her up a bit, he knew he stood a better chanc
e at making her talk now than ever before. The situation was too readily available for him.

  I’d be a fool if I didn’t take advantage of this.

  A brief concern for her sanity came and went as he resolved to push her to anger. If she was strong enough to survive a full blunt attack from Bergen, she could handle far more than what he had planned for her.

  “I’m not foolish enough to mistake deceitfulness for empathy,” he said, easing into the role and pouring on the disdain.

  For a moment, Kallan appeared hurt, then grimaced.

  “Perhaps I suspect deceit in you,” Kallan said. “Besides…I’m not tired.”

  Rune frowned at the blatant lie.

  “Good,” Rune said and crossed his arms, ensuring he looked the part. “Then you have enough energy now to tell me why so many people are interested in you.”

  Kallan furrowed her brow. “I don’t know.”

  There was the cue he had hoped would come. Before she could reach for her dagger, Rune had her by the arm, pulling her into him and holding her inches from his face.

  “I know too much about the players involved to believe you know nothing about what’s going on here. What’s so interesting about that pouch of yours that the Dvergar would keep you alive?”

  Kallan’s eyes glistened in the moonlight, wide and clear like glass. He could see the turmoil spinning within.

  “Abductors don’t make murderers,” she whispered.

  Still lying.

  “I know the Dvergar,” Rune said. “They don’t take hostages alive unless you have proven to be more valuable alive than dead in their mines. And you hardly look like you’d survive a day.”

  Kallan pursed her lips in question. He was losing her anger and he knew it.

  Rune gave her a shake and released her, letting her fall to the boulder.

  “How does a Ljosalfr know anything about the Dvergar?” she said.

  Rune scoffed, milking her temper. “I know a lot more than you give me credit for, princess.”

  Kallan dug her fingers into the rock. “Stop calling me that.”

  “Why does the Dvergar want your pouch?”

  “What’s to say I know anything about the madness of Motsognir?” she said.

  Her exhaustion was making her slow to anger. If he wanted the answers, he would have to push her harder. Rune shrugged, and pulled his mouth into a smirk he knew she wanted to slap off his face.

  “What’s to say you don’t?” he said. “You’ve driven me to bouts of madness numerous times in the past few weeks.” He widened his smile, intending this one to hurt. It would have to hurt. “And I like you. It’s no wonder you were almost dead when I found you.”

  Insult bathed her eyes, and Kallan hugged herself against the chill. A twinge of guilt stabbed Rune’s chest.

  “Why did you come here?” Kallan said. She was recoiling and the fight was leaving her. Rune held his hateful stare.

  “Nothing more than personal interests,” he said and waited until she showed a glimmer of flattery before ripping it out of her. “The Dokkalfar will raze my city if I step one foot in Alfheim without their queen.”

  “They’ll do that regardless. Without me to command them, they will lead my army to Gunir and rend the walls.” Kallan met his eyes. “Your precious Dark One, your berserker will be the first to die.”

  Rune was on her. With his hand to her throat, he shoved her down into the boulder before she could even realize he had moved. He held her pinned to the stone, seething with a sudden rage that flooded back as she dug at his hand. His breath grazed her ear as he hissed, indifferent to her claws.

  “Your games grow tiring. My patience is gone. You fail to see the greater threat while you play with my people to sate your blood lust.”

  Even beneath the filth from the road, she smelled of lavender and rose. “The pouch, princess,” he said, pushing aside the perfumes that fought to cloud his mind. “What do they want with the pouch?”

  Her eyes glazed behind a wall of unfallen tears.

  “It’s just a pouch,” she whispered, clutching his forearm.

  He could see her walls weakening beneath the strain he put on her. She was no longer able to withhold the angst that was dangerously close to tearing down the walls she had built.

  More prominent than before, her grief reached him from the shadows. Within the depths of her eyes, he saw his mother’s anguish peering back at him, images of his mother lying dead, his father howling with rage, and Bergen maddened with the wrath of the berserker.

  “Please.” A wall of unshed tears held in Kallan’s eyes.

  Rune awakened from his memories, surprised to see that he still held her by the neck against the stone. He forced himself to hold the position a while longer.

  “What pain do you so preciously harbor?” he whispered, remembering his plan, his act, and his feigned rage. “What complacency do you hide behind?” he asked and wondered why he cared at all.

  “Why did you come for me?” she breathed, studying him through the strands of hair that had spilled over her face.

