The Elven (19 page)

A cold fury gripped Mandred. “What was that? What about my son? Where is he?” He jumped to his feet, knocking the jug of mead from the bench. The onlookers recoiled from him. Farodin’s right hand rested on the pommel of his sword. He was keeping a sharp eye on the spearmen.

“What happened to Freya and my son?” Mandred shouted, his voice breaking. “What is going on here? Is the whole village bewitched? Why are you all so different?”

“You’re the one who’s different, Mandred Torgridson,” snapped an old woman. “Don’t look at me like that. Before you chose Freya, you were happy enough to have me sit on your lap. It’s me, Gudrun.”

Mandred stared at the weathered face. “Gudrun?” She had once been as fair as a summer’s day. Was it possible? Those eyes . . . yes, it was her.

“The winter after the monster came was even worse. The fjord was frozen solid, and one night, they came. At first, all we heard were their horns in the distance, then we saw the chains of light. Riders. Hundreds. They came across the fjord from the Hartungscliff, from the stone circle. They rode straight across the ice. No one who was there will ever forget that night. They were like spirits, but alive. The faerylight was like waves rolling across the sky, and the village was covered in green light. Their horses’ hooves hardly even scraped the snow, but they were flesh and blood, the cold elf queen, Emergrid, and all her court. They were beautiful to look at. And terrifying, too, for their eyes mirrored the chill in their hearts. The most magnificent of their horses carried a delicate woman. She wore a dress that looked like it was made from butterflies’ wings. She seemed untouched by the cold, though the night was bitter. A man in black and a soldier in a white cloak rode at her side. In her entourage came falconers and lutists, soldiers in shining armor, and women dressed as if for a summer feast. And wolves as big as highland ponies. They came to a stop in front of your longhouse, Mandred. In front of this hall.”

In the fire pit, a piece of wood exploded, sending sparks flying to the soot-blackened roof, and Gudrun continued. “Your wife opened her hall to Queen Emergrid. Freya met them with mead and bread, according to the laws of hospitality, but the elf queen took nothing. She demanded what you promised her, Mandred. Your son. The price for this village to survive and for the beast to be taken from us.”

Mandred buried his face in his hands. She came. How could he ever have promised her that? “What . . . what of Freya?” he stammered. “Is she . . . ?”

“When the elves took away her son, they took away her will to live. She wept. She begged for mercy for her child. She offered her own life instead, but Queen Emergrid took no pity on her. Freya ran barefoot through the snow, and she followed the elves all the way to the Hartungscliff. We found her there the next morning, in the center of the standing stones. She had ripped her dress to rags, and she cried and cried . . . We brought her back to the village, but Freya did not want to be under one roof with us anymore. She climbed to the top of your grandfather’s burial mound and called on the gods and the darkest spirits of the night for revenge. After that, her own spirit grew more and more confused. We always saw her with a bundle of rags in her arms, holding it the way you might hold a baby. We took food to her, Jarl. We tried everything. On the first spring morning after the equinox, we found her dead on your grandfather’s barrow. She died with a smile on her face. We buried her that same day in the barrow. A white stone marks her grave.”

Mandred felt as if his heart must stop beating. His anger was gone. Tears flowed over his cheeks, and he felt no shame for it. He went to the door of the house. No one followed him.

His grandfather’s burial mound lay a short way outside the new earth wall that now protected Firnstayn, close to the large white boulder on the shore of the fjord. This was the place his grandfather had landed and come ashore. He had founded the village and named it after the boulder, as white as midwinter snow. Firnstayn.

Mandred found the white gravestone on the side of the low burial mound. He dropped to his knees and stayed that way for a long time. His hands stroked the rough stone tenderly.

In the darkest hour of the night, Mandred thought he saw a shadow in a torn dress on the summit of the barrow.

“I’ll bring him back, Freya,” he whispered. “May it cost my life, I’ll bring him back. I swear it by the oak tree that saved me. Let my vow be as strong as an oak.” Mandred searched for Atta Aikhjarto’s gift, and when he found the acorn, he pressed it into the black dirt of the grave. “I’ll bring him back to you.”

