Raven Magic

by Jennifer Willis

  Hugh tried to move up to walk beside Thor, but Thor pushed past a springy pine branch and deliberately let it snap back in Hugh’s face. Thor smiled with satisfaction at the loud THWACK followed by Hugh’s surprised exclamation of pain.

  “It’s dangerous, pushing on like this in the dark,” Hugh said, his voice slightly more nasal. Thor hoped the tree branch had inflicted some damage. “We should stop and make camp.”

  This time Thor did turn on his heel to confront the guide. “Is there some reason you don’t want me moving downstream?”

  Hugh paused before answering. “I am merely trying to keep you safe. Everything—especially your head—will be clearer in the morning. In your condition, I’d think you’d want to rest.”

  Thor stepped closer and buried his index finger in the skinny man’s flannel shirt. “My condition? What precisely would that be?”

  “You’ve got him there, cousin,” Freyr chuckled behind him.

  Hugh peered into Thor’s eyes. Thor guessed Hugh was trying to determine whether he was still under the influence of the hallucinogenic mushrooms.

  “You are feeling dizzy,” Hugh suggested, adopting a deep monotone. “You are feeling disoriented and unsteady on your feet.”

  “He’s trying to hypnotize you now,” Freyr offered.

  “Yeah, I got that,” Thor grumbled.

  Encouraged by Thor’s remark, Hugh leaned closer and intensified his eye contact. It was all Thor could do not to back away from the crazy-eyed guide, but he knew he’d just end up in the stream again.

  “You want nothing more than to rest,” Hugh continued. “To sit by the cool, pleasant water and rest. It will help your vision if you stop now. You will feel much better, and more focused.”

  Hugh stared into Thor’s face and waited. Thor burst into a wide grin.

  “Nice sales pitch, but I’m not buying.” Thor pushed the guide out of his face, and Hugh stumbled sideways into the creek.

  Thor turned and continued downstream. Freyr fell into step behind him.

  “I think you’ve at least managed to leave the hunters behind,” Freyr offered. “They’re probably still on your trail, though. This stream is easy enough to follow, but you’ve kept a punishing pace.”

  “Good to know.” Thor pressed forward.

  “But, you’re feeling dizzy!” Hugh called out as he jogged back onto the bank, water sloshing out of his worn boots. He ran straight through Freyr to catch up to Thor.

  “Hey!” Freyr cried out. “Now that’s just rude.”

  “You need to sit,” Hugh said in a stilted voice as he worked to keep pace. “You need to rest and focus on your vision.”

  “My vision’s just fine, thanks for asking,” Thor replied.

  “This isn’t . . . You are not responding as I had anticipated.” Hugh cleared his throat and deepened his voice. “You don’t want to disappoint your fiancée, do you? You must remain still and allow your vision to come to you.”

  “Enough!” Thor turned again to face Hugh. “I have information from a reputable source that Sally is in trouble.” He pointed a fat finger downstream at Mt. Bachelor, whose peak gleamed red-orange against the night’s sky. “And last I checked, dormant volcanoes don’t normally glow like that.”

  Hugh looked past Thor’s shoulder at Mt. Bachelor to the south. “No, I would think you were right at that.”

  Thor paused. The guide had at least confirmed that Thor wasn’t hallucinating the peak’s new color palette. “You don’t know what that’s about?”

  “Why should I?”

  “So much for being a guide to the mysteries of the wilderness,” Freyr commented.

  Thor held his tongue and took a moment to think. He glanced at Freyr, and then looked back at Hugh. Freyr might just have been cracking wise again, but he had a point.

  “What can you tell me about the volcano?” Thor asked Hugh.

  “Legends or geology?”

  “Vulcanology,” Freyr corrected. Thor flashed him a dirty look, and the Vanir ghost chuckled to himself.

  “Let’s go with legends,” Thor replied.

  “You sound like a contestant on Jeopardy,” Freyr chortled. “I’ll take volcanic legends for 400, Alex!”

  “Quiet, you,” Thor barked.

  Hugh blinked at him. “I, I’m sorry. Did you want me to answer or not?”

