The Wizard And The Warlord (35 page)

“Where were you? What happened?” Rolfr demanded delightedly, echoed by a not-so-pleased Mikla, who still sat on his horse scowling.

“It was the sending,” Sigurd said. “I heard it calling and I thought it sounded like you, Rolfr, shouting for help, so I chased it down the ravine until I realized it was a trick.”

“That ought to have been the death of you,” Mikla said reprovingly. “I’m still amazed to see you alive. Did you have to fight with Hross-Bjorn?”

Sigurd thought of the discovery of his control over his power and smiled. “Yes, and I shall tell you about it later.”

“Later?” Rolfr exclaimed. “I want to hear about it right now. Mikla, let’s stop awhile for a little celebration. Sigurd, you must be half starved.”

Mikla sighed and consented, shaking his head in exasperation. Rolfr uncorked a flask of Gunnar’s fine ale, and they sat down and passed it around while Sigurd talked. Rolfr interrupted with frequent exclamations of astonishment and glee, and even Mikla forgot his disapprobation long enough to add an interjection or two.

“I must say we’re both very relieved to have you back,” Mikla said when Sigurd had told about Grisnir. “I certainly wouldn’t know what to do with this.” He knocked on the lid of the carven box. “Well, is everyone ready to proceed again?”

The thing that really saved Sigurd from a tongue-lashing was the rune-stick map which he had received from Grisnir. At the sight of it, Mikla’s entire attitude had undergone a dramatic turnabout, and for a while he could only shake his head and gently turn it over in his hands.

As they rode into the fells, Rolfr told Sigurd how they had returned to the camp and discovered his absence. For a long while, they had waited; then they became alarmed, but it was too dark to search, and they didn’t want to move camp too soon and definitely lose Sigurd. The next day they searched and found no traces of footsteps after the rainfall, and on the next day they were awakened before dawn by faint shouts from higher above in the ravine.

“The sending,” Sigurd said immediately, and Rolfr nodded.

“Mikla dowsed you out as lower, but we could hear these cries above us, so we went upward. I certainly wish I could have met Grisnir. Who would ever have imagined a troll choosing to lead a decent life like that? I hope we can stop on the way back. My, isn’t it splendid to be back in the fells at last? I wouldn’t like to live in the lowlands, no indeed.”

As they continued toward Svartafell, Sigurd thought more often about the box, and his curiosity about what lay inside it began to pique him quite fiercely. For some reason, he also thought more about Bjarnhardr’s sword, which Mikla carried. Perhaps now that he had his errant power under his control to strengthen him, he could possess the sword and use it without falling under its influence.

Hross-Bjorn had lost his arrogance and confidence after his rout at Sigurd’s hands. At night, he prowled warily around their camp, well out of the reach of any spells, rumbling and growling to vent frustration when no one was deceived by his voices and altered forms. Sigurd perceived that the sending seemed almost desperate; in the scanty light of dawn or dusk, Hross-Bjorn looked almost haggard. He was no match for the power and Mikla both, and the knowledge of it must have cankered his wicked soul.

Watching the sending’s resentful trampling and pawing one evening, Mikla observed, “Bjarnhardr must be almost as angry, if he’s aware of our progress, and I’m sure he must be.”

Sigurd thought of the Dokkalfar who had pursued them, and wondered aloud if they were still following, inexorably picking up the clues and information they needed from the farms were the three friends had stopped to work. “And what about Jotull?” he added, frowning in the puzzlement of his mixed feelings about the wizard. “Is he just awaiting his chance, do you suppose?”

Rolfr shivered. “Oh, yes, I’m almost sure of it. He isn’t holding back out of any fear of us, I assure you.”

“He’ll wait for the best opportunity,” Mikla said. “Jotull is not one to give up easily, and I doubt if Bjarnhardr will allow him to return to Svinhagahall without that box. I’ve been expecting to see him again, and the only thing that astonishes me is the fact that we haven’t seen him yet.”

“But I wouldn’t stop looking,” Rolfr added hastily, with a nervous glance behind him. “Jotull’s no fool.”

“But he doesn’t know the way to Svartafell,” Mikla said. “He’s relying upon us to show him. You recall that the box is as useless to him as it is to us, until it’s opened. I’m sure he has a plan in mind, but whatever it is, Rolfr, you may be sure that it calls for the removal of you and me.“

Rolfr grimly flexed his arm. “I think it’s about ready to pull a bowstring—a little stiff perhaps, but I’m no longer useless.”

