Foresworn (18 page)

Right by the elves.

Arun started to unzip his coat, but Branton chose that moment to yell and run forward with his sword. Arun jumped aside, pulling me with him, and the sword barely missed us. Arun switched the knife to a reverse grip and faced his former friend. “Stop this. Stop this right now. I don’t want to hurt you.”

“Don’t you remember the stories?” Branton chuckled, the sound wet from the blood that had to be trickling down his throat. “I kill you.”

“Branton, you aren’t Surt and I’m not Freyr. We can change everything.” Arun took a step closer to him. “You can fight with us.”

“No, thanks. What we have planned for this place will be a little too hot—even for me.”

“You also die in those stories, Sutter,” I yelled. “Idiot. And all this drama is pathetic.”

A tree just to my right lit up. It flared into a raging inferno instantly and before we could move away, a tree to our left joined the fire party. I heard and felt the fire start up behind me, and when I turned to look, the sight of a rope hanging from one of the trees sent terror screaming through me.

My shaking then had nothing to do with the cold. I glanced into the sky, wondering about the time and how far away we were from sunset. If we could somehow hold Branton, the giants and the elves off until then, maybe Arun’s power would be something to stop this. Maybe the others would have time to get here.

As if thinking about them, the sound of a helicopter filled the air. Some of the giants ran toward it and one leaped into the air and grabbed, coming so close I held my breath. I knew Coral and Raven were on that thing.

The pilot managed to elude the giants and land. Kids spilled from it fast. My sisters, Vanir, Taran, Magnus, Brigg and Nanna. Grady, Hallur and Alva followed. And then, when the Valkyries Mist and Kara stepped down, the music on the lake started again. And again it didn’t sound so much like music to me, but voices. So many voices, they wound around each other, flowing into a tone that did sound like harps and wood flutes.

Everyone, including my sisters, held some sort of weapon as they stood in a line in front of the helicopter.

I was so busy watching them, the coughs that suddenly tore up and out of my throat nearly sent me to my knees. All I could think about was carbon monoxide and how Arun and I had to get away from the fire because it surrounded us on three sides now. I didn’t think he realized the fire had spread, and then I knew it for sure when a giant reached down to grab me and Arun shoved me out of the way so he could stab his knife up into the giant’s hand.

The battle began as I tumbled over backward.

Right into the fire.

The sun turns black, earth sinks in the sea,

The hot stars down from heaven are whirled;

Fierce grows the steam and the life-feeding flame,

Till fire leaps high about heaven itself.

Now Garm howls loud before Gnipahellir,

The fetters will burst, and the wolf run free;

Much do I know, and more can see

Of the fate of the gods, the mighty in fight.

—The Norse
Poetic Edda

Chapter Fourteen

As I fell, I instinctively tried to grab that dangling rope, marveling over the fact I felt nothing. In my nightmares, the burn had always hurt so, so much. This was kind of like watching the movie
Firestarter
. I could see my hair go flying up as I fell back, could see the sparks lighting it up. Everything felt surreal, as if my heart went into slow motion and the world around me ceased to have tactile function.

I guess when you’re dying, you go stupid and start thinking stupid things because just as I realized shock was keeping me from feeling it, the pain began.

And nothing in my nightmares had prepared me for the reality.

Of fire crawling onto and into everything on my body.

Of the smell of my hair burning.

Of the bone-deep
,
searing pain that came when the fire ate through that first layer of skin.

Just when I released the ragged scream clawing its way out of my throat, everything around me came to a stop.

It wasn’t like my
rune tempus
, nothing spun around—the world just halted. I lay there, whimpering because I felt nothing but pain. I was made of pain. And of ash and the death I could sense reaching for me with sharp, searing claws.

Then a woman stepped through the flames. She wore jeans and tall gray boots, her bare arms were ripped and her vest was a silver so shiny, it hurt my eyes. She had straight long blond hair that looked like a waterfall of silk as she leaned over me. “Shh,” she said softly. “I’m Hildr. Did you think I’d let a true warrior like you suffer through this death? Come with me.”

And the pain stopped.

I had to close my eyes a moment and bask in the feel of absolutely nothing. I’d always wondered why some gave up their lives when there was still something to fight for and now that I’d felt that sort of pain, I understood. Understood that sometimes, the only freedom was in letting go.

But letting go wasn’t a part of my true nature.

Which was why carbon monoxide or even the breakdown of my own body hadn’t killed me yet. Fighting was what I knew.

It was what I did best.

She held out her hand and I took it and stood, marveling that I could see right through my arm. I started to look down at my body on the ground, but she stopped me with a long-fingered hand to my cheek.

“You don’t want to do that.”

I thought of fighting her because curiosity was another thing I did best. Then I remembered what it had felt like when the fire had reached my scalp. I closed my eyes.

“I should have reached you faster.” Sorrow deepened her voice. “Plus, this will make things tricky.” She pulled me through a wall of fire and we stopped next to Arun, who stared back at my body with a look of such utter horror and such stark loss, I felt it in my gut.

