The Hills of Home (The Song of the Ash Tree Book 2) Read online

  The blades clashed once and even that was too much for the stranger to bear. The sword dropped from his hand, clanging to the ground, and he stood defenseless in front of Raef, swaying. The giants roared, calling for Raef to take his eyes, break his fingers, make him run so he could be hunted down like prey, but Raef would not give them the satisfaction of such cruel sport. Retrieving the sword, Raef pressed it back into the man’s palm. His fingers only curled around the hilt partway, so Raef held it there with a firm grip. Stepping close to the stranger, Raef whispered in his ear, “Go in peace and drink with my father in Valhalla.”

  Raef’s bent sword slid between the man’s ribs with ease and Raef watched life fade from his eyes. He went limp and Raef lowered him to the ground, hoping his final moments had been easier than those that came before. The giants were furious and shouted abuse at Raef, but his own fury burned bright.

  “Hrodvelgr! Is this how you think to break me? By making me strip the life from those who cannot defend themselves? You think to kill me with my own compassion? I am more cruel than you know.”

  “You know nothing of cruelty, filth,” Hrodvelgr answered. “I was born in it.”

  “If it is sport you want, send me someone worthy of me and I will give you a good bleeding.”

  The giants muttered to each other and Hrodvelgr shouted a command. The gate opened a second time and a pair of giants prodded a creature into the arena with sharp spears. The beast, the height of a horse but built like a mountain and covered in coarse, dark hair, growled in protest, teeth snapping. As the giants backed away, the creature stalked them, gnashing a great curved pair of teeth that hung out of the upper jaw, but it made no move to attack. When the gate shut, the beast snarled and at last Raef became the focus of its attention.

  Man and beast circled, gaze never straying from the other. Raef’s steps narrowed the gap between them even as he continued to move to his right, and the creature grew more infuriated with every move.

  The charge was strong and thunderous, but slow and Raef evaded with little effort. Sliding on the worn rock, the creature spun to advance a second time. This time, Raef sidestepped and slashed at its rear legs. The damage was not great and the creature only grew more inflamed. The third attack was just as fierce and again Raef’s sword bit into the beast’s exposed flesh, but the fourth was more calculated as the beast churned toward Raef once more, matching Raef’s footwork and succeeding in pressing Raef back.

  Off balance, Raef ducked and rolled to avoid the slavering teeth. Reaching up, he stabbed into the creature’s underbelly but the creature’s weight and momentum tore the bent sword from Raef’s grasp and Raef found himself weaponless as the beast gathered itself for another run. The sword dangled from its belly and blood dripped down the hilt and to the ground.

  Before the creature could charge again, Raef was on the move, his feet carrying him over the smooth stone. As he closed the distance, the creature lumbered forward and at the last instant Raef dropped to the ground and slid. The beast ducked its head, trying to catch up its prey in its massive jaws, and one long tooth grazed Raef’s right forearm as he shielded his face from damage. With his other hand, he reached for the hilt, grasping tight despite the hot, slippery blood. Wrenching hard, Raef drew the blade through the beast’s belly as he continued to slide, and then he was out from under it. The creature roared and twisted, trying to attack, but its legs faltered and it fell forward on its face. Leaping forward, Raef jumped on the creature’s back and plunged his sword down into its neck. Life left in a flood of gore and the body fell limp to the ground but Raef wasn’t finished.

  Raising his blood-streaked arms, he called to the giants in the arena. “Is this enough blood for you?” Sliding off the creature’s back, Raef hacked and hacked with the battered blade until he had severed the head from the body. Dipping his fingers in the blood that pooled on the stone, Raef wiped them down one side of his face and then the other, his eyes locked with Hrodvelgr.

  When the pair of giants lifted him up by the arms, he did not protest but let them carry him from the arena amid the shouts of the giants who bellowed for revenge for their fallen creature. He was tossed back into his cell with more force than was necessary but he did not let the giants see his grimace as he rolled off his bruised shoulder and got back to his feet. “Tell Hrodvelgr my offer still stands,” Raef called to the backs of the retreating giants, and then darkness fell once more.

