by J. L. Murray
Magda was shaking beside Eleni. “You vile scum,” she said. “I will kill you in the most painful way possible. I will weave a thread and make crows peck at your tender parts for centuries to come. I will make your flesh crawl with worms.”
“Now, now,” said Perun. “You promised. Safety.”
After some thought, Eleni led Perun through the dark to the only place she wanted him sleeping. She asked a middle aged woman with graying brown hair to bring several quilts and she led Perun through the gate. It was strange seeing her old prison now. She peered in through the hole she had made in the door the last time she had escaped. She pulled the hatch open with a loud creak and, putting her hands on either side of the door, melted the metal back into place. She looked at Perun.
“Here?” he said. He looked around at the darkness that was almost stifling. “This can't be safe. Put me in the village.”
“So you can try to kill me in my sleep?” said Eleni. “No. It was Magda's decision to help you, but I will say where you are kept. And I say you stay in here. We have lookouts at the top of the gate, and someone will come to check on you and bring you food. You will be safe.”
“You mean to keep me as a prisoner?” Perun said, surprised. Then he smiled. “You've changed, Zaric. I quite like the way your new mind works.”
“My name is Eleni. You would do well to remember that.”
“Of course,” he said. “I'm not going in there, though.”
“You will,” said Eleni. “If you want my protection, Magda's protection, you will stay here. I don't have time to hold your hand. Take your blankets and get in the box.”
Perun glared at her. He roughly pulled the blankets from the woman standing behind him. “I can kill you again, Zaric. Make no mistake.” He ducked under the low door and into the black darkness of the box.
“Perhaps,” said Eleni. “But right now you need my help.” She closed the hatch harder than was necessary and hoped it hurt his ears. Then she walked with the woman back into the village. The woman stole glances at Eleni as they walked.
Eleni returned to Iren's house to find Fin sitting at the table with Magda, a candle flickering dimly on their grave faces.
“Are you all right?” Eleni said.
“I'm fine,” he said. “I woke and tried to get out of the bed, and a girl came to help me. I heard Perun outside.” He winced as he shifted his weight on the chair.
“I'm sorry,” Eleni said.
“For what?”
“I injured you. I didn't mean to.”
“It was a battle,” Fin shrugged. “We're alive.”
“Can we focus on what's important?” Magda said testily.
Eleni sat down next to Fin. The necklace was on the table, radiating power, the little bolts inside latticing inside and casting a pale glow all around it.
“Why didn't I see it? Of course Perun made it,” said Magda. “I've been wearing my sister as a bauble for days. It makes me sick.”
“We all should have seen it,” Eleni said.
“How do we get her out?” said Fin.
“Perun claims not to know,” said Magda.
“So Danai is actually inside this little bubble?” said Eleni, picking up the necklace gingerly. “How?”
“It would take great magic,” said Magda. “Possibly from the same place they acquired the power that opens their chests. I should have asked Perun. But the urge to kill him was too strong. I couldn't look at him.”
“What has happened?” said Fin.
While Magda recounted events, Eleni peered inside the necklace. She rolled it in between her fingers. Magda was staring at her. “Please be careful, child,” she said, sounding nervous. Eleni looked at her.
“I know how to get her out,” Eleni said.
“How?” said Fin.
Fin and Magda stared at Eleni in horror as she raised the necklace above her head. Magda's mouth opened and closed like she wanted to scream at Eleni but no words came out. Fin shook his head. Eleni let the bauble fall, watching it sparkle through the air as it fell. A sound like stone shattering against stone rent the air dully in the small house.
“What have you done?” Magda finally croaked.
“Eleni,” Fin said, his voice a whisper. The necklace lay on the ground in tiny pieces of clear nothingness. A broken bubble.
Eleni held up a hand. “Wait,” she said.
There was a spark. Then another. Electricity bloomed from the broken necklace like a flower. Small at first, but with each pulse, the bloom grew bigger. Eleni could feel the power in her chest. It made it hard to breathe. The blossom of lightning became a round, glowing orb the size of a man's fist. It began to buzz and vibrate and, as the three of them watched, elongate.
“What is happening?” said Fin.
