Fragments of your Soul (The Mirror Worlds Book 1)

by Erbsland, E. S.

  “Hardly,” said Naal and looked her over dismissively. “If not even Hel is able to, why should you?”

  Hel, however, turned around to her and looked at her searchingly. Suddenly her eyes were no longer empty, but what Arvid saw confused her so much that she instinctively took a step back. She didn’t know what it was, but the being in front of her was familiar, as if she had known it for a long time. Then the moment was over, and Hel turned back to the water.

  “Maybe you could,” she said thoughtfully. “There’s so much that is unknown in your soul… an ever-changing darkness, which I cannot penetrate.” Slowly she let herself sink into a squat. “Perhaps you could,” she repeated softly.

  Then suddenly she rose with a hasty jerk. “It drifts off!” she said, alarmed.

  They set in motion like a single being.

  “It’s over here,” called Hel, while they hastily climbed over rocks and stones, following the sparkle of the soul shard, which was now carried down the Black Waters by the current. Hel, who was accustomed to this environment, got along much faster. Arvid and Naal kept slipping off the rocks or got stuck in crevices. Then at last Hel stopped again and sat down at the waterfront.

  “We don’t have much time left,” she said, as Arvid reached her and saw that the stone was stuck in a small bump again. Arvid knew what she meant. It was dark, but she could still see that the water disappeared in a pitch-black, gaping hole, barely one hundred steps from them.

  “I’ll get it,” Arvid said firmly.

  “It’s risky,” Hel pointed out. “The splinter will affect your thoughts and feelings and may push you to do things you’d never do otherwise. You will have to fully concentrate on safely retrieving the shard.”

  “Arvid!” Naal called breathlessly. She had climbed down the last rock and stopped, panting heavily. “You can’t do that,” she said excitedly. “Have you forgotten what you’re wearing on your arm? I won’t let you recklessly put Loke’s life at risk!”

  “Recklessly?” Arvid asked, stunned.

  “The shard is only dangerous for her mind,” Hel said. “The cold water is the only thing that could threaten her life. She’s not a giant like us.”

  “Exactly,” Naal said. “Humans are weak. She will drown.”

  “Naal,” Hel said urgently, “in a few hours the shard may be lost and not resurface again for decades.”

  “It can’t possibly be that valuable.”

  “Believe me, it is.”

  Naal said nothing and stared gloomily at the water in front of them.

  “My father would have wanted Arvid to try,” Hel added after a while. “You and I cannot carry the stone, but against the water and the cold we can help her.”

  “All right,” Naal finally said with a resigned sigh. “It looks like I’ll have to protect the life of my son myself.”

  Arvid hurried to get rid of her cloak, coat and her boots. It was cold, but after a moment’s hesitation she also slipped out of her dress. When she got out of the water, she would be grateful for every dry piece of clothing.

  “I’ll get into the water with you,” Naal said firmly, as Arvid let herself slide down the slippery stone of the water’s edge, shivering in the cold. Now that she could feel the icy breath of the dark water, her heart began to beat anxiously. This river was even colder than the underground stream in Loke’s house in Jördendheim, and the current dangerously strong. She would have to wade three or four steps out into the water, where she probably was barely able to stand.

  “Naal, I need your hand,” she said. “Otherwise the water will simply drag me down when I dive.”

  “You mustn’t let her go, Naal,” Hel said urgently. “Under the influence of the stone Arvid might do the most nonsensical things.”

  Naal nodded. She climbed down and jumped in the icy water beside Arvid. It barely reached up to her thighs, but would be up to well above Arvid’s waist, already here at the edge.

  “Already lost your courage?” asked Naal mockingly when she noticed Arvid’s hesitation.

  “No,” Arvid said firmly. Still it took all her willpower to bring herself to finally slide into the water.

  It was a feeling as if her skin was stung by a thousand tiny needles. Instinctively she sucked in the air until she thought her lungs would burst soon. With all her might she had to force herself to exhale again, yet she slowly felt herself overcome by a numbing feeling of dizziness. The river tore at her quivering body, but then she felt the firm grip of Naal’s hand around her arm.

