“Are all berserkers so dire?” Astrid asks lightly.
I frown harder.
Her lips press together and she says, “I’ll have to distract you, then. Concentrate. There may be an exam when I’m finished.” The line of her mouth spreads into a smile. I lift one corner of mine in response.
And Astrid immediately launches into random facts: Her favorite holiday is Disir Day, six weeks from now, when there will be dancing and revelry, then the slaughter of cows and goats and cats in honor of the goddesses. She prefers tea to coffee, but a fine barley beer to anything in the world. She dislikes the flavor of coriander, but cinnamon reminds her of her mother.
When her mother disappeared, Astrid went to live with her uncle Richard in Westport City. “He’s a seethmathr,” she says, casting me a sideways glance to gauge my reaction. But I don’t judge men for playing with Freya’s seething magic. Odin did it himself. When I only tap my fingers on the door handle, she continues, “He makes good money at it, and most of his clients don’t care that he’s a man.”
“Why did you come to Sanctus Sigurd’s?” Astrid should have had her pick of masters in nearly any trade; she shouldn’t have needed to rely on an academy education.
“I wanted to apprentice to Richard, but he was worried that we’d both be shunned if it was discovered I learned from him. We compromised by having me go to Sigurd’s for at least a year, in order to convince people I’d had a semblance of a regular education.”
She tells me of driving around the country with her mother, stopping to camp with dozens or occasionally hundreds of people. “The festivals were the best,” she says. “When tents went up and you could buy anything, from hotpigs to bison burgers, and sit at craft tables to watch women weave bracelets, or watch quilting circles creating these immense blankets with ancient heroes and common gods on them. We bought a hand-scribed edition of the Eddas for my tenth birthday.” Astrid rolls her eyes my way. “Once we met a peddler saying his sticks were straight from the New World Tree itself.”
I laugh for her, though I’m reminded of the snake caravans Mom and I sometimes joined. Lokiskin who were always trying to sell false relics.
Astrid sighs quietly enough that I can’t hear it over the wind, but only see the way her shoulders rise and fall. “And then there was the seething.” She tightens her fingers around the steering wheel. “Gods, Soren. You’ve seen me seeth, but that was nothing. Mom had hundreds of followers, always giving her things to toss into the bonfires. She’d personally throw the stuff in, no matter how long it took, and then her chorus would circle around, blowing the corrberry smoke at her from every direction. I remember how exciting it was when she danced, and how hot my cheeks would get. I always knew the moment just before she hit the deepest part of the trance. Mom would stop, suddenly. And one by one the people would ask their questions. About crop failure, marriage, birth, the stock market, even vacation plans, Soren! Important things and totally not important things. But Mom answered all of them. She always knew.”
I want to touch her. To just put a hand on her shoulder or her knee.
“She was loved,” Astrid says. “I would like to be loved.”
My mouth opens and I almost tell her that my mom abandoned me when I walked into a militia station to declare myself and accept the stigma of my father’s name. Instead I ask, “Were you and your mother in this desert where we’ll find Baldur?”
“Yes. We camped there. For the last time.”
After that, she’s quiet until we pull into Bassett, Nebrasge, for gasoline.
We fill the tank at an old-fashioned station. It’s a white brick building with a striped awning. The pumps have no automatic shutoff and I try not to worry I’ll spill gasoline everywhere after the trouble I had popping open the lid.
Astrid leans out the open window to ask, “Are you hungry? Looks like there’s a diner down the road.”
We park on the street and walk into the plain red storefront. A bell clangs over the door. There are two rows of Formica tables with peeling plastic chairs and a bar with yellow stools. We sit across from each other at a booth. Astrid barely glances at the single-sheet laminated menu before beginning to flip through the wheel of jukebox choices. I decide on the pulled-pork sandwich with fried potatoes. When the waitress comes, she smiles brightly and the wrinkles around her eyes gather. A bracelet of linked silver horses circles her wrist: she’s a devotee of Freyr the Satisfied, god of wealth and joy. She introduces herself as Esmeralda and takes our order. Astrid asks about local sightseeing as if we’ll be in town longer to spend more money.
