Even now, with the whole world against us, we laughed together. He kissed me through his laughter, light feathery brushes against my mouth, the tip of my nose, my chin, his aim unerring despite the dark. My hands had found his jaw, angling his mouth to mine, when the door flew open behind us. We split apart just as the light from a torch spilled across the cell.
“Hey!” cried Snorri. “Have you two lost your minds? Gunnarsson, you murderer—I forbid you to laugh. Nor you, skraeling, who I fed and protected, only to have you spit my kindness in my face. You two have no right to happiness.” His voice cracked, but his fury was a man’s, not a boy’s. “Not with my father’s blood on your hands.” His voice fell to a fierce whisper. “You should ask Jesus to offer you salvation. That’s your only hope now.”
Neither of us looked at Snorri. We barely heard him. All my attention was on Brandr, and all of his on me.
In that one stolen moment of firelight, I could see him clearly. It felt like seeing him for the first time. Tomorrow, surrounded by our enemies, I knew my friend’s face would be closed to me. He wouldn’t show weakness, any more than I would. But in this brief moment, he was mine. I’d thought I knew his face better even than my family’s—yet I’d never seen him like this. His eyes burned hot and clear. His cheeks were flushed; his beard sparked gold and orange in the torchlight. In the deep crease between his brows, in the emotion playing along his lips, I saw the conflict of joy and despair that echoed in my own heart.
Snorri slammed the door behind him, thrusting us back into darkness more complete than before.
“I think, finally, I might die happy,” Brandr murmured.
“No,” I protested, my voice catching. “No. I have finally seen you.”
He made a sound more growl than sigh, and I could hear the creak of chains as he strained at his fetters. “Where are you?” he begged. “I can’t feel you.”
I struggled toward his voice. His searching hand found mine. He pulled me toward him, and I awkwardly slipped beneath the circle of his arms so that my cheek might press once more against his chest.
He sighed deeply and lay back against the curved bottom of the boat. My head rested on the pillow of muscle above his heart. His fingers made slow circles just along the base of my spine. His chains cut into the small of my back, but I felt no pain.
A tight, thrumming pleasure flushed my skin with heat.
For once, I was glad of my woman’s body.
CHAPTER FORTY-SEVEN
Still clasped in Brandr’s arms, I kept my eyes glued to the border of the door, watching for the light of the false dawn that would herald our deaths.
I tried to tune my ears to Brandr’s heartbeats alone.
The iron bolt clanked open.
“It’s too soon,” I whispered. “The sky is still dark.”
He only held me tighter in response.
The door swung slowly ajar, revealing not our executioners but the hunched figure of Muirenn holding a small oil lamp. The thrall stepped inside and moved to close the door behind her.
“Careful, woman,” the tattooed guard warned her, stepping into view. “Freydis says they’re more dangerous than they look. In that, at least, I believe her.”
“This one wouldn’t hurt me,” she chided impatiently. “Go on now, shut the door before their little wisp of heat escapes and you freeze them to death before tomorrow.”
The door closed firmly behind her. She placed her lamp on the floor. I smiled to see the dish she carried in her other hand. If it was up to Muirenn, we wouldn’t die hungry. She offered me a piece of dried stockfish, then presented Brandr with a hunk of strong cheese.
He took an enormous bite and closed his eyes. “I’ve missed this. A dying man’s last wish fulfilled.” If I hadn’t known better, I would’ve accused Brandr of flirting with the old woman.
She patted him on the head. “It’s good to see you, my boy.”
“Muirenn used to stay with me and Galinn sometimes after our mother died,” he explained to me, swallowing the last of the cheese. “I tormented her ceaselessly, but somehow she’s forgiven me.”
“Ach, don’t believe him. He was always a good child. The only cruel thing he ever did was run off to go viking and leave me behind.”
Brandr smiled—then yawned.
“You’ve had a hard day,” she soothed. “Don’t fight it. Go to sleep, my boy.”
And to my surprise, he did. He curled into a loose ball—and slept.