  Thor sighed in exasperation and planted his hands on his hips. “I wasn’t talking to you. Just . . . It’s nothing. Tell me.”

  Hugh cast a tentative glance to either side. “Are you talking to the trees? Has the forest given you a vision?”

  “Will you stop with the visions!” Thor exploded. A squirrel in a nearby nest startled awake and screeched and chittered its annoyance. It wasn’t anything Thor hadn’t heard before. “Just tell me about Mt. Bachelor. Surely the First People had a story for every one of these mountains.”

  Hugh nodded. “More than one, actually. But I am not one of the First People.”

  “I’d wager he’s older than that,” Freyr said. He took a step back and looked Hugh up and down. “Still playing at being a regular human being, though the façade’s beginning to crack. Maybe a new avatar of something very old. That might explain the erratic behavior.”

  Thor considered Freyr’s words and took his time making his own study of Hugh. “Not one of the First People.”

  Hugh adopted a condescending smile. “Of course not. I am your guide, sent to help—“

  “Yeah, yeah.” Thor cut him off with a wave of his hand. “So you keep telling me.”

  “But the legend of the volcano Bachelor,” Hugh continued. “He is as his name describes, an unattached male. The youngest peak in this region. And apparently quite the desirable catch.”

  “I’m not exactly in the market,” Thor replied. Hugh’s smile dimmed.

  “I think I know this one.” Freyr nodded upstream. “The peaks back up there, the sisters, they’re supposed to be rivals for Bachelor’s affection.”

  Hugh resumed his story. “And so the Three Sisters would compete with each other—“

  “Trying to win him over,” Thor interrupted again. “I get it.”

  Hugh narrowed his eyes and studied Thor’s face. “Are you sure the forest isn’t giving you a vision?”

  Thor resisted the temptation to look at Freyr again, and the even stronger temptation to bust Hugh square in the nose. “Let’s just say I’ve got an inside source. Can we skip ahead to the part where the volcano starts to glow?”

  “That I cannot say,” Hugh replied.

  “Can’t, or won’t?” Thor demanded.

  Freyr glanced again from the peaks of the Three Sisters in the north and Mt. Bachelor to the south. “Sally. It’s Sally.”

  Allowing himself the indulgence of a low growl, Thor leveled his shoulders and loomed over the thin-framed Hugh. “It’s about time you told me who you really are.”

  Hugh’s eyebrows lifted in surprise. “I am your guide.”

  Freyr shook his head. “My sister never would have chosen this clown.”

  Hugh started backing toward the trees.

  “Tell me who you are, and what your purpose is,” Thor demanded. “Tell me now.”

  Hugh lifted his hands as though he were about to begin an elaborate explanation. But instead of opening his mouth, Hugh spun on his heel and darted into the woods.

  “Get him!” Freyr shouted.

  Thor wavered. After the brief pause in his creekside trek, his feet felt like shifting bags of grain. Hunger was taking its toll, and he was just as disoriented as Hugh had suggested. After a few faltering steps, Thor found his balance and ran full tilt into the forest, following the sound of Hugh’s retreating footsteps. He ducked under branches and dodged the tree trunks that seemed to leap out at him from the darkness.

  “There he is!” a familiar voice cried from the shadows somewhere behind him. “Don’t lose him!”

  Thor’s jaw tightened as he realized he’d been spotted by Cammo Man and his intrep
id camera crew. Pausing to interrogate Hugh had given the Bigfoot hunters enough time to catch up.

  “There’s no point in running!” Thor shouted ahead, hoping he didn’t sound like he was on the verge of passing out. Hugh might have pulled his vanishing act again. It was possible Hugh was some kind of ghost, like Freyr—but a spirit who could manipulate matter well enough to keep braining Thor with sticks. But Thor was counting on Hugh still being able to hear him.

  “You have to see this through!” Thor shouted again. “This vision quest isn’t over.”

  He couldn’t outrun Hugh in the forest at night, so he decided to gamble on trying to instill fear or some sense of obligation. Maybe then Hugh would turn back. All the while, Freyr silently kept pace at Thor’s side.

  “What else should I say?”

  Freyr shrugged. “Maybe an unflattering remark about his mother? You’re good at that.”

