Claw and Crown Bundle

by Richard Lunch

  By the time I returned to Draugr’s hut, he had piled the coals to protect their heat for later, and spread out our bedding on branches. The furs flapped in the morning air. I handed him the now, only three-quarters full pot of water. He grunted.

  “There was someone in the wood.”

  “Mm? You don’t say,” he set the pot down and took the bowls from out of my hands.

  “Wait…” I followed him into the hut, trying not to let my eyes catch on the way the muscles in his back rippled under the skin when he did something as simple as set the bowls down, “You know who it was.”

  “What...who...you said you saw something?” He was untying bunches of dried herbs from the ceiling and putting them into a large wooden bowl.

  “I saw eyes, and I followed. I heard laughter, and then the pot by the river bank was upended and the bowls stacked upon it.”

  “Is that why there was so little water?”

  “No!” I huffed. I wished he would stop his fiddling with the herbs and turn to me. It was jarring to see such a large man, with his strong fingers gently untying the string on some plant that was far too pungent to be kept indoors.

  “And did you catch sight of this person?”

  “No. There was nothing, only laughter, and it followed me out of the wood.”

  Draugr nodded, and said nothing else for several more bunches of herbs. I watched him take them down, untie them, and put them in his bowl. He took the water pot and poured some into an iron pot, which he hung over the coals. He added some wood. It sprang to life with flames in the heat.

  “Cooking again, already.”

  “I didn’t think I would need to, but I’m going to boil something. Minor change of plans. Why don’t you wrap your hands. We are going to chop wood in a moment.”

  “Chop wood. Look - I stayed-”

  “Teaching will happen, but at my home, we work in the mornings.”

  With that, he would only point at cloth to wrap my hands with and would say no more.

  Chapter 4

  Draugr

  I had worried, to be true, that this prince would be returned to his fathers as useless as he had come to me, but the incident in the wood gave me hope. The spirits in this part of the wood were more active. They slipped through the veil between worlds more easily than in other parts of the forest, but they rarely bothered strangers...not unless they thought those strangers were worth paying attention to. It gave me something to work with, a place to start. If I could help him hone his senses, then perhaps he would be able to improve in other areas. Perhaps the experience would instill some much-needed wisdom in him.

  “How much wood do you need? If you need to keep warm, maybe you should just try wearing a shirt.”

  A log, split into what amounted to one quarter of the log and three quarters, two less-than-usable pieces, tumbled away from the log where Hafporir was chopping.

  “You need to chop them down the center.”

  “I am,” he bit his lip and readjusted the white cloths wrapping his hands.

  One strip was stained with a touch of red. His soft hands were blistering. My stomach twisted with pity. I pushed the feeling away. He had to learn to cope with a little pain. There would certainly be more to come. It was for his own good that he should experience some now, where he was safe. An unprepared king could be eaten alive by his duties, and his kingdom with it.

  He sighed, his silvery hair flitting in front of his face. His face held all of the impudence of his youth, but underneath, I thought, just for a moment, that I saw the fortitude that had made his fathers into kings.

  “Don’t you chop wood?” He whined.

  The kingliness may have just been an illusion.

  “I have other work. There is a saying among farmers, till your own field.”

  He sighed and took a moment to adjust his hands on the axe. I turned to get back to my task when I heard a muttering behind me.

  “What was that, young prince?”

  “I said - I don’t see why you need all this wood.”

  “The wood is because you are cold.”

  He quieted after that, a frown creasing lines in his face. His bright blue eyes wandered out to the forest. I could tell he was thinking of the spirit. It would not be the last time that young prince saw something otherworldly. Tonight, in truth, would be, with any luck, the second time today.

  I took a basket and went out into the wood to gather the herbs and roots; barks and berries, that I would need. Dried would have to do for summer herbs, but where fresh could be had, it would be better.

