Fragments of your Soul (The Mirror Worlds Book 1) (42 page)

Arvid thought. “You’re… four hundred and eight years old,” she realized, stunned.

“So you did listen.”

“I… well… yes. Last night was… an exceptional time to tell me your birthday.”

Loke chuckled. “It was the best time I could choose. But it was probably not good enough.”

“I don’t understand you.”

“I was obliged to tell you these things. But I thought that you wouldn’t remember later.”

Now Arvid understood. Perhaps she should feel offended because Loke still didn’t trust her, but at the moment she just felt privileged to know so much about him—even though it in reality was precious little.

“Can I stay here and watch you?” she asked finally. “I can’t concentrate on reading.”

Loke lowered the needle. “Do you know what I like about embroidering?” he asked.

Arvid thought for a moment, then she shook her head.

“One is left in peace,” Loke answered his own question. “If you just stand or sit somewhere, people think it’s a good idea to ask why you’re just sitting or standing there. They think it’s a reasonable opportunity to engage in conversation, but in reality they get on your nerves, disturb the peace of the moment and interrupt important thoughts.”

Arvid took a moment to understand what he meant.

“I’m… getting on your nerves?”

“Yes, you are,” Loke replied coolly. “Pretty often, to be honest, but at the moment quite in particular.”

His answer hurt. It pained Arvid that he obviously considered her presence a nuisance, but she tried to tell herself that she should never have expected anything else. Her affection for Loke made her forget time and again that to him, she was nothing more than a human goddess, whose help he needed to implement his plan.

“I… understand,” she said softly. “I’m sorry to have bothered you.” She got up and aimlessly crossed the room. Her eyes filled with tears, and there was nothing she could do about it.

Exactly when the fortieth hour started, the Njema and the Njorkma arrived, along with two human servants who Arvid had never seen before. While the giants cleaned their wounds and covered them with fresh bandages, the two humans took care of their hair.

The Njema again explained what they should do at which point of the ceremony, but Arvid scarcely listened. There was still a dull ache sitting in her heart, but she knew it was her own fault. She had imagined Loke’s feelings toward her would have changed because of what had happened last night. How could she have been so foolish? “We have to get something done,” Loke had said and made clear what it had meant to him. And still Arvid didn’t seem to be able to stop hoping.

A little later she and Loke followed the two runemasters back the corridor they had come from the evening before. The Njema carried the white cloth. It was a strange feeling, since Arvid was well aware that the fabric bore clear traces of their lovemaking.

As they stepped into the Hall of Runes, Arvid was overwhelmed by the number of guests who had come. The entire ring around the altar was filled with giants and dwarves; in the back stood figures in brown. On the podium Arvid saw three unknown giants, Loke’s siblings and his mother Naal. As their eyes met, Arvid looked away quickly. The old giantess might have consented to their marriage, but she didn’t look as though her feelings toward her had changed.

The babble of voices around them got lower as they approached the altar. As Arvid climbed the stone steps, there was a tense silence in the hall. Arvid felt two hundred pairs of eyes resting on her. Her heart pounded hard in her chest, although she knew that there were no bloody cuts waiting today.

“Welcome!” the Njorkma finally said with a loud voice, as Arvid reached the required height and stopped. “All of you are here today to witness the legal closing of the marriage between Loke, son of Farbaute, and Arvid, daughter of Carl.” He pointed to the Njema, who held up the white cloth. “The last part of the ritual is complete. It only remains for us to permanently seal the band of life.”

A servant handed him a knife. With practiced movements the Njorkma cut a long strip from the middle of the cloth. The Njema was handed a bulbous bottle with a milky, glittering liquid by a second servant.

Loke now stepped up to Arvid, while the Njorkma and the Njema took positions to their left and right. Arvid couldn’t bring herself to look at Loke. She held out her bandaged arm, and he put his own firmly against it.

“So shall this cloth imbue the runes of life with might,” said the Njorkma and wrapped the strip around their arms. “It shall connect them and close the band of life, so that their lives may be one forever.” When he was done, he took a step back, and the Njema approached. “The water of life,” she said aloud and poured the contents of the bottle over Arvid and Loke’s arms and the fabric around them. The liquid ran down in a thin, glittering stream, penetrated the white cloth, and then the bandage. As the water touched the cuts on Arvid’s skin, they began to burn and throb again, but she gritted her teeth and concentrated on how the whitish drops fell to the ground with a bright splash.

Finally the bottle was empty. A strange feeling came over Arvid as she watched the last bit of water drip to the ground, where a glistening puddle had formed. She raised her head and looked at Loke, who returned her gaze calmly. The love she felt for him hurt. Why did he have to torment her so?