  “You better hurry,” she said seriously.

  Arvid nodded wordlessly, then she went off. It was not easy to move against the current, and the water quickly became deeper. Everything about her body ached from the cold and yet she adamantly put one foot before the other and forced herself farther in the direction of the shard.

  Finally, she was right above it. She took another deep breath, firmly clasped Naal’s wrist and then dived down into the freezing cold. Everything was blurry and dark, but the gleaming stone was clearly visible. Arvid knew it would be lost forever if she just tore it loose and couldn’t get hold of it.

  But she managed.

  Arvid knew she had to defend herself against the effect of the splinter, but it was impossible. As soon as she closed her hand around it, something seemed to take possession of her. The power of the stone was so enticing that Arvid let out a triumphant laugh. She watched as her breath rose up in swirling bubbles, but what did it matter? She was no longer dependent on things like air. She could do anything she wanted.

  Suddenly she felt like she was being grabbed by the arm and a moment later violently pulled out of the icy water. A dark, seething anger came over her. Arvid let out an angry scream and yanked her arm free, only to almost get swept away by the current. Enraged, she stared up at the giantess who had dared to tear her off her feet.

  “Puny creature!” bellowed Arvid. “Don’t you dare to touch me again, or I will destroy you!”

  Naal looked at her in shock and loosened her grip a little. The sight filled Arvid with such satisfaction that her anger subsided and another chuckle escaped her lips. Actually, it was quite funny. Yes, it was kind of amusing to see Naal like that.

  “Oh yes, you do well to be afraid,” she said with cheerful mockery. “What choice do you have? Your whole worthless existence depends on my favor.”

  In a powerful movement she pulled herself up on the next rock and out of the water. She felt power surging through her. It was absolute. It was of such purity that it was not to be wasted on ordinary and insignificant things. This power was solely intended to push the boundaries of this world in order to raise her life force to a new level.

  “Arvid,” she suddenly heard a voice behind her, “please put away the stone.”

  Arvid turned around and looked at the black-clad figure behind her. It was Hel. Earlier, she had not noticed how strange she was, but a certain power emanated from her. What kind of power might that be? It was no power that was familiar to her, but what was it?

  “What’s wrong with you?” said Arvid. “I can’t see your soul. How come?”

  “Put away the stone,” Hel repeated insistently. “You are not yourself. The stone influences you, Arvid. Put it on the ground.”

  “Stone?” said Arvid, stunned. She opened her hand and looked down at the shard. It wasn’t much bigger than her fingertip, but it was sharp and pointed. It looked a bit like amber, but if you looked closely, a speckled pattern could be seen, as if it was composed of hundreds of small grains. And this thing should be so special? Of such immense importance that she had thrown herself into the river in her underwear? The thought was so funny that Arvid began to laugh out loud.

  “This is unbelievable!” she said with a grin. “Because of this ridiculous stone I stripped almost naked. Have you any idea how gr
eat my power is?” She looked over at Naal and Hel and raised her hands. They both looked at each other with blank faces and made no attempt to speak. They looked like cows, standing in a pasture and goggling at passing wanderers. Arvid chuckled, then looked back to the shard on her palm. It was an incredibly ugly thing.

  “This stone is not of importance to me,” she said contemptuously and dropped the splinter to the ground.

  It remained lying in the wet sand and Arvid stared at it. She could feel its grip releasing her mind. Suddenly she felt the burning pain of the cold on her skin and the wet underwear that stuck to her body. Her legs were trembling, and dizziness overcame her. Suddenly Arvid felt a stranger in her own body—no, it went even deeper than that. For a moment it seemed as if she had become a stranger to her own soul, as if she were a different person.

  Hel quickly grabbed her by the arm and helped her to sit down. “You’ve done well,” she said with a smile.

