Her eyes were still narrowed as she looked at me. “But you were a High Elf. You were alive before Ragnarok. Did you know who he was?”
This time, the truth. I nodded.
“And he didn’t die in the chaos after Ragnarok, right? No one has seen him for a thousand years, but the Lords said he still breathed.”
I went still as a marble statue, and she leaned closer. Her eyes blazed with ferocity.
“He’s still alive, right?” she said. “Because if he isn’t, then you dragged me here on a wild goose chase after a ring that serves no purpose.”
I shrugged. I had, after all, been in prison a thousand years. There was no reason for her to think I’d know what happened to Galin during that time.
She pulled out the golden ring to show it to me. “When we get out of here, I might need your help. I want to find him among the High Elves. You know more about them than I do, of course. Will you help me do that?”
I nodded again, wishing the nokk would attack us again and end this conversation.
“It didn’t make sense that he’d be living on an island in the dark for the last thousand years.” Her fingers curled as though she was thinking of calling her blade to her. “I’ve been waiting for you to wake up. Something seems off about this place.”
With a dawning horror, it occurred to me that my mate had saved my unconscious body from a monster, and she’d been waiting over me as I slept. I felt I needed to reassert some sense of strength and masculinity.
Slowly, I stood and dusted off my clothes. My body was tired, low on energy. I needed to devour a soul if I wanted to replenish myself. That always made me feel better.
I’m going to investigate. Wait here.
Then, before Ali could protest or ask to come along, I brushed off the last of the dirt and climbed up the side of the riverbank. At the top, the ground was broken up by small tufts of gray grass. A thick fog had descended, and with it, the heavy stench of death.
In the misty distance, I saw a shadow move. I stiffened, motioning for Ali to stay before I began creeping forward. More shapes moved in front of me—the silhouettes of people. A smile crept over my lips. What I needed was a bit of feasting. To rip someone’s neck out, to regain some energy.
I growled softly, a sound that usually lured a person to me.
I crept closer. The silhouettes of men and women moved along a raised platform, maybe two feet above the muddy plain. An ancient road. I sucked in a short breath as I realized why they hadn’t noticed my growl.
Their skin was pale, eyes glazed. They trudged forward in a silent march, their gazes locked on the stones at their feet. Their bodies glimmered faintly with light.
I couldn’t eat a single one of them.
They were dead, and I knew then exactly where we were. My disappointment at not getting to feed was soon replaced by joy.
I turned back to Ali, then crossed down to write in the dirt. It’s the road to Helheim.
“You’re certain?”
I nodded.
Ali’s lip curled. “So that smell is… corpses?”
I nodded again. This road—Helvegen—would lead us straight to the Shore of the Dead. Leaning over, I wrote in the dirt, Our journey is almost over.
Chapter 38
Ali
Marroc and I had been walking for hours. My throat was parched, and my stomach grumbled. I tried to remember what I’d eaten today, but all I could recall was the apple in the Emperor’s chambers. What I would do for a bite of it now. There was water in the marsh beside the road—dark pools hidden behind bunches of gray reeds—but I was afraid to drink from them.
All around us, the dead shuffled forward, eyes dull and mouths hanging open.
At first, they’d had me completely on edge. Though their bodies looked intact, they moved like the draugr. But I quickly learned they had no interest in the living. Or anyone else, for that matter. They all walked north, toward what I could only assume was Helheim itself. The only sound was the soft shuffling of feet over ancient cobblestones.
Marroc kept close to me, watchful and silent. Wisps of smoke drifted off his skin. He was the one beacon of beauty in this parade of the dead.
I wished I could listen to the little device he had given me, but it was waterlogged and wouldn’t start. I’d tried humming a few bars of music, but it just didn’t feel right walking amongst the corpses.
Eventually, Marroc touched my arm, and I turned to see that in front of us, the dead were slowing. The dark form of a building rose from the mist. Something else was different, too. A new sound joined the noise of shuffling feet. The roar of rushing water.
