TWENTY-FOUR
I was in the fjord.
I could see the ice-blue water. The clouds moving in its reflection. My feet pressing into the smooth black pebbles. My arms wrapping around myself against the wind. The vision came over me like a cold wave. The cliff face jutting up from the water like a wall. Green moss climbing down it in long, bright strands. I could see it.
I let my weight fall against the tree, trying to hold the sight of Hylli in my mind. The edge of the forest beside the village. A shadow moving in the trees. I squinted, trying to focus my blurred vision.
The figure stalked in the distance, watching. Thick furs and the shine of silver. The white, empty eyes of a Herja. I blinked.
“Eelyn.”
He was there, in the trees. He was watching me. The Herja had come for my mother and now they’d come for me.
“Eelyn?” Something stung across my cheek. “Eelyn!”
The sunlight was suddenly gone. Black moved on black and hands pulled at me. My skin was numbed against the snow on the ground. I closed my eyes again, trying to leave it. Trying to get back to the fjord.
Fiske’s face was looking down into mine, his hands on me. But I couldn’t feel them.
“Herja,” I croaked, looking back to the trees. But there was no one.
Above his head, the moon blinked through the branches overhead. “What?”
“I want to go home, Fiske.” My words ran into each other and I could hear the weakness in them. The brittle sadness breaking on each one.
And then I was falling. The world bumped and swayed around me as he lifted me up off the ground. I could hear his breath. I could feel his skin. His arms wrapped around my limp body, holding me together.
I opened my eyes again and the trees floated past above. The sound of crunching snow filled my pounding head. I curled into Fiske and pinched my eyes closed until I could see the fjord again. Fog touching the cliffs. The smell of seawater. But the Herja was gone.
A door opened and suddenly we were inside. The familiar firelight of the house swallowed me, but I couldn’t feel its warmth.
“What happened?” Halvard ran to us.
“Get the water on.” Fiske was setting me down and surveying me in the dim light.
I was wrapped in his cloak. “Where’s Iri?” I whispered.
“Looking for you.” He pulled a blanket from the trunk and moved me closer to the fire. “Find him.” Fiske pushed Halvard toward the door and shoved him out. When he came back, he crouched down in front of me. “Who did this?”
I pulled the blanket tighter around me, searching his face. He looked different. There was something shining in his eyes that wasn’t there before. Or maybe it was. I had never seen them so closely.
“Who?” he asked again.
But all I could think was that he was still too close to me. That I wanted him to move away. “It was the man from Adalgildi,” I whispered.
“What did he do?”
I closed my eyes. I tried to disappear.
“Did he…?” The question broke off and his eyes dropped from mine.
I shook my head in answer, coiling my arms around my bare body.
Fiske stood, his boots pounding against the stone as he walked to the wall. He lifted an axe from the hook and opened the door. “Don’t tell them where I’m going.” And then he was gone.
* * *
I opened my eyes when the door opened and the weight of more blankets pressed down on top of me. Iri was asleep next to the fire, his head propped up on his saddlebags.
Fiske came through the door quietly, and I opened my eyes enough to watch him hang the axe back on the wall. He pulled his armor vest and tunic off and went to the basin of water to wash his face, raking his fingers through his hair. The cuts and bruises from the fighting season were healing, leaving smooth skin over the form of him, broad on top and narrow in the middle, like Iri. He set his hands on the table and leaned into it, looking into the basin as a single drop of water trailed to the end of his nose and fell into the water.
I stared at the blood-spotted tunic crumpled on the floor.
“Fiske?” Inge came down the ladder with her hair long and unbraided over her shoulders. “Where have you been?” she whispered.
When he didn’t answer, she took his arm and pulled him to face her.
“Thorpe.” He didn’t look at her.
Her voice dropped lower. “What did you do?”
He tied his hair back, coming to the fire and sitting to take off his boots. “Reminded him not to touch what doesn’t belong to him.”
