“Well…,” said Maddy. “Only once.”
“Did it make a prophecy?”
“It told me to wake you,” said Maddy, who was wishing she hadn’t got into this. “Look, are you going to help or not?”
“I’ll help,” said the Huntress with a chilly smile. “But I’m taking him with me. We’ll fly out together, find the General, pick up the glam, and if for some reason it isn’t there-”
“Why shouldn’t it be there?” said Loki.
“Let me guess,” said Skadi. “Perhaps some lying, conniving person thought he might be able to get me out of the way by sending me on a wild-goose chase while he and his little friend weaseled off with the Whisperer-you know, something like that. This way we can all rest easy. Don’t you think?”
Maddy glanced at Loki. “I’ll go.”
“You can’t.” He spoke reluctantly, as if weighing heavy odds. “The Hill is sealed from the Horse’s Eye. You can’t use the tunnels. Anyway, it would be suicide to go aboveground in this snow-as well as taking more hours than we can afford. No. She’s right. Whoever goes will have to take bird form to reach the village-an hour’s flight, if all goes well.”
Demon blood, Vanir blood, meant the power to shift from one Aspect into another. Loki and Skadi both shared that skill. Too late Maddy saw that her attempt to help had simply placed One-Eye in greater danger than before.
Loki knew it too-being basically dishonest himself, he had no great trust in Maddy’s story, and the prospect of facing Skadi again-this time after an hour-long flight and with One-Eye as his only chaperone-filled him with dread. “My dear Skadi,” he said, “it’s not that I don’t
“No buts. You’re coming.”
“You don’t understand.” Now there was desperation in his voice. “My glam’s used up. I’m tired. I’m hurt. I’m frozen stiff. There was a mountain cat the size of a- Honestly, I couldn’t light a
“Hmm,” said Skadi, and frowned.
Loki was right. She saw that now. His colors were weak, and, using Bjarkan, she could read his distress there as clearly as footprints in snow. He couldn’t shift; he couldn’t fight; she was surprised he could still stand.
“I need food,” said Loki. “Rest.”
“No time for that. We leave at once.”
“But,
But Skadi had already turned away. Leaving Maddy and Loki together, she seemed to be searching around the vast cavern, inspecting the walls, the floor, and the ice sculptures that rose out of it-here an oliphant, there a waterfall, a giant table, and beyond that a ship that gleamed in the moonlight, its every surface clustered with brilliants.
“Maddy, please. You’ve got to help me.” Loki’s voice was soft and urgent. “I promised her the Whisperer. When she finds out I don’t have it-”
“Trust me,” said Maddy. “I’ll think of something.”
“Really? That’s good. Forgive me if I don’t fall at your feet with gratitude
“I
For a second Skadi seemed to pause, then she moved on, still searching, her pale hair shining eerily as she went.
“What are you doing?” Maddy called, seeing the Huntress move deeper and deeper into the Hall of Sleepers.
“Getting help,” came the sardonic voice. “For our poor, exhausted friend.”
“Oh no,” said Loki.
“What now?” said Maddy.
“I think she’s going to wake someone else.” Loki put his face in his hands. “Gods,” he said. “That’s all we need.
2
More people after my blood, he’d said, but the second woman who came strolling out of the Hall of Sleepers was as different from the icy Huntress as cream is from granite.
This woman was round and soft and golden; flowers gleamed in her long hair, and Ar, the green rune of Plenty, shone out from her forehead. Her gaze fell on Maddy, and it was wide and trusting and slightly perplexed, like that of an infant who wishes to please.
And such was the charm of this strange and childlike woman that even Maddy, who had plenty of reason to dislike a certain kind of cowslip-haired beauty, felt the air of the cavern thaw a little at her presence and seemed to smell the scent of distant gardens and ripe strawberries and fresh honey straight from the comb.
Skadi walked behind her at some distance, as if unwilling to get too close to something so unlike herself.
Loki too recognized her; as the smiling woman made her way toward him, Maddy saw in his face a mixture of relief and what might have been embarrassment.
“Who is it?” whispered Maddy.
“Idun,” he said. “The Healer.”
“Here he is,” said Skadi curtly. “Now get him moving, and fast.”
Idun peered at Loki, wide-eyed. “Oh, dear. What have you been up to this time?” she said.
He pulled a face. “Me? Nothing.”
“Do be polite, Loki, or you won’t get your apple.”
Idun, thought Maddy. The keeper of the magical fruit that cures sickness and heals Time. According to the tales, the fruit was golden apples stored in a golden casket, but the fruit that Idun held out to Loki was small and yellow and wrapped in foliage, more like a crab apple than anything else, though its scent, potent even in the frosty air of the cavern, was all green summer and creamy Harvestmonth crammed into a handful of withered leaves.
“Eat it,” said Skadi as Loki hesitated.
Loki did, looking none too pleased. For a moment nothing seemed to happen, and then Maddy saw his signature brighten suddenly from its dim bruise color to a vibrant gleam. It had been fading; now it hummed with power that crackled from his hair and his fingertips and shimmered briefly across his entire body like St. Sepulchre’s fire.
The effect was immediate. He straightened; breathed deeply; tested his ribs and his injured hand and the gouges from the cat’s claws and found them mended.
“Feeling better?” said Idun.
Loki nodded.
“Good,” said Skadi. “Let’s go. And, Loki…”
“What?”
“In case you were thinking of pulling a fast one-”
“Who,
“I’ll be watching you.” She smiled. “Like a hawk.”
Ten minutes later an eagle and a small brown hawk were on their way to the village of Malbry. It would take them an hour to cross the valley. Without wings, Loki said, it was pointless to follow-and yet Maddy hated the thought of leaving One-Eye at the mercy of the Huntress when she realized (as she inevitably would) that she had been deceived.
Idun, as she soon discovered, was no help. She listened attentively enough to Maddy’s story but seemed to feel no sense of urgency or danger at all.
“Odin will think of something,” she said, and appeared to feel
But Maddy was not reassured. “There must be some way,” she said. “It’s my fault. I took the Whisperer…”
Idun was sitting on a block of ice, singing to herself. At the mention of the Whisperer she stopped, and a look of mild anxiety crossed her features.
“That old glam?” she said. “Best leave it alone. It never did give us anything but bad news.” She pulled a comb from her hair and examined it, then began to sing again, her voice a thin filament of sweetness in the chilly air.
It was clear to Maddy that whatever powers Idun possessed would be of little use to her in their present situation. Wild thoughts of mindblasting her way out of the cavern were attractive but impractical, and she knew that however much she tried, she could never walk to the village in time.
One solution remained, and as she examined it from all angles, weighing the benefits and disadvantages, she became more and more convinced that it was her only hope.
“There’s no choice,” she said at last. “I’ll have to wake another Sleeper.”
Idun smiled vaguely. “That would be nice, dear. Just like old times.”
Maddy had a feeling that reviving old times was the last thing they needed right now, but she didn’t see any alternative. The question was, whom to wake? And how could she be sure that waking someone else wouldn’t just make matters worse?
With a heavy heart, and with
