by Alane Adams
They had entered the poorer part of the city. Even this late at night, taverns were still open and raucous shouts could be heard from drunks teetering down the alley. One of them tried to grab at Sam’s boot, but he kicked the sot away and urged the horse on.
After another turn, the road came to an abrupt end. Rising above them was the block wall of the city’s perimeter. At that moment, they heard excited yelping.
“They’ve sent the dogs after us,” Mavery said.
“We’re trapped.” Sam sawed hard on the horse’s reins. “We have to turn around.”
“No, keep going. Head straight for the wall.” She kicked her heels in the horse’s ribs. The horse took off, rearing up its head as if to ask what they were thinking.
“Are you crazy?” Sam croaked.
The wall loomed ahead. He could hear the howling and yap-ping of dogs and the shouts of the men running behind them. He tried to pull in the reins, but Mavery just kept kicking her heels, urging the horse forward.
“Open the wall, Sam!” she shouted in his ear. “Use your magic.”
“I don’t have any magic!” he yelled.
Then he remembered the wall in the secret passage. Emenor had opened the stone with his medallion and made it disappear. Sam had done something magical back in the square, when he had swung Odin’s Stone. But would the talisman be potent enough to open a stone wall?
Ripping his father’s pouch from his neck, Sam spun it around his head, repeating Emenor’s words.
“Fein kinter, terminus!” he shouted, then closed his eyes, expecting to smack headfirst into stone.
But there was no collision, just darkness and a cold breeze. Then they were galloping across a grassy field, holding on for dear life.
Mavery let out a whoop, and Sam did, too. It had worked. They weren’t dead in a broken heap on the other side of the stone wall.
They raced across a field to the edge of the woods. To their right, steep cliffs led down to the ocean. The sun was rising over the blue sea, and Sam felt the beauty of Orkney in all its glory.
He had escaped one fate and now had to face a more perilous one: rescuing his friends.
Chapter Eighteen
They headed south. After a while, Sam heard soft snoring as Mavery slumped against him. The trail hugged the cliffs for a couple of hours and then turned inland and began to climb. A bank of fog rolled in, covering the sun, and the temperature began to drop. Mavery roused with a loud yawn.
“I’m cold,” she mumbled to his back. “And I’m hungry.”
Sam stopped the horse, needing a break himself. Tying it to a tree, he searched in the saddlebags for any provisions. Emenor had put in some rolls, a hunk of cheese, and a full leather water-skin. There was also a small bag of gold coins.
He took a seat on a rock across from Mavery, who had found a patch of grass to sit on. Using Leo’s knife, Sam carved off some cheese and split a roll, giving half to Mavery. They ate in silence. The gray fog grew thicker, settling around them until it blocked out the trees and cocooned them in a ghostly whiteout.
“So, where are we going?” Mavery asked, gnawing on her hunk of bread.
Sam pulled out the map Emenor had provided and spread it out. “Balfour Island.”
Mavery dropped her bread. “Are you crazy? I’m not going back to that nest of witches.”
“I have to rescue my friends. I thought you wanted to help me, but if you’re scared, you can walk back to Skara Brae.”
“Scared? Do you know what Balfour Island is like? You’ll die there. It’s crawling with sneevils. Have you ever seen a sneevil? It has tusks as long as your arm and pointy teeth that will tear your guts out and eat you while you’re still alive. Then there are the biters: giant insects that can drain all your blood in less than a minute.”
Sam gulped, pointing stubbornly at the map. “But I have a safe route. The Balfin who gave it to me said if I followed this map, I’d survive.”
Mavery snorted. “If a Balfin said it, it’s a lie. Guaranteed. And if you do survive, how are you going to save your friends? You can’t just walk up and knock on the door of the witches’ fortress and say, ‘Excuse me, Endera, can I have my friends back?’ She must have taken them for a reason. Endera always has a plan.”
He bristled at her lack of confidence. “I’ll come up with something.”
“Just because you’re a witch doesn’t mean they’ll go easy on you.”