  “The Warm Springs people will not take kindly to the bridegroom being abandoned in the woods!” Thor shouted as he came to a halt and bent double, resting his hands on his knees and trying to catch his breath.

  “You think that did it?” Freyr whispered.

  Thor motioned for him to be quiet. After a pause, Hugh called back. “You have not been abandoned.”

  There was movement in the trees immediately ahead, and Thor saw a shadowy figure step out from behind a particularly broad trunk. Hugh stood beside the tree and grinned. “But you were also never my responsibility.”

  Hugh turned and dashed deeper into the forest. Thor tried to follow, but he was confused by too many shadows in the dark and unfamiliar forest. His starved brain was probably playing tricks on him. A breeze picked up, and the swaying branches masked any movement Thor might reliably track. There was a mad flutter of bird feathers a few yards ahead. Thor surged forward, but Hugh’s footfalls had fallen silent.

  “Wait,” Freyr said.

  Thor slowed and saw his cousin pointing overhead. A lone raven flew out of the trees.

  “This is no time for bird-watching!” Thor growled, his temper rising to the surface. He plunged forward, stopping every few paces to try to get a bead on Hugh’s path, but he knew he had lost him. He’d also lost his way back to the stream.

  “Great. This is just super.” Thor stormed about in a small space between the towering evergreen trees, grinding pine needles into the dirt with each step. It felt good to finally vent some anger, even if he was just stomping dirt in the dark.

  “Now we’re lost, again.” Thor glanced at Freyr. “Hey, Nature Boy. I don’t suppose you can get us back to the creek?”

  “Maybe?” Freyr shrugged.

  Thor looked up into the tree canopy, trying to spot the distant glow of Mt. Bachelor’s red peak through the branches, but he’d lost his line of sight.

  “If I’m worth a damn, I’ll find my own way back. I did it once, right?” Not waiting for Freyr to respond, Thor charged through the trees in a rough approximation of the direction he’d come. He just hoped he wouldn’t run into the Bigfoot hunters along the way.

  Freyr followed silently behind.

  “You’re particularly useless as a spirit guide, you know?” Thor grumbled. His stomach was painfully sour, a nearly perfect match for his darkening mood.

  “I don’t think I’m actually your spirit guide,” Freyr replied. “And I did provide background information on the volcanoes, as you’ll recall.”

  Ignoring the scratches on his face and arms, Thor forced his way through a dense snarl of branches and then smacked chest-first against a thick trunk. He wavered on his feet for a moment and then fell backward on his butt.

  Freyr stood over him and laughed. “If only Bonnie could see you now.”

  “You’re not helping.” Thor rubbed at his face, expecting to find bloody abrasions across his skin. Instead, he pulled long strands of coarse hair out of his mouth. Thor spat in the dirt. “Since when are trees hairy?”

  The tree in question stepped closer. Disencumbering itself of the tangled branches of the surrounding foliage, the towering figure cast a seven-and-a-half foot shadow over Thor that was blacker than the darkness of the woods.

  “Oh,” Freyr exhaled in a long breath. “Uh, I think you just found the siatco.”

  11

  Loki sat on the ground beneath a brilliant blanket of stars and awaited the return of the ravens. He wasn’t interested in constellations this night but if he wanted to keep the skies clear enough to continue his star-gazing hobby in the centuries to come, he was going to have to take action in the immediate present. So much for his long weekend of wilderness entertainment.

  Soon the black-winged pair were circling overhead, before swooping down to a rocky outcropping below Loki’s perch. Within several minutes, Loki heard their approaching footsteps.

  “Report,” he demanded before they’d come into view, his expression darker than the forest below.

  Hugh and Moon climbed over the edge of Loki’s lookout and stood before him.

  “I’ve lost Sally,” Moon admitted with an obligatory shrug. She didn’t seem particularly upset or embarrassed by her failure. She might have been telling him she forgot to pick up milk at the store for all the concern she displayed. “And there are hunters in the forest.”

  “Hunters?” Loki’s eyes narrowed on her.

  “The guardian of the gods, the one you said would come. And his dog.”

  Loki nodded. He’d assumed Heimdall would find either Sally or Thor soon enough. He’d just been hoping it would be Thor.

