“Soren,” she whispers.
I cup the back of her head in my hand, cradling her face against my neck. “Astrid.”
“It isn’t your fault.”
I’m silent.
“We’re here for a hundred reasons. I can feel them piling up on top of me.”
“I know.”
“It was meant to be.”
My arms go rigid around her.
“It has to be fate.” There is a question in her voice, something I’ve never heard before.
Astrid Glyn, with wavering faith.
“But, Soren,” she says, “every time I think of him, a new cut slashes inside. I don’t know how this could ever be right.”
I twist my fingers into the bottom of her curls. “I’ll start by killing Alwulf Robertson.”
Astrid tilts her face up and the moonlight spreads silver into her hair and eyes. I could almost imagine she mirrors the night sky the way Baldur mirrored the sun. That’s who they are to me: my sun and my moon.
She says, “I never wanted you to have to kill.”
“It’s what I am.”
“But not who you’ve wanted to be.”
“It doesn’t matter now. For Baldur I will do this, and for you.”
“Soren.”
I wait. Her eyes dart everywhere. Up at the stars, to the iron gate between us, to my eyes, to my mouth. “Soren, I dreamed last night that it was you I resurrected. You were dead but I needed you so much I brought you back.”
“Oh.” The single syllable is a world of realization. We both thought the other would die tonight. We both were so wrong, and now there is guilt weighing on top of our sorrow.
She says, “I’m afraid. I can’t lose both of you.”
“You won’t.”
“Their captain is strong and knows his frenzy so much better than you yours.”
I say, “But he does not have you,” and I kiss her through the orchard gate.
It’s a kiss I have longed to take. A kiss that gently tugs at Astrid’s seething power, at the wildness inside both of us. It’s sweet and feels like a confession: I love her. Knowing that, I can temper my own frenzy; I can see all the sides of it. I sense it whirling, the form it takes and the way it clings to my bones.
Astrid whispers against my mouth, “Make it fast.”
I smile, recalling the holmgang in Bassett, Nebrasge, where I spoke those same words to her. May this one go as much in our favor as that.
The berserkers call me with pounding shields to return to the circle of torches. I avoid staring at Baldur’s body, and instead look toward the shadows of the buildings ahead. I know I won’t see Vider; she’ll be too good at hiding for that. But it’s better than looking at the grayness on his cheeks.
When this is over, if I live, I’ll see him. I’ll approach him with news that his blood price, at least, is paid.
Alwulf waits as nearly naked as I, with two berserkers at his shoulders. One is as old as he, the other in his prime. Each holds a set of circle shields. Hawthorn poles have been erected to mark the quarters. In the torchlight everything is riddled with shadows and orange stripes.
The remaining four berserkers stand at the corners, and two step closer to Henry and me as we reach the edge of the torch circle.
“Who challenges?” calls the last berserker, who remains evenly placed between Alwulf and me.
“I do,” I say. “I am Soren Bearskin, son of Styrr, son of Jul, and brother of Baldur the Beautiful, the god of light.”
There are murmurs at his name, and even Henry is surprised: they expected me to say I was a son of Odin.
The berserker directly across from the first speaker, who resembles him too much to be anything but a brother, says, “And who answers the challenge?”
Alwulf stands forward. The sword in his hand catches firelight and throws it at me. Scars hook down his chest in a pattern of thorns, and his left shoulder is covered in mottled burn marks. “I am Alwulf Goodspear, son of Robert, son of Jerome. All of us sons of Odin, the god of madness.”
Madness. Only another name for the battle-rage. I take deep breaths, pulling energy from the ground, and imagine it spilling down from the stars overhead. My bare feet are planted. I am the mountain, between the earth and the sky.
As Henry offers me my first shield, he puts his hand in the center of my back, and touches my frenzy. I shudder and lean into his hand as the connection snaps alive between us.
“Use it, Soren Bearskin,” he whispers. “All of us will be with you, and all of us will be with him. So it is when berserkers battle in the ring. It is not only a battle of skill, but of power.”
