I took another step, which triggered more elven magic, revealing rows of metal cabinets stuffed with boxes of files that traveled further back, into the pitch-blackness.
The archives.
It was so quiet, so still that even the soft pad of my steps echoed through the circular foyer. But none of that was what took my breath away.
All along the curved walls, the domed ceiling, the floor, everything was covered in a vibrant mural. The carvings on the doors were nothing but a window to the story painted here: the whole history of the elves almost coming alive through the stone. Such raw emotions were etched onto the faces of the beings: elves, angels, demons, wolves, dwarves.
They were so lifelike I felt like a voyeur, their eyes weirdly following me as I ventured further into the room. My feet itched to step over them, as if I were walking over a grave.
“Olivia?” I said again. No answer.
A fabric-bound book lay open on a table. I strode over—my eyes catching on a thick silver band glinting against the wood next to it: a ring. Someone must’ve accidentally left it, I thought as I looked down at the page, where a hungry open maw waited and a dozen eyes stared back at me.
With a mane of hair, long muscular body, large head, round ears, and wide muzzle, the creature reminded me of a lion, but at some point, during its creation or perhaps after, something had gone very wrong.
A leg, hoofed and limp, grew out of its chest. Two more hung off the sides of its gut. A feathered pair of wings jutted out of its back, the tips extending past the title.
Jelmadag, it said. I flinched, as if the grayscale animal—monster? demon?—drawn onto the paper could snap its jowls at me.
There were details, formulas scribbled along the edges of the pages, and blocks of text beneath the creature’s giant paws. I wasn’t sure what any of it meant. Everything was written in a different language.
Prickles swept over the scars on my shoulder blades, a faint inkling of déjà vu.
Where on earth would I have seen this thing before? I racked my brain for a memory—a drawing, a dream—and came back with nothing.
“River?”
I spun around, tailbone digging into the edge of the table, foolishly looking at all the hyperrealistic faces on the ground before settling on the familiar one of my old therapist. “You scared me.”
“I’m sorry.” Olivia’s eyes flared with curiosity—or maybe it was concern. “I went to my rooms to freshen up. I thought you might…” Her gaze roved my bloody outfit. I tucked a strand of hair behind my ear, my skin getting hotter, itchier, every drawn-out second. “Do the same.”
“Oh. That would’ve been smart.” I brushed my fingers against my temple, the light touch sending searing pain to the bone. “Ow.”
“Don’t touch it.” She held a stack of folders against her chest. “We’ll make this quick so you can make a pit stop at the geothermal pools.”
“Great idea,” I mumbled.
“How are you holding up otherwise?” The gossamer layers of her burnt-orange dress spilled over the floor art like rays of the sun.
“I—” I started, the painted eyes, the cackle, the magic from the cave flashing through my head. “I’ll survive. But… something doesn’t feel right. I don’t think that was a natural disaster—I mean, you heard what I told Freyja. There was this thick fog, and tendrils of shadow running up the mountain. I saw the same thing yesterday in the frozen moat. It looked like dark magic.”
“Did you relay this to the queen?” Olivia emptied her arms onto the table, the thick files thudding on the wood.
I rested my elbows on the surface. “I tried, but you know how she is.”
“Defensive.”
“Dismissive.” Despite being alone, I lowered my voice. “What if it was Grýla?”
“The ogress?” she said, flipping through her materials.
I nodded. “The queen called the cave I found on the mountain Grýla’s lair. And I know everyone said she was a myth, but every story around here seems to hold quite a bit of truth.”
“A long-standing feud with the elves is one thing, but if Grýla is real and caused that avalanche… she didn’t aim to break a few things. She aimed to kill.” Olivia pulled a crinkled sheet out of a folder and set it down in front of us. “Let’s come back to that. I found something.”
Peering over her shoulder, I skimmed the numbers, the illegible comments scribbled into neat rows. “What is it?”
“Incident reports for their Galdur.” She ran a finger along the date column, thin coils of raven hair framing her face. “The earliest recorded event is a century ago, near the end of the Cross-Realm War.”
