Odin's Child

by Siri Pettersen

  “You’d dine with rats if the opportunity presented itself.”

  She’d obviously seen him with Hirka and Kolgrim out on the square. He’d been friendly, like he was one of them. Forgotten who he was. An accusation that had followed him his entire life. Rime was about to defend himself, but he was interrupted by the augur, who came running in with his palms crossed in the sign of the Raven in front of his gray tunic. His fingers were trembling.

  “Ilume-madra, people are waiting for the message to begin. What can I say to—”

  “Out!”

  Ilume didn’t need to look at him. Her voice sent him scurrying back the way he’d come. Rime was tempted to follow him, but both he and Ilume had been waiting a long time for this moment. And she was the one to start.

  “You can’t even bring yourself to look in on me when you come home.”

  “You were in Ravnhov when I arrived.”

  His answer seemed to annoy her even more. Her meeting in Ravnhov clearly hadn’t gone well. Not that he had expected it to.

  “I was in Ravnhov, trying to keep the kingdoms together. For the Council’s sake, and for yours.”

  Rime stifled a snort. Ilume turned her back on him.

  “When you chose the sword after the Rite, I thought it was an act of childish rebellion, to defy me. I said nothing because I trusted your judgment. You are an An-Elderin! I expected you to make the right decision, just as soon as you’d had your bit of fun with those savages.”

  She spoke in her usual firm tone. Uncompromising. Hard as the stone floor she was standing on. Her hair hung in impeccable silver braids down her back. Only the color belied the fact that she had lived for almost a century. Even there she had an advantage over the people she wouldn’t touch: she would live longer than all of them, and her years would leave fewer traces. That’s how it was with powerful binders. That’s how it would have been with him too. But Rime had freely given up all hope of growing old.

  She turned to look at him again. “Your contempt for me knows no bounds. You’re willing to renounce the Council, renounce the Seer, and abandon the people just to make a point?!”

  He’d never seen her eyes so wild. She had reason to be angry, but he couldn’t bring himself to swallow her lies.

  “I’m not renouncing the Seer! I am renouncing the Council, to better serve Him. Better than I can do as a sleeping giant in Eisvaldr.”

  “How dare you?!” She took a step closer, but he didn’t budge. “You dare to speak as though you know anything. A pup! A pathetic pup who wants to measure his strength against mine!”

  The words bounced between the stone walls. A hollow echo, and for the first time Rime noticed the emptiness of the Seer’s hall.

  “It’s not about you,” he said. “It’s got nothing to do with you.”

  Rime felt the liberating truth of his own words. He respected Ilume. She was the head of the family. But he had no love for the kingdoms’ most powerful men and women, who had never done anything other than be born with the right name. He himself had been born with the best name imaginable, but his greatest deed had been to turn his back on his birthright.

  They stared at each other.

  Rime had already made his choice, and he knew that was what pained Ilume most. There was nothing she could do. He’d sworn the Oath. He had blood on his hands. She was powerless. That was new for her, and she didn’t wear it well.

  “You were to be the youngest,” she said. “The youngest ever.” Her voice lost some of its force. “You were to be the youngest and the strongest to take the chair in a thousand years.”

  “You’ll have to find someone else.”

  “Someone else?! We have no one else! Should we let the other families eat us alive? Would you see our family history go up in smoke? Your roots? Thank the Seer my daughter can’t see you from eternity!”

  Her words spread like poison in his chest. “Then let the people you claim to serve choose their leaders for themselves!” he struck back.

  Rime saw the blow coming but made no move to avoid it. He let her strike him. A stinging sensation spread across his cheek. Her eyes bore into him, but he felt nothing but calm. An inexplicable, deep calm.

  “I-Ilume-madra,” the augur stuttered from the shadows. He didn’t dare step into the light coming through the windows. “They’re—they’re waiting. For the message …”

  Ilume answered him without breaking eye contact with Rime.

  “Open the doors.”

