“Rein up, curse you all!” Bloodsong commanded. The mere effort of shouting nearly swept her consciousness away. She shakily dismounted. She let herself go to her knees, then carefully sheathed her sword and stretched out on the rocky ground. She tried to keep her eyes open but could not.
She heard the others reining up a short distance away, finally obeying her order, and the clatter of hooves on stones as they walked their weary mounts back toward her. Then she heard no more, exhaustion finally claiming her.
Dismounting, the others found her stretched out upon the ground: asleep.
“That Hel-fire spell she used no doubt requires a great deal of energy,” Huld said. “We must have drawn close enough to the cave to be within the Dwarfs’ magical protections. That would explain why my night-vision spell stopped working and the dead things stopped following.” She rubbed at her still throbbing temples.
“Both of you, get some rest,” Thorfinn said. “I’ll stand first watch.”
“Wake me,” Valgerth responded, “so that I may take my turn.”
Thorfinn slipped an arm around Valgerth’s waist and pulled her close. “As you wish,” he said, then lightly kissed her lips. She responded by embracing him and kissing him back.
“We’ll still live to see another dawn, it seems,” Thorfinn noted with a weary laugh as he gently stroked Valgerth’s face in the moonlight.
“If the Dwarfs don’t decide otherwise,” Huld said. “If only I could still make my night-vision spell work.”
“Your voice shows your weariness, Bright Eyes,” Thorfinn said. “Get some sleep while you can.”
“Aye,” Valgerth agreed. “You’ve done enough this night, guiding us through the dark to safety.”
Pride filled the young Witch. Valgerth was right. She had guided them to safety. If not for her, they would all be dead, or worse. And besides, she reminded herself, if the stories about Dwarfs being able to make themselves invisible were true, her night vision would be of no use, anyway.
“I will lie near Bloodsong,” Huld announced. “Wake me after your watch, Valgerth, and I will take a turn, too.”
Huld stretched out on the rocky ground near Bloodsong and closed her eyes. She willed her tensed muscles to relax, trying to quell the pain still throbbing in her head. Then she realized that although the night-vision spell no longer worked, it was still in effect, causing her the pain.
She quickly whispered the revoking incantation and felt the pain recede slightly. She rubbed the strained muscles in her neck and shoulders, feeling the pain recede a bit more. Beside her she heard Bloodsong breathing deeply, sleeping oblivious in exhaustion.
If she needs strength when she awakens, Huld thought, I will use the healing spell again, whether she wants me to or not. Moments later, the Witch was asleep.
Valgerth left the circle of Thorfinn’s arms and went to her knees beside Bloodsong. The Hel-warrior’s face was a pale oval, dimly glimpsed in the moonlight. Valgerth remembered the skull she had seen there, and the death-horror her friend had become during the battle. Repulsion again washed through her. An impulse to move farther away from Bloodsong possessed her, but she fought it down, reached out, and tucked Bloodsong’s shaggy fur cloak tighter around the sleeping warrior. I won’t desert you, Freyadis, Valgerth vowed.
Still feeling repulsion but determined not to let it shame her again, Valgerth pulled her own cloak tightly around herself against the cold and stretched out beside her friend. She heard Thorfinn moving about, tending to their weary horses, and soon she slept, but in her sleep came a dream of a skeletal corpse strutting in Bloodsong’s clothes, pretending to be alive.
BLOODSONG DID NOT awaken until the sun was well above the horizon. She jerked to a sitting position, upset that she had slept so long, wondering why no one had wakened her.
She was alone.
The Hel-warrior threw herself to her feet and drew her sword. A wave of dizziness swept over her. She cursed, swaying unsteadily, pain pounding in her head, vision blurring. She needed more rest to retain her full strength, but there was no time now to rest.
The dizziness and pain passed. Her vision cleared. She scanned the bare, rocky expanse of ground around her. Of Huld, Valgerth, and Thorfinn there was no sign. The horses, Bloodsong’s included, were gone, too, and with them all the remaining supplies.
