Chapter 42
At first, all she knew was pain.
It tore through her the minute her hands landed on the spear.
Flew straight to every cell of her body, every neuron and ligament.
Shredded her bones, ripped open every inch of skin, spilled her blood onto the ground.
The last sound she heard before losing access to her senses was the keening of her own tortured scream.
It was like nothing she’d ever felt before.
Like being simultaneously drowned and set on fire.
Like being struck by lightning while falling into a vat of frying oil.
It defied every parameter of pain that she knew existed.
And it wasn’t limited to one part of her body.
It was everywhere. It was everything. It was searing fire and smothering sadness and choking panic and a black dress at fourteen and a church filled with mourners and a dangerous world hiding in plain sight and a brother drifting away and monsters around every tree, every corner, and no place to hide because no place was truly safe, and pain, pain, inescapable pain …
It was excruciating.
It should have resulted in instant death.
Instant death. Yes. That was the answer.
If she died, the pain would cease. It would be so easy.
She could feel the darkness closing in on her, an approaching tunnel into which she could easily fall and let herself be carried away to the sweet, sweet afterlife.
She’d seen what death looked like. Death was fountains of mead and trapeze artists.
Death was a bustling market and a sparkling castle and a never-ending circus party. Death sounded amazing.
Just give in, whispered a soothing voice in her ear. Let yourself fall.
No.
She wasn’t sure where that word came from. If she’d thought it, or if it had thought her. Everything was upside-down and backward. Time didn’t exist. Individual beings didn’t exist. Nothing existed but blistering pain.
Blistering pain, and that one word.
No.
No, Charlie.
Don’t give in.
The voice … it was so familiar. She’d heard it before; she just couldn’t say where. It was so hard to think inside this searing agony. She probably wouldn’t have recognized the voice of her own mother.
Breathe.
Relax.
The pain isn’t real.
Not real? How could this searing torture not be real? It was all-consuming. It was the realest thing to ever exist.
I’m here, Charlie.
It will be over soon.
I’m waiting for you on the other side.
The voice’s words were so soothing, like a splash of cold water on a red, raw burn. From somewhere within the fog of pain, she thought she heard herself sob. Thought she heard that sob even over the jeers of the crowd.
The jeers of the crowd.
The crowd.
The Trial.
She was in the middle of the Trial. Yes.
A Trial that she had to get through if she wanted to make it out of Helheim alive.
A Trial that she could not fail—if not for herself, then for the sake of Mason, Sophie, Lou, Abigail, her mother …
She knew the pain caused by premature death, and she wouldn’t inflict that upon her loved ones. Not now. Not ever.
She understood, then, that this pain was not real.
Not physical. Her bones had not shattered.
Her skin had not split open. Her blood remained in her veins.
She was still whole, still standing at the center of the Trial arena, hands gripping Gungnir.
The pain—excruciating as it might have been—was mental. It was entirely in her head.
And she knew what to do with mental pain.
She and mental pain were old friends. They’d met as children, when a group of boys threw dirt at her twin sister, calling her Silent Sophie and asking if she even knew how to talk.
They met again when that same sister was in the hospital and her mother said everything would be fine but the fear in her eyes said something completely different.
And when the grief descended, that cold, suffocating cloud that turned every color in her life to gray, Charlie knew that mental pain was no longer just an acquaintance; it was her life partner.
Her roommate, her bedfellow, the worst best friend she’d ever have. It wasn’t going anywhere.
So she learned to shut it up. To push it down. To distract herself from its presence by whatever means necessary.
And that’s exactly what she needed to do now.
Because why was this mental pain any different from the kinds she’d felt before?
It wasn’t. So, she’d deal with it just as she always did—with one of her three distractions:
Research, train, recite.
Here, with her hands glued to Gungnir and her eyes blinded by pain, she could neither research nor train, but there was still one option left for her.
The one that she could do anywhere. That she had done anywhere.
That had gotten her through weeks of terror and barely suppressed panic.
The one that had become a mantra, a song, a prayer:
You will make yourself strong.
You will find Elias.
You will kill Elias.
You will never trust a boy with your heart again.
But the mantra didn’t work anymore. It wasn’t true. And if she was going to make it through this pain alive, she needed something new to recite.
She didn’t have to think hard about what that something new would be. The lines came to her of their own accord, as if they’d been hiding in her head all along, waiting for their chance to break free.
You are strong.
You found Elias.
You forgave Elias.
And you will see him again.
How funny. How ironic. If Charlie could have laughed, she would have.
For weeks, the driving force behind her three distractions was destroying Elias.