  Not needing to be asked twice, the augur disappeared. The doors were opened, and Rime was annoyed by his sense of relief at not being alone with her any longer. People poured in and filled the benches behind them. Ilume sat on the chair nearest the pulpit, shielded by the wings of the Seer. Rime sat by her side.

  He hated attending messages. The Seer was everything to him. All he had. But the messages were a nightmare. Always had been. Sitting motionless, facing everyone else, on show. You’d think it would get easier over the years, but Rime now realized that he’d never been supposed to get used to it. His purpose was completely different. His way of serving the Seer was different.

  The augur began to speak. At the same time, Ilume hissed into Rime’s ear, “As a son of the people, you’ll soon sink down to their level.”

  Rime steeled himself against her words.

  “I’ve been invited to Glimmeråsen for dinner this evening,” she went on. “It wouldn’t be appropriate for me to go, as well they know. They’re as insolent as they are power-hungry. But they could be of use. They can plead our case in the north when we’ve left Elveroa. It would be strategically unwise to turn them down, so you’ll go on your own.”

  Rime stared reluctantly at the front row, where all of Glimmeråsen were sitting. Kaisa nodded and smiled at him. She jabbed her daughter Sylja with her elbow, who jolted in confusion until she realized Rime was looking at her. She gave him a playful smile, and he fought back a shudder.

  He whispered to Ilume, “I think the Seer would understand if I didn’t go.”

  “You’re not going because the Seer told you to,” Ilume hissed. “You’re going because I told you to.”

  THE STONE WHISPERER

  Hirka stopped to catch her breath at the top of the hill behind the tavern. Her cheeks burned, and there was no point pretending it was because she’d been running. Rime had been back two days. And for two days in a row she’d behaved like an idiot. He’d dragged her away from a fight as if she were a wild dog. And people had laughed. Not that that bothered her.

  But they’d crowded around her. A square full of people, staring, as if she were a caged animal. Father would have ruptured something if he’d seen her. And she’d wasted valuable time. The message had started, which meant that now no one would be at home. She would have to wait to make her rounds with the basket.

  Hlosnian. Hlosnian will be home by now. He never goes to the Seer’s hall.

  He’d done something in the square. Shattered the rock in Kolgrim’s hand somehow to save her.

  Hirka walked back down the hill, crossed the bridge over the Stryfe, and headed up toward Hlosnian’s house on the north side. It was a crumbling stone building that had once been an inn. Though it had a lot of rooms, Hlosnian lived alone. If he hadn’t made his home there, the building would have fallen into ruin a long time ago. It was as if it stood only because he willed it to.

  Hirka followed the narrow trail through the high grass to his door. There was a rusted frame hanging from the corner, but the sign itself with the name of the inn was long gone. Hirka jumped as a raven took flight and disappeared behind the house. It had been sitting so still she’d thought it was a fixture. But a raven was always a good sign.

  Unless you’re me, that is.

  The door was ajar, so she squeezed through. She was reluctant to open it farther just in case the house decided then and there that it was too much effort to remain standing and buried her alive. It was dark, but she’d always liked the dark. She could see everything, bu
t no one could see her.

  The windows had been boarded up, the lead glass long since sold to Glimmeråsen. She saw a counter. Two tables. No chairs.

  “Hlosnian?”

  No response.

  Hirka heard a sawing sound and followed it into the next room. Sunlight fell to the floor from large, curved openings in the stone wall. Hlosnian’s workshop. He was sitting in the middle of the room, as much outside as in, his body hunched over a stone figure he was shaping. He had his back to her, absorbed in his work.

  The room had once been a stable. It was divided into stalls and smelled reassuringly of horse. A pair of dirty fingerless gloves hung from a nail in the wall. She knew he wore them in the winter.

  Sculptures and stones were heaped in the corners. Masterpieces of all sizes stacked like firewood. Some were broken, some were still in the early stages. Suspended in stone, waiting to emerge. Everything she could see was covered in white dust.

