The troll mother roars.
It’s an elegant howl, like the first strain of the Gjallarhorn that blows to signal the end of the world.
Her sons echo the call and I’m trapped in this circle of them. They’re turned away from the Shipworm, and I force a smile so wide I imagine Unferth’s grin behind it, his teeth behind mine, both of us here and dangerous. As the first thin light of dawn kisses the red rooftops, we face each other. Maybe if I can just draw it out long enough. Maybe.
The troll mother opens her mouth and she speaks. “Valkyrie.”
My spine straightens in shock. She knows me for what I am.
I work my mouth, but nothing comes out. It doesn’t matter, this shock, this troll mother recognizing me. What matters is distracting her, saving the others. I swallow grit and troll blood.
“Yes!” I cry. “I am Signy Valborn, the Valkyrie of the Tree. The Alfather named me. I am born of death and for death, troll. Who are you to be here, to challenge me?”
The troll mother stares at me, and I pray the people in the Shipworm are using the time to escape. I cannot glance their way, can’t let her notice them again. Unferth’s sword trembles in my exhausted hand.
Her stone skin is nicked and lined with scars, claw marks dug in straight lines and patterns, as if purposefully made. One great sickle-shaped scar on her shoulder almost appears to be the rune for transformation, and another giant X might be the rune for day.
The beautiful moon-marble troll twists her mouth into a horrible smile. She flexes her hands, rattling the bone bracelets on her wrists, and makes a huge barking sound.
“Poor lost girl,” she says, and laughs again. “Never know monster inside.”
I shake my head, knees weak.
The troll mother opens her arms invitingly. “You defeat me, they all live.”
I flick my eyes toward the red roofs. No true flash of sunlight, and low clouds could keep her safe for ages still, if Unferth’s stories of the mothers are true.
Dull certainty settles on my shoulders. I won’t survive her that long. Whose poem is this? Hers or mine? My vision wavers; my shoulder burns. I’m so weary, and the arm with Unferth’s sword trembles.
My story. It has to be mine.
“For Hangatyr!” I scream wildly, then run at her.
She doesn’t move but simply allows Unferth’s sword to cut into her chest. Dark blood bubbles around the blade. She casually lifts one arm and bats me away. Her sons hoot and bellow from the edges of the square.
The sword rips from my hands. I tumble over the hard stone yard and hit in a mess of aches and limbs. I struggle up. She pulls the sword out of her own body and tosses it to me. It clangs against the cobblestones.
I sway as I stand. The troll mother waits with an air of patience while people pour out of the Shipworm. Her sons growl and bare fangs at the people, but their mother flings a hand up to keep her sons from attacking. There’s Patty and some trapped guests fleeing for the docks.
I step forward, arcing around to get between the mother and the inn. I charge her again, dashing across the courtyard, sword raised.
There’s a scream of my name behind me, but I strike.
The troll mother knocks the sword aside and catches me against her chest. Her eyes are right at mine, sea-blue and aquamarine, and her breath warms me; her arms embrace me. She’s so hot, not like stone at all but slick and warm. Comfortable. I feel the beat of her heart like the tide, ancient and strong.
But there in her frozen eyes I see stone and heart.
Her heart.
The knowledge blazes through me. Sudden hope makes me twist and fight and scream again. I punch at her eye and her nose, and she coughs. I grab her tusk but can’t hurt her.
Her mouth opens and she says, “Your heart.”
I freeze. The runes pulse there in her eyes and I think, This is the end, but before I know, hands pull me free. I hit the ground and recognize Unferth’s boots next to my face. I grab at his ankle, but he charges her.
Gore covers Unferth’s gray coat and he stabs a thick troll-spear into her ribs. The mother roars and picks him up by the neck. He kicks. I scramble for his sword.
The troll mother squeezes and Unferth wilts. His arms dangle limp.
My world narrows.
Sunlight touches her head and she ducks. She throws Unferth’s body over her shoulder and barks at her sons.
Then she turns away with him. I try to run after and she swings her arm at me, catches me in the chest. I slam into the cobblestone courtyard again, unable to breathe, wheezing, gasping, clutching at my chest. A sharp, horrible pain branches like lightning from my side. I roll, try to stand. My skull pounds; I can hardly claw my way up the side of the general store to watch the final troll-sons harass the survivors fleeing the Shipworm in every direction. The lightening sky begins to reach the streets and alleys, and the trolls dodge through the remaining shadows after their mother.
I’m suddenly alone again.
Your heart.
Her heart.
The inn smokes, sending up long lines of ashes into the sky. The wind is not only acrid but sharp with blood, the sticky and nauseating smell of a funeral pyre. Strings of lanterns and colored paper flutter on the ground, scattering fake coins everywhere.
My eyes won’t focus at first on the lumps on the ground. There aren’t too many right here, mostly strangers I don’t know. Blood is frozen across their hands and faces. Their teeth shine from open mouths.
I whirl away, but there’s Amelia the dentist against the well, her dress stiff with blood. And there the actor Leif pinned to the earth with one of the troll-spears. My throat closes.
Then I see Bethya the mead mistress, but only because the tip of her braid suddenly catches fire. I stagger to her and fall to my knees, batting the fire out with my hands. The musky smell of burning hair gags me and I wretch against the ground, gripping deep into the cracked cobblestones until two of my fingernails break. Tears fall from pain and grief, and my heart is an ever-widening chasm.
Wiping my eyes, I turn toward a sudden flurry of movement.
The wind ruffles Jesca’s graying hair and the end of Rome’s blue shirt. No! They were supposed to escape. But here they are, fallen beside each other, his shattered arm half on top of her. A tiny wail worms its way out of my mouth. Both their faces flash before me, golden and laughing. I remember the roughness in Rome’s voice when he called me daughter and Jesca hugging me with hands as delicate as bird wings. Even the Alfather has a family.
I lean over Rome, one arm pressed to my ribs. I touch his cold cheek. His eyes are closed already, and his lips are pressed tightly together.
I open my mouth to say his name.
But nothing comes out.
Is this what my mother and father looked like, piled one atop the other in that faraway jungle? This is not how Freyans are supposed to die.
What will I tell Rathi? My throat is raw and burning; tears fall onto my cheeks only to dry tight against my skin in the heat from the fires. With a shaking finger I draw the rune peace onto their faces.
I lurch up to keep after the troll mother and her stone heart. There’s nothing I can do for them, but if there’s any chance, any at all, that Ned is still alive, that I can catch her and dig out her heart, I have to go.
Scarlet binding runes mark the alley she took. They waver in my hazy vision and at first I think I imagine them: final destiny, which means Ragnarok, the last battle of the gods. And lost sun.