She looked away from the cliff. Beyond what she assumed was the Dwarfs’ invisible barrier she saw ravens feasting upon the remains of the predators Nidhug had awakened, dead once more. Well beyond the death-feast rose the trees of the forested foothills.
To Bloodsong’s left, some distance across the rocky expanse of ground, the road led away, along the edge of the ledge where the ground ended. Beyond the edge the dark green tops of pines stretched away into the misty distance far below.
The Hel-warrior turned back toward the cliff and began walking quickly toward the black, yawning entrance to Dvalin’s Burrow. The vertical wall of the cliff reared skyward overhead. Weathered Runes cut into the rocks around the shadow-filled entrance.
There was no doubt in Bloodsong’s mind that her companions had been taken into Dvalin’s Burrow. She wondered why she had not been taken, too, and as if in answer, her eyes flicked downward to the Hel-ring, which gleamed against the black leather of her gloved left hand. She assumed a sleep spell had kept her oblivious while the kidnapping had taken place.
Many tales told of humans kidnapped by Dvalin’s Folk, human infants stolen from cribs, human women taken to become the wives of Dwarfs, human men taken to labor in the Dwarfs’ deep-earth mines. Men, women, and children used for meat in the Dwarfs’ stewpots.
The shadowy entrance to the cave loomed above her, though she was still some distance away. She hastened her pace but resisted the impulse to run, suspecting that she was being watched. She glanced to her left and right, saw nothing but rocks, but remembered tales that told how Dwarfs could become invisible and withstand sunlight by wearing magical red caps called Tarnkappes.
If only she hadn’t lost the Hel-saddle, she thought as she hurried forward. She would never have tried passing through Dvalin’s Burrow if she had been able to conjure and saddle a Hel-horse. She pushed down dark feelings of guilt for what had happened to her friends.
She reached the entrance, stopped, and looked up at the jagged rocks arching high overhead.
Turn away, a deep male voice suddenly commanded within her mind. Think of Guthrun, your daughter. Do not endanger her or your mission. Turn away and live. Enter and die.
“Release my friends and I shall turn away!” Bloodsong shouted at the darkness gaping before her. Echoes of her words came back to her from within the vast cave, and she remembered tales which claimed that echoes were Dwarfs mockingly repeating the things humans said.
“I do not wish to harm any of Dvalin’s Folk,” she continued, “but I will have my friends back by my side, unharmed!”
Echoes once more.
“We need not be enemies!” she insisted. “Aid me instead! Let us be allies! Return my friends to me and help me destroy King Nidhug!”
Echoes, then the voice in her mind spoke again. Turn away. Do not endanger your mission.
“You have endangered my mission by taking those who are aiding me, and by taking my horse! Release my friends! Value my mission more than your desire for human captives!”
Think of your daughter. Value her more than those who were taken.
“They would give their lives for me and have nearly done so several times already! They would not have been within your realm if not for me! Release them! Be my ally!”
Never shall a member of vile humankind be trusted again.
“I wish to destroy Nidhug! He who slayed Dvalin’s son! You can trust me to do everything in my power to destroy he who is enemy to us both! And if you do not release my friends, you can trust me to be, if not your ally, your destroyer
!”
More echoes came from within the cave but before the last echo had died, Bloodsong stepped beneath the arching rocks and into the darkness of Dvalin’s domain.
* * *
Huld awakened in pain and darkness. She tried to sit up, thinking that it was still night and she was still upon the rocky ground beyond the cliff. She could not sit up, could only barely move. Her hands were bound tightly behind her, knees and ankles lashed as one. Fear crept through her. “Bloodsong?” she whispered, tugging at the cords around her wrists. “Bloodsong? Valgerth? Thorfinn?”
No one responded. Somewhere water dripped. Faintly in the distance came a sound, as of hammers striking anvils. The air was cold but not as icy as she remembered before falling asleep, and she felt not the slightest breeze. Her fear grew, igniting panic. For a moment she struggled madly against her bonds, finally forcing herself to calm slightly, to stop wasting energy, to try to think clearly. She tried to invoke her night vision and was not surprised when she still could not.
