The swan caught sight of Tryggve and he watched her swim to the edge of the lake where the water was most shallow. Her feathers ruffled, her head bowed, and he watched, entranced, as the swan shifted its form into that of a woman with generous curves and perfect skin as white as the bird. Her hair, as pale as spring sunlight, fell down her shoulders, breasts, and back. She raised her head and smiled at him.
Her teeth, like pearls, he thought and felt his breath leave his body.
He watched enraptured as she walked from the lake to a small stone bench beneath the willow where she had abandoned her robe an hour ago.
With graceful ease, he watched his wife wrap her body in the robe. His eyes followed the slender curve of her face, her eyes, and the locks she pulled free from the fabric.
“Your eyes still take my heart as completely as the day we met,” he said as she made her way toward him. “Caoilinn.” He took up her hands and placed his mouth upon her palm.
“Such words,” she said, smiling.
“True words,” he corrected and pulled her into him. “You take my breath from me.” He buried his face into her neck and she laid her head onto his. “The children are gone,” he whispered.
“So you shall have me. Is that it?” she asked.
“Always have. Always will, so long as you’ll let me.” He grazed her neck with gentle kisses.
“Is breá liom tú,” she whispered back and Tryggve exhaled, pulling himself from her neck so that he could look into her eyes.
“You know I can’t understand a word of your sweet tongue.” He kissed her mouth. He released her and kissed her brow.
“I know that,” she said.
“Say it again.” He kissed the lids of her eyes.
“Is breá liom tú.”
He smiled and kissed her mouth again hard and deep until he had his fill.
“Tryggve?” she asked when he returned to her neck. “The children are gone, you say?”
“Hm.” He kissed her neck deeper and wrapped an arm around her waist. “Swann is off where Swann always is, in the valley.” He kissed the tip of her nose. “Rune has vanished.”
Caoilinn shifted to better look into his eyes.
“Where is he?”
“Geirolf said he skipped out on his lessons.” He raised her palm and kissed her wrist.
“Will you reprimand him?” Caoilinn asked.
“I will…” Tryggve kissed her brow again. “…not care.”
She smiled and Tryggve kissed her mouth.
“What aren’t you telling me, husband?”
“Later,” he whispered.
“Tryggve.”
He sighed, ceased his kissing, and wrapped his other arm around her.
“Rumor has slipped from the docks.” He hated himself for saying it. “It would appear that our son is home.”
“Bergen?”
Tryggve nodded, knowing his plans for the morning were quickly slipping from him.
“Bergen is,” Tryggve nodded.
Caoilinn beamed and heat flooded his insides.
“Where is he?”
Tryggve sighed. “I have a suspicion that Rune has taken it upon himself to find him.”
“Well then, why are we here?” she said and was off, free from his arms as she ran across the gardens toward the keep.
“Yes, love.” Struggling to think of little else but the curve of his wife’s backside, Tryggve ran his hands over his face and turned to join his wife. “Whatever you ask, my love, I shall give it.”
Tryggve took a step and stopped. She stood stiffly, her head bowed, frozen as if in pain.
“Caoilinn?”
She turned, her eyes brimming with fear.
“Something is wrong,” she gasped.
Only once before had he seen her like this. Once, years ago, and she hadn’t been wrong then either. Tension pulled his back taut with worry.
“What is wrong?” he asked. “Caoilinn?”
“The children,” she muttered. Before Tryggve could run toward the keep, Caoilinn shifted back into a swan and took flight.
From the gardens, she flew over the parapet to the courtyard while Tryggve fled up the steps to the kitchens. Panting, he threw open the door, slamming into the cook while he made his way up the steps to the Main Hall.
Paying no mind to the décor or the feast, Tryggve charged the great oak doors. Geirolf called, but Tryggve ignored him and punched open the doors to the courtyard.
“Please.” He heard Caoilinn’s plea, and the color drained from his face.