All our frenzies unite in a lightning web. I feel them individually: Henry, his rage so full of joy; the brothers, who push and pull like the moon and the tide; one who is hollow with fear; one with a center of peace; one and then another whose powers divide themselves again and again as they struggle between me and their warlord. One who grieves. And finally Alwulf, alive with strength and desperation.
Is he afraid of me?
I hold my sword aloft and yell.
All of them join me, in a growing roar, and I look beyond to Astrid, distant and small. She watches through the iron gate, one hand in constant motion as she draws a rune again and again in the air. The same one my dead father drew.
And then the berserkers yell “Hear!” and I leap into the holmgang ring.
When I battled Baldur, it was a dance. I held back; I tried to fight him with only skill and muscles.
This is different. I reach in and unlock that iron star.
Power rips through me, but I am a vessel for it, created to channel every bit of it, created to burn and exist.
It moves with me—I move with it—and when Alwulf and I come together we explode. Our swords clash, ringing through my bones. I swing again and he blocks, both of us roaring, because we cannot hold in the energy.
I focus through it, drawing it with me as I draw my sword. As I draw my arms and legs, as I know the motions of the dance, the rhythm of attack and defend, the jar of swords and the pain of sudden bruises. His blade cuts against my ribs and the heat of blood only gathers more power to me. I knock him back with my shield, and we catch together, chests heaving, blood and sweat in our eyes. He’s tied back his long braids but the iron collar marks his neck.
We fight, and we fight. All around the holmgang ring. My shield cracks in two, but we do not stop for a new one. Alwulf throws his away, and we meet again, swords ringing together like bells.
This dance is hard and pounding, and the weight of an entire berserk band’s frenzy presses at me. My body is clear, though, and my every motion sharp. I’m certain of my rightness, that this battle is mine to be won. He killed my lord. He destroyed my father. He imprisoned Astrid. All these are his crimes, and I am here to cleave them away, to set his blood free into the ground and release him, release myself of the responsibility. That is the blood price.
My frenzy is Odin’s hand, his own madness inhabiting me, guiding my sword. I bare my teeth as I fight, and my vision darkens. I am dizzy and burning and so near to losing my hold on what is happening.
The frenzy pushes at me, and I let go.
It courses through me in a rush again, sudden and fast, and I’m a tunnel for it. My ears go deaf from the roar of a hundred furious screams, and Alwulf falters.
The frenzy is mine.
I dive at him, knocking his sword away with my hand—my bare hand—and he falls back. I’m on top of him, a knee on his chest, the point of my sword pressing into his throat.
My arm shakes. Alwulf’s eyes roll wildly and blood trickles from the corner of his mouth.
All I have to do is press in.
I remember Baldur standing over me, ready. The tip of my spear pressing into my neck. I remember how his head blocked the sun and the sky behind him raged with light. Now, Soren Bearskin, are you ready to take me wherever I need to go?
And I remember how calm he was despite the hard breathin
g and sweat of the moment. He patiently waited for me to say I am ready, Prince. Under the sun, and to the edges of the world.
Then he let me up.
That holmgang ended in mercy—a thing Odin does not believe in.
But I am not sworn to the god of madness.
Tears blur my sight and one drops hot and hard onto Alwulf’s chest.
Closing my eyes, I close my heart, too, and the frenzy fades. Because I wished it to, because it is my tool. I am not its slave.
I stand up, taking my sword.
“New shield?” Henry calls, voice wavering with uncertainty.
Staring down at the captain, I say, “No. This is over. I serve the god of light; your life, Alwulf, the rest of the years, is a gift.”
He grimaces, tries to sit, but can’t. I’ve defeated him. Henry Halson says, “So be it.”
“So be it,” the rest acknowledge, in scattered voices, repeating it one or two at a time until, finally, the three words rasp from Alwulf’s own lips.
Shakily, I go to where Baldur’s body rests. I stare down at the pale gold of him, dull under the night sky, and lifeless as a doll. Down on one knee, I touch my hand over his heart, feeling the loss of him hollowing me out again.