The sun is bright outside, making the tiny town of Bassett bold and colorful. I’m quiet, sitting with my tattoo to the window so it won’t be readily visible to the restaurant.
Our drinks are served and I don’t turn my face when I thank Esmeralda. After she’s scooted off again, Astrid leans across the table. “You don’t trust anyone anywhere, do you?”
“It’s that they don’t trust me. When they see this.” I flick my thumb over the bottom of the spear tattoo.
“Because you act as though you aren’t to be trusted.”
Scowling, I decide not to mention being chased out of a convenience store when I was only thirteen. “You’ve seen how people turn away at school.”
“Taffy said you’re the one who stopped hanging out with London. Stopped sitting with them at lunch.”
“It was better that way, so he didn’t have to be uncomfortable.”
She pushes curls behind her ears. “What about your comfort? Wouldn’t you rather have friends? You aren’t a monster.”
I clench my jaw. There are so many arguments I could make, about being kicked out of battle guild, not allowed to spar with my peers. The way the girls all pulled back in Astrid’s own room the night she was reading runes. I ask, “Where exactly are we going after lunch?”
Astrid waits, studying me with narrowed eyes; then she leans back into the booth. “The Badlands.”
“That’s desert?”
“Yes. It’s rocky and desolate and there isn’t any civilization for miles and miles. Good place to hide a god.” Astrid toys with the saltshaker.
“You think someone did this on purpose, then.”
“Must have. Baldur’s ashes didn’t get up and run away themselves.”
“Gundrun Graycloak said it wasn’t Loki. Freya vouched for him.”
She dashes salt on the table, lifts her glass of tea and puts it down on top of the salt. “He’s stolen things from his brother-gods before.”
“What do pearls do for seething?” I nod at the string of them hugging her clavicle. “Protection? Ease of trance?”
Astrid bites her bottom lip as she grins. “No.” She laughs and caresses the pearls. “These are plastic.”
“Plastic.”
“Oh, Soren. Don’t glower at me.” Her smile doesn’t fade. “Mom gave them to me, of course. Don’t you have some silly thing from yours?”
“No.”
She begins to speak, but her eyes slide over my shoulder. Her mouth forms a perfect O. Twisting, I glance back at the TV anchored over the bar. A sketched image of a desert valley is displayed across the monitor. A young woman behind the bar stands on tiptoe to turn up the volume.
“… released from a massive seething dance performed privately in the court of the New World Tree. Seethkona Lilja described the image, and all six other seethkonas present agree that this is the place they saw in their dreams. Baldur was there, very much alone. No one has identified the location specifically, though the god of light is believed to be in the southern desert region, and possibly as near to Bright Home as the southern part of Colorada kingstate. Anyone with information is asked to call the tips hotline number shown at the bottom of the screen.”
“Southern Colorada?” I turn back to Astrid. But she purses her lips in a mischievous smile and sips her tea.
One of the men sitting at a table across from us pushes his chair back abruptly. His friend is glari
ng at me.
I draw up straight and square my shoulders, but remain seated. With my eyes, I try to warn Astrid. The two men position themselves at the edge of our table, looming over us with fingers tucked into their wide belts. Both wear hammers of Thor, one strung around the neck, the other as a dangling earring. By the way they walk, I know that one of them, the man with the earring, has training in a war band. His hard eyes scour over Astrid, then dart back to me.
“Can we help you?” I ask, not allowing them the first word.
The smaller one shrugs. “We were just thinking, ya know, what is a guy like you doing in our nice little town?”
The muscles in my abdomen tighten and I must force my hands to remain flat on the tabletop. When I twisted to watch the TV, I displayed the tattoo for all to see. “Passing through,” I say.
Now Astrid is going to witness exactly why I’ve been so wary.
