Sally sighed heavily and looked down at her pack. “This is just great,” she muttered to the dirt. “My one real friend, and Frigga has to go and ruin it.”
Sally kicked the side of her backpack and heard the jars inside clink against each other.
When Sally approached the stark border where the dust and dry grass of the open field met the cool humidity of the woods, she found Frigga chatting with the newly arrived guides. Opal, still wearing her overstuffed backpack, leaned against a tree and laughed at a joke Sally had missed.
Their guides were a tall, skinny man and a short, rounded woman, both sporting long, black hair and deeply tanned skin. Looking them over, Sally wondered if faded blue jeans, flannel work shirts, and beat-up boots were some kind of native guide dress code. Freya was nowhere in sight.
Sally glanced at the sweat lodge a few yards away. Wisps of smoke rose from beneath the layered deerskins. She was curious about what was going on inside, and she pondered whether she might have enjoyed the sweat more than the hot spring soak and subsequent witch spat. A bunch of sweaty men probably smelled better than the mineral pool, too.
Frigga was suddenly at Sally’s side, gesturing her toward the edge of the forest where Opal stood with the guides. “You go get acquainted. I’ll fetch the boys.”
Sally made her way toward the others but kept her eyes on the lodge. When Frigga threw open the animal-skin covering, a thick cloud of smoky steam and a ruckus of surprised shouts issued from within. Frigga coughed and waved the steam out of her face. “Just thought you’d like to know that your guide has arrived, dear. So, whenever you’re ready . . .”
Frigga dropped the skin back into place and wrinkled her nose. “Awfully fragrant in there.”
The guides mirrored the goddess’s smile. Sally thought the effect was kind of creepy, like those ghost girls from The Shining.
“Wouldn’t be a proper sweat otherwise,” the woman chuckled.
Thor emerged from the deerskin dome and pulled his damp towel tighter around his thick waist when he spotted Opal and Sally. In all the varied rages Sally had seen the thunder god fly into, she had never seen his skin quite the same shade of burning pink his entire body was flushing now. But instead of his usual growl, Thor offered a respectful nod to the group beneath the trees and then strode purposefully to the back of Heimdall’s pick-up truck to retrieve his clothes.
Sally felt the eyes of the female guide boring into her. She turned to find the woman grinning at her in obvious expectation. Sally tried to smile back, and then looked away.
Thor stood behind Heimdall’s truck and slipped on his underwear and blue jeans beneath his sweat-drenched towel before letting the sopping terrycloth drop to the dirt.
“Was it everything you hoped it would be?” Heimdall reached into the bed of his pick-up for his clothes and pulled a t-shirt over his head.
“Am I purified now? I definitely lost a few pounds.” Thor pulled on a long-sleeved, hooded sweatshirt. After roasting alive inside the sweat lodge, he was now shivering in the early June air. He grabbed a medium-sized backpack from the truck bed and hoisted it onto one shoulder. Not sure what he was supposed to take with him on a vision quest, he’d packed a knife and a couple of water bottles. Odin had already confiscated all of the beef jerky, candy bars, and canned beans he’d stowed away. Apparently, Thor wasn’t supposed to eat anything for the next four days. He wasn’t keen on the idea.
He was already hungry—a queasy kind of hunger, thanks to overheating in the sweat lodge. He’d normally be cranky, swearing up and down, and kicking at the dirt. Actually, he was cranky, but he was making an effort to keep it under wraps.
The sweat had left him red all over, though Thor figured it was just as likely that he’d broken out in a head-to-toe rash from struggling with his temper. Despite his recent experiments with mindful breathing, calming mantras, and even thoughts of Bonnie in her wedding dress, he was on a perpetual medium simmer. He kept his eyes down, certain that one wrong look from his mother or Rod would send him boiling over.
If only he’d stuck one of the candy bars in his pants pocket. Thor groaned as he lifted his ridiculously light backpack. With his food supplies confiscated, he was carrying only a couple of pairs of underwear, socks, an extra shirt, a toothbrush, and a ballpoint pen and blank journal—in case he wanted to record his thoughts or compose poetry while he was exploring the wilderness. Freya’s idea. Thor thought the chances of his waxing lyrical while his belly grumbled were slim.
Thor followed Heimdall over to meet the guides, then frowned when he took stock of the company. “I thought our cousin would be here to see me off?”
The short, native woman caught his eye and smiled. “She is detained with other matters.” Her voice was rigid and her words clipped. “But we are your appointed guides.” She held her hand out to him, and her grip was firm and warm. “Half-Moon Coppertree. You can call me Moon.”
“Moon,” Thor repeated her name as she withdrew her hand. “Nice.”
