by Farah Cook
“Frederick, over here?” I shout.
“Nora, quickly run,” he yells. I see his panic-stricken face covered in sweat and black dust. He runs toward me and takes my hand. We run in the opposite direction of the building, away from the five men with guns. We are at the tip of a rock and the only way down is to jump. The men start shooting after us. My heart jumps out of my chest.
“Nora, we’ve got to jump, now,” says Frederick. “There’s no other way.” I nod and feel the fear creeping on my skin. I hold his sweaty hand tightly and jump down the burning red desert slope embracing every bone in his body. We enter our doom.
24
MY SCREAMS MUFFLE in his chest and when I open my eyes, we’re back in the forest, where we departed. The ground underneath my feet is soft and in places boggy. The autumn wind is clean and crisp. I catch a glimpse of the sun in an open glade. Frederick looks at me, his face shining stronger than the sun.
“What just happened?” I ask.
“I’ve figured out the time lapse in the woods is shifting the landscape so it rotates. There are three phases. The forest, the desert and the ocean. We’re back in the forest…”
“Which means, the next phase is the ocean again,” I say.
“We’ll have to be fast, and tread the green way into the deeper end. It will lead us to the gates,” says Frederick, “of the City of Vikings.”
I gaze into his eyes, feeling grateful he came for me and that he is here by my side. I would be dead if he hadn’t saved me from sinking into the ocean of death.
“Frederick, what I said earlier…”
“You don’t have to explain yourself,” says Frederick. “Instead let me explain, Nora. My father has to do what’s in his power to make sure his Viking clan survives. I can’t go against my own kind, but I can join you.”
“Why?” I ask and look away. The mellow wind fills my hair with sprinkles of dry leaves. Frederick turns my head toward him.
“Because I am in love with you. I have not tricked you, or manipulated you, or put you under any spells. I never was fond of using magic. It’s an evil power that serves no good in our world.”
“Your clan wants me dead,” I say. “How can you not go against that?”
“I want to find the answers to that as much as you do. That’s why I am coming with you to the City of Vikings. I believe your dad knows something that can end the rivalry between the Verans and Goths. Maybe even unite them. There’s a larger force above us, something I can’t explain.”
“What did your dad mean that morning…”
“I don’t know. I was raised never to question him, to doubt or to go against him,” says Frederick. He watches me with hawk eyes, like he’s afraid I will slip away in the keep of the wind. “But we’ll find out together. Come on, let’s keep moving. We don’t have much time before the next phase rolls out on us – and then hell will break loose again.”
“Frederick, that cave, was that—?”
“Yes,” he says. “Draugen. I saw the ghosts with my eyes wide open, and it’s not a pretty sight. They are as real as any of this.”
“How did you manage to pull me out of the sea?”
“I used a spell to find you,” he says and gives me mischievous smile. “Not all spells are bad, we can use them to do good too if we want to. And in this instance, it helped me save your life.”
“Thank you,” I say and flutter my eyelashes. I let go of my anxieties and the questions haunting me. Frederick is my foe, but not because he declared himself to be. He’s perhaps only ever wanted to be my friend.
After an hour or two of walking through the green way as before, and passing through bogs, swamps and thick bushes, we begin to lose any clear sense of direction. The afternoon wears away and we begin to scramble and stumble into the fold of the forest that is wider and deeper than all the other passages we waded through.
I throw my body flat into a bank of flowerbeds. The smell is sweet and tangy. Frederick quickly pulls me up and shakes his head.
“Nothing is safe here,” he says. “Use your sixth sense.”
“It’s just a little rest,” I say. “Surely it’s not going to kill me.”
Frederick glares at me and wags a finger at me playfully. His whispers sound unearthly when he tells me, “I don’t want to ever risk losing you now that I have you this near.”
My silence is obviously not what he expects. The softness in my eyes should tell him I care enough about him to let him follow me on this journey. Whether he likes it or not, I’ll never be the type of girl who will show him my soft side. I’m a fighter and always have been. My tough side didn’t scare him off, and I take it he likes a girl with a strong head on her shoulders.
