31. Bonds Broken

“There is a cloaked man with us who only calls himself Soldier. I often see him watching me, and I wonder if he is Lucius, but then I remind myself that that is a bond long broken.

I think more and more often of our first meeting, of the people that Lucius dealt with, and how poorly it would go for them. I think of the map that I follow, a map that he gave me, with the warning that I would lose everything. I think of my boy that hates me, and my wife, her body trapped in a rattling cart. I think of all that, and I know with grim certainty that there is nothing left to lose.”

The Salt Sage sat at ease amongst a table divided, watching the fur-clad family opposite pick and prod at their meals. They had shown more enthusiasm for their food than Hjorvarth and Engli, who had chosen to sit at opposite ends of their row of five stone chairs to avoid being near the Sage.

“Pass the salt?” the Sage asked, replied by an angry furrowing of Brenna’s brown brows. He shrugged, then leaned over the table to grab the small bowl. “So, Jorund—not of The Hill—has it been a good season for hunting?”

“Worse than some.” Jorund gnawed at a scrappy bone. “Better than others.”

“Fishing?”

“About the same.”

“Knitting?” The Salt Sage smiled, his face steeped in shadow. “Would you say it’s a good season for knitting, Brenna?” She didn’t answer him, so he glanced to each of his companions. “I see you two found your way here, all right. Any trouble on the way?”

“Not on the way.” Hjorvarth sat stone-faced, staring straight at Gunnar, who did his best to avoid meeting eyes and silently lamented the seating arrangements.

Engli had gotten into a smiling contest with Dagny, so they sat glaring at one another with hollow grins. “I only wish we’d have come here sooner.”

“Did you both eat already?” the Sage asked. “You’ve not touched your meals.”

Astrid swept in from the kitchen, her black dress brushing across the stone floors. “I hope you’re not waiting for me.” She weighed a wooden plate in her hands as she decided where to sit. She studied her guests, one in his dirty brown robe and the other two looking filthy and haggard.

Astrid turned to Gunnar, who offered a smile that matched the resignation in his brown eyes. “You move, Gunnar.” She waved him away. “I’ll sit there.”

“Well…” Gunnar glanced across at Hjorvarth. “Since you’re twisting my arm.”

He pushed back from the table and abdicated his emerald-adorned seat.

“Astrid.” The Salt Sage waited for her sit and straighten her dress. “Is it a good season for knitting?”

“You can knit in all seasons.” Astrid reached for a handful of small potatoes. “Is it good for weaving?” She cut herself a sliver of pork as she waited for reply. “The season, I mean.” She grabbed a chunk of hard bread. “Edda says you’re good at weaving.”

He lifted a leg of lamb under his shadowed hood, and tore free some meat. “Does she?”

“I think she means like a spider.” Astrid carefully cut a square from her lamb. She chewed very slowly, her bright eyes fixed upon the Sage. “He is—”

“I am.” The Salt Sage dipped his hooded head. “I can weave with the best of them.” He turned to Jorund. “Where is Bjorn?”

Astrid’s gentle face darkened. “Why do you ask questions that you already know the answer to?” her voice had an edge that made all those seated turn to her. “A man as you would better spend his time asking questions of himself. If you could ever really call yourself that. A man… I mean.”

“I despise the Sage,” Hjorvarth put in. “Yet I see no reason for your rudeness.”

“Eat your food.” Astrid leveled an icy glare. “It is rude not to. And, after that, you will get a bath. Because you smell very badly. And so do you, Engli.”

“Astrid,” Jorund rebuked. “What has gotten into you?”

“What has gotten into me?” Astrid snapped. “You are—”

“You said you had a bath?” Hjorvarth asked, taking a tiny bite of meat.

Astrid glanced at him, but then turned back to her father. “You—”

“Astrid,” Hjorvarth said. “Since it was at your mention, I expect you’ll lead the way?” He pushed back from the table. “Well? I would not want to offend your family any further with my smell. Lest they try to bludgeon us and tie us up all over again.”

