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“Would you rather die or have a broken heart?” I call.

“They are the same to me.” Alf takes a smaller satchel out of the big one. He carries it to one end of the pit and shakes it upside down. The carcasses of rats tumble down into the pit. They are each so bloated, the tight skin shines. I see wide stitches of string holding together their bellies. How very odd. I'm fascinated against my will. Alf goes to the big satchel and takes out an enormous jug. Then he pours a glistening red stream over the rat carcasses.

The cobras wind with determined speed—after all, they haven't eaten anything all week; cobras don't eat people, as we all know now. Their tongues flicker, tasting the scent. It's so strong, I can imagine swooning. They open their hoods and mouths gigantically wide and strike. Slowly, ever so slowly, rats disappear down cobra throats. Each snake gorges on multiple rats.

Alf pulls two axes out of the satchel. He throws them into the other end of the pit. And he jumps in, hits the ground, and rolls. I scream. He doesn't look up at me. He
collects the axes and stares at the snakes. None of them gives evidence of knowing he's there.

He chops at the side of the pit that is in front of the ground before the door. He chops an indentation here, another above it and to the side, another above that and to the other side. He chops now high over his head.

“A snake,” I shout.

He turns. A cobra moves toward him, but awkwardly; it is a lumpy rope of rat. Alf aims the ax and throws hard. It cuts the snake in two. I stare to see if, against all reason, the rumor might possibly be true. The two halves of the snake twitch, but they don't move forward. And what's that? A huge shard of glass sticks out from one half of the snake.

Alf takes a step and halts, then another, his eyes on the two remaining snakes. He makes his way like that to the thrown ax and fetches it. Then he races back to the place where he's been chopping.

He looks at the two snakes one more time. Then he tosses an ax up onto the ground in front of the door. The crowd gasps. He tosses the second ax up. The crowd gasps. I am swallowing and swallowing. My eyes go to those snakes.

Alf puts his hands into the holds he has chopped and begins to climb the wall.

A cobra moves away from the remains of the heap of rats. It winds toward Alf.

Alf climbs the wall. The holds crumble under his feet and hands.

The snake stops and flinches. Then it winds closer.

“Faster,” I call. “Climb faster!”

Alf's hands are over the edge of the pit now, but his feet search for the holds.

The snake is directly under Alf.

“Faster!”

He kicks a hold with the tip of his boot. Then another.

The snake opens its hood and jaws. It strikes and falls sickly to the side with a series of spasms.

Alf stands on the earth in front of the door. He wipes sweat from his brow and leans, hands on his knees, looking back into the pit. Now he looks up at me. “Thank you for cheering me on.”

“Take your axes and go back.”

“And have my head impaled on a stake?” Alf smiles. “I seek a better end to this tale.”

“Don't talk crazy. Go back, Alf. Live. Please. I want you to live.”

“That's all the encouragement I need.” Alf throws an ax at the bridge-door. It wedges in firmly, a half-arm's length above his head.

“Are you daft? It would take you days to chop down that bridge-door.”

“I have no intention of chopping it down, for then how could we walk together across it over the pit once I win you?” He grabs the other ax in his left hand. With his right, he reaches up to the ax that's embedded in the door and pulls himself up with that one arm. He swings the other ax into the door higher up and then hangs by only the left hand. He works the first ax free, then swings it hard. It embeds even higher. He climbs the door like that, hanging from the axes by his arms. At any point, an ax head could give way. He would fall backward onto the ground, perhaps into the pit. At best he would be badly broken. And who dares think of the best?

But the ax heads bite firm.

In the pit, the two snakes move as though in death throes. I imagine their insides sliced with every muscle twitch. Glass-filled rats. The man is brilliant. Insane, but brilliant.

Alf is at the top of the door now. It astonishes me that he's made it this far. How can his arms be that strong? But axes can't bite into stone. What now? Oh, good Lord, what now? He cannot descend by the same method he used in climbing. He is lost!

