“Fenrir, listen to me,” Angrboda said in her most commanding motherly tone. “Your father isn’t blameless, not by any stretch of the imagination—”
“Don’t help me,” Loki muttered out of the side of his scarred mouth.
“—but he wasn’t the cause of all this,” she finished. “The Aesir are the ones truly deserving of your ire. Not him.”
Angrboda heard Loki let out a long, relieved breath behind her.
Fenrir and Jormungand both considered her. Then they looked at each other and Fenrir said, You’re right, Mother.
“I don’t know about you two, but I’ve just been tortured for three years by the Aesir. I’ve half a mind to go north to join up with Jotunheim’s army in Utgard when I leave here,” Loki added helpfully from over her shoulder. He gestured to his disfigured face. “Revenge and all that. What do you say? I’m sure they’d be happy to see you at the citadel.”
“How . . . did you know there’s an army in Utgard?” Angrboda asked, remembering what Skadi told her and arching an eyebrow at him.
“I may have been stuck in a cave, but I know where giants go when they get hungry. And by now, they’re probably angry, too. Angry enough to march against the Aesir, who’ve surely weathered this long winter in safety and comfort, as they do.”
Angrboda eyed him. “Are you sure you haven’t heard my prophecy?”
Utgard? Fenrir looked to his mother, curious. Does he speak the truth?
“He does,” Angrboda said.
Then we head north to join them, said Fenrir. And if we have to fight side by side with the likes of him in order to have our vengeance upon the Aesir, then so be it.
“That’s the spirit,” Loki said bracingly. But his forced cheerful veneer was starting to chip. She could tell from looking at him that he was still in terrible pain.
Fenrir turned to Angrboda once more and said, I’m sorry we didn’t have more time, Mama. But I’ve dreamt of revenge for too long to waste another moment.
Revenge, Jormungand hissed, eyes narrowing.
Angrboda pressed her face against each of their snouts for a moment in turn to say goodbye, and when she pulled away to look at them both, she whispered, “Go, my boys. And show them what you’re made of.”
And with that, Fenrir let out a final howl and bounded away down the beach, and Jormungand disappeared beneath the waves. The water churned as he descended before going still once more, the vanishing moon having no effect on the tides.
Indeed, the ocean seemed eerily still in the Serpent’s absence.
“That was a close one.” Loki let out a long breath and sagged back against the rock.
Angrboda stood there, stricken. Her cursed heart ached, and as much as she swiped at the silent tears coursing down her face, they just kept on coming.
“Did you mean what you said?” Loki asked her. “About . . . about not blaming me? For everything?”
“Yes,” she said, still staring off in the direction her sons had gone.
Loki opened his mouth, closed it again, and said, “Well, since you just freed me from my three years of torment—you said something about needing me to go to Hel for you. I thought you said you saw her already.”
Angrboda had very nearly forgotten about that in the wake of her unexpected reunion with Fenrir and Jormungand, and she whirled around to face him.
“Yes, I did, and she won’t let me see her again. I’ve tried,” she said with a renewed sense of urgency. “But you—I think she’d let you in, if you could get there. I need you to tell her something.”
“If I can get there,” Loki echoed, bemused. “Okay, sure. What do you need me to tell her?”
Angrboda put her hands on his thin shoulders and looked him dead in the eye. “Tell Hel to come to me. Tell her I can save her. Make her believe you. Her life depends on it. Swear to me you’ll find your way to her and you’ll tell her.”
“I swear it.”
“Swear it on your life, and hers, too.”
“I do. I do,” Loki said. He tilted his head sideways in a catlike motion. “Angrboda—you’re disappearing.”
Angrboda looked down at her hands—they were fading, though she did not will it so. “I must go,” she said, gritting her teeth. “Or I may not be able to get back. My means of travel is in turmoil.” Her hands started to pass through his shoulders and she pulled them away. “Yggdrasil trembles. The alignment of the worlds has been thrown off. The lines separating one realm from the next are beginning to blur, and I fear that soon, nothing will separate even the living from the dead. But at least that will make it easier for you to get to Hel.”