Magda only shook her head, watching the spot on the floor raptly. The orb had become longer and longer and seemed to be filling out into a shape. The light was too bright to look at without causing pain, but Eleni watched anyway. The glow grew longer and wider and fanned out, making a shape that was soon identifiable. A person. Eleni could make out arms and legs now. A head, feet, hands. Then the glow intensified and the body lifted off the ground, back arched.
And then the light screamed. Eleni realized it wasn't the light, though, but whoever was inside the light. She shielded her eyes. There was an odd, vibrating roll, like that of thunder, and then the light began to melt. It slid off the body underneath like melting ice and dissipated in the air. After what seemed like a lifetime, a young woman floated slowly to the floor, unmoving.
Eleni and Magda were next to her in an instant. Fin joined them, holding his side. The woman was naked and hairless. She was emaciated and pale, her ribs prominent and her eyes like the sockets of a skeleton. She had scorch marks all over her body, but as Eleni watched, these began to fade one by one.
“Danai,” said Magda. “My sister.” She was smiling and crying at the same time, tears streaming down her face. “Oh, dear girl. I've looked for you for so long.” She lifted her head from the floor and, sitting, placed it in her lap. “It's her,” Magda said, looking almost kind in her joy. “We found her.”
Suddenly they heard screams from beyond the cottage. Eleni leapt up to rush outside, but the cottage shook so violently that she nearly fell over. The door rattled as though from a strong wind. A flickering power buzzed and filled the air. Eleni recognized that feeling; the same buzzing she could feel down to her marrow when she was wearing the necklace. Eleni stepped away from the door just as it burst open with a blinding flash of light. She heard Magda cry out and she could see Fin dive to the floor, shielding his face. The light buzzed with electricity, then it was inside, sending waves of lightning around the room, barely missing Eleni. It stopped, hovering, and seeming to turn. Then, so fast it was a blur, it crashed into Danai, still unconscious on the floor. Her back arched as the jolts made her vibrate and twitch and she glowed with its power. Then she was still and the dim light of the lone candle returned.
Eleni looked at Fin, as shocked as she was. She looked at Magda, who looked like she was sobbing.
“What just happened?” said Eleni.
Magda looked up at her. “Perun is dead,” she said.
“How do you know?”
“Because he has just made Danai his vessel.”
Eleni looked at Danai, pitiful and hairless, but with her scorch-marks quickly fading. Her belly began to glow. Eleni looked at Fin who stared back at her. She forced herself to her feet and ran out the door. Women were running to the gate and looking out, their falxes in front of them. Another group was gathered round the ladder leading to the top of the wall where Eleni could see Iren standing alert, staring at something. She had an arrow notched in her bow, aiming it, Eleni gathered, toward the box.
“What is it?” Eleni asked the women around the ladder. “What has happened? Is he dead?”
The women shook their heads. A young boy looked up at her. “He was screaming,” he said with wide eyes.
“The lightning man was screaming.”
“Iren, what has happened?” Eleni called. Iren turned and looked down at her. Eleni could sense her fear. She looked back past the wall, as if making sure, then shouldered her bow and scurried down the ladder.
“It was my fault,” she said. “I looked away from the box just for a minute. There was lightning and thunder coming from my house. And when I looked back the man in the box started screaming. And then this glow exploded past, it just missed me. Then I shot the creature.”
“What did you shoot?” said Eleni.
Iren shook her head. “I don't know what it is called. But it killed the man you locked in the box.”
Eleni ran to the gate, Iren behind her. She made her way quickly to the box. The huge fur-covered body lay just beyond the hatch, unmoving on the ground with three arrows deep into its back. Eleni didn't need to turn it over all the way to know who—or what—it was. Its face was half turned and Eleni could see the fur and muscle burned off. It was the wolf-man that had survived the fire. The one given whispered instructions by Loki.
The door of the box had been ripped open. Eleni could smell the blood and electricity. She peered in, lighting a flame in the palm of her hand. There was hardly anything left of Perun. She saw a hand laying against the bloody quilts, guts decorating the floor from corner to corner. Half a ribcage with hardly any meat left on it. A chunk of hair connected to bloody scalp. Eleni tried to feel something as she looked at the carnage, but she felt nothing.
“I'm sorry,” Iren said tearfully.
