Fire and Lies (40 page)

“Bloodline?” Torunn asked. “Have you always had it then?”

“Her mother did,” Daggon said as Bergen and Rune bombarded him with questions. “It was strange that Kallan never developed the Sight.”

“How will Aaric’s hindrances affect her?” Rune asked, recalling Kallan’s explanation of Aaric siphoning her Seidr to block her memory when she was just a child.

“It may return over time to its full power,” Daggon said. “On the other hand, she may, forever, be hindered in that sense.” Daggon shook his head. “We won’t know until time has healed her of the damage done. On the other hand, we may never know. I know very little of this matter really. Who we need is Gudrun. She coul—”

His stomach clamped as Daggon suddenly lost his voice. Clamping his jaw, he looked to the fire, allowing the heat of the flames to dry the tears from his eyes.

“What of Lorlenalin?” Rune asked, changing the subject to ease his grief. “What condition did you find her in?”

Daggon sighed deeply as dark images rolled through his mind.

“There was almost no guard,” he said. “If the women and children of Lorlenalin were there, we didn’t see. Aaric used every abled and non-abled body for his army. Stripped the city of its citizens. Cooks. Key holders…” Daggon shook his head. “Everyone was gone. It was upon a happy chance that Joren found me there.”

Torunn watched the Seidr flow from Kallan’s palm into the runes.

“I thought Seidkonas always carried a Seidr staff.”

“You’re confusing me with the Iss Land Seidr Wielders,” Kallan said, too focused to smile at the mistake. “I never had a use for such hindrance.”

“And the runes?” Torunn asked as she peered down at the white powder.

The sharp stench of boiled herbs rose from the bowl of water above the flame.

“The runes only guide the Seidr.” Kallan snapped her wrist, disrupting the Seidr flow, and took up the Seidr-infused powder, pouring it into a bowl. “The words alone do nothing. The runes themselves are just runes. But both can be used together as a tool just like this grindstone. Together, we can reach a desired effect. A Seidr staff is usually etched with runes to allow better control over the Seidr.” Kallan averted her attention to Torunn. “I can use the runes to form a shield of Seidr that prevents the sleeping spell from reaching Rune and Bergen.”

“Couldn’t you use the runes to shield all of them?” Torunn asked.

“I could,” Kallan said as she gently punctured a single, small hole into the thick stem of red flower. “But the efforts would require so much of my concentration, I wouldn’t be free to fight. And with a Seidr User on the battlefield, I need to fight.”

Without further question, Torunn watched as Kallan collected the milky white substance that seeped from the stem. She soon extinguished the flame that heated the water and waited only a few more minutes before dropping a dried mushroom into the brew.

With practiced craft, Kallan worked through the early morning hours until she emerged from her sitting room clutching a small bag and smelling of herbs that lingered with a stale bite.

* * *

Kallan pushed open the door to Rune’s bower. She wasn’t surprised to see him without his tunic, clutching a pipe as he stared out across the river to the empty plains. Still clasping the bag of herbs, she came to stand beside him.

“You can almost hear it.” Rune spoke over the pipe.

Kallan looked out into the forests beyond the river where pillars of smoldering bodies lay. In the distance, she could hear it: the sound of the march. The subtle thunder of thousands shook the ground as the Dokkalfar marched to Gunir’s walls.

“They come,” Rune said.

“
D
ump him there,” Fand growled with Aaric’s voice to the guards hauling Aaric behind her at the edge of the Alfheim Wood. Aaric hit the ground a few feet from Fand, giving him sufficient view of the plains ahead as his guard remained vigilant.

Fand smiled over the painted mimic of Aaric’s shoulder as she gazed at him.

“No protest? Not even an attempt to escape?” she played.

Aaric started back at his face worn too well by Fand. “I won’t give you the pleasure.”

Fand frowned.

“You will watch, Drui, as I rip the heart from your precious princess,” she spat before turning to the battlefield, eager to begin the end as the Ljosalfar marched to join them.

Across the river Klarelfr, Bergen’s men marched with rekindled hope to the open plains of Alfheim that wrapped around Gunir’s bailey. The gray and white of the clouds loomed overhead, mingling with the vast blacks of the brewing storm. The ominous veil forced a heaviness in the air that added to the tension and enveloped the whole of the army.

Armor and sword clanked in time with the monotonous thunder of the warriors’ march across the scorched plains, past the piles of smoldering bodies. Rune waited with his men across the river to the barren fighting grounds north of Gunir. Upon arrival, Bergen broke from his battalion and rode on ahead to the circle of runes and Kallan kneeling on the ground in her red skirts.

With two fingers poised, she etched the final figure into the soil and completed the circle. She scrutinized each rune then stood, brushing the dirt from her skirts.