He hangs from an ax by his left hand and reaches into
the pouch that dangles around his neck. He pulls out a dirk. A broken dirk, short and stubby, but the jagged edge glints sharp. He closes a fist around the handle and jams it between two stones. Then he hangs by the right hand from that dirk and pulls a second dirk out of his pouch. Equally broken. He climbs the wall like that. It's slower going than with the axes, because the dirk handles are so short. But at least the stones offer him footholds, so he's not swinging free.

When he is just below the window, he stops. The window ledge is one continuous slab of stone. No dirk could penetrate it.

He clings there, a hand on each dirk. His feet in narrow holds. “Help me.”

Without thought, I reach both hands out.

“No! Get away from the window. Move to the side.” He talks in bursts between breaths. Blood vessels stand out on his forehead. I back off. “I'm throwing in a dirk. Use it to pin one end of your cloak to the wood floor of your room and toss the other end of the cloak over the window.”

A dirk comes flying through the window. It lands with a clunk on the stone floor. Everything in this room is stone! What can I do? The only wood surface is the door. And it's farther from the window than my cloak is long.

He's hanging there. Exhausted. Heart and bones.

I pin one end of my cloak to the door at the height equal to the bottom of the window. I take off my outer shift and use a strap brooch to fasten one end of it to the other end of the cloak. It is still not long enough. I take off my under shift and use the other strap brooch to fasten one end of it to the other end of the outer shift. The remaining end of the under shift now just barely reaches to the center of the window ledge.

I lean my head out the window. “Reach your hand to the center of the window ledge. You'll feel the cloth.”

His hand fumbles. I place the cloth in it. He pulls. Then his other hand is reaching up and pulling. His head appears over the window ledge.

The under shift rips. No! I lunge for his arm.

But he has already clasped a hand over the inside lip of the window ledge. He pulls himself over and slides in onto the floor. The skin of his chest has been scraped away.

I turn my back and cry. He's safe. He will live.

I hear his footsteps cross the room. Then my cloak descends around my nakedness.

“Thank you,” he says. I listen to the drag and sough of his rough breathing. “Will you marry me?”

I sob into my cloak.

The king and his men are in the great hall, feasting. It is a celebration of Alf's success. The queen is there as well. But she kept true to her word; she did me the favor I asked today. Then she dressed herself beautifully, put on her hawk-plumage cloak, and left.

Thyra and Ragnhild have also done their parts: Women are gathering in the large room of the king's home. They look at me sideways as they enter. Their skepticism is natural. I am the king and queen's adopted child—I might well assume the right to order them around. And of late I am the girl in the tower; men died trying to win me. Who knows what evil might lurk in such a heart? And, perhaps most worrisome of all, I am the girl who has kept herself hidden away since the valiant Alf stormed the tower yesterday. What could I be thinking? My mental powers are called into question.

The women sit on the floor. Twelve of them, including Thyra and Ragnhild. Some work in this household. Others, I don't know. They are friends of Thyra and Ragnhild.

I get to my knees. The very action catches them by surprise—their eyes shift around the room, as though spies might jump out at any moment. They expected me to walk in their midst royally, making declarations, perhaps? I open my hands to them. “Some of you are slaves.” I look around at the faces, some dark, some scarred, all thin. “Some are free women, but servants.” I nod. Only a few of them dare to nod back. “Many of you—maybe all—find few choices in daily life. Maybe you foresee marriage, maybe not. But whether or not to marry and who to marry, for many of you—maybe for all—will not be your choice.” I nod again. They stare at me, unblinking. “Choice. It is a mighty thing, choice. How to pass your day, your life. Who to bed with, or not. Choice.” They are still staring. “I want choice. I demand it. I am taking that right—by force.” I lower my voice. “And if you come with me, you will have that right too. You will choose how to pass your day, how to live your life.”

The women look at one another. They speak only with their eyes, but so many conversations are going on. One woman, the older slave Unn, shakes a hand, open-fingered, toward me. “What do you mean, come with you? Where are you going?”

“I cannot tell you.”