The moon appeared between the clouds. The shadow atop the burial mound had vanished.

Return to Albenmark

I
t was winter in Albenmark, but despite the beauty of the snowy landscape, the winter chill was as hard on him here as in his own world. Here, too, Mandred had to work hard, slogging a path through the deep snow while his elven companions walked lightly beside him. Now, though, his strength failed him. At Freya’s grave, he’d been ready to take on anything Albenmark could throw at him, but today, he was downcast and felt nothing but emptiness inside.

His son would be a stranger to him, and thinking about him offered little consolation. He
did
want to see him . . . but had little hope that they might be reunited. Oleif would have grown to manhood years ago, and it may well be that he called someone else his father. The fact that it was winter in Albenmark made Mandred’s dejection complete. This was the land of elves and faeries. It was supposed to be a land of eternal spring. That, at least, was what it said in the faery stories. It had to be a bad omen, finding this world in the grip of winter. It didn’t matter that Farodin and Nuramon had assured him a hundred times that the seasons here went through their cycles just as they did in the human world.

Atta Aikhjarto had not spoken to him at the gate when they crossed over. Did trees hibernate once they shed their leaves? No one had met them at the gate, although the queen apparently knew everything that went on in her dominions.

On the first day, they marched as far as the Welruun gate, and encountered no one on their journey. Mandred thought he knew why. Doom had followed them to Albenmark. From the beginning, an unlucky star had hung over the elfhunt, and the light from it had not yet died. They had lived through a story like something from the old heroic sagas . . . and those stories inevitably ended in tragedy.

On the morning of their second day in Albenmark, when Mandred awoke in their freezing campsite and made himself get up, he did so only because he didn’t want anyone in the future to be able to say he had not followed his path to its end. He would take the elfhunt—the first ever to have been led by a human—home again. What was left of it, at least. He wanted to know what disaster would finally seal their fate.

No watchman challenged them at the Shalyn Falah, and even when they reached Emerelle’s castle, no one was there to meet them. It was as if the elves had all died out. Their steps echoed eerily when they passed through the massive gates. Mandred sensed that they were being watched, but look as he might, all he saw were deserted battlements and empty window arches.

Farodin and Nuramon had hardly spoken a word on their journey. Even they seemed unsettled.

Why are they avoiding us?
Mandred wondered in annoyance. They had certainly been away long enough, but they were returning victorious. They deserved a more fitting welcome than this. But who was he to understand how an elf thought? Whatever had happened here must have something to do with their ultimate doom . . . the final fateful stroke that brought every saga to an end.

Nuramon and Farodin were walking faster now. The rhythm of their steps reverberated from the transparent walls in a hollow staccato beat.

At the far end of the enormous hall waited a figure, all in black. Master Alvias. He bowed his head momentarily to Mandred but did not even acknowledge the presence of Farodin and Nuramon.

“Welcome, Mortal Mandred, jarl of Firnstayn,” said Alvias. “The queen has foreseen your return at this hour. She would like to see you and your companions. This way.”

As if opened by an invisible hand, the door to the Royal Hall swung wide, and it seemed to Mandred that every soul in Albenmark was gathered inside. A throng of elves and centaurs, fairies, kobolds, gnomes, all standing silently.

Mandred felt as if something large had gotten wedged in his throat. The silence of the enormous gathering was even more unnerving than the endless empty halls and courtyards had been. Not a cough to be heard, not a cleared throat, nothing. Mandred looked up to the ceiling. A white dome of ice had replaced the rainbow of spring. It reminded him of the Cave of Luth.

A passage opened through the crowd to the foot of the throne. The time that had passed had left no mark on the queen. Emerelle still looked like a young woman.

Master Alvias joined a troop of young soldiers who stood to the left at the foot of the throne, while Farodin and Nuramon kneeled before the queen.

A trace of a smile played on Emerelle’s lips. “So, Mandred the Mortal, still you do not deign to bow before the queen of Albenmark.”

Less than ever
, thought Mandred.

Emerelle’s hand moved to the bowl beside her throne. “As often as I looked into the water, I saw neither you nor your companions. What happened to you, Mandred, leader of the elfhunt? Did you find what you were hunting?”