The Njorkma now removed the cloth from her arms, then a servant handed the Njema a wooden box. She opened it and held it out for Arvid. “The ones on your side, Your Highness,” she said with a smile. Arvid frantically forced herself to return the smile. She took out one of the blue hair beads and turned to Loke, who stepped closer now. Her hands trembled as she fastened one pearl after another in his dark gray hair. When she was done, Loke carefully released the three felted hair strands from the knot at the back of Arvid’s head. He was so close to her now that she could smell his body odor.

“Why did you cry?” he suddenly asked in her native language, while he firmly fastened the first of the blue beads in her hair. He spoke so softly that only Arvid and the two runemasters could hear his words.

“I… I didn’t cry,” Arvid said, just as quietly.

“You haven’t gotten any better at lying,” said Loke and picked up the second bead. “You can see the traces on your face.”

Arvid swallowed. Suddenly a thick lump seemed to sit in her throat, but she pulled herself together and tried not to think about the incident again.

“It’s not important,” she whispered.

Loke frowned as he threaded the last bead on Arvid’s hair. He took the three strands of hair and wrapped them around Arvid’s topknot, where he fastened them with a small hairpin, which was handed to him by the Njema. Then he stepped back and looked at her intently, almost like a painter who for the first time looked at his finished work.

The Njorkma turned to the crowd and raised his arms. “The marriage is hereby officially confirmed.”

A thunderous applause swelled. Uncertainly, Arvid looked around the room and in the countless silver-gray faces. Not all of the guests applauded. Some looked serious, but most of them happy and friendly, and wherever Arvid discovered the brown-clad figure of a servant, she was met by a joyful smile. Today was a good day for the people of Sölunnir, the day a human became part of the royal family, even if she only had a minor role to play. It was a good feeling to experience the joy of those people. Despite the pain in her heart, a gentle smile began to spread on her face.

“We should go,” Loke said to her.

Arvid nodded. She began to descend the steps of the altar, but Loke unceremoniously grasped her around the waist and put her down beside him. They followed the two runemasters up to the podium at the end of the room, where Byleist and Naal were waiting for them now. Once at the top, they turned around and waved to the crowd, then they stepped through the door in the back wall. The Njema and the Njorkma remained in the hall. As the door closed behind them, the noise and chattering voices of the guests trailed off almost entirely.

It was the same room where they had been waiting before the start of the ceremony yesterday, but it had changed. In the middle stood a large table, which was cluttered with paper and writing utensils. Ghelm, the old scribbler, rose from his chair to greet them, but Loke’s mother beat him to it.

“I guess I have congratulations to make good for,” she said soberly. “Well, Loke, you might want to lift your wife up for me,” she added sarcastically.

“No,” Loke said coolly. “I guess you’ll have to kneel down, Mother.”

Naal stared Loke in a hostile manner. Arvid glanced at Byleist, who silently rolled his eyes. It seemed to happen frequently that Loke was arguing with his mother, but Arvid didn’t want it to happen because of her.

“You don’t need to do that, Your Highness,” Arvid said. “It wouldn’t be sincere anyway, and a mere waste of time and energy.”

“At least she is direct,” Naal said. She measured Arvid with a contemptuous look, but as vulnerable as Arvid was with Loke, his mother’s conscious attempts at hurting her barely touched her. She had accepted that Naal couldn’t stand her and regarded her as just another worthless human. But she knew she was not.

“At least she’s more diplomatic than you,” growled Loke.

Naal passed over Loke’s comment and looked at Arvid. “You don’t need to call me Highness anymore,” she said sourly. “Funnily enough, you now have an equally high rank as me. Only on the physical height you have some work to do. Perhaps you should have yourself a portable stool made.”

“Mother!” cried Byleist.

“What?” she asked with feigned innocence. “I’m only making constructive suggestions. So that she is not getting stepped on one day.”

“Enough now!” Byleist said sharply. “We really have better things to do than to insult each other.”

His words had an effect, although the mood was frigid the next few hours and both Naal and Loke remained in dogged silence. It was obvious that Byleist tried his best to ignore this fact. He patiently explained to Arvid whom the letters on the table should reach. All of them had already been written by Ghelm. The recipients were a handful of influential houses in the Ice Wastes, the royal families of Utstern and Borkh and a large number of dwarven peoples. The one letter to Asgard Loke wrote personally.

Here and there Arvid tried to read a few lines, but she soon realized that the letters mainly contained the cumbersomely worded information that she and Loke had gotten married. Ghelm had also used the opportunity to emphasize and praise the value and importance of the relations between Isvirndjellen and the recipients of the letters, which had led to long, dry treatises. After a while Arvid gave up reading and confined herself to signing the letters as fourth and last, before they went back to Ghelm.

Finally they were finished, and only Loke was still busy completing the letter to Asgard. Arvid, who was sitting not far from him, watched with some admiration as he wrote down rune by rune, so clearly and cleanly, as if they were printed.

