The Morning Flower

by Amanda Hocking

  “That was quite the introduction, better than I would’ve hoped for,” Indu said, sounding strangely delighted by this whole uncomfortable situation. “Ulla, this is your sister Noomi. Noomi, meet your little sister Ulla.”

  “Hi, it’s nice to meet you.” I started to extend my hand toward her, but she was glowering at me, her arms clasped behind her back, so I quickly retracted and leaned back into Pan, grateful for his arm around me.

  “How would you know?” Noomi countered. “You haven’t met me yet.”

  “Yeah, no, that’s true,” I stammered.

  “I’m Pan. I’m her—” Pan stopped himself, probably realizing that saying anymore would only make us uncomfortable, and Noomi definitely didn’t care. “Hello.”

  “I am Tuva,” the shorter one announced, her dark eyes quickly shifting between me and Pan. “I am the chieftain of the thrimavolk.”

  “Noomi is her second-in-command,” Indu interjected with pride. “They run things down here.”

  “You’re both very impressive women,” I said, trying to compliment them, but they both stared blankly at me.

  “We were planning a feast for you tonight,” Indu said, as if he had suddenly remembered. “I will head upstairs to see to its completion, and while I am attending to that, Noomi and Tuva can show you around. By the time dinner is ready, you will have made a choice whether or not you want to stay on for a few nights, and if you do, you can tell your friends to come join us.”

  “And if not?” Pan asked.

  “If not, then you’ll leave,” he said flatly. “You’re not being held against your will.”

  “To make it perfectly clear: you are not a prisoner,” Noomi told me. “You’re not being pressured or coerced to stay. In fact, you’re hardly even welcome here. If you want to go, Tuva and I will be the first ones to show you the door.”

  “That is very clear,” I said.

  “I will check on you shortly. I’m sure you will come to enjoy each other’s company.” Indu gave Noomi a knowing look before he departed.

  “So.” Pan folded his arms over his chest as he eyed them. “How many of there are you?”

  “Sixty-eight,” Noomi replied instantly.

  Tuva added, “Sixty-nine with you.”

  “If she makes it,” Noomi grumbled.

  “Not all the daughters can make it,” Tuva said, speaking more softly, almost like a secret.

  “And no men can?” Pan asked pointedly.

  Noomi smirked, her wide slender mouth looking like her father’s. “No, this isn’t the work for boys.”

  “Are you Vittra?” Tuva asked him.

  He shook his head. “No.”

  She leaned toward him and sniffed the air. “You smell like there’s Vittra in you.”

  “I don’t…” He glanced down at me. “Is that a compliment?”

  She nodded. “I like the Vittra. They’re strong and put up a fight.”

  “I can’t tell if you’re threatening me or flirting with me,” he said.

  “I think it’s a bit of both,” I said.

  “She’s right,” Noomi said.

  Tuva smiled wide, revealing her teeth, and then she snapped them together hard enough to make a clacking sound. I flinched, and Noomi chortled in response.

  “What do you do here?” I asked, trying to ease the growing tension.

  “Here we relax,” Tuva replied simply, then pointed to the narrow corridor that broke off from the main room. “Down the hall are our rooms and bathrooms. At the very end, we have our gym and our study, where we do our training and our services.”

  “Training and services? What’s that?” I asked.

  “We spend most of our time training and preparing for the War to Come,” Noomi replied gruffly.

  “What War to Come?” Pan asked.

  Noomi shrugged. “Whichever one comes next.”

  “There will always be another war, and we will be prepared for it,” Tuva clarified. “But that doesn’t mean it’s all doom and gloom down here. We have games. We climb the mountains and hike. We have a choir.”

  Pan laughed in surprise. “You have a choir?”

  “Yes,” Tuva said. “If you stay for supper, Indu wants them to put on a performance for you.”

  “We look forward to hearing it.” I smiled at them, even though they had yet to reciprocate.

  “Does that mean you feel safe here?” Noomi asked.

  “Should I?” I countered evenly.

  She hardly thought before answering. “I wouldn’t if I were you, but I don’t trust anyone.”

