East

Rose

ALL OF THE OUTLYING buildings, except the stables, were connected to the ice palace by tunnels, creating a weblike maze that caused at least one softskin a day to get hopelessly lost. There were trolls who were assigned the job of leading those wandering softskins to their proper place. Though it did not seem likely there would be trolls in the passageways on the night of the wedding feast, I did not want to take the risk. Even the most unobservant troll would think it odd to find a party guest roaming the passages leading to the servants' quarters. So I decided to circle around and approach the front entrance of the palace from the outside.

I put on my reindeer-skin parka over the dress, donned my old boots (putting the dainty pearl shoes in my pockets), and went outside.

The northern lights were extraordinary. I had never seen them so glorious, so richly hued and vivid. Though I was not particularly cold in my layers, I began to shiver. The Troll Queen's power was immense. Did I really think that I, with nothing but a flimsy mask and a ring on my thumb, had any chance of taking away that which she desired above all else?

It was a long walk, skirting the outside of the ice palace, but eventually I came to the front. I slipped stealthily around the corner and saw palace guards busily meeting and attending to the sleigh of a group of late-arriving trolls. No one noticed me as I made my way up the sweeping ice stairway. Ahead of me a pair of trolls were just entering, and I trailed behind them. They, too, wore furs, which they hung on a treelike contraption made of ice—a coatrack, I guessed. There weren't many coats on it, as most of the visitors had arrived earlier and were staying inside the ice palace. I found a spot for my coat and placed my boots under it.

I entered the banquet room. The sight before me stopped my breath. It was an enormous hall, with glistening ice walls, a cathedral ceiling, and towering windows made of clear ice. Through the windows the northern lights were visible in all their overwhelming beauty. The ice refracted the pulsing blues, greens, and purples, causing color to swirl across every surface of the room. The radiance and perfection of it was almost too much to take in.

Hundreds of trolls were gathered, all dressed elegantly in brilliantly colored finery. The air vibrated with their guttural voices. Tables lined the outside walls, having been pushed aside after the banquet was done to make space for dancing. Many trolls were sitting at the tables, but most were dancing. What they danced to was barely recognizable to me as music. It was a rumbling, pulsing sound, combined with a higher-pitched noise, possibly from an instrument like a flauto, though there was little in the way of melody. The sound hurt my ears, but in some strange way fit with the pulsing of the northern lights. Probably the queen had arranged that as well, I thought grimly.

The trolls' dancing wasn't very much like the dancing I knew from back in Njord, either. Pairing off, they held on to each other by the elbows and moved their feet in a crabbed, sideways motion.

Then I saw him and all my other thoughts fell away.

I had not seen his face since that night when I had dripped hot tallow on him. I no longer was aware of the troll music, and there was a strange prickly feeling all along my skin.

He was dancing with a troll lady, and he had a stiff but genuinely polite expression on his face. His eyes looked tired.

A voice at my side startled me. "Kaunis puku" it said. Taking my eyes reluctantly from the man who had been a white bear, I turned to find a male troll with a leering smile on his ridged face. He wore a turquoise jacket. "Mutta miksi el varikas?" he continued. I was not sure, but I think the words meant he thought my dress lovely but wondered why it had no color.

I smiled politely and, not knowing what else to say, croaked out in my best effort at troll language that I would love to dance. He looked a little puzzled at this but then said, "Et saa tanssi" and, taking my gloved hand, led me out onto the dance floor. My heart pounding, I tried to follow what I saw the others doing. It did not seem difficult, though I managed to step on the troll's feet several times. Luckily, he did not try to converse with me. It was not long before he led me off the dance floor and then left me. Relieved, I hoped he would pass along the word that the troll lady in the colorless dress had two left feet.

I found a spot by an ice pillar from where I could watch the dancers. That my moon dress was not brightly colored made blending into the background easier.

I saw the Troll Queen at once. She was seated on a raised dais, on a throne that looked to be made of nothing but diamonds, and she was gazing out over the festive tableau with a serene, proprietary air. I noticed that most often her eyes were on the one she called Myk. And so were mine.

He was a stranger to me. And yet he was not. Though his form was that of a man, I could still see the white bear in him. Or perhaps he was the man I had seen in the white bear. But the way he held his head, the movement of his shoulders, the level gaze of his eyes. All those were familiar. And I remembered the days spent in the room with the red couch, my fumbling attempts at his music, the stories he had listened to me tell. The loneliness in his eyes, and the kindness. And as I watched the man who had been a white bear make polite conversation with a stout troll lady in an orange dress (one I had hemmed only the day before), I realized suddenly that this man, this stranger, was dear to me, as dear as one of my own family. Perhaps dearer, I thought, with a great rush of inexplicably strong feeling. There was a strange expectant beating of my heart that I had never felt before.

But just at the very moment I understood what this white bear-man was to me, I saw him gaze up at the Troll Queen. A look of warmth, knowing and affectionate, passed between them, and my stomach lurched. I felt as if Simka had kicked me there, hard.

Was it possible? Did he... love the Troll Queen? Had I come all this way to rescue one from a captivity he actually desired? My thoughts were jumbled, my hands sweating inside my white gloves. The ring felt slippery on my thumb.

Suddenly I saw Tuki. He was at the white bear—man's side and was speaking to him earnestly. The Troll Queen had been distracted for the moment by a delegation of particularly elegant trolls wishing to pay their respects.

Tuki had the white bear-man's hand and was pulling him across the dance floor. Toward me.

I watched them approach with a mixture of fear and excitement. It all has come down to this moment, I thought. Journey's end.

