“I cannot do as they ask. It is not possible,” he said. “They have no bodies. Otherwise, I would have been home to you in an instant.” Home to you—the words sounded like music.
Of course, he couldn’t impregnate a woman who had no body. He couldn’t even magic her molecules—she had no molecules. “Besides, I’d be jealous.” Her voice caught again.
“She cannot help us,” the troll queen said. Cassie gripped his fur—no! She could not be losing him again. The troll princess drooped blue, and the queen stretched a tentacle to stroke her, as if to comfort her. It moved through the princess’s body as if through water. She retracted the tentacle, and for an instant she was translucent. The queen, Cassie realized, was as shapeless as the other trolls. Bear was right—none of them had bodies. It was all an illusion. The queen’s eyes fixed back on Cassie. Pulsing orange now, she said, “Remove the human. We have no need of her.”
The trolls descended on them. “No!” Cassie shouted. Hundreds of trolls slid between Cassie and Bear and, crowbarlike, wedged them apart. She couldn’t lose him a second time! “No, stop! Please!”
Bear was shouting too. She fought against the trolls. Each one she pushed back was replaced by a dozen more. It was like fighting ocean waves. Trolls flowed into her.
Her stomach contracted, and for a second, Cassie lost ground. “No! Please, anything you want! Bargain with me! Anything!”
“No, Cassie! Save yourself!”
She shouted at the queen, “Tell me: What do you want?”
Surrounded by shadowy shapes, the queen writhed on the dais. “Life,” she hissed. Instinctively, Cassie clutched her stomach.
“Do not do it!” Bear said.
“You have life?” Wingless, the queen rose into the air. “You have life in you?”
What did that have to do with anything? Cassie looked down at her stomach and thought of her long journey here—it had to do with everything.
“No, Cassie!” Bear snapped his teeth and swiped with his claws, but the trolls still blocked him.
She’d do what she had to do to save her Bear. That’s what she’d done all along, all for him. Wasn’t it? With her arms wrapped around her stomach, she looked at her love and wondered—had she done it for him, or for herself?
The troll queen, body spreading like ink, flew above her. “We will keep you, then, and we will have your child!” she exulted.
Cassie felt the damp touch of trolls on her stomach. She swung her hand out to ward them off and struck only empty air. “Your princess promised my freedom!”
The troll princess shrank into a ball. “I didn’t know!” she wailed.
Growing like some mythical god, the queen filled the cavernous room. The trolls thickened around Cassie and Bear. Through wisps of gray, the queen throbbed orange and green. “Your baby for your king. It is our bargain.”
Cassie looked down at her bulging stomach. Here was her chance for the two things she’d wanted when she’d begun this journey: her Bear and no baby. Except that it was not that simple. It hadn’t been that simple for a while now. “There must be something else you want,” she said.
“We make no other offer,” the queen said.
Cassie stroked her stomach and almost felt dйjа vu, though it wasn’t her memory she was feeling. She knew this moment. This had been her mother’s choice when she’d faced down the North Wind. This had been her father’s choice when he’d honored Gail’s sacrifice and stayed with the newborn Cassie. Cassie hadn’t understood it before. She hadn’t understood them. But she did now—the horrible frustration her father must have felt, having to make that choice, this choice. All at once, she forgave him; she forgave them both. How could she give up her baby? But how could she lose Bear? She needed him. She loved him.
“Do not do it, Cassie,” he said. “Leave me. Please, I beg you.” She heard the words: If you love me, let me go.
She loved him enough to leave all she had ever known, to turn her world upside down, to come to this place beyond all known places, to risk her life, to almost die.
Did she love him enough to let him go?
Yes, she did.
The queen pulsed brighter. “What is your answer?”
Bowing her head, Cassie said a single word: “No.”
CHAPTER 31
Latitude indeterminate
Longitude indeterminate
Altitude indeterminate
Hissing, the trolls rolled over them. One troll was a drop of water, but hundreds of thousands were a tidal wave. More trolls flooded between Cassie and Bear. No, wait! She wasn’t ready yet! She hadn’t said good-bye.
Bear blurred behind trolls as if underwater. Muscles straining, he pushed at the tide. Cassie skidded backward. “At least let me say good-bye! Please!” She heard him call her name, and the trolls hissed louder. “Bear, I love you!” she yelled. Could he hear her? Please, let him have heard her. He’d never heard her say it. “I’m sorry! I’m so sorry!” For everything! she wanted to say—for not trusting him, for endangering their baby, and most of all for failing to rescue him. She had proved to be her father’s daughter to the end. She had found her limit, the line she would not cross, the cliff she would not leap off. Bear was now a white smudge behind the gray shadows. “Bear!”
Her stomach seized.
For an instant, she lost her breath, and the trolls swept her up. She sailed backward and rammed into a wall. Her face smushed sideways against stone. “You’re crushing me!” Crushing the baby!
The walls melted, and Cassie spilled into the white room. Catching her balance, she ran toward the throne room, but the troll princess sealed the wall shut again with a word, separating Cassie from the other trolls and from Bear. Shouting, Cassie pounded on the wall until another contraction crushed the breath out of her. She felt wet run down her inner thighs. “Oh, no. God, no,” she said. “Not now. Not here.” Not without Bear. Not stranded on a troll island.
A pulsing orb, the troll princess said, “You truly have life in you?”
“Let me out of here,” Cassie said. “Make the door appear.” She had to get to her grandfather. He had to take her home.
The troll princess floated across the room and said, “Open,” the magic word. The stone melted into the wooden door. Battered, it hung open, and Cassie heard the crash of waves. She bolted outside.
Sea air hit her face. “Grandfather!”
Black clouds swarmed.
“Grandfather, help me.” She doubled over as another contraction racked through her. Walking made the contractions worse. “Grandfather!” she screamed.
Fascinated, the troll princess oozed over the rocks. “Is this pain?”
Cassie slipped on seaweed as another contraction snatched her breath. She caught herself on a tree. Her arms and legs shook. “Please, Grandfather!”
He did not answer, or he did not hear. Wordless, the wind stirred the sea, and swells smashed into the shore.
The troll princess asked, “What is it like to feel pain?”
She had to keep calm. Calm. Calm. Cassie took deep breaths.
The princess sighed. “I wish I could feel pain.”
Another contraction followed fast on the heels of the last. This was not a false alarm; she knew it. “Bear!” Breaking waves drowned her cry.
Contractions crashed on top of each other like a relentless sea storm. Cassie gasped for air. She flailed with pain. Her hands hit the rocks. She did not feel them. She yelled like an animal.
She didn’t know how long it lasted—hours, minutes, days. Contractions came and went. She was caught inside them. The world outside her body ceased to exist. She couldn’t think of a time before this and couldn’t imagine a time after. It was just the pain, the rocks, and the sea. And then, like in the eye of a storm, the pain eased, and Cassie needed to push. She spread her skirt and squatted. Push. Veins jumped out on her neck, and sweat popped out on her forehead. Her lungs whooshed. Push. She was exploding. She wanted to climb out of her skin. It hurt to push, and it hurt not to push. She felt herself stretching. She would burst. More than anything, she wanted the baby out. She pushed.