Runemarks (25 page)

Ouch, that hurts!

He sensed it catching his thoughts like a fingernail snagging silk. It was an uncomfortable feeling, but when Loki tried to close his mind to it, a second lance of pain, more acute this time, slammed through his head.

“What’s wrong?” said Maddy, seeing him falter.

But Loki was in no position just then to explain. Eyes closed, he took another drunken step. Below him the Whisperer sparkled with glee.

What do you want?
Loki said silently.

Your attention, Dogstar. And your word.

“My word?”

In silence, if you value your life.

With an effort, Loki nodded.

I know what you’re thinking,
said the voice in his mind.
You are afraid, because I can read your thoughts. You are surprised at how my powers have grown.

Loki said nothing but gritted his teeth.

And you are wondering whether I mean to punish you.

Still Loki said nothing.

I ought to,
said the Whisperer.
But I’m giving you a chance to redeem yourself.

Redeem myself?
said Loki, surprised.
Since when did you care about saving my soul?

In his mind he felt the Whisperer’s amusement.
It’s not your soul I care about. Nevertheless, you will do as I say. Go with the girl to Netherworld. Take me with you as far as Hel. Free the gods—avert the war—

And why would you want to go to Hel? What’s your plan, you old fraud?

A last, tremendous bolt of pain went rocketing through Loki’s head. He fell to his knees, unable to cry out, as the voice in his mind delivered its warning.

No questions,
it said.
Just do as I say.

And then the alien presence was gone, leaving him shaking and breathless. Once more he wondered at how much stronger it had grown; his struggle to contain the thing, centuries earlier, had lasted for days, exhausting them both and causing devastation in World Below, but today it had brought him to his knees in seconds.

Now it shone with a warning gleam, and Loki heard its whispering voice, faint but commanding at the back of his mind.

No trickery. Do I have your word?

All right.
He opened his eyes and took slow, deep breaths.

“What happened?” said Maddy, looking concerned.

Loki shrugged. “I fell,” he said. “Bloody skirts.” And with those words he picked himself up and turned the full force of his scarred smile on Maddy. “Now,” he said. “Are we going to Netherworld or not?”

6

It was a most unholy alliance. On the one side the Huntress, royally clad in Ethelberta’s blue velvet; on the other, the parson, with his golden key. It was two in the morning when they repaired to the parsonage and, to Ethel’s bewilderment and displeasure, went immediately to Nat’s study and locked themselves in.

There, Nat told the Huntress all he knew—about Maddy Smith, the one-eyed Journeyman who had been her friend, and most especially about the Order and its works—and he read to her from the Good Book and recited some of the canticles in the lesser of the Closed Chapters.

Skadi watched and listened with cold amusement to the little man’s efforts to master the glamour that he called the Word. As the hours passed, however, she began to grow curious. He was clumsy and untrained, but he had a spark, a power she did not quite understand. She could see it in his colors: it was almost as if there were
two
light-signatures there instead of one, a normal signature of an undistinguished brown and a brighter thread that ran through it, as a silver skein may be woven into a cheaper silk. Somehow, it seemed, Nat Parson, for all his conceit and self-indulgence, had powers that might be of value to her—or might threaten her, if allowed to grow untrained.

“Now light it.” They were sitting at Nat’s desk, an unlit taper in a candlestick between them.
Kaen,
the fire rune, gleamed, a little crookedly, between the parson’s fingers.

“You’re not concentrating,” said Skadi impatiently. “Hold it steady, focus your thoughts, say the cantrip, and light the taper.”

For several seconds Nat frowned at the candlestick. “It doesn’t work,” he complained at last. “I can’t work these heathen cantrips. Why can’t I just use the Word?”

“The
Word
?” In spite of herself, Skadi laughed. “Listen, fellow,” she said as patiently as she could. “Do you use an oliphant to plow your garden? Would you burn a forest to light your pipe?”

