The Witch of Luna Hill - reading sample / læseprøve

The Witch of Luna Hill ~ Part one ~

Neel Kay

Chapter 1 Merian “So, Merian, when exactly did you fall madly in love with me?”

Merian flinched. “What?” She stared at Birk like she wanted to hurt him.

“I mean...” he faltered when the pencil in her hand suddenly broke under the pressure. “I just assumed...” he stuttered, clearly not used to the unwelcoming stare and hard tone that Merian was shooting at him.

“Well, don’t! I am not in any kind of love with you. I let you study with me. That’s all. It doesn’t mean my little school girl heart is fluttering like a butterfly.” She made quotation marks in the air and rolled her eyes. She’d heard some of the other girls say to each other that that was how Birk made their hearts react. Merian had wanted to vomit – well, bang their heads against each other and then vomit.

“Understood loud and clear.” Birk leaned back, his hands up in the air, palms facing her.

Merian sighed heavily, regretting having answered him so harshly. That wasn’t how it was supposed to go. She wanted him to choose her. She wanted him to take her with him when he went home for the summer to Thunder Rock. Somehow, no matter how difficult it was, she had to try to be nice to him.

“Look, I’m sorry...” she began, feeling like she was betraying all of her principles.

“No, it’s fine,” Birk assured her. “Really, it is! I mean, it’s actually kind of refreshing.”

She didn’t want to look at him as if she thought he was a conceited, cheap little bitch, but she just couldn’t help herself. It

made him laugh out loud. Not a single person shushed him, even though they were in the library and everyone was studying for the final exams. But then who would ever dare to shush the ever so gorgeous and popular Birk Dane? Merian suddenly realised she was sneering at him.

Birk smirked. “You’re kind of funny, Mer.” “Merian! My name’s Merian.”

He nodded indifferently. “So, why are you trying to be nice to me? Emphasis on trying, because clearly you’re struggling. Or is it just not in your nature to be nice to people? That’s it, isn’t it?”

“No,” she just said, not sure how else to respond without throwing him completely off and spoiling any chance of getting what she so needed from him.

Merian gnawed away on the inside of her cheek while staring at Birk’s text book that lay open on the table between them. He was still only on page six and they had a final exam tomorrow.

“I need to come with you to Thunder Rock,” she blurted out in a whisper, looking as if she was in agonising pain while trying to hide her face in her long curls. She didn’t want anyone else hearing it, and in the library the bookshelves had ears, especially if Birk Dane was nearby.

Birk folded his hands behind his head and smiled at her.

Merian pulled a face. “I cannot for the world understand why you would want that when your heart isn’t - what was it? - fluttering at the sight of me?”

“Are you making fun of me?”

“No! I’m trying to understand you. I mean, you’ve spent the entire year being socially retarded, and now suddenly you want to come home with me. Explain it to me, please.”

“Never mind.” Merian returned her gaze to her text book. She really needed to do well on that exam tomorrow. It was the only class

that she could count on for pulling up her extremely poor grade average. She’d fallen terribly behind this semester, too distracted to care about her exams, or anything else for that matter. Besides, she strongly suspected this was the last time the university could make students sweat over finals. The place was suffering badly in the war.

Education wasn’t exactly a top priority at the moment.

“Wow.” Birk learned over his book and actually turned over a page, but he didn’t even look at it. “You are so weird it’s just ridiculous.”

Merian nodded. She actually nodded, because, well, that was probably true. And in all honesty, she really didn’t mind being weird.

Rather weird than ordinary.

“I’m just going to assume you want my body then,” he said, trying to hide the twitch of his lips with a hand.

“What? No!” Merian exclaimed and was immediately shushed from somewhere behind the biology shelves. She tried desperately to put away the repulsed expression that she’d felt creep upon her face.

“Then tell me why,” Birk demanded.

Merian closed her eyes for a moment and took a deep breath.

When she opened them again and looked over at Birk he was smiling patiently. “I have all night,” he grinned.

“You have to study. I have to study.”

“Then tell me quickly so we can get back to studying.” He leaned over the table. “Come on. Whisper it to me,” he whispered himself before winking at her.

It almost made her enjoy revealing to him that the reason wasn’t his perfect abs or irresistible charm. If only the real reason wasn't so embarrassing.

“Fine!” Merian sighed, biting the bullet. “I don’t want to go home.” She looked at her hands folded on the table in front of her, and swallowed once before continuing. “And I have nowhere else to

go because I’m a social retard, as you so nicely put it, who does not have any friends whom I can stay with. But you always pick one to come home with you for the summer. Not that I really understand why anyone in their right mind would want to go to Northland voluntarily. But that is why. And if I could get out of going home I would happily spend the summer at Thunder Rock, even with you.”

She probably shouldn’t have added that last bit, she suddenly realised. Merian bit her lip as she looked up at Birk.

At first, he looked somewhat taken aback and stared at her with his mouth hanging open. Then he started to snort. Again no one shushed him.

Merian gawked at Birk dead-pan.

“Oh my god, you’re serious!?” he said completely stunned.

“Yes,” she mumbled, blushing slightly with annoyance. “I am.”

“But why? Why don’t you want to go home? Don’t you want to see your family?”

“Yes,” Merian admitted. “I miss my mother, I really do. But I also know that I’m going to turn into a fourteen year old version of myself after twenty-four hours with her.”

Birk arched an eyebrow. “Meaning..?”

“Meaning that she gets on my nerves so much that I start slamming doors and talk back like a right little brat.”

Merian shook her head. She was tired and miserable from trying to figure out a way to avoid going home for six weeks, and even more tired and miserable from the realisation that Birk seemed to be her only way out. How could she ever get him to choose her?

He never brought home girls because girls immediately thought that meant that they were his girlfriend. Merian had once overheard Birk tell one of his friends that he had too much love in him for just one girl. That was the first time Birk Dane had made her want to vomit.

Well, slap the hell out of him on behalf of the human race and then vomit.

But Merian wouldn’t be the needy, jealous girlfriend. She’d be a friend or maybe rather an acquaintance. Maybe she could even help him pull? Not that she had any idea how.

“I heard that your brother is the new sheriff of Witch’s Nose,” Birk said quietly, clearly thinking that he’d found the reason to her domestic aversion.

Merian really didn’t want to talk about it; but yes, that was partly why she was constantly on edge when near her mother, who would not shut up about how heartbroken it made her that her only son was in collusion with the man who had split Bragimark in two in an evil war.

“Must be really difficult for your mother?”

“Yes, it is! Thank you for making me feel even guiltier about that than I already do.” Aggressively, she banged her book shut and crammed everything into her bag.

