He went back to the bed, tired from just that small bit of work. The door was obviously thick, he could see as much by the area between the bars in its window and the wood that extended to either side. It was nothing he’d be able to knock down and with rock on either side of it, he figured the walls weren’t likely to give way if he slammed against it. That was the whole of the cell for him to look at. The wood under him was smooth, at least, but he couldn’t call it comfortable.
A guard walked by the window of the cell, peeking in. Erik stood up and shouted at the man.
“Where is Tove?! Hey!”
He rose to his feet and pushed himself toward the door to the cell, holding onto his stomach to give himself some support against the dull pain of sudden movement. He reached the door and grabbed the bars of the window.
“Where is she?”
He saw the guard head back down the hallway, not even glancing at his door as he went. Erik took the time to look around the small room outside his cell a bit. There were a pair of torches and not much else. He dropped back down, moving back to the bed, not sure why he was in the cell to begin with. The valkyries had attacked him. Was that enough to lock him up? It would hardly be possible to lock up the agents of a god, so had they taken him instead? They had looked at him with suspicion and maybe even malice in Kvernes for the same reason. Vali had even tried to kill him in the name of saving the city. The sentiment rang true enough. They’d toppled a building onto him just to stop him breathing.
There was no more sound outside of his cell for a time, so Erik went to sleep again. He was pulled awake by the sound of scraping rock against his cell floor. He jumped to his feet to look for the source. He quickly walked the room looking at the edges of the walls from bottom to top and then scanning the rest, but there was no sign of what might have made the sound. It could have come from outside, he told himself, thinking of how everything in the stone halls echoed horribly.
Erik sat back on the wooden bed, restless. It was then that he realized that the pain had faded entirely. The realization frustrated him all the more as there was nothing he could think to do. To make it all worse, he was either being toyed with or becoming paranoid. Neither would serve him well inside the prison. There was another prisoner but the man hadn’t made a sound since he’d been brought in.
The door to his cell opened and a guard came in holding a small bowl.
“Dinner.”
Erik stood up.
“Hey,” the guard warned, backing away. “Steady.”
“Where is Tove?”
“You can take your dinner or have it thrown at you. Which is it?”
Erik sat himself back down and the guard placed the bowl on the ground before backing out and closing the door. He went to it as soon as the guard was gone, and began to eat it as fast as he could lift the spoon. It was only runny gruel but it was something, at least. He hadn’t realized how hungry he was until the food hit his tongue. He made embarrassing noises as he stood, forcing spoonful after spoonful into his face.
The sound of rock scraping on rock caused Erik to spin. He dropped the bowl at the sight of a gaunt man coming toward him at inhuman speed. The man grabbed him by the face, squeezing his cheeks together. The man’s grip was too strong to be called normal. Erik slapped the hand away and the man backed away from him, putting his arms out as if mocking Erik to goad him into a fight.
“A… fight. No… no need… for that here.” He gave a slow wheezing laugh.
Erik looked the man up and down. He was in tattered robes and had a long black beard coming down from his face. The hair on his head had not fared as well, large patches missing and the rest wiry and thin. There was muscle under thin skin that rippled as the man slowly hopped back and forth in front him.
“Who are you?”
“A neighbor.” The man’s eyes turned to the cell door and widened. He licked his lips and then turned his attention to the bed. “You slept. Slept in here?”
Erik didn’t answer.
The man lurched at him. “Don’t—”
When Erik raised his fist, the man reeled backward, throwing his hands up.
“Didn’t…” The man drew a deep, wheezing breath and continued at his terrible cadence. “Didn’t mean to…” He nearly choked on the word. “Frighten.”
Erik watched closely as his neighbor stepped back into the light from the cell door. There was a strange twitching in his throat. The man saw him looking and put his hands over the twitching mass.
“The brain… never forgets. Never.”
Erik heard footsteps in the hall and the strange man twisted toward them for a half second before scurrying back to the hole he’d come through and disappearing back to the other cell. Erik followed him but still barely managed to catch the loosened brick in motion. It was barely wide enough for a man at the best of times, let alone at the speed the gaunt figure had pushed himself through it.
The door to his cell opened and two guards came in, one