Mandred cleared his throat. His mouth was as dry, as if he’d swallowed a wagonload of flour. “The beast is dead,” he said. “Slain. Its head lies at Luth’s foot, and I fed its liver to the dogs. It was slain at our hand, and by our wrath.” Mandred noted a disparaging frown cross Alvias’s face. Mandred didn’t care. The old crow could think what he liked of him. Or better yet . . . Mandred smiled grimly. The high and mighty conceit of Alvias and the others would evaporate once they discovered what the elfhunt’s quarry had
really
been.

“We rode out to hunt down a creature that was half man and half boar,” Mandred said, then paused for a moment, as a skald might, to stoke his audience’s intrigue. “But what we found was a creature that should not have existed since the days of the Alben. It was a creature known to Albenmark as a Devanthar.”

Mandred observed the crowd from the corner of his eye. He might have counted on at least one fainting flower faery, but instead of a shocked murmur, all that followed was more silence, as if his news came as no surprise to the folk of Albenmark.

The silence nonplussed him. His voice halting a little, he reported what had befallen them during the hunt, the terrors they had faced and the companions who had been lost. He described their trek up the glacier, spoke of the desecrated ironbeards in a voice filled with wrath, and praised Farodin’s heroic courage and Nuramon’s skill as a healer. He told the story of the Devanthar’s trap and of how many years the demon had stolen from him, and as he did, his voice nearly failed him. When he came to his return to Firnstayn, he glanced for a moment to his companions, who were still kneeling beside him. “With the two companions who still remained from the elfhunt, I went—” Farodin shook his head, the slightest of gestures, and Mandred fell silent.

“What was it you were going to say, Mandred?” asked the queen.

“I . . .” Mandred did not feel that he should conceal what had happened. Still, he hesitated for a moment. “I wanted to say that we returned to Firnstayn to spend one night among my people.” His final words fell in a tone of ice.

The queen betrayed no special reaction. “I thank you for your report, Mandred,” she said, her voice formal. “The three of you have accomplished great deeds. What do you think the Devanthar intended? What do you think was behind the things it did?”

Mandred gestured toward his companions. “We have spent many hours on that question. We believe it wanted to create a prison for the elven souls in the Cave of Luth. What we don’t know is whose soul it wanted. In the end, the beast failed. We killed it, and we escaped.”

The queen looked at the three men before her in silence. Was she waiting for something? Had he skipped over some silly elven tripe that was supposed to bring his report to an end? For a heartbeat, it seemed to Mandred that the queen’s gaze was focused on Nuramon.

“I thank you and your companions. The elfhunt achieved what it set out to do. You have completed your task well.” She paused briefly, and now her eyes came to rest on him. “Because you were in your village, you know that I went there to claim what I was due. Now I would like to introduce you to Alfadas, your son.” The queen gestured toward one of the soldiers standing beside Alvias.

Mandred’s heart jumped. The man looked like an elf. His ears were hidden beneath blond hair that fell to his shoulders. Only when Mandred looked closer did he notice the fine differences. This Alfadas—as Emerelle, in her superior way, had named his Oleif—wore an ankle-length mail shirt and a flowing cape. He was almost a head taller than Mandred. His height hid the fact that he was somewhat broader and more powerful of build than the other elves. But as strange as he might look, his warm brown eyes left no doubt. He had Freya’s eyes. And it was with Freya’s smile that his son greeted him. But why the devil did he not wear a beard? His chin was as smooth as a woman’s . . . or an elf’s.

Alfadas stepped down from the platform on which the throne stood. “Father, I never stopped hoping.” He laid one hand solemnly over his heart and bowed his head.

“You do not bow to your father,” said Mandred sternly, and threw his arms around the soldier. “My son!” By the gods. His boy smelled like a rose. “My son,” he said again, but more quietly now, and released him from his embrace. “Alfadas?” The name felt wrong on his tongue. Mandred looked him up and down. He looked like one of the heroes of old. “You’re . . . tall,” he noted, simply to say something, but also to gain some control over the feelings that threatened to overwhelm him. His son, the child that only days earlier he thought had just been born. And here he was, a man.