He saw my dress first and something flickered in his eyes, some dim spark of recognition, and I remembered the white bear watching me through the doorway when I'd tried the dress on. He hesitated, pausing in his approach. Tuki looked eagerly between us. But when the white bear—man looked up at my face, the spark faded. That polite, kind look I had seen him wear most of the evening replaced it. I could barely hear past the pounding of my heart, but I think Tuki introduced me in troll language as "Rose, who is visiting from distant lands."

"Would you care to dance?" he asked politely in stiff troll words.

I nodded. He led me onto the dance floor.

"I hope you are having a pleasurable evening," he said, again in troll language. He was not looking at me but keeping his eyes politely averted. Troll small talk, I thought wildly. My mouth felt dry, my tongue leaden.

"Your gown..." He hesitated, that dim spark returning to his eyes. "It is ... unusual." He dropped one of my elbows and rubbed his forehead, as if trying to dispel whatever was clouding his thoughts.

"I have something to show you," I said in a low voice, using my own language and making no attempt to sound like a troll.

He looked genuinely startled by that, even alarmed. His eyes searched my face.

"Your voice ... And..." I think he had seen that I wore a mask.

Quickly I slipped one glove partway off and removed the ring from my thumb. I pressed it into his palm.

His feet kept moving as he gazed down at the ring. The edges of his eyes creased, as though he was puzzled. Then he gave his head a little shake and handed the ring back to me.

"It is very nice. But I cannot..."

"It is yours," I said urgently.

He shook his head. "I do not think so. But thank you." He wanted to get away from me, I could feel it.

I once more, pressed the ring into his hand. "Look more closely," I said.

"You are kind," he said, "but I must return to my queen."

He reached toward me, to return the ring, but I backed away, curtsied, and said, "It is a gift. Please keep it."

Moving blindly I made my way back to my pillar and leaned heavily against it. I watched the man who had been a white bear move away from me across the dance floor. He put his hand into his pocket, and I guessed he had put the ring there. Then I looked up at the queen's throne and saw her eyes on me. I felt a shiver of fear. Had she seen? Had my mask slipped? But then her gaze shifted to the one she called Myk. I was not prepared for the look I saw on the pale queen's face. It was an expression of pure love. Love. Not ownership, or cruel manipulation, but wholehearted, even tender, love. And though I could not see his eyes, I guessed that her expression was reflected in his.

So that was it. They genuinely cared for each other.

Suddenly I could not stay there another moment. I had to leave. I wanted to run but forced myself to walk out of the banquet hall. Tears were already beginning to soak into the stiff fabric of my mask. The moment I was out of sight I began to run. I found my parka on the coatrack, and my boots, and, hastily putting them on, headed for the palace entrance.

I slid sideways out the front; the trolls there were busy sharing some kind of steaming beverage that was making them laugh loudly in their coarse voices, and they did not notice me. The cold knifed into me, and the mask, damp from my tears, began to freeze to my face. Quickly I ripped it off and shoved it into a pocket.

I ran around the side of the palace and made my way to the stables. The trolls there were also drinking and talking loudly as they watched over a full paddock of the visitors' reindeer. I was able to sneak into a back stall, where I found one of my favorite reindeer, a sleek white beauty I had dubbed Vaettur. Taking his halter, I led him from his stall and out one of the back entrances to the stables. I mounted him and cautiously guided him to the nearest gate. All the gates had been left open to accommodate the troll visitors. As soon as I was some distance from the palace, I gave Vaettur a kick and we were off.

Vaettur was strong and fast, and I clung to him like a drowning person. I had no thought, no plan, except to get away from the ice palace. What a fool I had been. Every inch of that endless journey, the days, weeks, months ... It had all been for nothing. And the worst of it was that I knew then what I had lost.

Throughout the journey to find the white bear I had told myself I was doing it to make right the wrong I had done. It was a matter of honor, of responsibility. But that had been only part of it. The truth was I loved him. I loved him as a white bear, and I loved him still as the man who had been a white bear. I was no better than the Troll Queen, only I had cloaked my feelings in virtuous words.

And I had lost him. For the second time.

The cold seared through me, but it did not matter. Nothing mattered.

My heart felt frozen inside my chest. It was too cold a night for a broken heart, I thought irrationally. Where would I go, what would I do? "Go home," I told myself. Keep riding until I was back with Neddy, and Father and Mother. Then I railed at myself for behaving like a spoiled child who hadn't gotten the prize she wanted at a party. And it was absurd. As strong and swift as he was, I could not ride Vaettur all the way across the frozen land of Niflheim, much less back to Njord. I would need the right clothing, the rest of my gear. But I was not thinking clearly.

Suddenly the reindeer shied and then reared back. Lost in myself, I had not been paying attention to where we were going. I looked then and saw that we were on the lip of a steep icy slope. Vaettur had not wanted to take on such a descent at the pace we were going, and I didn't blame him.

As I looked down into the frozen valley, my eye was caught by a scattering of shapes that lay opaque against the frozen background of white snow. The northern lights were still illuminating the sky, though not as bright as before, and they gave teasing glimpses of the shapes below.

Despite the jumbled state of my feelings, I was curious. What could those objects be? I wondered. There were scores of them lit up by the lights above bursting into even greater brilliance. I urged Vaettur forward. Cautiously he began to descend the slope.

We reached a point more than halfway down where it was too slick for the reindeer to get a footing; in fact, I saw that there was a band of glittering ice about twice my height that ran around the perimeter of the valley floor.

But that was not all I saw. Dismounting, I stared into the valley, my eyes transfixed. Was it possible?...Vaettur snuffled at my pockets, looking for a treat, but I did not even notice. I just stared in disbelief and horror.