“Well, isn’t that nice to hear,” the man with the earring says. As they hang over us, I see that neither of them is older than twenty-five. Neither stands lightly, and both have looser muscles than me, despite the hardness in the soldier’s eyes. If it becomes necessary, I can get us out of the diner even without my weapons. Both sword and spear are back at the Spark; as one of Odin’s, I can carry steel into any public place except for some temples, but that would have drawn immediate attention. My tattoo and my darker skin are enough to make me stand out.
The question is, are these two going to back down now that they’ve spoken to us, made clear they don’t want us here? Or will they do something rash?
Esmeralda appears at the soldier’s elbow, her smile strained. “Hey now, all, your sandwiches’ll be right up. Oz, David, you getting to know our guests a bit? They’re on their way up to the Black Hills.”
The soldier catches my eye. I see the change on his face as the idea occurs to him. Thor’s soldiers are as notoriously hotheaded as berserkers are mad. This one is going to challenge me, I know it. Fighting holmgang against a berserker, even a young one like me, will go miles for his reputation.
“Oh,” Astrid interrupts merrily, “we were just asking this pig-faced troll-sucker to leave us alone.”
My body flares hot with panic, and all the sound in the restaurant fades.
“What did you call me?” the soldier hisses.
“Not you, darling.” Raising her voice further, she taps the younger one on the stomach. “This giant’s ass-wart was ogling me.”
I shake my head, trying again to catch her eye.
But her grin only widens. “For the insult, I challenge you. You are not a man’s equal, and not a man at heart.” The ritual words sound like a blithe poem on her tongue, not a call to battle.
“I am as much a man as you,” bites back the young man, accepting the challenge with equal ritual. His fists clench until his knuckles turn white.
“Oz,” Esmeralda says. She seems as worried as me.
The soldier claps a hand on Oz’s shoulder. He glances at me when he says, “We will meet in the holmring.”
“A mark and a half from now,” says Astrid. She asks Esmeralda, “Can we still eat?”
The waitress nods and backs away.
“This will be fun, little witch,” Oz sneers. He and David stomp out of the diner. We’re being watched by the handful of other patrons. One older man at the bar follows David and Oz. I sit, pressing my boots into the tiles below the table, trying to be calm. The quiet roars in my ears. I look at Astrid and she’s sipping at her tea, her face unconcerned. Her chin is lowered, so she glances up at me coyly.
I slap my hands on the table, stand, and leave.
Outside, the noontime sun barely heats the air. The previously charming little town appears closed, narrow, and hostile to me now. A row of toy houses glaring at me all down the street. I reach the car and lean against it, bowing my head.
“Soren.”
A growl bursts out of me. “What were you thinking?”
“He was going to challenge you.”
I turn. Her eyes are shining as ever; her face is calm. “I could have handled them, Astrid. You know that.”
“We can’t risk it. You—you don’t have your battle-fury under control. You were forbidden combat until after you come to full berserking.”
“By Modra Hadley, who only holds sway at the academy.” My entire body is tense. Even my teeth vibrate. “It wouldn’t have been difficult to stomp their pretty asses into the ground.”
Astrid clasps her hands together. “I’m only seventeen. The worst he can call is blood. Not death. But you—if you were entering the ring, you’d have to give your name. They’d know you, and he could have called to death despite your age. Besides, they’d have had guns at the ready in case …”
I close my eyes, seeing the kickback of a dozen rifles and hearing the thunder as my dad jerked again and again and then fell.
She puts a hand on my wrist. I grab her shoulders. “Astrid,” I say helplessly.
“Will you hold my shields?” They’re only more ritual words, but this time I feel like she’s asking me for my whole heart.
My hands tighten on her. I lift her up so her heels leave the sidewalk.
“You’re hurting me,” she whispers.
I drop her as though she’s caught fire. “I’m sorry.” I shouldn’t be here with her, where I can harm her so easily.
We stand still for a moment before she takes one step closer. “Soren Bearskin, will you hold my shields?”
Her voice makes me flush, because she still wants to trust me. Fortunately, there’s an official response, so I don’t have to find my own words. “I will stand at the hazel pole, Astrid Glyn, Freya’s daughter, and hold your shields.”
