The Strange Maid

NINETEEN

THE MOMENT BALDUR’S charity ball officially begins, I’m waiting inside the parlor of the town house. We’re to make a grand entrance about an hour into the evening, and as I’ve been dressed and pressed for quite some time, waiting is all I can do. I sit for a while at the baby grand, plunking out old nursery tunes, trying to distract myself from the whirl of thoughts spiraling endlessly behind my eyes.

Wide-winged fans drive thick air down at the crown of my head. The humidity finds every free strand and curls it against my cheeks and neck. Disir Day is midway through Blissmonth, and exactly six weeks since I sat alone on the death ship beach, watching two hundred paper lanterns rise up and up into the stars. Almost as long since Unferth died.

I tell myself his loyalties don’t matter anymore. Precia agrees the riddle itself was approved by Odin, regardless of its being a prophecy, too. And so what would it mean if Freya sent Ned to me? No more than that she wants me to solve the riddle, to meet my destiny. There’s no reason to think that just because she stole Baldur’s ashes and manipulated Soren’s lover, because she may be sending me dreams, that Freya wants anything nefarious from me. Ned Unferth helped me on this path to achieving my destiny; I should accept it and let go.

It’s only this niggling question in my heart: how much of Ned’s truths were lies?

Soren isn’t down yet, and I can’t think what could be taking them longer with him than they took with me. I glance at the wide-faced grandmother clock stretched tall beside the door. Five minutes past seven. The manner of this old house muffles the noise from upstairs, though I just left a maid there and saw at least one man moving in and out of Soren’s rooms.

I pace around the edge of the Oriental rug that covers a good half the floor. What is the troll mother doing now, as I’m forced to wear a fancy dress and go make nice for charity? Where is she? Will she dream of me tonight, as I dream of her? I put my feet down heel-to-toe and breath steadily, imagining the dark red line bordering the rug is Peachtree’s tightrope. Pedestrian noise from the Quarter outside and distant music catch a ride on the sticky breeze.

“Isn’t this a vision?” says a man in the doorway. He leans against the door frame in a tuxedo with silver fitted vest and bow tie. Sun-yellow hair is pushed behind his ears to curl loose against his lapels, and his face is wide-open, tanned and flawless. Even without the dark foyer for contrast behind him, he’d be a beacon of sunlight.

Baldur the Beautiful smiles, pushes gracefully off the door, and comes to me with his right hand held out, palm up.

Because there’s absolutely nothing else to do, I give him mine. He raises it and bows, holding my gaze with his. His eyes are indigo, and around his pupils is a thin penumbra of dark pink. Like the sunset outside. My breath becomes sheer, too light for oxygen. Even seeing him on the pavilion at the funerals didn’t prepare me for this contact.

Baldur kisses my knuckles and flutters his lashes as he glances away politely.

It breaks my shock as he must have known it would, and I manage to squeeze his fingers. “My lord Baldur,” I say, too husky to sound like myself. He’s filling the room with bright ardor, enough to power a city.

“It’s such a pleasure, Signy of the Tree.” His smile is merry and he drops my hand, planting his on his very fine hip. “I was sorry to have missed you at the funeral.”

Despite his words, I feel as though I’ve been dropped into a summery ocean and have to relearn to breathe. Out of habit I think for Unferth to anchor me: he’d be cutting and hard, but I can’t think of anything gloomy about the god of light.

Folding my hands before me in the semblance of calm, I reach for politeness. It’s what Jesca would’ve wanted. “Thank you for what you’re doing tonight. Vinland needs it.”

“I feel responsible,” he says, sorrow eclipsing his smile. “My absence upset so many things, and Vinland paid the price. I would that I could change that.”

I shake my head slowly. Odd-eye, he’s so beautiful and shining, but his fingers play against his thigh as if he’s nervous.

Like a man.

With a leaden tongue I say, “Sacrifice is worthwhile.”

Surprise winks across his face and he nods firmly. But immediately Baldur wipes away the brief serious note with a smile. “This dress looks amazing.”