“I will lead the young ladies into the wilderness.” She nodded at Opal and Sally.
The tall, skinny man took a step toward Thor. “Hugh.”
Thor looked him up and down. A stiff breeze could have knocked the man over. “That’s it? Hugh?”
The man’s face broke into a broad, toothy grin. “Well, Hubert Black Feather, if you want to be formal.”
“Okay. Hugh.” Thor dropped his pack onto the ground. “Anything I should know before we get started?”
Hugh looked at Thor’s pack. “You got any food in there?”
“Why? You hungry?” Thor cracked a smile, but no one else seemed amused. His stomach grumbled, and he cleared his throat to hide the noise. “No food. That’s the rule, right?”
“One of ‘em, anyway.” Hugh looked Thor directly in the eye, and something cold in the man’s black-eyed stare sent a shiver down Thor’s spine. He shrugged inside his hoodie, still trying to adjust to the cool air outside the sweat lodge.
“You got a knife?” Hugh asked.
“Yeah.”
“Let’s see it.”
Thor crouched down and unzipped one of his pack’s exterior pockets. He pulled out a large knife in a simple leather sheath that was older than most of the surrounding trees. Thor held it out for Hugh’s visual inspection, and he bristled when Hugh grabbed it out of his hands.
Hugh pulled the blade out of its sheath and lifted it to the sun to judge its edge. He spun the knife in one hand and then the other. “Nice weight.” He shoved the blade back into its sheath and handed it back to Thor.
Thor stooped to return the blade to his pack, but Hugh nudged the backpack away with the toe of one of his worn boots.
“Leave the rest,” Hugh said. “Knife’s all you need.”
Thor frowned. The man was tall, but not as tall as Thor or even Heimdall. He was wiry and looked almost fragile. Despite the broad grin, the way Hugh sucked in his cheeks had Thor wondering if he might be missing some of his back teeth.
“Not even a water bottle?” Thor asked, incredulous. “Or dry socks?”
Hugh offered a wry smile. “Everything you need’s in the woods, son. Let’s go.” Hugh turned softly on his heel and strode into the woods.
Thor stared after Hugh until he had nearly disappeared in the trees. Thor looked quickly to his parents for direction. Frigga gestured toward the forest.
“Wait!” Thor called. “I’m coming!” He gave his abandoned pack a last glance, then took off into the woods at a fast jog.
Seconds after Thor departed, Moon turned to Sally and Opal. “So, young ladies.” She nodded toward their backpacks. “I see you have prepared well for your journey.”
“I have a knife,” Sally volunteered. She was really hoping Moon wouldn’t make her leave her backpack behind.
“I do, too,” Opal added quickly. “And water bottles, and camping food, and a sleeping bag, and my journal, and—”
Moon held up a hand. “That all sounds fine.” She l
ooked at Sally. “You’re sure you’ve packed everything you need?”
Sally stared back at her and tried to shake the eerie feeling that she was about to star in her own personalized disaster movie. She really wished Freya was there.
“Sally,” Frigga prompted.
“Uh, yeah.” Sally looked into Moon’s dark hazel eyes and tried to figure out what the guide was up to, but Moon’s expression was steady and unreadable. “I think I’ve got everything.”
“Good,” Moon announced with a satisfied nod. “Anything we don’t have already, we can find along the trail.” Moon gestured toward the forest. “Shall we begin?”
“Don’t you have a pack?” Opal asked.
Moon tapped her right temple. “Everything I need is right here,” she said with a wink, then turned and led the way into the woods. Sally and Opal fell in behind her, single-file. They entered the woods a few yards from where Thor and Hugh had started, and then turned sharply away to travel a divergent path.
Loki lowered his binoculars and smiled. He’d hidden himself well, high on a ridge overlooking the field where Tim had built the sweat lodge for Thor and his groomsmen. No one had invited Loki into the sweat lodge with the other male members of Odin’s Lodge, but he hadn’t expected to be included.
These days, he was more of an outcast than he’d been in a good while. Not even Odin had reached out to him since the trouble in Ireland. Maybe the revelation of Loki’s ancient alliance with the pookas against the Vanir was the proverbial last straw. Although Odin and the rest of the Æsir had ultimately benefitted from Loki’s actions, Odin wasn’t too happy about being kept in the dark all these centuries.
To add to his transgressions, Loki had knowingly allowed Sally to be placed in grave danger. He didn’t speak up before she went abroad. He kept it to himself that Freya and Freyr were the grandchildren of the goddess Badbh, and that the twins had a claim to the Éireann throne if they wanted it. It didn’t matter that Freyr and Freya hadn’t volunteered this information themselves.