  It felt good, no, good was not the right word. It felt right to be alone for a moment. The clack of the axe hitting logs echoed through the forest, but aside from that steady reminder of Hafporir’s presence, I could be alone again. The mistletoe snuck up on me, in the corner of my vision. A different kind of laughter rang in my ears. It called out from my memory, not from spirit lips but the lips of one who was flesh and bone and fur.

  Don’t you know? Whenever you see mistletoe on a walk in the wood, you must kiss your true love.

  “And if you aren’t with me?” I recited what I had said then, out loud.

  Then run home to kiss me.

  “And what if you left home?” I reached out and let his finger trace a petal of the white winter flower, the vine that chokes its host.

  The memory and the wood could not answer, because he had left, and that was it, no more words to capture in my heart, nothing left to hold onto but smoke.

  I left the mistletoe and continued to collect the herbs. Somehow, the magic of walking alone in the forest was gone. The wind was cold now, not refreshing, and the steady thwack of Hafporir swinging the axe was nearly maddening. I would have to set him to a different task on my return, for the sake of his hands and for the sake of my sanity.

  I found the herbs, and even a mushroom I needed among the snow and old brush of the forest floor. I returned to find the axe sticking up out of the stump, two pieces of wood cast off to either side. My eyes followed a trail of bloody strips of cloth up to the tree line. There, Hafporir sat, his back against a moss-covered trunk. He had his eyes closed. Blistered and bloodied hands lay to either side.

  I chewed at my lip. Perhaps I was being too hard on him. He sighed the sigh of a child not getting his way, and I lost my sympathy again. This young cub counted on his fathers, on their peace, too much. Here, on the edge of the kingdom, it was harder to forget that we lived among other kingdoms, other species, and that in our fledgling state, at only two decades of a dynasty, we were ever so vulnerable.

  I picked up the axe and ran for him with a shout, “Rah!”

  “Eeeaaahhh!” He screeched and rolled out of the way before the axe buried into the ground where he had sat a moment ago. I pulled it out and turned it on him.

  “What are you DOING?”

  His face was pure shock. His jaw hung slack. I advanced. He scrambled backward. The crunch of leaves and twigs was the only sound before there was the hiss of the axe in the air.

  “GrrrRRRAAARR!”

  In a flash of white, the wolf was upon me. Its eyes shone a blue that threatened to cut the sky with their color. Its teeth gnashed at the air with hot steam pouring out from between them. The air crackled with magic.

  He caught the handle of the axe between his teeth and broke it. The splinters flew through the air. His teeth descended to my neck. I kicked and flipped the wolf onto the ground. I dug my fingers into the nape of his neck.

  “Be still, Hafporir. Twas a test.”

  His mouth foamed. He did not seem to comprehend. He snapped at my wrist and raked his claws in the earth. They formed deep trenches there as the needle sharp points on his white paws dug deeper.

  “Be calm!” I shook him again.

  He returned to human form. I let go of his neck with a jolt and looked up at the trees. In his man’s body, he was as exquisite as the wolf. The muscles on his back from whatever exercise he had as a princeling extended down throug
h his buttocks and legs. His skin was pure, unscarred and pearly. I kept my eyes away, trying to will the hardness between my legs to fade while I listened to him scramble for his clothes.

  “Draugr...what-”

  I let out a long, deep breath, “I needed to know how well you can defend yourself. Your speed in changing is impressive but…”

  “But what?”

  I turned to him. He was dressed and his cheeks were flushed.

  “Someone in human form shouldn’t be able to subdue a wolf.”

  He glared at me. I shrugged and picked up the shattered pieces of axe handle. I handed him the axe-head.

  “Tomorrow you’ll need to make a new handle for the axe.”

  “I hate you.”

  The words stung. Did he? Cannot he see the value of this instruction?

  “Princes and kings may be silver-tongued, but it’s lonely old fools who spend their youth with nought but poison on their lips.”

  “Hmph,” he huffed.