“There is one good thing about all this,” Naal said finally, breaking the silence in the room. “I can at last see my son in his natural form for some time.”

“That’s not his natural form,” said Arvid.

Naal’s face darkened as she looked at Arvid. “As close to his natural form as possible,” she said with an icy voice. “But I know. Of course you think the measly, human body he uses in Asgard was his preferred shape. You’re mistaken.”

Arvid closed her eyes for a moment. There were many things that she would have liked to throw at Naal, but she controlled herself. “Forgive me, but you have no idea what I think.”

“It’s completely irrelevant what you think,” said Naal. “Loke is my son. And he is a giant, if you like it or not.”

“He’s a shapeshifter, in case it escaped you.”

Naal gave a short, dry laugh. “As much as I wish he wasn’t, it has not escaped me.” Her face hardened. “It’s a damned curse,” she murmured. “How can a mother deserve this?”

“It gives him great power, Mother,” Byleist interfered now. “You’d better be grateful.”

“Grateful?” Naal said with bitter mockery. “For what? My son bearing something inside him that constantly makes him deny his true nature? It even poisons his thoughts. Do you think he’s always been so… abnormal?”

“Be quiet, Mother!” Loke now hissed angrily. “I’m sick of your whining.”

“All I want is the son I once gave birth to,” Naal continued, unfazed. “I’m your mother, after all. Isn’t my happiness worth anything to you?”

“Please, Mother,” Byleist said urgently, “the time is highly inappropriate.”

Naal snorted and turned her gaze back to Arvid. “My son is a giant, not some human or another absurd, repulsive creature. I want no freaks as grandchildren.”

Arvid drew in a sharp breath and turned away.

Byleist stared at Naal, stunned. “Mother! You can’t just…”

“Would you all just shut up!” Loke thundered and got up with an angry jerk. “To me your happiness is worth as much as mine is to you, Mother—I don’t give a single, fucking damn!”

For a moment he glared at her angrily, then he sat down again and continued writing. Arvid was petrified. Naal and Byleist looked shocked as well, but only for a while. When Loke was finished and Naal signed the letter, her face had again taken a hard, bitter expression.

“I guess my duty’s done here,” she said coolly and rose and left without any farewell. Shortly afterward, Loke followed her example.

After Arvid had caught herself again, Byleist offered her to take her to her new quarters. Arvid had no objection; on the contrary, she could use some company at the moment, and Byleist seemed like someone who didn’t let himself get thrown off track so quickly.

“Why do I get new quarters?” she asked, as they walked along one of the long corridors of the fortress.

“You’re no longer a guest,” said Byleist, “but part of the family. It would be inappropriate for you to stay in guest quarters, separated from your husband. It wouldn’t make a good picture, if that got around.”

Arvid hesitated. “I’ll live with Loke?”

Byleist laughed. “But yes. He is your husband.”

“That doesn’t mean anything. Loke’s not very sociable.”

“There you are right. He is a loner. Nevertheless, it would be inappropriate. If anyone knows about the power of stories and rumors, it’s Loke. They get from the servants to our guests and are carried far beyond our borders.”

Arvid understood. She could only hope that she and Loke wouldn’t be constantly at loggerheads, like back in his home in Jördendheim. Here in Sölunnir there was no Nod, who brought them back to their senses if their quarrels began to get out of hand. At the thought of her friend her heart sank.

“Tell me, Byleist,” Arvid finally began cautiously, “has your mother always been so hostile?”

“Oh, don’t attach too much importance to it,” Byleist said. “She has never been particularly approachable, but right now she’s just scared.”

“Scared? Forgive me, but she didn’t exactly seem scared to me.”

“And yet she is,” said Byleist. “She fears for Loke. To you it may seem incomprehensible, but… our mother loves all her children, even Loke. Loke perhaps most of all of us, but he is also the one who causes her most pain. He has never done what she would have liked, never what she considers to be the right thing.”

“To me it seems more as if he
isn’t
what she would have liked,” Arvid said.

“Perhaps,” conceded Byleist. “Surely she would have preferred him to grow into a goodly man and found a family here in Isvirndjellen. That was what she had planned when he was born.”

“He should become king one day.”

“Yes, he should. But instead he took to being anything but a giant and a king. Throughout his life, our mother had to watch as he did things that she disliked. In all the years in which he was not here, she had to hear and read from a distance how he allied himself with the wrong sides, just to betray them again. Her son was feared, despised, hated, worshiped and admired by others, then punished again and even tortured, blackmailed and abused because of his powers, while he blackmailed and abused others.” Byleist sighed deeply and shook his head. “He’s one big puzzle. Nobody knows what is going on inside him, perhaps not even he himself. I love him as a brother, but… yes, he is the god of chaos. He’s like a hurricane in the dark. Impressive, in a frightening way beautiful, but also merciless and deadly if you stand in his way. And no one sees him coming.”