Cold wind blows off the mountains, smelling of snow and evergreens. “I am your man,” I say to his lifeless face. “There may be the wild frenzy inside, but I am not a killer. Astrid knew. You knew. I am berserk, but can choose what that means. I serve the sun, and that—” My voice thickens too much for talking. I want to lie down beside him, to remain here all throughout the night and, when the dawn arrives, myself light the fire that will consume him.
“That,” I whisper, “means hope and life and love. Those things you forgot, but still were.”
My hand warms the skin over his heart, and for a moment I can almost imagine it will beat again.
But he is dead, his murderer defeated. And I am not finished.
Astrid is in the orchard, and so awaits Idun, the lady who ordered Baldur killed.
As I move toward the gate, Henry and two others approach. One is the older man who stood at Alwulf’s side, the other the berserker in whose frenzy I sensed so much sadness. Both of them blond and blue-eyed as berserkers should be.
Henry says, “Take this, for it will get colder before the sun rises.”
The older berserker holds out a coat of bearskin, and the sad one offers a cloak trimmed in fur.
“Thank you.” I put the coat on over my bare, bloody chest. It’s heavy and warm. Henry hands me my boots. I remove Vider’s troll eye from the toe and tuck it into the coat pocket. As I tie up my boots I say, “Wait for me.” I cannot add before you burn Baldur, but they know.
I throw the cloak over my arm for Astrid, and walk to the orchard gate.
TWENTY-ONE
THE HEAVY BLACK lock opens easily, and I step onto the orchard ground. Berserkers swing the gate shut behind me. The moment I’m trapped, I sense tranquility in the air itself: I’ve walked onto hallowed land.
Astrid appears, and I open my coat. She slips in against my bare chest, uncaring that I have been bloodied so recently. I wrap the cloak about both of us, and we breathe in slow unison, heating all the crevices and shadows between us.
As she thaws, tears gently fall from her closed eyes, as if her sorrow was ice and now it melts in the heat of my bitter victory.
All around us are the whisper of wind through leaves, the quiet creak of branches, and the crackle of fire as the berserkers outside light more and more torches to place along the fence. The glow will guide us into the deep darkness that is Idun’s orchard.
Finally, Astrid opens her eyes and says, “That was well done, Soren. He would be proud, and I am honored.” She wipes the tears from her cheeks.
I go onto my knees and kiss both of her hands. “I want you to come out of here with me, but you can’t, can you?”
Astrid tugs the cloak closed around her shoulders. She turns and looks into the trees. “This is what I have dreamed.”
“I know.”
“For years.”
“For your whole life,” I say, thinking of how my father was here before I was born, how this orchard is the cradle for all the threads linking us to the past.
“It’s been pulling at me,” she says. “But I would not go without you.”
I put my hand on her shoulder and squeeze. “As it should be, Astrid Jennasdottir.”
Together we walk between the trees.
It’s not long before we leave the torches behind, and the only light we have filters silver and pale from the moon. It’s barely enough, but Astrid knows the way. Her fingers curl around mine and I move beside her, a strong shadow. Our feet make sharp snaps against the cold orchard ground.
The trees are ancient ones, their thick limbs heavy with leaves but mostly bare of fruit. Here and there a round apple shines, out of season, and colored unnaturally bright in the moonlight. But there are no more than a handful of apples for every tree. Fruit and leaves have blanketed the ground, though we walk along a clear path through the low-hanging, looming branches. It’s quiet; even breezes do not penetrate the thickness here. I think once or twice that something watches us, paces us through the wild apples.
It isn’t long before weariness creeps into me. I’ve exploded with frenzy, fought for my life, lost a friend. All I wish to do is curl up in the roots of a tree and sleep for several days.
I doubt we’ve walked more than a half kilometer yet into the antique orchard when a clearing appears through the branches.
Moonlight streams in, and onto a slender figure in a white cloak. A cat perches delicately on her shoulder. She stands before a small golden tree, no taller than me, but hung with tiny, wizened apples. A half dozen would fit easily into my palm, and they’re every shade of gold.
