She stared up as his form gradually came into focus. Candlelight played across his cheekbone, the edge of his lips pulled down.
“What…happened…” Silla tried to sit up, but everything swayed.
“Easy now.” Rey’s warm palm slid to the small of her back, helping her up.
“Tell me precisely what happened, girl,” snapped Harpa. “You disturbed my weavings, then had a…a fit.”
“Trilla is seeking attention once more,” muttered Rykka, a twist ofsmoke rising from her black hair as she flitted over Harpa’s shoulder. “Already she’s brought those ice demons to your yard, and now this.”
“The voice,” whispered Silla. “It would not stop. The voice…”
“What voice?” asked Rey.
“The voice. It beckoned me. It pulled me to the tapestry, and when I touched it…” Silla’s eyes flew to Harpa’s. “A life for a life.”
Harpa’s eyes went wide. “What did you say?”
“A life for a life,” repeated Silla. “Thrice now I’ve heard this in strange visions. The first during my Cohesion Rite.”
Harpa’s gaze grew distant. “I could not find you that day. I thought nothing of it but…” Harpa scowled at Silla. “Where did you go? What did you see?”
“Hrolf,” said Silla. “I saw King Hrolf. Who is the Dark One?”
Harpa recoiled, pressing a hand to her forehead. Slowly, she turned to the tapestry. “Serpent, dragon, tree, queen.”
“Does anyone care to explain?” grumbled Rey.
“Myrkur,” gasped Rykka. “Myrkur is the Dark One.” An ember snapped from within the smoke spirit, and she zipped to the hearthfire, hiding beneath a blackened log.
“The god of chaos?” asked Rey, skeptically.
“I must hear everything,” said Harpa sharply. “Start from the beginning.”
And so, Silla did, beginning with the Cohesion Rite, when she’d watched King Hrolf summon the Dark One, and proceeding with his attempt to murder his own granddaughter. Reluctantly, she ended with her own mother’s bargain gone awry.
“A life for a life,” murmured Harpa. “Those were King Hrolf’s last words, though none understood the meaning.”
Harpa watched Silla with keen amber eyes. “In all my time spent with her, Queen Svalla never spoke of it. The attempt on her life was kept silent,” she said, a note of bitterness in her voice. “It was decided best to preserve the public’s support of the Volsiks. But it was well known that Princess Svalla suffered from night terrors well into adulthood. The servants spoke of her screams. Of the words she cried out in sleep.A life for a life.”
Silla’s stomach knotted as she thought of her mother pacing in that room. What fear Svalla must have felt, facing down the Dark One. But she’d done it for Eisa. For Saga. So that her daughters might live.
“What does it mean?” asked Rey, frustrated.
“It means,” said Harpa slowly, “Myrkur has been threading darkness into the Volsik line for generations, and we were none the wiser.”
“Who?” asked Silla, dumbstruck. “If he didn’t want my mother’s life, who then did he want?”
Harpa observed her. “That, I do not know. Perhaps you. Perhaps your sister.” She turned to the tapestry. “But I fear—” She paused for a moment. “The serpent, we understand. But the rest…”
“Could the tree reside in the Western Woods?” asked Rey, and Silla knew he thought of the Bloodaxe Crew in Istré battling unknown foes in those woods. Fear tightened her stomach as she thought of Sigrún, Hekla and Gunnar.
Harpa pushed to her feet and paced the cabin. “Serpent and dragon are Myrkur’s children. But the tree and the queen. These I do not know.”
Rey massaged his temples.
Harpa turned to them, her face lined with worry. “The long winters,” she said. “Myrkur’s creatures entering through cracks in the world. And the Volsiks—the protectors of Íseldur—captive and forced into hiding. A Volsik must always sit on the throne. To bring balance. To counter Myrkur’s chaos.”
A premonitory chill ran down Silla’s spine.