The dead slowed nearly to a halt as they began to discard their clothes and belongings, dropping them in piles and heaps on the road. Marroc crossed to a pile and rummaged around until he found an old book, then kept searching, presumably for a pencil. While he did that, I sifted through the shirts and jeans until I found a bag.
Resupplied, we pushed forward among the dead. Eventually, the mist parted, and I saw that the dark shape was a narrow bridge that spanned a roaring river. The bridge was only large enough for one person, but opulent, made of crystals and gold.
We weren’t in Hel—not yet. Helheim was a walled realm. But we were getting close.
By the bridge’s entrance stood a towering woman, at least ten feet tall. Dressed in iron armor, she balanced a long sword in front of her and stared out onto the road. Not dead, but not really seeing, either. I realized I knew her name. This was Modgud, the furious battler, the giantess who guarded the river Gjoll. Her glimmering blond hair draped over her armor.
As we approached the bridge, the dead funneled into a narrow path so that only one could cross at a time. Slowly, they shambled over the bridge, and we moved behind them.
When we got to the entrance, Marroc started to cross, and I wondered if the giantess would notice. But she didn’t move a muscle. Her eyes remained straight ahead.
As soon as I took a step onto the bridge, however, her sword shattered stones at my feet.
“What brings the living to my bridge?” she growled, fixing me with black eyes. “Why do you wish to cross these waters?”
“I—” My mouth opened and closed. I couldn’t explain to her that I wanted to steal Loki’s wand, could I? I’d keep it simple. “I am traveling to the Nastrand—the Shore of the Dead.”
The giantess didn’t move, and her sword continued to block my path. “You must pay the toll. The dead don’t need to pay. Only the living.”
I opened my palms. “You want money? Because I don’t have any.”
“What would I do with money?” growled the giantess. “Your kind pay the toll in blood. Wet my blade and you may pass.”
It took a moment for her intention to sink in. “You want me to cut myself on your sword?”
“Either you do it yourself or I’ll do it for you.” Her muscular forearm flexed, and the sword shifted toward me.
I looked at the blade, then at my hand and missing finger. Couldn’t be as bad as that. “All right.”
I gripped the sword, then slid my palm down fast, cutting into the skin—but not too deep. All the same, pain lanced up my arm. It hurt more than I’d expected.
“Is that enough?” I said, pointing to the smear of blood I’d left on the giantess’s blade.
Modgud raised her sword and licked it clean with a pale tongue. My lip curled.
She didn’t look at me as she spoke. “You have paid the toll. You may pass.”
I stepped onto the bridge. It was constructed of clear crystal, and I could see straight through to the river. Water rushed between massive boulders. A feeling of vertigo washed over me, and I made my first mistake. I grabbed hold of the guard rails to steady myself, nearly falling anyway as searing pain blurred my vision. I’d pressed the wound on my hand directly onto the edge of sharp crystal.
Slowly, I moved forward, gripping my injured hand. Blood dripped from my palm onto the crystal bridge. When I reached the middle
of the bridge, I paused. This was when I made my second mistake. I looked down.
Trapped between the stones were thousands of silver sticks. I paused, squinting. No, not sticks—swords. Thousands upon thousands of razor-sharp blades stuck out from between the rocks. A cold wind stung my cheeks.
As I looked down, the bridge started swaying precariously, like the thing wanted to throw me off just for being alive. I started forward again, trying to stay upright as I rushed toward the end of the bridge.
As I stepped onto the land, I gripped my injured hand, wincing.
Modgud’s deep voice called out to me. “Living elf, you have crossed into the land of the dead. Your fate is sealed. Understand that you cannot leave by this path.”
Marroc was already ripping off a piece of cloth from the bottom of his shirt. Now that it was ragged and torn, I could clearly see the rippling muscles of his abdomen underneath it.