Gunnar smirked. “We certainly wouldn’t want that.” He patted his younger sister on the back. “Go on then, Astrid. Before you get yourself into trouble.”

Astrid sighed. “Our father has already placed us in more trouble than he knows.” She walked over to Hjorvarth. “Come on, then.”

Dagny rose to her feet in alarm. “I’ll come with you Astrid.”

“Bloody fool.” Engli laughed, disgusted. “Or should I just say fool, because, lucky for you, Hjorvarth didn’t bloody you, did he? Because the man happens not to have a cruel bone in his body.”

“Engli.” Dagny’s eyes narrowed. “Are you sure a man a soft as you should use such hard words? You might actually have to defend yourself if he leaves.”

“You’ve a point. You might shoot me with that bow of yours… you know, the one that he didn’t break because you started crying when he took it from you.”

Dagny whisked an arrow from her quiver and readied her bow.

“Don’t,” Gunnar spoke in weary voice that gave her pause. He had his bowstring drawn back to his cheek. “I’m tired Dag’, and my head still aches from the beating I took. So you really need to sit back down and swallow your pride, or I’m letting this arrow fly.”

Dagny regarded her brother with confusion. “You’re joking?”

“I’m serious.” Gunnar settled his arms and back. “You shouldn’t have loosed any arrows in that kitchen. Not at Engli, and not at Hjorvarth. Even worse that you kept at it when the lantern broke.” He shook his head. “You were firing at footsteps. How did you know Bjorn or me hadn’t got back up, or that it wouldn’t hit mother?”

“Gunnar.” Jorund rose from his seat, and glared at his son. “Go to your room.”

Gunnar paid his father no more than a glance. “No.”

“Then kill your sister,” Jorund growled. “You’ve three heartbeats to do it before I bounce your head off the table.”

“Apologies for intruding on your familial disagreements,” the Sage said. “But I feel that I should mention Hjorvarth left with Astrid some time ago. Also…” He lifted up his cup. “Would you fetch me a drink, Gunnar?”

Gunnar sighed his discontent. “You ought to watch her, father. One day she’s going to kill an innocent man.” He lowered the bow, and slung it over his shoulder. “Wine or ale?”

“Ale.” The Salt Sage stretched to pass the cup to Gunnar, who took it with a nod and then made his way to the kitchen.

Engli smiled now he got to his feet. “I think I’ll get a drink as well.”

Dagny watched him leave, then frowned at her father. “That was between me and Gunnar. Little need for you to add your own hollow threat.”

“Gunnar would have loosed,” the Sage assured. “He would have missed, but then he would have been aiming to miss you… which means he would have hit you—in the throat, specifically. So had Jorund not intervened, you almost certainly would have died. And as such you should be more grateful.”

Dagny scowled at the robed stranger. “Why are you even here?”

***

“Why are you here?” Astrid asked.

Hjorvarth stood looking at gleaming pipes that ran above his head and through the walls of the small stone room in which they both stood. “To get a bath?” He walked forward, and looked down at the large brass basin. “Though by the look of things, I will need to fetch some water.”

“No. You just need to use this.” She stood by the wall, her hand resting on a large brass wheel. “I hadn’t meant here, anyway. I had meant here. Why are you here?”

“It may be some fault of my ears,” Hjorvarth said, walking over, “but you’re saying the same word twice over. And asking a question I’ve already answered.”

Astrid stepped back now he approached. “Twist it that way.”

Metal squealing, he turned the wheel rightways. Hollowed by stone walls, clunking metal and rushing water sounded beneath their feet, growing closer, and louder, until Hjorvarth feared that whatever mechanism the room housed was going to destroy itself. He turned back the wheel as quickly as he could, just in time to quell the dribble of water that pattered out from a metal plate above the basin.

“Turn it back,” Astrid instructed.