  Only then did Raef use his fingers to assess the damage the creature’s tooth had done to his arm. Though he had no light to see by, gentle prodding revealed that the slash was short but deep. There was nothing he could do and he slumped against the wall of his cell, weary and desperate for water, his forearm burning with pain. Closing his eyes, Raef drifted in and out of sleep as the blood, both his and the creature’s, grew sticky and tight on his skin.

  When he became alert, he did not know how much time had passed, only that a voice seemed to be calling to him. At first he thought it was Eira’s voice and then it seemed to be Siv, but as his eyes and mind focused, he knew it was Bara’s. Lurching to his feet, Raef found the bars of his cell.

  “I am here,” he called out into the black.

  “Then you have not died of your wounds.” The giantess sounded pleased.

  “No. It is thirst I suffer from.” Raef licked his lips.

  “How many did you kill?”

  “A man, old and beaten, a husk of what he used to be. And then a creature of some kind. Never have I seen its like.”

  A pause lingered in the blackness. “Did it have a pair of long teeth?”

  “Yes.”

  “Then you are not likely to see the light of day again.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “Once, my people kept many of those creatures. Though strong and ferocious, they could be controlled and they did hard labor. But a sickness swarmed through their ranks and their numbers dwindled. The strongest survived and these were carefully bred, but time was against them. Only one remained and he stalked Hrodvelgr’s halls like a king, the mightiest of champions. Now, he is dead and Hrodvelgr will never forget who wielded the sword that took the life blood from him.”

  “If he was so precious, Hrodvelgr should have kept him out of the arena. Let Hrodvelgr challenge me himself. I will earn my freedom.”

  “You should not wish for such things.”

  Angry and reckless, Raef shouted, “I would wish for anything that would bring me home.”

  Skjaldi’s voice broke in, faint but strong enough in the silence. “Please. Be careful of what you say. You do not know who might be listening.”

  Raef took a deep breath and fought to calm himself. “Bara. You promised me the knowledge I seek should I survive. Here I am. I ask that you speak and fulfill your promise. Tell me how I may leave this forsaken place.”

  The silence dragged on and Raef began to despair of hearing the giantess’ voice again. The pain pulsing from the wound on his forearm had lessened, but now it flooded back. Raef’s fingers tightened over the iron bar he had been clutching.

  “I beg you.” Raef’s voice drifted into the darkness and still nothing answered it. He closed his eyes and rested his forehead against the bars of his cell.

  “The way is ancient and perilous. I do not know that a man would survive it.” Bara sounded reluctant.

  “And yet I must try.”

  “From Hrodvelgr’s halls, travel north for two days and two nights. There you will see a labyrinth of sharp rock. Look for the gate wreathed in smoke. Only there can you enter and you must follow the red stones, nothing else. Do not stray from the path. If you do, you are lost.”

  “Sounds simple enough.”

  “A fool’s words. The very air you breath will wreak havoc with your mind and draw you astray. There is nothing simple about the labyrinth.”

  “Then how do your people traverse it?”

  “Because we must. It is our last possession from a more ancient world. It was not made by the
gods, does not answer to them. The labyrinth is ours, a reminder of past glory, and so we cling to it even though it is not kind to us.” Bara paused. “There, I have told you what I know. Think of me when you have your revenge and I will know sweet satisfaction.”

  “Why do you not escape?”

  Bara did not answer right away. “Hrodvelgr keeps me here because I would not submit to him. I have not seen the outside of this cell once during my captivity. He does not bring me to the arena, he does not attempt to win me over. He keeps me here in darkness and waits for me to die.”

  “Perhaps I can help,” Raef began, but Bara cut him off.

  “No,” she said, her voice fierce. “If your chance comes, it will be brief. You must not waste it on me. Or anyone here.”

  Raef kept his thoughts to himself and sat down on the floor of his cell. Time passed in darkness and in doubt. He knew only a growing thirst and weariness that ragged fits of sleep could not overcome. The cells around him were quiet and Raef, when he was conscious, did not feel like speaking. Though he tried to banish them by thinking of home and Eira, his thoughts were dark and full of images of battle and fire and death. Once, he woke himself from a fitful sleep, the dreadful eyes of Fenrir the great wolf burned into his mind and across his eyelids. Though he had not cried out, his heart pounded and sweat glazed his face. He did not sleep again for a long time, but kept his eyes, wide and staring, fixed on the floor of his cell.