The corner of his mouth tells me he’s flirting, and my heartbeat picks up again. “Your designer did herself proud, and I appreciate it. Without you, I’d have shown up in a hoodie and giant black boots.”

He laughs, too bright for this world.

I struggle to say “I understand you’re quite the boxer.”

“Soren’s been talking about me?” Delight pushes up his golden eyebrows. They distract me for a split second and I notice the pink is fading from his eyes. They truly carry a piece of the changing sky.

“Um, yes. Yes.” I’m hopelessly caught up in his beauty.

Empty-headed girl, sneers Unferth.

As if he’s here, judging me, I fist my hands and say, “Lord Sun, may I ask you a thing about your father?”

Baldur the Beautiful takes my hand. His own eyes burn too brightly for me to read runes in them. “Of course.”

“Do you know … all the names of his Lonely Warriors?”

His golden eyebrows shoot up. “Ah, yes, I believe so.”

“Was there one named Unferth? Ned Truth-Teller?”

“No,” he says immediately. “Though it sounds familiar.”

“It’s also the name of a character in The Song of Beowulf.”

“Ah!” He claps his hands together, and just as he’s about to continue, Soren enters, saying, “Baldur, you’re here!”

The men embrace, clapping each other’s backs and grinning in the way of brothers. I take a moment to release my shaky breath, to right the world that’s tilting under my feet.

They’ve put Soren in a white uniform that mirrors the berserkers’ usual attire: double-breasted jacket with two rows of golden sunburst buttons and a narrow, high collar. The tails of his jacket are almost as full as a skirt and will look amazing if he dances. A thin stripe of yellow lines the outside of his white slacks, and his shoes are so shiny the chandelier reflects back on the toes.

He stretches his neck uncomfortably.

“You look more than worthy of being the Sun’s first Berserk,” Baldur laughs, throwing an arm around Soren again and turning them both to face me.

Focused on Soren’s familiarity, I purse my lips as if shopping. “How can I choose only one?”

“No need for that, pretty thing,” interrupts a young woman in a gown that sparkles like it’s made of a thousand shards of green glass. She slinks into the room. “I’m here for the Bearstar’s escort.”

Something in her vivid green eyes reminds me I haven’t eaten in hours. My stomach pinches with that hunger, and when the newcomer winds her arm possessively through Soren’s, I ungraciously think she must be wearing contacts like Rathi.

Soren lets her hold his arm and doesn’t appear surprised, but shifts slightly so he’s more between her and Baldur. The woman laughs, revealing strong teeth. “I’m not here to eat him, boy.”

“I invited her,” the god of light reassures us. “Glory, meet Signy Valborn, of the New World Tree.”

Glory’s lips never lower down over those teeth as she studies me.

I hold myself still. She’s only taller because she’s wearing heels. “Glory,” I say. “Have you no epithet?”

She leans in. The hairs on my arms rise as her face envelops my entire vision. I don’t know what stands in front of me, except that she is no real woman. Do not quail before predators, little raven, hisses Unferth.

“I need no epithet,” she murmurs.

“Signy.” Soren is there beside me, glowering at Glory hard enough she wrinkles her nose at him. “This is Lady Fenris.”

Fenris Wolf, daughter of Loki, destined to swallow the sun at the end of the world.

My eyes drop to her neck, where a collar woven from nine silver chains rests. The stories say those chains bind her with all the magic of the goddess Freya and the elves and goblins into this girl’s form so that she can be no danger to Baldur. He, at least, must believe it’s true.

I force myself to look past her to the god of light. As delicately as I can, I ask, “Shall I ready myself for any more divine surprises tonight?”

Glory barks a laugh, and Baldur bows apologetically as he offers his hand to lead me out. Soren catches my eye and nods once.

But then Soren always prepares for the worst.

