El-brinith and Chan’rék’ril watched each new elf file in with clear interest, their eyes lighting for every one in turn. They wore matching broad smiles, their attitude closest to Darris’ own. Andvari paced from Kevral to Captain, fingers moving nimbly over the lacing that held his ax in place. He clearly worried for the Renshai as well, their friendship strengthened by the resolution of long-held hostility. It was a phenomenon Darris had described more than once in song: hard-won friendships often discovered an intensity that regular relationships could never match.
Finally, when twice as many elves as usual pressed against the walls and the door could barely close, Captain gave a nod of wary satisfaction. Darris rescued a curl about to tumble into his eyes and focused on the chant that rose in heavily accented, alien voices yet seemed as gentle and fluid as a lullaby. Tae crouched. Andvari went still. The two elves stopped studying the newcomers to concentrate on the coming transport. Only Kevral and Ra-khir seemed wholly unaffected, standing in the same despondent hush, clutching one another’s hand.
Captain’s voice rose over those of the other elves. Darris listened intently, having nearly captured the syllables of the spell verbatim. As the familiar sounds rose over the jovinay arythanik, he covered his eyes with his hands. The dizzying sensation of movement brought a queasy feeling to his stomach. He released his eyes, suffering the concern Captain had not allowed himself to show. His companions stood all around him, most rubbing eyes assaulted by the magic’s brightness. Otherwise, none seemed worse for the transport. If anything, Kevral and Ra-khir appeared more alive, forced to attention by new surroundings that could hold any sort of threat.
They stood beneath a massive ash tree, its branches stretching beyond sight, seemingly to infinity. Movement in the branches caught Darris’ notice. At first, he believed massive birds skipped from limb to limb. Then, he recognized the movement as leaping, not flying. Flashes of white against brown fur identified the creatures conclusively as deer. They moved with a grace beyond anything of the mortal world, slender legs bounding, tails flickering, heads dipping to devour the bright green shoots on every branch. Even as Darris admired their grace, he recognized bulkier animals interspersed with the deer. Cloven hooves skipped over branches as solid as anything built by mankind, and the shaggy coats sported a variety of colors. Unlike the silent deer, the coarse song of the goats filled the air like birdsong. Bees as large as hummingbirds flitted around Darris’ head, gathering droplets of dew stretching like honey from the lowest boughs.
Darris’ lore gave him the answer even as Andvari spoke it in a breathless whisper, “Yggdrasill. The World Tree.”
Darris stared at the axis of the world, memorizing every detail. A million songs described it, yet all of them remained vague for want of a witness to its grandeur. Now, he realized, none of them had come near to capturing the sparkling hue of its leaves, more precious than emeralds. Orange-pink fruit bowed the branches. He knew the tree touched every world, yet mere words had never captured its vastness. It rose in increments so subtle it appeared nearly flat, yet its umbrella of protection defied space and time, stretching and defining eternity. He could sit for hours observing and writing and still never capture its vastness.
El-brinith broke Darris’ contemplation. “The shard is pretty much straight down, but moving.”
“Moving?” Andvari’s brow creased. “Why would that be?”
“Most likely in the possession of something living,” Chan’rék’ril explained.
Darris perched on one of the three great roots that arched upward from the trunk before plunging into open caverns. The task seemed hopeless. The roots, he knew, led to the nine main worlds. They could never hope to explore all of that territory, and El-brinith’s spell would only work one time. Resigned, he refused to let his concerns affect the others. “Where first?”
“The shortest.” El-brinith tapped the central root, thicker than her entire body. “We can stop before we reach any of the worlds. If the shard lay in one of those, the jovinay arythanik would have sent us directly there.”
Darris rose, wishing he had thought of that particular detail on his own, though it did not appease him. El-brinith believed the shard in the possession of a living creature, which meant it could move freely, even onto other worlds. Religious knowledge filled Darris’ head, and he sorted out the references to Yggdrasill. The shortest root led to the worlds of gods and elves: Asgard, Vanaheim, and Alfheim. Past discussions with the elves suggested that, of the three, only Asgard had survived the Ragnarok. A body of water lay beneath each root, and these seemed the most likely places for creatures to visit.