Upon the steps, wrapped in the remnants of a gown, lay Swann, naked and drained of blood that now covered her young body. From her navel to her chest, her body had been cut, gutted like one of the animals brought to slaughter. A handprint of dried blood marred her face where her lifeless silver eyes stared into nothing.
Beside her, Bergen and Rune waited while Caoilinn splayed her hands onto Swann and sent streams of gold into the lifeless child.
“Caoilinn! No!” Tryggve cried and fell to his knees alongside his wife and daughter. “You can’t give too much. You’ll die.”
Caoilinn increased the flow of her Seidr.
“Caoilinn.” Tryggve clutched her arms and tried to pull her away.
“Le do thoil,” she said. “Ní le do thoil bás. Please.” But she drew too much. And when she linked her Seidr to Tryggve, she was unaware of the life she took from him.
Tryggve felt his arms weaken, his head spun with darkness, but Caoilinn didn’t break the link.
“I can save her,” she muttered, but Swann lay unmoving, not breathing while the Seidr drained from Caoilinn.
Tryggve released his wife. His Seidr came back, his eyes focused, and he watched Caoilinn pour her life into Swann. The child lay on the courtyard steps.
“I can…shábháil…” Caoilinn muttered. “Ní le do thoil bás.”
She was pale now. “I can sa—” The Seidr line broke and Caoilinn fell back into Tryggve’s arms.
The red of her lips was almost white. The gleam in her eyes was fading.
“S—She’s given too much,” Tryggve said. He brushed her waxen face with a shaking hand. “Geirolf,” he muttered. “Where’s Geirolf?”
The king searched the many faces that had gathered to see. Too helpless to change the fates, too stunned to cry or weep, they only looked on in silence and dismay.
“Caoi—”
Her skin was gray. Her breath was broken. The light in her eyes was fading.
“Ní le do thoi—” And she gave her last breath.
Tryggve’s head spun.
My wife.
He touched her white lips.
My daughter.
He turned to Swann, seeing, but not understanding.
“Rune?” Tryggve said. “Bergen?”
Neither moved.
“What happened?” Tryggve asked. “How…”
Geirolf was there, leaning closer to inspect the queen.
“We found her,” Rune said. “The valley.”
Tryggve gazed upon Swann, so like her mother, blood covering her pale skin.
He shook his muddled head and shifted his gaze to Caoilinn, waxen and gray in his arms. His hands had grown cold.
He felt Geirolf shift to touch her neck, and the king raised his bewildered eyes to the old man. “Geirolf?”
Geirolf’s eyes glazed over with a wall of tears and he looked to his king. With a quivering lip, Geirolf shook his head and Tryggve felt his sanity leave him.
With trembling hands, he raked his scalp and pulled at strands of hair, one hand still clamped to his wife.
“W—who…?” He couldn’t finish. He couldn’t speak. “W—why…?” Tryggve turned his attention to his daughter, his wife, his sons.
Bergen stood shaking, breathing as if chilled by a mountain storm. Rune stood beside him, his fingers clutching something until his knuckles were white beneath the blood. Blood covered their faces, their clothes, their hands. Blood now covered Caoilin
n. Swann’s blood.
“W—ha…” Tryggve could say no more.
Shaking, Rune extended the white-knuckled hand that clasped a silver band of metal. It struck the courtyard stone, punctuating the silence like a deadened weight.
Tryggve shifted his crazed eyes to the object. An elding armband engraved with the tri-corner knot and a hammer.
“Dokkalfar,” Geirolf sputtered.
“Eyolf,” Tryggve muttered.
Rage consumed him and pushed the confusion and grief aside until only fire burned, and it severed his senses. Wild rage, cold hate took Tryggve and ripped his mind from him. With a single thought, he raised his eyes to the south.
Lorlenalin.
“Get my sword.”
* * *
Rune gazed at the lifeless faces staring up at him, paying no mind as his father called for his sword and ran to the stables. Torunn had joined them and muffled her sobs into her skirts. Gently, she wrapped the bodies in cloth while Geirolf took up Caoilinn’s body.