“Where are you going? Merian...!” Birk threw his hands up in the air and sighed before pushing back his chair, getting ready to go after her.

“Forget it,” Merian said, sounding much more passiveaggressive than she’d intended. “I’ll think of something else.”

“Something else?” Birk got up from his chair, looking both baffled and concerned. “Is it really that bad?” He reached out to grab her hand, but she managed to avoid his touch.

Somewhere someone gasped.

“Don’t worry about it!” When she left she could feel the eyes of every single female person in the library burn into her back. She felt like yelling at them to get a fucking life, letting them know that she wasn’t about to steel their precious Birk Dane away from their sorry excuses for a life. Stupid sheep!

“Is it really that bad?” she mimicked Birk when she got outside and felt the freshness of the cool night air hit her face.

Bragimark was at war, her own brother had joined the enemy’s side, and her uncle expected Merian to be nothing but eternally considerate to her mother.

“She’s lost her husband. And now her only son is fighting his own family. The least you can do is treat her with the kindness and respect that she deserves.” Her uncle had said it several times when Merian had been home last winter, making her want to hit him hard.

But she’d gritted her teeth and nodded obediently and instead let it out on the pillows on her bed. When she’d left for the fourth semester there had been feathers all over her bedroom.

No one seemed to care how it all made Merian feel. She had also lost loved ones. Her father had been killed, and she too had had her heart broken when Lyder had turned his back on everyone at home and had become one of Vithar’s much dreaded sheriffs.

Yes, it really was that bad! Plus if she heard the name Kord Magritte, her mother’s absolute favourite distraction, mentioned ever again she would most definitely kill someone.

Merian let out a pained cry that echoed in the triangular square between the library, the science faculty and the administration’s building. She closed her eyes and took a few deep gulps of breath.

Well, fine. She would go home. She would just try to spend as little time as possible with her mother and her uncle. It was summer, after all. She could go out on walks. It was not like last winter when the knee deep snow had made it impossible to go very far.

She opened her eyes, nodded and then tussled up her auburn curls. She would just have to face the confrontations and deal with them on site. Right! Head on!

“Fuck!” she mumbled.

“Right now?” Birk chuckled, startling Merian.

“What are you doing here?” She didn’t have to be nice to him anymore or attempt to. He’d turned her down, right? She could go back to treating him with the full-on contempt that he deserved.

“I go to school here,” he said matter-of-factly, completely ignoring her harsh tone.

She curled up her eyebrows, rolled her eyes at him and started walking towards the girls’ dorms. Birk didn’t follow her.

“Hey, Merian,” he shouted when she was about to turn the corner of the administration’s building and head down the path that led to the dorms.

She stopped and looked back. Birk was still standing where she had left him.

“I don’t bring girls home,” he continued.

Merian nodded. She thought it was an explanation to why he wouldn’t be choosing her and she felt the last tiny thread of hope vacate her body. Suddenly, she felt extremely exhausted. Well, that really was it, wasn’t it? She was actually going home. Maybe she could kill herself once she got there?

“It’s fine...” Her voice wobbled. She wasn’t even sure that he was able to hear her over the distance.

“However,” he shook his head like he couldn’t believe what he was about to say, “if you really want to you can come.”

Merian thought she had heard him wrong. She took a few shaky steps in Birk’s direction and then hesitated. She tried to control the smile that had crept upon her face, but she was pretty sure she was practically grinning like a maniac. “To Thunder Rock?” she said, almost giggling.

Birk nodded and sighed. “Yes, you can come with me to Thunder Rock.”

“But why?”

No, don’t ask why, she said to herself in acute panic. He’d just start to reconsider and change his mind when he realised what he was getting himself into. Merian squeezed her lips together and contemplated running away before he had a chance to backtrack.

“Because...” Birk shrugged his shoulders and then he laughed.

“You seem like an, um, interesting person even if you are a bit on the weird side. It might even be fun.”

Merian didn’t know what to say, and instead she just giggled excessively and it didn’t even bother her that much.

“We leave right after finals,” Birk said and held up an index finger as if to point out that she had to respect the time frame.

“No problem!” She beamed at him.

“Good. Good luck tomorrow.”

“You too. And Birk? Thank you!”

Again he shrugged. Then he turned around and walked back into the library. When he was out of sight, Merian fell to her knees, threw her hands to the sky and whispered: “Thank you!” And for the first time in several weeks, she felt like she could actually breathe.

Chapter 2 Aia Aia wasn’t really expecting much out of life. She wasn’t an adventurer, had a tendency to be a little bit too glum and was too much of a realist to be a dreamer. She expected to have to work in the forest from dawn till dusk every day for the rest of her life. Hard labour would eventually run her body down until it one day cracked and she’d walk around like most of the old women in the village of Norden, hunched over and staring forever down on their dirty feet and the eternal mud beneath them.

She supposed she ought to be thinking differently, dream big, and embrace life in some loud and spectacular manner, considering she had been found drowned in a lake a year ago. Coming back from the dead might have made her feel invincible somehow, or so people expected, but it didn’t. Instead, the experience had made her realise that life was fragile and there was no need to gamble with it. So instead she grew accustomed to the quiet and the simple life. And it really wasn’t all that bad.

Aia had in fact been dead when one of the villagers had found her in the lake a few miles west of Norden last summer. She’d had a bloody stab wound just under her left collarbone, bruises all over her body, especially around her throat and neck, and according to Detmer, the man who’d found her, she hadn’t been breathing.

No one knew her. No one had come looking for her. Aia often wondered how she’d ended up in such a terrible state, and most importantly, who had killed her. Her thoughts would wander and she would try really hard to remember what had happened the day Detmer had managed to bring her back to life by blowing air into her mouth. Or what had happened any other day before that, really, because she couldn’t remember a single thing from before she woke

up in Detmer and Meg’s little cottage in the outskirts of Norden. Not even her name. The only reason they called her Aia was because when Meg had asked her what her name was she’d said: “I...ah...?”

At night, she dreamed of deep dark waters engulfing her and filling up her lungs and killing her. She dreamed of a man who was holding her down. She didn’t know what he looked like, but she could feel his hatred and she knew his voice; raspy and always with an undertone of loathing like she was vermin to him. She just couldn’t dig him out of her memory, but she knew she knew that voice. He had a snake and he always called her Poppy. Aia hated it and refused to acknowledge that it was her real name. But maybe it was?

She hadn’t told anyone about the man in her dreams or the name he called her. She had, however, told Meg about the water dream. She felt like she had to explain why she was always kicking and screaming in her sleep and then waking up breathless and gasping for air.

