by J. M. Barlog
Kratos complied. Once they were together, the woman laid both paste-filled hands on the boar’s vessel, held by Kratos’ fingers.
“Sunnan-þoka,” she uttered slowly and distinctly. Atreus’ gaze widened in amazement.
A corona of light momentarily escaped her closed palms. Hildisvíni bucked with a squeal. As the witch withdrew her hands, so did Kratos. The paste had bonded the smoking wound together.
“You’re a witch,” Atreus said.
“I cannot finish my healing here. My home lies just beyond the trees there. You will carry him,” she said, ignoring Atreus’ observation.
Atreus shot his father a pleading look.
The witch leveled a fierce, intense look at the God of War.
“He must not die,” she said.
Kratos stared back at her. Reading the urgency of her words, he clutched the wounded animal in both arms before rising unsteadily to his feet. In some strange way she had convinced him to obey her command. The old Kratos would have shown no concern for a dying animal. Or was it his son who had softened his heart toward these two?
“This way.”
The witch approached a formidable ten-foot-high rock wall, covered in vines. Standing before it, she took up soil from a nearby mound and released it from her hand in a sweeping gesture.
“Greioa.”
The vines began twisting and turning, untangling until they revealed a path through an opening in the rock wall.
Both Kratos and Atreus paid close attention to the magic at work as they followed the witch along the path. Atreus viewed it with awe, Kratos with trepidation and concern. Just how much magic did this witch possess? And could she become a threat to them? He did not like the unsettling way she had looked at him during their first encounter in the clearing. He had thought it was because they had shot her animal, now he was not so sure.
Atreus sprinted ahead, anxious about the animal. If the witch could accomplish what she said, she would remove the guilt wracking his mind. At least it might deaden the pain he suffered for what his act had caused.
Kratos found himself quickening his pace, despite supporting the boar’s cumbersome weight across his arms. He slowed, however, when he came alongside the witch. He felt it prudent to keep her within view at all times.
“That bow seems rather big for you,” she commented, eyeing the way Atreus clutched it as he jogged. He treated it like it was more than just a weapon.
“My mother made it for me. Said I would grow into it,” he said proudly.
“Your mother is a very smart woman.” The witch cast a furtive glance at Kratos.
“How much further?” Kratos said, shifting the boar in his arms.
“I have never seen either of you in these woods before. Your mother must miss you being away from home,” she said.
“She… my mother is dead,” Atreus said, grief churning up into his throat. He wasn’t even sure why he told her that. But doing so forced him to glance at his father, with guilt across his face. If his words brought anger, his father hid it well.
Atreus pointed to the towering mountaintop visible through gaps in the trees. “We are taking her ashes to the highest peak in the realm.”
“Ashes?” the witch said, an edge of alarm in her voice.
“It was her wish,” Atreus added.
“Boy!” Kratos snarled.
The witch shot Kratos an unreadable stare. “I am sorry for your loss. We are here.”
Atreus stopped. “Here” was not what he was expecting. They approached a strange hill shaped like a bloated clamshell, with a gnarled wych elm atop it, stretching into the gray sky.
“You live in this tree?” he asked, surprised, yet at the same time fascinated.
“Not in it. Below it.” She smiled. “Heimili!”
At her order, the hill rose. Actually, the hill became the shell of an enormous creature resembling an aged tortoise. A cottage of tightly entwined branches and roots hung from the animal’s belly, as if it had grown right into the forest.
“It is safe. There is no threat here,” the witch assured Kratos, when his face hardened toward her. Delving into the witch’s stare, he realized that for now he must trust her.
Undaunted, Atreus dashed toward the gargantuan creature. “Is he friendly?”
Then he stopped. “Is it a he or a she?”
“Boy,” Kratos warned.
“I promise you, he is safe here,” the witch said. “It is a he.”
The creature bowed its head to Atreus, who responded by reaching up to scratch its huge square chin.
“He will not hurt anyone,” Atreus said.
Approaching a vine-covered door, the witch waved it open with her arm. “Quickly now.”
Kratos trailed her inside, with Atreus remaining outside until his father had completely disappeared within the dwelling. Suspicion stopped Kratos a few steps in. Sunlight streamed in through four unshuttered windows, illuminating every corner. A fifth window in the farthest corner had no light beaming in, and the view through it was dreary and devoid of plant life. Kratos failed to comprehend how that window could be so different from the others. Shelves and tables, benches, and small stands were scattered throughout, all littered with the accouterments of ancient seiðr magic. Stacks of wooden bowls and vials lined the shelves on the outer walls.
Only after Kratos’ nod did Atreus join him inside. He, too, gazed in fascination at the peculiar surroundings. The house was just as Atreus would have imagined it from the stories his mother had told him over the years about the witches in the realm. But she always described the witches as ugly, mean, and evil. Discarded bones littering the floor in an out-of-the-way location just inside the door caught his attention, as did the out-of-place fifth window.
Taking it all in, Atreus identified a distaff with flax hanging off it. On a small table across from them, he identified sprigs of hawkweed and lyme grass.