“How exactly does this work?” Bergen asked, expecting a lot more than a few squiggles drawn in the dirt. He studied the runes that formed a circle around a patch of earth. There was just room enough for three men to stand beside each other comfortably without feeling awkward.

“The runes are infused with Seidr,” Kallan said. “They’ll recognize the spell and guide it around you so it won’t touch you.”

Bergen raised a doubtful brow, antagonizing Kallan’s mood.

“Don’t stand within the circle and sleep the battle away, for all I care,” she grumped and spun on her heel before climbing onto Astrid. A moment later, she rode down the line of the archers. 

“I think I liked her better when she feared me,” Bergen muttered as Rune joined Bergen beside the ring. “Too much of that sounded like Gudrun.”

“What did you do?” Rune asked.

Dismissing Rune’s questions, Bergen entered the circle and silently debated the merit of Kallan’s Seidr as Rune too stepped into the circle. Bergen looked his brother up then down, assessing the mere inches of space between them.

“This is uncomfortably close,” Bergen said. “Are you sure two men will be enough?”

When Rune didn’t answer, he looked to Kallan, who returned from her assessment.

“Hey!” Bergen called. “Are you sure this is enough?”

“A small group, or any group, segregated from the army will tip Aaric off. Your instructions are clear,” she said firmly. “If you leave the circle before I finish administering the spell, you will pass into sleep with your men. Stay within the circle and you can fight.”

She pulled back on the reins, bringing Astrid to a halt as she flicked back a strand of hair over her shoulder. Kallan flashed Bergen a smirk.

“Of course, if you feel you can’t handle it, by all means, choose a handful of men to stand with you.”

Bergen and Rune exchanged glances.

“We can take him,” Bergen said, confidently.

Within view of the front, Aaric’s battalion lingered over the hillside with what little morning sun could break through the pending storm.

Outside the circle, at the back of the infantry, Roald threw back his head and downed the last of a mead he had brought with him.

“You’re a fool for standing here,” Rune said, catching a glimpse of the bandaged stub of his right shoulder.

Roald fired back a grin.

“I would shame my fathers if I didn’t fight while I still had a strong arm and two legs. Besides…” Roald widened his grin. “…your Dokkalfr insisted I take her damn apple with me.”

With vigor, Roald tucked his flagon under his stub, took up Kallan’s apple from a pocket, and bit into the fruit, nearly cleaving it in two.

“I feel great!” he proclaimed through a wet mouthful of Seidr.

“Everything is set,” Kallan said, looking down from her seat on Astrid. “We’ll wait for the advance to distract them then I will release the spell.”

Rune nodded once as the thunder of feet swept the plains from the far edge of the wood. He tightened his grip on his bow and released a short breath.

“I still say we should have the archers ready,” Bergen grumbled.

In the distance, the Dokkalfar ranks aligned, following the first of Aaric’s orders. The rows of Dokkalfar raised their bows.

“If Kallan’s spell goes well, those archers will join us,” Rune said.

Roald threw a grimace over his armless shoulder.

“Why am I not in the circle?”

Engaging his archers, Rune mirrored the command and cued the Ljosalfar to ready their spears. The air was thick and eerily still.

“Because,” Bergen said, keeping his eyes on Aaric seated upon his horse, “you’re too weak to keep up!”

The Ljosalfar’s battle cry filled the plains, drowning out Roald’s vulgarity as the Dokkalfar released their arrows from the forest’s edge, signaling Rune’s army to unleash their volley.

Raising her arms to the sky, Kallan muttered a charm and raised a canopy of Seidr. A blanket of opaque blue poured from Kallan’s hand as the Dokkalfar arrows plinked off Kallan’s ward that spilled down the whole of Rune’s army.

Rune waited between volleys and gave the command.

“Fly!” Rune cried and launched his spearmen out from under the protection of Kallan’s ward.

Their feet pounded the ground like thunder. With spears raised, they advanced, seeded with bloodlust to avenge their kin.

“Now!” Fand screamed in Aaric’s voice, sending the Dokkalfar charging into the plains to meet the Ljosalfar.

The air echoed with cries as Kallan withdrew the ward and took up handfuls of fine powder from her pouch. Bits of Seidr from the shield rained down in a show of gold and light.

“Now!” Rune shouted to Kallan and, at once, she released the Seidr.

Below her breath, she muttered, pulling on the threads of Seidr from the winds. Gently, a controlled breeze blew up into the mixture and released the tiny, white specs into the air. Her words carried the wind through the field, taking her spell with it as the clang of spears collided.

In a gradual wave that moved unnoticed, the warriors bore against their armaments as the weight of their weapons increased. Sluggishly, the Alfar wielded their swords and spears, burdened with an unnatural mass that slowed their movements until, too weak to stand, they began to collapse beneath their armor. A few surrendered their weapons as their bodies fell. Others dropped to a knee. Their eyes, too heavy to keep open, closed.

