Raven Magic

by Jennifer Willis

  A twig snapped somewhere above and beyond the cave entrance. Thor looked first to Heimdall, then to Grace, who were both tracking the sound.

  “Not the volcano spirits?” Heimdall asked.

  Grace shook her head. “Not local wildlife, either.”

  An exasperated frown settled over Thor’s face. “Not these bozos again.”

  Grace clutched her walking stick in her fists. “Shall we?”

  The heat rose at the back of Thor’s neck. His short-temper was back in force, but the anger felt different now. There was a new tug in his gut, an instinct to defend that mingled with his knee-jerk reflex to fight. The life cradled in his arms yawned, and Thor felt the child’s breath move through him.

  His face hardened, and he nodded at Grace. “Right. Let’s get this over with.”

  Opal held out her arms to take Thor’s burden, but he turned and gently laid the child inside the cave. He pointed a thick finger first at Heimdall and then at Rod. “Stand guard,” he ordered them. “Protect this cave with your lives if you have to.”

  Grace chuckled and patted Thor’s forearm. “I don’t think it will come to that.”

  Thor followed the old woman into the woods, heading straight for the sounds of panicked shuffling and the frustrated mumble of voices.

  “Will you get out of the way?” one man complained in an ineffective whisper. “I’m telling you we need to get in there, and it needs to happen now.”

  “Just a minute! This isn’t as easy as it looks, and this is the last camera I have after the others got smoked,” came the response. A third voice added, “You up my hazard pay, I’m all yours.”

  The hunters had left a conspicuous mess of a trail—broken branches and skidding footprints—and Thor and Grace marched straight toward them. When the men were in view, Grace stopped and touched Thor’s elbow. “Let them come to us.”

  “Hazard pay?” the lead man in the camouflage safari gear balked.

  Cammo Man. The mere sight of him made Thor’s shoulder muscles twitch, and he spat into the dirt.

  “You’re under contract,” Cammo Man answered the younger videographer. “I own you.”

  The trio of Bigfoot hunters was scrambling through the trees while recording both audio and video, and they were so intent on not dropping their cameras or bumping into one another that Cammo Man collided with Thor as he walked backward issuing hushed orders and insults.

  The man turned, eyes alight as his gaze met Thor’s chest and then traveled upward. When he saw Thor’s irritated face, his entire body betrayed his disappointment. “You’re not a sasquatch!” If Cammo Man had been wearing a hat, Thor imagined he would have thrown it to the ground in vexation.

  His jaw tight, Thor kept his breath measured and even. No, he was not the siatco. How could he be, when Nanitch was dead?

  The tall, skinny kid with bad skin stepped up behind his boss. “We saw Bigfoot fall into the volcano, remember?” His voice cracked as he eyed Thor, and his shorter, bearded companion shifted his equipment in Thor’s direction.

  Thor and Grace glanced at each other. Her initial shock and dismay hardened into a wry smile.

  “You think there’s only one creature loose in these woods?” Cammo Man snapped at his employee. “Those wily beasts have been living up here for years. You don’t give up just because you can’t get more footage of the first one you found.”

  Cammo Man faced Thor again as he motioned the shorter man forward. “You were there! What was it like at the volcano mouth?” Holding his bandaged forearm against his chest, he used his good hand to grab a mic from the tall kid and shoved it in Thor’s face. “Was there an epic struggle before you could finally save yourself and cast the menacing creature into the fiery abyss?”

  Grace stepped forward to answer, but Thor held up a hand. “I’ve got this,” he said with a smooth composure that would have shocked his mother.

  Grace chuckled and stepped back.

  Cammo Man gazed up at Thor expectantly, very nearly drooling over the exclusive interview he was about to get. He motioned the cameraman closer. “Well?” Cammo Man demanded. “What’s your story?”

  Thor lifted his eyebrows in bemusement. “My story, which will be your story from this moment forward, is that three overzealous and misguided adventurers wasted a full weekend and their entire production budget bumbling around in the woods tracking a . . . a mythological creature that doesn’t exist.”