“Is that true?” I asked Marroc with a growing sense of panic. “I’m trapped here now?”
He grunted, pulling me closer to him, binding the cut in my palm. While he was doing that, of course, he couldn’t answer.
As soon as he’d bandaged it up tightly, I asked again. “Marroc. What does she mean? I can’t leave here?”
He flipped open his book and scribbled something on the first blank page. You cannot leave by this path.
A bolt of anger shot through me. He knew? “Why didn’t you tell me before I crossed?”
He gave a slow shrug, like he had not a care in the world. Loki’s wand will allow us to escape.
But the wand was bullshit. Probably. “What if you’re wrong about it being here? What if we don’t find it? What if I’m not able to steal it?” Panic was rising in my chest. “My entire life depends on a legend. An unproven rumor that you believe.”
We will not fail. I will not allow it.
“Oh, really? You won’t allow it. Because you control everything.” Rage was rising in me, and my fingers twitched. “Mom always told me what your kind was like. The High Elves. That you were self-serving, never to be trusted. You look out for your own kind, don’t you? That’s why you threw us in the caves. You all blamed us for Ragnarok. And now you’re willing to risk my life for your own goals.”
Marroc had gone very still, his dark hair caught in the wind.
“Guess Mom was right,” I said.
Chapter 39
Marroc
On this side of the river, the mist thinned. An icy breeze stirred the air, revealing muddy plains on either side of the road.
Ali walked in front of me, her back stiff, eyes fixed straight ahead. Blood from her palm soaked the strip of my shirt I’d given her. I wished I’d been able to clean it.
Without the power of speech, it was hard to explain my certainty to her. I knew the wand was here, because I could feel it. It was like the thing had been calling to me. And here, in the world of the dead, it was growing stronger, its power like a gleaming beacon drawing me ever closer.
Soon, I’d have my soul back. I’d be alive again, for the first time since Ragnarok. Since floods had drowned the world, since disease had spread and the gods had slaughtered each other. The deaths of the gods had been Fate… Wyrd.
And now, Fate was telling me to get the wand.
I’d bet my life on it. But I didn’t suppose Ali would be swayed by a feeling.
Seemed I should have told her in advance the entire story, but I’d forgotten how to deal with people long ago. The thousand years in prison had robbed me of all ability to work with other elves. The lack of a soul didn’t help, either.
Once it was returned to my body, I’d remember.
As we followed the road, figures started to move father out in the plains, slipping in and out of the fog. The longer we walked, the more numerous they became. Soon, I heard the clash of steel and the clink of armor rising around us.
With the pounding of hooves, a warhorse charged out of the mist. The rider waved a banner, his mouth open in a silent scream, and a legion of the gleaming dead raced behind him. The hooves were the only sound the entire horde made, and as they rushed around us, I pulled Ali in close.
With glimmering dust clouding around us, the soldiers split into two factions, one on either side of the road. Ali pulled away from me, still looking furious.
We walked slowly, now, as a great battle raged on either side of the road. Dead men fought in complete silence, even as they stabbed each other with spears. Dead warriors lopped limbs with swords and bashed in skulls with battleaxes. The mud ran thick with their blood, but they rose again and pieced their bodies back together like grisly jigsaw puzzles.
But they wouldn’t bother us.
Ali was as silent as the dead warriors, and I knew she was seething like the mists around us.
When we’d finally moved past the silent battle, the fog thinned a little, and I could see a dark line rising from the fog, stretching out on either side. As we approached, it grew larger and larger until it was as taller than the highest skyscrapers in Boston. Taller even than the Citadel on Beacon Hill.
Before us loomed a massive iron wall extending in either direction as far as the eye could see. Great streaks of rust stained the wall, like giant smears of blood. Lines of dead shuffled toward it.
This was the wall surrounding Helheim itself. Not a defensive structure, but one meant to keep the souls of the dead trapped inside.