“It's all right,” said Eleni. She gave the girl a tight smile. “You killed the beast that did this. Well done.”
Eleni walked heavily back to the cottage. The door had been blown completely off and lay outside on the ground. She strode across it and entered the house.
“Perun is dead,” she said.“Loki's grandson. The wolf creature tore him into little pieces. I think it ate most of him. Iren killed it.”
“Good girl,” said Fin.
Magda was still, her forehead to Danai's. She was stroking her sister's face. Danai opened her eyes. They were the same icy blue that Eleni remembered from her dream. Magda sat up and looked at her, her eyes red from crying. Danai sat up slowly and looked around at each of them slowly. Then, as if moving through water, her eyes moved down to her own body. Her own belly, which was still glowing and sparking with electricity.
“No,” she rasped. “It cannot be. Not after everything.”
Magda touched her and Danai flinched. “Sister, I'm so sorry,” Magda said. “I didn't know.”
Danai looked at her. “How could you?”
Eleni lifted Danai gently in her arms. She was so light. She weighed far less than a stag. She carried her to the next cottage and laid her gently on the cot where Eleni had been sleeping the past three days. Fin limped behind and waited outside the hut. Danai was asleep before Magda even pulled the quilt over her. They joined Fin outside.
“What now?” he said.
Magda shook her head. “We wait for her to heal.”
“Loki is trying to end the world,” said Eleni. “We don't have time to wait.”
Magda looked at her quickly. “The Fates heal fast, girl.”
Eleni sighed. “So we wait. Then what?”
“Then my sister follows the path Anja took. And we will follow her.”
“She can do that?” said Fin. “Even after all this time?”
“Time means nothing to the Sudice,” said Magda.
“Time means everything,” said Eleni. “We don't know how long we have. Loki said all he needs is darkness to start Ragnarok. What does that mean?”
Something flashed behind Magda's eyes. “It means,” she said gravely, “he's going to hunt the sun gods. If he needs darkness to start Ragnarok, he must put out the sun. If he takes the strongest, the weakest will fall. Daja was the weakest of the strong. He will surely be moving to stronger gods now.”
“What can we do?” said Fin.
“We should find Anja,” said Eleni. “If we find Anja before he has finished, the three Fates will be reunited and they can set things right.”
Magda nodded. “Yes. We should find Anja.”
“So we wait,” said Eleni. “And we follow Danai to find my mother. The last of the Fates.”
Fin frowned. “It can't be that simple.”
Magda laughed a joyless laugh. “It won't be simple, boy. The world is chaos. Nothing is simple.”
Eleni walked away, and looked up toward the mountains. She would be climbing those mountains soon. If she left she may never see her forest again. This village, once her prison, had now become a refuge for her and for all the mortal women in the Reiver camp. And the place where the once-great god of lightning met his temporary end.
But as she gazed at the deep snows of the pass, she wondered. Did Loki want Perun killed because he knew the secret of Loki's power, or to protect Eleni from a god who had already killed Zaric once, and wanted him dead for all time?
Magda was right. The world was chaos, and perhaps if the chaos ended, so would Eleni. Looking at the Reiver women, eating their fill now but still thin as saplings, Eleni wondered if mortals did poison the earth. The lightning god Perun infected everything around him with his thirst for power. Maybe Loki wasn't as mad as everyone said. Perhaps he had a point in ending all this fighting, all the bickering and blood and pain and cruelty, and starting a new world.
Eleni dismissed the idea with a shake of her head. She found herself standing at the gate, looking out at the world. She almost expected the she-wolf to come bounding toward her. Eleni felt cold and hollow when she remembered that Daja was dead, forever, her soul bound in the horn that Loki possessed.
Loki wasn't right. He had killed her only friend. When Fin finally limped over to join her, she allowed him to touch her shoulder.
“I want to burn him,” she said. “I want Loki to burn and scream for mercy. And then I want to kill him.”
Fin forced a thin smile. “We shall go into the fire smiling,” he said.
by J.L. Murray
The Other Side of the Desert
Between the Devil and the Deep Blue Sea
The Devil Is A Gentleman
Before The Devil Knows You're Dead
The Niki Slobodian Omnibus (Books 1-3)
For more about J.L. Murray, visit the author page.