A squirrel rushed up the longest root, zipping to the opposite side of the tree to clamber up its trunk.
Kevral led the way down the cavern, the excitement of visiting a place of deep and significant legend driving aside her sadness. They followed her through an echoing cavern filled with a light whose source Darris could not fathom. Prepared to memorize a maze as complex as the one that warded Béarn’s dungeon, he found the task unnecessary. The cave surrounded the root, which did not branch. In fact, it barely arched as it delved toward the upper worlds. The idea of heading downward to reach Asgard repeatedly befuddled Darris, and he had to keep reminding himself that he no longer stood upon the ground of Midgard. Yggdrasill sheltered even the uppermost portions of the worlds the gods had created and in which they alone dwelt. Only now, Darris realized he had seen no sky through the interwoven branches of the great ash, only higher limbs in endlessly rising increments reaching toward the heavens.
The journey seemed to span moments and days at once. Then, suddenly, the root ended. A circular pool filled the area immediately below it. Beyond stretched a vast plain as far as Darris’ vision. As the group arrived, three massive figures appeared from the shadows created by the meeting of cavern and meadow. Kevral and Andvari crouched. Darris instinctively placed himself between the elves and the giants, as he might do for the king. Ra-khir stood as ready as the other warriors, though he would not insult unidentified strangers by assuming them hostile. His hands stayed well away from his hilt.
As the others glided closer, their identities became clear. All three of the Norns stood together, guarding the well that bore the same name as one of them: Urdr, meaning Past or Fate. Skuld stepped forward, examining them as she might a flaw in her dress. “You again? Do you have more business here?”
Ra-khir glanced at El-brinith. Though clearly willing to return to his role as speaker, he knew she had had the last and longest conversation with the giantess whose name literally meant “Being” but who represented the future as well.
The elf rose to the challenge. “The same business that brought us to Odin’s testing ground. We’re seeking the last shard of the shattered Pica.”
All three of the giantesses shook their heads together, Skuld still the one speaking. “I gave you the one I discovered on the testing grounds. I have seen no other.”
Losing interest in the conversation, Verdandi seized a bucket, dipping it deep into the well. She dredged up clay as well as water, muddying the surface beyond visibility.
Skuld watched her sister from the corner of her eye. “If we’re finished with you, we have work that needs doing.”
Darris could not resist asking, “What exactly do you do here?”
Urdr fixed him with a sharp stare of her watery blue eyes. Wrinkles folded over her brows and into the sockets, taking all fierceness from the look. “We keep the Tree alive and, with it, all the worlds of gods, elves, and mankind.”
Skuld shook the bucket, sloshing a small amount of silt-filled water to the ground. “The mud of the well preserves the branches that the stags and goats mangle and repairs the damage done by Nidhogg the dragon. The water nourishes Yggdrasill.” She spoke the tree’s name with the fondness of a mother.
Dragon. Darris’ eyes widened. They had already battled one such creature, and the results had nearly proven fatal to more than one of them. He hoped this Nid
hogg did not have the shard, and the expression taking shape on Andvari’s features suggested he shared the bard’s thought.
“We also guard the well.” Verdandi gave the group a hard look. “You may not touch it.”
Ra-khir made a conciliatory gesture. “So long as it does not contain the shard, we have no reason to disturb the waters or you.”
“It does not.” Verdandi fairly hissed. The others nodded their agreement.
Darris suspected they spoke truth. Although their need to oversee the well might drive them to lie, it seemed unlikely El-brinith’s spell would have considered the depths of still water significant movement.
Ra-khir remained polite despite Verdandi’s evident hostility. It seemed odd that one whose name meant “Necessity” did not seem to recognize the desperation that would drive this group even to battle the Norns for what they sought. “Then we shall look elsewhere, Ladies. Could you please enlighten us as to what lies beyond the well?”