She takes my hands, the ones that held her too hard. I feel her skin cold against my fever, and as she weaves our fingers together, I stare as if they’re miles away.
Astrid says, “Come on, our sandwiches are waiting, and I’ll need the fuel.”
FIVE
THE HOLMRING IN Bassett, Nebrasge, spreads out within a grove of white birch trees. The black eyes spiraling down the trunks serve as nature’s witness. A shallow square ditch creates a border around the ring, and the grass inside has been stamped down into dust. I stand with Astrid at one corner, which is marked off with four tall poles of hazel wood.
Oz and his soldier friend David huddle together at the opposite corner. I study them, trying to determine how difficult a time Astrid will have.
All around us a crowd has gathered. Half the population of Bassett, I suspect. It’s not every day a holmgang occurs, especially one involving strangers. Adults and children sit on lawn chairs or stand around drinking soda and cans of cheap beer. Cell phones are out, clicking images of the ring, Oz, and us. I want to glower and glare at the culprits, to hide my tattoo even though it’s too late for that. When a guy my age turns on a handheld video camera, I can’t help stepping forward.
Astrid places a hand on my elbow. “There isn’t anything you can do, Soren,” she murmurs.
She’s right. I frown down at her.
Esmeralda found Astrid a pair of loose fight pants that tie at her waist and leave her calves bare. Astrid wears the pants and her own exercise bra and nothing else but the plastic pearls. After she dressed, I ran through stretches with her, and a quick warm-up. Astrid humored me, and waited until I was finished to remind me that she’d been training for holmgang all her life, just as I had. I gritted my teeth and had to acknowledge it. I didn’t like it, but I reminded myself that for most people, holmgang is not life or death as it would be for a berserker. Many of Astrid’s peers hardly even take it seriously, assuming they can buy themselves a champion to fight for them, or get away with only a scratch.
Finally, before coming to the ring, Astrid removed the seething kit from her canvas bag and unrolled it. A single long piece of leather with dozens of pockets sewn inside, the kit held all the ingredients necessary for the seethkona’s trade.
“You aren’t going in alt
ered,” I said, stopping her hand as it skimmed over the pockets.
“No, but I want a charm or two, and lavender oil will calm me.”
“A charm?”
Pulling a round, flat piece of horn from one of the pockets, she said, “Yes, this one.” She offered it to me.
The cool horn coin was rubbed smooth on both sides. A streak of gray mottled the edge. If there had ever been a rune marked in, it was long worn away. “What is it?”
“Walrus tusk.”
I wrapped my hand around the charm. Walrus tusk for heightened strength and potency. Thor himself prized such items.
“And this,” she said as she gave me another.
A molar, the size of my thumb knuckle.
“From a hill troll.”
The two charms together in my hand tingled warmly. I raised my fist to my mouth and said against my skin, “Myself to myself.” It was the oldest of Odin’s blessings, invoking the power found in self-sacrifice.
“Thank you, Soren.” Astrid dabbed lavender oil from a tiny flask onto her neck. She took the charms back and tucked them into her bra.
The mayor of Bassett steps forward from the crowd to officiate. “Who challenges?” he calls.
Astrid replies, “I do. I am Astrid Glyn, daughter of Jenna, daughter of Ariel, all of us daughters of the Feather-Flying Goddess, Freya.”
With relish, I watch Oz’s face slacken. He knows the name of Jenna Glyn. Hisses and whispers flicker around the gathered crowd like a swarm of flies.
Swallowing his questions, the mayor waves for the guy with the camera to keep filming and yells, “And who answers her challenge?”
“I do. I am Oslaf Smithson, son of Erik, son of Patrik, all of us sons of Thor Thunderer.” Oz puts his fists on his hips. He wears only loose pants similar to Astrid’s. In older times, the holmgang was fought in battle raiment and boots, often with helmets. But modern sensibility allows for less terrible holmgang, especially between young people, and it can be little more than a common spar. Even when it involves blood.