Loki nodded but still looked worried. “Boda—”
Angrboda felt the ground lurch beneath her. The last thing she saw was Loki’s hands reaching for her as she fell, and she closed her eyes and braced herself for impact.
And when she opened her eyes again, in her bed, tears were flowing down either side of her face. She was exhausted, panicked, trembling, cold—and alone. Relief settled over her when she saw Skadi standing in the doorway, looking out, her face skyward. Beyond her, the she-wolf sat in the clearing, her massive shaggy head tilted upward as well.
Angrboda stepped up next to Skadi, who started at her approach, then put an arm around her shoulders. Neither woman tore her gaze away from the dying sun and moon.
Skadi’s voice shook as she whispered, “You did it. It’s time.”
“I know,” Angrboda whispered back, leaning in close. “I know.”
* * *
• • •
Skadi spent the next few hours packing up what few supplies she’d take with her to Utgard. Meanwhile Angrboda struggled to make as much of her hunger potion as she possibly could with what few resources she had left. She packed all her tiny clay pots into a large wooden box and padded it with wool, and Skadi packed as much as she could onto her sledge.
“And with that,” said Angrboda, shoulders sagging, “I’ve done all I can do for Jotunheim.”
“You’ve done more than enough,” Skadi told her as she secured the last strap. “And our people will be grateful for it.” She took something out of her pocket: Angrboda’s sheathed antler-handled knife, the one she usually wore at her belt. “You left this on the table when you were dressing, so I sharpened it for you after I sharpened my sword.”
“Thank you,” Angrboda said, and untied her belt to thread it through the sheath’s loop. Then she cast her eyes to the sword at Skadi’s hip and asked, “Your father’s?”
Skadi nodded solemnly. “None other.”
The snow and wind that had battered them for the past three years had stopped, and the air was warming; it was still bitterly cold, but they could now be outside for longer than a few breaths before experiencing extreme discomfort. But just as on that seaside cliff, the worlds seemed to be unnervingly still, silent, waiting.
Like a bowstring drawn taut . . .
And any moment now, the arrow would be released.
“Where’s your wolf gone off to?” Skadi asked, looking around, at the exact moment the creature in question materialized out of the forest—and she was not alone.
There was a figure walking with the massive wolf, whose form seemed to be flickering back and forth the same way Angrboda had when she’d left Loki on the cliff. She recognized this man as Baldur, his white hair luminous even in the low light of the disappearing sun.
Angrboda bristled at the sight of him, but then her gaze moved to the woman slung across the she-wolf’s back, whose face was hidden by cascading waves of thick black hair.
I heard them wandering through the woods, the she-wolf said.
Baldur looked first at Skadi, whose jaw had dropped, and then his eyes fell on Angrboda. He took a step toward her, arms spread imploringly, and said, “Thank goodness we found you.”
The woman on the she-w
olf’s back made a noise of discomfort. Baldur’s brow knitted with worry, his eyes darting to her and then back to Angrboda. Then he raised his hands palms up in surrender and said, “Please. You have to help her.”
“What?” Angrboda said at the same moment the woman lifted her head and groaned, “Mother?”
Angrboda froze. “Hel?”
Skadi was already rushing toward the wolf and had Hel down and upright within seconds. She could not stand up on her own and leaned on Skadi for support.
Angrboda could’ve wept with relief. Loki convinced her.
“It’s good to see you, little one,” Skadi said, tears welling up in her eyes.
“I wish I could say the same,” Hel said in a weak voice.
Skadi turned to Baldur and demanded, “What have you done to her?”
“Nothing but try to help. I’m here and then—then I’m not,” said Baldur, holding out his flickering hands. “Sometimes I could support her and help her along. Other times, she’d fall, and . . .” He balled his fists. “And there was nothing I could do about it. We’d still be out there in the snow if your wolf hadn’t found us.”
