“I know not. He felt ill, and suddenly was gone. Yesterday he went into the woods looking for a strayed cow. Maybe a swart elf shot him.”
He lay washed and cleanly clad, his eyes closed for him and the jaw bound up. Hardgreip went over and peered narrowly. He had been long and lean. His nose thrust like a crag from the ashen face and gray-shot beard.
Hadding told the wife he was sorry and promised whatever help he could give. “I can hew a coffin from a log, we can both dig, and we’ll leave a piece of silver in his grave,” he said. She struggled not to weep.
Hardgreip plucked his sleeve. “Come outside with me,” she murmured. Hadding followed her.
Rain had stopped for a while. Mists eddied over the sodden ground. Westward the clouds had parted enough to let through a nearly level sunbeam. It turned the mere blood red. Water dripped off roof and trees.
Hadding looked down into his leman’s eyes. They burned like the pool, though her fingers where she caught at his wrist were cold. “Here I can work a spell,” she hissed. “We’ve had too many bad foretokenings. If we know what lies ahead, we can make ready for it and belike win free.”
“I have always heard that the will of the Norns stands not to be changed,” he said misgivingly.
Her voice sharpened. “Would you go blind toward your foemen if you could scout them out first? I’ve lived far longer than you, and learned somewhat about the underworlds.”
“What do you think to do?”
“This man is newly dead. His soul has not yet fared far. It Will be easy to call back. But he has been beyond time. I will make him foretell for us.”
Hadding’s skin crawled. “That’s an ill repayment for the widow’s kindness.”
“Ha, shall a dirt-grubber and her brood hold back the last of the Skjoldungs from what is his? Hadding, I, who made a drow speak with me, am going to do this. Best will be if you help, but will you or nil you, it shall happen.”
Her keenness overwhelmed his youthfulness. Besides, if she turned herself into a giantess again, he could not stand against her He watched unhappily while she cut a shoot off a blackthorn, trimmed it to a short stick, and carved runes in it. When she was done, night was falling fast and rain gusted anew. They went back inside.
“There is something we must do,” Hardgreip told Gerd. “Keep off, you and your children, and you’ll come to no hurt. Otherwise dreadfulness can befall you.”
The woman gaped and cringed. Loath though Hadding seemed, he did not gainsay his friend. His sword could easily put an end to her family. Gerd moaned. She herded her youngsters back in among the kine.
Hardgreip stoked up the hearthfire. From a household jug she poured water into the household kettle and set it above. From her pack she took things Hadding had not known she had brought along, leaves of nightshade, a dried toad, a bat’s wings, the withered navel string of a stillborn, and uglier stuff. She cast them into the water and cast the garb off herself. Naked she stood in the shifting flamelight and thronging shadows, holding the runestave above the kettle and chanting while that which was within came to seethe.
Hadding stood as if frozen. It was worse than at the dolmen. Never, in all his years with the giants, had he seen this side of her.
Steam swirled white over Hardgreip’s hand and the stick. The dark wood glistened. She gave it to Hadding. “Now,” she said, “put this beneath his tongue.”
He had thought himself fearless, but as far as he had already gone, he dared not now do anything but obey. Step by stiff step he went over to the deathling. The flesh was dank to touch as he unbound the jaw. He must pry it open. Hastily he shoved the runestave crosswise into the dry mouth between the teeth. At once he stepped back.
Hardgreip took his place by the bed. She raised her arms. “Waken, Skuli,” she shrilled. “By the might that was Ymir’s, I call you to come, I bid you read the morrow for me. No rest in the grave shall you elsewise have, but the fires of Surt shall burn you, the snakes of Hel shall nest where your heart was, and the eagle at the end of the world shall tear you until the ending of all the worlds. Rise and speak.”
The body stirred. Widow and children wailed in the cow-stall. It heard them not. Wrenching itself along inch by inch, bones grinding together, it sat up. The eyes opened. They were filmed and empty, but a red smoldering moved in them. The head jerked to and fro until it found Hardgreip. A voice grated around the runestave.
You drew me from the dead. Now doom shall fall on you
Who haled me out of hell. Ill hap and woe be yours.
From the mold that was mine has your magic most foul
And cruel now called me to come from the shades
That I answer your asking with all that I know
Of what shall fare whence and go whither for you.
My word is of woe that awaits you, and death.
Unwilling I wended here, witch, and must speak,
My tongue bearing tidings of terrible things.
Soon hence from my house you will hasten your steps
Away to a wilderness, wandering lost
Till horror shall have you, a hideous end.
You will wretchedly rue the wrong that you did
In dragging the dead from the darkness up
By trollcraft to travel the troublous road,
Bound to your bidding. Abide now the time
When fearsome foes take fell revenge.
You drew me from the dead. Now doom shall fall on you
Who haled me out of hell. Ill hap and woe be yours.
The head creaked around until the unblinking, tearless eyes caught Hadding. He stood his ground, helpless though he was, and heard.
Yet know that as the net of night pulls close about her,
The