  “And that other one is with them,” Moon added.

  Loki frowned.

  “The other girl, Opal, who came into the forest.”

  Loki nodded and waited a maddening few moments for Moon to continue, but she remained silent.

  “So, Heimdall has Sally.” Loki looked down into the forest.

  “No. But he is hunting for her,” Moon replied.

  A slow smile spread on Loki’s face. Heimdall had Opal, but not Sally. The Rune Witch was still free to continue her shadow work.

  “I don’t know where she is.”

  Loki looked up sharply. Sally was smart. Resourceful, too. She could survive another night in the forest without supervision. Loki was almost certain of it.

  He looked to Hugh. “And you?”

  Hugh’s expression darkened into a scowl. “We are not your minions. We’re not under your authority.”

  The Norse ravens never would have balked or pushed back. Huginn and Muninn hadn’t been Loki’s to command, but they’d at least shown him proper respect. But Huginn and Muninn had long since been absorbed into a greater power, and it altered both sides of the equation. Loki was still learning about this new combination of black feathers and ancient guile, and the unpredictability excited and intrigued him.

  Loki ducked his head, playing his practiced part of the diplomat. “I apologize for my impatience.”

  The act seemed to satisfy Hugh. “Thor is somewhere in the woods.”

  “I knew that much already.”

  “There is an additional party.” Hugh cut his eyes toward Moon. They shared a mischievous smile. “A minor annoyance.”

  “But an amusing one,” Moon said. Loki knew they wouldn’t say anything more on the matter, not while there was private entertainment to be had.

  Hugh shrugged. “There is news from the volcanoes.”

  Loki rose to his feet. This was the dark disclosure he had feared. The volcanoes in this region were supposed to be dormant or extinct, but modern vulcanology didn’t take supernatural forces into account. Loki decided on a pretense of ignorance. “The volcanoes?”

  Hugh and Moon laughed in harmony, a sound that was simultaneously beautiful and bone-chilling, like death’s birdsong.

  “They have been watching,” Moon said with a broad smile.

  “And the Sisters.” Hugh shook his head. “They are not happy that Jonathan has chosen his bride.”

  Loki stood rooted to the spot as the raw realization
settled over him. Jonathan has chosen his bride. Not the turn of events he had anticipated. He felt the balance of probability swing against Sally, and he made a conscious effort not to ball his hands into fists. He kept playing dumb. “What are you talking about?”

  Hugh shot Moon an exasperated glance and then spread his hands as he began to explain. “The three peaks to the north. They grow jealous and restless over this new rival.”

  Loki tried to keep his jaw loose and his voice relaxed. “I don’t think infighting among volcano spirits has any bearing on our project.”

  Moon took a step toward him. “The spirit of Bachelor Mountain has taken the maid in the forest.”

  Loki looked back and forth between Moon and Hugh. They were toying with him, and they seemed to believe they were getting the better of him. Let the ravens play their games. Loki tried not to smile.

  “Jonathan, the spirit of Mt. Bachelor, he has Sally,” Loki said, adding a deliberate note of tension to his voice. “That’s what you’re telling me.”

  Hugh and Moon nodded in eerie unison, but it was Moon who spoke. “He compels her now to his mountain peak home. He will make her his bride in a day, perhaps two.”

  Loki forced himself to swallow hard, enjoying the look of smug satisfaction that flickered over their faces. “And how does the volcano spirit make someone his bride?”

  Moon blinked at Loki and frowned, as though she couldn’t understand how the god of chaos could fail to grasp something so basic. “By casting her into his lava bed, of course.”

  Loki dropped to his knees and cried out in pain. The collapse was a calculated move, but he hadn’t expected his left patella to strike quite so hard against the rocky surface beneath him. Keeping his eyes closed, he reached out with both arms and grasped at the empty air as though asking his compatriots for their assistance. As he expected, they chuckled to each other and backed away.

  “Renew,” Moon said in low tones that echoed in the rock beneath Loki’s knees. He kept his eyes closed and his face to the ground.

  “You set this in motion,” Hugh called out proudly. “It’s a good thing, and we thank you for it.”