  Cammo Man’s eyes narrowed. He leaned forward. “You’re talking about yourself and the two girls, right? What about the others?” He gave Grace a smug once-over. “What about her? You dragged your granny out here? What’s her story?”

  “Same as his.” Grace folded her hands over the top of her walking stick and chuckled again.

  Thor edged closer to Cammo Man until the toes of their boots met. “I’m talking about you.” He smiled down at him as the man’s face fell into Thor’s shadow. “You’ll turn over your equipment now. And then be on your way.”

  “And you won’t be coming back,” Grace added. “Ever.”

  Thor grinned. “What she said.”

  Cammo Man seemed to consider Thor’s words. He glanced back at his crew, who both lifted their shoulders as though to ask, Why not?

  But when Cammo Man faced Thor again, his expression was unyielding. He backed up a few paces so he could meet Thor’s gaze with his own steely eyes. “With respect, no. Now, if you’re not going to respond to reasonable interview questions, kindly stand aside so we can continue with our work.”

  Thor stepped forward and pinned the man’s boots in place with his own. “It wasn’t a suggestion.”

  Cammo Man gulped. “I, I won’t be intimidated!” he spluttered. “I, we have been working too long and too hard on this project to have some overgrown boy scout prevent us from getting to the bottom of what’s going on in these woods. And we’ve got you on tape, making threats! The world has a right to know! The truth will come out! If we have to,” he swallowed again, “even if we must come to blows . . .”

  Thor crossed his arms over his chest and waited. He flexed his biceps—just a little, for effect.

  “You can’t make me back down!” Cammo Man practically squealed, his face turning red. “I’ll die first.” He balled his good hand into a fist and tried to stare down Thor, but the big god looked over the man’s head to smirk at the crew.

  Still pinned by Thor’s boots, Cammo Man glanced over his shoulder to find his employees laying down their equipment and backing away.

  “What are you doing?! Never surrender! Pick that up!” Cammo Man shouted at the bearded man. “You have to record this! This kind of harassment and bullying interference is a classic element of the sasquatch story.”

  When the cameraman made no move to retrieve his gear, Cammo Man bent at the knees and waist, contorting his body to reach for the equipment himself, but he succeeded only in falling flat on his back. Thor stepped back and released the man’s feet. Cammo Man scrambled for the camera, but Grace slammed the point of her walking stick into the ground just shy of the man’s fingers.

  “Leave it,” she commanded.

  Cammo Man’s breath heaved in his chest. He struck Grace’s stick with his fist, but she held firm. Finally, he rolled onto his back and rested his hands on his chest. “This is my life’s work,” he said, spitting pine needles.

  Thor gazed down on the man spluttering in the dirt. The crew had backed far enough away that the pair felt safe to turn their backs on Thor and Grace. They took off at a run, the skinny kid particularly ungainly as he wound his way through the trees. Thor wondered if they had any practical idea of where in the woods they were, and if he could send Fenrir to guide them to someplace a bit closer to civilization—assuming the Randulfr was still skulking about. But if a pair of Bigfoot hunters got a look at the Fenris Wolf in the flesh, or the fur . . . Thor let the thought go. Those boys would have to be someone else’s problem.

  Grace used her walking stick to drag the camera a
way from Cammo Man, and Thor felt his temper tick higher with every whimper from the TV cryptozoologist sitting in a pathetic crumple on the ground.

  “Get up,” Thor grumbled.

  Cammo Man looked up at him, uncertain, then moved in an ungraceful scurry to obey. He brushed dirt and dry leaves off his stained safari shirt and stood up tall. He lifted his chin to address Thor, but he couldn’t keep the quaver out of his voice. “What are you going to do with me?”

  Thor stretched and flexed his fingers. Should he—or better yet, Laika—chase the man through the forest so the hunter could taste what it meant to be hunted? Should he and Grace absconded with the AV gear and then leave him to fend for himself? Maybe he should just sic the Fenris Wolf on the man and be done with it—a guarantee he would never again disturb any being who chose to live unseen on the edge of human civilization.

