Valmar put his back against the woman’s as figures emerged from the woods on every side. His sword sang of high challenge and defiance. These creatures no longer had misty outlines but showed themselves as they were: hollow, cloven-hoofed, naked beneath their helmets and shields, dangling oversized genitals before them.
“This is your last chance to yield, Valmar!” one called.
“Don’t let him yield,” said another. “He’s got a renegade Hearthkeeper! She’ll be weakened from contact with a mortal-let’s kill him and take her for ourselves!”
“Trust men,” Valmar heard an amused voice at his ear, “to try to make something just like themselves-and have it come out even worse.”
The swords and axes these creatures wielded had no mistiness at all about them. For another moment they still hesitated, leering and whispering among themselves. Valmar, watching and trying to keep his breathing regular, thought that this would be his first real fight. He shifted his grip slightly on the singing sword, thinking of his weeks of training at the Wanderers’ manor, remembering everything Gizor had taught him but also remembering how easily his father had beaten him that time.
Suddenly with a cry the creatures charged. There were at least twenty of them, coming at them from all directions. The woman laughed, throwing up her shield before her. Valmar, bracing himself, thought that it was all very well to laugh at danger when one was immortal.
Then the creatures were on them. Valmar felt almost detached, watching himself fighting coolly and calmly, landing blow after blow as his sword sang gloriously, turning, parrying, deflecting a stroke on his shield, anticipating the next stroke, driving in for a sharp thrust when an opponent was off balance for even a second.
And then he realized he was actually killing them.
Where a few seconds before a mob of leering empty men had rushed at him, the ground at his feet was now littered with broken bits and pieces, looking not even vaguely human. He felt panic and nausea rising in him, but more creatures were coming, and a second’s glance behind him showed that the woman, at any rate, was not killing those attacking her.
Now he lashed out wildly, almost forgetting to protect himself with his shield. He did not want them to touch him, he did not even want them near him, he wanted all their twisted, hollow, inhuman forms far, far away. He was not fighting for the Wanderers or for the woman at his shoulder, but to protect himself from nightmare.
“Valmar!” He felt a grip on his arm. “Don’t chase them! They’re leading you into ambush!”
He had not realized until that second that he was chasing them, that he had been about to run across the clearing with his sword high and a death-cry on his lips.
Because they had fallen back, those few who were left, retreated hastily toward the trees. She stared at the dry broken pieces of bone and skin-but could they actually be bone and skin? — that littered the ground at his feet. “I did not know,” she said in a very small voice, “that anything could be killed here.”
Valmar ripped off his helmet, feeling sicker than ever. He had just killed over a dozen immortals. The Wanderers had told him he had awesome powers here, but they had certainly led him to believe that he was the only being in this land who could suffer death. They had told him they wanted the “third force” driven back, made to give up their attacks on the lords of voima, but they had said nothing about killing them. And if these creatures really were the Wanderers’ own creation-
He grabbed the woman’s hand. “Let’s get out of here.” He ran through the woods, dragging her behind him, until they emerged at the track where his white stallion waited where he had left it. He tossed the woman onto the horse’s back and leaped on behind her. Running from nightmare, running from the destruction of the service he had tried to offer the lords of earth and sky, he kicked the stallion forward. They galloped down the hill away from the trolls’ manor, across rivers he did not even try to count, the terrible unending sunset blinding their vision and the wind whipping in their faces, until after an hour the stallion ceased galloping, then even trotting.
He slid from the horse’s back, pulling her down beside him. “I know you’re not meant for me,” he gasped, unfastening the clasps on her mail and pulling it off with shaking fingers. “I know you were meant to serve the Wanderers, until somehow you became separated from them. But I don’t care. I must have you. They set me a test and I’ve failed utterly. I cannot fail any worse by taking you.”
“I am not, ” she told Valmar a little testily, “‘meant’ for the Wanderers. We Hearthkeepers are separate, independent, made to govern in our own right. We once ruled earth and sky, and though our powers have long been lessened, we are sure they are fated to return once the time of the Wanderers passes. And this time we intend to make sure that they do not ever end our rule again.”
They lay with their heads shaded by a tree, its leaves green but withered, and their feet in the sun. The white stallion grazed nearby.
She kept wanting to talk. Valmar, feeling feverish, his heart fluttering, did not want to talk, especially now that desire was beginning to burn in him again. If he allowed himself to think about how he had failed the Wanderers he would break down completely and sob like a boy, but when he possessed her all those thoughts were very far away.
“But since you’re showing no sign of trying to return now to your Wanderers,” she continued with the hint of a laugh, “does that mean that you agree to leave them and serve me instead?”
He rolled on top of her and silenced her with his mouth on hers. He did not want her to remind him again of the quarrels among the immortals, of the dire need of the lords of voima that had led them to turn in their desperation even to a mortal, even to him. He only wanted to feel her body against his and her arms tight around him.
He fell asleep at last, utterly exhausted, clasping her in a final effort to find forgetfulness. He slept so deeply that no nightmares troubled him, until he rolled in slumber so that his face was toward the sun and the low red light found its way through the shriveled leaves and made images on the insides of his eyelids.
