Grim laughed again. “Soon, your name will be forgotten. It doesn’t matter to me. When did you last see my brother?”
Shrug. “Went to help Baldur find Nina.”
Grim snorted. “Baldur the Allfather, lovesick halfwit. But you don’t know where they went?”
Head shake.
“I’ve sent Helen word about my capture of you. As soon as I’m sure she’s taken the bait, I will end this suffering. It shouldn’t last much longer.”
I didn’t have the energy to cry. I shrugged and closed my eyes.
The apple seeds had sprouted. Two little green shoots reached toward the sky. I brushed my fingers over the tender green stalks, hoping to encourage their growth. My touch had no influence, though—not as it had on the mother tree—but that didn’t matter. Those two little signs of life in this long-dead place eased my heartache and emptiness. I ate as many apples from the mother tree as I could stuff in my stomach, and I buried seeds all about the burned-out building.
For what felt like hours, I planted, moving out from the house in concentric circles. I couldn’t rebuild the city, but I could build an orchard. By the time I had planted the seeds from all the apples I could eat, I had created a perimeter around the house, two rows deep. The sun was setting as I buried the last seed. My stomach groaned from overeating, and dried juice coated my fingers and wrists in a sticky film.
I returned to the yard outside my burnt house and eased down against the base of the mother tree. The grass beneath it had grown into a thick green carpet. In fact, anywhere I had planted a seed already showed signs of life. Little green patches dotted the yard, and only a few burned, dry places remained. Soon those would be gone, too.
I leaned back against the tree and stretched. I turned my face up to the sky and greeted the rising moon. “Hello, Mani. Long time, no see.”
The floor shuddered, and the cavern groaned and squealed. Ice splinters broke free and rained over me. The cave had come to life. During my last round of oblivion—I wouldn’t quite call it sleep—my fire had gone out. Normally, my heat melted the ice enough to keep me lying in a shallow, lukewarm puddle, but it had since frozen hard.
I sought my internal power source and found a small, burning ember. Not enough for a full flame, but much more than I’d expected, enough to combat the cold. But how…?
The apples.
The apples were the figment of a dream. Imagination. Hopeful thinking.
Is that all they are?
I didn’t know how they could be anything else. But the proof lay in the fire. Not the pitiful trickle borne of Grimm’s strange energy drink—the force inside me was stronger than that, but it wasn’t enough.
Not yet. But soon.
I sat in the grass at the base of my tree and stared at the big silver moon filling the sky. So close and huge, it pressed against the roof of the world as if reaching down for my touch. A breeze ruffled my hair. I lifted my face toward it, inhaling the scent of apples. Some of the fruit had fallen and sat bruised on the ground around me, skins split and heading fast toward rot, and the air smelled of cider. Time, in that place, moved in funny ways.
“Mani, what did we get ourselves into?”
The moon did not respond.
“You suspected you were something more than a simple man, didn’t you? And you were always so much more than just a brother to me. I guess that’s the curse of twins. When you died, I should have suspected something was up. Losing you shouldn’t have hurt that badly. It wasn’t normal. Even Mom and Dad could move on. They made you, gave birth to you, and they could let you go. Why not me? Why couldn’t I let go, Mani?”
In the solitude of that place, the slightest rustle equaled the explosion of thunder. The tree leaves brushing together and the percussion of approaching footsteps created an orchestra of noise. I sucked in a breath and held it. Had the wolf found me, even in this place? But the intruder wasn’t Skoll or Helen or Grim.
It wasn’t Mani either.
“When it comes to letting go, you haven’t been given much choice, unfortunately.” Aleksander Thorin stepped out from the orchard’s shadows, and the moonlight crowned his pale hair and molded him in quicksilver. “It was you who decided to track down the truth of your brother’s murder, but even if you hadn’t, this ordeal would have been foisted on you eventually.
“Also, you have yet to show you are the sort to run away from a challenge. That is not fate’s fault so much as an admirable and yet equally annoying facet of your character.”
I snorted. “Maybe Skoll could have done me the favor of killing me in my blissful ignorance rather than letting me die well informed but in much greater pain.”
“Die? You’re giving up already?”
“And let you off the hook? No, I don’t think so.”
Thorin grinned. “That’s good to know, because I was wondering whether I should waste my time coming to rescue you or not.”
I grimaced, rolled to my feet, and stood. “Maybe if you had come with me in the first place, I wouldn’t need rescuing. What are you doing here? I thought this was some happy place I made up in my head, but if that were true, then there’s no way I would have dreamed about you.”
Thorin’s eyes sparkled, and his grin widened. “Your subconscious disagrees with your ego. I think you want me rather badly.”
“I want to not die rather badly. If you can help me with that, then yes, I could see how it would appear I might desire your company.”
Stepping closer, Thorin peered into my face. His expression revealed genuine concern. “How are you doing, Sunshine? No bravado. Be honest with me.”
I shrugged. “I think I should be doing a lot worse than I am, actually.”
Thorin’s brow furrowed. “What do you mean?”
“I mean that it was Grim’s intention to keep me on the edge of death. But this place and these apples…” I motioned to the mother tree overhead. “I think if I had enough time, they might bring my fire back. But then what?”
“Knowing Grim, I suspect you don’t have much time. He intends to see you dead, Sunshine.”