Sometimes Meg would wake her and complain that Aia was keeping her awake. Not out of concern, obviously; Meg had trouble caring about anyone but herself. When Detmer had passed away a few months back they’d been asked to vacate the cottage, because it was reserved for those who worked in the forest. Meg had been screaming that she would die if she had to leave her home.

“We would have to sell our bodies to smelly, disgusting men,” she’d said to Aia one night. “And you would probably just end up pregnant, and who in their right mind would bring a baby into this horrible world in a time of war and poverty? You might as well just abort it,” she’d hissed as if Aia had, in fact, been with child.

“Then you go sell your body,” Aia had said, “and I’ll, I don’t know, join the greys.”

Meg’s eyes had almost rolled out of their sockets. “You wouldn’t! Those evil, murderous...” She’d looked around their tiny

living room as if enemy soldiers might actually be hiding behind the furniture. Then she’d lowered her voice and said: “I might not care much about you, but please don’t join them. They’re evil. They are pure and rotting evil.”

“Right. So, what do we do?” Aia had said, not really caring that Meg had basically just said that she hated her, because Aia’s feelings towards Meg weren’t exactly on the warm and fuzzy side either. They tolerated each other. Just.

Meg had shrugged and then signalled in the direction of the forest with a nod of her head. “You work there and we can stay.”

“Me? What about you?”

“Oh, I’m far too old. Obviously, I could if I would,” she’d said, not realising the slip of her tongue. “But you’re young, you have a strong back.”

And that was how Aia ended up working alongside the woodsmen, stacking wood for winter and making lunch for them .

She went into the forest at sunup and came back to the cottage at sundown. She and Meg ate their supper and then she went to sleep.

That was her life, day in and day out; monotonous and uneventful, and she’d gotten used to it.

Aia wasn’t the only woman who worked in the forest, but she was by far the strongest and the one who got the most work done, in spite of her petite frame; probably because she didn’t care much about standing around gossiping all day and eyeing up the woodsmen. Sometimes she would even help cut down trees. If she had to say so herself, she was actually quite handy with an axe.

On this day, Aia wasn’t expecting anything out of ordinary when she once again left for the forest at the crack of dawn. When she had walked through the village towards the forest, old man Poole stopped her just before leaving Norden.

“You walk into that forest every day, child,” he said.

Aia arched an eyebrow. She was hardly a child anymore. Well, maybe she was compared with Poole, who was pushing a hundred. If she had to guess she’d say she was about twenty.

“How far is it? Five miles? And then you return at nightfall, also on foot.”

“That’s about right,” Aia smiled as she kept walking, trying to look busy so he wouldn’t notice that she was trying to avoid him. She really wasn’t in a talkative mood in the early hours of the day.

“You know that it’s your birthday today,” Poole smiled, refusing to let her keep walking. “Happy birthday, child.”

“It’s not my birthday. I don’t know when my birthday is.”

“So it might be today?”

Aia shrugged her shoulders. So what if it was? There really wasn’t anything to celebrate, was there?

“No, but what I mean is, today is exactly a year after Detmer brought you back to life. It’s your re-birthday, so to speak.”

“Really? A year ago today?” Had it really been that long? Back then she’d imagined she’d have her memory back by now. Now she wondered if it would ever come back.

“Happy re-birthday.”

“Thank you.” Aia shot him a little smile. “I’m one year old today,” she grinned.

“Yes, you are,” Poole laughed. “And you know what? I think the sun will come out today.”

“No, it’s going to rain. It always rains.”

“Not always.”

“I think another thunderstorm is brewing,” Aia claimed, even though the sky was covered only by a thin layer of light grey clouds.

It annoyed her. It made it impossible for her to complain excessively about the weather; one of her absolute favourite pastimes.

Poole shook his wrinkled head slowly. Then he chuckled and said: “I want to give you a birthday present.”

“Oh no, you really don’t have to,” Aia protested. She tried to back away, but Poole grabbed both her hands and pulled her with him to his stable. She could easily have gotten away from his grip, even though he was surprisingly strong for a 100 year-old, but she didn’t want to seem rude.

“I really have to get to work,” she said.

But Poole ignored her protests. “This is Maply,” he said with pride and unfolded his arms towards a brown mare staring dead-pan at Aia. Its nostrils widened once and then it turned its indifferent gaze towards Poole.

“It’s a horse,” Aia ascertained. Why was he showing her his horse? Surely he wasn’t giving it to her?

“Indeed it is. And she’s yours for the day.”

“What do you mean?”

“You can ride her to the forest so you don’t have to walk.”

But she liked walking. She was used to it. It didn’t bother her to walk ten miles a day. But he looked so proud and so happy, and she was afraid he’d fall over dead of a broken heart if she refused his gift.

When Poole’s smile started to quiver in the corners of his mouth she hurriedly said: “That’s really nice, Poole, I could do with a day without walking all those miles.”

His smile immediately returned to full force. He clapped his hands excitedly and began preparing Maply.

It was safe to say that Aia wasn’t an experienced rider, and it was also safe to say that horses made her incredibly nervous. When she got up on the animal she tried desperately not to let it smell her fear, and she swallowed hard several times.

“Maply is very gentle,” Poole assured her just as he gave the mare a slap on the bottom, and it started to walk slowly down the road leading into the forest.

It was a pace that suited Aia, and she relaxed a bit until she thought about what to do with the horse once she got to her destination. How did she make it stop? And was she expected to feed it?

Well, at least something new had happened, even if it did make her comfort zone shake ever so slightly.

It had rained all night. It often did in Northland where the raging of thunderstorms wasn’t unusual. The road to the woodsmen’s station was covered with pebbles, lots of them, to keep the road from getting slippery with mud. The ride on Maply was going well, and Aia would probably have gotten to her destination safely if only that squirrel hadn’t suddenly darted across the road.

At first, Aia thought everything would be fine. Maply started and then she backed up a bit. Aia tried to sooth her with the sounds she’d heard other riders use when trying to calm down a horse. But apparently Aia was saying them all wrong. Suddenly, a twig broke under one of the horse’s hooves and Maply went into a wild gallop down a muddy byroad.

Aia was hanging on for dear life, so much that she didn’t even have enough strength to let out a scream. A tiny “help” managed to escape her lips, but it sounded muffled like it was being sucked right back into her mouth. She was clinging to Maply’s neck with both arms, and her legs were clenched around the saddle.

This was just great. She’d survived a brutal knife attack and had been brought back to life after having drowned just so she could die on this stupid horse, because a squirrel and a twig had scared it?

If she did survive there was no way in hell she would ever come even

remotely near one of those damn creatures again, birthday present or not.