Dumbfounded, I turned back to Muirenn.
Except Muirenn was gone.
In her place stood an impossibly tall man who glowed with an inner light that put the lamp to shame.
“Ia’a!” I threw my body in front of Brandr’s.
“Quiet now, you don’t want to wake him, do you?” the strange man scolded in a voice that was musical, multilayered—like a man’s and a woman’s and a bird’s all at once. “The poor thing needs his rest. And you and I need some time to talk.” His narrow lips quirked, mirrored by one raised dark brow. Intricate braids wound through his long black hair. Though he was beardless, a long mustache plaited with gold thread fell past his pointed chin.
His features seemed not Norse, not Inuit, but some combination of both. His narrow eyes sparked in the darkness like snow crystals in sunlight; I couldn’t bear to look at them. His lithe figure was almost feminine; flowing silver robes clothed his arms and legs, their delicacy belied by a bronze breastplate embossed with a man’s muscles. With every smooth motion of his limbs, the silver robes glittered, casting points of light around the dark hold of the ship. The man himself seemed to shift and blur with the motion.
“What did you do with Muirenn?” I managed.
The stranger laughed delightedly. “Do with her? I am her. I’ve been her on and off for years now! Which was excessively dull for a long time, by the way. Ever since she got so old and wrinkled.” He leaned against the wall of the hold, completely at ease. “I’ve often thought it’s about time to be some pretty young thing for a while, but Muirenn knows all the right people, you see. It’s not easy to get close to Freydis Eriksdottir without her great protector Thor noticing. So”—he sighed dramatically—“here I am, old and frail and humble. At least for now. I am a shapeshifter, you know.” He blinked at me, his eyes suddenly spinning with rainbows.
“Loki?”
“Very good, Omat! Your lover taught you well.”
My shock quickly turned to suspicion. I’d met the spirits before: Taqqiq had stolen my power; Sanna haunted my steps. What torment did this new god have planned for me?
“I thought the Aesir chained you up beneath a venomous serpent after you killed innocent Baldur.”
He brushed aside my concerns with a graceful wave of his hand. “Some of us cannot be held by chains, my dear.” He cast a pointed glance at the iron links around my wrists.
“What do you want of me?”
“Oh, not much.” He shrugged, grinning again. “Don’t worry, I’m not going to hurt you—or your friend. I merely desire guidance.”
“Guidance?” I choked. “From me?”
“Well, an introduction, if you will.”
“I don’t understand.”
Again the loud sigh. “I’m a Jotun.”
“A—a Frost Giant?”
“Right!” He brightened. “And I’ve come home.”
“To here?”
“Precisely. To Jotunheim.”
“You’re mistaken. I lied to Freydis. There are no Frost Giants here.”
“Of course there are. You just call them Wolf and Bear and Raven. Sanna and Sila. Malina and Taqqiq. And now that Freydis has finally arrived, I am here to join them!”
He spoke in riddles, and I was tired of being the spirits’ plaything. I wanted answers. I wanted to know if he would hurt me—or help me. Nothing else mattered.
“You couldn’t come before?” I asked with thinly disguised impatience. “Aren’t you a god?”
Loki’s face darkened, his humor vanis
hing in an instant. “If we gods could do whatever we liked, do you really think you’d even exist?” He pushed off the wall and came to stand above me. “Why would we bother? Why not just live atop our World Tree in a constant state of bliss, loving and fighting and feasting? No, no. We need you, as much as I’m loath to admit it. You created us from dreams and prayers and hopes and fears, and we in turn grant you sustenance for both spirit and flesh. Now that the Norse have come to your shores, I have, too—borne here by the power of their faith as surely as they are borne by the wind in their sails. We create them. They create us. A great circle.” His gesture took in the cell, the ship, the whole of the world. “We all need each other. And right now,” he continued, catching my eye in his rainbow gaze, “I need you in particular.” Smirking at my bound hands, he added, “And, if I’m not mistaken, you need me.”
