The Mist Children

by E. C. Hibbs

  About the Author

  E. C. Hibbs is an award-winning author and artist, often found lost in the woods or in her own imagination. She adores nature, fantasy, and anything to do with winter. She also hosts a YouTube channel, discussing writing tips and the real-world origins of fairy tales. She lives with her family in Cheshire, England.

  Learn more and join the Batty Brigade at

  www.echibbs.weebly.com

  Also by E. C. Hibbs

  THE FOXFIRES TRILOGY

  The Winter Spirits

  The Mist Children

  The Night River

  THE TRAGIC SILENCE SERIES

  Tragic Silence

  The Libelle Papers

  Sepia and Silver

  Blindsighted Wanderer

  The Sailorman’s Daughters

  Night Journeys: Anthology

  The Hollow Hills Tarot Deck

  Blood and Scales (anthology co-author)

  Dare to Shine (anthology co-author)

  Fae Thee Well (anthology co-author)

  AS CHARLOTTE E. BURGESS

  Into the Woods and Far Away: A Collection of Faery Meditations

  Gentle Steps: Meditations for Anxiety and Depression

  The Mist Children

  The Foxfires Trilogy

  Book Two

  E. C. Hibbs

  This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, businesses, places, events, locales, and incidents are either the products of the author’s imagination or used in a fictitious manner. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, or actual events is purely coincidental.

  The Mist Children Copyright © 2020 by E. C. Hibbs

  All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or used in any manner without written permission of the copyright owner except for the use of quotations in a book review.

  First published June 2020

  Cartography, cover design, cover artwork, book production and layout by E. C. Hibbs

  Cover stock image from AdobeStock

  Author photograph by Allison Page-Hibbs

  www.echibbs.weebly.com

  For Tara,

  Amazing friend and boss.

  Without you, I never would have known the frozen north.

  Prologue

  At the outskirts of Poro village, the sound of friendly jeering carried over the frozen surface of Lake Nordjarvi. On the banks, three children – two boys and a girl – ran about with lengths of rope in hand. They had stuck a pair of antlers into the snow and were testing how far away they could get before the lassos landed short.

  The girl tossed her rope and it fell pathetically, three feet from the antlers. The boys shrieked with laughter.

  “What kind of throw was that?” one of them snorted.

  The girl glowered. “Shut up, Niko. Mine was better than any of yours!”

  “Alright then, let’s try something else, and see who’s best,” said Niko. “Boden, get the antlers and pretend you’re a reindeer, and then Inga and me will try to catch you! Whoever lassos first wins!”

  “Fine!” Inga snatched her rope with newfound vigour.

  Boden dug the antlers out of the snow and held them against his head. He loped around, kicking and snorting like a calf. Inga and Niko tossed their lassos, but both missed, and they gave chase.

  “Come on!” Boden shouted. “You can do better than that, can’t you?”

  Niko shoved his way past Inga and threw his rope. It snagged on one of the antler points, but slipped off before it could tighten.

  “I’ll get you!” he cried, the words broken with laughter.

  Excitement overcame them and Boden soon gave up impersonating a reindeer. He sprinted towards the Nordjarvi. The others ran after him, giggling wildly, slipping as they left the bank and emerged onto the lake. There was still a layer of snow lying on top of the ice, but their shoes sank straight through it, all grip gone.

  Boden lost his footing completely and went flying onto his backside. The antlers fell from his grasp and skittered across the surface. A lasso landed neatly around his torso.

  “I got you!” cried Inga triumphantly. Then she turned on Niko. “I win!”

  “Shut up,” Niko glowered. He glanced uneasily at the antlers. “Why did you throw them?” he demanded.

  “I didn’t throw them. I dropped them,” argued Boden as he disentangled himself from the rope.

  “We’ve got to get them,” said Niko hotly. “My Papa will be so cross if I lose them. He said he needed them later to make new knife handles.”

  “Well, go and get them,” said Inga. “The ice is still thick enough to walk on.”

  Niko nodded – more to himself than the others. He had never liked being out on the water in the middle of winter. Even though he’d crossed lakes every year on the migration, and sometimes came ice fishing with his family, there was something about doing it which unsettled him.

  It was a frozen purgatory; water, yet solid: a thin skin which he could crash through at any moment. Eevi, his older sister, had told him: if you fall under the ice, the cold would kill you before you could drown, before you could even shout for help.

  He shuddered. He couldn’t wait for summer.

  But he couldn’t let Inga and Boden see he was afraid, either. They were his friends, but they would still tease him. So he straightened his back and headed towards the antlers.

  They were several feet away, but the distance seemed like miles as the anxiety tightened his muscles. The soles of his shoes were made from the fur of a reindeer’s head, and the strands, sticking out in all directions, gave a fantastic grip. But he still moved slowly, listening for the slightest crack.

  After a few tense seconds, he reached the antlers and snatched them up. He let out a small smirk of relief and turned back to his friends.

  But they weren’t looking at him. Their eyes carried on past him, wide with alarm. Inga’s mouth had fallen open and her breath fogged in the air.

  “What is it?” Niko asked.

