1633880583 (F) (62 page)

She saw a cavern lit by self-luminous crystals in the primary colors, mixing to form every hue. Golden grassland filled the cavern floor.

In
Bison
went, rowing right down a frothing river, rushing toward a silver castle that made Gaunt think of vast drinking vessels, and daggers, and loot. She looked up at a dim, misty sky, for the cavern was huge enough to form clouds.

“Is this the place you remember?” Bone asked Innocence.

When Innocence didn’t reply Gaunt touched her son’s shoulder, wondering if she was really allowed to make such gestures, yet. He stared at her hand but didn’t shake it off. “Are you all right?”

“I’m . . . all right. Truly all right. The troll-sight has faded.” It was true. There was no green gleam in Innocence’s eye. “Skrymir can’t see through my eyes or hear my speech. Tell me, what is our quest? This may not last.”

The other questers shared a look, and Gaunt nodded. It was Malin who said, “We are going to destroy Skrymir’s heart.”

“I sense where it is,” Deadfall said. “Or rather, I did. We will have to return to our world to find it.”

“All right,” Innocence said. “I’ll still help you. I like being free of Skrymir. I am my own master. Or I wish to be. . . .” He hung his head, shook it as if pushing through cobwebs.

“What is it?” Gaunt asked.

“
Naglfar
, if that’s what it truly was, was hard to see. In my troll-sight it was beautiful. But it made me sick. Freidar and Nan were kind to me. And Cairn . . .”

“Who is she?” Bone asked. “Gaunt’s met her too, but I do not understand what she is or what she wants.”

“She claims to serve the Vindir. I don’t know why she has an interest in me.” He hesitated. “She once posed the question, of what should you ask your future self.”

“We have more immediate questions,” Gaunt said. “Look.”

Riding up to them on smoky gray horses were a dozen warriors in translucent armor. They were what Gaunt’s own folk called “delven,” with translucent skin and organs beneath the armor. Ropes were thrown to
Bison
, and the riders’ leader called out, “Humans! Tie off these lines and be taken to the castle of Sølvlyss. Else you will fight us.”

“Go along with it,” Erik commanded.

The riders brought
Bison
to the castle, and waiting for them were two mismatched figures. One was a short, wizened gray-skinned man in a brown robe and a wide-brimmed straw hat, who said, “Welcome, foamreavers! I am Earl Morksol, and this is my daughter—”

“Inga!” called out Malin.

Earl Morksol frowned. “Alfhild. Her name is Alfhild.”

The second figure was the spitting image of Inga, if Inga had been shorter, slighter, less powerfully muscled. She wore a colorful bunad—a peasant dress—of red and blue.

“You are the girl who was taken,” Gaunt said, “when the changeling Inga was left behind.”

“Ah!” said the earl. “You know the troll-scion who was offered up, so I might claim a human as my daughter.”

Malin said, “But you are not trolls.”

“Indeed not! But we had a threefold arrangement with Skrymir Hollowheart. I gave him my daughter to be his foundling. She was before the age of Shaping, and so she took on troll-aspect. Her name is now Rubblewrack. Meanwhile Skrymir gave his daughter to the humans, and we took theirs.”

Malin said, “Inga . . . Inga is Skrymir’s daughter?”

“Yes,” said the earl. “I believe I said that. The important thing is that you are wrong. My daughter is Alfhild. Not Inga.”

“Hello, Alfhild,” said Malin. “I have a friend who would like to meet you.”

“You mean Innocence Gaunt?” snapped Alfhild. “He can’t have me. He spurned me once, and I do not forgive.”

“Ah,” said Innocence in obvious mock sadness. “Well, that is as it may be. Our errand was fruitless. May we be gone?”

“Hold on now,” said Morksol. “You’ve eaten of our food, lad. Maybe just a little, maybe not-quite-willingly. But enough to make you feel at home here, is it not? You should remain in my service, Innocence Gaunt, whether or not Alfhild wants you.”

Gaunt saw worry in Innocence’s eyes, and she gripped his arm. “None will keep him captive, Earl Morksol. Never again. I swear this.”

“His mother, are you?” Morksol said. “And his father beside him too, eh? The familial bond in humans is strong. Perhaps because you’re so short-lived. But you both feel great guilt for reasons unclear to me. Love and guilt! Two curses I am luckily spared. You swear to defend him?”

