RuneWarriors (15 page)

“Hurry, Ulf!” Dane shouted. But the doomfish were gaining. Twenty yards…ten…they were closing fast. It looked as if Ulf the Whale's mother might be receiving a sympathy visit.

And then, with two of the giant man-eaters mere feet away from mealtime, two arrows came whizzing through the air—
ffffttt! ffffttt!—
and made direct hits, killing the doomfish in an instant. This gave three other men time to rush into the water and pull Ulf up onto shore. And once he caught his breath, he pumped Jarl's hand and thanked him for saving his life. For indeed it had been Jarl who'd shot the arrows; while everyone else had been yelling, he'd found the bow and arrow he'd stashed and shot the dreaded predators with ease.

Dane noticed Lut looking weak and haggard and, knowing the ordeal that lay before them, suggested that it might be best if he returned to their ship and stay aboard, if only to guard it from interlopers. Lut protested, saying he was certainly up to the task, and if there was any chance of seeing a frost giant, he was certainly going to do it. But then he was seized with another coughing fit, and seeing a firmness in Dane's demeanor he hadn't seen before, he agreed it might be best. Dane embraced the old one, realizing how parchment thin Lut was, and it sent a new worry through the young man.

“The thunder,” Lut said, putting his leathered hand on Dane's shoulder, “is just within your grasp. Take it, son.” Dane bade him good-bye and watched as Blek and Orm the Hairy One guided Lut through the woods toward the ship. Dane had a notion this might be the last he'd ever see of the old one, but he banished the thought from his mind, turning it toward making preparations for the arduous journey ahead.

Blek and Orm soon returned. Keen on revenge, the men gathered round Dane, looking to him for guidance. Dane gazed up at the snow-capped peaks of Mount Neverest far in the distance. Then he gazed at his men and said, “We know now what we must do to defeat Thidrek. We must journey to Mount Neverest. It is there in the Land of the Frost Giants that we shall find the thunder we seek. Thor's Hammer.”

A sober resolve settled over the men.

“And if we can't find it before he does, all hope for our lands—and Astrid—is lost.” That said, Dane began to trudge up the snowy slope toward the impossibly high mountain. One by one, his men silently followed, the snow falling heavier about them as they plodded on, each step drawing them closer to their fate.

A
strid was numb. For the first time in her life, she felt too cold to be afraid. They'd been toiling for hours in a blinding blizzard up the side of Mount Neverest, the snowfall so heavy at times, she could barely see a foot in front of her. The blistering winds had blown so bone-chillingly cold that she could no longer feel her hands or feet. Her mind was crowded with visions of giant bears and ice wolves and other ravenous beasts that they would no doubt soon encounter. Tethered to a pair of Thidrek's guardsmen, she'd dragged herself onward despite the despair in her heart and growing certainty that something bad was about to befall her. She'd lost hope of living much longer.

Now the howl of the wind subsided and the daylight darkened. She lifted her eyes from the ground to see that they were entering an ice cave, a narrow crevasse of blue
glacial ice that soon opened into a large cavernous chamber. It was Thidrek's plan to take shelter here until the storm lifted and then to move on to higher elevations.

Grateful to be out of the freezing wind, Astrid sank to her knees and fell back against a wall, weak and aching with hunger. The flickering light from the Berserker guards' torches seemed to waver and go blurry. She closed her eyes for what seemed only a moment and sank into a dream of a big, silvery moon spilling out stars onto a black velvet sky. The stars began falling, turning into snowflakes, each flake uniquely crystalline and perfect. And then the snowflakes sprouted wings and turned into lovely white birds that flew toward the sun and—

She awoke to the clamor of voices.

“We've found it, sire!” said Grelf, his eyes alight with excitement. “The Hammer! Just up the mountain on the next ridge. It had been buried in snow, but the winds must have uncovered it. It's there for the taking, sir. It's…magnificent!”