Maply galloped in a panic down the byroad and then swerved left down a much wider forest road. The sudden move made the saddle jerk loose and slide down to the right side of the horse. Aia fell with it. She tried desperately to climb back up on the animal’s back, but twigs and branches kept hitting her in the face, making her lose her grip.

“Hey!” The strange, loud voice made Maply rear several times, and when it sped away again Aia couldn’t hold on any longer. She landed on her right shoulder, rolled around a few times, hurting every single limb on her body, and then ended up with her face in a pool of mud.

“Shit,” she mumbled, pulling her head up. But when trying to get up further a sharp pain shot through her right shoulder, making her cry out in agony and collapse back into the mud.

“Stupid, moronic, dim-witted horse,” she hissed. With the support of her left arm she once again tried to get up. But the ground was slippery with mud, and as she, shaken and searchingly, got to her feet she suddenly lost her footing. Aia fell on her behind and slid all the way down the deep slope by the side of the road. She covered her face with her hands and screamed as loudly as she could until she hit the bottom with a grunt. She lay there for a few moments before opening her eyes, looking straight up in a sky that drew increasingly darker by the minute. She’d said it would rain. It often did.

“Oh my goodness, are you alright? Are you dead? Hello?”

Aia figured it was the voice of the man who had startled Maply even more than she’d already been. She tried to turn around, but her entire body was aching and refused to comply.

“Can you speak?” the man then added, sounding worried.

“I’m not dead,” she managed to yell back. It hurt in her chest when she breathed and talked.

“Thank goodness! Are you hurt?”

“That would be a yes!”

“Really?” His voice broke.

Aia swallowed and again she looked up at the sky, thinking she was lucky that she had slid down a slope that was in a clearing.

Had she hit a tree on her way down she most definitely would have been killed and then some.

“Is it bad?”

With a lot of effort and a series of agonised cries Aia managed to roll around so she could sit up on her knees and look up the slope and see the man who was standing up there on the road.

“Can you crawl up?” he said with hope in his voice. “Ugh, I really don’t like all this mud.” He held his hands to his chest, both his little fingers sticking out. He was eyeing the muddy slope with lucid aversion.

“You don’t like mud?” Aia yelled back. “Then why the hell do you live in Northland where it rains more than anywhere in the entire country?”

“Well, because of my research.”

“Your research?”

Who cared about his research? Well, she supposed she had asked. But when were they going to talk about rescuing her?

“Yes, the lightning.” He gestured upwards and nodded.

Aia had no idea what he was talking about. “I’ve been hurt pretty badly,” she then said. “I don’t think I’m going to be able to get up from here without help.”

“I will get you help,” the man yelled back, suddenly getting all excited. “Stay where you are. I will get you help.”

“Alright, I’ll stay here...” she mumbled when she couldn’t see him anymore.

Then suddenly, he emerged at the edge of the road again. “I promise I’ll return with help. It might just take a little time, but I will be back with help,” he assured her.

“Good.” Aia groaned in pain. “Thank you.” She rolled back over on her back. It wasn’t the most comfortable position, but it was the one that hurt the least.

Chapter 3 Aia When the first raindrops fell Aia had been lying at the bottom of the slope for what seemed like hours. In reality, it had probably only been about twenty minutes.

She had tried a few times to roll over on her knees, and gritting her teeth she had attempted to try and climb the steep slope, but it had hurt so incredibly much that she’d actually passed out.

Now she just lay there waiting for that man to return with help. She really hoped he remembered where he had left her. He had, however, seemed a little confused, and she was starting to get nervous she wouldn’t be found.

And now it rained. A lot. Aia was getting drenched and she started to shiver. The tiny little lump that had appeared in her throat when she’d regained consciousness after having fainted the first time grew bigger, until she was suddenly sobbing loudly and violently. And with her luck, or lack of it, she could probably also expect a pack of wolves to drop by, any minute now.

“She’s down there, Regin!”

Aia’s head jerked up. It was him. He’d come back. She quickly wiped her eyes and nose with the back of her hand and once again rolled slowly over on her knees and looked up.

He was accompanied by another man, a much taller man with broad shoulders and a huge red beard. “How are you holding up?” he yelled down to her.

“I’m not really,” she managed to say through the chattering of her teeth.

“How do we do this?” Red beard contemplated. “I don’t think throwing you a rope and pulling you up will help much if you’re in that much pain. Where does it hurt the most?”

“Everywhere! My shoulder, mostly, maybe. I think it’s dislocated.”

“Alright,” he nodded. “I’m coming down.” He tied one end of a rope around a tree, the other end around his waist and then proceeded carefully down the slope towards her.

The other man kept looking down at Aia, biting his nails and fidgeting with his jacket collar.

“Hello,” Red beard said when he squatted down next to Aia and smiled. There was a friendly air about him and Aia immediately liked him. “I’m Regin. What’s your name?” he said as he began examining her shoulder.

“Aia.” “What did she say?” lightning man yelled from the road.

“She said her name is Aia,” Regin shouted back. He put his thumb under his chin and his forefinger on his lip as he was contemplating how to transport her up the slope without having her scream in heart-wrenching agony all the up and beyond.

“Oh, that’s really pretty,” it sounded from the road.

“He’s kind of weird, isn’t he?” Aia whispered to Regin.

“He prefers eccentric,” he whispered back. His hair was as red as his beard and he had the most amazing dark eyes with the hint of a golden circle around the iris.

“Now, you said your shoulder might be dislocated? Maybe if I push it back you’ll be able to make the ride up the hill.”

“What do you mean push it back?”

Before Aia had much of a chance to protest against the plan Regin put one hand between the shoulder and the collarbone and the other hand directly on the shoulder, and then he both pushed and pulled at the same time.

Aia screamed as the excruciating stabbing of pain left her with stars in the corner of her eyes, and then once again, everything went

black. She came back to just as they reached the road, and Regin lifted her up into his arms.

“I have a blanket,” lightning man sang, hurrying along with a woollen blanket which he put on top of her.

“Unfold it, man,” Regin groaned.

“But she’s muddy. You’re muddy.” The blanket was removed and unfolded, and he tried to wrap her in it without having to touch her too much. “What are we going to do with her, Regin? Should we take her home and give her a warm bath?”

“Well, it is the least you can do. Hey, are you okay?” He lowered his voice to a whisper whenever he spoke to Aia. But she couldn’t speak. The pain was numbing, and when she wasn’t sobbing uncontrollably her teeth chattered hard. She was absolutely convinced she was going to die from her injuries.

“What is wrong with her?” she heard lightning man wonder. “I mean, we did save her. She’ll be alright, won’t she?”

“How can you be this stupid as a professor?” Regin hissed.

