Death Under the Bridge

by Cate Martin

  "Yes, I understand that bit," I said.

  "But also, fighting the Thors is fun," the first troll said, and the others laughed and offered their hearty ascent to this assessment.

  "Ingrid!" Thorbjorn called, and I turned to see him coming back up the hill, his brothers with Solvi following behind.

  "Good, you've got him," I said, and resisted the urge to fuss with my windbreaker again. I wasn't sure if they saw me as volva or not, but trying to adjust anything was more likely to break an illusion than to help it. Then I realized I was still holding my pencil like a wand and put my hands on my lap.

  "Sorry, we got caught up," he said when he'd reached my side. He had put his weapons away and was mopping the blood and sweat from his brow with the edge of his cloak. Then he looked back to watch the others approach. "Ingrid, may I present my brothers?"

  "Absolutely," I said.

  "This is my oldest brother, Thorulv," Thorbjorn said, waving a hand towards the brother with the completely shaved head, who gave me a solemn nod. I returned the gesture.

  "My second oldest brother, Thormund," Thorbjorn said, moving his hand to indicate the brother with the multiple thick braids. We also exchanged nods.

  "Thorge, my younger brother," Thorbjorn went on, and I nodded to the brother who shaved the sides of his head.

  "And finally, my youngest brother, Thoralv," he said, and I nodded to the brother with the short, spiky hair and no beard. He nodded back, as solemn as the others, but then broke into a grin. He looked like he would be just barely out of high school, if Villmark had a high school.

  "My thanks to all of you," I said. "And it's good to finally meet you."

  "She thought I had made you all up," Thorbjorn said with a laugh.

  "After what happened when we were kids?" Thormund asked.

  "She doesn't remember that far back," Thorbjorn said, but then added with more cheer in his voice, "not yet."

  "You are here as volva, then?" Thorulv asked in a grave tone after the laughter of the others had died.

  Was I? I had only created that mantle for myself to stop the fighting, and yet, wasn't I about to deal with a matter of justice? That was part of my grandmother's purview.

  They were all looking at me with expectant faces. I had to say something. "Really, I just wanted to ask Solvi some questions. But he ran away before I could speak to him, and then he set a troll ambush on us to keep us from following him. So perhaps this is an official matter now."

  "A matter for the council, perhaps?" Thorulv asked.

  I bit my lip. Was I overstepping here?

  "Solvi will answer Ingrid's questions now," Thorbjorn said, coming to stand with folded arms behind me. "We were intending to do this in a friendly manner, but Solvi is the one who made that impossible. So now he will answer the same questions, but to a volva. That is just."

  "But will his fate be decided here? Will his sentence be carried out here?" Thorulv pressed.

  I could feel Thorbjorn about to answer for me, but when I raised my hand, he fell silent. Maybe the Thors weren't as in my thrall as the trolls were, but they were still behaving with more deference than usual. Or at least Thorbjorn was.

  "That will depend on his answers to my questions," I said. Thorulv appeared to think this over, but then gave me a nod and took half a step back, yielding the point to me.

  "Very well," I said, squeezing my hands together as if I could somehow lend myself strength. "Solvi. What do you have to say for yourself?"

  "I will say as much as you like," Solvi said. "I will tell you everything. But I hope in return to ask for one boon."

  "That will depend on what you have to say, and on the nature of that boon," I said.

  Solvi nodded as if he had expected that to be the answer.

  "Tell me what happened with Garrett," I said.

  "I met him under the bridge last night," Solvi said. "But perhaps I should start my tale a bit sooner?"

  "We already discussed how you were breaking the Villmark rules by selling your art in the modern world, and that Garrett was your distributor," I said. "And I know he was passing that work off as his, and that he had a new partner that was helping him take his business to the next level. You knew all this as well?"

  "I discovered it," Solvi said with a nod. "When Garrett Nelsen and I reached our first agreement, he promised me my art would be everywhere. He could sell some of it, we agreed, but some of it must be free for all to see. In museums, in exhibitions, things like that. This is what I wanted. But each of the next three times I met him, it became more clear that Nelsen was interested only in making money. And that a little money made him hungry for more, and more money made him hungrier still."