“Desperately,” I admitted, allowing myself the first spark of hope.
“Why do you think I’m here?” Loki twisted his long, braided mustache around a slender finger. “You’ve been missing something, haven’t you? The other Jotuns took it from you.” He released his mustache and placed a hot finger on my cheek. “Well, I’m giving it back.”
With Loki’s touch, a glimmer of power coursed through my flesh. For a brief moment, I could almost see the glow move from his skin to mine.
“My magic…,” I said softly, my eyes trapped in Loki’s sparkling gaze. I reached out with my mind, flexing senses stiff with disuse, seeking some way to test my newfound strength.
I found Brandr, still sleeping under Loki’s spell. I reached deep inside him. I had never done this to another person, and yet I found no barriers, nothing, just his spirit calling to my own. Deep within his soul, a single image burned and danced like the Sun’s ghost on closed eyelids: a young Inuk, lit only by torchlight. My round cheeks flushed and dotted with birthmarks, my hair brushing the tops of my ears, my lips swollen from his kisses. All these things anyone might have seen. But I saw myself not as anyone would have, but as Brandr had—and I was beautiful. I was strong. For all the fear in his breast, he clung to the knowledge of all we had been to each other—and all we still could be. He had hope.
I could’ve stayed in that moment forever, but Loki’s touch pulled me back.
The god stroked my cheek—not as a threat, as the Moon Man once had, but with a grandfather’s affection. Loki had been man and woman. He moved between spirit and flesh. He could understand what it was to have that ability taken from you.
“Why have you helped me?” I begged.
“Because we want the same thing. To protect this land from invaders.”
I sucked in a breath. I had found an ally indeed. “Go on.”
“You will take me to Sanna. She will send her icebergs to rip through the ships’ hulls. The knarrs will founder and sink. All the Norse will drown and Jotunheim will once again be the realm of my people and yours.”
I wanted to agree. I wanted to link hands with Loki and help him defeat our enemies. But his plan had a fatal flaw.
“I can’t go to Sanna. She’ll kill me.”
He shrugged. “Perhaps, but that’s a risk you must take. I left this land in another age—I no longer speak the Jotuns’ tongue. You must summon her.”
“The spirits have turned from me. Why would they listen now?”
“The spirits of the animals have never abandoned you. Who sent your wolfdogs? Who made them whales?”
“Narwhals. One who truly wanted to protect me would have sent the fierce, fanged whales instead.”
Loki clicked his tongue. “I suspect your Wolf Spirit would’ve happily done just that. But your wolfdogs chose which sort of whales to become. Think, my dear. Narwhals never leave the north, not even in winter. They stay close to protect their own family, not to massacre the families of others. And though usually only their males have tusks, sometimes a rare female is born with one as well.” He lifted a brow. “Sounds like someone I know.”
I scowled at him to hide my weakening resolve. “But Sanna?” I protested. “She bears me an old grudge for stealing my father’s spirit from her.”
“That’s exactly why she’ll come when you call her. She wants nothing more than to have you in her clutches.”
“Exactly. If she catches me, I’m dead.”
“There’s no rift between you that cannot be healed. You two have more in common than you think.”
“Perhaps…,” I conceded, an idea blossoming in my mind.
“So, Inuk. You’re the only mortal who can speak both the Inuk’s tongue and the Norseman’s—who can see the world of both flesh and spirit. You will help? Or should I take back your powers and leave you here to die at first light?” He smiled still, but I wasn’t fooled. He wanted this. Needed it.
“No, no. I’ll do whatever it takes to save my people. I’ll go to Sanna. Just help us escape first.”
“I’m afraid I can’t just magic you both out of here, my dear. I have to be quiet. Subtle. Odin is a farseeing god. He heard Galinn’s plan—a new land, safe from the Christ. Though Galinn, poor child, was too mild and meek to see it through. Odin and Thor sent Freydis Eriksdottir to claim it for them instead. To fight off skraelings and Christians alike. They must wonder why she changed her mind and fled Vinland.” Loki sighed. “So far, Odin thinks me still imprisoned, so it cannot be me sending her such confusing dreams. But if he realizes I’ve escaped, he’ll send Thor and Tyr to seek me out. And trust my words—you do not want to battle the might of the Aesir. So you see why I can’t just go around displaying my godly powers to every Greenland shepherd.”