Pretending it’s little deal to sit in a limousine whiter than ivory with two immortal beings strains even my skills at performance. I perch with my knees together and Unferth’s sword pressed across my thighs. The housekeeper handed it to me as Baldur swept me out the front door. The sheath is new, made of mirrored silver, with a chain-mail baldric I should easily buckle into.

Glory rubs her bare ankle against Soren’s calf to see him squirm and speaks to him in a rough language I suspect is the berserker wolf-tongue. Soren, when he answers at all, does so in Anglish. Based on his answers, she’s grilling him on our hunt, occasionally sliding me a wicked glance.

I peer out the tinted window at the passing Port Orleans, relishing the tingle of Baldur’s gaze. He hasn’t said anything, only sprawls in his corner with a pleasant smile.

The streets are narrow, full of people celebrating the holiday. Light seeps from every window, from the long iron balconies and streetlamps. The limo slowly curves toward the river, which is only a black void between the hotels and convention center. We turn alongside a massive green park. It’s Sanctus Louis, and in the center is the crooked hanging tree and statue of Frigg. A brilliant spotlight shines onto her face, making it glow.

I twist to point her out to Soren, but Baldur is staring at my lap with slightly narrowed eyes. Protectively, I grip Unferth’s sword and the god looks up at me. “Is there a tiny boar etched into that garnet?”

“Yes, how did you know?”

“Hringmæl swords are rare these days.” Baldur holds out his hand and I give the sword over eagerly. He inspects the raw garnet, flicks his finger over the ring dangling from the pommel, then caresses the narrow wooden grip and flat crosspiece.

“Do you know it?” Soren asks.

“It looks like Hrunting.” Delight peppers his voice. “Is this why you were asking about Unferth and Beowulf?”

“You know its name?” I whisper.

But the limo stops and everyone but me looks outside. Our driver opens the doors and Baldur steps out with the blade. He holds his hand in for me.

Glorious light blinds me and I blink to adjust. We’re surrounded by guests and the media, and before us is a mansion. The veranda is lined with massive white pillars and crystal chandeliers hanging between them like fixed galaxies. Taxis and hired cars and another limo fill the circle driveway, and photographers wait in the garden, snapping pictures of the guests in their gala gowns and tuxedos. We aren’t the only ones fashionably late, and we’re nearly lost in the noise of the crowd and cameras and jazz.

Baldur faces me and gently settles Unferth’s sword over my shoulder. His fingers skillfully find the buckle of my baldric and snap it around my ribs. They designed it to act as a belt around the high waist of this red dress and to cut up between my breasts like a necklace. The cold silver pinches but holds the iron weight of the sword firmly against me. I feel as though Baldur is fixing my armor in place before battle.

Beside us, Soren slings his own sword on and touches the small of Glory’s bare back. I’ve no idea how her dress stays on. Divine will? The four of us go together, and Baldur only pulls me ahead of the others at the last moment. We climb the broad steps up into the house.

The foyer would fit the entire Shipworm under its nine-meter ceiling held up by dark wooden beams, and a green marble floor spreads out like a meadow toward the high arch leading down into the ballroom itself. Standing here is like standing in a time-frozen forest cathedral.

It’s hot despite the low rush of air-conditioning and crushed with people in every manner of gown and suit, clashing and vying for attention. Here’s Precia of the South striding toward us with her wolf-guards behind, in an elegant white gown that seems to be made of spiderweb, diamonds, and soft gray feathers. Her makeup is impeccable, her hair styled beneath a net of silver. She holds her hand to me and I take it, then she kisses Baldur’s cheek.

A yell goes up and suddenly we’re surrounded by a line of berserk warriors in black long-vest uniforms, hard black tattoos cutting down each left cheek.

They step up and bow to Baldur, but then one smiles at me, turning the attention of the entire line my way. It’s Sharkman, grinning, and when he bows to me, it’s deeper than to the god. With a happy cry, I release Baldur and go forward, pulling the berserker up and kissing his cheek just where the tattoo cuts. “Sharkman,” I say.

“Lady Signy.” His voice is inappropriately low.