Thidrek's face took on a look of such rare intensity that, to a passing stranger, he would have appeared to be in a state of religious ecstasy or the rapture of true love. But Astrid saw it was merely his raw lust for power, unmasked.

“This is good,” said Thidrek. “This is very,
very
good. You've done well, Grelf. And you'll be rewarded.”

“Thank you, sire, thank you!” said Grelf, his eyes shining with avarice. Grelf bowed to Thidrek, more obsequiously than ever before, and then turned to escort him out of the
passage. Abruptly they stopped, Thidrek, Grelf, the dozen or so Berserkers who accompanied them all frozen in their footsteps. It seemed that something, or some
one
, was blocking their path. Instead of moving forward, they began to backpedal, their heads tilting upward, eyes bulging. And then Astrid saw what the men all saw as the creature moved into the cave: An enormous
frostkjempe,
a frost giant!

So the legends were true! Amazing! She'd heard the stories as a child, tales of giant men made of ice who strode the tops of mountains, their thunderous footsteps causing deadly avalanches that often wiped out whole villages, fearsome creatures who could gobble up a child in one bite. As a girl she'd loved the stories and believed in them wholeheartedly. But as she'd grown older, she'd stopped believing the fantastic tales her father told. While other girls of the village talked of jewelry and makeup and boys, Astrid had happily busied herself learning to hunt and fish with her father. She grew into a levelheaded, practical-minded girl who had stopped believing in giants.

Now the frost giant stood before her, very much alive. He was so huge—well over twenty feet tall—that he had to bend over to enter the cave. And he was made entirely of ice! His shape was every bit that of a man's—he had arms, legs, feet, and hands; but instead of flesh and bone his entire body was formed of tiny frozen crystals and covered in a thick, bluish-white frost. His limbs creaked when he walked, and when his arm brushed against his side, tiny
flakes of ice were scraped off and fell to the floor. His face Astrid found particularly striking. He had a broad, flat forehead and a large frosted ridge of a brow above his tiny ice-blue eyes—eyes, Astrid saw, that missed nothing. From his chin hung a beard of frosted icicles, and each time he exhaled, he puffed out a cloud of cold air that iced over his beard, making his beard icicles grow longer. He was a breathtaking sight to behold, otherworldly and magnificent.

The men shrank away, cowering in fear. The giant bent over them, peering curiously at their gleaming armor. And as he did so, a guardsman lashed out with a sword and hacked off the first two fingers of the giant's left hand. The ice fingers fell and shattered on the floor. Instead of reacting in pain, the giant merely stared blankly at his missing fingers. Astrid was still too numb to feel anything but fascination.

“I implore your forgiveness,” said Thidrek, stepping forward to address the giant. “His rashness will be
severely
punished.” He glared at the offending guardsman, then raised the Shield of Odin to his chest in caution. “We come in peace. I am Prince Thidrek, son of Mirvik the Mild, ruler of the northern fjordlands. I am deeply honored to make your acquaintance.” He gave a low bow, a gesture of respect he'd never shown anyone.

A small, encouraging smile formed on the giant's face, and Thidrek continued.

“I believe you're in possession of an item I desire. Thor's
Hammer. I would like to buy it from you.”

The frost giant's face clouded with concern. He gave a frosty snort and lowered his gaze to the floor. Noting the great creature's dismay, Thidrek took a new tack.

“I'm prepared to pay handsomely.”

Still the giant frowned.

“Try to see it my way,” Thidrek said in a honeyed tone. “I'm a benevolent ruler who wants to keep peace. With the Hammer in my possession, all the tribes would cease their stupid warring, and the killing would end.” The giant was silent, unswayed by Thidrek's words, his simple mind sensing them to be untrue. Feeling he was losing control, Thidrek shot a look at Grelf. “This was
your
idea, Grelf! A little help here?” And then, whispered so that only Grelf could hear: “If I don't get the Hammer, I'll have your head!”