“Take care of Swann,” Geirolf muttered to someone, but Rune heard nothing.
Bergen remained at his side, his shoulders shaking, his hands curled into white fists. His hair hung over his face, hiding the rage that shook him. The shock was wearing off. The wave of crying had begun. Someone took up Swann’s body and carried her into the keep. The sky was gray. Blood, Swann’s blood, stained the steps of the keep. The armband lay where it had fallen.
Forcing his body to move, Rune took up the band and trudged down the steps and started for the barracks.
The door creaked. The barracks were empty. Rune stopped in the doorway and gazed at the collection of swords and armaments. His eyes stopped on a single sword. Still clutching the armband, he withdrew it.
Hate boiled, rage rose. Rune screamed and swung the blade. His shoulders shook, and he swung again. Images of his sister’s body stripped and broken, bleeding and dead, swarmed him. Her body left to die in a pool of her own blood.
He swung the blade again and again.
Bergen had roared and taken up Swann’s body.
Rune had dug at the earth with his fists. He didn’t know how long they sat there screaming over her body.
Rune swung the blade. He roared, letting his voice shred his throat with the same agony that clawed his chest, and lunged, swinging again and then bringing the blade down into a table, down to the wooden floor.
He remembered the armband lying in the grass.
Rune swung the blade and it shattered in two. He dropped to his knees and stabbed at the floor with a half-blade while the tip clamored to the ground somewhere.
The dagger used to gut her had been left. Rune had run off, shouting to the murderer to come out while Bergen rocked sweet Swann and roared.
Rune dug at the floor over and over until the blade broke again. With his fists, he punched the floor and dug at the planks until his knuckles bled.
And then Mother.
His mind couldn’t process. Anguish clamped his chest and dug itself into his heart.
Rune shook his head and punched his brow. He pulled at his hair and dug at his scalp, desperate to find the Dokkalfar and kill him.
The barracks door struck the wall.
Rune remained, kneeling on the floor, yearning to find another sword and slash away at the world.
“Father’s gone,” he heard Bergen say. “I’m going after him.”
“Where?” Rune asked. Screaming had begun to pass over Gunir.
“To hunt Dokkalfar,” Bergen said.
Rune raised his face to his brother. Cold hate penetrated the silver blue of Bergen’s eyes.
“I’ll get the horses.”
* * *
The wind howled over the hundreds that lay dead on the forest road. Rune tightened his hold on the reins. He couldn’t see the end of the massacre through the steam.
Too stunned to speak, he stared at the Dokkalfar women, the children, the soldiers, and horses as Bergen spoke.
“Hundreds lay dead for me.
Silenced, they weep for thee,
Blood spilled where ne’er they’ll be.”
A raven cawed. The first of the flock were gathering.
“Silence the hundreds.”
The stench of the dead was growing. Within the hour, the field would be crawling with scavengers. This was how King Eyolf would find his kin. There was little time to act.
Rune turned his horse around. All taste for vengeance had left him.
“What are you doing?” Bergen asked and turned his horse to follow.
“There will be war,” Rune said. “The Dokkalfar king won’t dismiss this, nor should he.”
Bergen pulled back on his reins and looked to the dead.
Rune stopped his horse and turned. “Bergen,” he said. “We need to go back. We need to find Father before the Dokkalfar do.”
Bergen stared, not moving, the hate in his eye unyielding.
“Bergen,” Rune said.
It was another long moment before Bergen steered his horse back around to follow his brother.
CHAPTER 6
Kallan smelled the death before she saw the amassed bodies that lay, hewn in pools of their own blood and excrement. Steam rose from the bodies of children, dismembered and disemboweled beside the mothers who had thrown their broken bodies onto them. The steam now formed a thick fog that appeared to have rolled in. Interspersed with meat, drink, and gifts carried for Austramonath, three hundred lay dead.
In silence, Kallan stared from atop her horse. The ravens made feast where piles of pussywillows lay beside children. Alongside the corpses of horses and Alfar, wreaths of flowers and wild branches littered the ground.