We followed the road north until a pair of towers came into view, jutting from the wall, flanking an entrance. Almost all the dead streamed into it, but a few turned to the right or left, ambling along.
The gate to Helheim.
When we were a hundred and fifty yards away, I stopped and pulled out my book—which I now realized was an old romance set in a time of pandemic, called Quarantined with a Bad Boy. I grimaced at the cover, then flipped it open to a mostly blank page.
I wrote, Let me go in to explore. I’m already dead, and it’s better that I go on my own. You’re mortal. I can’t die.
She nodded, still barely meeting my gaze.
I turned to see a shambling legion of the dead moving toward the gates. I blended into the crowd, walking among them until I was maybe a hundred yards from the entrance. I tried to look inside, but it was filled with a shimmering mist. From the other side of the gate, I could hear disquieting noises—howls, shrieks, and a low, unending ululation.
From the stories and legends, I knew that visitors to Helheim didn’t pass through the entrance with the rest of the dead, but I didn’t know why. I guessed that since my body was already dead, I was unlikely to be affected by any magic that might be in play here. Still, I had to be careful. I crept up closer.
I watched as a dead man with a white beard approached the gate, his body gleaming. He trundled forward, one foot in front of the other—but when he reached the swirling mist, he stopped, and his body seemed to freeze in place. With a gust of wind, his skin crumbled into dust. In the flickering instant as his body disintegrated, I saw a shadow pass into the opalescent mist.
This was why the other travelers in the stories had found alternate entrances. The main gate stripped a man’s body from his soul.
And since I had no soul, I’d become nothing but dust.
With rising frustration, I turned back to Ali.
Chapter 40
Ali
Marroc and I walked along the base of the soaring iron wall, close enough that I could reach out and touch it. My feet sank into the mud, and it pulled at my shoes, squelching with every step. At least we’d moved away from the unseeing eyes of the dead.
Water dripped down the wall in rivulets, streaking it with rust. The wall wasn’t entirely smooth. Strange bumps—rivets, maybe—marred its surface. I guessed it was attached to some sort of structure on the other side, but it was impossible to tell. And what I couldn’t understand was how, if it kept the dead in, we were going to be able to breach it.
Curious, I reached out to touch the wall, but Marroc pulled my hand
away.
Probably for the best. I had no idea what sort of magic was at play in this place.
I stared up at it as we walked, dread rising in my chest. Was Mom in there? And Dad? My mouth went dry, and I swallowed hard. I didn’t want to think of them dead. I didn’t like thinking of Mom sick, wasting away in her bed. I wanted to remember her like she was when she was healthy, braiding my hair and telling me how Ragnarok had unfolded all those years ago—it had started with a flood all over the world, and the disease set in. Then the battles between the gods and the giants that had left nearly all of them dead. Mom called it Twilight of the Gods.
She’d told me stories of the world of Midgard even before that, before humans thought it could end, when everything was light. When they’d danced to music in nightclubs. The way Mom spun a tale always lit my mind on fire. She was a fleck of light in a world of darkness.
And if I could see her again…
Marroc turned to face me. Pale smoke drifted off his skin, though it was hard to tell where the smoke ended and the mist began. He was writing in the romance book, which, quite frankly, I wanted to read later.
He showed me his note. I think the best thing will be for me to climb over and then for you to join me.
I pointed at the wall. “I can climb, too. There are divots between the sheets of iron where I could fit my fingers.” Even with my injured hand, climbing it would be a breeze.
He nodded. Going up will be easy. The going down will be more difficult. We don’t know what’s on the other side, and it’s easy to slip when climbing down. If I fall, I won’t die.
I arched an eyebrow. I’d spent years scaling slick black rockface in the underground Shadow Caverns, but whatever. I was too tired to argue.
We kept moving until we reached a long seam between two sheets of iron. It looked like it ran all the way to the top.
Cursed Prince (Night Elves Trilogy Book 1) Page 14