Getting revenge on what he did to her and her friends.
Who knew that, just a few days after he finally reappeared, she’d use those same tactics to make sure she’d see him again?
Who knew that all those nights she’d spent obsessing over how to kill a mare would prepare her for this moment, the moment she fought to become one?
You are strong.
You found Elias.
You forgave Elias.
And you will see him again.
All at once, the agony vanished. The world went dark. The screams and jeers evaporated, leaving behind perfect silence. The kind of silence that could swallow you whole.
Charlie looked down at the spot where she was standing.
Under her feet was grass, but the coloring was wrong.
It was gray instead of green, as if leeched of all its color.
Her feet were bare and pale white, like slices of moonlight.
When she raised her head to take in the rest of her surroundings, she found only darkness.
Yawning, never-ending darkness, like she was in the belly of a crow.
And the pain …
The pain was gone.
And not the kind of gone that comes after a good cry. Not the numbing warmth, like your heart has slowed down and you can finally breathe again. It had just disappeared, leaving no trace that it had ever been there in the first place.
Charlie had done it. She’d made it through.
She’d expected to feel immense relief. Perhaps even joy. Instead, she felt …
Nothing.
Yes. She felt nothing. No relief or joy, not even mild happiness that she had made it through the first part of the Trial. She was completely empty, as if she’d forgotten how to feel at all.
And it was …
Well.
It was wonderful.
She was completely alone on a patch of gray grass in total darkness, but she wasn’t afraid. She had no idea where her brother or Henry or her friends were, but she didn’t care. No stress weighed upon her shoulders. No panic. No anxiety.
Finally.
It was fabulous. It was glorious. Charlie would have beamed if she actually felt happiness. But she didn’t; she only felt a delicious nothingness.
“No wonder people become drug addicts,” she said aloud, even though there was nothing and no one to talk to.
As if summoned by her words, dim gray light began to shimmer in the darkness.
Charlie watched dispassionately as a landscape came to life before her: a tall gray hilltop, complete with rustling gray grass and a small gray tree at the top.
The tree had a thin trunk and a round, perfectly symmetrical crown of leaves. She thought it might be a birch.
Welcome, Charlotte Hudson.
Charlie turned, looking for the source of the echoey whisper that had just danced across her ears. “Hello?”
You cannot see me, said the voice. You can only listen.
“A disembodied voice,” she said flatly. “How original.”
This is a test, the voice went on, ignoring her sarcasm. The result will determine whether you are fit to become a mare of night.
“Righto.” She clapped her hands once. “I’m ready. Let’s get on with it.”
Six gray lights shimmered to life just over the hilltop. They were lined up to the right of the birch tree.
Over here are six people you love, said the voice.
Gradually, the six lights molded themselves into distinct shapes, becoming human-shaped silhouettes. They took on detail and texture, eventually turning into six figures that she recognized instantly: Lou, Abigail, Mason, Sophie, Elias, and her mother.
Over here is the rest of the world.
To the left, more silhouettes came to life. Hundreds of them. Thousands. Millions. They kept appearing, multiplying to infinity, until Charlie could see nothing but an endless crowd.
You are required to light one side of this hill on fire and watch the people atop it burn alive, said the voice. Which hill do you choose?
“That’s an odd question,” Charlie said.
It is a question of morality, responded the voice, intended to cut to the heart of who you truly are. Now that your emotions are gone, you can think without bias. You can use only your mind to answer the question.
So, who do you burn?
Do you sacrifice those dearest to you to save billions?
Or do you murder the world for the sake of those you love most?
“Is this question supposed to be hard?” Charlie asked. “Because it’s not. The answer is obvious.”
Is it, now?
It was. It was stupidly obvious, in fact. She found it hard to believe that anyone before her had ever struggled with this test.
“Of course it is. The answer is none of the above. The answer is screw your idiotic test. The answer is I find you, the person behind this voice, and anyone else associated with you and this ridiculous operation, and I kill you all. Cut off your heads and whatnot. Then I won’t have to answer the question.
” She raised her hands high, beaming without joy. “Problem solved!”
For several seconds, the voice did not respond. It seemed not to know how.
“What?” asked Charlie. “Has no one ever picked that answer before?”
More silence.
The gray landscape in front of her started to shiver, to blur at the edges.
It’s you, said the voice.
“Me?” Charlie asked. “What do you mean?”
It’s you.
It’s finally you.
It felt like the faceless voice was holding its breath.
“What the hell are you talking about?” Charlie demanded. “Tell me. Now.”
The bringer of Ragnarok, the voice whispered. Here at last.