A small murmuring of distrust runs through the group.

Thyra gets to her knees. “Speak, Alfhild.” There is a gasp as the women realize Thyra has called me by name without saying my title first. “Tell them why you cannot say where you are going. If you don't trust them, how can they trust you?”

I hadn't planned on this. I would have shared with the women, once we were away. But beforehand, it's dangerous. I don't want those who stay behind to lead pursuers to our trail. Thyra's reasoning makes sense, though. “I cannot say where because I do not know. I have to find my sister.” I swallow the lump of grief in my throat and force myself to say it: “She was stolen by a ship. I think a Russian slave ship. I'm sure of it.”

Their faces open. I see the sadness they carry. How many of them were stolen? But others must have been sold into slavery by their parents. That has to be worse.

“Your sister?” says one woman, a little older than me. Her face is not open; it is shrewd and hard. She is a servant to Queen Tove. Her name is Ingun. “You have lived here a long time. We never heard talk of a sister.”

“It was seven years ago.”

“Seven years?” Ingun looks at me as though I'm void of reason. “Why, anything could have happened to her by now. She could be anywhere.”

“Exactly,” I say. “So if you come with me, you may wander far.”

“How will wandering with you mean we have choice?” It is the slave Unn again. She is bold and tenacious. That's what I need in my companions. I must win her.

“I will pay wages. Everyone gets the same pay. You can choose to leave anytime.”

“Where will you get the money to pay wages?” asks Ingun.

“I have money.” I look around, my eyes seeking and holding the eyes of each of them in turn. “It is not stolen. It belongs to no one else. This is truth. I will pay you, I swear.”

“But I'm a slave,” says Unn. “No law protects a runaway slave. If I am caught, your father, the king, can have me put to death. And he will. I have no doubt. I have lived here twenty-three years, serving both king and queen, and the king and queen before them.”

I've thought about this, at least, thank heavens. “We can send word back to Heiðabý about each of you. The rumor will be whatever you want. It can be that you were lost at sea. Or died of illness. Or that I forced you to come and you've escaped and are on your way home. It can be a secret message to the people you love who need to know you are well. It's up to you. Think about that one thing: It's up to you. Everything will be up to you. In a new place, with money in your pouch, what becomes of you will be your choice.”

“What do you mean, ‘lost at sea'?” asks a girl I don't know. From her clothes and skin, she is a slave. “You said that. You said the message can be we were ‘lost at sea'.”

“Can I know your name?”

She presses her lips together, and I see her fight fear. “I want to hear about the sea.”

“I am Alfhild.” I look at her and try to radiate gentleness. “Your name. Please?”

“Jofrid.”

“Jofrid. A good Norse name. And Unn is a good Norse name. All of you go by good Norse names. As do I. But”—I fold my hands in front of my chest—“we may go by other names inside our heads. Those people, those other girls and women with those foreign names locked inside us, they need choice.”

“That may be,” says Unn. “But Jofrid is right; tell us about the sea.”

“The only way to follow the path of a Russian slave ship is by sea. Right?” I look around, appealing to them for agreement. They just look back at me. “There's a boat waiting for us. It will be our home.”

“I know nothing about boats,” says the servant Matilda.

“You'll learn.”

“And just who is going to teach me?”

“Me,” I say.

“You know how to manage a boat?”

“I do.”

“That's hard to believe. But even if it's true, what will happen to the boat at first, when none of the rest of us knows a thing about it?”

“Maybe we need some men,” says Ragnhild quickly. She's at my side. I hear her heavy breathing. “I can think of one who might come.”

“No men.” I shake my head hard. “If women leave, they may chase us, but they will give up quickly. If men leave, they will hunt us down relentlessly.”

“Then we're back to my question,” says Matilda. “How can we think of setting out with only one person who knows about boats?”

“I know about boats,” says Jofrid. “So we'll be starting with two of us knowing how to do things.”

I rub my hands together as hope rises in my chest. This may really happen. “Within days all of us will learn every detail of managing a boat.”