Inge watched him for a moment before she gave a small nod, but worry hung heavy on her face. “I’ll speak to the Tala tomorrow.”
“I’ll speak to the Tala.” The room fell silent.
“Fiske…”
He stilled, looking up at her.
But she didn’t speak. She only looked at him, her eyes falling from his head down to his feet and meeting his eyes again. Like she was trying to uncover something.
He stood, walking past her to the ladder. She watched him until he was out of sight and then turned back toward the fire. She didn’t move for a long time and when she finally closed her eyes, her mouth was moving, a silent prayer on her lips.
I sunk lower into the blankets. Because Inge didn’t know that I was the past Iri had left behind. I was what she should be praying against.
And it was only a matter of time before she did.
* * *
I lay in the loft as the others went about their day.
No one talked to me.
No one asked me to do anything.
I pulled my legs up and hugged them into my chest, still trying to feel the warmth down in the center of my frozen bones. Where I felt empty.
When the sun grew brighter, I pulled the blankets up over my head and listened to my heartbeat. Iri climbed up the ladder and stood over me, his worry filling the room. I pretended to be asleep and when he climbed back down, I let myself breathe again. I stared into the dark of the blankets, trying to remember what that feeling was—the feeling chewing at the edges of me while I stood in the dark of the forest tied naked to the tree.
I had never been so vulnerable. So full of fear.
And I had never hated myself until that moment.
I remembered the light reflecting off the snow. The sound of my quick breath in the silence. Thinking that if I died, I wouldn’t reach Sólbjǫrg. Then, the all-consuming shame of being afraid to die for the very first time in my life.
I could see the reds and oranges and yellows of the battlefield. The heat and the sting of pain. The burn of a war cry in my throat. I could see myself, alive. Strong.
I blinked.
And there was only the white and cold and quiet of that forest. There was only loneliness. There was only the very barest part of me, waiting for the end to come. It crept toward me in the dark. It came for me. And when it overtook me, my last thought was I don’t want to die.
I had never known real fear until the moment I saw Iri in Aurvanger. I had never considered there was more to life than the most basic explanation—that the gods were willing over us. That they were giving and taking their favor.
But I was without my clan.
I was alone in that forest.
Sigr had turned his eyes from me. I could feel it. And I could only think of Iri, just a boy, dying slowly in the cold. Of my mother, the life drained from her flesh. All her fight gone.
And the Herja, floating in the dark like a harbinger, watching me.
There was a knock at the door below and my eyes refocused.
“Inge.” A warm voice floated up to me and I crawled to the edge of my cot to peer through the cracks of the loft.
The Tala came through the door and everyone stood. Inge took the Tala’s hands into her own and squeezed them. But that worry was still there, hanging over her. It made her look heavy on her feet.
“I have good news.” The Tala stepped over the threshold an
d into the house. “Runa’s father has accepted Iri’s request to marry her.” She gripped Iri’s arm and smiled.
Relief pushed its way over his face and he looked up to meet Inge’s eyes.
“You’re worthy of it, Iri.” Inge smiled.
The Tala nodded. “The two of you will make a very good match.”
The sweetness in Iri’s eyes reached inside me and touched the raw pain of losing him again. The urge to cry swelled behind my tongue.
“Thank you.” He nodded.
“You’ll need to get everything in order, of course. We’ll make the preparations as soon as you like.”
The Tala smiled again and I studied her. She seemed genuinely happy and the others looked at her with a fondness. A trust. But all I could think of when I looked at the Tala was the way she’d watched me in the forest. The way she walked away from me, leaving me to die.
She sat at the table, folding her hands in her lap, and her manner changed a little, the room going silent with it. “We do need to talk about what happened last night.” Her eyes went to Fiske, who stood on the other side of the fire. “Do you have anything you’d like to say?”
Fiske didn’t seem nervous like Inge was. He stood straight, looking the Tala in the eye. “I went to speak with Thorpe last night after I returned from the hunt and learned that he’d tried to kill my dýr.”