“You will only lose me if you break my trust Frederick.”
“Did I ever earn it?” he furrows his brows.
“Now you have,” I say. “Guard it, with your life.” We tread the sinking ground following a brook, seeping through the earth next to us.
“We’re on the right track, Nora,” Frederick smiles, and looks ahead to the weedy bed where the brook flows. The path leads us into a deep gully – dangerous and dark. The sky seals off as trees move in on us forming an arch of thick branches woven together. I hear the birds caw and dance in circles above us. The blue sky appears so suddenly, the sun glistening on our faces. Frederick takes my hand and pushes me up to the edge of the cleft.
“What did you do that for?” I say primly and dust myself off. He stretches his hand out and he pulls me up so he’s close to me, his breath synced with mine. Frederick motions with his eyes, and I turn around to look over a high steep bank.
“I wanted to show you this cliff,” he says.
At our feet is a wide-open space with a field of emerald grass straws and golden reeds. In the distance, mountains and green valleys are covered in trees. “Look beyond the horizon, do you see it?”
Through the boughs and branches, the golden wings of the sun spread like glitter and in the midst of it all another steep bank and a black river.
“I see nothing,” I say and stare at him, feeling the stiffness in my neck. He holds me from behind. His arms swing around my waist. He takes my hand and points with my finger east of the river crossing the Rocky Mountains bordered with willow trees.
“That’s where we need to go,” he says. “To the City of Vikings.” As soon as the words leave his lips, a dreamy haze hits me. Our destination is not far, and yet the distance through the Forbidden Areas poses an unknown number of challenges. Frederick passes into the rays of light uniting with the long grass embracing him. He shouts that the ground is steady.
Frederick takes a step further between the foot of the cliff and river and drops between the turf and water’s edge. My heart sinks, but his long neck keeps his head in place just where I can see it.
“The footpath next to the river winds all the way to the other side following the right side and leading us to east of the forest,” he shouts.
“Are you sure?” I hesitate, “we are not heading into marshlands or some ugly place with sinking bogs?”
Frederick nods, and we set out on our way east of the river. The track looks uneven and I wonder who made it. In this forest, nothing is as it seems, and everything I’ve been told and more has been true. My suspicion is not without reaction. The trees, willows and valleys shift and move, like they are on this journey with us. The swamps and bogs look similar and the weather shifts quickly around here.
Majestic and beautiful, the trees have enormous trunks and branches sprawling and arching their way through the woods, and as they sway and creak, a feeling of unease comes over me. I feel a sense of danger, and a faint vision of who used to walk in these woods.
Tall men, commoners, fairies, dwarfs and trolls. They live inside the forest. We’re being watched and it’s only a matter of time – the watching will lead to a question. What are we doing in the land that’s forbidden? We have our own world that we’ve built. The Triangle, which belongs to th
e Goth Empire – frail and weakened Verans rule in deceit.
The claim of the Triangle is a victory too short of celebration. Magnus, soon newly awakened Emperor and rightful ruler of the Empire, will want to claim back what is his and defend his keep. The reason for my journey – is to bring back the weapons of power and destruction. An army of raiders, not nearly enough to defeat the smallest swarm of bees in these woods, but still an army of brave warriors that believe in the legend of the Vikings. The battle of the nine worlds that will lead us into war.
After walking for a while it becomes difficult to follow the path. I’m stealing glances at Frederick, and I know what’s on his mind. The path is changing. Are we still heading east? Did he ever see the golden gates to the city we seek? I don’t know, but as night falls, the road leads nowhere and I am beginning to believe it’s all an illusion deceiving us and leading us to our death.
The shadow embraces the forest looming over us, crossing the trees like death. The path becomes unclear and the trees hanging over us lower their branches and we fight our way through the thickness mounting us. Smokey mist curls above the quiet lake’s surface and I’m drawn by a mysterious sound. I hear a sharp voice shrill in the air singing in an unearthly manner.