He did, more slowly than he had before, and the pipes made less complaint. Water hissed down like heavy rain and steam rose up to moisten stone. Hjorvarth watched as if unimpressed, but kept a careful eye on Astrid to see if aught was amiss. Then he saw the basin neared its limits, so twisted back the whining wheel.

Astrid smiled up at him. “It’s good, isn’t it?”

“Unnatural to my mind,” Hjorvarth said. “Lazy to any, I would think.”

“Of course,” Astrid said as sarcasm. “Better to haul water up and down the stairs until you fill the thing, and then blacken the bottom with fire.”

Hjorvarth nodded. “Or wash yourself with a bucket of cold water.” He took hold of a fur-trimmed sleeve, and got a hand up and into his jacket. With a groan, and a little shaking, he pulled an arm free, then tore the garment away from his aching shoulders and let it drop to the floor. Hjorvarth squinted at the steam billowing up from the basin. “Is this done, then?”

“Only if you want to burn your skin,” Astrid said. “You look very tired. Why don’t you sit?”

“I’m not tired.” Hjorvarth offered her a look of distrust, but with exhaustion it appeared little more than an attempt to hold open his eyes. “You can leave.”

“I will… as soon as you tell me why you’re here.”

“I was told to come here,” Hjorvarth said. “To your home, by the Sage. To this room, by you.”

“You’ve no say in it?”

“The less I have the better. I put too much stock in my own leanings before and my foster father paid for it.” Hjorvarth thought she seemed unsatisfied. “It is my fault Engli is here, so I came to keep him alive… and perhaps murder the Sage.” He shrugged under his ragged white shirt. “But now that I’ve seen his talk of goblins was no story, perhaps I should help him. And trust in his claim that he can save Horvorr.”

Astrid met the words with a careful nod. “But you don’t trust him?”

“Every word from his mouth rings false in my ear. He claimed his plan involved the Hall of Hrothgar, yet we’ve now headed East instead of West. He claimed we had no time to stock supplies before leaving Horvorr, yet he’s happy to wait here.” He managed a sad laugh. “Every man and woman in Horvorr might already be dead.”

Astrid reached up to place her delicate hand on his bruised shoulder. “Edda says they’re fine.”

Hjorvarth walked towards the basin, shrugging her off, and she stumbled. He swished his hand through the water. Dirt and blood ebbed from his large palm. “Hot enough to burn.” He reached under his shirt and began a pathetic struggle to pull it over his shoulders. The fabric tore badly, and then he got it off, revealing bruises and cuts all across his shoulders and a criss-cross of scars down his back.

Astrid’s gaze followed a long scar that ran from shoulder to hip.

“I saw some drawings in your room,” Hjorvarth said as idle mention.

“Of you?”

“They are of me, then? I thought the face familiar, but…” He turned, brows furrowed. “I did not see how you would know to draw me, given that we only just met.”

“I see you in my dreams,” Astrid said, easily meeting his tired stare. “I have for years now. Though I didn’t know your name until Edda told me… so I used to call you the sad man, instead.” She smiled in concern. “I would often see you by water, by the sea or by the lake, though at times you’re staring at a wall of ice. I don’t really know why, but you seem so—you seem lost, I think. Alone.”

Hjorvarth raked muddy fingers down his cheek. “You tell odd lies.” He dipped a hand in the basin. “The water is fine. And I know well enough how to wash myself.”

“Of course.” Astrid’s gaze fell as she departed, only to pause in the doorway. “You said the Sage’s words ring false in your ear… do mine?”

Unauthorized reproduction: this story has been taken without approval. Report sightings.

“They do not,” Hjorvarth admitted. “But oft enough the worst folk are those that believe their own lies.”

***

“Fourth on the left,” Engli repeated as he walked through the narrow corridors. He had been eating and drinking with Gunnar and Dagny and both of them now seemed pleasant enough, which gave him a hard time reconciling the amiable company with those same folk who had, had him beaten and bound.

