Part 3: Chapter 10: Even Loki Thinks Edward Cullen Is a Stalker
Chapter 10: The Jotuns Strike Back
Something woke Aslaug. Maybe a footstep, or maybe a creak, or maybe a hiss from the radiator by her bed, which had finally started wheezing rusty-smelling hot air.
She sat up. It wasn’t late; she could hear a studio audience laughing on the TV downstairs. But the room felt wrong. She asked, “Who’s there?”
“Only me,” said Loki. He folded back the closet door and stepped out, his fiery hair glinting in the darkness.
Aslaug pressed her hand to her mouth. By the time the urge to scream had passed, Loki was beside her, dumping a pile of clothes on her bed.
“I wasn’t watching you sleep, I swear,” he said in his own voice, without Mr. Blanding’s Australian accent. “That would be ‘creepy,’” wouldn’t it? Like a stalker. I think that’s the word you’d use. Anyway, I just wanted to grab you something to wear, in case it took you a long time to get conscious. You’ve got to go up the mountain, Aslaug, right now. Stephen’s doing something stupid, and he could get hurt.”
Though Aslaug wasn’t one hundred percent conscious yet, this made sense to her. Stephen always seemed to be on the brink of doing something slightly insane. “Go wait outside,” she said, pushing herself toward the edge of the bed where Loki wasn’t. “I’ll get dressed and meet you.”
Loki nodded. “But quick,” he said. “Don’t worry about the people downstairs. I’ve runed the stairs and hallway so they won’t hear a thing.”
“You didn’t hurt them?”
“Why would I? Don’t forget the sword.”
Loki went to the window, pressed his palm flat against it, stepped forward and disappeared. It was as if he became light, and the light folded itself into the house’s old wood bones and seeped through its cracks. That seemed to make sense, too, for now.
Aslaug unfolded the clothes he had given her, but they were all wrong - a good, churchy pair of pants and an argyle sweater. She lowered her feet to the cold oak planks and fumbled around on the floor till she found the jeans and sweatshirt she’d worn yesterday. (Today? Was it after midnight?)
She was dressed and halfway to the stairs when she remembered Loki’s last words. Then she went back and slid the sword from its hiding place under the bed, rolled in an old rag rug. It felt strange to hold a bare blade.
She tiptoed down the stairs carrying her shoes, despite what Loki had said. The corner step creaked, the way it always did. The TV was still blaring in the living-room, louder than usual, and Aslaug couldn’t stop herself from peeking around the doorframe. She saw Pike sitting with his feet up on the armrest the way her mother didn’t like, a can of Bud Lite between his knees. The man on TV said something, and he snorted.
She eased the front door open and stepped out, making sure not to let it swing behind her. The porch was an obstacle course, what with the barrels of apples and crates of Mason jars and her brother’s fallen bike and three wandering soccer balls, but once she was safely down the steps, she checked her mother’s window. The reading lamp shone up there, just as it should.
Grass crunched under her feet as she headed down the driveway, skirting the pools of floodlight. When she reached the path, Loki emerged from the darkness and fell into step with her. She didn’t know where he’d come from and didn’t care.
Loki walked with a brisk, easy glide, making her huff and puff to keep pace. He wore what looked like Mr. Blanding’s weekend clothes: jeans and a Berkeley sweatshirt and black Converses. Seeing him from the corner of her eye, Aslaug almost thought he was Mr. Blanding. She wondered if she was starting to forget what the real Mr. Blanding looked like or what the real Loki looked like, or both.
But this was no ordinary man. She noticed that where his sneaker’s heel rose from the path, a spark sometimes appeared.
Clouds had covered the stars, leaving the hillside lit only by the glow of the valley, but that and Loki’s sparks and the strong, springy feel of him kept her on track. They were at the far edge of the Mosses’ land when she finally caught her breath enough to ask, “What happened to Stephen?”
“He went to kill Jotuns all by his lonesome,” said Loki. “I can’t be sure, but I did see him sneak out of his great-grandparents’ house and head up the path, not twenty minutes ago. I thought he might be coming to see you, but he passed the driveway and kept going.”
“Why didn’t you stop him yourself?”
Even as she asked, she knew the answer. Stephen would never do anything Loki told him to do.
“I considered that,” said Loki. “But I thought if I used any kind of force on him, or a rune, that boy would make it another reason to tell you what a villain I am. He has it in for me. I think I remind him of his stepfather.”