Her furnishings remained simple. There appeared to be no items of sentimental value, suggesting this was maybe a place merely for work and sleep. Surely the witch’s true home, and her personal items, must be somewhere else.
Atreus drifted from his father’s side to inspect the curious items scattered about the room.
“Place him there on the stave,” she said, gesturing to a runic symbol painted in crimson on the timber floor. Candles marked the cardinal points on the stave, suggesting it was a sacred spot.
“And keep him still!”
Kratos lowered himself to his knees with some difficulty, struggling to maintain his balance with the large struggling animal across his arms. Once there, he gently set the beast to rest on the symbol. He knew not what the symbol meant, only that if it was important to the witch, so it must be important to save the creature.
While the witch scurried about, gathering up an armful of ingredients, the animal grunted in pain, struggling to move while Kratos held him firmly in place.
“I know! I will not do that,” she retorted to the animal’s grunt. “Hold him still!” she directed Kratos, who applied greater pressure onto the beast’s shoulder.
Shooing the boy out of her way, the witch took up a mortar before kneeling beside the wounded creature. She remained intensely focused on her task as she placed the necessary items in the mortar then began grinding. She never looked at Kratos, the boy, or the animal. All her concentration focused on the task.
“You live alone?” Atreus risked asking.
The witch at first offered no answer, pretending his question went unheard.
“I live here with Hildisvíni,” came her reply a few moments later.
“I—” Atreus started.
“It is better that way,” she said.
“My father does not like people either,” he added.
“Boy,” Kratos snarled.
“Well, you don’t. It’s not true?” Atreus said. Kratos turned a frown at him.
The boar bucked wildly.
“Hold him down before he hurts himself,” the witch
said.
Kneeling beside the boar, she waved an open vial under its nose. Within a few moments, the animal calmed under Kratos’ grip.
“Easy… rest now,” she instructed the boar, rubbing her hand gently across its flank. “I need two more things: fresh red root that grows just behind the house. Can you pull a cluster?” she said to Atreus.
Up until that moment he had felt helpless. He so wanted to assist the animal, but he knew anything he did would be fruitless compared to what the witch and his father were doing.
He scurried out the open door.
“What else? You said two things,” Kratos said, shifting to balance his weight on his feet. Thinking he sought to stand, the witch snared his forearm, pulling him close so as to share a secret.
“I—” she started, searching beyond Kratos’ stare. Her lips stilled as if frozen.
Recognition dawned on her face. She hesitated. Before speaking, she cast her gaze out the door, where she saw Atreus. She needed a deep breath before speaking.
“I know what you are; and that you are not of this realm. But there is no mistaking what I sensed.”
Kratos sought to bury his surprise. How could she know? What powers did she possess that allowed her inside him? Failing to come up with an answer, he remained silent.
“The boy does not know, does he? About your true nature… or his own.”
Kratos yanked his arm free, angry that she dared intrude into his life and that of his son. No one was meant to know the truth about them. No one in this land was ever supposed to learn the God of War’s identity.
“That is none of your concern,” Kratos snapped.
Snorting her disapproval, the witch rose, and, affronted by his reaction, crossed the room to return an item to her apothecary.
“You should know the gods of these realms do not take kindly to outsiders. Trust me, I know.”
Leaving her bench with her bowls and cups, the witch crossed to a window overlooking her garden. Outside, Atreus crawled through the plants in search of the roots she had requested. Kratos followed to stand beside her at the window.
“When they find you—and they will—they will make things difficult. Your boy will require answers.”
“That will be my problem.”
“Whatever you hide, you cannot protect him forever. But you are right, this does not concern me.”
Kratos read her expression, attempting to pry inside her mind. There was more he needed to know, more she knew but seemed unwilling to share. Was she an ally or an enemy? He tried to analyze her indecipherable look.
“Lamb’s cress. I also need lamb’s cress. Do you mind? It is a white-petalled flower in the garden. Just a handful,” she said, more to herself than to Kratos, as she moved to the cottage’s rear door.
“Fine. Lamb’s cress,” Kratos said.
“Time is critical.”
Kratos joined Atreus in the garden, whose search continued for the plant the witch had requested.
Sensing there was something his son wished to confide in him about, Kratos delivered a stern look meant to coax Atreus into talking.
“I like her. I mean, she lives under a giant turtle!” he called out.
“Do not be too open with her. We do not know if we can trust her,” Kratos replied in a harsh whisper.
“Has she tried to kill us? No,” Atreus said with a smile.
“Yet,” Kratos shot back.
Atreus finally located the red-root plant. He tugged at it, expecting it to yield to his pull. Instead, the plant held fast. Using both hands, he yanked with all his strength. The plant refused to budge.
“Can you help? I cannot quite get it.”
“Use your knife,” Kratos said.
Atreus reached for his knife on his belt. The sheath was empty. His knife was gone. Panicked, he scrambled in ever-widening circles, searching the nearby ground, hoping he had just lost it. His search expanded to the surrounding garden.
Kratos watched his son’s desperate actions without speaking. He could see the distress spilling onto his face. But a lesson was a lesson, and Atreus needed to feel the sting of his failure to learn his lesson properly.