“You spoke with him?”
Fiske’s face bore no expression. Beside him, Iri looked into the fire, his hand twitching at his belt.
She tilted her head to one side. “Thorpe abused your property and he had no right to take what belongs to you. He brought the consequences upon himself.”
That was the Aska way too. When you broke the law, you paid for it. There were no judges or rule keepers. Only the Talas attempt to keep the peace in a village. When someone wronged you, you dealt with it yourself. If you didn’t, you were a target for others looking to take advantage.
Fiske nodded. “Thank you.”
“Thank you,” Inge echoed quietly.
“However, I would like to advise you, Fiske. You’ve chosen to take on your first dýr. And you didn’t take just any dýr. You took an Aska. May I ask why?”
Fiske jerked his chin, stretching his shoulder. “My mother needed help with the house.”
“What is it?” Inge looked concerned.
The Tala watched Fiske for a long moment. “I had a dream about her. I’m unsure of what it means, but I feel that Thora has her eye on this Aska.”
Iri’s jaw clenched.
“You seem very upset by Thorpe’s treatment of her.”
“I need her to work. If Thorpe had killed her, he would have had to pay me for her, just like he would for killing a sheep or a horse.”
The pit in my stomach grew, widening until it was something I could fall into. Something that could make me disappear.
The Tala looked up to Inge. “I would suggest trading her to another village after the thaw. Somewhere they won’t know what she is. She draws too much attention as an Aska to be useful. And I will also remind you that you’re expected to choose a wife, as Iri has. I hoped it would be this winter, but it looks as if that’s not going to happen.”
Fiske hesitated before shaking his head. “No.”
“Alright. Next winter. Agreed?”
“Yes,” Fiske and Inge answered together.
“I’m very glad to hear that.” She stood, smoothing out her skirt. “Inge, I’d be happy to help find you another dýr. I know you need the help.”
“Thank you.” Inge hugged her, her chin resting on the Tala’s shoulder.
They walked to the door arm in arm and I sank back into the cot, burying myself again.
I closed my eyes and welcomed the dark.
TWENTY-FIVE
I sat beside Inge in the meadow, digging up bulbs of fennel in silence. The sun was high and heatless, reflecting off the frozen ground. I pushed the spade into it, prying the earth up and raking through it with my hands.
The skin around my wrist was raw again, the bruise on my face sore when I moved my mouth.
Inge picked up a bulb and dusted it off with her fingers. “I’m sorry about what happened.”
I sat back on my knees, taking it from her and setting it into the basket beside me. It wasn’t her fault, but I wanted to be angry at her anyway. I’d had my chance to get to the river and now it was gone.
She watched me, setting her hands into her lap. “I think we should talk.” She picked at the dirt beneath her fingernails. “About Iri.” She looked up to meet my eyes. “I know who you are, Eelyn.”
I recoiled, my mind pulling thoughts so quickly I could hardly follow them. I searched the meadow around us instinctively, looking for a threat. But we were alone.
She didn’t move, watching me. “I haven’t told anyone.”
The beat of my heart knocked in my chest. I tried to read her. Tried to decide what she was planning to do about it. How much she knew. “How?”
“When Fiske brought you home, I knew there was more to it than what he told me. When you mentioned your family and your age I had my suspicions. I thought you might be the sister he told us about. But I wasn’t sure.” She pulled in a long breath and let it out.
I stood, walking out a ways until I had a good view of the meadow. If she’d planned to trap me, this would be a good place. I had nowhere to hide. “He told you about me?”
“He did, but he didn’t have to. You look just like him.”
“Did he tell you I was his fighting mate?” My eyes were still on the tree line.
A sad smile lifted on her lips. “No, he didn’t.”
I faced her. She sat with her skirt spread around her in the grass. I swallowed hard. “I lost him in the fight. I turned around and he was just … gone. I was looking for him.” I sucked in a breath. “And I saw him just as he went over the edge. I couldn’t reach him.” I sank back down beside her. “What are you going to do?”