“She’s hurt, man. She’s cold and exhausted and probably also hurt internally. I’d bet you’d be far worse off than her if the same thing happened to you, you whiner.”

“Regin…!”

“Will you just go get the coach ready?”

“Um, how do you mean?”

“Put some blankets and pillows out on the seat.” He was still holding Aia in his arms, moved her around as if she was weightless to him. “Don’t worry,” he whispered in her ear.

“There, all set,” the professor said, and as Regin put Aia in the coach he wondered: “You think I should get her a new horse? I probably should because the other one ran away. Do you think it ran home? Where do you think she’s from?”

“I don’t know,” Regin sighed. “I think that right now we should concentrate on getting her back to the house so she can heal.”

“Is something broken? Do you think you can fix her?”

“I think so. But we have to hurry.” Regin wrapped the blanket around Aia’s legs, rearranged the one around her shoulders and placed a pillow under her head. Aia groaned in agony and opened her eyes just a squint.

Regin was rubbing his hands together, making a strange ball of glowing orange light appear between his hands.

“Nothing to be afraid of,” he assured her when he noticed she was looking at him. “It’ll numb down the pain and you’ll be just fine, I promise.”

Then he put his hands around the lower half of her cheeks and the sides of her neck. Warmth pulsated against her skin and penetrated it. It felt like tiny electric shocks.

Aia tried to pull back, but Regin shushed her gently. “Don’t be scared. It’ll help you.”

“When we get home do you think she’ll appreciate some hot tea with honey?” the professor suddenly interrupted.

Regin sighed and rolled his eyes.

Aia thought that if he hadn’t been a professor she would have thought he was a little mentally challenged. But maybe he was?

Maybe professor was an ironic nickname?

“Where are you taking me?” she mumbled, again seeing the darkness appear in the corner of her eyes. But amazingly enough, the pain was gone. She’d never before felt this relaxed,

comfortable and

content. It was some gift that Regin possessed.

“We’re taking you home with us to fix you up. You’ve been hurt pretty badly,” Regin replied. Then he climbed out of the coach, leaving Aia to herself, and sat up on the front seat with the professor.

“Let’s get home to Thunder Rock.”

*** Aia had no recollection of how she’d ended up in one of the many beds in lightning man’s mansion. Apparently, she had been out cold for a day or two. She had kept passing out and had also come down with a fever which had made her slip in and out of consciousness.

“We thought you would die!” the professor exclaimed the first morning Aia felt strong enough to come down for breakfast. “Even though...” He stopped. His big round eyes stared at her as if he suddenly realised that he really didn’t know her. Then he squeezed his thin lips together and lifted up his strange almost oblong chin and sniffled.

His superior stare made it very clear that she was not to ask what he’d been about to say. But Aia had a feeling it might have something to do with Regin’s orb of orange light that he had made appear between his hands the other day. Aia was still sore all over, but much to her surprise nothing was broken and nothing bled internally. Clearly, Regin was a healer – one of the gifted people who had managed to keep under the radar of Vithar and his army of grey soldiers, and out of the prison on Tooth Island.

“I’m glad I didn’t,” Aia said with a shy smile. “And I’m glad you came back with help.”

The professor shook his head, looking almost embarrassed now. “Here, have some breakfast. How do you like my breakfast room?”

“Um, it’s really nice?” Aia looked around, seeing one big oak table and only one chair. She stared at it. “Why is there only one chair?”

“It’s my chair,” the professor snapped possessively, making Aia jump and take a step back. “I mean,” he said in a milder tone, “it’s usually just me here. But you can borrow it and sit down and eat.” He stared at the chair with a longing glare. “Breakfast,” he then added.

“Thank you.” Aia walked sideways to the chair while keeping a close eye on the professor. “It’s a very big house you got here, Professor Dane.”

“It is one of my family’s estates.” He shrugged.

“One of them?” Aia mumbled as she pulled out the chair. She wavered. She was worried the professor might do something crazy if she actually did sit down.

“Go ahead,” he said and nodded. “Do you want tea?”

Reluctantly, Aia sat down while the professor turned around to fetch a teacup from the narrow serving table along one of the side walls.

“Do you live here all by yourself?” she asked as she scanned the room for the quickest escape.

“Regin lives here too. He’s my cook.”

“Oh, really? Is he here?” She really hoped he would walk in any second.

“No, he went to Saltung to pick up my nephew. He’s coming home for the summer.”

Suddenly, the professor seemed more normal and when he put the full teacup down in front of her he shot her a little encouraging smile. “Do you want a little bit of honey in your tea? You still sound a bit hoarse.”

“Sure, why not?”

“Yes, why indeed not?” he shouted and then turned around to get more cups which he then filled with tea. One, two, three, four cups were filled to the brink and normality was again relative.

Aia wondered when he would get around to putting in the honey, or more importantly, when he would leave the room so she could make her escape.

“When is Regin coming back?” she asked, trying desperately not to let the professor know that he was making her nervous.

“Later,” he simply replied. “Do you like cheese?”

Aia nodded.

“Not everyone likes cheese. I personally love cheese. But I don’t particularly like eggs. Do you like eggs?”

“Yes, I like most foods. I’m not really that picky.”

“But you’re so tiny,” the professor exclaimed, suddenly staring at her neck. It made Aia shift in her seat, and when she swallowed his eyes darted up to her face. “Do I make you nervous?” he asked, looking embarrassed.

Aia didn’t move a muscle. “A bit,” she admitted while holding her breath.

“I’m so sorry. I have that effect on people.” Then he shrugged as if it was nothing and continued to fetch her breakfast.

Bread and berries were placed on the table in front of Aia, and when Professor Dane seemed to be finished Aia sent him a meek smile and said: “Looks good.”

“Well, you dig in,” he said proudly. “I’m going to have to excuse myself as I have some work I need to finish up.”

“Oh, you do what you have to do,” Aia said and exhaled slowly through her nose. When he was gone she stared long at the door he’d exited through. Then she looked at all the food in front of her, and her growling stomach decided that she needed food before fleeing.

“At least you’ll die full,” Aia mumbled to herself and sunk her teeth into a piece of bread.

Chapter 4 Merian “Why do you think you’re so absolutely horrible at making friends?”

Merian tried to look as if she was really giving it some serious thought by cocking her head to one side, narrowing her eyes and pursing her lips. Then she said: “I don’t know? Maybe I’m just not as endearingly charming as you?”

Birk nodded. “Yes, that is probably why,” he said, sounding very serious. But when she looked over at him he winked, and Merian pulled a face.

They had been travelling several hours by coach from the university in the Thumb towards the mountains. Merian had never been this far north before.