Angrboda turned to her daughter. “You can no longer walk?”
“My legs have finally failed me,” Hel muttered, avoiding her gaze.
“But before,” said Angrboda, “when I saw you, you looked fine—”
“That was before,” Hel said flatly. “That was when I was ruler of a realm. In that place, a little girl’s dead legs functioned without her mother’s healing salves. But now that they’ve rotted to bone . . .”
“You’re . . . no longer ruler of a realm?” Skadi asked, but Angrboda knew the answer.
Hel’s green eyes finally turned to her mother. “My realm is empty; I relinquished the dead to my father. They’re all sailing to join my brothers and the giants in their fight against the gods. I have no power over anyone anymore.”
“Which explains this,” said Baldur, holding out his hands again. “I’m . . . becoming more and more solid. More alive. And the rest of the dead, too . . .” He swallowed. “My brother Hod went with them, to fight. And I—I don’t even know which side he’ll fight for. But how can the dead come back to life? None of this makes any sense . . .”
“Of course it makes sense,” Angrboda said. She relayed to them what she’d told Loki: “With Yggdrasil thrown off its axis, there is nothing separating the world of the dead from that of the living. That’s how the dead could sail out of Hel’s realm in the first place.”
Skadi understood. “So the Nine Worlds are bleeding into one another because the natural order of the universe is in complete chaos, and everyone who has ever died a nonglorious death is now fighting on the side of the giants? Lovely.”
Hel reached up and brushed her hair out of her face, and Angrboda was startled by how sickly her daughter looked: her features gaunt, her eyes sunken and dark-rimmed, her breath coming in short gasps.
“She needs rest,” Baldur said nervously, and Angrboda noticed for the first time that his wife, Nanna—who had been so upset by his death that she’d died of grief and been put on the pyre with him—was conspicuously absent from Hel’s undead Asgardian escort.
“She’ll get it,” Angrboda said. “I’ll take care of her.”
Hel muttered something unintelligible but allowed herself to be carried into the cave by Skadi, who set her down on the sleeping pallet. Baldur followed, and once inside, he planted himself at Hel’s bedside.
“Angrboda,” Skadi said, pulling the witch outside, “it’s time for me to go.”
Angrboda knew she was right. She reached up and cupped Skadi’s cheek, but paused when she looked over Skadi’s shoulder and saw the she-wolf sitting beside the Huntress’s sledge.
Your reindeer seem to have run off, the she-wolf said. I hope you don’t mind a grizzled old dog in their place.
“You mean to go with Skadi?” Angrboda said, but she found she wasn’t surprised. Even if her shield was strong enough to protect the she-wolf, too, the creature was old and tired.
It seems the thing to do, the wolf replied. It’s as good a way as any to die. Better than being burned alive, at least.
Angrboda didn’t disagree.
“I guess this is goodbye, old friend,” she whispered, and the she-wolf licked her face, then allowed Skadi to secure her to the sledge using the old harness Angrboda had crafted for her wagon, which had been buried in snow for some time.
And then Skadi turned to Angrboda.
Tears had started forming in Angrboda’s eyes before Skadi’s arms were around her, and they clung to each other for dear life.
“Please don’t go.” Angrboda’s voice was almost a whimper as her tears soaked into Skadi’s shoulder. “I can protect you. I will protect you. Just stay.”
“I cannot,” Skadi said, her voice thick with emotion. “The dead are joining forces with the giants. Don’t you know what that means? I’m to see my father on the battlefield, and I will make him proud.”
“You’ve already made him proud,” Angrboda argued. “Who wouldn’t be proud of you?”
Skadi put a hand on either side of the witch’s face. “Even if you could protect me, it would be at your expense, wouldn’t it?”
Angrboda had at some point, without realizing it, come to terms with the fact that she was going to burn again. It never occurred to her to save herself; her shield was meant only for Hel.