  “You are Indudottir,” Tuva said confidently. “You will be safe here. Your friends are allowed here for a short time, but they cannot stay for long. Áibmoráigi is home to the Älvolk and the thrimavolk, and nothing else. If you are not one of those two, your stay can only be temporary.”

  “We tried that before with Illaria, and it is not something I wish to do again,” Noomi said wearily.

  “Illaria?” I pounced on the name. “You know Illaria?”

  Noomi scowled and exchanged a look with Tuva before finally answering, “She lived here for a while, until her sister fell ill and she had to go back home to care for her.”

  “Why did she stay here?” I pressed. “Indu said he wasn’t her father. Is she thrimavolk?”

  “No, she wasn’t,” Noomi said. “He dated her mother—your mother—when Illaria and Eliana were young. Their father had died, and Illaria became way too attached to our father.”

  “Indu needed to set more boundaries for her,” Tuva added. “She was an ardent follower of our beliefs, but there was no place here for her. It is good that she went home.”

  I swallowed my uneasiness and forced a smile. “I only want to stay here long enough to get to know you and our father and find out what life is like here for you.”

  “Our life here is good,” Noomi assured me in her flat, stilted style. “We have food, we have shelter, we have purpose, we have family. There is nothing more that life has to offer that we do not have.”

  45

  Hymnal

  The dining room glowed under the candles in the iron chandeliers. It was a surprisingly warm, lovely setup, with flowers and food spread across the table, and this was a nice introduction for Dagny and Elof. Things had been going well, so Indu and I had gone to retrieve them, and they joined everyone for dinner.

  The table took up the entire room, and there still wasn’t enough room for all of us. That was understandable, given there were twenty-seven Älvolk, sixty-eight thrimavolk, and then the four of us guests. Still, the seating seemed to be overwhelmingly inadequate, since over half of the thrimavolk had to eat elsewhere in a smaller dining hall.

  Indu seated us at the end of the table. He sat himself to my right and Noomi to Dagny’s left with Pan and Elof in the center. Tuva sat next to Noomi, but the rest of the thrimavolk were peppered around the table among the men.

  Before the meal was served, Indu stood and everyone fell silent. “Tonight we all have much to celeberate. It’s not often that we have guests, but it is a fitting way to rejoice at the return of my daughter, my morning flower.” He raised his glass and smiled down at me. “Join in my welcoming them into our home! Skol!”

  Everyone around the table shouted Skol, but I felt more like an animal on display than an invited guest. Indu had attempted to introduce us to the many young women and older men who sat around the table, but there had been far too many for us to remember.

  Once the meal was served—heavy in root vegetables and bread with sour cheeses made of elk milk—seven girls marched in from another room. They wore elaborate costumes of deep cranberry and dark indigo, with bold embroidery in yellow thread creating intricate patterns along their boat necklines and down the centers of their garments. Their garb was something like a dress, with the solid fabric ending midthigh but brightly colored tassels continuing all the way down to the floor.

  Their hair and makeup were very similar to Noomi and Tuva’s,
but these girls were more embellished, with jewels pasted to their foreheads and lots of chunky necklaces and earrings.

  After the girls came out in a processional, they lined up in a semicircle at the end of the table across from us so we’d have the best view. Everyone at the table fell silent, putting down their utensils and looking at the girls.

  Then they began to sing. It was a mournful, almost bluesy song, or maybe that was because of the way they accentuated their throaty baritones. I couldn’t really tell if that was their natural vocal range, or if they’d trained to sing in such an unusually low manner.

  It was a beautiful song, and their unique style of singing made it hauntingly melodic. The lyrics were in a language I didn’t completely understand, something that sounded vaguely Nordic.

  As far as I could tell, the song was something about a summer bird looking for a morning flower, but the bird was never able to find what it was looking for before nightfall.

  When they finished we all applauded, and the choir bowed before exiting in a single file.

  “That is a uniquely talented choir you have there,” Elof said, sounding genuinely impressed as he watched them leave. “You have a truly special group here.”