“Is it true you knew Stephen in Alaska? Why were you there?” Looking ahead, she could see only something vast and black looming against slightly paler sky. A tidal wave? A monster? A mountain?
“Why am I anywhere?” said Loki in his charming, evasive way. “Aslaug, by now you should know I’m not an ordinary person. I can step inside that mountain and be home in five minutes. And by home I mean out of time, not just far away.”
He was confusing her. She willed herself to stay focused on the original question. “But why were you specifically in Alaska, with Stephen? Did you give him that rune tattoo? And,” she added as it occurred to her, “why were you out there tonight, by the Wildasins’ house? Were you watching him?”
“Stalking him, you mean?” said Loki. They had reached the crescent of trees, and he held up a low bough so she could pass. “Nope. As I think I just reminded you, I’m not an ordinary person.”
“But what does that…”
“It means I don’t need to hang around a place to notice something interesting going on there.” They had reached the entrance to the rock maze, and he stood aside and beckoned her with a flourish. “You’re going to need to go on without me, m’lady. If your friend knows I’m involved, he’ll become very difficult to deal with. But I promise to be within shouting distance. You know how to use that silly sword?”
She nodded and made an uncertain swipe; though she still felt clumsy, she had begun to like the heft of the blade in her hand. It was more graceful than the axe. “What’s silly?”
“Oh, nothing. It’s just obviously machine forged, is all,” said Loki. “Your dad wouldn’t be caught dead with such a weapon - and I happen to know that for a literal fact.” He cocked his head and was gone.
In her rush to leave the house, Aslaug had forgotten a flashlight. She called feebly, hopefully into the darkness, “Stephen?”
No answer. She called again, louder, her voice echoing on the rock walls. “Stephen!”
Still nothing. And now she had no choice but to launch herself into the rock maze.
It wasn’t really a maze, she reminded herself, finding her way between the first two tall outcroppings by feel. It was only a couple of twists and turns, with nowhere to go astray, and she’d done it dozens of times before.
Her right hand had to hold the long sword, keeping it stiffly at her side with the point down, so she oriented herself with her left. Her legs seemed to have a fairly reliable memory of how many steps to take in which direction, but she still banged her right knee twice and got the sword jammed in a crack. Aslaug said some words that would have surprised her mother, yanked the blade’s tip free, navigated the final turn, and stumbled out into the little clearing.
She knew she was here because she could stretch out her arms and not touch stone. The only way to find the cave entrance was to lurch across the open space, grab the mountain’s face, and feel her way along it.
It was not a pleasant prospect. She was intensely relieved to hear, straight in front of her, a short, barking human shout and then something hitting the ground with a sickening thud.
The sounds came from about a dozen yards away - inside the mountain. The thing that had fallen was rolling on stone, clanking. She followed the noise, stuck out her hand to meet the jagged edge of the opening, and plunged inside, letting the sword trail behind her so she wouldn’t trip over it when she tried to stand again.
Getting through was always the hard part. By the time she regained her footing, she was shivering in the cave’s glacial air, and her right wrist hurt from holding the sword at an odd angle. She pulled it through the hole, thinking, Now I understand why you need a sheath and buckler.
The thing that had hit the ground hard was a flashlight. She could see its beam stretched across the floor, illuminating a Coors can and scuff marks in the dirt.
And something else.
On the far wall of the cave, about twenty feet away, the beam caught an untied sneaker. Just to one side, between her and the standing person the sneaker was attached to, she could dimly see a massive form that glowed dully, dirtily, like ice, and she could feel the cold it emitted in waves. The Jotun loomed over the human, whose back was pressed to the wall.
Aslaug recognized the sneaker. “Stephen!”
Stephen didn’t answer. Coming closer, she could see he was standing very still with his right hand on his heart, as if he were saying the Pledge of Allegiance. But not by choice. The Jotun kept him pinned to the wall with two vast hands - smooth crystalline hands that ended in twisty black nails like claws. Stephen’s face was tense with concentration, as if he were brandishing a weapon.
He had a weapon, she realized. The rune on his hand. But shouldn’t it keep Jotuns from seeing him, let alone touching him?
No time to figure things out. She dived at the Jotun’s back and swung her sword hard.
The sword went in and stuck. It was like trying to halve a raw acorn squash. The Jotun did not release Stephen, but it made a little annoyed shrug of its shoulders, like a dog shaking off water, and turned its enormous head in her direction.
She was ready. She looked into its bleary-snow-globe eyes.
The Jotun exhaled. (Did it breathe?) Crimson light splashed the walls. Aslaug sprang forward, stood on tiptoe, and grabbed the hilt of her sword.
