We fell from the æther with a bone-crunching suddenness. I squeaked, and Thorin grunted.
“I’ve got you.” He held me steady until the room stopped swirling and my stomach settled.
After peeling open one eye, I peeked at my surroundings: dark stone floors, timber beams crisscrossing a high ceiling, colorful, plush carpets, a massive rock fireplace, sturdy furniture that invited visitors to sit but still managed to look regal. An artwork collection from innumerable periods, regions, and styles hung in a hodgepodge on the wall behind Thorin. And everywhere books, books, and more books. The style was eclectic, just like its owner.
Welcome back to New Breidablick.
I let go of Thorin, stepped back, and let loose a jaw-popping yawn. I groaned. “Why do I think going to sleep won’t be easy?”
“I’m sure you’re as anxious to hear from Skyla and Baldur as I am.”
“Val wants something from us, from you. Until I know what it is, I won’t be able to really relax.”
He nodded and took my hand. Still, no flashes of insight, no visions—he had respected my request to keep his mental walls raised. He towed me down the hall and stopped us in the doorway to the bedroom Baldur had assigned me. The huge bed beckoned. Its mountains of pillows and filmy curtains promised to lull me into a deep and restorative sleep.
“Try to get some rest,” he said. “Not just for yourself, but for me.”
I arched an eyebrow. “For you?”
“I’ll put myself in harm’s way for you without batting an eye, but I’d feel a lot better knowing you weren’t completely defenseless. Sleep, restore your fire, recover your strength. Then when the time comes”—he winked—“you’ll be ready, and I won’t have to save the world all by myself.”
I chuckled. “But you could, right?”
“I wouldn’t even break a sweat.”
“Promise you’ll wake me up if something happens.”
He squeezed my hand and let go. “I promise.”
Thorin closed the door behind him as he left. I crossed the room, drew back the thick down comforter, shoved aside a mountain of pillows, and climbed in. But of course I couldn’t fall asleep. My mind dwelled on the moral quandaries of Nate and Val. Like a movie camera, my memories focused on Nate’s face—close-up shots emphasizing the proud tilt in his jaw, the clarity in his eyes. No insanity there, only conviction.
I had participated in Nate’s death, and while I hadn’t drawn the blade across his neck, I couldn’t say I hadn’t known the outcome of that meeting. As if Thorin would have let Nate live if the Valkyries hadn’t finished him off. As if I hadn’t wanted to kill him myself for what he had done to my brother. But the Aesir had killed Narfi—Nate’s father and Val’s brother. The gods had used Narfi’s death as a tool to torture Loki as punishment for his hand in killing Baldur. But Narfi had been an innocent, as much of an innocent as my brother. Were Val and Nate not due as much vengeance as I?
Justice. Revenge. Two sides of a thin coin.
Everyone’s offenses against each other and claims to righteousness seemed equivalent on their surfaces, equally valued, equally conflicting. Did anyone’s pain truly take priority over another’s? Was anyone’s anguish purer? And when a situation called for a clear, quick decision, would I act, or would my empathy make me hesitate? Hesitation was deadly.
I gritted my teeth and groaned. Although my bones and muscles felt as though they had gained an extra hundred pounds, and my eyelids rasped like sandpaper every time I blinked, sleep remained elusive. Instead of drowning in useless, circular worrying, I rolled out of bed and crossed the room on tiptoes, trying not to alert anyone to my movements. If I’m going to be awake, might as well do something useful.
Thorin would probably lecture me about the dangers of exhaustion if he found me traipsing around the house, and I wanted to avoid explaining my actions, at least until I had something worth explaining. Investigating ancient Norse shaman practices sounded like a stupid idea when I ran it through my common-sense filter, but I had no other leads to follow.
I drew open the bedroom door and stepped into the hallway, ears tuned for voices or movement. During my previous, short visit, I had seen Nina using a tablet computer, and she kept it stashed in a desk in the living room. And who knew? Maybe Baldur had an Encyclopedia of the Völva on one of his ubiquitous bookshelves.
The plush rugs underfoot dampened my footsteps, and Baldur’s house remained quiet as I prowled. I found Nina’s tablet in a bottom desk drawer, and as it powered on and booted up, I sank onto Baldur’s sofa and curled up beneath a warm chenille throw. If Nina has a passcode on this thing, I’m screwed. But the tablet’s home screen came up without a log-in request, and I breathed a quiet sigh. Of course, a woman who openly admitted Helen Locke was her foster mother probably had nothing to hide.
This time, as I researched, the information sank in, and a little flame of hope flickered to life inside me. The term völva came from a Norse word meaning “wand carrier” or “carrier of a magic staff,” and they tended to be women. The term spákona was used almost interchangeably with völva, but it also seemed to refer more specifically to a woman with prophetic abilities—a seer. These women had their own saga in the Prose Edda, much the same as the Valkyries. And if the Valkyries are real, does that mean these women are? And if so, how do I go about finding them?