I glance down the line of berserkers. It’s perhaps half of them in full dress uniform. My chest expands and some tension rolls off my shoulders because they are at my side. “Welcome, Mad Eagles.”

As one they salute, two fingers over their hearts. Even at attention, Sharkman’s shoulders slouch just a little, unconcerned with any threats, and there’s Thebes beside him, towering over everyone, and the twins Gabriel and Brick with their thin blond braids. “Captain Darius sent me the youngest and most striking of you.”

“To stand at your wings,” Thebes manages, blushing in a way that distorts the color around his fire scar.

Sharkman grins that head-swallowing grin.

When I turn to introduce them to Precia, one bright flashbulb snaps, blinding me for a moment. As I readjust I see her waiting curiously, her bodyguards watching suspiciously beneath their wolf-mask tattoos. But Baldur claps Sharkman on the shoulder, and Glory shows the pretty twins her hungry teeth. Soren stands out darkly among the pale Asgardian elite. He looks past me at Sharkman with an expression that’s somehow both hard and very sad.

But there’s no time now—our arrival is announced, names ringing from an invisible speaker system. The Mad Eagles flank us as we move into the grand ballroom, which is all golden and blue and white with decoration and lights. Star-shaped lamps hang low over spinning, colorful dancers, who make and break patterns across the floor like the pieces of a kaleidoscope. The music comes from a small orchestra tucked into a private balcony overlooking the room. It’s a lazy but pleasant melody, full of horns. An elaborate fountain at the far side of the dance floor spills golden liquid I can only assume is mead. Long flags hang from each pillar, brilliant blue with golden letters declaring, HONOR THE DISIR! and WELCOME, QUEENS!

I pick a sight line over everyone’s head, to focus on none of the glitter and flashing cameras as the god of light leads us down the wide steps and directly through the dancers. The music slows and ends with a high note, conversations pause, and all the guests turn to watch us mount the dais.

The high table is set against a vast blue curtain like a sky behind it, beside great arching doors that lead out into a colorful night garden. Baldur draws me to the center, with Soren on Baldur’s right and Glory on my left. Precia moves to a seat at the far end of the table from me, and the berserkers spread out behind us. Baldur unbuckles my baldric and hangs Unferth’s sword—Hrunting—over the back of my chair. He pulls the chair out for me and weaves our fingers together.

Facing the crowd, he raises the hand not holding mine and cries, “Honor to the lady gods on this Disir Day! Honor to the lady beside me, and to my dear friend Soren Bearstar. Honor to the magnificent Valkyrie of the South. Cousins and friends, drink with me!”

Baldur lifts the silver goblet from the table before us, and I grasp mine, cupping it high and proud. We freeze and wait as the partygoers accept sparkling mead in flutes and glass goblets from rushing servants. I imagine the tableau we five are, with wings of black berserkers and the draperies of disir blue falling like water at our backs. I hope they’re making a lot of notes on this. It’s oh so very showy and grand.

Together the entire company drinks, cheering and calling out Baldur and hope and bright blessings. Baldur orders the feast, and the dancers join those guests already seated at their many round tables. Gentler music springs back to life and I look up to the orchestra ensconced in its balcony. Is Rathi here yet? I scan the crowd for him. He’s at one of the front tables, sitting with a glittering man who must be Ardo Vassing. They’re deep in conversation.

We eat a first course of soup, and Baldur toasts again. There are three more courses to pick at, all while holding myself as calm and relaxed as I can. Glory beside me eats every last morsel, smoothly and methodically, and between my own bites I slide pieces of broccoli and pork onto her plate. I didn’t pay gods only know how much for a ticket to this thing, after all.

Being at the high table gives me too much time to watch, to remember the final feast at the circus hall, when Ned pressed his back to my knee, when I saw chaos for the first time. By the third course I don’t bother hiding the moment I dump my candied potatoes onto Glory’s plate.

She laughs and tells me I don’t need to worry about my figure.