“You remembered to send word to your mother about where you’ll be?” Birk asked, making Merian roll her eyes at him. “Oh, right, I already asked you that,” he said as the memory seemed to dawn on him.

“Yes, you did. Twice. What’s the matter? Is all the partying and drinking making you stupid?”

“Hey! Don’t make me regret bringing you. I can still send you back, you know.”

Merian pressed her lips together and looked down on her hands. She found it really difficult to be nice to him, but she had to make an effort. He had helped her more than he would ever realise and for that she was grateful, but she hadn’t really been acting it.

“I’m sorry,” she murmured.

Birk eyed her curiously and then shook his head, looking slightly amused. He did that a lot.

Merian looked out of the window of the coach and noticed they were nearer the coast now. “Why is it that you live with your uncle?” she then thought out loud. “Don’t you have parents?”

Birk looked down and shrugged before sending his gaze out through the same window. Obviously, he didn’t like talking about his parents. Merian was just about to apologise for asking when Birk opened his mouth and said: “My father and I moved in with his brother after my mother died in childbirth. My father passed away a few years back. He had a weak heart.”

Merian nodded. She wished she hadn’t asked. She often did.

“It was at my father’s funeral that my uncle decided to tell me that my mother wasn’t really dead. That it had been a lie my father had told me all my life to protect me from the truth.”

Birk was now staring Merian straight in the eyes, looking at her as if she’d known all about it and ought to have told him.

Merian swallowed. His face was hard, his eyes cold and his mouth sneering.

“I’m sorry...” Merian mumbled. She shifted in her seat and her eyes wandered aimlessly.

Birk shook his head slightly. “She didn’t die. She abandoned me,” he said slowly. Then he coughed and it was as if he snapped back to the good old cheery Birk, and everything seemed alright again. He even smiled at Merian.

“Needless to say,” he continued in a rather sarcastic tone, “my relationship with my uncle is a wee bit strained. That is why I prefer to take friends home with me during vacations; to avoid the awkward silences. That and to keep me from killing the son of a bitch.”

“But that could also explain your mass consumption of women.” It just blurted out of Merian’s mouth before she even had a chance to think it over.

“What is that supposed to mean?” A slight chill quickly returned to Birk’s voice. “That I have mommy issues? Well, aren’t you clever! And what do you intend to do about it? You want to save me?” He snorted coldly.

“No, I...” Merian continuously shook her head as she stuttered her way through an explanation that assured him that she had no intentions of saving him. “That’s not why...”

“I know, I know,” he interrupted her impatiently, waving his hand dismissively at her. “You just want to escape your crazy mother.” He sighed. “Maybe your behaviour is also down to mommy issues?”

“No, I’ve always been this way.”

“Talking before thinking?”

Merian both shrugged and nodded. She felt embarrassed.

Again, she looked out of the window. They were nearing a port. “I thought we were going over the mountains?” she said, feeling relieved to be presented with an opportunity to change the subject.

She just hoped Birk would go along with it.

“No, we’re sailing around them,” Birk explained, following Merian’s gaze and confused expression when they headed towards the port in Agan.

“But why? Why don’t we just go over the Saxton pass?”

He laughed. “Are you serious? Have you not heard?”

Merian shook her head. “I don’t usually travel north.”

“It’s not safe,” Birk explained. “We’d probably get robbed, and you’d be raped for sure.”

“What?” She instantly pressed her knees together and folded her arms over her chest. “Why, um, why?”

“A few outlawed gangs hang around the Saxton pass; criminals who are only interested in valuables and violence.” Birk

shrugged. “So we sail around. It’s safer. No one gets robbed. Or raped.”

“Right,” Merian gulped. “Good idea.” *** The journey from the university took them almost two days with a night spent at the small inn in Agan, before travelling on to the much larger town of Saltung some fifty miles south of Thunder Rock.

“Regin will come pick us up,” Birk said as their luggage was being unloaded from the coach. “He’s my uncle’s cook, chauffeur, mechanic... well, everything, really, except lover.” He grinned.

They stood a while on the side of the busy road. Birk searched the crowd of people. “And he’s late,” he ascertained.

“So what do we do?” Merian asked.

Even though Bragimark was a small country, at least after the war against Niola some thirty years ago in which they lost the entire chunk of the mainland to their feuding neighbours, the northern part was so very different from Merian’s home county of Witch’s Nose, so named after its shape which indeed resembled the crooked nose of a witch of old. Though, in this day of age, you couldn’t really see who was a witch anymore. Witchcraft had become almost a commonplace, although true powers hadn’t.

The further north they’d gotten the heavier the clouds and the darker everything appeared. It also seemed to affect the people living here. They all looked so gloomy and serious. Merian didn’t understand why. As she’d heard it the war wasn’t that visible in Northland, so why the long faces?

A couple of soldiers in the characteristic dark grey uniforms, which were the reason why Vithar’s men in colloquial terms were called the greys, came marching down the street, passing just behind

them. Merian followed them with her eyes. Maybe Northland had become just as infected with Vithar’s atrocities as the rest of Bragimark?

Birk didn’t seem all that bothered. Or maybe he hadn’t noticed them? “We go to the tavern and wait,” he said. “We’ll get something to eat. Come on, I’m starving!”

Merian’s stomach growled as she followed Birk who had picked up their entire luggage. And she hurried in front of him and held the door as he struggled with the handle.

“Did you have to bring so much stuff?” he huffed. “What’s in here anyway?”

Merian helped him put down every bag and suitcase at the side of their table in the back of the cosy and lively little tavern. It felt like it was a completely different world from the overcast sky and the serious expressions that had walked past her just outside.

“It’s my books,” she lied, knowing only too well how heavy her weapons and armour were. They were at war, after all, and she had to keep up her sword fighting skills.

“You brought books? What the hell for? It’s summer vacation.”

“I like books!”

Merian froze as she spotted two more greys at the bar. One of them was staring straight at her. She sat down quickly just as the sheriff walked in. Merian recognised the three stripes with the strange V in a circle across on his sleeve; the same marking Lyder had on his grey uniform.

Merian had only seen him in that uniform once, but it was an image she’d never forget. Come to think of it, it was actually the last time she’d seen her brother. That had been just before the Winter Festival.

The two soldiers hurried out by the sight of the sheriff who was now scanning the room. His eyes stopped at Birk’s and Merian’s table.

“Birk Dane,” he shouted, making Merian’s stomach lurch. She glanced down at her luggage and hoped to god that he wasn’t going to search their stuff. Not that it was illegal to be carrying weapons, but she wasn’t really sure how to explain why she was travelling with so many of them. The explanation because I really want to kill your boss would probably just get her into trouble.

“You’re home!” the sheriff said to Birk. “Who’s your friend?”