Grelf gulped and approached the creature, feeling dwarfed by his vast size. Weeks earlier, when he'd learned from his spies that the Hammer had indeed fallen to earth and was believed to be in the possession of a frost giant, Thidrek had wanted to employ his usual method: to forcibly destroy the creature and simply steal the Hammer. But Grelf had counseled that they try a less violent, more cunning strategy, and he'd immediately begun to hatch a plan. The only way to beat a force you could never overpower, he reasoned, was not to fight it, but to give it exactly what it wanted. To find its greatest weakness. To feed its deepest need. And so he read. He called in experts. He
even interviewed a troll or two. Finally he hit on the answer: Frost giants, he learned, had been formed by the very tears of the gods. This made them extraordinarily sensitive and caring creatures, easily prone to tears themselves, great appreciators of poetry, song, and, most of all, beauty, in all its manifold forms. Therefore, he would appeal not to the giant's head but to his heart. Ah, emotional vulnerability! How Grelf enjoyed taking advantage of it in others!

Now Grelf looked up at the ice-crusted thing, praying that his words would not be his last, knowing it was either the Hammer or his head.

“Sir…I mean, Your Frostship,” Grelf sputtered, “surely the Hammer is a possession to be prized. But mightn't there be something of even greater value?” The giant furrowed his brow. Grelf forged on. “What I mean is, you dwell here alone, I see. No friends. No fellow giants. No pets. Nothing but freezing cold winds and a wasteland of ice to keep you company. The only voice you hear…is your own. That must be unspeakably hard.” The giant's face fell, and Grelf saw he'd struck just the nerve he'd been hoping for.

“You deserve more, don't you?” asked Grelf, and the giant nodded, seeming about to burst into tears. “Well, of course you do,” said Grelf. “That's why we've brought
her
”—Astrid felt herself pushed from the shadows into the center of the cave—“a lovely lady to be your bride. To brighten your days and give you the companionship you've so sorely missed.”

The frost giant took one look and his face lit up. Beaming rapturously, he bent toward her in charmed fascination. The soft blue-and-white frills of her dress made her look gift wrapped in ribbons and bows, just the effect Grelf had sought Hrolf to conjure.

“Uh, I don't think so,” said Astrid, who wanted no part of this trade, trying to hide behind Thidrek. But Thidrek, seeing the giant so smitten, quickly clamped a hand over her mouth, anxious to seal the deal.

“So it's settled. You take the girl and, and—” He looked to Grelf for help.

“An uplifted heart e'er after,” cooed Grelf.

“Right, all that. And in exchange, I take the Hammer. Oh, and if you don't mind, could you sign for it? Just to make it legal?” Thidrek nodded to Grelf, who then unrolled on the floor a small scroll of vellum marked
BILL OF SALE
. Grelf handed the giant a stick of charcoal and indicated where to sign. The giant took the stick and went to sign, but then stopped. And in a voice remarkably soft, the frost giant spoke.

“You promise peace?” the frost giant said. The force of his icy exhalation was so strong, it frosted Thidrek's face and hair. But the prince didn't flinch.

“Peace forever,” he said. “You have my word.”

Satisfied, the giant scrawled an
X
on the bill of sale and swung his gaze back to Astrid. With a single finger, he gently stroked the top of her head. An icy chill ran through her, giving her such violent shivers, she couldn't speak.

She saw Thidrek and his men begin to back out of the cave and heard the prince bid good-bye to the giant. “Don't bother showing us out,” Thidrek said. “We know the way.”

In a moment the men were gone and Astrid was alone with the brutish thing. She felt too weak to run, too scared to scream. With escape unlikely, faced with who knew what horrors, she did the only thing she possibly could in these impossible circumstances. She fainted.