“I’m not a witch,” Sam snapped, irritated at her assumption. “I am a Son of Odin. My father descended from Baldur.” Somehow, being related to the same guy who had fathered the mighty Thor was a lot more palatable than being part of a family of evil witches like Rubicus and the ever-horrible Endera.
But Mavery just laughed, almost splitting a gut. “Doesn’t matter who your dad was. You’re a witch, same as me.”
Sam’s anger rose, along with his blood pressure. “My moth-er’s the witch, not me. I don’t have magic.”
“Then how’d you get us out of Skara Brae? By wishing upon a star?” She kept laughing, and Sam grabbed the pouch around his neck, whipping it off to shove it in her face.
“I used this. It’s a piece of Odin’s Stone,” he yelled. “Emenor did the same thing with a trinket back in Skara Brae. I am not a witch, no matter who my mom is.” But his words sounded hollow, even to him.
“Not all witches are bad, you know,” she said indignantly. “It’s not magic that makes you evil.”
“What would you know about it?”
Her eyes grew shiny. She bent her head and mumbled, “My mother was evil, but I’m not.”
“How do you know?”
Her head came up to glare at him. “I just do.”
“But what if you turn out that way?”
“I won’t,” she said, jumping to her feet. “Because I’m nothing like her. I know who I am.”
Sam tried to think of a comeback, but the truth was, he was having a harder and harder time figuring out who the heck he was. Son of Odin. Lord of the Ninth Realm. And maybe a witch. He let the thought sink in. “We should go,” he sighed. “That is, if you’re still coming.”
They rode on, following the coastline. The fog had settled in like a thick blanket. It felt as if they were gliding through soup. The horse came to a stop and whinnied nervously, turning to look at them.
“I can’t see anything.” Sam waved his hand to clear the air. “Is it always like this?”
Mavery clutched his arm. “Shh,” she whispered. “We’re not alone.”
Sam strained to hear. The mist blanked out all noise, leaving them blind and deaf. The horse startled, looking left, its eyes flaring.
“They’re coming,” Mavery said, her fingers digging into his skin.
“Who?”
“Wraiths. Whatever you do, don’t look at them.”
Sam kicked the horse and prayed it could see where it was going better than he could.
Mavery’s arms locked around his waist. The horse jolted and pitched over the slippery, rocky trail. Branches whipped at his face.
He heard high-pitched screeching and the sound of rushing wind, as if the air was filled with flying creatures. Sam risked a glance to see if they were about to go off a cliff, and in front of him a ghostly woman flew by, her long hair trailing behind her like wisps of fog and her face as beautiful and perfect as a runway model’s.
He was transfixed by her beauty until her eyes locked with his; then he reeled back in horror as her face hollowed into a ghostly skull.
“I said don’t look at them!” Mavery shouted. “They can’t hurt you if you don’t see them.”
Too late. The wraith’s empty eye sockets sent out bolts of ice. Sam ducked, but a shard entered his shoulder, cutting it deeply. He shrieked in pain, then grabbed the shard and grimly pulled it out. It melted in his hands, leaving a burning pain behind.
A wraith appeared in front of them, and the horse reared up, terrified. Sam struggled to keep his grip on the saddle horn. Mavery scr
eamed as she tried to hang onto him, but her arms slipped. He tried to grab her but missed, and she fell to the ground with a thump. Then the horse jolted forward, leaving Mavery behind.
“Mavery!” he shouted, sawing back on the reins awkwardly.
He had to open his eyes, even if it meant a hundred wraiths impaled him. Fighting to control the horse, he kept repeating, “Whoa, girl, whoa,” until finally the animal halted.
Sam slid off and ran back, slipping over loose stones on the trail and scuffing his palms. When he found Mavery, the wraiths were swirling around her, creating a ghostly whirlwind. She sat in the middle of the maelstrom with her hands over her eyes. The creatures were singing to her, creating a shrill cacophony of sounds that was strangely captivating. He could see Mavery hesitate, fighting the urge to look; then her hands began to peel away from her eyes. They were enchanting her.
Sam grabbed the pouch hanging from his neck and swung Odin’s Stone around.