Eyolf’s saddle creaked as he lowered himself from his mount. All eyes scanned the dead that spanned the caravan.
“Eyolf…” Daggon spoke, releasing the Dokkalfar from their spell. Numb to the horror that blinded her, Kallan slid from Astrid. Her legs jelled and buckled beneath her.
“F—Fathe—” Her voice cracked. A raven took flight and circled the air. “Were there no guards?”
Eyolf shook his head, unable to speak.
“There were,” Daggon said.
The raven circled and landed upon a small, bloodied mass: a boy. It pecked the corpse then pulled at the boy’s head until it had a mouthful of strands.
“Stop it,” Kallan muttered.
The raven pecked at a stub where an arm should have been.
“Stop it,” Kallan said.
The raven did not obey.
“Stop it!” Kallan shrieked and, scooping up a rock from the ground, she chucked it hard at the bird. “Stop it!” She took up another and, this time, she ran. “Stop it!”
The second rock fell short like the first, but, as she approached the body, the ravens took flight and left the corpse to Kallan.
“Stop!” Kallan screamed and threw her third rock into the air. It fell to the ground with a soft thump. Beside the boy, Kallan stood where the stench of death was stronger.
Behind her, Eyolf and Daggon led the king’s war-men into the dead. In silence, they walked, some bodies too mangled to identify. A few men, some guards lay on the ground, but mostly women and children made up the dead.
“Daggon,” Kallan heard the strength in her father’s voice falter. “Have one of your men take Kallan home.”
“My king.” His voice too had weakened. “Kallan.”
Kallan wasn’t sure how long she gazed into the steam that rolled in the wind. A shadow moved and a soft sob filled the massacre that was Austramonath.
She watched the malformed creature whimper as it hobbled over the dead. It sobbed as it stumbled and babbled intermittently with disconnected slurs and cries until a boy, bathed in blood, emerged from the fog, cradling the remains of a second much smaller boy.
“Mother said…” he muttered. “I will…He’ll be alright.” He stumbled and the corpse he grasped swayed, allowing Kallan to make out that the body was missing an arm and its t
iny spine was cloven in two where entrails hung from its back.
“Mother said…” the boy muttered. “I can watch him. I can…I’m here…I did like you said, Mum. I’ll take care of him…”
His eyes focused as he emerged from his madness, and he noticed Kallan. “You can save him…you’re Seidkona. You’re…You can save him!”
Kallan stared, unable to speak, unable to offer words to the child whose mind had long since gone.
“Save him.” The child shoved the remains of his brother at Kallan. “You can! I know you can! You can…Mother told me…A Seidkona can save him!”
Kallan shook her head and forced the words to form. “I can’t.”
“You can!” The boy was standing close enough for Kallan to make out the blood that flowed from the child’s head and the one ruined eye now coated white. “You must!”
“Daggon,” Eyolf said.
“You aren’t even trying!” the boy screamed and Daggon reached to take him by the arm.
“Come along,” Daggon said.
The boy shrieked at Kallan. “You’ll kill him!”
Daggon grabbed the boy and firmly pulled him away from Kallan.
“You killed my brother!” The boy’s voice filled the stiff air.
“Daggon,” Kallan said and the captain froze. “I will take him.”
Daggon shook his head. “Kallan. You can’t help him.”
“I can’t bring his brother back.” Her knuckles were white as she dug her fists into her skirts and stumbled over the blood-soaked ground. “But I can help him.”
CHAPTER 7
Bergen sat on the steps of Gunir’s keep. Resting his arms on his knees, he supported his hunched back and shoulders. In one hand, he clutched the Sklavinian egg until his fingers were numb. In the other, he loosely held the neck of a bottle still full with mead.
Sklavinian artifacts are notorious for curses.
Rune’s words echoed back as Bergen stared at the stone courtyard bathed in moonlight and blood, Swann’s blood. He recalled Zabbai’s bronze body glistening in the sun of Râ-Kedet, naked and pure and perfect and chained. For two years, he had thought of little else.
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