by C. Gockel
Amy feels her legs get weak. She turns around, prepared for a kiss, but instead he just grins at her, and says, “Ma’am, let me get the door,” and steps out of reach.
She glares at him.
“Ladies first,” he says, opening the door for her.
“That’s a mean game,” she says, narrowing her eyes.
“I like games. I’m good at them.” He sounds so cheeky, Amy fumes a little.
Spinning on her heel, she says, “I guess I’m lucky your people wait until marriage.”
Bohdi chuckles like he doesn’t believe her ire. Which he probably shouldn’t—this morning was too much fun.
As she descends the staircase, his footsteps are very fast behind her, making her descent down the staircase more treacherous. “You seem rushed,” she says. Because of what’s outside?
Bohdi halts behind her on the steps. Amy turns around and sees his Adam’s apple bob. “I’m just … if we find the mirror, I might find out who my parents are,” he says, ducking his eyes.
She’s suddenly angry at herself for wanting to make out. The end of his search could be here, in Jotunheim. She crosses her fingers, smiles at him, and says, “Maybe.” And then she turns and runs as fast as she can down the stairs. He follows right behind.
When they reach the front door, Bohdi swings his rifle around. It’s not one of the heavy Barrett rifles; instead it’s what she’s pretty sure is an M4—they’re ideal for urban combat situations. That realization makes her gulp.
“Let me go first this time,” he says.
Before she has a chance to ask, he slips outside. She peeks through the door after him. What passes for a street has a line of Frost Giants trudging along it. They are pulling sleds loaded with sacks of goods and leading shaggy donkeys and goats. Children follow the sleds or sit atop the animals. The newcomers’ clothing looks carelessly tossed together. Instead of tailored leather coats and trousers they wear linens, with animal hides draped over their shoulders.
Amy sees a few Frost Giant men standing on the opposite side of the street, clutching their cloaks to their chests. They incline their heads toward the inn. Amy sees one spit in the snow. She nervously adjusts her earpiece and slips out behind Bohdi. The temperature has dropped and she pulls her muffler up to just below her nose. Thomas and Cruz are on guard outside. They have a giant metal trash-can thing between them; smoke billows from its top, and heat radiates from its sides. Thomas inclines his head to the group of loitering men and says to Bohdi, “Can you see what’s up with them?” Neither Thomas nor Cruz did well in Amy’s Jotunn lessons.
“Right,” Bohdi says, leaving Amy, Cruz, and Thomas, and stepping across the street. Holding his hands at chest level, in their own language Bohdi says, “Is there a problem?”
“Would you translate for us, Doctor?” Cruz asks. Amy relays Bohdi’s question, even as one of the Frost Giants answers, “What are you?”
“I’m a human,” says Bohdi.
Mutters rise in the line of Frost Giants, and the men take a step back. One of them mutters, “Ragnarok.” A child screams.
The man who addressed Bohdi says, “I thought this was a dwarf dwelling?”
“The inn does belong to a dwarf,” Bohdi says.
“Belongs?” says the man. He spits in the snow. “Still?”
Bohdi lowers his hands. Before Amy finishes translating, Cruz and Thomas, possibly sensing tension in the air, raise their rifles. The line of Frost Giants comes to a halt. The space between the inn and the men clears.
“Yes, it still belongs to her,” says Bohdi.
One of the other Frost Giant men takes a step toward Bohdi. “Are you going to give us lodging?”
“I don’t like this,” Thomas’s gravelly voice rumbles before Amy’s even translated.
“You’ll need to speak to Gem, the proprietress,” Bohdi says.
One of the Frost Giantesses snarls, “We will not beg a dwarf for lodging!”
“No,” says Bohdi, “I would expect you to pay Gem for lodging.”
“Weakly human,” snarls one of the men. His cloak slides to the ground, and he rushes toward Bohdi, a knife suddenly in his hand. Amy gasps … if Thomas or Cruz fires, they might hit Bohdi and ...
Holding the knife like a fire poker, the man slices in a quick horizontal motion, and Bohdi steps forward, instead of back. Amy puts her hand to her mouth. Bohdi catches the man by the wrist with the space between his upper arm and his forearm as though it’s a vice. He pivots and launches his palm up to the man’s elbow in a single fluid move. The man screams in pain, and the knife falls to the ground. Bohdi takes a step back. Raising his hands, he beckons to the onlookers. “Does anyone else want to dance?” The branches above him loosen and snap toward Bohdi like angry tongues.