“We do,” Bone said. “We will never be lost to each other again, except by death or his own choice.”

Alfhild stared at them.

Morksol said, “So be it. But hear my rede. Your son will never feel fully at home, anywhere. The road will always call to him.”

“I am familiar with that feeling,” Bone said.

“You are a traveler, I see. Tell me your tales, then. We’ve heard much about the outside world since your son’s visit piqued our interest. We know he’s not the Runethane, for a Runemarked Queen has arisen.”

“Does she live?” Innocence asked, and Alfhild frowned at him.

“Last we heard, yes, though time is strange in your world,” said Morksol.

“We must find her,” Innocence said.

“We have our own task, lad,” Erik said.

“You need to be free of Skrymir,” Gaunt whispered in his ear. He nodded.

Alfhild said, “Father, if they are to pass, then a suitable man must be left here to be my plaything.” She searched the crew and pointed at Katta. “Perhaps that one.”

Katta bowed, but he said, “I think I would disappoint.”

Alfhild looked at Northwing. “You are interesting,” she said.

Northwing laughed. “I would disappoint in a very different way.”

“You people perplex me,” Alfhild said. Searching the crew, her gaze settled upon Erik Glint. “You are old, but you might do.”

“I am mourning a lost love,” Erik said.

“He means my late wife,” said Yngvarr.

“She did nothing to dishonor you,” said Erik, “nor did I. Our love lived only in the days before she met you.”

“Excuse me?” said Alfhild. “Why do you talk about this dead woman when I am here?”

Bone coughed. “Survival? Eh?”

Erik seemed to ignore him. “You do seem magnificent, Princess Alfhild. An exquisite beauty with a commanding mind.”

“Yes?” she said. “And?”

“And rather spoiled. But you might grow out of it. I have a proposal.”

“You are rather forward.”

“It is not, perhaps, what you expect. Travel with us. See the world we mere humans struggle and toil within. Judge me the best way you can, by my craft and my courage. And I will see how you fare. We might come to approve of each other. Either way, we will have learned something.”

“The insolence!”

Erik shrugged. “If you are afraid . . .”

“I fear nothing. Father, I shall travel aboard this ship of fools for a time.”

“Daughter,” said Earl Morksol. “I knew a time like this would come, when you were tempted to leave our domain and see the world of your birth. But I did not wish it to be a time of war. There are ice-gems to be savored and circlets of stolen sunlight, garlands of smoke and brooches of ash. The Whispering Games have yet to commence, the Ceremony of Blazing Frost only a cycle distant. I beg you to defer suitors for a time, and stay.”

Alfhild blinked and lowered her head. “If I were uldra I would obey, Father. But I am human, and perhaps it is fitting I see my homeworld in a time of war.”

“Then go, and begone from my sight. I will welcome you when you are wiser. You will have no help in the going, however.”

Alfhild stepped aboard
Bison
, and Innocence pointed to the great rock around the far side of the moat, whence a stream emerged.

“We are rowing into that?” Erik asked.

“Into the portal I will make,” Innocence said, adding, “I hope” in a voice only Gaunt could hear.

Leaping Bison
’s men threw off the lines and rowed past the stunned warriors on the shore, moving around the strange moat toward the mass of rock from which streamed the peculiar river. As they neared it, Earl Morksol appeared to take leave of his senses, or perhaps find them again. He screeched, “Stop them! Rescue Alfhild! Kill them all!”

Arrows were loosed, and men died from the elf-shot. Gaunt and Bone tried to shield Innocence with their bodies as he raised his arm and a bright light appeared in front of them, a swirling illumination with a ghostly, bleak plain lying at the center of it.

Bison
plunged through.

CHAPTER 36

QUEENS

Joy’s company flew into the mountains of central Svardmark, seeking shelter and a means of defying Jewelwolf. Among the remote villages and forests they heard rumors that Princess Corinna fought on, aided by a mysterious Man in Black.

At first she doubted these stories, as they often included tales of a Runemarked Queen who battled Karvaks and walking corpses, who could destroy trolls with a kick, and who could fly. But Snow Pine pointed out to Joy, “There’s something to those stories. We may find Corinna and Walking Stick out there too.”

So they traced stories as though they were Spring Festival ribbons, moving up into the highlands.

Descending beside a familiar, burnt-out dairy, they encountered bandits by way of a sudden blast of air.