I was going to ask her what she meant by tricky, but I couldn’t get past his expression. “He’s never going to forgive himself for this and it was an accident.”

“His hand to the death of a norn,” she said as she walked me past the giant Arun had stabbed in the hand. “Though, I’ve also heard another version. His hand to the death of the forsworn.”

“You know that prophecy?” I frowned. “And what do you mean forsworn?”

“The one who lies under oath to her sisters, then relinquishes her life.” She waved her hand around us. “The one who goes into battle knowing she’s to die.”

“That doesn’t make me any different than the rest of these people. All of the warriors go into battle knowing their fate.”

She nodded. “True. But unlike the others, you’ve always known it would be fire. Any one of you triplets could have died, but for some reason, the other two were saved. I don’t normally have to stop time to take a warrior with me, but I felt it was fitting with your power.” Her smile was laced with sadness as well as kindness. “As one of the
einherjar
, you will be able to fight with the others, though for a time, they won’t be able to see you. Would you like to go now so you don’t have to be here for this part?”

“For this part?” I blinked at her. “You mean for their reaction to my death?” I turned to find my sisters. They had been running straight for the fire, and Raven’s outstretched hand nearly touched the flames. Horror filled my belly when I looked down and saw that her foot was about to lodge into a huge rock. She’d fall. Right into that fire. “Do you have to take me right now?” I whispered. “Is there a time problem here?”

She nodded. “We only have another minute or so.”

“Can you instead move my sister back before she falls into that fire?”

“If you’d like.”

Like there was a choice. “I would.”

She walked to Raven, lifted her and carried her back to the others, then did the same with Coral. Her smile still sad, Hildr turned back to me. I didn’t have time to swallow the knowledge that I was truly dead because everything went back to normal and the battle began.

The cry of thousands of birds filled the air. Raven, who had to be completely turned around because she’d been moved, fell to the ground, scrambled to her feet and ran toward the fire, Coral on her heels. This time, they stopped before they reached it and the raw, broken scream that tore out of Raven’s throat sent me to my ghost knees.

“Please stop looking in there,” I whispered. “Please look away.”

Raven turned to Coral and grabbed her purse. “There has to be something in here!” she yelled.

But Coral knew it was too late. Tears streamed down her face as she pulled her purse from Raven’s hands, dropped it to the ground and wrapped her arms around our eldest sister. Raven clutched handfuls of Coral’s coat as she sobbed into Coral’s hair.

Branton started to laugh and I spun toward the noise in time to see Arun turn, rage changing his face into a stranger’s as he ran forward, leaped into the air and slammed his knife into Branton’s chest as he came down. I couldn’t see if it was a killing blow from my angle. Branton fell back with a scream and Arun followed, his arm raised again.

Two giants rushed in to pry them apart, but Brigg and Nanna ran forward, weapons out.

The sound of snowmobiles joined the fight as Tyrone and the others arrived.

Hildr stepped next to me, turned my face toward hers. “There is a reason you three girls tracked down these particular boys. Do you understand that?”

I nodded, but said, “No.”

She tightened her fingers on my face until I winced. “There is a reason you went to Freyr.”

I shook my head, not understanding how her fingers could hurt my ghost face, not understanding why she was talking about Arun’s god. I tried to pull my face from her hand, but she increased her grip. “With his gift of healing, there could be a way if we just wait until his peak of power. It’s possible I can help.”

I shook my head. “He heals plants, Hildr.”

Magnus ran past us and didn’t even pause even though he nearly ran into me. He carried Arun’s sword, tossing it to him as he got close.

Hildr let go of me.

“The others can’t see you? But they can see Kara and Mist just fine.” I looked around for them and found Mist had joined the battle while Kara ran toward it. She turned and smiled at Hildr, then stabbed a long sword into the thigh of the first giant she reached.

“Only the others of my kind can see me right now because I’m willing it. We only need to hold out for a small time.”

“For what?” I stretched my neck, trying to see Arun. He was wielding his blood-covered sword like a madman, swinging and hacking, and I started to run toward him when he barely missed having his head knocked off by a giant. “He’s being reckless. That’s not like him.”

“His heart is broken.”

I swung toward her, my eyebrows going high. “His heart?”

“How could you not know the boy cared for you?” She frowned, then nodded to where he now stood on the carcass of a giant as he continued to fight. Arun suddenly yelled and jumped, and the elf in his path didn’t see what hit him.

I flinched. “You didn’t answer me—said we only had to hold out a short time. For what?”

“The gloaming.”

The time when magic was at its peak. I nodded and opened my mouth to ask more questions, but the sky pulled my attention as clouds poured over one another and swallowed most of the light. Brigg ran past me, yelling, and his light filled his area of battle just in time for me to see Taran take a running leap off the back of a crouching giant. He went high into the air and brought his hammer around in a swing that would have taken off a human’s head. The hammer smashed into the temple of a giant and blood splattered him as he grabbed on to another giant’s long hair and brought his hammer up under her chin. His fierce expression as he rode that giant to the ground and looked toward Coral made me hold my breath. A bolt of lightning struck the earth near Taran as he stopped and watched my sister momentarily.