It came out so easily she staggered. The Jotun seemed to have changed from a squash to a grainy snow bank. She stabbed it again, this time darting around its bulk to aim for the heart.
The snow bank howled and vanished, and with it went the warm light. She found herself standing still, holding the sword and shaking, staring at the flashlight beam on the dirt.
“Aslaug,” said Stephen, croaking a little. He had sunk to the floor and sat crouched there, caught full in the beam, with his hand still clamped over his heart. The blue rune stood out clearly. She scrambled toward him, but he raised his other hand and waved her back, away. “Turn around. More.”
She turned to see what he meant. Yes. There were more.
So far, Aslaug had seen Jotuns walking alone and in groups of three. Now she faced a semicircle of giants that fanned out along the cave wall, even blocking the entrance. Six, eight - twelve? More? It was impossible to count the shadowy forms, and impossible to say whether they’d been there all along or just appeared. Standing close, their individual bodies seemed to blur into a palisade of dirty ice and monster limbs and tiny, hostile eyes.
Tiny eyes? Was that possible? The eyes of Jotuns should be sad white balls, not quite focused. But some of these Jotuns seemed to be looking straight at her with the narrow yellow gaze of wolves finding prey.
It was a pitiless gaze, and as she looked back, her eyes passing down the line, it chilled her even more than the cold they exhaled with their breath. Whatever force was in her own eyes, she felt it recoil and petrify for an instant. She remembered Pike swearing and running the wipers on a frigid morning after an eighteen-wheeler showered them with slush; the windshield wouldn’t clear. “Damn squirter’s frozen.”
Frozen? Was she frozen? She clenched both fists, feeling the good, solid hilt of her sword - the sword Stephen had chosen. Then something came unstuck, and waves of light and warmth poured from her. She felt them lapping all the way to the walls of the cave and bouncing back to wash over her, raw and intense as direct sunlight, and she saw Stephen’s head tilt back as if he felt it. The light made a soft rushing, roaring noise, like a creek thawing under the ice. The Jotuns stood still, and she couldn’t see their eyes anymore.
Now she must do it, before the light faded. But how, when there were so many at once?
She raised the sword with both hands, preparing to tiptoe around the nearest Jotun and stab it in the heart. But right then, the sword seemed to seize a life of its own. It soared several feet into the air, forcing her to dash forward and grab it. The sword twitched. Just when she thought she would lose it, it stopped and hovered for an instant a few inches above her head, angling itself parallel to the ground. Then it crashed with a fierce, eager, singing sound straight into the crowd of Jotuns.
Ice flew everywhere, stinging Aslaug’s cheeks and eyelids. The sword dragged her along, her feet skipping to keep up, her wrists straining to hold the blade tight so the edge caught the hulking bodies at a right angle. She was hacking through them, bisecting them each in quick succession, like Sigurd when he threw a sword that somehow managed to cut a man in two.
But this was less heroic, of course, because they were nothing but ice. Nothing but water. By the time she reached the end of the line, her arms shook and her hands were cramped and nearly numb. She managed to slice the sword sideways a last time before letting her arms fall. The weight of the blade pulled her to the ground, and she groaned. The cave around her was dark and silent, except for the fallen flashlight and the sound of dripping.
She unwound her fingers from the sword hilt and laid it down gingerly. Then she sat cross-legged, rocking back and forth and rubbing her arms.
In the distance she heard a man’s weak voice, not Stephen’s, say, “Are they gone now? I hid my eyes.”
“Lucky for you,” said Stephen. He walked over to Aslaug, moving stiffly and carefully as if he were bruised, and looked down at her. “I can take the sword now. Are you all right?”
“Yeah.” She bent one of her sore wrists and used the hand to lever herself upright. He offered his runed hand, and she clasped it hard and stood up. “But don’t touch the sword. Something’s wrong with it.”
“It didn’t look that way,” said Stephen. “It looked pretty right.”
“Who’s he?” Aslaug didn’t want to think too hard about the sword, at least not now. She turned to the dark part of the cave from which the weak voice had come.
Stephen picked up the flashlight and aimed it. Aslaug saw a rough break in the cave wall, the passage to the deeper caverns she had always dreaded and tried to ignore. It was really no more than a crack between two massive boulders, two feet across at its widest point. Quartz glittered under the flashlight. Just to the right of the crack, leaning against the rock with both long legs hunched in front of him, sat Sam Gann the Weather Man.