“Fein kinter, ventimus!” he shouted, running forward, repeating the words he had used in the square. A sharp wind suddenly sprang up, blowing the wraiths back. The ghostly figures screeched angrily. Sam swung harder, sending a tornado toward them. But they hovered on the edge, trying to approach, as if they were drawn to the magic, not afraid of it. The pouch didn’t seem to be enough.
Sam’s own anger began to rise within him, and a cold chill filled his bones. Words sprang up in his head, lighting up like highway signs.
“Spera nae mora,” he shouted, ordering the wraiths to leave this place. He could feel them calling, whispering to him to join them in a strange language they shared.
“Spera nae mora,” he repeated, and they wavered, wanting to stay, until eventually they let out a mournful wail and trailed away, taking the entire fog bank with them.
“Mavery, are you okay?” He ran to her side, crouching down.
The little girl had her eyes covered, and she was crying. “They called to me. They told me to look at them, that I was one of them, but I’m not.”
“It’s okay. Don’t cry.”
She snuffled and wiped her nose with the back of her sleeve. “You were using your magic—your witch magic. I heard you. Now do you believe me?”
Sam touched the stone hanging around his neck. The stone had helped unlock something, but the power and the magical words had come from somewhere deep inside him. Like it or not, he was a witch. A sudden wave of dizziness came over him, and he sank back on the ground, dropping his head between his knees. Using magic was like burning a candle at both ends; he felt wiped out and weak.
“You’re bleeding,” she said, touching his shoulder gingerly. “Why did you come back for me?”
“We’re a team, aren’t we?” he said gruffly, lifting his head.
“We are?”
“Sure. You got me out of Skara Brae. You told me how to beat the wraiths. And I’m guessing you can get us to Balfour Island, because I don’t have a clue.”
She grinned through the tear-streaked dirt on her face. “I know where we can get a boat.”
Chapter Nineteen
They found the horse grazing on clumps of grass just down the trail. Sam loaded Mavery and climbed wearily into the saddle. As the fog burned away, the sun returned, shining brightly down on them with its red-mottled face.
The trail wound its way out of the woods and away from the coast up a steep hill, switching back and forth. The horse began to tire, wheezing loudly, gray flecks of foam on its mouth. Sam got off and led it by the reins, feeling blisters rise up on the backs of his heels after he had taken a handful of steps.
To pass the time, he asked Mavery about the wraiths. “Have you ever seen any of those creepy skeleton ladies before?”
“No, just heard the other witchlings talking about them, back when I lived on Balfour Island. They used to tease me, say they were going to leave me in the swamps, tied to a tree, for the wraiths to take away.”
“That’s harsh.” He looked up at her. “Did you get picked on a lot?”
She lifted her chin. “Didn’t bother me. Witchlings are a bunch of stupid girls. Just meant I wasn’t like them.”
“So, what’s a wraith, anyway?”
Mavery’s eyes lit up as she chattered away. “They’re soulless creatures who used to be a race of beautiful women. They bragged all about their good looks to Freya; she’s the goddess of beauty. They said they were ten times more beautiful than she was. Freya got mad and stripped them of their souls and left them in limbo. I’m thirsty,” she finished.
Sam stopped the horse. The air tasted like dust and the acrid smell of dead grass. There was nothing green covering the land. The shrubs had turned to brittle, dried-up shells. Sam passed Mavery a waterskin. She took a long sip and passed it back. He tilted his head to take a swig. As he did, he caught sight of the sun and the world came to a stop.
The red veins had spread in the few days he had been in Orkney. A new branch had sprouted up, forking off in a new direction, pulsating brightly.
As the red fingers of light licked at Sam’s face, a sudden madness drew him in, as if the sun were a magnet and he its target. The water ran down his shirt as he forgot where he was. He stared at the throbbing face, feeling a surge of power in his veins. The first time he had seen those red veins, he had been scared. Now he hungered for the sun, wanting its power for himself.
“Stop it,” Mavery said, throwing a hunk of bread at him.