The Frost Giants draw back, and then disperse, casting angry glares in Bohdi’s direction … all except the one with the broken arm. Hunching and cradling his arm, he runs.
Amy hears one of the gull-like birds give a cry. When all the men have vanished from sight, Bohdi turns around, jaw tight, eyes not meeting Amy’s. “That was too easy,” he says to Thomas and Cruz.
Cruz nods and says, “He was clumsy.” Amy blinks. She thought the exchange was scary. But when she thinks of it, she remembers Odin teaching Loki how to hold a knife. Holding it like a poker was not the way to do it.
The line begins to move again, but Amy notices the travelers quicken their pace as they step past the humans.
“They look like peasants,” Thomas says, “not like warriors or hunters.”
Amy watches the hard-scrabble giants walking past them. “I think you’re right.” In her ear, her radio buzzes. “Patel, Lewis—everything alright?”
Cruz answers, “Had a little trouble here. Patel was attacked.”
“What?” Steve’s and Larson’s voices snap in unison. But then Steve says, “Bohdi, are you alright?” And Larson says, “What did he do?”
“It was unprovoked!” says Amy.
“I’m fine, Captain,” Bohdi says. “Thanks for asking, Lieutenant.”
“It was unprovoked,” says Thomas. “There’s an influx of civilians here. Look almost like refugees. Apparently, they don’t like dwarves.”
There is silence over the radio.
Bohdi ducks his head and says, “Maybe I shouldn’t have broken his arm? I just didn’t think.”
Amy touches his shoulder. “It’s not like he gave you time to think. You shouldn’t be so hard on yourself.”
Bohdi finally meets her gaze. His jaw softens, and his eyes are soft.
Amy has to look away. She can’t say why her knees feel weak; instead she just tries to stick to the situation at hand. “I don’t think we should leave Gem and Bjorna alone.”
“I agree with that, too,” says Thomas. “Captain, permission to remain outside of the inn.”
Larson’s voice crackles in her ear. “We’re already spread thin.”
Amy tenses, but then Steve says, “Cruz, Thomas, stay there. Patel, Lewis, do I need to send an escort?”
“We’ll be fine,” says Bohdi. “They’re not dangerous.”
Amy blinks. That’s not how she’d summarize the situation. But she steps to Bohdi’s side, matching his pace as he walks down the alleyway that passes for a street. They turn between two buildings and leave the main thoroughfare to plough through the ankle deep snow of the sparse forest.
x x x x
“Wheeeeeeeeee!” Claire shouts above Steve and the team’s heads. Steve looks up and instantly regrets it. Claire is hanging upside down at what looks like a hundred feet above the ground, branches wrapped around her knees. She’s swinging with her upper body just like she learned to do on the uneven bars in her gymnastics classes back home. “I can see the ocean from here!” Claire shouts.
Steve looks through the door of the building they’ve set up above what they hope is Gullveig’s cavern. Just inside is a manhole-sized tunnel they’ve dug at the base of a medium-sized iron wood tree. The tunn
el stretches about six feet at a sharp angle to a crumbling brick wall. Berry is down there, completely out of view; Tucker is standing just behind him. Berry passes a brick to Tucker, who carries it outside of the structure they’ve erected for shelter. They’ll need to keep guards here. Out of sight, Berry says, “The mortar is so crumbly we’ll be able to pick apart an opening with our hands. I’m trying to go slow to make sure I don’t damage the structural integrity.”
“Good plan,” Steve says. “Less haste, more speed.”
“Wheeeee!” Claire shouts again, and Steve refuses to look up.
“If we could get up there we could see what’s going on back at the village,” says Larson. “Maybe if we called Claire down here, she could attract some branches our way?”
“Would be better if we could learn to do it ourselves,” Steve muses aloud.
In Jotunn, Gerðr says, “I don’t think you can do it.”
Sigyn, standing nearby, sighs. “Magic takes years to master. Claire has merely discovered her talent.”