“If that’s the case,” Skadi said, “if I were to stay here, with Hel, under your protection—do you think I would stand to see you die for my sake, too?” She shook her head. “No. Never.”
“That’s a good point,” Angrboda admitted.
Skadi leaned in and murmured, “Exactly. So if there’s a life after this one, then that’s where I’ll see you again.”
“And if not?” Angrboda managed to choke out. If I’m unable to die . . .
“Then this is it,” Skadi whispered, and kissed her a final time. Angrboda clung to her until Skadi turned to leave, her hand slipping out of Angrboda’s even as the witch reached for it. She did not look back.
When Skadi and her sledge disappeared from the clearing and into the woods, Angrboda collapsed to her knees and cried.
I just . . . want more time . . .
When she finally turned her face to the sky, she saw that the sun and moon were nearly spent. The sight caused her to compose herself, slow her breathing, stumble to her feet. She dried her eyes with the hem of her sleeve and looked toward her cave.
The witch still had work to do.
* * *
• • •
When Angrboda stepped back inside the cave, she saw that Baldur had pulled her carved chair over to Hel’s bedside and was sitting there, looking more solid by the second, not taking his eyes from Hel’s face.
Angrboda said, “If you could please give me a few moments alone with my daughter, I should like to make her comfortable and get her out of her muddy gown. Would you go fetch some more water from the stream? We’ve put a hole in the ice—it’ll be easy to spot.”
Baldur stood, nodded, and said, “I’ll gather firewood as well.” When he leaned down to grab a wooden bucket and his hand passed right through it, he added sheepishly, “To the best of my abilities, that is.” The second time he reached for the bucket he was solid enough to grab it, and he left the cave.
The door shut behind him, and silence ensued.
Angrboda sighed as she peeled off the fingerless mittens Hel had nalbinded for her so long ago and set them on the table. She had a little water sitting in a cauldron over the hearth, which she’d been using to mix her potions. She lowered it farther into the fire to heat it, and when she was satisfied, she took out some clean rags, stripped off Hel’s filthy dress, and bathed her—the top half of her, at least.
Hel’s face remained carefully blank the entir
e time, and she didn’t utter a word.
“You were like this when you were little, you know,” Angrboda said as she pulled a clean dress over Hel’s head, fed her arms through the sleeves, and pulled it down to cover her body.
“Like what?” Hel said at last.
“Angry when you couldn’t do things for yourself,” the witch replied, arranging the blankets and furs around Hel. “Furious at being helpless.”
Hel’s eyes moved past her mother to the nalbinded mittens on the table, and she made a face. “You still use those horrid old things?”
“I’ve barely taken them off since the night you gave them to me. They’ve held up just as well as this belt Gerd made,” Angrboda told her, but Hel only turned away so the witch couldn’t see her expression.
Eventually, when Angrboda had gone back to her stores and started digging around for any food she had left, Hel called weakly from the bed, “I was so angry at you both. Especially Papa. I’d planned to throw him into an eternal river of ice or a very deep crevice when he finally came to my realm. But when he showed up, he looked such a fright that tossing him into a bottomless pit actually might’ve been an improvement, and that rather took all the fun out of the idea.”
Angrboda paused and gave a wan smile, having found the large pouch of jerky she’d been rummaging for. She brought it to the table and said, “He would’ve talked his way out of it somehow. It’s what he does.”
“He talked me into coming here. Told me to give you another chance. I’m glad it was in private, so Baldur wouldn’t see me cry. It was so embarrassing,” Hel said, staring up at the ceiling of the cave. “Papa said I looked like his mother, Laufey. She’s where I got this dark hair from, while you and he are so fair.”
Angrboda sat down on the chair beside her. “He told me long ago that he didn’t remember his mother.”
“He said that seeing me reminded him,” Hel whispered. She finally turned her head and met Angrboda’s eyes. “I assume you two made up, or he wouldn’t have come?”
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