“Asgard.” Urdr gave Ra-khir a measuring look.
El-brinith gestured back the way they had come.
“Thank you,” Ra-khir said, and the group returned toward the trunk of the World Tree.
The trip proved more difficult because of the steady upward course. Darris estimated that it took about twice as long, though time again passed in a strange, inexplicable blur that lacked meaning. He could not measure their progress by conversation as his companions kept mostly to themselves, Tae and the elves naturally taciturn, Ra-khir and Kevral quieted by circumstance, and Andvari choosing the company of his own thoughts over forcing Darris to arias. Darris kept himself engrossed by memorizing the events at the Well of Urdr, the look and feel of Yggdrasill’s root and the cavern it occupied, and capturing the emotions of the group. No book yet contained the information the Norns had divulged. Now, all of it would become immortalized in song.
At length, the party reached the ground beneath Yggdrasill once more, startling the squirrel that clung, upside down, from the trunk. It leaped to a branch, scolding them with loud, repetitive chattering.
Only then, El-brinith spoke her opinion of the situation. “That root didn’t delve far enough to account for the position I saw the shard, and I still maintain it’s on this world. Let’s try another.”
Andvari flicked his war braids behind his shoulders. “Which one?”
“This one.” El-brinith indicated a root by placing a small foot upon it. “It’s the one that leads to Midgard, Jötunheim, Nídavellír, and Nualfheim.”
A wistful look crossed Chan’rék’ril’s face at the mention of the last two worlds, where Captain stated Frey had sent the remaining elves: those who wished to recreate Alfheim and those who embraced the darkness that Odin bore in the guise of Dh’arlo’mé.
“It may not be deep enough either,” El-brinith confessed. “But I’d rather try it before facing the dragon or accidentally finding ourselves in Hel or Niflheim.”
Even Kevral shivered at the mention of the worlds of the dead, the second more horrible than the first. Also called Misty Hel, it was the dark cold site reserved for the most horrible of those who died in disgrace.
No one challenged El-brinith’s decision to attempt the route that seemed easiest first, which disappointed Darris.
Tae also noted Kevral’s lack of enthusiasm. “Why isn’t there a wild Renshai insisting we confront the dragon?”
Verdandi hauled herself from the cavern, supporting the bucket on the lip of the opening. Her sisters clambered out behind her.
Kevral sighed, tensing, mood rushing from sorrow to irritation in an instant. “I’m tired, all right? Aren’t I allowed that after all that’s happened? After losing my baby and my soul, maybe I’m willing to take the easy way, for once. I won’t run from a confrontation with twenty dragons, if that’s what you’re implying.”
Tae raised his hands in surrender, physically backing down. “Hey, I was joking . . .”
An answer came from an unexpected source. Urdr’s voice boomed, caught beneath the ceiling of Yggdrasill. “Your soul was not lost, young Renshai. The spirit spiders got only that of your unborn baby, hence you lost him long before the day of his birth.”
Kevral jerked around to face the Norns.
Verdandi softened her sister’s pronouncement. “Indeed, the youngling gave up his soul, but he is not lost. He carries the blood of immortals. Like an elf, his years may span enough cycles to make an afterlife unnecessary.”
Darris’ attention went naturally to Skuld, the only one who could see the future and announce the true fate of the heir to Pudar’s throne. But the youngest of the Norns only smiled as she clambered from the cavern. Even Odin, whose wisdom spanned all things, had his blind spots. Some who studied myth believed his great anger and merciless temper came of his powerlessness before the Norns, especially the close-mouthed Skuld. Even the all powerful AllFather learned the future the way every other did.
Kevral, too, awaited more that never came. She tensed. For a moment, Darris believed she would charge the giantesses, demanding information rightfully hers; yet she did not. He doubted cowardice, or even her own depression held her back, but rather her respect for divine creatures her people had studied and worshiped for millennia.