He sat up, digging at his eyes with the heels of his hands. She lay a short distance away, comfortably relaxed but with her eyes open. “If more Hearthkeepers knew of the capacities of mortals,” she said with a languorous smile, “more human men would find themselves with immortal wives.”
He rose without answering and walked a short distance to where a stream cut across the meadow. He dipped his whole head in, then splashed cool water over himself. He no longer felt like sobbing, but his failure was a dull ache he thought he could never overcome. And his desperate attempts to find solace in a woman’s embrace now seemed shameful, unmanly. He might not serve the Wanderers anymore, but he also could not meekly offer his “capacities” to a woman’s service.
He stood up, shaking wet hair from his eyes, knowing what he had to do. His back toward her, he found his clothes and slowly started putting them on.
“When you were so intent on serving your Wanderers,” she said behind him in good-natured tones, “and I thought I could never seduce you from them, I should have returned to the other Hearthkeepers. Instead, I found myself with all my feelings changed, and for a mortal!”
Valmar paused in pulling on his tunic, wondering what she could be talking about, then shrugged. It did not matter.
“So I thought if I could not have you for us, I could still have you for me. But maybe I was too quick to admit defeat! Your Wanderers will not want you now, after you have killed their creation and run away with me. But the Hearthkeepers still want you! You are needed, Valmar Hadros’s son.”
He carried his shield and sword to the stallion. Someone had unsaddled him and rubbed him down. Had he done so? He had no memory of it, but then his memories of the last twelve hours were very confused. Perhaps she had done it while he slept. He put on the saddle blanket and saddle, then paused in tightening the straps to wonder if he ought to offer to take her somewhere. But then he shrugged again. She was an immortal being who belonged in this land where it was quite clear he had never belonged. She seemed capable of appearing wherever she wanted; let her appear by herself back with the other Hearthkeepers.
She finally seemed to realize something was wrong. “Where are you going?”
“There is only one way to redeem anything that may be left of my honor,” he said, not turning around. “I shall return to the Wanderers and tell them I am ready to go to Hel for them. I do not know if a living mortal could return from Hel, but it does not matter. I shall stay.”
She took him by the shoulders and whirled him toward her. “What do you mean?” she cried, black eyes flashing. “To give up your life is the path of despair, not of honor!”
“The only path of honor left,” he said dully, “is to give my own life so the lords of voima may be reborn.”
She kept a tight grip on his arms. He stood quietly, not resisting, not meeting her eyes. “You tried to tell me this the first time we met,” she said angrily, “that the Wanderers wanted you to bring them death. At the time I did not believe it. I thought they were only testing your courage. But I should have listened more closely. Hear what I say, Valmar! The Wanderers’ time is over. Fate has ordained that it is our time now. But they are too cowardly to accept this. Instead they want you to bring them Death, and why? Not so they can be reborn, or whatever story they tried to tell you. But so they can kill us!”
He looked up then. “To kill you? Immortal women? No! That cannot be their intention.”
“They did not tell you that you could kill their hollow men-why should they have been any more truthful in this? And think, Valmar! They knew you wanted glory, with trumpets blowing and flags flying high. Would you have followed them if you thought they wanted to murder their competition?”
Everything she said compelled belief. But he could not think this of the strong, merciful, shining lords of voima. “Maybe it is too late,” he said slowly. “Maybe by coming, a mortal, into this realm I have already brought death here.”
She looked at him, considering. “An interesting question. You killed the Wanderers’ hollow creatures, but had they ever been truly alive? Immortals have always come from immortals, but since we separated from the men no new immortals have been born. Maybe they thought they could create their own successors, but even they realized that effort failed… I know! You can try to kill me.”
“What?!”
She had already gone briskly to get her armor. “It’s the only way to find out if you have brought death here already, or merely crumbled some beings that could not truly die because they had never truly lived. If death is here, then you certainly will not need to take a trip to Hel!” She laughed at his expression, settling her horned helmet on her head. “Don’t worry. If you start to inflict real damage on me you can always stop in time.”
He slid his own shield on his arm, not sure what else to do, and drew his singing sword. Laughing, she lashed out with a sharp blow which he parried easily. She struck again, harder, and again he knocked the blow away. Her third stroke he deflected on his shield.
“Are you afraid to fight me?” she asked, eyes glinting like mirrors. “You have not landed a stroke yet, Valmar Hadros’s son!”
He parried her next thrust and struck her shield so hard she staggered for a second, then he returned to a defensive posture.
“You’re afraid,” she said tauntingly. “You know you’ve deserted the Wanderers, and now you’re afraid even the Hearthkeepers won’t have you if you kill me. Try it! Or are you afraid of being defeated in swordplay by a woman?”
He had defeated her once, disarmed her without the slightest difficulty. Why could he not do so now? He tried to knock the sword from her hand, to strike her sword arm with his shield, but she evaded his blows. Had she let him win that time, or was it his own fear of hurting her that now weakened him?
