Death Under the Bridge

by Cate Martin

I couldn't argue with that.

  I looked around to see if any of my Runde friends were among the locals, but they weren't. Well, it was early yet, and technically a weeknight.

  "Are you staying or do you have to work?" I asked.

  "Staying," he said with a warm smile.

  "Cool," I said, pleased. "Sit by the fire?"

  "No, let's take that corner of there," Thorbjorn said, pointing out a cozy little nook in the farthest corner from the fire.

  "Okay," I said slowly. I wasn't sure what this sudden change in sociability meant. I knew that he spent most of his time alone, as apparently his brothers did. But when he was with the others, he tended to be the center of everything, telling the best stories and the funniest jokes and challenging anyone at all to any sort of competition, no matter how dangerous or how mundane. Being in the mead hall, but apart from the others? How long could that even last before someone dragged him off to settle some bet?

  I didn't see how it happened, but when we reached the table and I had set my bag into the corner behind my chair, I straightened to see Thorbjorn already had drinks in his hand. He had an enormous mug of beer for himself and set a comparatively dainty mug of mead in front of me.

  Comparatively. As I took a sip of the honey wine, I reminded myself I was in no way going to finish this drink. There must have been a whole bottle's worth in there.

  "A fine day," Thorbjorn said as he wiped beer foam from his beard, then looked around the room at his fellow Villmarkers with a radiant fondness.

  "Yes, that was fantastic," I said. "I have so many sketches. Just rough drawings, but when I start fleshing them out, I'll have some amazing illustrations."

  "I imagine so," he said. "The ship we were on as kids was nowhere near as beautiful as the one we made this year. That should be even more inspiring for you than the last one."

  "I hope so," I said, taking another sip of my mead. "Of course things don't have the same impact on adults as they do in children. I'm an artist, so I try to keep that child alive inside of me, but it's not the same as when I was actually a child."

  "No," he agreed. "That voyage when we were children, that helped your art?"

  "I think it spawned it," I said. "I'm not exaggerating. Really, someday when you have a little time, you really should come down to my grandmother's house so I can show you the most impressive drawings I've done. They're really too big to be lugging around, and I could just see myself tripping and throwing my life's work into the waterfall."

  "I suppose I should," he said, looking down into his own beer as if he had found something floating in it.

  I could feel his disappointment, but it took me a moment to work out the cause. There was no reason he couldn't come down to Runde. He had before, if just to the crossroads. So why was he sad now?

  Then it dawned on me. He had really hoped I would remember more, that the day out on the water in the ship would bring back all the memories. I wished it had, but I wasn't sad that it didn't. At least, not the way Thorbjorn seemed to be.

  Was there something specific he wanted me to remember from when I was eight?

  "Hey," I said, nudging his arm to break his moody regarding of his beer. "This was an unforgettable day. Seriously. I'm going to treasure the memory of it for the rest of my life. Never in a million years did I think I would ever feel what it was like to be in an actual Viking ship rolling over the waves. Thank you."

  "Well, don't thank me," he said. "Your grandmother did the magic."

  "I'm guessing because you asked her to," I said. He said nothing, just hastily took another long pull from the mug.

  I took another sip of mead and looked past Thorbjorn to the table with the three locals. They were still with the Villmarker who had brought over the round of beers, all talking and laughing together. But there was a fifth person at their table now who was sitting with them but not really taking part in the conversation.

  Roarr.

  I had seen him around Villmark a few times in the last month when I had been there with my grandmother. We had never spoken to him directly, but even among the others he always seemed to keep to himself. Not that the other Villmarkers were shunning him or anything, they just didn't seem to know what to do with him.

  "Have you talked to Roarr at all?" I asked Thorbjorn.

  He turned to follow my gaze over his shoulder, then turned back to me with a shrug. "Not really."

  "He seems lonely," I said.

  "Shouldn't he be?" Thorbjorn asked.

  "Maybe?" I said. "But also, he's still grieving. It seems cruel to have to go through that alone."

