They were on the other side of the longhouse before Gunnhild stopped in her tracks and turned around, her eyes wild in the lanternlight. “Nothing. I did nothing. I couldn’t reach the sprits. I couldn’t reach anyone. I should have known. When I tried before, right after the raid, Katla was there in the dark place, which is why I didn’t try again—not alone—but she was there again and . . . I’m not . . . I’m not strong enough—”
Though Oddny did not understand half of this and had no idea who Katla was, she thought she understood the problem. “That’s why you got that look on your face at the feast when Thorolf suggested you could’ve summoned a wind—you can’t, because you need to leave your body to cast the spell?”
“Right. So it seems that even with the songs, I can’t risk traveling. I have the runes and I have my curses, but without sending out my mind or being able to contact the dead . . . I’m not even a witch, am I, if I can’t do those things? How will we ever find Signy now?”
“Start at Birka and go from there, as Halldor said? We’re no worse off than when you arrived.” Though Oddny had to admit she was disappointed—a precise lead would mean finding Signy that much more quickly. “Do you still think we can get to her before winter?”
“I asked my father earlier today if he would give me a ship and crew. He refused. Said we’d never make it there and back in time.” Gunnhild rubbed her forehead, seeming to calm down a bit. “But we’ll find another way. I swear it to you.”
Before Oddny could reply, a figure came toward them out of the darkness and resolved itself into the shape of—
“His timing is abhorrent,” Oddny muttered.
“What do you want?” Gunnhild asked Eirik as the flickering light from Oddny’s lantern illuminated his face.
“A word,” said the king. He looked to Oddny. “A private word. Leave the lantern, please, if you would.”
Oddny shoved it at him, barely allowing him to get a grip on the rope before she let go of it. There was no time to relay the conversation she’d heard between him and Arinbjorn in the armory earlier, so all she could say to Gunnhild was, “Be careful.”
Then she stomped back toward the cookhouse with her fists clenched at her sides, her mind a storm, irritated at Eirik’s interruption and Ozur’s reluctance to spare them a ship.
I’m sorry, she thought, wishing Signy could hear her. We won’t give up. I promise.
14
“YOU HAVE A LOT of nerve,” Gunnhild said, rounding on Eirik once Oddny was far enough away. “What is it?”
“You still owe me payment for taking you here,” he said, seeming oddly unruffled by her tone. That was her first clue that this conversation was going to take a turn.
“You’ll have it by first light the morning after next, and then our dealings will be done,” she said tersely. “Is that all?”
“No. You see, I learned some things today.”
“Oh yes? Congratulations. How many things? One, two? That makes, what, four things total that you know?”
Eirik ignored the jab. “I talked to some of your father’s old watchmen. And then I stopped by the cookhouse and had a little chat with Ulfrun and Vigdis, and they had a lot to say.”
Gunnhild fought the urge to bludgeon him in the head with her staff. Give him the beating she’d wanted to see him take earlier on the practice field. “About what?”
“About you. About your childhood. About your relationship with your mother.”
Every hair on her body stood on end.
“You are steering this conversation onto thin ice, King Eirik,” Gunnhild said through her teeth. “Tread carefully. Say what you’re going to say and be done with it.”
“I asked you for help once, and we came to terms. I was hoping to do so again. For a . . . longer engagement.”
“No,” Gunnhild said without hesitation. “I told you, I have more important things to do. The moment I hand you that bindrune is the last moment I wish to spend in your presence.”
“As I’ve said, I can pay you.”
“I don’t want your silver.”
“I thought as much. And if I can’t appeal to your coin purse”—he stepped closer, holding the lantern aloft between them—“perhaps I can appeal to your ambition.”
“You know nothing of my ambition.”
“Oh, don’t I? Let’s see . . .” He began to circle her with long, lazy strides, and she turned with him, never letting him see her back. “A child whose mother tired of daughters and never wanted her. No one to stand up for her, even though everyone knows what’s happening—her father and brothers don’t care, and the servants are just as scared of her mother as she is. The one person who should have always been looking out for her was, instead, her biggest villain. Only her neighbors’ mother ever attempted to save her, so she had to save herself in the end. To what lengths would such a person go in order to make something of themselves, to prove their mother wrong?”
Halfway through she’d stopped turning and stood frozen in place, both hands tight on her staff, his words slipping under her skin like needle pricks.
“This is low, even for you,” she said. “You’ve snooped around in my life only to take my pain and shove it in my face in a sorry attempt to bend me to your will—it’s reprehensible. Give me one good reason not to send you on your way with a curse for my troubles.”
Eirik stopped in front of her, shaking his head. “You think I’m trying to insult you. I’m not. They didn’t deserve you, Gunnhild.”
She opened her mouth and shut it again. This, coming from him, was so unexpected that it rendered her utterly at a loss.
“I’ve lost some respect for your father—that’s certain,” he continued. “He did nothing to stop her. Your friend Oddny’s mother was the only one who ever tried to help you, and Thorbjorg is the reason she’s dead—yet you still don’t wish to ally with me against her?”
“That’s correct,” Gunnhild said frostily.
“Don’t you see? Whatever Thorbjorg has against you, she’s Olaf’s right hand. She’s my enemy, too. So if you don’t want to work for me, perhaps if we work together—”
“How many times must I refuse you before you take the hint?” She jabbed her staff at his chest and he took a step back. “I want nothing to do with you. You may paint such an alliance as beneficial to us both, but there’s nothing you could possibly offer me that would make me want to help you. How does any of this appeal to my ambition?”
Eirik hesitated, as if he were trying to force the next words out of his mouth.
“Get to your point,” she snapped. “My patience wears thin, and—”
“Marry me.”
She searched his face for a long moment and saw no hint of a jest. His jaw was set, his lips in a thin line. It was the unhappiest marriage proposal she’d ever heard of, so much so that she couldn’t help but laugh: big, doubled-over belly laughs that echoed across the empty yard and sent a flock of seagulls scattering from the other end of the beach.