I free my sword and say, “Idun.”
But the lady draws back her hood to look at Astrid, and Astrid says, “Mom.”
My arm falters as Astrid rushes forward and Idun spreads her hands to welcome her daughter into an embrace. The cat leaps away, making room. They hold each other tight, and Astrid is shaking. Idun, known before as Jenna Glyn, closes her eyes, and I can see the finality, the penance, marked across her face as she hugs her daughter.
I wait outside their embrace, hanging back with my sword point hovering just over the earth. All I can think is: Astrid’s mother is alive, and she had Baldur killed.
Astrid leans away and puts her hands on her mother’s face, peering into it. “You haven’t changed,” she whispers, but Jenna says, “Oh, my little cat, you have. You have. Everything has changed.”
“What have you done?” I ask, stepping forward. I wish to tear Astrid away, to impose myself between.
“Soren.” Astrid reaches for my hand and for her mother’s, and she connects us. “Soren, this is my mother, Jenna Glyn. Mom, this is Soren, my …” She blinks and shakes her head before saying, “… my everything.”
Jenna’s eyes widen in horror, and I don’t mind because I dislike her, too. Vehemently. She is like an older, harder version of Astrid, with the same thick licorice curls, the same eyes that hold the moonlight like bottle glass, the same lips and cheeks, as if nothing of Astrid’s father found its way into Astrid.
Except, perhaps, honor. For this woman had Baldur killed.
“Oh, Astrid,” she breathes, her mouth trembling as she stares at me, as if I am news she has dreaded for a hundred years.
“What’s wrong, Mom?” Astrid is smiling. “Sweet swans! I’ve found you here; I’ve always been meant to. I knew you weren’t dead!” A laugh pours out of her, like bubbles in sparkling mead. “Mom! I can’t believe it—you’re Idun … but you’re human. You’re mortal, aren’t you?”
“Yes. I am. But it is always a woman—or a girl—who guards the apples. True youth burns only in one who will someday die. The apples grow brightest when tended by one who is young, but will be so only for a time.” Jenna’s eyes close again, and she takes
her hand away from Astrid, to press against her own chest.
I say, “Remember what the berserkers were ordered: ‘Kill the golden one and lead the seether into the orchard.’ ”
There is a moment of fraught silence as Astrid remembers. I see the image of Baldur’s broken self flash in Astrid’s eyes, and I see her face fall to pieces. It cuts at me, because I made her remember, I wouldn’t even let her have five minutes of happiness with her rediscovered mother.
“You left me to become the Lady of Apples,” Astrid whispers. “You’re Idun.”
Jenna lifts one hand to gently cup a wrinkled apple of immortality that dangles near her from the small golden tree. “I am.”
Astrid puts one foot forward. “And you told the Bears to kill Baldur.”
“I did,” she admits, her voice hushed and sorry. Not at all what I expected. She should not regret it; she should be triumphant. I grip my sword tightly and go to Astrid’s side. I take her hand and weave our fingers together. “This was your mother, Astrid, but is no longer.”
My cruel words cause Jenna’s eyes to shut again, and tears plop onto Astrid’s cheeks.
“Listen, Astrid, child of the Feather-Flying Goddess,” Idun the Youthful murmurs, opening her eyes and pinning her daughter to the darkness of the grove. “And listen, Soren Bearstar, child of Odin and brother to his son. Listen to the story of Jenna Glyn, called Freyasdottir, called Seether of All Dreams. I will tell you what became of her, if you will listen.”
She pulls back from us and kneels on the soft grass growing between the roots of the apple tree.
Astrid tugs my hand. My sword arm trembles, but she caresses my knuckles, my wrist, her fingers flickering under the cuff of the bearskin coat. “Soren,” she whispers.
I sheathe my sword. When Astrid turns to face Idun again, I wrap my arms around her from behind, making myself into a shell for her. Into support and anything else she might need. Both of us look to her mother.