  "You couldn't keep up with the demand?" I asked. I could scarcely believe it. I had seen all that Solvi had done, so many pieces that were being traded and bought and sold, but also the work on his own house and on the Viking ship. I had thought I was a productive artist, but Solvi put me to shame.

  "I was not given the opportunity to try," Solvi said, and for the first time an emotion was inflecting his normally stoic voice. He sounded bitter.

  "What do you mean?" I asked.

  "Nelsen was planning to cheat me," Solvi said.

  "How?" I asked.

  "I will tell it as I learned of it," Solvi said after a moment's thought. "Yesterday, when we were all on the ship, we saw that new bridge. The steel one."

  "Yes," I said. "The Nelsens keep building a bridge there, but the Sorensens keep tearing it down."

  "Indeed," Solvi said. "The Nelsens need the bridge to connect their fields, but the Sorensens tear it down because it is too low for their fishing boats to pass under it."

  "Hold on," I said, holding up a hand. "Why do the farming Sorensens care about fishing boats?"

  "I do not understand you," Solvi said.

  "It is an old feud," Thorulv said. "This bridge has been a source of conflict since Runde was founded. But now it is just like a reflex to fight over it. It is possible neither family remembers why, only that they must fight over this bridge as a matter of family honor."

  "I suppose originally there weren't fishing Sorensens and farming Sorensens. There were just Sorensens," I said, thinking out loud. "If the bridge really did block the boats from reaching the lake, that could be why half of them moved closer to the shore."

  "Also, with your modern trucks and the roads that crisscross the river valley, the bridge is not so important to the Nelsens as it was once, when farming was done with horses or just manpower," Thorbjorn added.

  "Yeah," I nodded. "Wow. I can't wait to talk to mormor about this."

  Solvi took a deep breath, as if eager to get on with his tale. I waved for him to continue. "On the ship, after we passed the bridge, two of the Villmarkers sitting by me on the rowing benches were talking about that bridge. They drank often with the people of Runde and had heard tales. The bridge was made of steel this time. Harder to burn down, but also far more expensive. But important to the Nelsen family."

  "You think Garrett paid for it?" I asked. "With money he made from your art? But you wanted him to sell it. I'm still not sure why this upset you."

  "Because," Solvi said, "he didn't earn that money by selling the pieces of my art which I had given him. He made it by selling the art itself."

  "I don't follow you," I said.

  "He had found a..." he stopped to hunt for the word, then landed with, "manufacturer. Someone who would look at one of my pieces and make thousands of inferior copies."

  "Oh," I said. Then I remembered that whistle, and Kyle's suspicion that there were other secret partners that Garrett was meeting with. "Oh," I said again, more slowly.

  "This I could not abide," Solvi said, although his voice was as calm as ever. "I sent him a message to meet me at once so that we could discuss it."

  "So you met under the bridge," I said.

  "No," Solvi said. "That would be too visible. I knew enough about this family quarrel by then to know that the Sore
nsens would at once need to find a way to tear that bridge down. Even at night, that place would be too exposed to meet Nelsen there. No, we met outside the barn where he claimed to craft my art. As if he ever could." There was that hint of bitterness again.

  "Then what?" I asked.

  "His parents were home, so that wasn't a safe place to talk either. So we walked closer to the creek. There was a shed there, so old and neglected it was barely still standing. It had once been a fishing house, but had been long since abandoned, being too far from the lake. I confronted Nelsen about his plans, but he didn't even try to deny what he was doing," Solvi said. "He didn't even deny knowing that it wasn't a part of our agreement, or that he knew I would object to it. He just didn't care. Not about our agreement, not about my art, not about anything but money. And he told me he was about to make a lot of money."

  "So what did you do?" I asked.

  "I demanded that he stop everything," Solvi said. "I demanded that he return to our original agreement and stop all plans for mass producing my work."