“Do you hear that?” I say. When I turn to my side. Frederick is not there. At the turn of dusk the hostile night keeps me prisoner, and I fear what might have happened to him in the blink of an eye. I walk to the lake and squat down, gliding my fingers over the water. It tingles, and something reaches out and pulls me into the deep.
His eyes are golden, blazing fire – the nøkken has a hold of me. His black bones clutch me under the water watching every movement I make. I think I may be dreaming and try to wake. Am I in reality or in a dream? With my eyes wide open I see endless dead bodies at the bottom of the lake. There among the dead, I see Frederick’s face, and he’s alive but terrified and his screams are muffled.
I stretch my hand out and my sword places itself firmly among my fingers. The water is thick and resistant, I sway my arm heavily across my chest and break through the nøkken’s black bones, which turn to dust. I swim rapidly, releasing Frederick from strings of duckweed and algae, and swim up to a dark opening.
We breathe in the fresh air, moist and warm, coughing out the lake water from our lungs. Soaked, I lie shivering, and he towers over me holding me close. The grass under me is smooth, shaven and firm. Together we lie flat with bended knees just holding one another under the pale starless night.
“That was close,” he says, coughing out trapped air. “He nearly got us.”
“I can’t believe I killed a nøkken,” I say and smile. “I always wanted to do that ever since I saw one in the East. Amber eyes glowing with fire from hell.”
“They once belonged to the fairies,” says Frederick. “Now, nothing but bloodthirsty creatures that feed on human blood.”
“Where there’s one…” I say.
“There will not be more,” finishes Frederick. “Nøkken are lone creatures.”
“Frederick?”
“What would you do if I died?” I ask, leaving an open silence between us.
“What makes you say that?”
“Death is closer than we think,” I say. “We’ve invited ourselves as guests into its hollow embrace.”
“We have to keep moving. We are close. I can feel it.”
“What if the City of Vikings doesn’t exist?” I say.
“I’ve seen it—”
“Could be an illusion, you said so yourself—”
“I know what I saw, Nora,” Frederick gets to his feet, and moves away from the edge of the lake. He turns and stands steady in the grass. I stand up and look at his eyes – locked onto something in motion. The forest behind us changes before our eyes. The path is plain and clear and the clipped eaves roll out like a trimmed arch to the knoll at the top. On the slope is a door, just a door.
25
WHITE LIGHT FILLS the lamps swinging from the beams arching over the tall framed wooden door. Bewildered, Frederick stares at me like he’s run out of explanations. It’s not like the forest comes with a map that’s reliable. In the shadows of the woods we’ve seen enough to believe only what causes nightmares.
“We need luck on our side,” I say, making my nerves visible to him as I bravely reach out for the handle. He gently pulls me close and kisses the tip of my nose.
“There’s no such thing as luck,” he says. “We make our own luck.”
“Whatever hides behind this door…”
“Could be deadly, but we’ll face it together,” he says with reverent seriousness.
I turn the handle and the door creaks. Inside is a wide room, far to the right a woman is seated on a grand chair decorated in wood carvings. Her ice-blond hair flows like water down her shoulders. Her eyes black roots, shifting color to ash gray. Her ears are pointy, almost sharp. Frederick and I turn to run, but the door shuts.
“Come! Don’t be shy,” she says standing tall, so her head reaches the ceiling.
“Let us out at once,” I say and raise my sword.
“Out?” she ponders and bats her eyelashes. “You’ve only just invited yourselves into the forbidden kingdom of elves. Now you must meet the elf queen and elf king who will decide your fate. For out there, the still death awaits you. The fog, the trees, and dangerous waters. Swamps and hollows, sinking meadows and dead willow leaves, and who knows what mystical creatures you’ve survived already to get this far.” She spreads out her arms like wings and takes our hands. When I resist, she drags me across the room and pins me down to the bench with a crackling fire to my side.