Someone moaned nearby.
“Bloodsong?” she called, no longer bothering to whisper.
“No,” Thorfinn said. “Thor’s Curse! What—”
“You’re bound, too?” Huld asked.
“Aye,” Thorfinn answered, jerking at his bonds.
Somewhere between Huld and Thorfinn, Valgerth groaned. She cursed. “Skadi’s Bow! I must have fallen asleep on watch!””
“Don’t blame yourself,” Huld interrupted. “If Dwarfs have captured us, they probably used magic, a sleep spell or something. But Bloodsong? She’s not here?”
“They may not have taken Freyadis,” Valgerth suggested, struggling in vain to loosen the cords that held her. “That ring she wears and what she has become,” she said, thinking of the nightmares she’d had.
“Turn your body so I can reach your hands,” Thorfinn said, inching toward Valgerth. “My hands are behind me.”
“As are mine.”
“And mine,” Huld added.
“But maybe I can still untie you.” Thorfinn grunted, reaching Valgerth, exploring her bonds in the darkness.
A hopeful silence was held for several long moments, then Thorfinn cursed. “There are no knots!” he exclaimed, “and the cords, though flexible, have the feel of metal to them.”
“Curse their Dwarfish magic,” Huld muttered. “I suppose we should not be surprised. The bond with which the Gods bound the demon-wolf, Fenris, was made by Dwarfs, or so I’ve heard.”
“Aye,” Thorfinn agreed. “They say it is slender and silken in appearance, but the more the Wolf strains against it, the stronger it becomes.”
“I’m thinking of other tales,” Valgerth said, struggling harder. “I’ve no wish to become some gnarled Dwarf’s wife, or stew meat in a Dwarfish cauldron.”
“If they didn’t take Bloodsong, then we may still have a chance,” Thorfinn offered.
“Do you think she would try to rescue us?” Huld asked.
“Of course!” Thorfinn answered without hesitation.
“She would have once,” Valgerth added. “Now? The way she is now? I don’t know. And, besides, she has Guthrun and her mission to think about first.”
“Yes,” Huld agreed, her hope fading. “And what could she do, anyway? One woman, even a Hel-warrior, against all of Dvalin’s Folk? Her Witch-powers will be as useless as mine within Dvalin’s realm, and—”
“She will try,” Thorfinn cut in angrily, “if she can. Curse you both! We’re alive! And while we breathe there is always a chance that we’ll get free, even if we have to make that chance ourselves, we—” His voice trailed away at the sound of many approaching footsteps.
The rich, musty scent of newly turned earth filled the air. “Freya!” Huld cried as strong hands grasped her feet, thighs, waist, shoulders, and lifted her into the air.
Moments later Valgerth and Thorfinn found themselves lifted too.
Twisting and struggling and cursing in their silent captors’ arms, the three were carried away.
* * *
As Bloodsong moved steadily deeper into Dvalin’s Burrow, her sensation of being watched grew stronger. Soon the sunlight spilling through the entrance was lost in the distance behind, and she was walking through total darkness.
She held herself tensed, straining with her darkness-trained senses for a sound, a smell, some indication of an approaching attacker, and each time her mind flitted to the hopelessness of what she had undertaken, she ruthlessly pushed away the distracting, weakening thoughts.
She moved forward slowly, careful in the darkness not to step off a ledge or into a pit designed to trap trespassers. The floor of the cave angled downward into the Earth. The incline grew steadily steeper. She thought of Hel’s realm, of descending into Helheim’s icy darkness, thought of the six years she had spent there, suddenly felt more sure of herself, more at home in the darkness of the Burrow.
The pathway narrowed. She could now feel stone walls with her outstretched arms, the rocks icy through the leather of her gloves. The ceiling lowered until she was moving crouched through a twisting, downward-angled tunnel. She slipped on the rocks, caught herself, felt cold water seeping from the wet stones.