He reached the small stone room he was searching for, and dashed forwards, nearly banging his head on a jutting pipe. He recognised the huge man slumped lifelessly in the brass tub’s murky water. Hjorvarth had turned deathly pale, save for muted bruises across his shoulders and chest. Engli thought him dead, then marked the rippling of brown water beneath his broad nose.

“Hjorvarth.” Engli shook him by the shoulder. “Are you all right?”

“Hm?” Hjorvarth blinked open his eyes. “Is something wrong?”

“I’m fine,” Engli said. “So is the Sage. They just sent me to get a wash.”

Hjorvarth yawned. He placed his hands on the brass sides, slipping forward and sending water sloshing out from the tub.

Engli stepped back from the splash. “Are you sure you’re all right?”

“Fine,” Hjorvarth murmured, his lips barely above the water. “Though we’re wasting time here.”

Engli met the sentiment with an unconvinced smile. “You look like you need to rest.”

Hjorvarth set his grip again, and heaved one leg over the basin, sending more water onto the stone. “I’ll rest when I’m dead.” He slipped on wet metal when he came over the sides, and thumped into the stone.

Engli didn’t see the warrior he knew on the floor, but a sad and wet man made small by the exhaustion in his bearing and in his pale eyes. “You need some sleep, Hjorvarth. And something to eat, as well.”

“I feel all the worse,” Bjorn said, offering a wry smile now he ducked under the doorway. “Seeing you lying there like that, and knowing you had the better of me.” He tossed a large fur blanket over the naked man. “You should dry yourself off, and then go to bed.”

Hjorvarth squinted up. He pulled the blanket over his shoulders, reminded by his own weakness of Isleif. He then pushed up from one knee, and wobbled to his feet. Speckled fur barely made him decent. “Where do I sleep?”

***

Jorund sat alone on his side of the stone table. He rubbed at his black beard, and stared at the brown-robed man. “Do you think I’m blind?”

The Salt Sage gazed back at him from the darkness of his own hood, offering no answer.

“That I don’t see who you are—what you are?”

The Salt Sage smiled. “A humble servant of Mubarrak?”

“I thought it a myth. A man that can change his face as easily as his clothes. Yet here you are, sat at my table, eating my food. Jorund of The Hill would be rising from his grave… had I not fed his body to trolls.”

“Perhaps the fluids in their stomach broil?” the Sage ventured. “Though I suppose they’ve secreted him into fresh skin by now.” He sipped from his wooden cup of ale. “But I’m not really sure what you mean to begin with. As I never change my face, save for when I shave… and that would be a poor effort by any man’s measure.”

“Why are you here?” Jorund demanded. “Why did you come to the mountains of the Small King?”

“They’re not really his mountains anymore.” The Salt Sage chuckled. “Either way, I’m here because your Small King stole something from me, or rather I gifted it to him under false pretense, and now I need it back.”

“If the Small King is real… and he finds out that I helped you, then my family will suffer badly. I cannot take the risk. I cannot let you leave—”

“You don’t really have a choice in the matter.” The Salt Sage waved a gnawed lamb bone through the air. “You either decide to risk the wrath of some odd and ugly deity that you’ve never met… or, you try to restrain a man sat in front of you. A man that dearly hates restraints.”

Silence settled along the vacant seats and cluttered table, broken only by the distant banter of Gunnar and Bjorn.

Jorund sat more upright in his seat, gripping the axe at his belt.

“I might strike you as a jovial, or even a humorous man.” The Salt Sage placed the bone back on his plate. “And you might mistake that for the mark of a man with a good or a soft heart. But if you press me, Jorund,” his voice shook with wrathful conviction, “then I will snuff you out like a candle. If you so much as stand with that axe in your hand, then you will condemn your entire family to death. I will leave your whole house in darkness.”