A quick search of the online white pages turned up nothing. No Vlva Union Local 113, Lake Tahoe branch. After skimming through another set of search results, I stumbled onto an online forum full of postings by academic types, arguing the minutiae of ancient religions. One thread discussed völvur mystical practices. With no better idea about how to make a connection, if such a connection existed, I registered for access to the message board under a fake name and left a note asking anyone familiar with ancient Norse shamanic practices to leave a note or call Thorin’s cell phone.
I read my message a few more times, snorted at the ridiculousness of it, and logged out. As much as I doubted the likelihood of finding them, I hoped if the völvur were real, perhaps they knew about the existence of the Aesir in this modern world. The mystical forces that brought me my visions might reach out to these seers on my behalf. Perhaps I had rung a cosmic doorbell. Now I had to wait for someone to answer.
My eyes felt as though they had rolled across a hot, dry desert. My tired brain begged for a reprieve, so I shut down Nina’s tablet, set it on Baldur’s coffee table, and snuggled deeper into my blanket. Sleep had evaded me before, but now it bloomed like a thick, viscous fog. I turned on my side, curled into a ball, and sank into the mists.
In darkness, the roar of rushing water drowned out everything. I stepped toward a distant pinprick of light. Rocky and uneven ground threatened to roll my ankles and challenged each step. I moved slowly, bracing a hand against the jagged wall beside me, and worked my way toward the light. The pinprick widened into the uneven, serrated mouth of a cave. Light diluted the darkness and revealed the rocky floors, walls, and ceiling of a massive cavern.
A river rushed beside me, pouring out from the cave mouth, cascading down a series of stone steps, and pooling into a rock basin several yards below. Silver scales flashed in the sunlight as a fish jumped and landed with a splash. The fish darted away downstream and disappeared.
I headed for the light, but before I reached the exit, someone called to me from within the cave. His hollow voice echoed against the walls. “Solina?”
Spinning on my heel, I lurched into the cave, chasing the familiar voice through that unfamiliar, dark space. A cold finger of ice stroked my spine, and a chill settled over my shoulders like a shawl made from frost. “Dad? Is that you?”
Relentless and driven, I searched that cave, following its endless twisting corridors, but I never found him. The dream faded away.
Chapter 7
Late in the afternoon, I stumbled into Baldur’s kitchen, groggy and famished. Coffee warmed in a pot on the counter, and Nina stood before the oven, back facing me. Her presence startled me, but I calmed myself. Can’t avoid her in her own house.
New Breidablick was her own house, although she hadn’t claimed it—although she couldn’t remember it. A sympathy pang tugged at my heart. Nina had warned me, not long ago, that she would throw me to the wolf if it worked in her favor, but she had also been kind to me while I was lost in a fog and grieving for Val. She had defied my icy disposition those first few days, bringing me coffee and microwaved bowls of canned chicken soup. She never mentioned Helen—never made a threat. In fact, she’d rarely said a word.
Baldur’s love and attention were healing her. I had to believe that.
I sniffed and recognized vanilla, brown sugar, citrus, and something else... something salty? Bitter?
“Muffins,” she said, as if reading my mind. She had pulled her dark hair into a neat knot, and she wore comfortable loungewear—a draping sweater and soft knit pants. Not invalid clothes, but close. She glanced at me over her shoulder. “Thorin said you might be hungry when you woke up, which is pretty thoughtful for a guy who doesn’t eat. None of them eat. Did you know that?”
So far she had mostly managed soup and simple sandwiches. Venturing into baking seemed like a big step, one for which I wasn’t sure she was ready. “You bake?”
“No, but I got bored, and it was something to do.”
I eased closer to the oven, still trying to discern the ingredients based on smell. Muffins were innocuous—easy to make, easy to screw up with too much mixing, subpar ingredients, old stale flour. The smallest thing made the difference between fluffy, moist perfection and dry, crumbly blech. I sniffed again. “Orange?” Orange and cranberry was a classic combination. Orange spice?
She grinned, her eyes lit up, and she nodded. “Orange zest.”
“And what else? I smell another ingredient.”
Her smile turned cagey. “It’s a secret.”
I arched an eyebrow. “Oh?”
“Maybe you’ll guess it.”
Mystery muffins, my favorite. I didn’t roll my eyes because Nina was being nice and not too crazy, and I wanted to encourage that behavior. Call it positive reinforcement.
“You were a baker, weren’t you?” she asked.
“When you talk about it in past tense like that...” I smiled sadly at her. “It’s like talking about someone who died.”