  When they shortly afterwards arrived at Hel’s house, Arvid was a little better. Hel brought a box of thick wood, and quickly and under extreme concentration, Arvid put the shard inside, without getting overwhelmed by its influence.

  Naal was silent the whole time and lay down to sleep shortly after they had eaten. Arvid, on the other hand, couldn’t find rest, even though it was in the middle of the night. She sat down on the bench right by the window and looked outside, although there was not much to see in the dark. She could see the trace of the red star lamps that lit the path leading up. Maybe it was exactly this simple picture that calmed her so. While she had held the soul shard in her hand, she had caught a glimpse of something that had blurred, almost destroyed, the border of the rules of her world.

  Eventually, Hel sat down beside her. She looked incredibly tired.

  “Don’t you want to go to sleep?” said Arvid.

  “Not yet,” Hel said. “I wanted to answer your question… and talk about my father.”

  “What question?”

  “You wanted to know why you can’t see my soul.”

  “Right,” Arvid said with an embarrassed smile. “I hope that wasn‘t too rude…”

  “It wasn’t,” Hel said. “It’s because I possess the gift to absorb the properties of any soul. It is as if it becomes my own. Like this I can exactly recognize its nature and composition.”

  “I… don’t know if I understand this,” confessed Arvid.

  Hel smiled. “That doesn’t matter. You only have to understand that I am able to recognize a soul clearly, even if it is not bound to a body. That’s why I’m down here at the river.”

  “Not bound to a body?” Arvid asked blankly. “Do you mean… the souls of the dead?”

  “For example.”

  “And what does this have to do with the river?”

  “It’s not just a river,” said Hel. “It’s the Black Waters. Deep within them runs the soul stream. I observe it at all times.”

  “The soul stream,” Arvid murmured thoughtfully. She had heard of it, but had that not just been a fairy tale? “I thought that was just some story.”

  “No,” Hel said, “but many don’t believe it exists, because hardly anyone has ever seen it. It is omnipresent. It flows deep inside the earth, everywhere, but this is the only known location where it becomes visible—at least for those who have the gift to recognize souls.”

  “So soul gems are actually crystallized souls?”

  “No. But… there is something of a soul that remains in this world when it passes. These residues are what make a soul gem what it is.”

  Arvid nodded thoughtfully, then she let her eyes wander outside the window again. The staircase in the rock face was so infinitely high. How many possibly knew that soul gems originated in a place like this?

  “Well, Arvid,” Hel said after a long pause, “what happened between you and my father?”

  “What… exactly do you mean?” On the one hand Arvid had so many questions she wanted to ask Hel; on the other hand it made her uncomfortable to talk to her about Loke, especially about what had happened last. After all, he was Hel’s father.

  “He was here a few days ago,” Hel said. “He asked me for an absurd number of different soul gems and… well, it could only mean that he was extremely upset.”

  “Why?”

  “Has he ever told you how my mother died?”

  “No,” Arvid said, then she swallowed. “Just… his brother… Helblindi said that Loke was responsible for her death.” She insecurely looked up to Hel. “Is that true?”

  “He didn’t kill her, if that’s what you mean,” Hel said. “How could he? He and she were connected with a band of life.”

  Arvid hesitated. She had never really thought about that. Now that Hel mentioned it, she suddenly felt very foolish.

  “She took her own life,” Hel said, “but this certainly had to do with Loke. It was a political connection. My mother had accepted that, but… when she realized who and what Loke was, she became very unhappy. She couldn’t stand him. Hatred began to grow in her. She hated what Loke was, and he made her life a living hell by tormenting her in every possible way.”

  Arvid felt a queasy feeling spreading in her when she heard that. She knew how Loke could be. How would he treat someone whom he despised, but with whom he was forced to live together?

  “It must… have been bad,” she said softly.

  “I think that both contributed, that the situation finally got out of control,” Hel said. “My mother hated my father deeply. The idea that there was no way for her to escape this connection must have worn her out. She wanted to destroy him; all her thinking circled around this one thing. She knew that when she died, the band of life would also kill Loke. This thought was the last bit of happiness left in her.”