  Indu lifted his glass as if to toast him. “That we do. We are all truly blessed here.” He smiled as he surveyed everyone around the table.

  Other than Noomi, Tuva, and the ones in the choir, most of the girls weren’t wearing makeup of any kind. That made their scarification more obvious—dots carved into their flesh across their cheek and foreheads, shaped into simple horizontal patterns.

  Now that I’d spotted the scarification on the others, I could more clearly see it on Noomi. She had had three staggered lines—each one made of five dots—beginning at the corner of each of her eyes.

  The men didn’t have any scarification that I noticed, but many of them were older, their faces lined with wrinkles, so maybe it was harder to see. There were a handful of younger men, in their teens and twenties, but facial hair helped hide their faces.

  No one had given their ages, but Noomi and Tuva did appear to be the oldest of the thrimavolk, and they looked about midtwenties, maybe a little older. The youngest at the table with us were in their lower teens, but Noomi made a comment about the “youngens eating in another room with their unrefined table manners.”

  When we finished our meal, the choir came in for another song, but by then I could hardly keep my eyes open. The day had been exhaustingly long, including a hike partway up a mountain, and I had a dull ache behind my eyes that I suspected was a lingering effect from whatever Indu had done with the painful leat fámus.

  “I’m sorry, but I really need to get some sleep,” I told Indu, speaking quietly as the girls sang something about a snail, if I heard correctly.

  “Of course. Your journey has been long,” Indu said, then looked across the table to Noomi. “Your sister will show you and your friend Dagny to your room. I can escort the men to their room now also, if that is what you wish.”

  “I’m actually not tired yet.” Elof leaned back in his chair and looked at Pan. “What do you say? Would you stay up and join me for dessert?”

  Pan shrugged. “I could stay up a while longer.”

  “I don’t know how you two can do it.” Dagny yawned as she stood. “I can’t wait to get some sleep.”

  As I walked past Pan on the way out, I put my hand on his shoulder. “Be safe.”

  “I always am.” He put his hand over mine and smiled up at me. “Sleep well, and I’ll see you in the morning.”

  Noomi led us down the narrow corridors of the thrimavolk dormitory. They had given us a brief tour earlier, but it hadn’t been much to see because most of the doors were shut, their occupants inside quietly busying themselves.

  The rooms we had seen had mostly looked the same—each one contained two sets of bunk beds, with two or three girls sharing each room. There were a few personal effects scattered around the rooms—books, hairbrushes, dolls, jewelry, that kind of thing—but for the most part the spaces had a clean, almost sterile feel to them. The linens on the beds were military-taut.

  Noomi took us to the room at the very end of the hall, and she smiled when she remarked, “It’s right next to the bathroom.”

  Normally that would probably be a plus for your sleeping arrangements, but not in a place that didn’t have running water. The bathroom had composting toilets made out of stone and wood, and it didn’t smell as bad as I would’ve feared, but there was something unpleasant seeping through the door. Water brought up from a well was warmed, and some of the younger girls refilled the basins in the bathroom.

  Our room itself was fine, following the same medieval institutional vibe the rest of the place was giving me. I tossed my duffel bag onto one of the bottom bunks, and Dagny sat on the bed across from it.

  “Someone will get you in the morning when it’s time for breakfast,” Noomi told us as she lit the kerosene lamps on the two nightstands. “If you have trouble, knock on the bedroom three doors down. That is your nearest neighbor.”

  “There are empty rooms down here?” Dagny asked.

  “There are many empty rooms.”

  “Then why do so many of you bunk up?” she asked, referring to the four beds. “Wouldn’t you rather have your own space?”

  “No.” Noomi stood rigidly in the center of the room, eyeing Dagny. “Would you like your own room? We assumed you’d rather be together for comfort.”

  “Together is fine,” Dagny said, without checking to see how I’d respond, but that was what I would’ve answered anyway.

  “Good.” She walked out of the room and said, “Idjá,” before shutting the door.

  Once she was gone, Dagny said in a hushed voice, “This place is intense.”

