Thief Eyes

remain in the mortal realm for long.”

“What’s that supposed to mean?” Ari asked.

Svan looked at him like he couldn’t believe how stupid Ari was. “Now that would depend on the realm, wouldn’t it? In the realm of fire, your flesh will melt and boil; in the realm of ice, it will freeze and shatter; in the realm of light, you will turn to sunbeams and disappear. In other realms, other things. I suggest we not wait around to recite them.” He walked on, his staff tapping the ledge, which had begun to slope downhill.

The cold rain fell harder. I pulled up my hood, but the wind blew the rain right into it. More rain dripped from Ari’s hat. I glanced past him, toward the foggy emptiness—and quickly wrenched my gaze away, breathing hard.

“Haley?” Ari squeezed my hand, and I realized I’d stopped walking. I looked up at the mountain. The vertical rock wall stretched up and up—that made me dizzy, too. I squeezed my eyes closed. When I opened them Ari was looking at me, his own eyes wide with concern.

“I fell, didn’t I?” I said.

Ari frowned and began walking again. I followed, keeping my gaze firmly on the stone beneath my feet. Svan had disappeared out of sight once more.

“Were you there when I fell? Did you see?”

Ari pulled his cap down over his ears. “Yeah. I tried to stop you, but I messed it up. So Muninn saved your life instead and I got pulled along for the ride.”

Ari wasn’t the one who’d fallen. He couldn’t have messed up half as much as me. “Why did I fall?” It seemed suddenly important to know.

Ari walked faster. I hurried to keep up, still keeping my eyes on the ledge. “You climbed too high,” Ari said. “And then you let go. I don’t know why.”

The ledge grew slippery as the rain continued. I glanced at my scarred palm. I couldn’t have let go on purpose, could I?

Svan had stopped walking. A couple dozen paces ahead of him, the ledge ended abruptly, giving way to more fog. A few cold tendrils drifted toward us.

“Now what?” I said.

“Now we jump,” Svan said, as if that should have been obvious. He broke into a run, his leather shoes slapping the stone. As he reached the edge he held his arms out wide—one hand holding his staff, the other his leather bag—and leaped into the fog. It swallowed him at once, leaving no sign he’d been there.

In the silence that followed, Ari and I stared at each other. Dizziness washed over me, stronger than before. I began backing away, only Ari still held my hand. After a few steps I came to a halt.

The blowing rain stung my cheeks. I can’t, I thought, but I had no choice. I looked up at Ari. “You go first,” I said.

“And give you the chance to change your mind? No way.”

My hand trembled in Ari’s grasp. “Someone has to go first,” I said reasonably.

“We’ll jump together,” Ari said.

We wouldn’t jump as far together. Ari was risking his own life just to make sure I didn’t risk mine. I adjusted the backpack on my shoulders, knowing I was stalling. “We’ll have to run first. We should count. But you don’t have to—”

“One!” Ari ran, dragging me along.

I stumbled, then matched his pace. “Two!” I said. I can’t do this.

“Three!” Ari said. “Now!”

We jumped, our hands still clasped. Wind whistled past my ears as fog surrounded us. It blew my hood back, and my hair streamed out behind me.

The whistling turned to a roar. Icy rain gave way to burning wind. Somehow, impossibly, we were still jumping. The fog around us turned to roiling orange flames. Heat rolled over me, a physical thing. The realm of fire. Something reached for me out of the flames—a huge misshapen arm, made entirely of flame. Hot fingers stroked my cheek. Any second my skin would catch fire, and then there would be pain—

Another fiery arm reached for Ari. “Leave him alone!” I screamed, knowing they couldn’t hear me, knowing they wouldn’t listen if they could.

Yet in my head, through the roaring, I heard a rough, inhuman voice, crackling like dry paper. “What would you give us to leave him alone?” Burning eyes stared at me through the flames. A burning shudder ran through me.

“Anything!” I said, knowing I had less to offer the power here than I’d had to offer Muninn.

Fiery fingers brushed my hair. “Once before, we accepted such golden locks as a gift. We accept them now. We gift you our fire in turn. Nothing will stay our power this time. You will take our fire into your blood and not merely your hair. You will take our fire into your world, and in so doing, perhaps help us find our way free into that world at last. Do you accept?”

Hot wind scoured my skin like sandpaper. A sickening charred smell filled the air—my own skin melting away. The darkness in me burned away, too, replaced by light so bright it hurt my eyes. Another moment and I’d burn down to ash. I clutched Ari’s hand, though I could no longer see him through the burning. “Yes!” I said, knowing only that I wanted the heat to go away.

“Very good.” The voice in my head made a satisfied sound. The smell of burning hair filled the air.

I slammed into ice-cold water. It cooled the fire, leaving behind warm coals that settled down somewhere deep inside me. Water washed over me as my hands and knees hit wet sand. I sputtered to my feet, thigh-deep in salt water, my clothes and backpack soaked through and dripping. A hand grabbed mine—Ari. He must have landed on his feet; he was only wet to the thighs. “Haley, your hair …”

The fire was gone, my skin unburned. We were no longer on a mountain ledge, but in a bay beside a black sandy beach. Beyond the beach I saw a dirt-and-gravel road, beyond that, gray hills smudged with red and orange mosses.

Ari shivered—was he cold? His hat was gone. Rain dimpled the surface of the bay, and water soaked through my sneakers, but I wasn’t cold at all. Ari splashed out of the water, and I followed, still holding his hand. As we reached the shore, I stopped short and stared at him. “I know you,” I said.

Ari kept shivering. “Yes, we’ve been through this already. I’m Ari, Katrin’s son—”

“No. I remember you. I ran into your dog—” I reached around and touched my hair. It was short, barely touching my ears and the back of my neck. The ends were brittle—burned away—and the smell of burning hair lingered. The darkness over my memories had burned away, too. I was Haley, I went to Rincon High, I studied biology and wanted to work with animals and ran track, my father was Gabe, my mother was Amanda—

My mom—I released Ari’s hand, my fingernails digging for my palms. My mom had disappeared—no, she hadn’t disappeared, she’d been caught by a spell—it had to be a spell, because I knew magic was real now—only before the spell caught her she’d run, because she found out that Dad had—nails broke through my palms, the pain shoving other thoughts away. Smoke seemed to rise from the broken skin, but I could have imagined that. I knew only that I had one more chance to push the memories back, to bury them so deeply that only the stone halls of Muninn’s cave would ever remember them.

I forced my fingernails away from my skin. The pain receded, the smoke disappeared—if it had ever been there—and I faced the memory straight on. “My dad,” I said slowly, looking at Ari. “And your mom …” Katrin, who gave me her notebook, who told me not to run … “They had an affair. My mom found out, and she ran.” Ari looked down, as if my steady gaze hurt him. He rubbed his sleeves for warmth. His lips were pale, which should have worried me, but I just went on, “Mom’s been gone a year. I came to Iceland to find her. If Katrin’s right, there’s nothing left to find. Hallgerd’s spell—” Katrin said the spell had consumed Mom, as surely as the fire Ari and I had leaped through had almost consumed us.

The coals inside me grew hot at the thought. My jeans and jacket steamed in the damp air. I reached for the coin—its metal felt merely warm now—and closed my fingers around it.

The coin flared hotter. The ground shook beneath me, and I fell to my knees.

“Haley!” Hallgerd’s voice roared into my head. This time, I understood every word. “Where have you been?”