on the stool. Vali was looking straight at her.
‘You are a sorcerer!’ The implications of what she saw began to sink in. If this was a shape-shifter, if he could appear exactly as Vali, then — if he got free — he could take the prince’s place, eat with them, play and who knows what more? Perhaps they would have climbed the hills and lain kissing on the grass together. Perhaps they would have gone out in the little boat, as she and Vali often did. And then what? Murder, as wolves always murdered.
The man blinked at her. He cleared his throat and said slowly, ‘Not a sorcerer.’ His voice was low and cracked, with a strange accent. He produced his words carefully, as if they were fragile things that might break if he let them out too quickly. It was as if he was unused to speaking.
‘Then what are you?’
‘I am a wolf.’
Adisla was careful not to look at him directly for too long, in case he cast a spell on her.
‘You’ve stolen the face of the prince.’
‘This face was given me by a brother. I am proud to wear it. I look through his eyes and he sees again through me. I wear his fur and he runs again, through me.’
Adisla realised he was talking about the wolf pelt.
‘You are a fetch,’ she said, ‘a subtle, scheming shape-changer. Who sent you here?’
‘I stole the food of a black-hued man. He enchanted me and brought me to this place.’
Now Adisla did laugh. Vali, she well knew, was more interested in playing king’s table and mooning about the hills than he was in magic.
‘You’re black-hued yourself, no need for insults.’
‘It is true,’ he said. ‘I am a wolf.’
‘And now what is to happen to you, wolf?’
He said nothing, just looked into her eyes.
‘They will hang you,’ she said.
Still he didn’t speak but she couldn’t shake his gaze. Was this what it was like, she wondered, to be enchanted?
‘You don’t seem too concerned about it.’
‘I am a wolf.’
She thought that he didn’t understand the trouble he was in. Or did death not mean the same to him as it did to her?
‘You are the Fenris Wolf,’ she said, ‘fettered and chained.’
‘Fenrisulfr will break his fetters one day, say the prophecies.’
Adisla felt a chill go through her. She had always found that myth disturbing. The god Loki had had monstrous children, one of which was the gigantic Fenris Wolf. The gods had been so afraid of Fenrisulfr that they tricked it into fetters. Lashed by a cord called Thin to a rock called Scream, a sword thrust into its jaws to keep them open, its saliva ran out to become a river called Hope. The tale said the wolf would lie there until the twilight of the gods — Ragnarok — when it would break its bonds and kill the All-Father Odin. It would usher in a new age, ruled by beautiful, just, fair spirits, not the corrupt, battle-mad, vengeful and deceitful gods they called the Aesir, of which Odin was the chief.
The rhyme from the prophecy went through her head. The fetters shall burst and the wolf run free
Much do I know and more can see.
Her mother had told her the story when she was a child and Adisla had been thrilled and scared.
‘But you are not the Fenris Wolf,’ she said, ‘or you would break your fetters.’
‘No,’ said the wolfman. He seemed very sad.
‘Would you like some food or drink?’ said Adisla.
‘Yes,’ said the wolfman.
Adisla went over to the hall. Everyone was too drunk to notice her, everyone except Vali, who caught her eye and then looked away. She took some bread and butter from the mead bench, along with a cup. On her way back she drew water from the well and dipped the cup into the bucket. Then she approached the wolfman again.
She fed him the bread, pushing it into his mouth, almost afraid he might bite her. He ate it slowly, not gulping it like an animal as she had expected him to do. Still he held her gaze. He’s showing me he’s human, she thought. He says he’s a wolf but that’s not really what he wants me to see. Then she held the cup to his lips.
‘More?’
‘Yes.’
She refilled the cup three or four times. The man did not seem like a savage or a sorcerer. His eyes were not furious; he didn’t spit at her or curse her. Adisla studied him closely. She could see he was very like Vali indeed, although his face was more weather-beaten and leaner. She reached forward and touched his hair — it was like Vali’s too. But he wasn’t exactly the same, only very similar. Did she still think he was a sorcerer? She didn’t know.
‘I didn’t think wolfmen could speak,’ she said.
‘I only know two,’ he said. ‘One doesn’t, but I do, when I must.’
‘When is that?’
‘Not much,’ said the wolfman.
‘Is your mother a wolfwoman. Or a wolf?’ she said.
‘My family are like you. I lost them when I was young.’
‘They died?’
‘No, I lost them, on a hillside. My wolf father looked after me from then.’
He was more like Vali than Adisla had thought. He too had been effectively orphaned at an early age. Why did she feel so sorry for this bandit, so fascinated by him?
‘You were given to a wizard?’
‘Not a wizard, a wolf.’
‘A wolf like you?’
‘Yes.’
They said nothing for a while; she just helped him eat and drink.
Then the wolfman said, ‘Why are you helping me?’
‘I don’t know.’
‘Your kinsmen beat me and tied me here. Are you a traitor to them?’
‘I am true to myself,’ said Adisla. ‘I am a free woman and no one commands me.’
The wolfman was watching her very intently now.
‘What is your name?’ she said.
‘I am a wolf.’
‘Don’t wolves have names?’
‘No.’
‘Well, wolf, I am Adisla,’ she said.
For the first time he broke from staring at her to look at the ground.
‘My family called me Feileg,’ he said, ‘but I lost my name when I lost them.’
‘You seem unused to kindness, Feileg.’
‘I am a wolf,’ he said. She found herself looking into his eyes again. They were like Vali’s, without the humour but also without the discomfort that so often radiated from the prince.
She sensed he wanted to ask her something. Was this it? The spell that enchanters work, was it coming over her?
‘What?’ said Adisla.
‘Marry me,’ said the wolfman.
If it was a spell, that broke it. Adisla burst out laughing. ‘I’m afraid, sir, that your prospects seem a little bleak for that right now.’
‘I will escape,’ said the wolfman. ‘Marry me. We have spoken, we have exchanged kindnesses. Then you go to your kin and they arrange it. My mother said this is how it is done. I have many treasures in the hills and I will spread them before you. Go to your kin.’