Instead, Loki had been conveniently elsewhere, as always.
Thor had long bellowed that he’d catch Loki in a lie one of these decades. This time he’d come close enough to satisfy himself that Loki should be expelled from the Lodge once and for all. Odin didn’t agree, not entirely. Technically, Loki hadn’t lied; he never did. But this time his mischievous tendency to withhold vital information was enough to earn him Odin’s cold shoulder.
That suited Loki just fine. If Thor wanted a schism, Loki was happy to provide a long one. Maybe he’d even take the Moon Witch with him.
Loki raised his binoculars again and watched Sally disappear into the woods. She trailed behind Opal and their guide. He couldn’t help the grin on his face. The Moon Witch needed to be tested, again and again. She’d needed to get a taste of the Vanir homeland in Ireland. She’d needed to get close to the Køjer Devils in Norway. Her kind of magick would stagnate if she was always being coddled. This Moon Witch’s power thrived on danger. She should get dirty and bloody, mess with forces beyond her control, and learn from the sometimes devastating experience of trial and error.
It had been too bad about her roommate, the silly girl who called herself “Tara” and went on about how only she was a true witch. Her sacrifice wasn’t Sally’s fault. And Sally had come through unscathed, at least physically. This little nature walk was simply the necessary next step along her magickal path.
It wasn’t a secret that Loki had a soft spot for Sally. He didn’t wish her to come to any true harm. But he would sit back and watch her leap into this crucible, no matter the result.
Acknowledgments
This book would not now be in your hands without the support and assistance of some important people. Just now over the hump in a planned five-volume series, I’d like to acknowledge the following:
Jeff Robinson at Scamper Labs for his amazing cover designs for this series. Jeff and I have been trading emails—and swapping manuscript feedback, political outrage, and relationship philosophies—ever since I accidentally sent him a message at the end of 1997. We still have yet to meet face-to-face.
My Black Pool beta readers: Tuffy Black, Rebecca Stefoff, Larkin Willis, Dale Ivan Smith, and Laurel J. Standley. Your eagerness to preview this volume helped me to push through distractions and other obstacles in order to get this done. Tuffy was also a pre-beta reader, slogging through each new section as I plowed through a massive rewrite, and Laurel sat across the coffee shop table from me nearly every Tuesday morning and asked, “So, how’s it coming?” Rebecca’s notes in particular were right on the money. You all helped me to make this a better book.
Terri Kleinberg, my go-to resource on all things witchy. Thanks for loaning me your copy of Janet & Stewart Farrar’s The Witches’ Goddess, and for brainstorming paranormal plot points with me.
The librarians at my local branch of the Washington County Library System—particularly Crystal, Heather, and Will—for fielding some very strange questions and not batting an eye at my odd research materials.
My favorite hang-out and writing spot, Maplewood Coffee & Tea—with special thanks to baristas Chelsea, Liz, and Krystal and proprietor Jo. You’ve always greeted me with a smile and given me a warm office-away-from-home, not to mention the amazing teas and savory pastries.
The members and officers of the Northwest Independent Writers Association. Yes, you made my life hell this year by appointing me Director of the NIWA Seal of Quality program, but I’ve also been inspired by how everyone in this group pushes each other to reach higher and do better.
The International Reporting Project, which named me a Fellow in the fall of 2011. My time in Ireland was spent running down sources for news stories on religious diversity in that country, but those five weeks based in Dublin also helped to shape and inform much of The Black Pool.
As always, Mike Volk, my alpha reader and the Valhalla series’ biggest and earliest cheerleader. Mike is honestly surprised I’m not yet rich and famous.
About the Author
Author photograph by Rachel Hadiashar.
Jennifer Willis is a writer and editor based in Portland, Oregon. In her non-fiction work, she specializes in topics related to sustainability, spirituality/religion, and living. Her articles have appeared in The Oregonian, The Christian Science Monitor, Salon.com, The Portland Tribune, The Writer, Ancestry Magazine, Skirt!, Vegetarian Times, Spirituality & Health, and other print and online publications at home and across the globe.
In fiction, she focuses on urban fantasy and playful mayhem.
This is her fourth novel, and the third volume in the Valhalla series. Her first book, rhythm, was released in 2001.
For more information . . .
@jenwillis
Jennifer-Willis-Writer-Editor
jennifer-willis.com
Also by Jennifer Willis
Rhythm
The Valhalla series
Valhalla
Iduna’s Apples
The Black Pool
Raven Quest
Mars Adventure Romance Series (M.A.R.S.)
Mars Ho!
Find the online Valhalla Glossary—including character names, places, and more—and news of future books at jennifer-willis.com.
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