 

The storm on Mount Neverest had spread downward to where the mountain met the sea, and now it had enveloped the ship. Lut lay on deck beneath a bundle of furs, dimly aware of his own heartbeat and the patter of raindrops on his furs. The distant howl of the wind was high and shrill, like the spirits of long-dead ancestors calling to him in song. Though he felt the heat of his own heart fire fading, his mind was alive with pictures. The flinty grin of Voldar the Vile, his lost chieftain. The boyish laugh of Dane the Defiant, the son he'd gained. And the new face that had invaded his dreams. Some kind of bearded, ice-crusted creature that seemed to Lut no mere man but something far more…threatening. He prayed for the safety of Dane and the others, knowing that the higher up the mountain they went, the closer they'd come to the thing that could kill them all.

A
strid awoke to the sound of someone happily humming. She lay on a soft bed of fir twigs, the flickering glow of a nearby fire for a moment making her feel warm and safe. But again she heard the humming, and remembering she'd been sold to a brutish beast whose breath alone was enough to give a girl serious frostbite, she realized her prospects looked none too promising.

Presently the frost giant lumbered into view. Seeing Astrid awake, he grinned a giant grin. She waited, expecting the worst. She might be forced to cook and clean for him, or wash his back, or even be eaten perhaps. But he seemed so happy in her presence, she didn't have the heart to do what she normally would have done in this situation, which would be to yell and scream and kick until she'd fought her way free. The tender way he looked at her, the
way he had fashioned her comfortable bed—these softened her heart and made her think maybe he wasn't going to hurt her after all.

Still, she couldn't be sure. The best course of action, she decided, was to engage him in conversation, to draw him out so she could get to know him. Only then could she tell if he was truly dangerous or not.

Astrid smiled. The giant gave a shy smile of his own, then quickly looked away. He seemed afraid to look directly at her.

“You live here…alone?” she asked.

“Yes,” he said. The soft sound of his voice was surprisingly soothing, as if he were speaking through a flute, turning his words magically to music. “But now I have you,” he said.

“Yes, you do.”

There was an uncomfortable silence. Then the giant said, “My heart is glad you are here.”

Astrid nodded and smiled, pretending to be as comfortable as if she were in her very own home. Inhaling deeply, he took in her scent, pleased by it. He asked if she was hungry. She nodded. Following him into the next room, she saw it was a kind of makeshift kitchen, with a giant-size table and chairs. He had made a crackling fire in the corner, explaining he used fire only for the light it cast, saying that heat was his enemy.

“Humans,” said Astrid, “need fire for warmth.”

The frost giant nodded, understanding. Astrid was
touched he'd gone to such trouble just for her. And when the giant added another huge log to the fire, she saw that the blaze of heat melted his hand a bit, making little droplets of water roll down his fingers and onto the floor, where they quickly froze again. She then watched in amazement as he plunged his left hand—the one with the missing fingers—into a huge pot of ice-cold water. And as he pulled it out again, Astrid saw that the water had caused frost crystals to begin growing where his old fingers had been, and soon, after another dip back in the chilled water, the missing fingers had completely re-formed themselves and grown back. The giant made a fist with his left hand, seeing that his new fingers worked just fine.

“Good as new?” Astrid asked.

The giant nodded and smiled. Then he set down what looked like a huge wooden porridge bowl, over six paces in diameter. “Join me,” he said, nodding to the bowl. The wooden spoon he'd set inside was as tall as Astrid herself. Ravenous, she leaned over the rim of the bowl. It was filled with blue snow! And leaning over further, she fell all the way in. As she peeked up over the rim of the bowl, the giant saw she had a slushy gob of the blue snow on her head, as if she were wearing it as a hat. She carefully scooped a little bit off her head and tasted it. How delicious! What was it?

Snow flavored with fresh blueberries, the frost giant said, which grew on lower elevations of the mountain. He gently lifted her out and gave her a rag to wipe herself
with. Then he broke a tiny icicle from his beard and, scratching an indentation into one end, gave it to her to use as a spoon. And to her surprise, it worked just fine.