  I looked at him then the sun. It would be setting in a few hours.

  “Go to the river and wash your body. Wash everything. Tonight you will travel far. When you return, we will eat.”

  “Good. I’m hungry.” I pretended not to notice that he turned a little pale at the prospect of returning to the river.

  He stomped off into the wood. I was torn - he seemed to have some raw ability, but he was easily shocked, so uninitiated in the ways of the world. I picked up my basket of herbs. The brew would have to sort him out.

  Chapter 5

  Hafporir

  The food was good, but I was not going to tell him that. My already filthy clothes scraped against my clean skin. How could Draugr live like this? He had roasted a couple of squirrels. The meat was fatty, unlike the rabbit. He had made some sort of salty grain mush, though, and that was less pleasant. I missed bread. My stomach ached at the thought. I scraped the bottom of my bowl with the wooden spoon. I put the last spoonful in my mouth and gagged.

  The hut filled with a sickening, pungent stench like a rotting carcass mixed with moldering cheese and the bitterest herbs. I spit the mouthful out into the bowl. My appetite fled like a rabbit the second that smell hit my nostrils.

  “What are you doing?”

  “If you’ve finished with your supper, wash the dishes.”

  “Gladly. Anything to get away from that smell.”

  Draugr only stirred the pot. I let the door slam shut on my way out.

  Things were quiet down by the stream. I dipped my injured hands in the water until they were numb. That damn axe, that damn whatever that was here before, that damn Draugr. They were all conspiring to make me quit this place before next sunrise. I splashed my face. The work of the day had left a fog behind my eyes. I scrubbed the plates and stood, shaking off the rest of the water. Droplets pattered on the forest floor.

  “If this is not any better tomorrow, I shall quit, and I will go back home to my fathers. Varghoss will understand at the least. He knows what it is like to be a prince.”

  Somehow, the promise did not sit well in my chest. I made my way back to that pathetic little hut.

  “What a nut,” I shook my head, “where did they find him? This hermit, this lone wolf, this damnable fool.”

  I stopped straight in my tracks. There was something off about the hut. It seemed to shimmer in the light of the setting sun, like it was not quite there, like the glistening waves of heat that came off a fire in the summer. I approached slowly.

  In a blink, the vision was gone. The hairs on the back of my neck rose. For all that we were in the midst of the living world, the animals and the trees of the wood, there was something unnatural about this place. It made me long for the castle, and its man-made stone walls with man-made secrets. Whatever secrets Draugr’s land held, it felt like they were whispered by the earth and wind, by dead lips and ghost’s breath. Even the moon, as it rose above the treetops, seemed to scrutinize me. It watched me, and I felt, all of a sudden, all eyes on me. It was not unlike appearing at court, in front of emissaries from across the kingdom. Whatever it was, it watched and it waited, like the hopeful eyes of subjects who had travelled for weeks to have their pleas heard.

  I shook off the shivers and entered the hut. It was dark save for a single candle that flickered in the center of the room. Draugr knelt, stirring a pot and mumbling. I set the plates down, and having nothing else to do, I sat and watched him.

  He knelt in silence over the stinking pot for a time. The candle dripped wax onto the floor with an audible hiss.

  I was about to go back out and clear my head from the stink when Draugr turned. He took a large fur, it looked like that of a bear, and wrapped it around my shoulders.

  “Go sit by the coals. You’ll need to stay warm.”

  I wrinkled my nose, “I don’t think-”

  He gripped my shoulders and bore his gray eyes into mine. The touch sent a jolt through my body. My heart beat faster and I hoped it was too dark for him to see the flush I felt in my cheeks.

  “You will need to listen to me tonight,” he ordered.

  A passing thought turned my stomach. I felt like I could listen to Draugr tell me what to do all night. The runes of his tattoos danced in the candlelight. His eyes were piercing; his face handsome, and the tone of his voice with its masculine command made me want to melt into his arms.