I cried out a warning he couldn’t hear when a giant reached for him, but he swung his hammer up and around and took off the male’s finger. Thunder rumbled through the atmosphere as his eyes glowed.

“I can’t believe I have to just stand here and watch. I want to help.” I looked at Hildr, frowned. “I don’t understand. Where are the dead warriors who are supposed to help?”

“The
einherjar
will come.” She gave me one of those enigmatic smiles I’d read about in books—the kind that I’d always found really annoying.

I glared at her. “Didn’t you just say that I’m now one of the
einherjar
?”

“You are. Watch.” She pointed.

I didn’t look away at first because that sadness had come back to her expression. I was dead—I knew it. And if she’d pulled me off the battlefield then I would be able to come back.

But as what?

Raven’s sudden scream yanked my attention back to the fighting, and I breathed a quick sigh of relief when I saw she was okay. She and Coral had been frantically putting together spell bags as both of them cried. Raven would have absolutely no idea what she was doing. But now she stood, her hands over her mouth. I followed her gaze, and this time I couldn’t stop running forward as I spotted Arun flying back through the air into a tree. He hit hard and slid down, but he didn’t stay down long. He crawled forward, shaking his head, and when he seemed to have it together, he stood and ran toward...I ran around a giant to see Arun was fighting elves. Along with Tyrone, Magnus and Mist.

The elves used everything around them to battle. With parkour-like moves that reminded me of Taran, they jumped onto and off giants, trees and any thing or person who got in their way. Only their moves were fluid, sinuous and utterly, utterly creepy.

And then Brigg made the first wrong move. He slashed at the Achilles tendon of a giant, then was distracted by an elf lunging toward him. He took his eyes off the giant. I screamed and ran toward Brigg only to watch in what felt like slow motion as that giant lifted the still-stunned Brigg into the air and snapped his neck.

Just like that.

I fell to my knees, watched as the giant tossed Brigg’s body to the side.

Nanna screamed and sobbed and jumped onto the giant’s back. He snatched her over his shoulder, then slammed her into the trees. I couldn’t tell if she moved after that. I doubted she could.

It felt like my heart had been ripped from my chest. I waited, holding my breath, hoping with everything in me that my new friend would come back out of the forest...knowing that she wouldn’t.

“I can’t stand this!” I stood, turned and yelled at Hildr, tears streaming down my face as my anger and the shock of sudden blinding grief grew until it felt like a solid thing in my chest. I’d really liked Nanna. Liked her and Brigg both. “Why the hell do we have to wait for the gloaming? You look like a battle warrior—why aren’t you helping?”

She merely crossed those muscled arms and glared back at me.

Then, as it darkened even more around me, I realized sunset had arrived and a ripple went through the creatures fighting as one by one, those around Arun came to a stop. I rushed forward and actually tried to push one elf aside to get to Arun, but I moved right through the creature. I realized it was the one called Vrunlin, the one who was supposed to be my father. I shivered but kept going.

I stopped in front of Arun as his eyes took on an otherworldly glow.

He leaned over, looking around at the creatures surrounding him as he panted and gulped in air. Blood smeared his cheeks, his clothes, and it had matted some of his beautiful blond curls. He snarled at one of the elves, but before he could move, he cried out in pain and his back bowed until his face pointed toward the sky. In the next instant, Hildr stood with him, her hands on his shoulders, her eyes closed.

I stepped closer but could do nothing, and the utter feeling of helplessness made me yell through my clenched teeth.

Then something rustled around my feet. Around everyone’s feet. My eyes flew open wide as vines grew out of the ground and continued to grow and lengthen until they surrounded Arun and Hildr. The pain on Arun’s face made me reach for him. I touched his cheek.

His eyes flew open and at first I thought he saw me.

He hadn’t. But he’d felt me because he touched his cheek, then turned toward my body, which still rested behind a wall of fire. It occurred to me that if the fire still burned then Branton still held life somewhere in this mass of fighters and corpses.

Arun narrowed his eyes, raised his hands and flung them out. The vines snapped out so fast I blinked, then stared in shock as they wrapped around the necks of the elves closest to Arun. They tried to pry them loose without success, and one by one the elves dropped to the ground, writhing as they suffocated. Arun flung out his hand again and a vine thickened until it was bigger around than Tyrone’s thigh. It wrapped a giant’s ankle and tugged. The huge creature took down another giant when he fell.

The ground shook around us.

The warriors took advantage and jumped the fallen giants, Taran getting there first with his hammer. Vanir right behind him with something that looked like a club. Raven’s boyfriend swung that club hard into the one of the fallen giants and I winced at the spray of blood.Arun looked over his shoulder, and I knew he could see Hildr. When she smiled, his rage suddenly eased and he shoved past her and ran right through the fire.