Bloodsong moved forward again, no longer worried about attacks from either side while the tunnel walls pressed closely, hesitating each time she felt openings in the walls, ready to use her sword if need be as she passed them by.
After a long while she stopped, stilled her breathing, and listened. Faintly in the distance she could hear a sound, as of hammers striking anvils, no doubt the Dwarfs at work in their smithy. She moved forward once more.
When an even longer time had passed, Bloodsong stopped again. The tunnel had widened. She could no longer touch both walls at once, and the ceiling had risen so that she could stand without crouching.
Stretching her cramped back muscles, she allowed herself a moment of rest. The sound of the Dwarfish hammering had become fainter.
They don’t need to attack me, she suddenly thought. All they have to do is leave me to walk lost in darkness until lack of food and water take their toll and I—
“No!” she cried, cutting off the traitorous thoughts. Her voice echoed back at her from every side. Anger flared.
She started forward again, feeling her way along the wall with her left hand, her sword ready in her right.
After a longer time, it became a struggle to concentrate, to keep her thoughts steady, and to remain alert for danger. Sleep pulled at her, beckoned her to rest. Once she nearly stepped into empty space and caught herself only barely in time, skirting the edge of a pit. She moved onward once more.
The air became warmer. The floor leveled. She kept moving. Then, far ahead, faint in the distance, there was a flickering, crimson light, brightening as she neared.
Her muscles tensed for battle.
The light was soon bright enough to reveal a vast cavern around her, distant ceiling lost in blackness, the jagged walls arching upward, dark passageways leading off in all directions. The flickering light was coming from a square-cut opening in the wall.
Slowly, silently, Bloodsong approached the lighted opening. She pressed herself flat against the wall just beyond the portal and scanned the cavern through which she’d come. She still saw no danger, no movement. No sound came from beyond the lighted portal, but the scent of newly turned earth was thick in the air.
She quietly unstrapped her shield from her back, held it and her sword ready, drew a deep breath, and cautiously edged sideways toward the opening.
Her vision blurred, dimmed. Strength left her muscles. Sword and shield clattered to the rocky floor. Her legs folded beneath her, and darkness cloaked her consciousness as unnatural sleep pulled her down into oblivion.
* * *
Bloodsong’s awareness returned in patches. She could not move, could not speak. Struggle a
s she might, she could not break through to complete consciousness. She wondered what was real and what but dreams.
She felt herself being carried. Strong hands gripped her ankles, knees, waist, and shoulders. The scent of earth was still heavy. A fluttering of her eyelids revealed nothing but darkness. The air felt colder again. Occasionally she would hear a muffled laugh nearby. The sound of hammers striking anvils came and went several times, making her think that there must be numerous Dwarfish smithies secreted within Dvalin’s Burrow.
In time, she felt herself placed upon her back, rocks beneath her, and heard footsteps receding into the distance.
She fluttered her eyelids open for a moment, saw pinpoints of sparkling light far overhead, glittering specks of white, like diamonds embedded in a dark-roofed cavern. Or like stars? The air was icy now. From somewhere far away came the sound of howling wolves.
Outside! she thought. I’m outside!
She fought to move, failed again, was pulled down into sleep once more.
* * *
Thorfinn opened his eyes and closed them quickly with a curse, nearly blinded by the light. He raised a hand to shield his eyes, opened them again, only to realize he was no longer tied. He was outside the cave. The light was sunlight.
Nearby lay Huld and Valgerth, also unbound, sleeping. Beyond them stood their horses, all four of them. But of Bloodsong there was no sign.
Valgerth opened her eyes a moment before Thorfinn reached her. She, too, cursed at the light.
“We’re outside!” Thorfinn told her, grinning. She took his offered hand and stood up, looking confused.
“So, we’re back where we were?” she asked.
“So it seems,” Thorfinn agreed.
Both looked up at the cliff towering overhead. The arched entrance to the cave yawned darkly.
“I’m not sure,” Valgerth said. “I could but barely glimpse it in the moonlight, but it looks different somehow.”
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