  Most of the sculptures were of trees. She was standing next to a white tree that came up to her chest. The branches looked so alive that she half expected them to move. She reached out to touch them. Carefully.

  “You shouldn’t be here.”

  Hirka snatched her arm back. Hlosnian was still sitting with his back to her. The stone dust danced in the shafts of sunlight and settled on his pale red tunic, the only touch of color in the room.

  “I don’t like going to the messages,” she replied. She wasn’t afraid of saying this to him since he never went either. She went over to him and he regarded her with one bushy eyebrow raised, as if he hadn’t understood her response. His hair and beard were thick and gray with streaks of white, reminding her of the last snow on Gardfjella.

  He turned back to his work. Hirka wanted to thank him for his help at the square, but she wasn’t really sure what he’d done, if he’d done anything at all. She took a brown glass bottle out of her basket.

  “I’ve brought your oil.”

  She put it on the bench.

  “That’s a lot,” he said.

  “Yes. It’s … a gift.”

  “I see. Don’t suppose you’ve brought the recipe as well?”

  Hirka could feel herself blushing. She’d had that same thought. Father would say she was giving away his livelihood, but what else could they do? Walk away from the village and leave people in the lurch? The only other healer in the area was Ilume’s, and they’d be leaving soon as well.

  “You can make it yourself. It’s really very easy. You just need almonds and oats and—”

  “I don’t have time to make it myself.” Hlosnian met her gaze. He had deep creases in his forehead. His eyes were clear and blue. One of his eyelids drooped a bit more than the other. The kids in the village said one side of his face was asleep. Hirka thought it made him look kindly and mysterious.

  He opened the bottle and rubbed a couple drops into his hands and up an arm covered in old scars. Hirka didn’t know what had caused them, but she knew the oil helped him when the skin felt tight. The horse smell turned to almond as he massaged his arms.

  “I don’t have time, but I might have to find time, is that right?”

  Hirka pretended not to hear the question. “You’re very talented,” she said, looking around. She picked up a spiral-shaped stone.

  “I didn’t make that. The Might made that. A long time ago. Before people, almost before the world came to be.”

  “Oh … you’re still talented though.”

  He snorted in response.

  “I’ve seen what we can make with our hands. I can’t call this anything more than a pastime.”

  He wasn’t just being modest. Hirka knew that Hlosnian had made an icon of the Seer for the Seer’s hall that people traveled long distances to see, but he himself hadn’t set foot there since it was finished. Ramoja said that was the curse of perfectionism.

  “What have you seen, then?” she asked.

  Hlosnian put down the stone figure. He stared absentmindedly into the dust.

  “The tree. The Seer’s tree. I saw it once, when I was a stone whisperer in Eisvaldr.” Hirka wanted to ask what a stone whisperer actually did, but she didn’t want to interrupt. Hlosnian had worked in Eisvaldr! The city at the end of the city. Home of the Seer.

  And Rime.

  The tree was the Seer’s throne. A world tree, wrought of stone. Black and glistening, with branches that reached out and filled the room. An impossible piece of work. He had never seen anything more beautiful. Everything had changed that day. He didn’t want to make anything other than that tree. But it was impossible. It had been shaped by old forces. By the Might as it once was. Before the war. Before people.

  Hlosnian’s eyes were veiled by a pain Hirka couldn’t fathom. “What did you do?” she asked. “Did you stop working for the Council?”

  “You never stop working for the Council,” he replied. He looked at her. “You are what you are. And you are what you do. When the time comes, the best thing you can do is the right thing. The worst thing you can do is nothing.”

  Hirka looked down, embarrassed. What had she done? Gone after Kolgrim. Like a fool. Hlosnian was right. She was what she was, but she had a choice. She could choose to act differently, and she could choose not to leave.

  Hlosnian watched her as he polished the small stone woman he had in his hand.

  “Be care—” Hirka exclaimed, but it was too late. A crack appeared and the tail broke off the sculpture. The old man gave a laugh that belied his years.