“Someone from school,” Birk said, not looking too comfortable with the situation.

Merian’s stomach turned stone cold even though her cheeks were flaming bright red. She clenched her jaw and really had to restrain herself from doing something that would probably be considered incredibly stupid.

“Friend got a name?” the sheriff said as he walked towards their table and stopped just before he stumbled over their luggage, almost giving Merian a heart attack.

The entire tavern had gone dead quiet as if every single person in there was holding their breath.

“It’s Merian,” Merian said, her voice breaking much to her regret. She cleared her throat, straightened her back and lifted her chin. The sheriff looked slightly amused at her efforts. “Merian Storm,” she then added with emphasis and this time with a clear and unaffected voice.

“Storm?” the sheriff repeated, scanning every inch of her face.

“Any relation to Lyder Storm, the sheriff of Witch’s Nose?”

“He’s my brother,” she said. Only time that having a sheriff for a brother would come in handy.

“Really?” He raised an eyebrow and looked genuinely curious.

“And what is Lyder Storm’s sister doing up here in Northland?

Vacationing with the boyfriend, eh?” He smiled joylessly, and without waiting for an answer he turned his stone cold eyes towards Birk.

“You can’t escape the army forever, Dane. One day you’ll be mine.

See you soon,” he added with a slow smile before he turned around and walked slowly out of the tavern, staring down everyone he passed on the way. Once he was gone murmur slowly arose.

“I hate those guys,” Merian whispered, her jaw still clenched.

“Even your own brother?”

“Yes!” *** They ate in silence. Merian suddenly didn’t have much of an appetite, but she knew she probably wouldn’t get anything to eat before they arrived at Thunder Rock, and by the looks of it that could be hours away. So she ate some bread and some chicken, but it made her gag.

“Are you going to eat the rest of your chicken?” Birk said, still with his mouth full.

“Go ahead.” She pushed the plate across the table and then eyed him curiously. “Is that why you keep failing your exams?” she asked.

“Whatever do you mean?” Birk answered innocently and blinked.

“So you don’t have to join the army?”

Vithar had announced, apparently as a sign of goodwill, that any young man who wanted an education was allowed to enrol at university. But afterwards, they were expected to join the greys. Join his army or be sent to Tooth Island and suffer the consequences of

poor decision-making. They said no one had ever returned from Tooth Island. Well, except Parmona.

Birk smiled and winked at her just as a big man with a bushy red beard put his hand on his shoulder.

Merian gasped.

“Birk,” the man said, “I’m sorry I’m late. But I see you’re in good company. When you’ve finished eating I’ve got the coach ready for us outside. Hello,” he then proceeded to say to Merian. “I’m Regin.”

“I’m Merian.”

“Merian, eh?” Regin smiled, and Merian relaxed. “You look different from the usual type of guests Birk brings home. Much prettier. And female.”

“Don’t start, Regin,” Birk sighed. “Merian’s just a friend.”

“Who’s a girl,” Regin said, still smiling.

“Coincidentally,” Birk remarked as he wiped his mouth with a napkin and got up.

“I’m still going to help him pull,” Merian said, making Regin burst into jovial laughter.

“Well, alright then,” he said, drying his eyes with the root of his hand. “Not that I think he needs the help,” he added, eyeing every single female in the tavern whose longing stares frequently darted in their direction. He leaned over the table and whispered to Merian: “It’s not me they are looking at.”

Birk sighed again, looking bored. “Are you finished, Merian?

Can we go? I’m so tired of this road life I could sleep for a week.”

Chapter 5 Aia “I want to go home.” Aia jumped to her feet when Professor Dane finally descended from his study in the tower. “I really think it’s time for me to go home. I have responsibilities. I have a job that I may or may not have lost because I haven’t shown for days and a cottage that may be taken from...” She stopped her ramblings when it became clear to her that the professor wasn’t listening at all.

He looked oddly delighted as if he was high on bitter mountain root. He came towards her, his hands up in the air as if he wanted to cup her face, but just before touching her he changed his mind. He probably felt about her the way he felt about mud and eggs.

“You can’t leave now.” He looked at his hands as if he didn’t understand the concept of them. Then he lowered them and shoved them into his pockets. “I have finally, FINALLY,” the ever present hands flew back up in the air, “made an incredible breakthrough.”

“Really?” Aia wasn’t sure what that meant. She still didn’t entirely believe he was a real professor.

But his eyes shone with excitement, and he had this incredibly relieved smile on his face as if he believed everything was going to be alright. It even made Aia smile and relax a bit.

“So what is it?” she asked. “Is it something to do with your research?”

“I’ve finally managed to harvest a lightning bolt into a cylinder only this big.” He held up his thumb and index finger about an inch apart. “I’ve been working so hard.” He pushed out his lower lip and blew air up in his face. “Seriously, you don’t know how hard Regin has been pushing me to get this thing to work.”

“Regin? I thought he was your cook?”

“What?” Professor Dane’s eyes darted around the place.

Clearly, he had said something he wasn’t supposed to. “Yes, yes, but he also...” he stumbled to a halt, his cheeks blushing.

“You don’t have to explain. It’s really none of my business,” Aia said.

“That’s right, it isn’t,” Regin said from the main doorway, his jaw clenched and his otherwise so kind eyes suddenly very serious and hard.

“Look, I really don’t care what it is you’re doing here. I just want to go back to Norden,” Aia said. “How far is it? Will I be able to get there in a few hours?”

Regin kept staring at Professor Dane who looked huffed and started to sulk. “Well, you just left me here,” he cried as if that would make everything perfectly fine. “I had to tell someone.”

Regin shook his head and then turned his gaze towards Aia. She was expecting the worst, but was surprised to find kindness smoothing down his face and even a smile lingering somewhere deep down in the bushy beard. “You can’t go now,” he said in an uplifting tone. “You’ve just been really ill. Besides, it’ll be dark out soon and it’ll probably rain. It always does. I’ll drive you home tomorrow. How does that work for you?”

“Yes, fine, that’ll be...fine.”

“Good. Because I’m absolutely beat after having been to Saltung and back picking up his lot.” With a sideways nod of his head he gestured to a young man and a woman behind him; both looked as if they were about Aia’s age, whatever age that was.

The man had the most beautiful face Aia had ever seen. His pure, clean, almost porcelain skin really stood out under his raven dark hair, and the hypnotising stare of his deep dark eyes was just breathtaking. No doubt he was a hit amongst women.

“Hello there,” he said, his voice a little lighter than Aia had expected. “Who’s this gorgeous little thing?”

“Thing?” The woman behind him echoed. “She’s not a thing, Birk, she’s a person.” She rolled her eyes in annoyance.