“Stubborn or savage?” she asks.
“Both,” says Frederick nearly laughing. I glare at him in amazement. “Sorry.”
“I’m Nora Hunt – a Viking assassin and with me I carry the map of the world tree Yggdrasil – I was chosen by the gods…”
“Your gods are no good in the realm of elves,” says the elf, sniffing me like a dog. She looks at Frederick and gives him a round of sniffing too. “Hmmm.” A long pause and she drums her fingers on her chin.
“What?” I ask, anger swelling in my throat as I eyeball her long pastel-colored cotton dress. Her waist is tiny and framed by a bulky brown leather belt with a brown crust in the middle.
“A Goth and a Veran,” her black eyes expand and the black of her eyes expands. Frederick looks at me and a faint hint of dark becomes visible in his blue eyes. He stands motionless, poised – soundless whispers leave his lips. “Of course, black magic is forbidden in elf territory,” she hushes Frederick, placing her long pointy finger on his delicate lips and he swallows the words.
With a sudden movement, she rips off my shirt and stares at my back. I gather my blouse from the floor and hug it close to my chest where I keep it. I feel no life in Yggdrasil as if she’s withered away in the murky shadows of the forest.
“It’s true,” she says. “You are bearer of the map that leads to the nine worlds.”
“She’s more than that,” says Frederick drawing in a deep breath. The elf woman massages her forehead as if on the verge of a migraine.
“Doesn’t that make the two of you… enemies?” she asks.
“We believe an alliance can be restored,” says Frederick, broadening his shoulders. The elf woman laughs sharply.
“Says a Veran knowing you will serve the one who seeks to rule the nine worlds – and shadow doom will fall on the world of the Vikings.”
“That’s not true,” I shout. “The Goth Empire—”
“Is passive,” she says. “It has been for many years, and under the black spells of the ones you think will form an alliance with you. For it is too late. An alliance was formed between the Verans and Lord Nourusa – the lord of all dark lords and his only allegiance is to his master. He’s waiting for you to unlock the nine worlds and as you are destined to do so, they will fall into the shadows forever.”
“Is that true, Frederick?” I stare
at him, and he runs his fingers through his blond locks. He slams his fist into the table in front of me so the beaker with wine spills on the floor. Red thick fluid spreads across the uneven boards, with thick layered tree roots intertwining. The look in his eyes lingers. “Are you listening to me? answer me. Did you know?”
“I knew. Okay. I knew about the alliance, but how do you expect me to tell you something like this?” he lets out a loud roar and throws a chair against the door. It smashes into bits that scatter across the floor. He mutters to himself and his face turns crimson as if I’d slapped him with my words.
“You lied to me,” I say in voice so flat it’s unrecognizable to myself. I can hardly breathe or get any words out, but I force myself. “How could you?”
“I never lied to you, Nora. I couldn’t tell you because I still believe—” The elf laughs again and opens a secret door to her right.
“Rivals, are never meant to unite,” she says. “It’s the law of the jungle. Have you ever seen a lion befriend a lamb?”
“Who is the lion?” I ask.
“And who is the lamb?” asks Frederick.
“Let’s find out, shall we?”
In the dead of the night we wander down a steep path flanked by beds of flowers. The air outside is different and the sky illuminated by stars twinkling. The moon appears young high above us, and under the trees we enter through a black rocky tunnel, arching dark slopes to a great gate. The entrance to the elves’ world opens as we pass through the gateway held by a grand plinth. The light from the night sky is bright and brisk like a silver mist.
On seats cut in oak sit the elf queen and king crowned in head jewels, and surrounded in the majestic garden entrance of eaves and arches by branches and willows. There is a heavenly smell of roses and wild exotic flowers. Pinewood and glimmering plants as if dusted in gold. Elves with long silver hair and glowing maple eyes sit eavesdropping, listening to a spell from a book in a quiet gathering.