  Thor looked at the trembling, red-faced man and felt genuine pity. It tasted bad in his mouth. The sight of the contemptible intruder irritated Thor, but not enough to agitate him to real anger. Instead, the man’s nervous sweat and ragged breath made Thor uncomfortably conscious of his own strength, and of the friend he’d lost to the mountain.

  “Can you find your way out of here?” Thor asked.

  Cammo Man blinked up at him, seeming not to comprehend the question.

  “Do you have a map or something?” Thor tried again. “Or any idea where you are right now?”

  Cammo Man coughed and stumbled backward, colliding with a tree. “Oh, right, yes. Yes, I have a map.” He patted the many pockets of his military-surplus hunting vest and dug into them to produce a variety of tools and instruments, some of them actually useful. He stuffed his utility knife, chewing tobacco, ballpoint pens, Field Notes journal, insect repellant, lip balm, tissue packet, hand sanitizer, and other paraphernalia back into his pockets, then held a worn map in one hand and a mirrored compass in the bandaged other one. He lifted them for Thor’s inspection.

  Thor nodded. If Cammo Man could keep his wits about him, he’d probably make it out of the wilderness in respectable shape. “You should be off then.” He waved a hand in dismissal.

  “Now?” Cammo Man cast a glance toward the equipment and gear bags lying in the dirt. “Couldn’t I just . . . I mean, there’s weeks of work on there—”

  “Go,” Grace commanded in a voice much larger than her size.

  Thor dipped his head. “I wouldn’t stick around to argue, if I were you.”

  “Right, um, of course,” the man stammered. He side-stepped the tree he’d been leaning against and backed up a few paces, working to keep both Thor and Grace in sight, then he turned and sprinted into woods.

  “Nice work.” Grace smiled.

  “Rather spry for an older fellow.” Thor winced as soon as the words were out of his mouth. He glanced sideways at Grace, easily a generation older than the lead Bigfoot hunter and someone who’d proved herself a veritable force of nature. But if Grace had registered his accidentally ageist comment, she’d taken it in stride.

  Thor stooped to retrieve the camera, microphones, and gear bags the crew had left behind. His gut churned when he realized there was no way to ensure the man didn’t have digital copies of his footage on a cloud server or SD cards full of siatco video in one of his many vest pockets.

  “It’s a chance we’ll have to take,” Grace said, apparently reading his mind. “If he does have anything, may this little confrontation make him think twice about using it.” Her smile widened. “Or it will all just add to the legend.”

  Thor balanced the equipment in his arms and turned back toward the cave. Would Cammo Man’s tale to his compatriots back in the world become part of the mythology of the wise and steadfast siatco, a race that had just hours earlier reduced its number to one? Thor sniffed back the sting of tears as he shouldered his way past a low-hanging pine branch and through the dry scrub. Then he stood aside to allow Grace to walk in front of him.

  “Just hold on,” Sally begged. She fought to support Odin as they moved slowly forward.

  Once Heimdall and Thor had moved ahead and out of sight, Odin rested a heavy hand on her shoulder and started leaning on her small frame. Within minutes, he had one arm weighted heavily across her shoulders, and Sally’s knees threatened to buckle with every step. Odin was barely on his own feet, his breath ragged and phlegmy.

  “Opal!” Sally shouted, though she and Odin both were out of breath. Her voice carried barely a few yards.

  “No.” Odin rested his drooping head against hers. “Don’t involve them.”

  Sally definitely didn’t like the sound of that, nor was she encouraged by the raspy sound of the old god’s voice. She willed her feet to keep moving forward. But shouldn’t they stop to rest? Was there anything Sally could do for him, on her own?

  Rod had her pack, but she was pretty sure none of her supplies would have done Odin any good, anyway. Opal was the one with the herbs and the ready knowledge of medicinal plants in the woods. But Odin didn’t want her help. If this turned out to be some kind of macho Viking thing, Sally was going to be really perturbed.

  They were moving up a more pronounced incline now, and each step required more strength and will than the last. Sally stumbled on uneven ground, and she and Odin both nearly tumbled to the dirt. She tried to fit her body to Odin’s in a more comfortable and supportive position, but it wasn’t any use. She was tripping over her own feet while Odin’s boots practically dragged across the dirt. She was starting to see spots. Her legs grew heavier and less cooperative the longer she remained upright. Clumsily, she maneuvered toward a thick-trunked evergreen and leaned against it.