What had the Devanthar and Emerelle done? They had snatched his son away from him in a way he could never have imagined. A few days earlier, he’d been looking forward to holding his newborn in his arms, and now a man stood before him in the prime of life. Oleif could have been his brother. They had denied him so much. All the hours he would have spent teaching Oleif what made a man of honor. Carefree summer evenings spent fishing together along the fjord. The first campaign of war, when his youngster would become a man. Long forays hunting in the winter.

Despite everything, he knew that he could count himself lucky. How would it have been to face a man older than himself and to have to call him son?

He looked Oleif up and down one more time. A fine-looking man, he was. “I’m happy I’m still older than you, boy.” Mandred smiled mischievously. “There might still be one or two things I can teach you. I’m afraid these elves have no idea how to fight with an axe and . . .”

His son smiled broadly . . . like an elf.

“Alfadas is to follow you now,” Emerelle ceremoniously declared. “I have taught him what there was to be learned here. Now it is up to you to lead him into the human world and teach him as you see fit.”

Mandred could not be certain whether Emerelle’s words carried a touch of irony. “I will do that,” he said, his voice strong enough so that everyone present in that enormous hall could hear it.

Beside Mandred, Farodin suddenly stood up, his mail shirt ringing softly. “My queen, I beg a question.”

Emerelle nodded agreeably.

“Where is our beloved? We have done what she wished.”

To Mandred, it felt as if the air in the Royal Hall suddenly grew cooler.

“Remember the terrace overlooking the orchard?” asked Emerelle in a formal tone.

“Yes, Majesty.” Farodin made no more pretense of hiding his desire to see Noroelle again. Nuramon, too, was on his feet now, unbidden.

“You must go there.”

“By your leave, Majesty,” said Nuramon.

The queen granted them a curt nod.

His companions strode back through the Royal Hall to the high door. Mandred watched them go, glad that they, at least, had a loved one they could return to, even if he had never understood how two men were able to love the same woman without bashing in each other’s heads.

When Farodin and Nuramon had departed, the queen spoke to Mandred in a solemn voice. “Mandred, I declare the hunt for the manboar complete. The beast caused some measure of ill, but in the end, the form that it had taken was defeated. You and your companions shall spend one final night in the hunters’ chambers. You should refresh your body and soul, remember those who did not return, and say farewell to one another.”

Emerelle stood up and went to Oleif. She took his hands in hers.

“You were almost a son to me, Alfadas Mandredson. Never forget that.”

For Mandred, the words of the queen were like hot coals falling in tinder. Oleif already had a mother. And she would no doubt still be alive today if Emerelle had not demanded their son as the price of the elfhunt. Only with great effort did he manage to hold his temper in check. Despite his anger, he saw that saying good-bye to Oleif was truly painful for Emerelle. Not even the cold-hearted queen of the Albenkin was completely devoid of feeling. Mandred understood how foolish it was to put all the blame on her. It was true that she was the one who had demanded his child as the price for sending the elfhunt, but he had accepted it. And he had done so without even asking Freya, though she was still carrying the child beneath her heart. The manboar had been beaten, but his decision had cost Freya—the woman he had wanted to save most of all—her life. What must she have felt when the elves had stood before her, simultaneously beautiful and merciless, and demanded from her the one dear thing she still had in her life? Had she accepted the trade, or had she put up a fight? What had taken place that night? He had to know.

“Queen . . . what did my wife say to you when you had the child collected?”

A deep crease formed on Emerelle’s forehead. “I did not have Alfadas collected. I rode to Firnstayn with my entire court. I did not go like a thief under cover of night and snow. I visited your village like a royal court should, to honor you and your son. But I alone went to your wife.” She looked at Alfadas. “Your mother was very afraid. She held you at her breast, protecting you . . . I told her about the elfhunt. I will never forget her words, Mandred. She said, ‘Two lives for a village. This is the jarl’s decision, and I accept it.’” Emerelle stepped back from Oleif and looked into Mandred’s eyes candidly. The woman, so small this close, stood a mere hand’s breadth from him.

“Was that all?” asked Mandred. He knew how fractious Freya could be. That was another thing he had loved about her.