  “But the band didn’t kill him,” said Arvid. “After all, Loke is still alive.”

  Hel nodded. “I’m sure he told you that living runes don’t hold forever on the body of a shapeshifter.”

  “Yes. Your mother didn’t know that?”

  “I admit I don’t know if she knew,” Hel said, “but when she killed herself, the band was not completely faded yet. She took a poison, then she sent for Loke, who had to watch as she slowly died. He knew that the band of life would do something to him, but it was uncertain what. My mother killed herself to at least see her husband suffer in this very last hour.”

  “How horrible,” whispered Arvid.

  “He who sows suffering will reap sorrow,” Hel said. “My father has sown endless fields of it.” She rose and slowly walked over to the table, where the box with the shard was still standing.

  “This is what he lost on that day,” she said. “At least what remains of it.” She reached out with her hand, but paused before her fingers touched the wood of the box.

  Arvid frowned. “A soul gem?”

  “Back then it was no gem yet,” said Hel. She turned to Arvid, looking at her seriously. “When my mother died, the band of life shattered Loke’s soul, but only one of the fragments was lost. After all these years this shard is all that still remains of it.”

  “But… that’s…” Arvid broke off and rose also. “This is a soul gem that formed from… a part of Loke’s soul?” she asked in disbelief. The thought was outrageous.

  “A very small part,” Hel said. “I’m telling you this because… every time my father is feeling bad, he blames it on the imbalance the loss of this fragment caused. He often carries a collection of tiny soul gems… broken gems. He tries to compensate for this imbalance, but probably he’ll never quite succeed.”

  “But with this shard it might be possible,” Arvid said excitedly.

  “I’m afraid not. What he has lost is lost forever. This splinter only contains a meager residue… Nevertheless, it is the best alternative there is.”
r />   “At least that.”

  “I’m also glad that we were able to retrieve the shard,” Hel said, but without actually looking glad. In a strange way all her emotions only seemed to be superficial and fleeting. She went to one of the chairs and sat down. “But you still haven’t answered my question. What happened between you and my father?” She looked at Arvid from her empty, expressionless eyes, but Arvid hesitated. Then finally she grabbed the chair next to her and sat down also.

  “It’s… complicated,” she said haltingly. “Your father, he… well, he hurt me a lot. He’s done that… many times before, but… this time it was really bad. It was… it was…” She broke off, thinking, then shrugged helplessly.

  “Did he make you angry?” said Hel, as Arvid didn’t continue.

  “I wish so much that he would have,” Arvid said with a sad smile. “I can handle that just fine, you know? But… No, he… said something to me that hit my most sensitive spot. At first I was just shocked, sad, desperate… but then… Loke suddenly tried to comfort me. At least… I think that’s what he tried. And then it occurred to me that Loke had known full well that I would be shocked about what he said. He had done it on purpose… and… deliberately, just to comfort me shortly afterwards and somehow try to make up for it again. It was so contradictory and absurd. I felt… like a worthless toy that was being pushed around helplessly.”

  Hel nodded thoughtfully. “And you told him that?”

  “Yes,” Arvid said quietly. “That… and that I will have nothing more to do with him or anything about his life.”

  “And you were serious?”

  “Yes, I was,” Arvid said, looking down at her hands. “To him I’m… vulnerable and completely defenseless. The pain was just too much.”

  “You do love him.”

  Arvid hesitated, then nodded. “For so long… For months I’ve been clinging to the hope that he would return my feelings, but… whenever he is nice to me, gets closer to me, then… then it turns out that it’s just a game or an experiment.” She sighed deeply. “Our marriage only made it worse. Right from the first minute my head told me that Loke only made me his wife to protect me and thus his plan. But my heart hoped on. I was ready to accept all his faults, if only I knew that… I meant something to him. But then a week ago… it was just too much. Why should I continue hoping, when he’s just playing with me and obviously takes pleasure in hurting me?”