“I thought that if I let you escape, the danger would be gone. But I was wrong. It took years for this village to trust Iri. If the Riki knew that he and Fiske are lying about who you are or that they are trying to help you, they would kill them. I won’t tell the Tala or anyone else. After the thaw, you’ll run away. You’ll go back to the Aska and we won’t come after you.” She went back to digging and the pain surfaced on her face. The fear.
“He’s not leaving. He won’t come back with me,” I said.
“I know.”
“I—” I bit back the strangled sound in my voice.
“What?” She sat up.
“Thank you—for what you did for Iri.”
When I looked at her again, her eyes were filled with tears. “You’re welcome.”
“Mama!”
Halvard ran toward us from across the meadow and Inge stood quickly, taking her skirt into her hands. “Halvard?”
“It’s Gyda!” He jumped up and down, waving her to him.
She smiled widely. “It’s time.” She held a hand out to me.
I looked at it, the soft, slender line of her fingers, splayed out and waiting. She looked down at me, the smile still broad on her face.
I lifted my hand and almost pulled it back before I let her take it. She pulled me up beside her, brushing the grass off my pants like a mother would do to a child.
“Let’s go.” She lifted the basket onto her arm and started toward the trees.
The length of her dress parted the tall dry grass as she walked, her arm swinging at her side as she ran after Halvard. Her long dark hair fell down her back in one intricate braid.
It didn’t matter how much I didn’t want to see it or how hard I tried to remember what I’d always been taught. Inge was a mother. And whatever the difference in blood, she loved Iri as if there were none.
* * *
I watched out the front door, across the path to Gyda’s house, where Inge and Runa were inside. The labor had already been going for hours, but it was Gyda’s first b
aby. They could be there all night.
Halvard finished eating and climbed the ladder, leaving Fiske, Iri, and me by the fire. I pulled a pair of Halvard’s pants into my lap and started mending them where he’d torn a hole in the knee.
“I’ll stay until the thaw,” I said, pulling the needle through the wool.
Iri sat up, leaning forward. Beside him, Fiske glanced at me, his gaze lingering for only a moment.
“I’ll stay until the thaw and then I’ll go home.”
Iri nodded, smiling. “Alright.”
If Inge wasn’t going to tell anyone, there was no sense in me taking the risk now. I would stay out of sight and out of trouble. I’d go home and face my shame and try to find a way to earn back what I’d lost in the eyes of Sigr.
Runa came through the door, her face flushed from the cold, and fetched a wooden box from the shelf. I filled a bowl with the stew we’d eaten for supper and handed it to her.
She hesitated, looking at it and then behind me to where Iri sat. She took the bowl, smiling. “Thank you.”
I sat back down, starting on the pants again, embarrassed. I hadn’t thought about it. I’d just done it.
“Did the baby come?” Iri caught her hand as she passed and pulled her to him.
She smiled, touching her nose to his. “Not yet.” Her fingers slipped through his grasp and she went back out the door.
Halvard’s snoring rumbled in the loft and Fiske and Iri sat in front of the fire, mending opposite ends of a net. I listened to them, talking about the next hunt. The next fighting season. The next visit from the Riki traders. Making plans.
Their lives would go on when I left. I would fade like a bruise or a memory.
Fiske rubbed the salve into the broken skin on his knuckles that appeared after he went to see Thorpe. I ran my fingers over the wound on my arm and the same sting that had crawled over me when he touched me ignited again, making me feel too warm by the fire.
A screech echoed through the air outside and we all straightened, Iri and Fiske falling quiet. I stood, looking out the door, into the dark village, but I couldn’t see anything. It was quiet again.
“Maybe it was Gyda.” I leaned into the doorpost.
Iri relaxed back into his seat, throwing another log onto the fire. “Eelyn’s good with nets.”
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