  “Now it’s like you.” He put the tailless figure in her basket along with the spiral-shaped stone. “Not to worry,” he said. “I can always start again. These things happen when you don’t pay attention to the stone. You need to listen to it. Always.” Then he started mumbling, mostly to himself. “The question is how you could have known …”

  He got up and started rummaging in a drawer in his workbench. He found what he was looking for and handed Hirka a stone disc. Round and no larger than the palm of her hand. It was decorated with pale characters she didn’t recognize. She wondered for a moment whether it was another gift, but then Hlosnian knocked her arm, making her drop it. It fell to the floor with a crash and broke into several pieces.

  “Sorry! I didn’t mean to …”

  But Hlosnian wasn’t listening. He crouched down and studied the pieces, all while mumbling to himself. She suddenly felt like an interloper. He’d fallen into some kind of artistic reverie. A rough finger poked at the broken pieces.

  “You’re not supposed to be here,” he said again.

  Hirka gripped her basket and started backing cautiously out of the room. He was old. He didn’t always know what he was saying anymore.

  “I have to go,” she said.

  “I know,” he replied, and he began to polish another stone.

  INSRINGIN

  Urd paced back and forth along the balcony. He looked up every time he reached the end but didn’t cross the bridge leading to the Council Chamber under the dome. The bridge was suspended high above Eisvaldr, with ornately decorated archways that didn’t hold his interest today. He simply paced. And waited. Waited, and choked back the bitterness of being forced to wait for a no. Ilume’s no.

  Luckily, Ilume wasn’t the only member of the Council. The ten other councillors also had to cast their votes. Maybe they had already cast their votes. A dizzying thought. Urd realized that his fate might already have been decided. Either he was in or he wasn’t. Once Ilume’s vote arrived, he would know. If only that mangy bag of feathers would get here! How long could it possibly take a raven to make such a trip?!

  He’d done another lap and reached the bridge again. He stopped for a moment. Narrow stone bridges connected many of Eisvaldr’s towers, but this bridge, Asebriggi, was the oldest of them all. The carvings of ravens and serpents had been almost completely worn away by the elements. The corners were no longer sharp and probably hadn’t been for hundreds of years. Round columns supported a vaulted roof, which was more worn on
the western side, where the winds came from the mountains in Blindból.

  On the other side of the bridge lay the Council Chamber, and there they sat deciding his future. While he was forced to wait out here like a dog!

  Urd turned his back on the bridge and started to walk along the balcony again. It was the safest way to prevent his temper from getting the better of him. That couldn’t happen now. Fortunately he was an extremely patient man. Probably the most patient man in all of Ym. He had waited a long time. He could wait a little longer. Soon, he would find out if it had been worth it.

  Urd shivered. Not because of the wind, though it was howling between the columns, but because of the waiting.

  His deceased father had said that a man should never risk more than he could stand to lose, and Urd felt in every inch of his body that he had risked far too much. Absolutely everything. And this was his only chance. If they said no to him today, it was a no for life.

  “They say she’s already on her way.” Slabba’s annoying voice interrupted Urd’s chain of thought. He’d almost forgotten that the merchant was sitting there. Though sitting was the wrong word. In his shapeless embroidered green tunic, it was more like he was spilling across the glimmerstone bench.

  “Who?”

  “Ilume-madra.” Slabba pulled out an already damp handkerchief and wiped the sweat off his fingers. Each was weighed down with gold and sparkling with gemstones. It made him look pathetic, like a wealthy old dowager. Urd turned away in disgust, but Slabba continued.

  “They say she’s cleared out her house and is only days from Mannfalla.”

  “Who says?”

  “I have … contacts,” Slabba said, trying to make it sound offhand.

  Urd stifled a snort. You. Contacts.

  Slabba didn’t know more than most people, but he was fond of citing a wealth of sources of valuable information. He could be useful sometimes, but as far as Urd’s ambitions were concerned, the merchant might as well be deaf and blind. A fat fly in the web, with delusions of being the spider.