“Let’s go.” Tae sprang through the second root’s cavern.
Driven to take back the lead, Kevral hurried after Tae, and their companions followed. Much like the other, this root never divided, simply led through the cavern in a graceful arc that resisted an accounting of time. It, too, ended at a body of water. A spring that started at the tip of the root trickled over the wood and into a tiny lake at its base. A whiff of damp reached Darris’ nose where he stood behind his friends, and his mouth went suddenly and painfully dry. Every fiber of his being yearned for a sip of that water.
Darris rammed into Ra-khir’s shielding arm before he realized he had moved.
“The Spring of Mimir,” Kevral explained.
“Where are you going?” Ra-khir asked.
“I’m thirsty.” Darris suffered a rush of defensiveness. “I need a sip.”
Tae casually slipped between Ra-khir and the lake, under the auspices of studying the water. It irritated Darris that now two of his friends prepared to stop him from performing the one act for which his entire life had prepared him. The Spring of Mimir contained all the knowledge of the universe. One mouthful would impart that to him as well.
Darris’ throat became a fire that needed quenching. He had never known a need so great. His hand fell to his hilt. If necessary, he would battle through his companions. “I need a drink.”
Andvari defined the problem. “Odin paid for his sip with an eye and nine days hanging upside down from Yggdrasill with a spear in his side. No doubt it will cost you as much.”
“One sip . . .” Darris panted, his need as strong as the one for air. “. . . is worth that price and more.” He retreated from Ra-khir, then galloped around the Knight of Erythane. He collided with Tae who had shifted directly into Darris’ path. The Easterner collapsed beneath him, and they tumbled into a wheel of flailing limbs. Driven to madness, Darris hammered at the barrier that separated him from all that mattered. Tae swore, then yelped in pain. Suddenly, the blockade disappeared, and Darris staggered blindly forward. He slammed into another barrier, this one hard and cold. Pain lanced through his nose. He dropped to his knees, waiting for his vision to unswirl. The water beckoned him irresistibly, and he tried desperately to answer.
A voice speared into Darris’ head. “Your price is different, descendant of Jahiran. A taste will cost your voice and your talent.”
As Darris knelt, helplessly driven, in front of the barrier, strong hands seized him, pinning him to the ground. He fought wildly, kicking until a leg came free then connected with something firm and fleshy. A grunt followed, then more hands held him. He howled, foaming like a rabid dog, ripping at their hands and feet and snapping at anything that came within range.
“Darris.” Ra-khir’s voice hi
ssed into his ear. “Get control. Darris!”
Darris went still, glaring at his captors. Andvari, Ra-khir, and Kevral pinned him to the ground. Tae crouched nearby, clutching his forehead. Blood striped his fingers where the wound from Loki’s citadel had reopened, with Darris’ savage assistance.
Ra-khir’s chiseled features looked down into Darris’ face. “What in darkest Hel is going on with you?”
Darris stared fiercely, and his tone gave none of the ground his body must. “I just want a drink. Why are you treating me like a vicious animal?”
Kevral chimed in. “Because you’re acting like one.”
“Kevral,” Ra-khir warned, unwilling to risk his hold on Darris’ hands to glance at her. He softened his voice to address Darris again. “We’re just concerned. We wonder whose will you’re truly serving and whether you really understand what you’re sacrificing.”
A tidal wave of need struck Darris again. He struggled madly. His friends’ hands gouged like shackles against his wrists and legs. Gradually, exhaustion worried at his battle lust, leaving him aching and tired. He stopped fighting.
“Darris, we’re going to take you away from the spring.”
The words pounded Darris like a hammer blow. “No!”
Ra-khir ignored the interruption. “When you’re beyond its influence and can think clearly, you can decide if you really want this. If you still do, I won’t interfere.” He glanced around at the others, apparently seeking their support as well. “In fact, I’ll help you any way I can. I just want you to make the decision using your own good sense, not driven to some fanatical frenzy.”
The Children of Wrath Page 64