  They didn’t reply. Niko slowly turned.

  A boy was standing on the ice, just out of arms’ length. He looked about the same age as them, or perhaps a year younger, with sandy blonde hair reaching to his shoulders. Ugly burn scars shone on his cheek. He was dressed in a baggy coat, decorated with the patterns of Poro, but Niko couldn’t remember seeing him before. He was dripping wet from head to toe, clothes clinging to his skinny body. His eyes were closed.

  Niko shivered just looking at him. How had he not frozen solid, soaked as he was? Where had he even come from?

  “Uh… hello,” he said uncertainly.

  The boy didn’t reply.

  Niko threw a confused glance at Boden and Inga.

  They were muttering between themselves, but they didn’t come closer to investigate. No matter that the ice was still sturdy; they all knew that too much weight in one place was never a good idea.

  Niko fidgeted, rocking back and forth on his heels. Unsure of what else he could say, he asked, “What’s your name?”

  The boy tilted his head slightly. The movement was strange and fitful, more like a bird than a human. He kept his eyes closed.

  “I’m Aki,” he said, barely above a whisper. When he opened his mouth, water spilled out and dripped down his chin.

  Niko fought the urge to recoil.

  Inga took a tentative step forward. “Is everything alright?”

  “I think so,” Niko called back.

  “Do you want me to get my Mama?” she offered.

  Niko refused, then addressed Aki again.

  “Hey… aren’t you cold? Do you know you’re not supposed to go out in wet clothes?”

  Aki didn’t say anything. The only movement was another twitch of his head.

  Th
e silence began to get uncomfortable, and Niko went to ask something else, to break it. But then Aki murmured, so quietly, he had to lean in to hear.

  “It’s my birthday.”

  Niko hesitated.

  “Happy birthday,” he said. “How old are you?”

  “I’m five.”

  “Uh… well, do you want to play with us?”

  Aki nodded woodenly, but didn’t take a single step. Then he opened his eyes.

  Niko screamed. They were completely white and clouded over, with no hint of colour at all. It was like they belonged in a corpse.

  He bolted for the shore, for his friends, but they were screaming too. Niko slipped, arms flailing frantically as he tried to stay on his feet. Dense mist spread around him, as though a giant being had let out a lungful of breath into the winter air. It enveloped him first, then Boden and Inga as they tried to run.

  There was a slippery sound, like fish squirming over each other, followed by the gnashing of teeth. And then, as though the icy layer had given way beneath them, the children disappeared from view.

  On the hill nearby stood the Poro mage, Enska. He had heard the commotion and arrived just in time to see Inga fall. His eyes strayed to the little boy, standing in the middle of the lake, and his blood ran cold.

  There was nothing to be done for the youngsters now. He turned back and hurried towards the village.

  “Lilja…” he muttered under his breath. “Lilja, what have you done?”

  Chapter One

  Formless. Endless. Infinite. That was what it was like.

  Lumi’s grasp was firm around Tuomas’s wrist as she pulled him up through the air. He could still feel Elin’s arms pressing into him even as he melted away, body-soul and life-soul spinning around each other in expectation.

  He sensed a faint pressure, like a bubble popping around his entire body. It surrounded him, but it didn’t hurt. He passed through it, into the World Above, and he opened his eyes.

  A spectacle of light greeted him. It was still dark, but the night seemed to stretch on forever. The stars shone so close and so brightly, he could have reached out and touched them. In their constellations, he saw the faces of nameless Spirits, their eyes turned on him. Lumi’s aurora flowed all around like a river of green and blue. It drifted in a wind he couldn’t feel, swelled into waves and dipped in waterfalls.

  Unlike her, he was still in his physical body. It wasn’t the same as when he had travelled here in trance, but he didn’t care. He was aware of his skin and bones encasing his souls in a peculiar fleshy cage, yet every fibre of him felt unbound. He was cold and warm all at once; he breathed without needing his lungs; he saw with a depth beyond mere human vision. Up here, he was not only Tuomas, the boy from Akerfjorden, but something else: something older and more powerful. He was a mote of dust suspended in the starlight. He was a Spirit in human form, and he was free.

  Lumi hovered in front of him. She still had the face of a girl, but it was clearer than he remembered, as though her skin had disappeared and left only an impression of light. It shifted around itself, fusing perfectly with the aurora’s trails. She was solid and yet not, pure energy even as she held him. Then he blinked, and she was a fox; then a simple orb. But more than seeing her, he felt her: the part of her which could have taken any form in any space in time, and he would have always known it to be her.

  Welcome home, she said inside his head. There was no need to move her lips; no need to vocalise anything.

  Tuomas glanced back at the World Between. It was so far away. He could see the curvature of the land, covered with snow and ice. The largest trees were the size of twigs; entire forests seemed no denser than the hairs on his arm; reindeer herds several hundred strong could have been blotted out with his thumb. Even the mountains and the islands were like mere pebbles, forcing their way upwards through an unmarked sheet of whiteness.

  So small. So distant. So perfect.

  I can’t stay forever, he said to Lumi. I promised Elin I’d be back for the migration.