Nat shrugged. “I want to get to the things that matter. I’m not interested in learning
tricks.
”

Once more Skadi laughed. You had to give it to the man, she thought—at least his ambitions were vast, if his intelligence wasn’t. She had entered their pact with the intention of humoring him for just as long as it took to gain the secrets of the Order, but now her curiosity had been aroused. Perhaps he could be useful after all.

“Tricks?” she said. “These
tricks,
as you call them, are your apprenticeship. Despise them, and our alliance is over. Now stop complaining and light the taper.”

Nat made a sound of disgust. “I can’t,” he muttered angrily, and at that very moment, with an angry
whoosh!
the taper leaped into violent flame, scattering papers, bowling over the candlestick, and sending a jet of fire so high toward the ceiling that it left a black soot stain on the plasterwork.

Skadi raised a dispassionate eyebrow. “You lack control,” she said. “Again.”

But Nat was looking at the blackened taper with an expression of wild exhilaration. “I did it,” he said.

“Poorly,” said the Huntress.

“But did you
feel
it?” said Nat. “That
power
—” He paused abruptly, bringing one hand to his temple as if he had a headache. “That power,” he repeated, but vaguely, as if his mind were on something else.

“Again, please,” said Skadi coolly. “And this time try to exercise a little restraint.” She righted the candlestick—which was still hot—and placed a fresh taper on the spike.

Nat Parson smiled almost absently. The rune
Kaen,
less crooked this time, began to take shape between his fingers.

“Steady,” said the Huntress. “Give yourself time.”
Kaen
was burning brightly now, a nugget of fire in the parson’s hand. “That’s too much,” said Skadi. “Bring it right down.”

But either Nat didn’t hear her or he didn’t care, for
Kaen
brightened once again, now glowing so intensely that Skadi could feel it, like a lump of molten glass radiating fierce heat.

Nat’s eyes were pinpoints of eager fire; before him on the desk, scattered papers began to curl and crisp. The candle itself, standing unmarked in its holder before him, began to drool and melt as the heat increased.

“Stop it,” said Skadi. “You’ll burn yourself.”

Nat Parson only smiled.

Now Skadi was beginning to feel unaccountably nervous.
Kaen
across the desk from her was the shrunken heart of a furnace; its yellow had veered to an eerie blue-white.

“Stop it,” she said.

Still there was no reply from Nat Parson. Skadi cast
Isa
with her fingers, meaning to freeze out the fire rune before it could escape and cause damage.

Then Nat looked at her. Across the desk of charring papers, blue
Isa
and fiery
Kaen
faced each other in a deadlock, and once again Skadi felt that sense of peculiar, nagging unease.

This wasn’t supposed to happen,
she thought. The fellow had no training, no glam—so where was he getting this influx of power?

In her hand
Isa
was beginning to fail. She cast it again, harder this time, putting the force of her own glam behind it.

On Nat’s face the smile broadened; his eyes closed like those of a man in the throes of delight. Skadi pushed harder—

And suddenly it was over; so quickly that she had difficulty believing it had ever been.
Kaen
broke apart, frozen by
Isa,
and a dozen fragments snickered into the far wall, leaving tiny flecks of cinder embedded in the plasterwork. Nat goggled at these with a bewilderment that might have been comic in any other circumstance, and Skadi let out a sigh of relief—which was absurd, as surely she could not have expected any other outcome.

And yet, hadn’t she felt something as she faced him across the desk? As if some power—maybe even a
superior
power—had lent itself to his, or some gaze of unspeakable penetration had flitted briefly over their struggle of wills?

In any case, it was gone now. Nat seemed awakened from a kind of daze, observing the marks of his working against the ceiling and walls as if for the first time. Once more Skadi noticed that he rubbed his temple with the tips of his fingers, as if to ward off an approaching headache. “Did I do it?” he inquired at last.

Skadi nodded. “You made a start. Tell me,” she said. “How did it feel?”