Sigurd looked at Mikla. “And I would feel far better if I had a sword to help defend all of us. Surely I’m stronger now that my power is my ally, Mikla, so why don’t you give it back?”

Mikla’s eyes promptly retreated under his scowling brows. “No, never,” he said instantly. “I had a very close call with that sword myself and I might not be so lucky the next time.”

“You don’t trust me,” Sigurd retorted, rising to stalk away.

“It’s not you I distrust, it’s that sword and its curse,” Mikla snapped.

“It’s the same thing,” Sigurd replied angrily. “If you trusted my abilities, you wouldn’t be afraid to give the sword back to me. You’re saying that I’m incompetent to handle it.”

Mikla returned his accusing glower. “Why should I be willing for you to experiment, when I’m the one who would suffer the most if you lost your temper? I wouldn’t really think you’d be willing to make another mistake, Sigurd, if your power failed to control the curse.”

Sigurd turned his back and walked away, partly to prove that he could control his temper and partly because he was afraid he was going to lose it again. If he had learned anything, it was the futility of arguing with Mikla, who was so unreasonably stubborn that nothing would ever change his mind; trying to negotiate with him only set him all the firmer in his convictions. The more foolish they were, the more solidly he insisted upon them.

Sigurd remained cold to Mikla for several days. They were traveling in rougher country, which necessitated a slower pace and more stops to rest the horses. Sigurd and Mikla refused to speak to each other, leaving Rolfr to do most of the talking. Rolfr urged them individually to stop quarreling, and Mikla might have been persuaded to put an end to the dispute, but Sigurd vowed he wouldn’t speak to Mikla again until his sword was returned to him. Traveling with two companions, each of whom refused to acknowledge the other’s existence, was trying even for someone of Rolfr’s amiable disposition.

Bad luck added to everyone’s discouragement. Several times they went astray and had to backtrack, using MiMa’s dowsing pendulum to find the way. Frequently they had to forge through deep snow and skirt gaping crevices in the earth, where the water thundered below and churned itself to spume on the teeth of the jagged rocks. At night, they were cold and often wet as they huddled in the scanty protection of a rocky overhang or shallow cave, and everyone’s thoughts dwelt on the green, sheltered lowlands they had left behind.

Sigurd felt more sorry for himself with each passing mile as they climbed into the higher mountains. The snow was deeper and the wind blew colder over the icy rocks in the exposed places. They descended from a long traverse of a windswept scarp into a deep, narrow valley, which was clogged with a massive snowdrift. Glad to escape the claws of the wind, the horses halted and put their heads down to nibble at the few wisps of winter-crisped grass struggling between the stones.

Mikla dismounted and stood awhile, looking back the way they had come, with an intent frown on his face. For several days, Sigurd had been upon the point of breaking his resolve and asking Mikla if he thought someone was following, but at the last minute he decided to uphold his pride and refrained from speaking. Rolfr looked back uneasily also, after watching Mikla, but he said nothing and looked anxious and puzzled.

Mikla turned sharply, focusing his attention on the snowdrift ahead of them. Thrusting his staff into it, he hoisted himself up to its crest to survey it. He called back to the others, “I’m going to walk across it and make sure it’s not just a bridge over a fissure. Bring the horses up here and wait until I give you the signal from the other side.”

Sigurd sighed, irritated and cold. “I don’t know why he has to do this every single time we cross a snowdrift or glacier,” he growled to Rolfr. ‘There’s probably several hundred feet of ice below us, but that’s not nearly enough for Mikla.“

They coaxed the horses onto the snowdrift and watched Mikla striding across the gleaming white expanse before them, prodding each step ahead with his staff. Then Sigurd heard a sound like a sigh. Mikla stopped an instant and then began to run. The snow sagged slowly in a large circular depression covering nearly a third of the glacier. Sigurd and Rolfr raised an involuntary shout of horror, and suddenly the snow bridge vanished with a sighing groan, taking the small figure of Mikla with it into a vast blue chasm in the ice below.

After a moment of frozen shock, Rolfr and Sigurd desperately drove the horses off the edge of the snow, slithering and scrambling in sudden panic. Halting the plunging horses on a nearby knob of barren rock, they looked back at the glacier and the fissure, where more snow crumbled silently into the great crevice, leaving edges as sharp and clean as if something had sliced it. Rolfr clenched his hands and stared helplessly, shaking his head and repeating, “I can’t believe it. He’s gone—just like that. Here one moment, then just gone.”