  And you will, she replied. I shall take you back there myself.

  When?

  Whenever you want. You are not a prisoner here. But first…

  She reached towards him and grasped his hand.

  Come with me, she said. There is somebody who you need to see.

  Who? Tuomas asked.

  The Sun Spirit.

  He froze. He didn’t know what he had been expecting when he chose to come to the World Above, but meeting his Spirit mother took him by surprise.

  How? he asked. You can’t go near her… can you?

  He remembered walking the forests with Lumi during the Long Dark and how she had recoiled at the faintest stretch of daylight. Even the blue dusk was almost too much for her. But Lumi sensed the concern as it flowed through his mind, and though he couldn’t see her smile, he felt it.

  You forget that she raised me, she replied. She and I cannot shine onto the World Between at the same time. But we are above such physicality here. I can take you to her.

  Before he could say anything else, she pulled him through the sky. Something warm and powerful spread over the back of his neck and an overwhelmingly bright light engulfed him. He spun away, but Lumi kept hold of him.

  Do not be afraid to look at me, a voice said. It was barely above a whisper, yet soft and gentle, like the clear sweetness of a summer’s day.

  He turned back to the light, but wasn’t blinded again. There was no fiery white glow which the people of the Northlands saw, but something as formless and flowing as Lumi. He couldn’t make out a face, yet in his mind he sensed a radiant beauty cloaked in gold, hair like flames, eyes brighter than the stars. She twisted into shades of red, yellow and white. He smelled honey and pollen, and the dryness of baking soil under a blazing sky. Heat was everywhere; more heat than he’d ever felt in his life, yet it wasn’t unbearable. It didn’t burn him, but soaked into him, spreading through his entire being.

  He sensed himself in that warmth. He was a part of it. A part of her.

  Lumi let go of him and drew back to a respectful distance. The Sun Spirit reached out and swept him close. Inside his chest, Tuomas felt his life-soul pulse with happiness. He had never known his human mother, but in an instant, he knew what it would have been like to be held by her.

  My dear son, the Sun Spirit said lovingly. My dear Red Fox One.

  He melted into the sound of her voice. He recognised it. He had known her for so long; longer than the boy called Tuomas could ever imagine.

  I love you so much, my sweet son, she whispered in his mind.

  I don’t understand, Tuomas said. Wasn’t I here before I came into this body? I was with you after the time of the Great Mage, I know I was.

  True, the Sun Spirit said, but it does not matter. No matter how endless we are, no matter whether it is by a day or an age, I will always miss you. Every day in your human life, I have gazed down upon you, as your sister has every night. Every day, I longed for you and loved you.

  She moved away from him a little so Lumi could approach. The aurora bloomed around them, filled with souls. He regarded them: lives once lived now frozen, frolicking here with Lumi until they chose to leave the World Above and be reborn. There were thousands of them – millions – more than he could have counted even if he had tried until the end of time.

  Tuomas, Lumi said so only he could hear, I want you to remember this moment. This is your mother. Not the Silver One. She is mine, though she would rather have you over me.

  Tuomas nodded. How could have ever been a fool enough to think that any Spirit besides this one was his parent?

  Lumi heard his thoughts, and so did the Sun Spirit, and he sensed a red flare deep within her.

  I will keep you from my sister while you are here, she promised. She will never steal you away again, my son. Beware her. No matter what she says to you, do not allow her to ensnare you again.

  Tuomas felt the gravity in her words, but he didn’t worry. He wa
s too happy and contended to be concerned about anything. No amount of dreaming could compare with the beauty; no days spent floating in summer lakes could come close to the weightlessness. Time had no meaning and could have stretched on forever. He could spend an eternity up here trying to touch every star and swim every inch of the sky.

  Lumi and the Sun Spirit let it lie. They swirled around him: a perfect fusion of warm and cool; then Lumi swept him into her grasp and floated away. She pulled him close to the skin of the World Between, flicked her tail and sent out a fresh wave of Lights. They were freezing cold – colder than even ice could possibly be. A shiver passed through Tuomas but he ignored it. It was too wonderful. She was too wonderful.

  He eyed the tiny huts below; the snow extending to the horizon.

  Can they see us down there? he asked.

  Lumi smiled. In response, she took his wrists and wheeled him in a circle. With every movement, the Lights grew stronger until they filled the entire sky.

  Dance with me, she said.

  The Sun Spirit rose and fell. With each passing day, she regained her strength. At first, she was barely a line of golden light above the horizon, but slowly she grew, rising a little higher and shining a little further. It was so gradual, Tuomas didn’t even notice it. He was too busy frolicking in her glow, spinning through the World Above with Lumi, soaring and diving in ways no bird could ever match. He ran and floated, swam and danced. There was movement everywhere and nowhere at the same time. He felt the heartbeat of all living things pulsing through him, like the most perfect drum had struck up the rhythm of truth.

  It would be so easy to stay here. If the events of this winter had taught him anything, it was that things were so much larger than he ever could have imagined. Sometimes he thought they were too large. How could so much have happened in such a short space of time?

  How long has it been? he asked Lumi one night. How long have I been here?