Now Fhord’s serious, his gaze dropping to find mine. “Will you help me, rabbit?”
I return his stare, trying to understand what he’s asking of me. How dangerous it will be. But then I realize it doesn’t matter. Fhord’s not someone who likes asking favors. This matters to him.
“Sure,” I agree with a little smile. “But you’ll owe me. I’ll let you know what I want when we’re done.”
“That sounds … dangerous. For me. Am I going to regret this?”
“So, so much. But I don’t think you have a choice.” I stand to start pulling together our packs. “Time to go, before you change your mind.”
The sun hovers to our right as we leave the camp, casting long shadows in our path. It feels so much like Midgard, I don’t know if I want to laugh or cry. The jungles I called home for years—where I first saw signs that Ragnarök approached—hover in my memories. Tall trees, heavy with large emerald leaves sparkling with morning dew, a floor that looks like green felt splattered with red, yellow, and orange fronds, birds in a rainbow of colors swooping around us, all remind me of home. It’s been too long.
We ride for hours before Fhord speaks again. “We’ll enter the forbidden land when we cross this creek,” he says as Sigurd draws beside Hilde. “They’ll sense that we’re there, but just stay close to me.”
He reaches for Hilde’s reins, drawing me to a stop. “You cannot end any of them.” His voice is firm, unbending. “They shouldn’t threaten us. But if any of them does, cut off whatever limb attacks but never their heads. The gods have spelled this place to harm anyone who takes one of the draugr from them.” His eyes narrow into emerald slits. “No matter what, do not behead any of them. We’ll both pay the price if you do.”
“I love a good challenge,” I respond with a smile and a quick dip of my chin. “This should be an interesting day.”
Fhord nods, releasing my reins as he sits up straight in his saddle. “Stay right behind me. Don’t let them separate us. If we’re allowed to question one of them, they should let us leave unharmed.”
“And if not?”
“Then we run. As fast as Hilde will go.”
I feel it as we approach the creek, a gentle push that makes me want to turn a different direction. If I hadn’t known what was here, I’d have believed it was just my own good sense encouraging me to avoid an unknown area. It’s dark and dank, and I can see why travelers would stay away. The unease increases the closer we get, twisting my stomach and sending a chill up and down my spine.
It goes away, though, as soon as our horses trudge through the water, replaced by something worse. I can feel the draugrs’ presence. All of them. It’s as if their psyches are no longer attached to their bodies and float freely in this place. They are restless and lost, searching for some way to escape the purgatory in which the gods have trapped them. Now my mouth is dry, my heart racing in my need to do … something. I’m overcome with a desire to help them escape their miserable existence. To put them out of their misery.
“Remember, rabbit, you can’t end any of them. No matter what.”
“How did you know I was thinking that?”
“I’ve been here before. I know how desperately they want to be released from this place. I feel it too. Everyone who comes here does. But you can’t give in to it.”
“It’s horrible what the gods have done to them.”
Fhord laughs, a cold, bitter snort. “The gods have done this and worse. Many times over. It isn’t our place to question or challenge them.” His voice suggests he doesn’t believe his own words. Turning in the saddle, Fhord captures my gaze. “I’ve seen what happens to someone who ends a draugr’s existence. Don’t let it happen to you.” Then he spins to face ahead again. “Follow me.”
We’re both silent as Fhord takes a meandering path, slowly leading me through this strange place. The grief and desperation I felt when we crossed the creek have only gotten worse, and I’m struggling to keep tears from rolling down my cheeks. My need to help these beings increases with each step, and I have no idea if I’ll be able to resist when the time comes, regardless of Fhord’s warnings.
The stench hits me first. I’ve lived through more battles than I’d like to remember, and this smell always lingers in the days that follow. Human flesh decaying in the hot sun, scavengers and vermin releasing the scent of death as they feast in the endless cycle of life. My breaths grow shallow as I fight the nausea that rolls through me, stop the retching that tries to erupt. This will pass, I remind myself.
When I see them, I’m horrified and fascinated. We’ve entered a clearing, and I realize as I look around that they’ve surrounded us. All of them. They look even worse than they smell. Although they’re more than a dragon’s-length away from us, I can see the causes of their death—holes in their heads or chests or guts that have turned green and yellow with their decay. Some carry so many injuries it’s hard to see how they can still move. Hard to imagine that even the gods have the power needed to rouse these bags of bones and decayed flesh.
Fhord pauses to search the specters around us. He nods when he finds the one he seeks. “Follow me,” he says quietly as he turns our horses in the direction of an enormous being who spent his life in battle and should have died there. The hole in his chest, exposing a spindly, decaying rib cage and the atrophied organs it once protected, suggests a slow, painful death.
The others don’t follow yet. I don’t let myself hope they won’t. They can’t catch us off guard.
“You may not be here.” The words aren’t spoken. They don’t breach the air around us. Instead, they appear in my thoughts, as if they came from me. But they’re guttural, desperate. This being has no hope. Nothing to lose.
Fhord speaks his response, disturbing the unusual silence that had settled around us. I realize for the first time that even the birds have abandoned this place. Nothing lives here. It exists only for these undead, perpetually trapped beings.
“I need knowledge you possess. We will leave when you give it to me.” His voice is steady, calm. Quiet and compelling.
“Why should I help you? You will not release me from my pain.”
“Not today. But I hope to find a way to release you. I will return if I do.”
The warrior stills, though others start to move. It’s almost as if they want to hear Fhord’s words.