I study her, remembering that her destiny was manipulated by Freya. The goddess of witches saw in the web of fate that the Fenris Wolf would one day begin the end of the world by swallowing the sun. It was on Freya’s word that Glory was bound with the silver chains around her neck, forged by goblin magic and placed there by our gods—her kin. It’s easy to forget sometimes that our gods are so vindictive. “Do you hate them?” I ask.

The godling puts down her spoon and leans nearer. She smells like candy. Her dark green eyes fix upon me. “Who?”

“The gods of Asgard.” I see truth in her wild eyes, too.

Glory slides her tongue against the tips of her front teeth. “Some of them, sometimes.”

“They’ve chained you. Kept you from your destiny.”

“Nothing can keep me from my destiny.” Her lips curl and she glances past me to Baldur. “He will be so delicious.”

“You wish,” Baldur says, like a child.

“I’ll make certain you enjoy it, boy.”

They’re so mundane suddenly, cousins arguing over attention or the best seat at Yule.

Nothing can keep me from my destiny.

At the end of the meal, Baldur offers his arm and invites me to dance.

We sweep across the marble tiles. I remind myself what I’m getting out of this—Red Stripe, a powerful ally in hunting the troll mother, and of course charity for the Summerlings—as I put my arms around Baldur and let him turn me and spin me, taking tiny steps, focused on his eyes. They’re so dark blue they’re nearly black, with tiny points of light reflected in them as if the universe peers through.

He hands me off to Soren for the next song. The berserker dances smoothly but with such concentration it furrows his brow. “You’re pale under that makeup,” he says. “Are you well?”

“Tired, that’s all. Glad to see the Mad Eagles.”

Soren glances at the black line of berserkers and I add, “But are you well?”

“So many berserkers together make me nervous,” he admits with a little wrinkle between his eyebrows.

I reach up and push it out with one finger. He scowls and shakes me away. “They’re good men,” I tell him, replacing my hand on his shoulder.

“As good as Odin’s madmen can be,” he says.

An older man with his beard in a seven-strand braid cuts in.

It’s the king of Orleans kingstate, his coat heavy with ribbons and medals from the Mediterr Conflict. He tells how glad he is to have our gala in his fine, fine kingstate and I admit admiration for the bursting flowers and heady air. Around us dancers whirl, faceless and pressing in. At least the king doesn’t bring up politics. He does tell me everyone is praying for Vinland.

I say, “I’m afraid there’s little that prayer can do for Vinland these days.” Of course I mean to suggest what we need is money. The point of this entire ball.

He says, “It brings communities together, strengthens them.”

I wonder if he believes it. “I assure you, the Freyans at Jellyfish Cove were strong and together when they died with weapons in their hands, not prayers.”

The king frowns. “There is always room for prayer.”

From behind me, Rathi says, “You’re both right.” He touches my bare shoulder, nodding respectfully at the king before he continues. “The wounds on our home are fierce, and etched in bone and blood. The smell of sacrifice is everywhere now, drowning all else.” His fingers tighten on my shoulder. “But the Valkyrie never stay on a battlefield past the gathering of souls. The dead are buried or burned, and the grass grows back. The earth heals itself. None of joy’s children have forsaken Vinland, none of those who live have given up. We’re working—and praying—together, and we will rebuild Freyr’s throne. He will be there again, because we are there.”

The king of Orleans claps a hand on my wish-brother’s back. “You speak like your father.”

Rathi bows. “My thanks.”

“Dance with me,” I say, and turn away into the crowd, bringing Rathi along. He’s warm and smiling back at me, those too-green eyes bright as he spins me onto the dance floor.

“Thank you,” I say.

Rathi turns me under his arm and then back. “Peachtree wants you to pay attention to how I do in a room with at least one person better-looking than me.”

“Surely she knows you’re used to it enough to hide your feelings?”

“Wounded!” He slips a hand from mine to slap it over his heart. The ruby ring on his forefinger catches fire.

