Snow-Walker

Twelve

Brand kindles brand till they burn out,

Flame is quickened by flame.

They spent the rest of the day preparing for a hard journey. All the supplies of food were brought in from the outhouses; two hares that Brochael found in his snares were cooked and cut up. Water would not be a problem. The snow still lay here on the high ground, and as they traveled down, Brochael said, they would find the rivers awash with meltwater. Still, Jessa took care to bring in a few buckets from the hot spring and wash in luxury. She knew it would be a long time before that would happen again.

Kari moved about downstairs, watching Brochael for a while, then he wandered outside, the birds flapping and hopping after him. Thorkil followed; Jessa closed the door behind them. Sitting down at the table next to Brochael, feeling clean and warm, she said, “You misled us, didn’t you? Deliberately.”

“Not me. They’re Gudrun’s stories. You should blame her.”

After a moment Jessa said, “It’s hard to believe she could spin such lies, even her… Kari is so…”

“Ordinary?” Brochael asked slyly.

“Well, no. Of course not…”

Brochael laughed. “Exactly. He’s her image, Jessa, her copy. They say when he was born the midwife screamed out in horror—she could see, I suppose, that this was another of the Snow-walkers, another sorcerer. And Gudrun—I often wonder what she must have thought about this rival, the only one who might ever threaten her. So she shut him away and let the rumors run.”

Jessa looked up. “And why didn’t she kill him? Many babies die. It wouldn’t have seemed so strange.”

Brochael stopped his work. For a moment he did not answer; then he said, “That’s what worries me, Jessa. It’s worried me for years. She wants him for something. And I don’t want to think about what.”

Later, as she picked out her warmest clothes and squashed them into a pack, she heard Thorkil come in behind her. He closed the door of the room softly.

“Brochael says take as little as you can,” she said. “We’ll have to carry everything ourselves, remember.”

He muttered something and sat down. She turned her head.

“What’s wrong?”

Thorkil laughed briefly. “Nothing! We’re leaving this place, for a start. That makes me happy enough.”

“Does it?” She threaded the laces of the bag swiftly. “I didn’t want to come here either—I think I was more frightened than you even—but since I’ve been here, I’ve been happy, in an odd sort of way. And now we know Kari’s not…”

“Yes!” Thorkil breathed a sigh of exasperation. “Kari! Thinking he was some sort of deformed creature was bad, but I’m not sure the truth isn’t worse. He’s her, Jessa. Every time he looks at me I shiver.”

“No,” she said, shaking her head. “He’s not her. He just looks the same. But that doesn’t mean they are the same.”

For a moment they both sat side by side, thinking.

Then she pulled his hair playfully. “Worrier. Be a warrior. And I see you’re still wearing the lady’s present, anyway.”

He shrugged, and touched the arm ring. “That’s because it won’t come off.”

Surprised, Jessa looked at it. “I thought it was loose enough before.”

“A bit looser. Perhaps the cold here has made it shrink. Anyway, it won’t come off, and it doesn’t matter. No one can steal it this way.”

She put her hand on the smooth snake and tugged at it, but he was right. It gripped his wrist without a gap.

“Perhaps it’s swallowed a bit more of its tail.” He laughed.

There was something in his voice for a moment that was new to her; a strange tone. But when she looked at him he laughed and stood up, his longish brown hair brushing the collar of the red jerkin. “Don’t worry, Jessa, I won’t bring much. I may like fine things, but I’m too lazy to carry them far!”

And they both laughed in the cold room.

That evening, around the fire in the darkness downstairs, they made their plans.

“We’ll go south,” Brochael said. “After all, it’s the only way you can go from this godforsaken place. To the north is nothing but ice, mountains and seas of it, and mists. Beyond that, Gunningagap, the rift into blackness. Only sorcerers could live up there.”

Jessa flicked a glance at Kari; he sat curled up against Brochael’s knees, his face a shifting mask of firelight and shadows.

“And then where?” Thorkil asked. “A ship?”

“No ship would take us,” Brochael said curtly. “And I don’t intend to try. The weather’s beginning to turn milder. Spring is coming. We’ll go overland—it will be hard, but safer. And there’s a place—an old hall, one of the Wulfings’ hunting halls in the mountains. That’s the place we’re going.”

“Will we be safe there?” Jessa asked, surprised.

Brochael shrugged. “As anywhere. But that’s the meeting place. It’s all been arranged, long ago. The Jarl’s death will bring them.”

Kari shifted, as if the fire scorched him. One of the ravens gave a low croak; the flames crackled and hissed over damp wood.

“And after?” Thorkil insisted. “What then? Will these mysterious allies of yours have swordsmen, horses, axmen? Will they fight against Gudrun?”

“We’ll see.” Brochael gave his rich laugh. “You’re very curious, aren’t you, lad.”

Thorkil shrugged. “Wary, that’s all.”

And then Kari said, very quietly, “We should start tomorrow.”

Brochael looked at him.

After a moment he said, “What is it?”

“A ship.” Kari watched the flames; his voice was quiet. “A ship with a dragon prow. She’s beached, on a rocky shore.”

“Can you show us?” Brochael kept his voice low.

Kari did not answer. His gaze seemed to be on something deep in the fire; Jessa stared too, trying to see.

And then, in the shifting of a burned log, the ship was there. She saw it through the flames, as if it was behind them, a little beyond. Horses were being led off, down a steep ramp into the water that swirled and sank through the shingle. Men stood about, some holding torches that guttered and spat. She could smell pitch and resin, the salt tang of the fjord, hear a gull crying, far off.

“That’s Trond.” Thorkil’s voice came out of the darkness. Jessa nodded. She had already recognized the steep cliffs, and among a group of men, Sigmund Graycloak, his hair swept across his face by the night wind.

But the men coming from the boat were some she had seen about the Jarlshold; silent, rough men, each with a serpent mark tattooed down his cheek—Gudrun’s own choice. She counted ten or more. An ashen shield was flung down, then spears, heavy packs. Then the flames flickered in the draft, and there was only darkness behind the fire.

She looked at Brochael. “How can they have gotten so far already? It’s impossible. It took us three days to reach Trond....”

His bleak expression answered her; she caught her breath as the thought leaped into her mind. “She sent them out before? Before Ragnar was dead?”

Brochael nodded silently, rubbing his beard. For a while no one spoke, each of them thinking. Jessa felt again that sudden urge of panic that she had known so long ago in the Jarlshall; could almost think she smelled Gudrun’s sweet scent, hear the drift and rustle of her movements.

Raising her head, she stared at the flames.

Gudrun looked back at her.

The sorceress was surrounded by candles; a halo of light that lit the sharpness of her smile, the eager glint of her eyes.

Transfixed with fear, Jessa hardly breathed, but Kari stretched out his foot and nudged a log. It shifted with a shower of sparks. Wood fell, settled. The fire leaped up; it showed Jessa the dark room, Kari’s face with a bleak pain in it, Brochael’s grim and angry.

“Did she see us?” Thorkil whispered.

“No.” Kari’s fingers shook; he clenched them. “She tries—often. But I won’t let her. Not anymore.”

Behind him something shuffled in the darkness. The raven, with a hop and a flutter, perched on the chair behind Brochael’s shoulder. Its eyes were tiny red sparks in the flame light.