  ELEVEN

  How much time passed, Raef could not comprehend but for knowing it had to be a matter of days. At last a flicker of light returned and Raef was glad to see the old giant’s cracked and crumbling face, glad of the sloppy stew that was pushed into his cell, and most glad to see a cup of precious water. Raef fell upon the food like a ravenous wolf and gulped the water down, his tongue probing the cup for each and every drop. When the bowl was wiped clean, Raef flung it against the far wall of his cell and groped among the shards until he found one that was sharp and as long as his hand. This he tucked between his pants and belt, then rolled the wool down over the belt to hide the sharp pottery. The food, poor as it was, signaled that he was not meant to die just yet and that gave him strength beyond nourishment.

  But the brief light brought by the giant’s torch had shown him something that gnawed at his mind. Unwashed and untended, the angry wound on his arm was oozing blood and puss. And the heat he had at first felt only in the skin surrounding the slash was spreading, coiling its way up to Raef’s elbow. Had he been more careful, he might have saved a splash of water to wash the wound, but in his heart he knew it was not enough.

  Sleep came, and with it a fever. Raef jerked awake long enough to know the sensation of sweat beading on his forehead and chest, to feel the frantic fluttering of his heart as it fought against the invading heat, but then the fever sucked him back down into the depths of unconsciousness. And he began to dream.

  The nightmares wracked through him with far greater potency than before. No longer did Fenrir come alone to torment him. A pale face that Raef knew to be Loki’s joined the wolf, but the god’s presence was not what brought screams to Raef’s lips. He saw his father, alive despite the gaping wound in his belly, an accusation on Einarr’s tongue. But before his father could speak his condemnation, he vanished, replaced by Vakre, pierced with arrows, Siv, impaled on a spear, Eira, her heart carved from her chest. A moment’s reprieve as Raef surfaced, awake, gasping for air, and then he was lost once more. Again and again Raef watched his friends die, watched his home burn, watched the forests of Vannheim wither and die, watched a great wave rise up from the ocean, until at last the world that came to him when he closed his eyes became too much to bear. Though exhausted, though the fever beckoned him, he did not sleep, but Raef knew it was only a matter of time before the images invaded his waking eyes as well.

  When the jailor came a second time and deposited food and water in his cell, Raef crawled to it on hands and knees. He downed half the water and spread the rest over his wound with trembling fingers, but only managed to force down a few swallows of the meager stew before he set the bowl down, drained and sick to his stomach. When Bara called out to him once, her voice seeming very far away, he did not answer, for all his strength was concentrated on staying awake. Of Skjaldi there was no sound but for the broken, ragged breathing that seemed to come and go, at times filtering into Raef’s embattled consciousness.

  When the light came a third time, Raef did not remove his gaze from the wall of his cell and at first did not notice that the old giant had stopped at his door. Only when the keys came out, jangling in the silence, did he shift his glance to the bars.

  “Time to go. Up with you.”

  Raef’s muscles obeyed, though they were clumsy and slow, and he stumbled to the door.

  Sneering, the giant picked Raef up by his ankles and dangled him upside down. He lifted Raef until they were eye to eye. “Men are weak.”

  As they moved between the cells, their way lit by torchlight, Bara’s voice came to him.

  “Remember who you are. Remember what you have promised.”

  “Silence,” the jailor yelled, but Bara would not be subdued.

  “Courage, Raef, and remember.”

  The stone door ground shut behind them, leaving Bara in darkness. Raef tried to cling to her words, tried to imagine them an ember that he could hold in his heart. He closed his eyes and saw not the world’s ending, but a spark of light, faint but steady. It seemed to pulse in time with the beating of his heart. When he opened his eyes, the spark vanished but, though he was drenched in fever and devoid of strength, there was something new deep in his core, something that felt like hope.