I regard him. It might be a curse to have danced with Baldur and let him reframe my understanding of beauty, but as I study Rathi’s short eyelashes and smooth cheeks, the wave of his slick hair that’s not only one golden hue but a half dozen ranging from wheat-colored to sandy and brown, the scar just in front of his right ear and the small indent in his chin, I realize I can’t remember anything specific about Baldur’s face except those magical eyes. The god of light is too perfect to hold in my memory.

“God, Signy, what are you staring at?” Rathi laughs nervously.

I look down at the black horse pin holding his wide silk tie in place. “Oh, you.” Forcing myself to meet his eyes again. “I’m thinking I prefer your sort of looks to—to certain gods’.”

“Signy—”

“Hrothgar.”

He purses his lips and changes course. “You do look remarkably dangerous, but up close your eyeliner is like a raccoon.”

Smacking his arm absently, I glance around for Soren. There’s Baldur and Glory back up at the high table, but no Sun’s Berserk. The red eye of Unferth’s sword catches my attention, hanging there on the back of my seat. “Rathi.”

“Hmm?” Over my shoulder, he watches the ever-shifting crowd with his confident, relaxed preacher’s mask, which makes him seem both approachable and above it all.

“Did you know Ned’s sword has a name?”

Rathi frowns. “Hrunting.”

I release him and head for an abandoned chair near one of the white pillars. I smooth my hands down my skirt until they’re folded peacefully. “What does the name mean?” I ask as he joins me.

“It’s the name of the sword Beowulf used to slay Grendel’s mother.” Rathi raises one eyebrow.

I nod slowly, wishing I had Unferth’s flask. “Beowulf got the sword from Hrothgar’s poet, right?”

“Yes. The poet, Unferth Truth-Teller, gave it as a sort of peace offering between them. The theory was that maybe Hrunting would work against the trolls when no other weapon would, because Hrunting was tempered in blood. It was a kinslayer. Don’t you know all this?”

Unferth whispers, I killed my brother with it.

Is it possible my Unferth is the Unferth of the poem? He had the sword; he claimed to be a kinslayer; he knew that poem inside and out; he knew so much about me and the Alfather. But Baldur claims there are no Einherjar with his name. Unferth himself said he was only a man.

“Signy.”

With both hands on my shoulders, Rathi shakes me just once and ever so slightly. I refocus on his face, all the connections between Unferth and The Song of Beowulf knotted in my mind.

“Do you think it could be the real thing?” I glance past him up at my sword on the dais.

“The real …” Rathi looks hurriedly over his shoulder, then back at me. He laughs. “Signy, the real Hrunting has to be sixteen hundred years old. That sword is not. There are re-creations of famous swords all over the place, especially at a Viker Festival. Edd Smithson made copies of Gudrun’s Helblade every year.”

What game was Ned playing? Even if the sword is a replica, if he himself was born twenty-five years ago and took up the name, there must be a reason for it. He put the pieces before me.

Some may be the workings of Fate: my own attraction to Valtheow the Dark’s bloody story, the Alfather’s love of her. That my wish-brother is named for her husband, the famous Freyan king Hrothgar. But some were woven in by Ned Unferth: He brought trolls into my life; he used the ancient poet’s name. He told me my rune scar is linguistically linked to her name—Valtheow, Strange Maid—and the troll mother paints herself with that rune in my dreams.

A cold line of fear slides down my back. Red Stripe. One-armed Red Stripe, who Unferth led me right toward.

Beowulf Berserk killed Grendel by tearing off the monster’s arm. In vengeance, the troll’s mother destroyed the golden hall of Heorot.

Just as my troll mother destroyed Vinland.

Did she follow Red Stripe?

I see Unferth again, ice in his eyes, fingers hard on my elbows, when I told him Baldur was missing. He’d been afraid. Was it not for Baldur’s sake, but because he knew the troll mother was coming after her son?

“Sig?” Rathi says.

“I need to go outside,” I whisper, pushing away from him and darting through people, rushing for one of the open side doors.