For a moment Nat thought about it, still rubbing his temple. Then he gave a tiny, puzzled smile, like that of a man trying to recall the excesses of a night of distant revelry. “It felt good,” he said at last. His eyes met hers, and she thought she saw in their silvery pupils a reflection of his earlier delight.
“Good,”
he repeated softly, and for the first time since the End of the World, the icy Huntress shivered.

7

She had planned to introduce her new ally to the Vanir without delay. Now she began to think again. After all, the Vanir were not her people—except through marriage, and that had been a mistake. The old man was still fond of her, of course, but their natures were too different for the marriage to last. Njörd’s home by the sea had proved unbearable to her; her place in the mountains equally so to him. The same went for Frey and Freyja: their loyalties were with their father, not her, and she knew that her pursuit of Odin and his grandchild might not meet with unanimous approval.

Of course, if she’d managed to lay her hands on the Whisperer, then things might have been different. But as things stood at the moment, she was likely to meet with some opposition—Heimdall, at least, would stay loyal to Odin—and she had no desire to find herself at odds with the Vanir. So far Odin held all the cards: the Oracle and, more importantly, the girl. The Vanir knew the prophecy as well as he did. None of them would knowingly oppose Thor’s child, and though Skadi had no love for Asgard herself, she guessed that the others would give a great deal for the chance to regain the Sky Citadel.

And so, that morning, after breakfast with the parson, she returned in bird form to the Hall of Sleepers. She flew right over Loki’s head, but by then he was already on his way to the meeting place in Little Bear Wood, and it never occurred to the eagle that the old lady it saw on the Malbry road might be the Trickster in disguise.

As Skadi dressed—in the same tunic and boots she had left behind—she gave the Vanir a carefully edited account of the night’s work. Odin and Loki were working together, she said, along with a girl—whose identity, she told them, was still unknown. They had the Whisperer; they had foiled the Examiners and, in spite of her vigilance, had managed to escape.

She did not mention her promise to Nat Parson or her plans for Maddy Smith.

“So why didn’t Odin wake us himself?” said Heimdall when she had finished.

“Perhaps he was afraid,” said Skadi.

“Afraid? Of what?”

Skadi shrugged.

“Obviously he’s planning something,” said Frey.

“Without telling us?” said Bragi, offended.

“Why not?” said Skadi. “It’s Odin’s way. Secrets and lies were always his currency—”

“Untrue,” said Heimdall. “He’s loyal to us.”

Skadi looked impatient. “Oh, please. Let’s face it, Goldie. The General’s
always
flirted with Chaos.
More
than flirted—and now we find he’s thick as thieves with Loki again—
Loki,
of all people. What more do you need? If he wanted
you,
he’d have wakened you, wouldn’t he?”

Now the Vanir were looking uneasy.

“The world has changed,” Skadi went on. “There are new gods,
powerful
gods, working against us. Why do you think he took the Whisperer? Why do you think he left the Vanir sleeping?”

There was a lull. “Perhaps he’s working on an alliance,” said Frey doubtfully.

“You think so?” said Skadi. “With whom? I wonder.” And she told them what she knew of the Examiners of World’s End; of the Nameless, of the Word. They listened in silence—all but Idun, who seemed oblivious—and when Skadi had finished, even fickle Freyja was looking grim.

“Their Word is more powerful than any of ours,” said Skadi. “They can defeat us—they can control us—they can make us their slaves. They are the Order. Who knows what deal Odin may have cut with them to save himself?”

“But you said he was their prisoner,” said Bragi.

“A trick,” she said, “to lure me to the village.” And she explained how, at the very moment at which she was about to release Odin, they had turned against her, striking her down with a foul blow and making their escape—with the Whisperer—into the Hill.

“Why you?” said Heimdall, still suspicious.

“Because,” said Skadi, “I’m not one of you. All you Vanir—you’ve been with him too long. You’ve started thinking of him as one of your own. He isn’t. His loyalties are with the Æsir first and the Vanir second—if there
is
a second. But to save the Æsir, don’t you think he’d sacrifice you if he had to? Do you think he’d hesitate, even for a moment?”