The wind moaned and lashed at them, throwing them toward a granite cliff-face.

“Haboob!” Haytham called. “We need to descend!”

“I know, O Mighty Changeable Inventor!” called the efrit. “You may be a man of shifting loyalties, but I am the polestar of your journeys, the one you may bellow at without fear! I will diminish our height as best I can!”

“Less talk! Less altitude as well!”

“Know that I will mourn your every toenail, cherish every jot in your manuscripts, speak well of you to the women who love you.”

“Which women do you speak of?”

“A little focus, man,” scoffed Flint.

“You’re one to talk,” said Snow Pine.

Grownups
.
Always finding time to bicker. And to talk about sex at ridiculous moments. Someone has to act.
Joy felt the cold wind and behind it some entity directing it. She took exception to that.

She allowed herself to feel anger, raised her Runemarked hand, and willed a blast of heat to shred the cold wind.

The attacking weather died away.

The balloon came gently to rest, merely scraping against the cliff. The craft dropped as Haboob eased his fire.

Joy studied the snows beneath them, searching for the reason for the wind. Snow Pine and Flint peered beside her. “Well done,” Snow Pine observed.

“Thank you, Mother.”

“It seems wisest to stay on your good side, daughter.”

“I was raised to believe in filial piety.”

“So was I,” Snow Pine said. “That didn’t stop me from running away from home.”

“Well,” Joy said, “I seem to have done that already.”

“Ha.”

Flint said, “I see something in the woods, yonder.”

“Your treasure hunter eyes at work?” Snow Pine said.

“Or my interest in self-preservation. There’s a group of Kantenings in there.”

Joy peered across the white fields toward the piney woods and did indeed see a group of men and women, thick-haired horses among them.

The balloon thudded to the ground beside a waterfall and the stream it birthed. “We had better make contact,” Flint said. “Be careful, however! These are people of savage temperament in a time of tumult. And let’s be honest, this land
is
a bit primitive. They may react with violence.”

Flint’s words seemed reasonable, and yet thinking of the Kantenings Joy had fought beside, she felt guilty dismissing them as primitive. She said, “Let’s approach with hands open. I want them to see the Runemark.”

“Hands open,” Snow Pine said, “but weapons nearby. Haytham—”

“I know,” said the inventor. “Guard the balloon.”

Joy, Snow Pine, and Flint stepped out of the gondola. “You follow me and Flint,” Snow Pine began, but Joy cut her off.

“I am the Runethane.” Joy led the way.

As they passed the burnt-out dairy, there came a pounding from within the ruin, and a tinkle of laughter.

“Someone’s in there,” Snow Pine said.

“They can see us, certainly,” Flint said, “but I can’t see them.”

Joy peered inside.

Immediately there burst out three beings who appeared to be young Kantening women dressed for a summer fair. Each had cow’s tails. They were talking simultaneously.

“It’s too early—this house is ours!”

“Come back in spring!”

“We don’t want
you
in any case, girl!”

Joy supposed the open-handed gesture was worth a try.

The girls gasped.

“Is she the Runethane?”

“Isn’t that supposed to be a boy?”

“She looks strange.”

Joy said, “I am the Runemarked Queen. Who are you?”

“We are uldra,” said one of the girls. “This place was occupied by a hay-troll, but he left. Maybe he joined the great troll army. Anyway, it’s not yet spring, so humans don’t belong up here, Runemarked Queen, if such you are.”

“I broke your control of the weather, if you doubt me.”

“It wasn’t our control of the weather, human.”

The Kantenings were approaching on skis. Their leader was a boy who skied with a heavy pouch around his neck. She wondered at his intent, but the uldra seemed sure of it. “He comes to drive us out with salmebok and steel,” said the girl who’d spoken earlier. “Let us destroy him!”

Joy knew her loyalties. Yet something made her say, “I am the Runemarked Queen. I might be able to talk them out of it. I might be able to banish you myself. What can you give me to help you?”

One of the uldra hissed and attacked. Out of nowhere she plucked a sword forged of impossibly thin filaments, like a silver labyrinth or a platinum spider’s web.

Joy leapt and kicked the sword from the wielder’s hand. Next she hit the uldra with the flat of her Runemarked palm. Unseen power flowed forth and knocked the uldra back into her fellows, toppling them into the derelict structure.