“It's good,” she said between bites, and the giant smiled. As she spooned up her slushie, he explained that, since he was a frost giant, ice was all he could eat. Snow, hailstones, icicles, pack ice, sheet ice—any form of frozen water at all. The hoarfrost that formed on tree limbs after a light rain was particularly light and crunchy. And the flavored bowls of slush, like the one she was eating, were refreshing. But most delectable of all, he said, was the ancient blue ice that could be found deep in the hearts of glaciers. “The older, the better,” he murmured.

The more she ate the sweet concoction, the better she felt, and the easier it became to talk with the giant. She asked questions about his life, and he answered shyly at first. But soon he warmed to her and began to tell her many things.

He told her his name was Thrym. He had lived alone in the cave for some years, having been sent away a long time ago by the other frost giants and told never to return. When she asked why he'd been ostracized, at first he wouldn't say. After some coaxing, he told her it was because he'd been “blamed for the death of another.” He had killed one of his own kind.

Astrid said nothing and waited for him to continue. Haltingly, he explained that he had had a girlfriend, a frost giantess, and against her father's wishes he had taken her
for a midnight walk. And being a playful sort, he had started to chase her around, trying to kiss her, and she had coyly played along, trying to run from him. It had been fun for a time, but the game had gotten out of hand. They had strayed too far down the mountain, and she had slipped and fallen and rolled down past the snow line. And she'd melted to death.

“Melted to…?” Astrid said. It sounded so awful.

“Yes,” he said. And he told her that frost giants can survive only in the coldest climes, up on snowbound mountaintops where the freezing air and icy winds keep them frozen solid and healthy. And if he or his kind venture down too far below the snow line, where the air is much warmer, they will quickly melt and be destroyed. “You have your world,” he said, “we have ours,” explaining that this was the gods' way of keeping humans and giants apart. There was a silence, and then he said, “Never go below the snow.” That's what he'd always been told. But he'd been foolish and irresponsible and had been banished forever from his world. And would live here alone for the rest of his days.

To lift his mood, she changed subjects, asking about Thor's Hammer. How had he come to possess it?

He said that one day after he'd been cast out, during a particularly lonely stretch of time, there'd been a raging storm. A gale-force wind had blown, with iceballs the size of sheep's heads. Lightning blazed and thunder boomed for three long days and nights, during which
he'd had to take shelter inside the ice cave.

When the storm had abated and the skies had cleared, he'd gone out to play on the slopes, and that's when he'd come upon the Hammer lying half buried in the new-fallen snow. Its energies somewhat depleted, it glowed and sparked, melting the ice around it, giving off a bright halo of light. At first amazed, Thrym had danced about it in delight, further gladdened to see the shadow of himself that the Hammer's halo of light threw over the snow, a shadow so lifelike, it mirrored his every move, and this he came to call his
shadowfriend
.

Thrym soon realized that Thor most probably had lost his prized weapon in an ill-advised marathon of drinking or carelessly thrown it in a fit of anger, and it had fallen from the sky and landed on Thrym's mountaintop. He'd kept it as a kind of toy or companion, often talking to it out loud, unburdening his troubles, expecting any day that Thor would be down to retrieve it, and he would be rewarded for having looked after it with such devotion. (Thor's impulsive rages and drinking bouts were widely excused, if not altogether celebrated, since they were thought to be the by-product of an unhappy childhood. Though he was among the greatest of all the gods, Thor still needed to blow off steam every now and then.)

For a whole year Thrym had lived alone on the mountain, the Hammer his only companion. But Thor had never showed. Thrym had grown tired of waiting, his heart hardening in disappointment. He felt that not only had his
own kind rejected him, but the gods had as well. And so, when Thidrek had arrived, being a peaceable fellow, he had gladly given the Hammer away for the pleasure of Astrid's company. When he admitted this to Astrid, he smiled a little-boy smile that made Astrid fear him less and feel that, despite his huge bulk, he perhaps was far less a threat than she had first imagined. All Thrym wanted, she sensed, was someone to love—and someone to love him in return—and that made him like everybody else inside.