  “I can’t return to Alfheim without the queen.” He spoke his half lie and watched the hurt blanket her face. “What did Motsognir want from you?”

  “Nothing.”

  “Nothing,” Rune said. “They beat you. They broke you. They battered you…and you insist they wanted nothing. I’ll ask again until you utter the words yourself. What did Motsognir want with you?”

  “Nothing.” Kallan shook her head. “Nothing”

  “Then why did they take you?” he asked. “What reason?”

  “Reason?” Kallan scoffed. “The Dvergar are trols. They have no reason. They abandon reason. It is what makes them trols.”

  A subtle grin pulled at Rune’s mouth, and the moonlight caught the gleam in his eye. He knew he had her.

  “Then why do you grieve what they took from you, princess?”

  “Leave me,” she said and, with a surge of the Seidr, fired a pulse of energy that Rune felt building within her. He caught the flame with his hand, but the movement forced him to release Kallan, who pushed herself up from the boulder and wasted no time collecting Astrid’s reins.

  Back to the beginning and with no answers as before.

  Rune sighed and ran a hand over his face as Kallan led Astrid through the trees. He followed a fair distance behind her while maintaining his grim mood and entertaining thoughts of abandoning Kallan in the forests of Midgard.

  CHAPTER 47

  Night changed the forests of Midgard, boldly blanketing everything in countless shades of black. Light blues, cold and distant like the light that encircles the moon, mingled with the shadow’s umbra. There were places where greens so dark as to look black reached into every crevice, while others, distant and darker took the shape of trees.

  The mountains appeared as nothing more than vast clouds that closed in around them from all directions forcing Kallan and Rune to commit to the winding paths that shaped the valleys with flowing rivers. The rivers were a splendor all their own, flowing like quicksilver, as black and as smooth as slick strips of elding. Their sheen rippled the reflected moonlight.

  Kallan and Rune heard the running waters long before they saw them. Tattered and worn with exhaustion, they trudged on. Weariness pulled their muscles and rent their nerves until their eyes burned for want of sleep. Too tired to speak, they walked in silence, saying nothing beyond the spiteful glances they permanently wore through the long night.

  In darkness, they left behind the last reds of the tundra, unaware that the world had faded to a lush green dappled with various shades of yellow. Beneath their feet, the earth softened and their spirits lifted for a short time.

  Clusters of pine, peppered with birch and ash, became more frequent until it widened into vast forests that stretched up the mountains’ sides. Black peaks, silhouetted against the night, obscured the horizon and seemed to forever block their path ahead while enclosing them on all sides. When, at last, they rounde
d the final mountain, the valley widened and stretched on ahead for miles, allowing them the first clear view since Jotunheim, but only as far as the night allowed.

  The gentle pull of the leather reins and soft plod of Astrid’s hooves lulled them into a monotonous drawl so that when Rune stopped, Kallan walked into his outstretched arm.

  “What is it?” she asked, glancing about with the precision of a bird as she grasped the hilt of the sword bound at her side. “Is it them?”

  The unmistakable scent of freshly turned earth hung in the air as Rune peered through the trees, fighting to make out the shapes in the shadows. He stepped to the edge of the forest and, all at once, she understood what he saw just beyond the wood.

  “No,” he said. “They’re graves.”

  An infinite number of stones, arranged to outline a fleet of longboats sent out to sea, glowed white in the moonlight. Rows upon rows of stone ships, each one a grave, stretched beyond the mountain’s end and spanned the valley. Some, of impressive stature, had been made of rocks that required the aid of a dozen men to move, while others—most—were small enough to move by hand. But one, the grandest, located in the farthest corner of the field, had been shaped with boulders five times the height of a tall man and etched with ancient runes.

  For several minutes Rune and Kallan gaped, neither speaking as they beheld the magnitude of stone.

  “There must be hundreds,” Kallan breathed as she gazed, stunned at their sheer size.

  “At least,” Rune said.

  With a muffled thump, Rune’s satchel struck the ground, averting Kallan’s attention from the field.

  “What are you doing?” she asked.

  Rune pulled the saddle from Astrid’s back.

  “We’ve been walking for hours,” he explained, dumping the saddle on the ground. “We could be walking for hours more without shelter when we pass through that valley.”

  Rune pulled the furs from Astrid’s back. “I want to catch some rest now while we have the trees for cover.”

  “What about them?” Kallan nodded back to the forest behind her and Rune shrugged.