Gerðr’s eyes go to a spot beside a nearby tree where Redman has begun furiously building a snow sculpture. Branches sway above his head but do not touch his body. “As has Mr. Redman,” she adds.
Valli shakes his head. “It’s such an unmanly talent.”
Ignoring him, Gerðr says, “But as you can see his magic is not strong enough. You humans are still too magically weak.”
Steve feels his skin heat. He hates being told what he can’t do. To Larson he says, “Don’t call Claire, I’m going to do this.”
He turns away, hands balling into fists at his side. Claire can call that magic feeling. Steve can’t call it, but he’s been overwhelmed by it—it feels like clarity, and there must be some way to recreate that feeling. He blinks and knows something that might work.
Steve had suffered PTSD after his short stint in the field. He’d nearly broken the wrist of a nurse when he was recovering from Q fever. She’d been trying to put a hand on his forehead—he’d seen a shadow through his eyelids and reacted. After that, he’d taken to studying mindfulness and meditation to try and self-medicate—his continued study of the martial arts had been part of that. It had been a way to meditate and focus while getting a workout—he’s always been one for efficiency.
“Captain?” says Larson.
“I need a moment of silence,” says Steve, raising a hand.
The team stops talking. They probably think he’s crazy. He almost runs his tongue over his teeth … but stops. Steve keeps his back turned to the team. He unballs his fists. Feeling silly, but also curious, he takes a deep breath through his nose, focusing on the sharp bite of the cold and the sensation of his lungs filling. Holding the breath, he focuses on letting his muscles loosen, and then he exhales through his mouth. Nothing happens, and he feels a rush of disappointment ... That is completely natural. As he acknowledges it, he feels the negative emotion drift away like a leaf caught in a breeze. He takes another deep breath, and repeats the process, and another … and another …
“Captain!” says Tucker.
Steve’s head snaps up. A branch is dangling about four feet above his head—too high. No, he will not accept that. Flipping off the tops of his mittens, he squats down, and taking another long breath, he imagines his muscles flooded with light, just like Claire had described. The branch slides a little closer, and Steve jumps before it can retreat. He’s vaguely aware of Valli swearing and the gasps of Sigyn and Gerðr. He catches the branch, trying to envision the light still flooding through him. He doesn’t have that feeling, and the branch doesn’t wrap around him, but he can climb a rope in a dead hang. He quickly pulls himself up. Steve’s not quite at the level of the mushroom-like cap of the iron wood tree and the thicker less mobile branches, when Gerðr says, “Captain Rogers is a remarkable man. Perhaps we should not be surprised.” Steve resists the urge to roll his eyes. He knows exactly what will happen next.
Sure enough, he hears Larson’s feet thudding across the ground. A second later, the branch jerks and then swings as the lieutenant catches it in a running leap. And then Larson is climbing up beneath him, trying to prove he can be remarkable, too. Steve hesitates for a moment, hoping the branch doesn’t break. When it doesn’t appear to give, he continues his climb, Larson just below his heels.
Steve makes it to the first large horizontal branch, pulls himself onto it, and stands.
“Yay, Dad!” Claire shouts, still high above. Larson is next to him an instant later. No one cries, “go,” or declares the finish line, but Steve knows they’re in a race, and the finish line is Claire. He jumps up to the next branch, and then the next. Larson goes to the other side of the trunk, and they race to Steve’s daughter. Steve wonders if it would be politically expedient to let Larson win, but he can’t bring himself to let it happen.
A few moments later, he’s panting for breath, and his fingers are threatening to seize up with cold. Hauling himself up onto the last branch, he reaches over and pats the top of his daughter’s head. She grins wide at him, sitting on her own branch, as casually as if it were a swing at the park. Larson pulls himself up to them, and Claire gestures with her chin. “Look over there, Dad and Bobby. It’s the ocean.” Steve follows her gaze, and his breath catches. From the tree top they can see over the edge of the mesa, to the forest that continues to stretch for a few miles. From so high, it looks like a carpet of gray ivy. Taking out his binoculars, Steve scans the forest. Twisting between the dark gray is a line of thinner cover that stretches from the mesa down to the ocean, where it curves around the peaks rising to the East. It’s a road, he realizes, and on it are people, walking slowly toward the mesa and the Keep. With his eyes, he traces their source. Near the ocean he sees a few dark geometric shapes between the tree line and the water—houses and boats drawn ashore for the winter. Is it a fishing village? He wonders if the orcas of Lake Balstead only reside in freshwater.