  "He has his parents," Thorbjorn said, then set his beer down with a thunk. "You feel sorry for him?"

  "I can't help it," I said, throwing up my hands. "It would help if there was some way to figure out just how much he was under Halldis' spell and how much was him just going along with things. Or taking an active part, even. I hate not knowing."

  "I think the only person who can ever know all of that for sure is Roarr," he said. "He has to confront that in himself. Or not; it's all up to him." He took another drink of beer.

  I looked down at the mead in the mug in front of me. I had only had a few little sips, and yet my head was already starting to feel swimmy. I was tempted to lay my head down on my folded arms and go to sleep right there on the table.

  "You're tired," Thorbjorn said. I jumped, belatedly realizing I had just zoned out sitting there on the bench for I had no idea how long.

  "I'm okay," I said, sitting up straighter and looking around the hall. "I was hoping some of the others might stop in later. It's too early to go home."

  "After what you did today? An early bedtime is probably exactly what you need," he said. And then he took the mug of mead away from me.

  "What I did today?" I said. "You mean sitting there letting you row? Watching everyone swim like crazy to keep up with a ship riding a brisk wind? Because I promise you drawing all day is how I normally spend my time, and it doesn't have me in bed by..." I glanced at my watch and winced, "eight."

  "You did more than that," he said. "More than you were meant to, but we could all see that your grandmother needed you."

  "I didn't do anything," I said. "I mean, I drew what it should've looked like if my grandmother's spell had been working, but that's nothing. It didn't feel like magic when I did it. It certainly wasn't exhausting."

  "You're paying the price now," he said. "It's not like running from a bear. You don't get winded right away."

  "You speak from experience?" I asked.

  "I haven't run from a bear since I was ten," he snorted.

  "I meant the magic thing," I said.

  "Well, no," he admitted. "But I've spent more time than most in your grandmother's company. You might as well go home. It's going to be an early night for the rest of us, anyway. Your grandmother can't keep it up all night after the day we had."

  "I should stay until she goes," I said, but I ruined the illusion of being firmly resolved in my vow by yawning hugely.

  "Go," he said. "I'll watch over your grandmother for you."

  "Thank you, Thorbjorn," I said as I grabbed my bag and got off the bench. Then, on impulse, I leaned over to plant a quick kiss on his cheek. "For the whole day. For everything," I said.

  He made some sort of harrumphing noise, but a few of the neighboring tables had witnessed our little moment, and laughing and ribbing started before I had even straightened back up again.

  By the time I reached the open doorway that led out to the parking lot and Runde proper, Thorbjorn had moved to one of the louder tables to sit between an ecstatic-looking Kara and a calmer Nilda. There were lining up challengers in front of him for arm wrestling.

  In two lines, one for each arm.

  As I stepped outside, I threw one last glance back over my shoulder toward the bar, hoping to catch a glimpse of my grandmother. If she was there, I couldn't see her over the taller heads of the men waiting for beer.

  Then I collide
d with something large and immoveable. Strong hands caught my arms to keep me from stumbling back.

  Damn that mead. Or the magic. Or both.

  "Sorry," I said, trying to look my crash victim in the eye, but I couldn't quite do it. It was too dark in the doorway, so far from the fire, and he was too tall.

  "Not a worry," a deep voice reassured me, and then he moved past me into the hall and I was alone on the concrete stoop.

  I blinked a few times. As tired as I was, I also seemed to be more attuned to magic. Never before had I felt such a sharp distinction between being inside the hall with all the illusion magic coursing through it and being out in the mundane world.

  Perhaps mead was the key. I laughed to myself as I started across the parking lot. I could just imagine the look on my grandmother's face if the next time we started a magic lesson I told her I needed a mug of mead the size of my head first.

  I only stumbled a few times on the way home and let myself in through the kitchen door to immediately be greeted by a very cranky cat.

  "What?" I demanded as I struggled out of my boots. "I left you with your full day's worth of food and plenty of water. Don't tell me you were lonely because, and I hate to point this out to you, you are a cat."