On their journey up the mountain, Astrid had overheard Grelf tell Thidrek how frost giants had been formed by the tears of the gods. When gazing down from Valhalla and profoundly moved by human events, whether it was mothers dying in childbirth or true love torn asunder by envy and ignorance, they shed their godly tears. These fell from the heavens onto the highest, coldest mountaintops, and when the teardrops touched the icebound earth, like seeds of life, they crystallized and grew and, alive with the spirit energy of that god's emotion, formed giant-size creatures made entirely of ice. This was why, as Grelf had said, though brutish in appearance, most frost giants were known to be sensitive creatures much given to shows of emotion.

After their meal, Thrym picked the wayward blueberry skins from his teeth with an old knife he'd found on the mountain long ago. Astrid asked if she could use it. “You want to pick your teeth too?” he asked.

She laughed and said, “It's a little big for
my
mouth. No,
I want to do some ice sculpting. It relaxes me.” The giant asked what she was going to make, and Astrid said she'd show him later, and he mustn't peek. So, as Astrid set about cutting and shaping a block of ice, Thrym did everything he could to entertain her and make her feel at home.

He did a little show with handpuppets that he'd sewn himself out of bits of cloth and goatskin. He made funny faces. He juggled snowballs. He performed feats of strength, hefting five huge tree trunks over his head at once. He danced a jig while playing a tune on a finely carved wooden flute and sang a song he composed on the spot just for her.

Astrid was touched. But the more he tried to please her, the more Astrid realized the sad truth. Since he was covered in frost, his touch kind of left her cold. Not to mention that he was four times taller than Dane or any other man she'd ever known. She felt even worse when Thrym began to talk of wanting to marry someday and have children. Well, it just wasn't going to work, no matter how many layers of protective clothing he agreed to wear. She tried to let him down easy.

“Listen, I have to be honest,” she said, easing her way into it. “I'm sure you're a kind and gentle giant, and I so appreciate everything you've done for me, Thrym, really I do. But the simple truth is it'll never work, you and me.”

At first he didn't understand. “What? You don't like me with a beard?” He quickly raked his hand across the icicles that hung from his chin and broke them all off. He struck a grinning pose, hoping she'd like his new look.

“It's not that. You look fine, Thrym…it's just…”

Thrym's face fell. “My height, eh?” he said. “But see,
I'm not so tall when I slouch.” He tried to lean over farther, but still he towered over her, and even he could see it wasn't working. “I'm too cold for you, is that it? The whole frost thing puts you off?”

“Thrym, please, it's not you. It's
me
.”

“You? But I think…I think you're beautiful.”

Astrid blushed to hear it, even from a frost giant.

“No, I mean…” Here she paused, amazed at what she realized she was about to say. “I mean, I love…someone else.” There. She'd said it. It was the first time she'd actually said it aloud. The first time she'd publicly admitted to anyone that she loved Dane. The boy she'd always dreamed of having one day. The boy who'd grown into a man right before her eyes the day he had nearly died trying to save her life.

“You love…another?” Thrym's gaze fell to the floor, and for a long moment he said nothing, remaining silent and morose. Astrid felt awful. She knew she'd hurt his feelings and wanted to say something to ease his pain.

“Listen, Thrym, just because
we
aren't right for each other doesn't mean you should give up on love. You'll find someone. I know you will.” She reached out to touch his arm, but struck by the sudden chill, she instantly withdrew it.

The giant pounded the tabletop with his fist.
Bam!
The cave shook. “
Find
someone? Fat chance!” He stomped about, his heavy footfalls shaking loose shards of ice from the ceiling and walls. “Do you know what it's like for me?
Of course you don't! You take your beauty for granted. Look at me! I'm made of
ice.
And ice is
cold
! Do you want to feel a deadly chill when touched? No! Humans want warmth! Well, I don't have what you want and I never will!” He slumped to the floor, put his head in his hands, and actually started to cry, the tears freezing the moment they landed on his cheeks.

“See? Even my tears freeze up…,” he blubbered.