Heimdall frowned. “You think he made a deal?”

Skadi nodded. “I think they forced him to it,” she said. “His own life in exchange for ours. But his plan went wrong. I killed the Examiner. I got away, and the Order lost its chance. That doesn’t mean it intends to give up.” She began to pace across the shining floor, her ice blue eyes gleaming. “We must assume they are coming after us with reinforcements. We must assume they know where we are. And
who.
”

It was enough. The seeds had been sown. Little by little, Skadi watched them grow in the eyes of the newly awakened Vanir. Heimdall bared his golden teeth; Frey’s eyes grew colder; kindly Njörd darkened like the edge of a cloud just veering toward rain. Bragi sang a sad song, Freyja wept, and Idun just sat on a block of ice and smiled, her face as unlined and serene as ever.

“Very well,” said Heimdall, turning to Skadi. “Let’s assume for the moment you’re right.” He squinted keenly at the Huntress, as if he perceived something in her signature that the others did not—some shift in her colors, some wrongness in the light. “Let us assume that Odin has a plan which may not be to our advantage. That’s
all
I’m willing to assume,” he said as Skadi seemed about to protest, “but I do understand the need for caution.”

“Good,” said Skadi.

“All the same, we outnumber them,” said Heimdall. “Seven of us to the three of them—assuming we’re counting the girl, of course…”

“Plus the Whisperer,” Skadi reminded him.

Heimdall looked thoughtful. “Yes, of course. They do have the Oracle. And the Oracle has no cause to love the Vanir. After all, we’re the ones who cut off Mimir’s head in the first place.”

The others exchanged glances. “He has a point,” said Frey.

“But does Odin
control
the Whisperer?” asked Njörd.

“Perhaps not,” said Heimdall.

“Then what do we do?” asked Freyja. “We can’t just hang around here forever—I say we talk to Odin.”

Skadi shot her a look of contempt. “Are
you
volunteering for the job?”

Freyja looked away.

“What about you, Goldie? Do you want to walk into whatever trap he’s set for you and find out what he’s planning the hard way?”

Heimdall scowled and said nothing.

“Well, what about you, Bragi? You’ve usually got more than enough to say for yourself. What do you suggest?”

Njörd interrupted her. “What’s your solution, Huntress?” he said.

“Well, as it happens…,” she began.

She told them as much and as little as she dared. She spoke of Nat Parson and his ambitions—playing them down as the impossible dreams of a vain and foolish man. She stressed his potential usefulness as an ally, told of his links with the Order and the Church, told them how he had already helped them by giving them access to the Good Book.

Of his newly acquired powers and of the uneasy feeling those powers gave her, the Huntress said nothing. The man had a glimmer. But it was unstable power—and that barely more than a spark. Nothing to feel threatened by. And he might prove useful.

“Useful how?” said Heimdall.

Skadi shrugged. “In these new times we need new allies,” she said. “How else are we to fight the Order? Besides, the Nameless
has
a name. I’d like to know it before it comes to war.”

Grudgingly Heimdall conceded the point. “So what does he want, this parson of yours?”

Skadi smiled. “He wants revenge against a renegade of the Folk. In exchange, he will give us information that will arm us against the Order and the Word. All he wants is the girl—I’d say he’s offering us a bargain.”

“The girl?” said Bragi. “But who is she?”

“No one,” said Skadi. “You know what Odin’s like: he’s always had a soft spot for the Folk. I imagine he’s been using her as a spy or something.”

Once more Heimdall gave her a searching look. “Freyja said she had glam.”

“So what if she does?” said Skadi sharply. “I told you, she’s of no importance. What matters is that Odin’s deceived us. And our first priority is to find out why.”

There was a long pause as the Vanir considered Skadi’s words.

“All right,” said Frey at last. “But first we meet with the General. We get things straight with him once and for all. And
if
he’s betrayed us—”

“Which I know he
has—
”

“Then,” said Frey, “we’ll give your churchman his revenge.”