It bounced off Sam’s head, but he ignored her, continuing his worship. His eyes began to feel warm, as if two hot coals were burning a hole in his head.
“Sam!” Mavery slid down from the horse and kicked him hard in the shin.
He hardly felt her feeble kick. His brain swelled with power; his eyes felt molten, as if he could shoot out fire. His blood was pumping as fast as a steam engine. At that moment, Sam could have torn the sun from the sky and devoured it. Mavery didn’t let up, pounding her fists on him, screaming at him to stop.
“What is wrong with you?” he shouted, finally tearing his eyes away. “They should have left you to the wraiths. You’re just a whiny brat nobody wants around.” Something was happening to him, a humming in his veins. The palms of his hands itched.
She opened her mouth to snap back at him, and without thinking, he raised his hand. A slim bolt of green lightning erupted from his palm, burning him and sending Mavery yelping backward. She hit the ground and let out a cry.
Sam’s legs were shaky. He looked down at the tendril of smoke rising from his palm. What had he done?
“Mavery?”
He ran to her side, but she scooted away.
“You used magic against me,” she said. Tears ran down her cheek. “Witchfire can kill. And your eyes were glowing a scary red color.”
“I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to. I don’t know what happened.” He felt sick and dizzy. He had only ever been able to do something with Odin’s Stone in his hand. This was new. Thrillingly so.
“You can’t look at the sun,” she sniffled. “It will poison you, make you a bad person.”
“I’m sorry,” Sam repeated, reaching for her hand to help her up, but she jerked her arm back.
Guilt swamped him. A thin trail of blood ran down her knee where she had skinned it. Mavery limped over to the horse and waited, holding herself rigid as Sam lifted her up. He took the reins and resumed trudging uphill. He kept his eyes firmly downward, away from temptation. He suddenly longed for nighttime, when the sun would be tucked away, out of sight.
Sam’s blisters grew blisters as they climbed steadily up the steep grade. After hiking for hours, they finally crested the hill. A sharp gust of salty wind blew in from the ocean. Below them was a small seaport, hemmed in by tall cliffs. Fishing boats bobbed off the coast. In the distance, a layer of clouds clung over an ominous dark mass. Jagged cliffs surrounded the island. In the center, the spires of a distant fortress rose into the sky, spearing the clouds.
“Is that Balfour Island?”
Mav
ery nodded mutely, keeping her eyes averted.
“Come on, then.” He climbed back into the saddle in front of her. “Let’s get on with it.”
They rode into the town, which consisted of some ram-shackle buildings lining a pocked dirt lane. Boats bobbed in the harbor. The smell of rotting fish permeated the air. No one paid much attention to a couple of kids on a broken-down horse. A fight broke out in front of the town store. A pair of men tussled over a bag of grain. It tore open and spilled on the ground. The crowd of onlookers rushed in and started scooping up handfuls of grain.
Rego had said food supplies were running low. Sam swallowed back his guilt. There was still time to rescue Howie and Keely, he convinced himself, and get on with his mission to stop this disaster from happening.
“Where to?” he asked, looking at Mavery over his shoulder.
She pointed toward the docks, her lips pressed tightly together.
“You have to talk to me eventually, you know,” he said, trying to pick out a boat that looked inviting. “I said I was sorry. I don’t know how to control magic.”
“Don’t care. I’m not going with you.” And with that, she slipped off the back of the horse and sprinted away, disappearing into the crowds.
Sam let her go. She had every right to leave him. He had really messed up. But without the little witchling, he quickly felt lost. He rode along through the town, checking buildings on either side for a sign that would tell him where to hire a boat. Howie and Keely were getting closer. He just had to get across the ocean to Balfour Island, follow the map Emenor had given him, stay away from sneevils, whatever they were, and not get eaten by bloodsucking bugs.
Piece of cake.
Sam tied the horse to a post in front of a wooden building. The sign out front claimed it was Dorrian’s Fine Tavern and Inn. Grabbing the small bag of gold Orrin had stashed in the saddlebags, he tucked it safely in his cloak. He had Leo’s knife and the stone around his neck. He was as good as across the ocean already.