“I lost it,” Atreus whispered.
In that excruciating moment, his mind flashed back to the funeral pyre at their house and the broadcloth linen he had used to prepare his mother. It is your knife now, his father had told him.
“I lost my knife,” Atreus confessed. He knelt, motionless. That knife was the most important thing he had from his mother. How could he have let himself be so stupid as to lose it?
Kratos withdrew the boy’s hunting knife from his belt to hold it high. “You dropped it chasing down the boar.”
A mélange of relief, embarrassment, and anger poured out. Atreus accepted the knife, desperate to conceal the shame of his shortcomings.
“What is wrong with me? If I had lost this forever—” he scolded himself.
“You did lose it,” his father corrected, his brow furrowed.
Atreus easily cut away some of the red roots, adding them to the flowers with the white petals that Kratos handed to him before returning to the house.
“I promise to take better care of it from now on,” Atreus said, refusing to look at his father.
Kratos remained near the door while Atreus offered the flowers and roots to the witch. “Exactly what I need,” she said, revealing only the faintest glimpse of a smile.
Without delay, she added them to her mortar to grind into the other ingredients. Then she applied the salve to the boar’s wound. Seconds later, the beast breathed easier, drifting off into a shallow, pain-free sleep.
“Mother told me stories about witches,” Atreus said.
“She did?” the witch replied, arching a brow.
“But she said witches are old and ugly and evil.”
“Am I ugly to you?”
“You are beautiful. Like my mother… was.”
The witch smiled, setting a gentle hand on Atreus’ shoulder.
“What is your name?” he asked.
The witch scrutinized him carefully. “For you, the Witch-in-the-woods is fine. Since that is what you deem I am.” Her unexpected response brought a quizzical stare from the lad.
“He is going to live?” he asked.
“Yes, I believe so.”
“Then we are leaving,” Kratos interjected sternly, uncomfortable facing his son’s familial interaction with the witch, the same way he had often interacted with his mother. He heard the boy’s words but sensed his wife’s kind heart in them. He wanted nothing more of this place, or this witch. The sooner they were gone, the better.
“Not without thanks,” the witch said.
Taking up a jar, she dipped a finger in a dark liquid then reached out to touch Kratos’ neck. His hand shot out to snare hers before she made contact, his face in a scowl.
“What are you doing?” he said through gritted teeth.
“You wish solitude, no? This mark will hide you from those who might make your journey… difficult.”
After a pause, he released her hand, nodding approval for her to paint a seiðr protection rune on his neck. All the while he eyed her keenly, uncertain of what to make of this mysterious hermit witch with a boar she called her friend.
“Leyna,” she whispered once she finished etching.
Dropping to the boy’s level, and noticing blood from his first kill still smudged against his cheek, she licked her thumb to wipe it away. Atreus endured the embarrassment, yet her warm touch against his cheek made him think of his mother. However, he remained perfectly still while she painted the same rune upon his neck, finishing with the same word.
“It means ‘hide’,” she added, in response to Atreus’ perplexed look.
The witch smiled at him the way his mother would smile whenever they were close. Atreus thought she was looking at him almost as if she forgave him for his transgression.
“A shortcut exists below the house to lead you safely out of these wo
ods. Follow the daylight.”
Kratos was already at the door.
The witch went to a wooden box in the corner, the size used to store firewood. Opening it, she withdrew dried rabbit, bread formed into small biscuits and an assortment of dried fruits.
“Take these for your journey.”
Kratos remained where he stood, Atreus having to collect up the provisions in both arms and deliver them to his father to be added to their nearly emptied sack.
“We thank you for these,” Atreus said.
“Heimili,” she commanded.
Moments later the structure began shaking, sinking into the ground around them, as if descending into another world. In reality, the great creature was simply squatting to lower them to their exit. Through the windows, the view was transformed from sunlight and azure sky to root-filled, entangled earth. Except the view through the fifth window never changed.
Kratos needed to grab hold of something to steady himself. Atreus, however, seemed too excited to do anything. The cottage finally settled into place with a gentle thud. The doorway now led to a planked spiral staircase below. A strong earthy smell assaulted their noses.
The witch remained beside the door while Kratos and Atreus filed past her. “And not all witches are evil,” she added, with a shade of sadness.
Her expression halted Atreus in his tracks. Why did she look at him that way? What was it about her expression that had taken over his mind?
“Will we see you again?” he felt a sudden need to ask.
Kratos snarled, continuing onto the path, turning about when he realized his son had stopped.
“As much, or as little, as you want. Now, be on your way.”
She lingered only a moment longer before shutting the door, leaving them alone on the staircase.
“This underground passage should put you back on your path to the mountain. But now that the dead walk Midgard, the road ahead is fraught with peril. Watch yourselves,” she felt a need to caution through the door.
Kratos checked that his axe remained secure in its sling across his back. Atreus felt the same sudden need to tighten his fingers around his bow.
“When she said the dead walk Midgard, did she mean the draugr, or that other thing we saw?”