“It might have been all of us,” Sigurd said in a shaken tone, and suddenly he felt so weak around the knees he could hardly stand. He sat down on a boulder and leaned his head in his hands, wishing that he and Mikla had parted on more friendly terms. “Is there any sense in trying to get close enough to look down into it?”

Rolfr shook his head with painful slowness. “It’s more likely we’d go down, too. The snow will be unstable and very dangerous. The fissure looks terribly deep, and so much snow fell in that he’s sure to be buried.” His voice faltered and broke, and he walked away a short distance.

Sigurd stood by the horses, who gathered around him with alarm in their large clear eyes, tossing their manes and snorting warm breaths as if they scented the recent death. After a while, Sigurd also felt the urge to leave the desolate spot and he called anxiously, “Rolfr, we’ve got to go. I don’t like the feel of this place anymore.”

Rolfr swung around immediately, his grief forgotten. “You’re right. Let’s go back the way we came so we won’t get lost. We&rsqou;ll have to go higher to get around this place. We don’t have a map now, you realize.”

It was an unpleasant shock. Sigurd’s eyes traveled to Mikla’s horse, which trotted along nearby with its reins flapping on its neck. The map had fallen into the fissure with Mikla, but his satchel and the sword were still fastened to his horse. Sigurd thought of the sword reluctantly, yet with growing excitement. Like Rolfr, he began to look back often.

At the end of the day, they stopped and set up their camp. Sigurd quietly claimed the sword by untying it from Mikla’s possessions and putting it with his own saddle. Rolfr gave him a troubled glance but said nothing. He was drawing another map on the side of a leather pouch. Between the two of them, they managed a fair duplicate of the map on the rune stick, which they had studied often enough to memorize. But that wasn’t much comfort in their present situation. Sigurd gloomily wished they had studied it more intently and recalled more accurately the distances between landmarks. Rolfr was fairly certain they had remembered all the landmarks, which was as much as they could do for now.

Hross-Bjorn, emboldened by the loss of Mikla, tormented them that night with faint shouts that sounded like a man calling for help, which was almost more than Rolfr could resist. He strode up and down in anguish, shaking his head and muttering to Sigurd, “I know I can’t leave my live friend to try finding the one we know must be dead. You won’t let me, will you, Siggi? Help me keep my wits, or I fear I may do something dreadfully rash.”

“Sit down at once then,” Sigurd commanded obligingly. “Have some tea. You know it’s only Hross-Bjorn trying to lure you out there. Nothing must happen to you, Rolfr. Then I and the box would be alone.” He shivered and poked more wood onto the fire, despite its scarcity. Their campsite was sheltered in a small cirque, with little waterfalls hissing down its steep sides. Rocks clattered down occasionally, probably dislodged by Hross-Bjorn’s prowling hooves. It was as safe and secure as any previous campsite, but Sigurd admitted to a desolate feeling of vulnerability, which Rolfr wholeheartedly seconded. They both stayed awake most of the night, taking turns dozing between Hross-Bjorn’s crying. Once Hross-Bjom crept close to the camp in an attempt to frighten the horses into breaking their picket lines and bolting away madly, but Sigurd’s power rose up and darted a fiery explosion at the sending.

“A small one, but very admirable for a first attempt,” Rolfr declared, after a moment of astonishment; Sigurd was far more astonished. “You’ve learned a great deal for a Scipling, Siggi. It seems to come almost naturally to you. With a little practice, you’ll be turning a rather noisy and smoky explosion into a very deadly dart of pure flame like a lance. I confess I’m rather jealous. The best I can do is a few sparks and a great deal of smoke. Tell me exactly how you did it.”

Sigurd thought a moment, then shrugged. “I just don’t know. I was mad enough at Hross-Bjorn at the moment to kill him, if he’d been within reach. I thought about it and it happened, that’s all I know. Do you think he’s sufficiently frightened to leave us alone for the rest of the night?”

Rolfr yawned and shivered. “I hope so.” He paused a long moment. “You do have that sword you could use if he dared attack us outright.”

“Yes, I suppose,” Sigurd said, looking at the sword which lay sheathed across the saddle with a small glow of pride. He had been right and Mikla wrong about having enough power to possess the sword without being compelled to do any evil violence with it. His late experiences, he reflected, had made him wiser, sadder, and considerably stronger. Thinking about his own improvement soon soothed him into complacent slumber, undisturbed by any further demonstrations from Hross-Bjorn.