Joanne Harris - Runemarks

And now Nat realized with mounting excitement that what he had taken for colors and lights were actually thoughts -thoughts drawn directly from the Outlander’s mind.

Of course, Nat knew perfectly well that he should not have been watching this at all. The mysteries of the Order were jealously guarded, which was why the Book of Words was closed. By rights he knew his duty: to stand back, eyes lowered, well out of range, and let the Examiner perform his Interrogation.

But Nat was ambitious. The thought of the Word-so close he could practically touch it-eclipsed both caution and sense of duty. Instead he stepped closer, made the same strange sign he had seen the Examiner make-and in a second the truesight enveloped him, spinning him for a moment into a maelstrom of lights and signatures.

Could this possibly be…a dream?

If so, it was the first one Nat Parson had ever experienced.

“O beautiful!” he breathed, and moving closer, unable to help himself, for a second he held the prisoner’s eye and something-some intimacy-passed between them.

The Examiner felt it like a rush of air. But the parson was in his way, damn the fool, and in the half second it took to push him aside, the precious information was lost.

The Examiner gave a howl of anger and frustration.

Nat Parson stared at the prisoner, his eyes wide with new knowledge.

And at that moment the roundhouse door slammed open on its hinges and a bolt of deadly blue light shot into the room.

I’m going to die, the parson thought as he cowered on the floor. He was vaguely conscious of Audun and Jed doing the same; at his side the Examiner lay, already stiffening, hands outstretched as if to ward off annihilation.

There was no doubt in Nat’s mind that the man was dead-the bolt had ripped him almost in two. The Good Book lay on the floor beside him, its pages scattered and scorched by the blast.

But even this had not killed his curiosity. As the other two hid their eyes, he looked up, made a circle with his finger and thumb, and saw his attackers: a woman, quite naked and almost too beautiful to look at in her caul of cold fire, and a young man in a state of similar undress, with a crooked smile that made the parson shiver.

“Get him,” said Skadi.

“Hang on,” said Loki. “I’m freezing to death.” Briefly he surveyed Audun, Nat, and Jed, still lying shivering on the roundhouse floor. “That tunic should do,” he said to Audun. “Oh, and the boots.” And at that he rapidly relieved him of both, leaving the guard in his underthings. “Not exactly a perfect fit,” said Loki, “but in the circumstances-”

“I said, get him,” snapped Skadi with mounting impatience.

Loki shrugged and stepped over to the prisoner. “Stand up, brother of mine,” he said, forking a runesign so that the chains dropped off. “Here comes the cavalry.”

Odin stood up. He looked terrible, thought Loki. Good news at any other time-but today he had been rather counting on the General’s protection.

Skadi moved forward and raised her glam. The runewhip hissed; its tip forked like a serpent’s tongue. “And now,” she said, “give me the Whisperer.”

Loki considered shifting to his fiery Aspect, then rejected the thought as a waste of glam. Skadi was standing over him, Isa at the ready, and fast as he was, he feared she was faster.

“Of course I’ll keep my end of the bargain,” he said, not taking his eye away from the runewhip that crackled and hissed like bottled lightning. “Eventually.”

Skadi’s expression, habitually cold, grew icy. “I warned you,” she said in a low voice.

“And I told you straight. I promised you the Whisperer. You’ll get it, don’t fret”-he glanced at Odin-“when we’re all out of this safely.”

Now, One-Eye was weak, but he had lost none of his mental agility. He knew Loki well enough to understand the game he was playing and to play along-for the time being. He could be lying-he probably was-but whether or not he had the Whisperer, now was not the time to dispute it.

“That wasn’t the deal,” said Skadi, coming closer.

“Try to think,” said Odin calmly. “Would either of us have brought it here, like some valueless bauble? Or would we, rather, hide it in a safe place, a place where no one would ever find it?”

Skadi nodded. “I see.” Then she turned and raised her glam. “Well, Dogstar, I think that concludes our business,” she said, and brought the runewhip down with a head-splitting crack. It missed Loki-just-and gouged a four-foot-long section out of the wall where he had been standing.

Nat, Jed, and Audun, who had all three been lying low in the hope of being overlooked, tried to press themselves further into the roundhouse floor.

Loki shot Odin a look of appeal. “I don’t know if you noticed, but I just saved your life.”

“You think that matters?” Skadi said. “You think that pays for what you’ve done?”

“Well, not exactly,” Loki said. “But you may still need me one of these days…”

“I’ll take that risk.”

She raised her glam. Barbed Isa fretted the air.

But now it was Odin who stepped forward. He looked old, his face drawn, his shirt drenched with fresh blood, but his colors blazed with sudden fury.

Skadi found him in her way and stared at him in astonishment. “You can’t be serious,” she said. “You’re giving him your protection now?”

Odin just looked at her steadily. To Nat, who was watching, his colors seemed to envelop him in a cloak of blue fire.

“No,” said Skadi. “I’ve waited too long.”

“He’s right. I may need him,” Odin said.

“After what happened at Ragnarók?”

“Things have changed since Ragnarók.”

“Some things never change. He dies. And as for you…” She fixed Odin with her cold gaze.

“Go on.” His voice was very soft.

“As for you, Odin, my time with the Æsir is done. I have no quarrel against you-yet. But don’t imagine I’m yours to command. And don’t you ever stand in my way.”

Behind her, Nat was mesmerized. The door stood open, not six feet away, and he knew he ought to take his chance to flee before these demons remembered his presence. And yet it held him: their dreadful fascination, their startling glamour.

They were the Seer-folk, of course. He’d guessed that at once, as soon as the Examiner cast the Word. That makes them gods, he thought in excitement. Gødfolk or demons, and with that power, who cares?

Now the three Seer-folk faced each other. To Nat they looked like columns of flame, sapphire, violet, and indigo. He wondered how he could see them still, now that the Examiner was dead, and he remembered the moment of contact between himself and the Outlander, the moment he had looked into the man’s eyes and seen…

What, exactly, had he seen?

What, exactly, had he heard?

The Seer-folk were arguing. The parson vaguely understood why: the ice woman wanted to kill the red-haired man, and the Outlander-who was no Outlander but some kind of Seer warlord-meant to stop her.

“Take care, Odin,” she said in a low voice. “You left your sovereignty in the Black Fortress. Now you’re just another used-up has-been with delusions of godhood. Let me pass, or I’ll split you where you stand.”

And she would too, thought Nat Parson. That thing in her hand was all rage. The Outlander, however, seemed unmoved. He was trying to call her bluff, thought Nat, not a move he himself would have considered.

“Last chance,” she said.

And then something that looked like a small firework of great intensity and spectacular power whizzed soundlessly over Nat’s head and hit the ice woman in the small of the back, pitching her abruptly into the Outlander’s arms.