  Mjolner made one last complaining meow. I let him have the last word since I was pretty sure I had made my point. He followed me upstairs and watched as I made an attempt at brushing my teeth and then changed from clothes that still smelled of Lake Superior into my PJs.

  I climbed under the duvet and the moment I was settled, Mjolner hopped onto the bed to curl up on the part of the pillow I wasn't using. By morning his share would somehow be twice the size of mine, but for now there was nothing better for sleeping than the satisfied sound of his purr close to my ear. I could feel that purr vibrating against my neck as I drifted off.

  I don't know if it was seeing Roarr, or doing that spell, or maybe just being in that cave and feeling the magic pouring into my grandmother, but the minute I closed my eyes I dreamed of Halldis.

  I hadn't seen her since the night she had tried to kill me, but I knew she was somewhere in those caves. Deeper and further in than I would ever have cause to go, Thorbjorn had told me. He had meant to reassure me, but I think I would rest more easily if I could see her there and know exactly where she was.

  This wasn't my first Halldis nightmare, but it was the most intense by far. Usually I just sensed her somewhere deep under the earth, and in those nightmares she was always watching me. Always aware of me, and in my dream I knew that was true when I was awake as much as when I was asleep. Those dreams were more just feelings than actual visual impressions, but somehow I sensed she was changing her appearance again, away from the crone she was and back towards the ever-youthful visage she preferred.

  But this night I saw more. I saw her in a cave made up like a humble little room with a bed and a table and chair set close to a smoky fire. She was sitting in that chair, but this time she wasn't watching me. She didn't even seem to be aware of me. Her eyes were closed, and her hands on her lap were twitching. But that twitching wasn't random. It was deliberate. It looked like...

  What did it look like? It reminded me of something.

  A loud pounding echoed around me and my eyes flew open to find myself sitting up in my little bed in my grandmother's cottage. My heart was racing and my breath was coming fast. My throat had a raw feeling, like I'd just screamed as loud and hard as I could.

  Had I?

  I concentrated on slowing my breathing, and my heart rate followed. Then I looked out of the window over my bed. The sky was gray, not quite dawn. But I didn't think I was going to get any more sleep that night.

  I reached for my robe, but my attention was caught by the motion of my own hand. I pulled it back then started moving my fingers, trying to trigger whatever thought hadn't quite formed the first time.

  A puppeteer. A master puppeteer, one of the ones who could manipulate a marionette in each hand. The elaborate ones with lots of strings.

  That's what Halldis' hands had reminded me of.

  I had to draw this right away before the image faded from my mind. I turned towards the drawing easel tucked in the corner of the room.

  Then the pounding came again, and I realized that hadn't been part of the dream at all.

  It wasn't even dawn yet, but someone was already at the door.

  I grabbed my robe and ran down the stairs, only a little annoyed that Mjolner still slept contentedly, now taking up the whole pillow.

  Chapter 5

  Remembering that my grandmother was likely still exhausted from the day before, I ran down the stairs to get to the door before whoever it was woke her, but I was too late. She was already there, hand on the knob to open the door. At first I thought she was still wearing her clothes from yesterday. But no, she had been wearing a blue flannel shirt yesterday, not the red and green checked one I saw now.

  How many knocks had there been that I had slept through? Or had she sensed trouble coming and dressed before it even arrived on our doorstep?

  I thought about going back up the stairs and getting dressed myself, but my curiosity was too strong. I lingered on the bottom step and leaned over the rail to see who was out there as my mother swung the door open.

  "Good morning, Carl, Tobias," my grandmother said, giving a nod each to the two young men standing there. I didn’t recognize them. They were both of average height and average build, dressed in the work jeans and warm flannel that was the Runde standard attire. They both had eyes the same shade of grayish-blue and light brown hair that curled at the ends but was flattened on top, presumably by the hats they currently held in their hands.

  "Ms. Torfa," the one she had called Carl said. He twisted the knit cap in his hands and shot Tobias a nervous look. Tobias gave him a supportive nod. "There's been trouble down at the bridge," he said, all in a rush. "We need you to come before it gets bad."