  I pinched my arm beneath the furs. Hard. The pain brought me back to my senses. I pulled the fur around me so it would cover the hardness between my thighs.

  Draugr was drawing a cup of something from the pot over the fire. It bubbled and steamed in the cup. He handed it to me.

  “Blow on it.”

  I did and gagged as the smell wafted into my nostrils. It stank like a skunk that had rotted in the hot summer sun for days. I blew again and felt my gorge rise.

  “Give me that,” he took the cup from me. His hand brushed mine and for a second I forgot that I hated him.

  Draugr cracked the door to his hut open and reached out. He had grabbed a scoop of snow, which he dumped unceremoniously into the wooden cup. He swirled the murky green contents and handed it back to me.

  “Drink. You must drink it all at once, and all of it.”

  “Impossible.”

  I held it to my lips and cringed, “Why?”

  “Some foods nourish the body. Others will nourish the mind, and others till, the soul, if you let them, and you are calm, and you are brave. Are you calm and brave?”

  “Hmph.”

  “Drink.”

  I put the cup to my lips and gagged down the first mouthful. I wanted to set it down, but I had already drunk some. I got through the cup and slammed it down on the floor.

  “Please tell me you have some mead to wash that down.”

  “Your head will spin as it is without the mead,” he picked up the cup.

  “I’ll let you know when my head is spinning too much. So, what awful potion did you give me? Will I be a good king, now?”

  “You’ll see,” he said, ignoring the irony in my voice.

  And then I did see, or I saw something.

  It was just on the edge of my vision. I turned to follow it, but every time I moved to face it, it was gone.

  Draugr watched me, his back against the wall.

  “Aren’t you going to have some?”

  “No. Do you feel the effects?”

  “If seeing things out of the corner of my eye is the effect, then sure.”

  “Sit forward. Straighten your back as though a string tied to the top of your skull is being pulled upward.”

  I followed his orders, instinctively. The hut twitched.

  That was how it was. A twitch. Like the blink of an eye, and then it was right again. But…a building does not twitch.

  “Look into the flame.”

  My eyes followed his command and settled on the dancing fire in front of me. It filled me with its heat and the glistening, warming fire swam to great heights and back again.
r />   Something was said.

  It was said again.

  “Open yourself to the spirit realm. Move into it, and let it move through you.”

  “How?” The word tumbled off my tongue. My mouth was thick and my gums were dry.

  “Accept everything that comes into your mind without fear.”

  “What do you mean?”

  I looked from the candle to Draugr. His eyes were completely white. They shone like beacons in the dark. He pointed to the candle and put a finger to his lips.

  “Just allow your thoughts to happen. I am here to protect you.”

  The light in his eyes was an impossible net. I was caught in it. I could not turn my head. He stood and put his hand on my chin. He began to direct it back toward the candle. I put my hand on his. His white eyes widened and his lips parted slightly. He gently removed my hand and tipped my gaze toward the candle, and stars sprang from it.

  Shooting stars spun through me. The light of them dissolved me like a drop of blood in water. The water rushed around me and it was so, so warm.

  The stars gave way to smoke and darkness.

  In that moment, my throat seized up and I coughed to clear it. Water met my lips. I drank. The smoke twisted into a wolf and then two wolves, females. It became two old wolves and then snow and then nothing.

  The darkness cracked open like an egg and out of it spilled a black fluid that rippled along the walls and floor and engulfed me in a soft hum.

  The hum grew to singing and then a chorus of howls and then I was in the wood, running through it and running and running, but it was different and then I saw why. From the top of the cliff I could see the castle, and from it flew a red flag. I could not make out the sign on it. It was not ours, not our colors.

  And then there were claws and a great growl.

  Diluted blood is nothing at all to spill. It waters the ground so the plant eaters become fat. It washes my fur and makes playthings for my cubs. It pleases my mate to see the ribbons on your throat. Dance with me.