  The old giant deposited Raef on a stone floor. At first he crumpled, then fought through dizziness to raise himself to his feet. The fever that had burned so bright still ate at him but Raef forced himself to master the heat, pushing it down until it only crackled beneath the surface of his skin, until he could think clearly. Before him rose six massive steps and at their peak sat Hrodvelgr in an iron throne. The air was fresh in this cavern, free from the ashy plumes that had fouled Raef’s lungs in his cell and Raef took as deep a breath as he dared. As the giant watched Raef sway and struggle for balance, he could not keep a satisfied smirk from marring his handsome face.

  “Not so bold, now? A pity. I rather like it when they want to fight.” Hrodvelgr rose and descended the steps. He circled Raef once. “I am unarmed. Would you like to strike me down, draw my blood? I know you want to. Your hatred burns within you. Go on,” Hrodvelgr spread his arms, “do your worst.” When Raef did nothing, the giant let loose a rumbling laugh, then peered down into Raef’s eyes. “Perhaps you burn less bright than I thought. Perhaps the darkness took too much from you.”

  Raef did not look away from Hrodvelgr’s face, but it was not the giant’s straight nose and dark blue eyes that he saw. Instead he looked inward and saw the spark, brighter than before. “You have broken me, Hrodvelgr. I admit that I am no match for you.”

  Hrodvelgr laughed again. “Spoken like a true waste of flesh and blood. At last you know your place in this world. But tell me, what am I to do with you? You are too weak to fight in my arena. Perhaps I can yet make a slave of you. Would you like to pour my mead? Wash my hair?”

  “Do with me as you will, only grant me one thing.”

  Hrodvelgr’s eyes narrowed slightly. “What do you speak of?”

  “Your knowledge, for I have been awed by your mighty race and surely you must be wiser even than Odin himself.”

  The frown grew but was at odds with Hrodvelgr’s swollen pride. The giant’s vanity won. “What would you know?”

  “Three things, only,” Raef said. The giant smiled, showing his teeth. “But,” Raef went on, “if you cannot answer one of my questions, you must grant me a favor.” Again Hrodvelgr’s face grew dark with suspicion. Raef held his breath.

  “Agreed. But if I answer you, you will be my slave and I will hunt down all those you cherish in
Midgard and bring them here to die.”

  Raef swallowed and blinked, seeing the blood of his dying friends once more behind his eyelids. “Agreed.”

  “Then ask your first question.”

  “Dew gathers in valleys and low places. Where does it come from?”

  Hrodvelgr did not manage to hide his surprise from Raef. He stomped up to his throne and sat down again before answering. “Hrimfaxi the stallion draws night across the sky. Foam falls from his mouth at dawn when he has reached the end of his labors. This is the dew in the dales. What else would you know?”

  “Wind travels over waves and whistles through the mountains. Where does it come from?”

  “The great eagle, Hraesvelg, the Corpse Eater, sits at the end of the world. Wind is born from the flapping of his mighty wings.” Hrodvelgr looked impatient and less sure of himself now. “Come, be done with it. What is your third and final question?”

  “Your hall is home to a man. Skjaldi he is called. What was the name he knew as a child?”

  Hrodvelgr was still on his throne, his face rigid, and Raef knew the giant was caught in his own arrogance. A vein at his temple pulsed and at last Hrodvelgr burst to his feet. “You are false! This is no question.”

  “Answer me.” Raef held his ground as Hrodvelgr pounded down the steps and came to a halt in front of Raef. The giant towered above but in his bewilderment did not strike. “Answer me,” Raef repeated.

  Hrodvelgr began to pace, his hands clenched into fists. “What name, what name,” he muttered to himself. He rounded on Raef, his posture proud but his eyes betrayed his doubt. “Do not think to deceive me. His name was Skjaldi then as it is now.”

  “Wrong.”

  Hrodvelgr howled and charged, but Raef seized on the spark that had swelled into a flame and found strength yet in his limbs. Throwing himself out of the giant’s path, Raef retrieved the shard of pottery that he had hidden at his waist. Small it was, but sharp, and it was enough to give the giant pause. Hrodvelgr pulled up, his gaze flickering between Raef’s face and the tiny weapon in his hand.