  "Trouble at the bridge," my grandmother repeated with a very weary sigh.

  "The new bridge?" I said. "The steel one?"

  "Yes, that's right," Carl said.

  "This is news to me," my grandmother said, turning to raise her eyebrows at me.

  "I saw it yesterday from the-" I literally bit my tongue before the rest of that sentence could spill out of me. "I saw it yesterday. I was going to ask you about it today, actually."

  "It seems, as early as it is, we're too late for that conversation," she said, then turned back to the men on her porch. "Steel, this time? Did someone set it on fire anyway?"

  "No, ma'am," Carl said.

  "Everyone was at the Old Sorensen Farm all night, arguing about what to do about it," Tobias said.

  "Everyone? All the Sorensens?" my grandmother asked.

  "Only a few of us fishing Sorensens," Tobias said. "But pretty near all the farming Sorensens were there."

  "Pretty near," my grandmother repeated as if making a mental note of that fact.

  "The point is, none of us were down by the bridge when it happened," Carl said, then amended, "I mean, when it must have happened."

  "When what must have happened?"

  But words failed him. It was Tobias who said, "there's been a murder. We think. There's a body, anyway."

  "Who?" my grandmother asked.

  "We didn't stay to find out," Carl said. "We came right here."

  "The body is in the creek, but sort of fetched up under the bridge. Facedown, but it's definitely a man, and his hair looked dark to me," Tobias said.

  "Dark hair, but you didn't recognize him?" my grandmother asked.

  "Not a Sorensen," Carl said. "We think maybe a Nelsen."

  "Who found the body?" my grandmother asked.

  "Davey Sorensen," Carl said. "He's-"

  "Stuart's boy," my grandmother said for him. "Sixteen now?"

  "That's right, ma'am," Carl said. "He had head to school early, had some sort of club thing he had to get to before first bell, but went out to tend to his chores
first. But then he came running back and woke the rest of us. The others are all down there now."

  "The others meaning the other Sorensens?" my grandmother guessed. "No Nelsens?"

  "Not when we left," Carl said. "But they're probably there by now."

  "You should come quickly," Tobias said.

  My grandmother gave a curt nod. "Right. Carl, you're coming with me now. Tobias, wait here for my granddaughter to get dressed and then show her the way. Ingrid, don't dawdle."

  "I won't," I said, already halfway back up the stairs. I dressed as quickly as I could, pulling on the same hoodie and windbreaker as the day before, and then ran back downstairs to pull on my hiking boots as Tobias waited awkwardly just inside the door.

  "I'm Ingrid, by the way," I said as I yanked my laces tight. "I don't think we've met?"

  "Briefly, but I'm not surprised that you don't remember me," he said.

  "Lisa's funeral," I guessed, and he nodded. I had met a lot of Sorensens that day. They all did kind of look alike, too. "You're a fishing Sorensen, right? But Carl is a farmer? I could've sworn you were brothers."

  "Cousins, actually," he said. "My dad joined my mom's dad's fishing business when they married."

  "How do you like it?" I asked as I smoothed down my uncombed hair and then tugged a wool hat down over it.

  "It's okay," he said with a shrug. "But my dad loves being out on the lake. I can't see him farming ever, but I guess he did when he was a kid."

  I gave a nod towards the door and he put on his own hat before heading back out into the chilly North Shore morning. I pulled the door shut behind me but didn't lock it, something that still felt really strange to me. It was like constantly leaving the house with the oven on and an iron plugged in and the bath running. My mind kept shrieking at me that I had forgotten something. I supposed at some point I'd get used to it.

  I'd have to. The one time I had asked, my grandmother had confessed she didn't even know where the door key had gotten to, and hadn't seemed at all concerned.

  The air was chilly, but the dew on the ground was still too wet to be frost. The sun wasn't quite over the horizon yet, but the sky over the lake was cloudless, just a watercolor background of blues and pinks. In any other circumstances, it would be a lovely morning for a walk.