He looks out across the ocean. It’s mostly frozen near the shore, but further out he sees deep blue waters and a rock formation that makes a natural arch—the waves crashing against it look like tiny white lines. Steve focuses on the arch and tries to guess its distance. “That arch must be huge,” he says.
Larson grunts. “It looks like Thomas was right, influx of civilians in town.” And Steve remembers that’s what he’s supposed to be looking at. Lowering his binoculars, he turns around; from his perch he can see the line of Frost Giants trickling along the town’s main thoroughfare.
“Market day?” asks Larson.
“Heiðr didn’t say anything about it,” says Steve.
At that moment Claire shouts, “Bohdi and Dr. Amy!” Before Steve knows what is happening, she dives head first from the branch she was sitting on. He almost falls out of the tree trying to catch her, but Larson pulls him back by the back of his parka. He hears his heart thudding in his ears.
A branch whips around Claire, slowing her descent. When she drops below the mushroom-like cap, she swings around and out of the branch’s embrace, jumps to the ground, and throws up her arms in triumph.
Bohdi chuckles. “Claire, you’re going to give your old man a heart attack.”
And isn’t that the truth. “Thanks,” Steve mutters belatedly to Larson.
Already slipping down the tree, the lieutenant says, “Don’t mention it,” and Steve realizes they’re in a race again, but after watching Claire bungee jump from the tree without a cord, Steve’s arms are shaking. His foot slips, and he almost curses. He slides down and his hand slips.
He sits down on a branch, and focuses on his breathing again, this time to keep from falling. He doesn’t stop—not even when he feels the branch wrap around his waist. He keeps breathing … looks down, sees Larson almost on the ground … and realizes that below him there is a gap in the branches just big enough for him to slip through.
Grabbing hold of the branch, Steve lets himself fall. Someone shouts, and he loses his concentration as he hurtles to the ground. The branch unc
oils from his waist, but he catches it with his hands. His weight pulls it down further, and he lets himself slide down as though it were a pole—bypassing Larson as he does. He winds up having to drop about six feet, but he’s ready for it, and lands lightly enough to surprise himself.
Claire laughs. Steve looks up at the lieutenant and grins. Larson glares.
In a fair imitation of Darth Vader, Bohdi says, “Impressive, most impressive, but you are not a Jedi yet.”
Mood still ebullient, Steve cracks into his best imitation of Yoda. “When forty-one-years-old you reach, be in as good shape, you will not.”
The human members of the team crack up.
Lewis’s eyes go wide. “Steve, I didn’t know you watched Star Wars!”
Steve blinks. “What?” It’s true it’s not his favorite movie, but who his age in the United States has not seen Star Wars?
“You seem too jocky,” says Lewis. She grins. “I think I respect you more now.”
Steve rolls his eyes. “Get into the hole, Padawan, and let us know if we’re in the right place,” he says, using what he hopes is the Star Wars word for apprentice.
Lewis actually giggles. “Yes, Master!” She gives Bohdi a smile, and then she jogs over to the hole in the ground. Steve’s eyebrow arches. So all he has to do to get cheerful and immediate obedience is use Star Wars speak? How had he not known that?
Redman hands Lewis a flashlight, and she disappears. The team hovers over the hole, except Bohdi. Fenrir lopes over and drops her head over his shoulder.
Gaze on the kid, Steve cocks his head.
Scratching Fenrir’s chin, and not meeting his gaze, Bohdi says, “Heard you talked Beatrice down last night.” He takes a deep breath. “Thanks.”
Steve’s first impulse is to harangue him about keeping it on the down-low and not getting Lewis pregnant. Steve only let Bohdi go fetch Lewis because he had a sneaking suspicion that if he sent someone else, Bohdi might have gotten testy. Steve’s taking a chance, betting that it’s better to give him orders he wants to obey, to keep him loyal until he has to give an order Bohdi will hate. Instead of haranguing the kid, Steve keeps to the Star Wars theme and pulls a Han Solo: “That’s two you owe me, Junior.”