***

Bjorn, broad figure barely edged by light, stood amid the snow outside of his home. A shrill wind twisted through the blackness, whistling back and forth across surrounding mountains. The huge moon showed only as a muted orb, silvering an otherwise thick shroud of grey clouds.

“What are you watching for?” asked a deep, weary voice.

“I’m not sure.” Bjorn cast a glance at Hjorvarth, dressed in dark wool, wrapped in furs, standing not far from the open door. “Though I hadn’t expected to see you.” He put his axe in his belt. “You do know you’re leaving at dawn?”

“I did not. Though I’m glad to hear it.” He trudged over, leaving a companionable distance between them, then turned his gaze towards a darkness of stark whites and shaded grey. “I would sleep, if not for odd dreams.”

“Odd dreams?” Bjorn asked, intrigue in his tone. “Of a usual sort, or more peculiar than that?”

“I’d rather not speak on it.”

“And yet you already have…”

Hjorvarth grunted. “How do I say it, then—” He squinted up at the night sky. “I dreamed that I was small, and that was odd enough. But every other man I saw was small as well, and oddly built.”

Bjorn offered him a curious smile, but said nothing.

“I saw women too, smaller than the men,” Hjorvarth continued. “I walked about Jorund’s house—your home—only it was better lit and there was more noise and people there. There had been a murder… a woman had been butchered, and they looked to me to find out who had committed the black act.”

Bjorn’s smile broadened. “I’d have not thought you one to play along with Astrid’s tall tales.” Hjorvarth met the words with a frown. Bjorn mirrored his expression. “Did she not ask you to tell that story?”

“You asked me to tell it,” Hjorvarth reminded.

“And Astrid did not tell you a similar story?” Bjorn asked. “She did not mention dwarves, or dreams, or murder?”

“She did mention dreams, but none to do with dwarves or murder.”

“Sorry.” Bjorn chuckled with surprise. “I had thought this a trick of some kind. Astrid had the same dream when she stayed in that room, and others like it. She said it was just that room that was haunted, and so I stayed there one night, and other nights, after we had moved her to a different room to stop her complaints, but I never had any dreams of dwarves. Or small men, as you put it. So I decided it was just some consequence of her youth… a childish story.”

Hjorvarth nodded as if he understood, even though he didn’t. “Why did you try to kill us?”

“Ah.” Bjorn stared at the darkness, his shadowed face growing solemn. “We didn’t, would be the short answer. Why did we try to tie you up? Fear, I suppose.” He studied the cloud-shrouded moon. “When we saw you, dirty and haggard as you looked, we thought you were outlaws. Jorund wanted to wait to hear your story, but I had no mind to take the risk. He had your axes, and that was fair enough, but you still had your knifes.”

“And you call that reason enough to beat and imprison us?”

Bjorn shrugged. “There was a time when we were more trusting, when four men came to our home, better spoken and better dressed than you or Engli. They stayed the night without causing any trouble, beyond the odd rough word or a hard look, and so we gave no pause when they asked to stay till midday and help us hunt.”

“And…?”

“Jorund, Logi and I, took a pair of them fishing. Logi being my youngest brother, or he was until one of those men opened his throat with a baiting knife.” Bjorn grimaced, shaking his head. “We killed those two easily enough, but it did little good for those here. Gunnar had tried to fight, and got stabbed and beaten for his efforts. They raped all of the women, save Astrid who they meant to keep for last. They murdered my grandmother, Edda, and my aunt Hildi.”

“You killed them?”

“Not soon enough.” Bjorn spoke with a deep regret that showed in his glazed gaze. “It was I alone that decided to treat with you as we did, as it had been my idea to let those men stay with us. Jorund had been reluctant… but I was of a mind that he was stuck in his ways, at risk of becoming a hermit.” He sighed in sorrow. “My aunt and my grandmother. My little brother. All dead because of me. And I thought—wrongly—that my father meant to make the same mistake.”

Hjorvarth considered the words. “Those men hold most the blame.”

