“How do you know my mother?” she asked the woman, returning to her earlier point.
“Magda sang for me,” the woman said. “And I answered.”
“She called you?” Cordelia tried to clarify.
“Her heart was sick with fear when her lover died,” the woman told her. She began to circle Cordelia again. “She stood before me where you are now, and I spoke her fortune to her.Stay,and she would surely die.Leave,and face the same. But the babe… Leave, andthe babewould live.” The woman stopped and faced Cordelia, placing a hand at her womb. “She didn’t even know she carried life then,” the woman said. “Just as you don’t now.”
Cordelia froze. “A-a baby?”
The woman grinned. “My line is strong in you, daughter. Anothervolvato raise our clan, eh? Odin favors us well. But your fate is not your mother’s. Leave, and both of you will die.”
Cordelia shuddered, running a hand down her stomach to her navel. “And if I stay?”
The woman’s lips drew back. “Ours is a tree with one root and two branches,” she said cryptically. “But not for long. For the tree to survive, one branch must be felled.”
Cordelia began to shake her head. “No. No that can’t be.”Beware the pair,Gordon’s mother had said.Beware the heir.And now her sister lay dying. Cordelia didn’t care what this woman said or who she was—it couldn’t come down to her or Eustace. She wouldn’t make a choice like that. “You’re lying,” she insisted. “You don’t know what you’re saying. Did you hurt her? Are you the one who took my sister?”
The old woman began to laugh. “You are much like her—your mother,” she said. “She wanted to fight me too. But she knew better. She knew old Hella’s tongue is made of pine and iron, arrow-straight and twice as sharp. And when I told her to keep one of my teeth next to her heart to protect her and the child, she knewit was the only way. Your sister is my daughter, girl. As you are. And your mother. And your mother’s mother. I do not strike my own.” She peered into Cordelia’s stormy eyes. “Teeth will not save you,” she said. “You need something sharper.”
“What about my sister? What will save Eustace?” Cordelia asked.
The old woman sneered. “Have you not been listening, girl? Are your ears full of goose fat?”
Cordelia trembled at her ire.
“Bone pays for bone. Blood for blood.” She glared at her. “If you want to save your sister, bring her to me. The land may be weakened by blasphemy,” she uttered. “Butweare strong.”
“Who are you?” Cordelia asked her, wrapping her arms around her waist.
“I am what lies behind,” the woman said. “And I am what lies ahead. Hella of the Bones. Speaker for the dead. I wield theSeidr.” She drew near to Cordelia, placing a finger between her breasts. “And you are of myvölur.”
The word flowed into Cordelia like honey, unlocking secrets along the way. This was the firstvolva,the original witch of their clan. It was her power, her magic, herbloodthat flowed through them.Even the gods respected them,Eustace had said. Hella of the Bones—mistress ofSeidr,singer of songs. They had beenof the Bonesever since. Her bones. Theirs.
The old witch drew back, her cold eyes resting on Cordelia’s shocked face as she tried to process everything she was learning. “When the time comes,” the woman said, “call and we will answer.” She gave Cordelia a hard look. “Do not forsake the bones, girl. Lest the bones forsake you.”
Cordelia gripped the bracelet on her wrist, cold as ice and hot as fire, heavier than a two-headed ax and just as sharp.
“The dragon is waiting,” Hella said. “Its hunger knows nobounds.” Her eyes hardened into blue stones. “Slay, girl, or be eaten.”
She drew her staff high before her and drove it back down into the center of the mound, and everything around them vanished.
Cordelia was alone again, and the world was as black as obsidian and just as merciless.
WHENCORDELIA OPENEDher eyes, Gordon stood over her, his face stretched nearly beyond recognition with worry.
“Thank God,” he cried, squeezing her shoulder. “I thought you’d never come around.”
Cordelia blinked and sputtered, a dry cough tearing its way through her throat. She tried to raise herself on her hands. Gordon wrapped a burly fist around one arm to help her. When she sat up, the world swam. It took a few seconds for the vertigo to settle. She looked down to see black smears across her shins and palms. Thick arcs of dirt lined her fingernails and toenails. The oatmeal knit of her dress was streaked green and brown from her climb.
Cordelia placed a hand to the side of her head, remembering the strange run across the promenade, her scramble up the hillside, the woman’s finger on her chest—Hella of the Bones.
“What happened?” she asked, wondering how much time she’d lost and what had taken place in the interval between the woman stabbing the mound with her staff and Gordon waking her up.
“I heard you tearing through the house,” he explained. “There was this powerful noise. I know I wasn’t supposed to leave your sister, but I was worried about you. I followed it outside. That’s when I spotted you up here.”
It was then Cordelia realized they were still on the hill above the crypt. “Noise?” Had he heard the voices too? Did he see Hella?
“It was you,” Gordon told her gently. “You were… you were singing. But ‘Kumbaya’ it was not. It’s like it was tearing out of your throat. I’m surprised you can talk.”
