Chapter Twenty-Two Elvine #2
Varnyr shook his head. “There was no love between Vahlak’s sister and myself. Queen she may have been, but not to me.”
“No,” Gruinskard said. “You serve the Vortigurn. Your king across the sea.”
“I did.” A measure of his former rumble coloured Varnyr’s tone as his gaze slid towards the old man. “And many were my crimes done in his service. Now I serve the Spear Maiden, and my oath is my life.”
“What is his name, this Vortigurn?” Gruinskard said.
“He has but one.”
“And his forbears? Surely his bloodline must bear a name?”
Varnyr squinted at Gruinskard in bafflement. “The Vortigurn has no forebears. He is eternal, like the mountains and the stars above.”
“So he has reigned, and lived, for centuries?”
“Since the time of my grandfather’s grandfather, and beyond. As children we are taught that he is the last of the Uhltvar, the blessed race who shared blood with the gods. Though, when I met him, I must confess I saw only a man.”
“You met the Vortigurn?” Elvine asked.
“Just once, when he called Vahlak to the citadel to be honoured for crushing the Red Sands revolt. The Vortigurn gifted him a sword with a hilt of gold and named him his Tuhlvyr of war. ‘Soon you will sail far, my golden blade,’ he said. ‘Soon you will be reunited with your sister, whom I know you cherish. It pained me to separate you at so young an age, for I too once had a twin sister, but the gods took her from me. How I long to see fair Astryd again.’”
Elvine saw something very unusual flicker across Gruinskard’s aged visage then: surprise. “Astryd,” he repeated softly.
“Is it significant?” Elvine asked.
“Perhaps.” He teased his beard with the brass fingers of his false hand. “Though I doubt it’ll bring us any closer to Lore.”
Colvyn returned with a cloak and two shirts. “If you sew these together, they might serve,” he said, tossing the bundle to Varnyr.
“My thanks,” Varnyr said with a grateful nod.
“Can you tell us anything about Lore’s route?” Elvine asked him.
“Only that it lies far to the north, as I said. But, I should add…” He paused, his expression becoming sombre.
“I did hear her say she expects to have you at her side when she reaches it. The workings of her mind were mostly a mystery to me, but one thing I saw clearly: she greatly regrets losing your company.”
I forgive you, Elvine. Can you not do the same for me? Beset by a sudden, unwelcome anger, Elvine got to her feet. “A sentiment unshared,” she said. “Eat and rest a while. My brother will stay with you.”
“I need no guards.”
“He’s here for the crew’s protection, not yours.”
Once back on the upper deck, she went to the prow, pointing the spear at the maze of fjords ahead.
“There,” she told Kahlvik upon sensing the thrum of affirmation.
The spirit in the spear had chosen the broadest channel, meaning the day’s sailing should be relatively free of complications.
However, she sensed more than direction in the spear’s touch, a sharper edge she took as a warning.
“That’s almost true north,” Kahlvik said. “We follow it, we’re likely to see some ice within few days. When that happens, Spear Maiden, I’ll no longer offer surety that this ship can sail any further.”
“If we can’t sail, then neither can Lore,” Elvine returned. “Please draw up your anchor and let’s be on our way. And signal the Chainbreaker to stay close. I sense battle on the wind.”
The wind grew stiffer as the day wore on, enabling both ships to draw in their oars and raise sails.
Kahlvik kept his canvas sheet at half its normal length, wary of speeding through such hazardous waters.
For once, Veltta seemed disinclined to flaunt the Chainbreaker’s superior swiftness, maintaining station a hundred paces to stern.
Elvine remained at the prow, constantly checking their heading with the spear.
It wasn’t long before Varnyr joined her, clad now in a cloak and stitched-together shirts.
“Your own work?” Elvine asked, eyeing the surprisingly neat criss-crossed twine of his stitches.
“The Vortigurn’s Fist were taught to sew from an early age,” he explained. “Knowing how to close a wound is a useful skill. And it works just as well for clothing.”
He wore his two swords on his back, the weapons angled so the handles jutted above each shoulder. Standing directly to Elvine’s rear with his arms crossed, she was put in mind of the statues in the Vaults of the Altvar. It struck her that this man would not have seemed out of place in such company.
“What?” she murmured to the spear, feeling it thrum with a warm pulse of amusement.
I was starting to wonder if you were immune to the typical impulses of your kind, the spirit said, her tone laced with a good-natured taunt. It pleases me to find you mundanely human, after all, at least in some respects.
“Just guide this ship,” Elvine snapped, annoyed at the flush creeping over her cheeks.
“You talk to it?”
Elvine was unable to contain a start as Gruinskard took his customary place to starboard of the Ohlnir’s figurehead. He exchanged a brief, mutually suspicious glance with Varnyr before focusing his gaze upon the spear. “Which would imply it talks back,” he added.
Still disconcerted by the spirit’s observation, Elvine confined her response to a shrug. Turning her face to the passing flanks of a narrow, high-peaked mountain, she hoped the chill breeze would banish the crimson tinge from her skin.
“And yet,” the old man continued, “when I touched it, I heard no voice. All it would share with me was pain.”
“It considers your hands unworthy,” Elvine told him. “As it did Lore’s. Yet chose not to hurt her as it did you.” Feeling the flush fade, she met Gruinskard’s eye. “I really should remember to ask it why it spared her but not you.”
Because he was more dangerous than her, the spirit interjected. A soul who has already enjoyed too much power should not be afforded more.
Gruinskard let out a faint huff of what she assumed to be feigned indifference. “This one’s story,” he said, nodding to Varnyr. “What he said of his king. Was there not a name that caught your notice?”
“Astryd. It’s not uncommon.”
“But it does feature in one tale of an ancient king, does it not? I’m sure your scholarly memory can supply it.”
“Velgard,” she said after a short pause for recollection. “Some tales say he had siblings. Some do not. But one does refer to a twin sister.” She squinted at Gruinskard. “An ancient, undying king. You can’t think…?”
“Have you not witnessed things these past months that you would never have believed? Set against all of that, is the notion of a man living many lifetimes so absurd?”
Velgard, the Exiled King, she thought, her mind returning to the city beneath the Fire Isles. There had been many bones and skulls there, victims of terrible violence. She had assumed Velgard must be among them. “The ruins were so old,” she said. “It’s impossible.”
Gruinskard rested his metal hand on the rail to lean closer. “Can you recall the name of the woman who first took on the mantle of Sister Lore?”
“Meginhyld Cahlwohlt,” Elvine replied promptly. “The Wisemother.”
“Yes, although folk didn’t start calling her Wisemother until many years after her death.
There was little that could be called motherly about her.
She despised children, you see, even her own.
Said they got in the way of proper study.
” He let out a soft, nostalgic chuckle. “I recall enduring many a hungry hour when she was at her books. Eventually, I learned if I cried loud and long enough she would shout for one of the maids to feed me.” He fell silent, the humour slipping from his face and meaning clear in his single eye.
“That would have been more than four hundred years ago,” Elvine said.
“Yes. The precise number eludes me. Some time ago I decided trying to keep track of the years was a pointless annoyance.”
“You are the son of the first Sister Lore? That is your claim?”
He inclined his head at the spear. “Ask that thing if I’m lying. It can hear lies, can’t it?”