“If you do kill me, of course,” she said with a grin, “you will have to get word to the rest of the Hearthkeepers. They will be very interested in knowing an immortal can now be killed. If we ambush the Wanderers-who will not suspect anything-we can kill them all, and then we shall be sure that fate will never ordain another end to our rule.”
He did not like her repeated suggestions that he had betrayed the Wanderers. Maybe he had, but it was not too late to make restitution, and if he had deserted them it was entirely her fault. He gritted his teeth and started raining rapid blows on her shield.
She had shifted to a defensive position. “Your Wanderers’ biggest mistake,” she said, panting now, “was trusting another man. They should have known a man could be led by the nose like a bullock by any attractive woman. Maybe they would have done better bringing a mortal woman to this land to do their bidding.”
Karin. They had wanted Karin. But she had refused to go with them-and maybe he should have refused as well. What was Karin doing now, he wondered, back in her father’s castle? Had Roric ever arrived, and, if so, had he let love for Karin destroy his honor?
The woman before him laughed again, mockingly. “Before, I let you defeat me because I knew it would excite you. But now, you see, I am fighting in earnest. Mortal men have such capacities in some areas, I mistakenly thought they would in battle too!”
How could he have ever thought he loved her? He drove forward, really fighting for the first time, swinging his sword as he had against the hollow men. She fell back, no longer mocking. The black eyes on either side of her nose guard looked alarmed. He struck at her as he had struck at Gizor many times in practice, as he had thrust at the inarticulate weapons-master-had that been another hollow creature? — at the Wanderers’ manor.
In the distance came the piercing note of a horn.
He stepped back for a second and looked across the meadow. A whole troop of riders were coming toward them. They were still a half mile away, but the sunset light glinted on their armor and horned helmets and shone on the white banner floating above them.
While his attention was distracted she sprang forward, swinging her sword as though berserk. He got his shield up just in time, parried, and thrust, driving her back again.
“We have you now, Valmar Hadros’s son,” she gasped. “You belong to us!”
He dropped his shield to swing his sword furiously, two handed. Its song was sweet and wild. She saw the blow coming, and for a fraction of a second her eyes widened. Then at the last instant she twisted-was she mocking again? — and lowered her own shield. The edge of his sword struck her in the side of the neck, just below the lip of the helmet, and was immediately bathed in crimson blood.
In the summertime of long, long ago Moikaa the hero sailed his ship alone across the deep and briny sea. There the spray leaped high and the wind tasted of salt, and in the midst of the sea he saw a maiden. Her hair was black, her eyes green, and her waist light and slender, and she walked across the water’s surface on shoes of leather.
“Come into my ship, oh maiden!” he called. “Come and rest upon my pillows!”
But she laughed with green eyes flashing. “Let disease rest upon your pillows,” she called, “but never I!”
In the autumn Moikaa went alone to the deep woods, timbering. The shadows were deep, the scent of pine strong. And there he saw a maiden, black-haired, green-eyed, walking across the treetops on shoes of leather.
“Come into my cart, oh maiden!” he called. “Come and rest upon my blankets!”
But she laughed with dark hair swirling. “Let destruction rest upon your blankets,” she called, “but never I!”
And in the winter the hero drove his sled alone across the ice fields. The sun threw diamonds onto the snow surface, and the wind bit into his lungs. And there he saw a maiden whose waist was light and slender, walking on the deepest drifts on shoes of leather.
“Come into my sled, oh maiden!” he called. “Come and rest upon my bearskins!”
She stopped then and considered him. “And why should I rest upon your bearskins?”
“Because there you shall enjoy a hero’s embraces!”
She laughed then as she came to him and stepped within his sled. When Moikaa tried to kiss her she twisted away, as slippery as an eel, as swift as a jay, as cold as a shard of ice. But the hero pinned her though she fought him, embraced her with his mighty arms, and finally she yielded to him upon the bearskins.
They lay then comfortably, and Moikaa asked, “Who are your mother and your father? You must be born of mighty heroes!”
“I have not seen my parents for long, long years,” said the maiden. “When I was just a little girl, I went berry picking with my mother. Foolish girl, I wandered far, seeking the reddest berries. When evening came I realized I was alone. I became afraid, but no one heard my calls. For hours, for days, I wandered, until the animals found me. I was raised then by the sturgeons of the sea, the eagles of the air, and the ice bears from the north. But still I carry my father’s name, for I am Laaiman’s daughter.”
When the hero did not answer, she turned green eyes to him and asked, “Who are your mother and your father? You must be born of mighty heroes!”
“Woe!” he cried, “that I was born! That disease did not suck out my life within the crib, that destruction did not fall on me before I learned to crawl! When I was just a little boy, my twin sister became lost, berry picking, when she wandered from our mother. I went to find her, searching far, becoming lost myself, but no one heard my calls. I was raised then by war giants and dragons, but still I carry my father’s name, for I am Laaiman’s son.”
They stared at each other and spoke together. “We have dishonored our parents. We have dishonored the beasts who raised us. We have made the lords of voima turn their backs upon us.” And they went, hand in hand, to a cliff that stood near by, and they hurled themselves over.