From atop Aaric’s horse, Fand stared, crunching Aaric’s brow into a wrinkled mass.

“The child has learned well,” Fand muttered, knowing too well the cause for her faltering army. “Let’s give it back, shall we?” Fand said, smirking at Aaric, who maintained his scowl. Snapping her hand high, Fand threw back the wind with Kallan’s spell and sent it soaring to a corner of the field where it dispersed, dropping everyone within its path. A gust of wind picked up and carried a piece of it toward Rune, Bergen, and Roald where it encompassed Kallan’s circle, but never entered it.

“What are you doing in here?” Bergen asked of Roald, who had subtly stepped behind the runes as the cloud of spell engulfed them.

Roald only grinned as realization blanketed Kallan’s face.

“He knows,” Kallan muttered.

Without warning, she sent Astrid into a full gallop behind the few Ljosalfar left standing to battle her brethren.

“Kallan!” Rune called, taking a step to follow, but Bergen dropped a heavy hand to Rune’s shoulder, holding back him within the circle. The spell had barely begun to disperse.

Forced to concede, Rune watched as Kallan exchanged a new flourish of words.

Pulling out a second handful of powder, the winds rose up and with it, her craft. At the end of the line, she pulled from the Seidr, forcing it through her and doubling it up. Willing the wind back, she gave a thrust, sending the spell back against Aaric.

Fand braced against the impact as heat flooded her chest. Extending an arm, she threw up a ward, shielding herself, Aaric, and his guard from Kallan’s spell. Fand’s glare hardened as she fixed her eyes on the queen. The spell dispersed and last of the warriors dropped, engulfing the plains in silence.

  Turning Astrid about, Kallan scanned the battlefield strewn with sleeping warriors. The cold winds burned her face with its chill as she panted deeply. She embraced the cold that churned her blood and balled her abhorrence into the mass of her Seidr. With the ring of her sword, Kallan extended her blade to the sky, let free her battle cry, and charged, inspiring Bergen, Rune, and Roald to abandon their circle and join in the hunt for Aaric’s demise.

Down against their spears, Rune swung
Gramm
, too angered to buckle against the weight of the spear. Beside him, Bergen allowed the fury he often buried beneath his black eyes to erupt, cutting all who dared stand in the path of the Dark One as he swung his blade with mastered precision. He gutted one and cleaved another, fueled only with his will and his rage as Kallan rode hard toward Fand.

Cold sweat spilled down Fand’s back as Bergen took his first swing. Frozen, she watched the rains beat down on the blade that pulsed with Seidr.

  “Go,” Fand said, sending out Aaric’s guard to the field. Obediently, they charged the Dark One.

  “Something wrong?” Aaric asked with a twinge of delight in his tone. In horror, Fand stared at the blade in Bergen’s hands, paying no mind as Kallan formed a ball of blue flame in her palm.

“Not at all,” Fand said, and turned her gaze to Aaric. Astrid’s hooves pounded the earth as Kallan drew near, and Fand jerked her arm, sending a stream of Seidr that arched through the air and collided with Astrid’s chest, throwing Kallan from her mount. Releasing a scream, Aaric burned the bonds from his wrists and stood just as quickly, charging Fand with a lance of Seidr. His Seidr met Fand’s palm as she clamped her hand down around Aaric’s and pulled his Seidr lance into her.

“Damn you Drui,” Fand muttered. “Kallan can take the life from you.”

Releasing Aaric’s hand, Fand turned the horse about and rode hard into the plains toward Kallan.

The battlefield vanished and the flash of light blinded Kallan and robbed her of sound. The ground struck her, breaking her body and leaving her breathless. Enclosed in silence, she battled to breathe, but no air came. Kallan punched the ground and clawed her throat, flailing about as she fought to gasp. But a nameless pain crept in, shutting her down as her lungs failed to expand. Despite all efforts, the air wouldn’t come and the void closed in.

Seconds lasted like days as Kallan’s consciousness faded between empty black and thoughts of death until, at last, the shadows faded. Sound returned, and Kallan gasped long and deep. Her stomach stopped convulsing and Kallan breathed.

Inhaling deeply, air filled her lungs. Kallan cleared the darkness that had nearly taken her. Panting, she pulled herself onto her knees and dug the tips of her fingers into the soft, cold earth. The soil was damp from the rain that had started to fall, slowly at first, then hard in a heavy shower.

Around her, the Alfar slept. The sharp clang of sword and spear mingled with Rune shouting indecipherably as sound flooded back. Her vision focused and she lifted her face from the ground. She was certain she heard Bergen’s boisterous laugh in the distance as he speared an opponent.

Kallan searched for her bearings, looking through the dismal gray that cloaked the battlefield. Unable to breathe, she stifled a sob as she rested her eyes on the heap that was Astrid’s body.