  "Let me guess," Thorbjorn said. "He said no?"

  Solvi nodded. "He said he didn't even need me anymore. He had made copies of everything I had already given him, with some modern technology. He showed me one of these copies on his phone," Solvi said, hesitating only momentarily over the word. "It looked like just lines on a screen to me, but I could see the shape of my work there. He said there was nothing I could do to stop it, that those copies were already in multiple locations." He stopped to take another deep breath, but this one caught in his throat momentarily. "Then he showed me a picture of one of these copies. Not in wood, but in plastic. And it was an abomination."

  "So you killed him," Thorbjorn finished for him.

  "I killed him," Solvi said without emotion. "There was a fishing spear in that ruin of a shed. Nelsen was laughing and walking away from me as if the discussion were over when it was not. And that spear was in my hand. Then it was in his back."

  "Then you put the body in the creek so it would wash out to the lake?" Thorbjorn guessed.

  "I put him in the creek to stop him from screaming," Solvi said. "And when that was done, I let him go. I didn't care what happened to him after that. I did not try to hide his body."

  "You didn't come to the council and explain what you did, either," Thorulv said, his voice a low growl.

  "No, I did not," Solvi said, and he bowed his head to look down at his own hands. "I knew in that moment that I would have to leave. So why explain? I wanted only to finish one last piece. It was too big to carry with me, you see."

  I sat back on my rock seat with a sigh, then looked up at Thorbjorn. "Are we missing any details, do you think?"

  "I think he told us everything," Thorbjorn said. Unlike Solvi, his voice was thick with passion. He was angry.

  I turned back to Solvi, who was still studying his own hands. "Your boon?" I asked.

  "I ask only to be allowed to exile myself," he said. "I will continue down this path, deeper into the hills to where our people never go. And I will never return."

  "You wish to escape punishment for what you have done?" Thorbjorn demanded.

  Solvi shook his head.

  "He wishes to choose his punishment," Thorulv said.

  "That is for the volva to do," Thorbjorn said. I looked up at the other Thors, expecting one of them to argue that it was a matter for the council to decide, but they were all nodding their agreement. Even Thorulv.

  "What I pronounce here and now shall be his fate?" I asked.

  "We will see it done, volva," Thorulv said.

  I folded my arms and thought it over. From what I knew, the council would be angry with Solvi for violating the trade rules, although they might go easy on him because of how careful he had been with that. But for the murder of a resident of Runde? I didn't think they would be inclined to punish that at all. Perhaps in other circumstances, but in this case, when Garrett Nelsen had so clearly violated an agreement and then invited retribution by laughing in the face of Solvi's grievances? No, I didn't think they would be too harsh with him. His request for self-exile was likely the harsher fate.

  But now I was in the same place I had been before, knowing I had solved a Runde murder, but having no way to bring the culprit to justice. Now there'd be yet another family who would never know what had happened or why.

  They'd never know that the murderer wasn't running free. How could they ever feel safe?

  But there was nothing I could decide here on the rocky hillside that would solve that problem. Perhaps the Thors would put Solvi in chains if I asked and drag him to Runde where the police could pick him up, but what then? In exchange for one murderer facing justice, I would destroy the safety of everyone else in Villmark.

  No, granting Solvi's boon was the best path before me. But it didn't sit well with me at all.

  "You will leave this place and never be seen again," I said. "I have your word on that?"

  "My word as a Villmarker, as a descendant of true Northmen, and as an artist," he said.

  That last hit a special chord in me, as much as I wished it didn't. "Garrett Nelsen's plans to mass produce your work, I can be sure that those are stopped," I said. I was less sure than I was hopeful, but I had some thoughts on that score. I was pretty confident that Kyle would listen to them in due time.

  "Thank you," Solvi said with a grateful bow.

  "But in return I will need the rest of your work," I said. "Everything in your home and around it."

  "It is yours," Solvi said. "My home, and everything in it, and everything around it, I now declare yours." Then he went on, "I regret that I killed Nelsen. But I regret more that Nelsen made it necessary. I believe selling my art has already enriched his people more than they deserve. I have nothing more to give them."