“They acted in their nature,” Bjorn said. “The blame is mine. As it would have been today, had I pushed you to murder.”

Hjorvarth watched as grief built in the proud man. “I know what to say, beyond that if you no longer trust your judgement, then you should defer to Jorund.” He paused. “And I can only question the worth of worrying over mistakes you cannot unmake.” He glanced sidelong at Bjorn. “Unless for you time flows both ways?”

“It does not.”

“You could spend some time training with Gunnar.”

Bjorn looked as if he didn’t understand.

“You both seemed badly out of practice today,” Hjorvarth explained.

Bjorn laughed at what he thought was a joke. “I’ve no clue how you managed to move so well in the dark.”

“Brolli would lock me in a lightless cellar full of men armed with clubs and sticks.”

“And you wanted to do that?”

“I did not,” Hjorvarth replied. “Though I don’t think what I wanted ever crossed his mind.”

Footfalls sounded against stone, more slowly onto snow.

Hjorvarth regarded the squat shadow of a man. “Engli?”

“Hjorvarth.” He had his hand around his axe, but loosened his grip and pretended to itch his leg. “Bjorn.”

“Engli.” Bjorn nodded in greeting, then smirked. “Has Dagny kicked you out of bed?”

Engli answered that with an uneasy laugh. “Would you mind if I spoke to Hjorvarth about a private matter?”

“That does me no harm.” Bjorn bowed before ambling towards the stone observatory.

“You went to bed with Jorund’s daughter?” Hjorvarth’s regard grew doubtful. “Are you not in love with Sybille?”

“No to both… yes, to the last one. I mean—I don’t know,” Engli decided. “Why would you even ask that?”

Hjorvarth shrugged. “So what of the private matter?”

“We should speak inside,” Engli said, leading off towards the door. “Come on.”

Hjorvarth followed, crossing into the firelit stone room. “What is this about?” he asked. Engli glanced back at him, but only shook his head, and made his way into the corridor. Hjorvarth had to squeeze through the archway. “Engli!”

“Jorund fought with the Sage,” Engli said, still moving to the stairs. “It went badly for him. And now it’s going to go worse for us if we don’t get out of here.”

“Bad for who?” Hjorvarth asked.

“For Jorund.” They crossed into the stone stairwell. Heated voices played back off of the ceiling. “We can speak of it afterwards.” Engli readied his shield, and descended the stairs two or three steps at a time until he rounded onto the landing where a bruised and bloody Jorund stood with his family. They each had a weapon to hand, whether bow or knife, and were all swearing death on the brown-robed stranger.

The Salt Sage held a slender knife against Astrid’s pale neck. Blood trickled down from a shallow cut, staining her white dress.

“Hello, Engli.” Astrid smiled at him and then at Hjorvarth now he thundered down the stairs. “Hjorvarth.”

Hjorvarth’s pale eyes turned wild. “Sage!”

“There you are, Hjorvarth.” The Salt Sage pulled his knife clear of her neck, but kept his other arm wrapped around her chest. “I think you might have been right about Jorund—he tried to kill me! Can you imagine? So, naturally, I explained that I wanted to leave, but—”

“Lies!” Jorund roared. “This man is not your friend, Hjorvarth. He has no friends. He is an—”

“So naturally!” the Sage ran over him, voice rising over an angry chorus of dissent. “I expressed my desire to leave! And then Jorund summoned his family! And tried to arrest! Maim! Or murder me! As evidenced by the weapons in their hands! And the angry looks upon their faces! Thank—”

Jorund charged forward with his axe. Hjorvarth lurched, catching him by the throat with such force that he dropped his axe. He lifted the bruised mountaineer up, off his feet, and towards the stairwell. Jorund glared down at him, choking and kicking out with his feet, but he saw only his own death reflected in those pale eyes.

Dagny trained her bow on Hjorvarth. Gunnar knocked her aside, sending the arrow into stone. Brenna stepped forward with a knife, but Engli blocked her way.