“That’s why you put Brandr to sleep?”
“It’s easier this way, you must admit. To him, our tales are just tales—he doesn’t really believe in the spirit world, much less the Aesir. And so he wouldn’t be able to see me. I’d appear to him still only as old Muirenn.”
“I don’t care what Brandr sees or doesn’t. You must promise that if I go to Sanna and do as you ask, you’ll come back—as an old woman, or a young god, or a goose for all I care—and help me and Brandr and Kiasik escape.”
Loki threw back his head and laughed. I took that for agreement.
The door creaked open.
“Muirenn?”
Snorri squinted into the cell. A harmless old woman looked back at him. For a moment, I wondered if my conversation with the god had all been a delirious vision.
Brandr stirred and cracked open his eyes.
“You’ve been here long enough, old woman,” Snorri said with a frown. “What could you have to say to them?”
“You don’t understand.” Muirenn lifted the empty dish of cheese. “Ever since the Vikings stole me away from my people in Írland, and I left my own suckling babe dead behind me, I’ve had to find what friends I can.” Snorri turned pale. “And now”—Muirenn’s tone remained light, but her eyes narrowed with pain—“now they take from me once again. Stealing away the boy I once cared for as my own son.” She patted Brandr’s head once more before turning to Snorri. “Shame be upon your people. Wherever you go, you shed blood—and we shed tears.”
“Let’s go, thrall,” the boy said gruffly. “Enough from you.”
“You will be judged. Odin’s ravens know all.” Her eyes caught mine. “The ravens,” she repeated, “know all.”
“Did I fall asleep?” Brandr asked as the door closed once more. He rubbed his face, looking bewildered.
I barely heard him, my mind still slotting together the pieces of Loki’s plan. It won’t work, I realized, remembering what Brandr had said about the Greenlanders’ lust for grain and timber. Killing Freydis and her men won’t be enough—I need to kill the Norsemen’s dreams of Vinland as well.
“They’re going to spread-eagle us, right?” I asked quickly. “Didn’t the Christ man also die upon a cross?”
“So they say…,” Brandr replied. “With a crown of thorns upon his head and a spear in his side.”
“And do the Christians not call him
a god? And say that he lived again?”
“Yes.”
“Then we, too, shall become gods. We, too, shall defeat death.”
“Omat, what—”
“You must trust me. I have to go now, or it’ll be too late.”
“Go? We’re still tied up!”
“My body will stay here, but my spirit will leave. Don’t worry!” I went on, before he could interrupt. “I told you I was a seer. An angakkuq.”
Brandr moved toward me as if he would grab my shoulders.
“Stay back!” I whispered fiercely. He winced as if struck. “You can’t touch me while I’m in a trance. If you wake my body before my spirit returns, I’ll be wrenched from the other world—I may never make it back to this one.”
“This is your plan?”
“You saw my wolfdogs turn to whales, and still you don’t believe there’s more to this world than what you see?”
“What? I didn’t see that,” he insisted. “I started north with the wolfdogs pulling the sled, but when we got to the strait, there was too much open water to cross. So I ripped it apart and made a raft. When I launched it, I had to leave the wolfdogs behind. That first night on the water, three narwhals showed up, circling me, pushing me with their horns. And”—he paused, as if realizing he was proving my point—“they never left.” He groaned. “Perhaps there is magic there. I don’t know—perhaps you learned the animals’ tongue as you learned mine and summoned the narwhals to help me. But I can’t believe your spirit can leave this cell.”
“Yet whether you believe or not, you must trust me, my dear one,” I urged, the endearment slipping unbidden from my lips. “You must stay here and be patient.”
The Wolf in the Whale Page 40