  "Fair enough," I said. Then I waved my hand to dismiss him. "Be gone with you."

  We six stood together on that hilltop until Solvi's form went from a silhouette to a blur to a mere dot. And then even that disappeared over one of an infinite number of hills.

  "Do you think we'll ever see him again?" I asked. I was looking up at Thorbjorn, but it was Thorulv who answered.

  "He'll be dead by this time tomorrow," he said and spat on the ground. "Thorbjorn, you can see the volva safely home?"

  "Surely," Thorbjorn said.

  "Thanks for answering our call," I said as the other brothers prepared to disperse.

  "We'll always be here when you need us," Thorulv said. Thormund raised his spear in agreement, Thorge let out a battle-cry that was more terrifying than heartening, and Thoralv put out his fist and left it there until I bumped it with my own fist.

  And then they were gone.

  Chapter 25

  Now that it was finally starting to get cold during the day, I could've wished for a few more warm Indian Summer days. But as I stopped my work to sit for a moment on one of the benches and warm my hands over the flames of the fire-pit, I decided that it wasn't so bad. With Loke and Thorbjorn's help, it had only taken the better part of a day to load all of Solvi's moveable art onto the two wagons we had brought down from Villmark. And at least it hadn't started raining, which had looked like a real possibility when I had woken up that morning.

  "I still don't get it," Loke said as he sat down across from me and peeled off his gloves to hold his palms toward the fire.

  "What don't you get?" I asked.

  "That bear," he said, pointing his chin towards the last sculpture which Thorbjorn was tying down on top of the load on one of the wagons. "You said he intended to leave after he killed Garrett Nelsen, but then he hung around to finish that. But no one was waiting for it. He just left it here in the yard."

  "With the stain still wet," I said.

  "But it wasn't promised to anybody," Loke persisted. "So why did he have to finish it?"

  "To leave a task half done is a torture for some of us," I said. I didn't add, but secretly had thought since the moment Solvi had vanished from my
sight, that he knew not only was he never coming back, but that he was about to walk to his inevitable death. Finishing the sculpture had given him just a little bit of time to come to terms with that decision.

  Or so I believed. Now that he was gone and I couldn't ask him, I'd never really know.

  "And I'm still mad you went past the tallest hill and fought with trolls and everything without asking me along," he sulked.

  "I went to the top of the tallest hill, not past it," I corrected him. "And I could scarcely invite you when I don't know where you live."

  "Did you ask for directions? Because anyone in Villmark could tell you where to go to find me," he said, still pouting. "Not to mention your cat. He can always find me. He stops by all the time."

  "Hey, I asked you to go with me to the fire cave to try my magic, and you said no," I reminded him.

  "That was different," he said.

  "Well, the one led to the other with no time to look around and wonder if I should be issuing any invitations," I said. "And honestly, you want me to rely on my cat to get in contact with you? I don't know where he is half the time."

  "If you need me, he'll know," Loke said. "He'll find you."

  "Oh, stop," I said, pressing my hands to my temples. "I can't stand one more mystery. And don't you dare say I'll understand it all later, or someday, or when my memory magically decides to reappear. I just can't anymore."

  "All right, Ingy," he said, and his voice was surprisingly gentle. I raised my head to look him in the eye. Was that sincerity there in their chocolate brown depths?

  "All right what?" I asked, still suspicious.

  "All right, I'll show you my house," he said. He got up and moved around the fire pit to sit next to me on the same bench, as if he didn't want Thorbjorn to overhear. "My parents died when I was ten and my sister was five. We've been on our own since then. I don't spend much time in that house. Too many memories. But if you like, when we are done with all this and have a bit of time, I'll show you which house."

  "You have a sister?" I asked. It was hard to imagine. I wondered what she was like?

  "Her name is Esja," he said. "As little as I like being home, she likes going out even less. But I shall be happy to introduce you two to each other. I'm not keeping secrets from you, Ingrid. There are just some things that hurt to speak of."