Göll became a blur, appearing in front of Tove as the sword came down. A spear of blue energy shot off of the end of the sword as it struck against her unmoving shoulder. The magic misted harmlessly in the air and the man scrambled back away from Göll, his rage turning to fear with each step. When he saw that the valkyrie was not moving to harm him, he started back forward, shouting complaints.
“You would let the girl provoke a fight and then interfere?!”
“You provoked a fight, oaf!” Tove screamed from behind Göll. “And you should not have stopped it, Göll!”
Göll spun, taking Tove by the shoulder. The girl froze, it was the first time Erik had seen Göll touch anyone other than him. “If you wish to fight, then learn to!”
“Why don’t you teach me then!”
“I intend to!”
Tove stood dumbstruck by Göll’s proclamation and the man shouted, annoyed at having been ignored. Göll turned her head toward him, her face showing that she did not intend to hear his voice any longer. The warband saw what Erik had, at least, and was quick to come and lock arms under the raging fighter, pulling him away from Göll as Flosi came forward. He yelled at the man.
“If you want a fight, pick one properly.”
“He—”
Flosi immediately struck the man on the jaw with full force, knocking him unconscious. The rest let him fall to the ground. The warchief turned to Erik, walking at him, hammer on his shoulder. “I’ll apologize for my man. If he wanted a fight, he ought to have said it outright.”
Erik looked at the man, slowly working his way back up on unsteady legs. “It’s fine. I have no intention of fighting any of your people.”
“I’ve told them as much, but you understand how fighters are.”
“I know the type, sure.”
Flosi turned and ordered the warband to begin their march again, the light having faded nearly entirely. The moon was much the same as the sun had been, keeping itself low in the sky. It provided nearly no light. Ahead of him, he saw dim green lights come out. Flosi kept beside him when they returned to their walk.
“I’ve noticed you watching Jari.”
Erik was on edge after the fight and he kept an eye on Flosi’s hammer. “That’s all you’re going to say?”
Flosi held up a hand. “We sent him, I know. But he was not told to lie to you.”
“I’m gonna call bullshit on that, Flosi. He had a pack full of fucking rocks.”
The man sighed. “Fair, then. We meant to attack you before we knew you were a berserker.”
“And now you don’t intend to attack me?”
“Not unless we must. I have given my word and unless you mean to malign my good name, I will keep it. You allowed my men to taste battle with valkyries and showed the face of a berserker to those who have not seen it. There is more value in those than I think you know. We followed you meaning to take those things and you gave them to us and more. That is a debt we’ve made for ourselves and I’ll repay it.”
Flosi walked away with that and went to the front of the warband. He was given a glowing green stone and the pace of the warband increased to a speed beyond what they’d managed during the day. It was a slavish march through a too-long night. Erik’s legs had not failed him in the days of walking, but whatever kept wounds healing did little for him when the work had been so constant with so little rest. There was no room for a complaint from either himself or Tove about the speed or the awkward terrain of the dark valley with the warband leading them through. They were in strange territory, now without light for the bulk of their waking hours and only dim shadow for the rest.
Even with the fur over him, the pain in his side was there, a constant feeling of needles jabbing into him. It was dimming slowly, but Erik figured sleep would be the only way past it. His feet had gone numb hours before he realized that the warband had no intention of stopping in the dark. They had gone quiet, all of them staring down in silence as they walked along with their strange glowing stones. It wasn’t until the sky showed the first signs of light that they slowed. Erik watched them as they seemed to come out of a trance, the stones dimming and showing themselves to be simple rocks carved on every face with runic shapes. He was near enough that he could see them, but they didn’t form anything resembling words that he knew.
They stopped as soon as they found enough level ground to form a camp, a trio of fires being set up immediately, one that seemed to be for Erik and his group. He laid out bedrolls beside it, wanting to sleep immediately, though he knew he’d be too hungry to manage it. Once the camps were prepared, Flosi came to them as Erik rubbed on the wound in his stomach.
“It will clear completely if you die.”
Erik frowned down at the red line on his stomach. “I’ll pass, thanks.”
Flosi waved Asfrid over and she brought heavy ale for them. She went away, promising to bring back meat when it was prepared. The ale had been warmed in spite of the fact that they’d just stopped. Erik looked over to the meat and found it wasn’t frozen either.
“How’d you keep this stuff liquid?”
Flosi smiled. “The runestones.” He took a massive swig and let out a satisfied breath after it had gone down. “They have been forgotten by most. Takes tens of years to learn to carve them so they do anything at all. Like most things, the younger ones think they are just old stories, but Odin gave