“Hjorvarth!” Astrid drove her head back and broke free from the Sage’s grip. “Put him down!” She drove her fist under the huge man’s ribs, causing him to lash out and swipe her face. Her cry of pain rooted Hjorvarth in reality, and he saw Jorund, bruised and choking in his grip, as a man and not a foe.

Hjorvarth stepped back from the stairwell, and let the mountaineer crumple to his knees. A metallic clicking began behind him. The silver-plated door grated open with a gust of stale air. Hjorvarth turned towards the darkness beyond the door, then looked drunkenly at all those around the landing.

Engli could see more clearly, and had started a dangerous dance with Brenna, warding away her knife with his shield. He kept a careful watch on Dagny and Gunnar, as well, who now had their bows drawn and aimed at one another.

“I think it’s time for us to go!” the Salt Sage shouted. “Engli. Hjorvarth. If you would be so kind as to come through here.” He gestured towards the dusty, web-strewn corridor. “This is an important path that we must take in order to save Horvorr.”

Engli met the words with a doubtful look. “Go on, Hjorvarth.”

“I wouldn’t,” Brenna warned. “And my husband would say the same if he could. That door leads to darkness and death.”

“Oh, I’d certainly listen to her,” the Sage said. “I can see a definite preference to being murdered in the light by her sharpened knife, rather than coming clear of this madhouse and embarking on a heroic quest.”

Hjorvarth looked down at Astrid, her lip swollen and split open. “I didn’t—”

“Bastard.” Astrid offered him a bloody smile. “It’s time for you to go. You’re not safe here anymore.”

“Hand over the Sage.” Brenna lowered her knife. “Hand him over, and you can both leave here in peace.”

Hjorvarth turned to the gloomy corridor without enthusiasm, but trudged forward into the darkness all the same.

“Come on then, Engli.” The Salt Sage beckoned him forward. “I’ll close it behind us.”

“You don’t strike me as a bad man,” Brenna told Engli now he backed away. “But if you follow him, then it will be the death of you.”

Engli smiled. “I’ve not got a single reason to trust anything you say.” He reached the wall, then hurried into the corridor.

“You’re a heathen,” Dagny told her brother. “A damn coward that puts his love of strangers above the safety of his own family.”

“A man is who he is.” Gunnar shrugged. “It’s just a shame that you are who you are, isn’t it, Dag’?”

“She’s not so bad, Gunnar.” The Salt Sage backed under the doorway, and placed his hands on either side of the frame. “Though I must say you’ve made some admirable choices here. If not for your intervention, this could have easily ended in a massacre.”

Struggling for breath, Jorund glared at the robed man. Brenna and Astrid helped him to his feet.

“Unfortunately your father is one of the bigger idiots I’ve met.” The Salt Sage sighed. “Still, I’ll offer him thanks for his terrible hospitality, and be on my way.”

He bowed, narrowly avoiding an arrow that splintered into stone above him, then swept into the corridor. The silvered door closed with a boom that echoed.

“Sage?” Engli called, not able to see in utter blackness. He turned to Hjorvarth. “I think he’s locked us in here.”

“That’s an odd thought,” the Sage said, startling him. “Why haven’t you turned on your lantern?”

“Because I don’t have one? I entered before you. You should have had the sense to steal one, or at the least tell one of us that we would need one.”

“I was in a stressful situation,” the Sage explained. “What with trying to stay alive while you went to fetch Hjorvarth.”

The men couldn’t see each another, but each stood close enough to feel one another’s presence.

“Fair enough,” Engli conceded. “We still need a light.”

“Nothing to be done for that, I’m afraid.” The Salt Sage turned his head to look about the shadows. “Is Hjorvarth even here?”

Hjorvarth grunted, too confused and ashamed to bother speaking.

“Do you want to lead us off?” the Sage asked. “It’s a fairly simple path, even in the dark. Straight the whole way until it isn’t.”