  “It is.” I had my back to her as I spoke, focusing on pulling my old T-shirt out of my trag, eager to change out of dirty jeans and sweatshirt. “I want to talk more to Indu and Noomi tomorrow and see if I can find out anything about my mother or Eliana. But regardless of how that conversation goes, even if they don’t tell me anything, I think we should leave.”

  “Elof won’t want to leave so soon,” she said in a bleak, resigned way. “He’ll want to find out everything he can. I’m sure he’s down there now interrogating them over pie.”

  I kept my back to her as I changed, but I trusted her to avert her eyes anyway. “Well, he better get as many answers as he can before tomorrow night, because that’s when I’m leaving. I’ll camp outside the restaurant on the lake if I have to.”

  “You think it’s dangerous to stay another night?”

  “I don’t know.” I sighed, then climbed into bed, pulling the stiff comforter over me as I tried to settle onto the firm mattress. “Ask me in the morning. Right now I’m exhausted, and I don’t feel safe or comfortable here.”

  I stared up at the bunk above me and breathed in deeply, letting the cool, moist air fill my lungs. Tears stung my eyes and I blinked them back. “None of this is how I expected it go when I finally met my family,” I admitted.

  “I’m sorry, Ulla. I’m sure you’ll feel better in the morning.” She stood up. “I’m going to go to the bathroom to freshen up, as much as I can, and get changed.”

  I closed my eyes, and I swear I was asleep before she’d even left the room. My sleep was dark and dreamless, and it was wonderful, but it didn’t last long enough. Sometime after Dagny had gone to bed, someone burst into our room.

  “Indudottir,” she was saying, and then she was shaking me awake, her deep voice like a growl in my ear. “Indudottir, wake up!”

  “What?” I sat up and squinted in the darkness. In my sleepy state I could only think to say, “I’m Ulla. I think you’ve got the wrong room.”

  “No, Ulla, I know it is you,” she said, and I realized it was Noomi, yanking me out of bed. “Your friend wants you.”

  “Dagny?” I asked.

  “No, I’m okay, I’m right here,” Dagny answered from the
other side of the room.

  “Not her, the other one. Pan. He’s in the medica with the häxdoktor. He’s hurt, and he’s asking for you.”

  46

  Safety

  The medica—the medical ward—was on the floor below, down another narrow stairwell. At the bottom of the steps was a sparse room with two beds, and the back wall was covered with shelves stocked with metal utensils, gauzy bandages, and tiny bottles of medicines and potions.

  But my eyes went right to Pan, sprawled out on one of the beds. Elof stood on a stepstool beside a tall man in a dark hood—the häxdoktor, presumably—so he was chest high to the bed, presumably so it would be easier to see and talk with Pan. A kerosene lamp hung above Pan, bathing him in a warm yellow glow, and his white T-shirt had been ripped open, the fabric now stained with blood.

  There was blood everywhere, actually. On the floor, on his jeans, soaking the bandages on the floor.

  I gasped and rushed over to him, half expecting to see a pale corpse, but Pan smiled at me with bleary eyes.

  “Hey, Ulla,” he said weakly. He reached out for me with his right hand, and I saw a fresh bandage wrapped tightly around his forearm.

  I took his hand and put my other hand on his chest. “What happened?”

  “It’s okay, it’s okay,” he said, assuring me with his crooked grin. “I was playing økkspill with Noomi, and the axe slipped.”

  “It’s not my fault,” Noomi interjected flatly. She’d brought me down here, and now she waited a step behind me, her hands clasped behind her back.

  “He is all right now,” Elof said, and his clear, authoritative way of speaking instilled far more confidence in me than Pan’s easy smile and glassy eyes. “We’ve given him a transfusion.”

  “Yeah, I feel weird, but good.” His eyes widened empathically. “Like really good.”

  “That could be the dadarud—a pain-relieving root we gave him,” Elof explained. “It also has some mild hallucinatory properties, but he is definitely not in any pain at the moment.”

  “See?” Pan squeezed my hand and stared up into me eyes. “I’m great.”