  “I can’t do this,” she panted.

  Odin nodded, his eye half-closed and his face contorted with pain. He disengaged from Sally’s support, but when he tried to lean against the tree he slid to the ground. Sally dropped painfully to her knees beside him.

  “I can’t help you if you won’t work with me,” she hissed in his ear, her usual awe of the ancient god definitely on the wane.

  He tried to push her back, but Sally held firm. She grabbed Odin’s head with both her hands and forced him to look at her.

  “Tell me what to do,” she demanded.

  A sad smile softened Odin’s haggard features. “I’m afraid there’s nothing to be done, little one.”

  Sally gripped the collar of his shirt as hot tears sprang to her eyes. How could the mighty Odin allow himself to be felled by an accidental blow from a bunch of cat-fighting volcano spirits?

  “No!” she shouted into his face. “Don’t you dare say that.” She took a few jagged breaths and scrambled to her feet. She pointed up the steep hill the others had climbed ahead of them. “I’m getting help,” she said, still out of breath. “You hang on. Do you hear me?”

  Odin reached a weak hand up to her. “Sally. Don’t leave me here to die alone.”

  Coughing back a sob, Sally stomped her boots in the dirt and upset a pair of ravens on a tree branch overhead. They cawed their displeasure, then beat their wings in descent to perch on a lower branch a few yards above Odin’s head. The old god looked up at the black birds and a flicker of a smile touched his lips. Sally’s blood ran cold.

  “No!” she shrieked. “This isn’t how it’s supposed to happen! Fenrir . . .” She glanced around at the empty woods, wondering if the Fenris Wolf was lurking nearby, waiting for his chance to pounce on the injured Odin and tear out his throat, just as the Norns had foretold.

  She held her breath and listened for any telltale sound of predation—even though she hadn’t the first clue what a stalking predator might sound like. She heard nothing save for the clicking beaks of the ravens watching over Odin.

  He took a deep, difficult breath and let out a gentle chuckle. “Very little about this world unfolds according to plan. Surely you’ve learned that for yourself.”

  Her breath was coming in awkward spasms. She glanced again up the wooded hill. “Your family is right up there. Don’t you want them
? Don’t you think they should know?”

  Odin closed his eye and straightened his spine against the rough bark of the tree, like he was settling in for deep meditation. He coughed, and a wave of pain washed over his face.

  “I can’t just stand here and let this happen!” Sally wiped her nose on a sleeve already crusty with dirt and snot as more tears rolled down her cheeks. She wondered if any of the previous Rune Witches had cried this much.

  Odin opened his eye. “Even if there’s nothing you can do to change it?”

  Sally sniffed hard and tried to get control of herself. Blubbering like a baby wasn’t going to do any good. She swallowed her next sob, then set her shoulders and her jaw. “I don’t accept that.” Her voice trembled, so she dug her heels into the dirt and stood tall. “I’ll not stand by, listen to your last words, and do nothing. Valhalla cannot have you. Not today.”

  Odin chuckled again, but it turned into a savage cough. Sally sucked in her breath when she saw spots of blood at the corners of his mouth.

  “I have no parting wisdom to offer.” Odin looked past the ravens and into the cloudless sky far above the canopy of trees. “It is strange to fade from so long a life in such a world, having seen so much of its evolution.”

  He paused and grew still, frightening Sally. Her body itched furiously with a need to do something. Anything. But she couldn’t leave his side when he seemed so near the end. Surely Heimdall or Rod would come looking for them. Any second now. Right?

  “Anything I’ve not said already probably isn’t worth the breath.” When he spoke, Sally nearly jumped both in relief and surprise that he was still alive.

  He smiled, and his eye drifted closed. His chest stilled, and Sally was sure her own heart stopped. She waited for his breath to rise again, for him to cough or smirk or give her grief about being overly sentimental, but nothing happened.

  “Odin!” she shouted. “Odin, come back!”

  His eye cracked open, and he offered a weak smile. “Soon.”