Clearly, not a girlfriend.

“Birk! You’re home,” Professor Dane exclaimed. He held out his arms as if he waited for Birk to run into his welcoming embrace.

But Birk just shook his head.

“Oh, whatever,” Professor Dane sighed. “Your room is as you left it over winter break.” He turned around. “I’ll be in my lab celebrating with myself.”

“I’ll go with you,” Regin said, following close behind. He then whispered something to the professor that Aia couldn’t make out.

“Oh, surely, she’s not a spy!” Professor Dane exclaimed, making Regin shush him.

“Apparently, he made a breakthrough,” Aia murmured when she suddenly found herself alone with yet two more strangers. She was really beginning to miss the familiarity of Norden.

“He’s always made a breakthrough,” Birk remarked dryly.

“And it always flops. It’s difficult catching lightning. It’s unpredictable.”

“He catches lightning?” the woman asked. She had beautiful auburn curls that she’d assembled in a wild bun on top of her head. It made her blue-green eyes really stand out.

“He tries to. He hasn’t succeeded yet.”

“He said he had.” Aia said, feeling stupid.

When she looked at Birk’s face her mind touched on the memory of Meg going on and on about pregnancies and babies and how it would be cruel to bring them into this messed-up world. She bit the inside of her cheek and gazed quickly over at the woman to make sure she wasn’t his girlfriend after all.

But why would Aia even care? She was leaving tomorrow morning. Still, she was starting to feel like how those girls working in the forest looked when they giggled at the woodsmen and batted their eyes at them. She felt like a moth to a flame; she couldn’t help gawking at Birk. He was just so pretty and mesmerising.

“Hello! I’m Merian,” the woman suddenly said after having ogled Aia for a while.

Putting an enormous effort into it Aia finally managed to tear away her gaze from Birk. Merian sent her an annoyed glance. She most definitely had to be his girlfriend.

“Merian is an old friend from school,” Birk explained as he moved a little bit away from her.

Merian rolled her eyes once again. “Yes, that’s right. I’m just a friend. I really don’t mind if you scoot along now and go have sex.”

“What?” Aia’s jaw dropped.

“Merian!” Birk clicked his tongue.

“Oh? Is that not the right approach?” Merian said. A little wry smiled lingered on her lips.

“Please, allow me to apologise on behalf of my friend as she’s somewhat...” He looked Merian up and down as if searching for the right word, and then finally he settled on: “challenged.”

“I think she looks pretty normal,” Aia said, making Merian flash a bright smile in her direction.

“Looks it, yes,” Birk agreed, “but on the inside...” He shook his head and then smiled as he settled his gaze on Aia. “But who are you?” He kept moving closer to her one tiny step at a time, and with every inch Aia felt her stomach flinch.

“I’m Aia.” “Aia? That’s beautiful. I’m sure there’s a great story behind that name.”

Merian’s throat rattled.

“Do you work for my uncle now? You weren’t here this last winter?”

“No, I just...fell of a horse.” Aia immediately regretted saying it. It sounded so stupid. And sure enough, it made Birk and Merian exchange looks. “It’s a long story.” She didn’t want to explain. She was sure these two mastered horse-riding to perfection and would laugh at her silly fall. “Anyway, I’m better now and I’m going home tomorrow.”

“Yes, I heard,” Birk said. “You live in Norden, near the forest?”

Aia nodded.

“Any spirits left up there?” Merian asked.

“Down there,” Birk corrected her. “You’re as far north as you possibly can be, in this country, anyway.”

Merian ignored him, sending Aia a tired glance. “The wood spirits,” she clarified. “I heard they all left after the royal family was slaughtered.”

“Oh, they did?” Aia felt stupid. She didn’t remember the massacre at the summer palace. It had happened before she was found in the lake. But the villagers had often spoken about it, though never mentioned the wood spirits leaving because of it. She knew about wood spirits just like she knew she didn’t like cranberries, and that bitter mountain root would make you high and most likely also hallucinate. But the memory connected with learning about those facts kept avoiding her. Besides, she thought the wood spirits only came out at night, and since Aia wasn’t in the forest at night she hadn’t noticed their absence.

Again, Birk and Merian exchanged glances, and annoyance was building up in Aia. “I have trouble with my memory,” she said and shrugged, but on the inside she was getting increasingly pissedoff by their stupid glances to each other. “I don’t remember things that happened over a year ago.”

“Seriously?” Merian looked unconvinced as she gawked at Aia. “Yes, seriously!” Aia snapped, making Birk back up with his hands held up in front of him.

“Careful, Merian,” he said and chuckled, “she’s a feisty one.”

Instantly, Aia didn’t find him all that attractive anymore, just plain annoying.

Chapter 6 Merian “Alright, kids! Are you hungry?” The moment Regin said it Merian’s stomach growled. She knew she should have eaten more in the tavern.

“Not me,” Birk said. He lifted up his bags. “I’m going to go unpack.”

“How about you, Aia? Are you hungry?”

Aia nodded. Her huge brown puppy dog eyes didn’t follow Birk as he went up the stairs. It surprised Merian. Maybe this Aia wasn’t like all those girls back at school anyway. Merian wondered if Aia had ever even gone to school. She looked so...rough, although pretty.

She was kind of on the small side, but her arms were firm and muscular; clearly, a girl who had to work hard for a living.

“I could eat,” she nodded and followed closely behind Merian who followed Regin to the kitchen.

“What would you like? An omelette?” He didn’t wait for a response as he just held up a finger and without saying another word left the kitchen.

“What...?” Merian started to follow him, but Aia sat down at the massive wooden table in the middle of the huge kitchen. “Where is he going?”

“To the henhouse to get some eggs, I imagine.”

“Oh.” Merian sat down opposite Aia. She wasn’t good with people, especially girls. They made her uncomfortable. At school, it always seemed like they were competing for something, whether it were grades, attention from boys, the teachers or each other. All Merian had been interested in were the good grades, but after last winter, even they weren’t all that important to her anymore. And that apparently made the girls at school suspicious. They looked at her as

if she couldn’t be trusted. They found it strange that she spent her time staring apathetically into thin air or watching the other students with contempt – and sometimes envy, although she’d sooner die than admit that.

Also, it didn’t really help her reputation much that her brother was one of Vithar’s sheriffs. Everyone knew.

Merian let her hair down and shook it with a sigh. Her roots were aching. She quickly glanced over at Aia and her long, dark blonde and straight hair. She’d braided it loosely in the back, leaving loose strands of hair falling down by the sides of her face.

“How come you don’t remember anything from over a year ago?” she asked Aia. Aia shrugged. Merian narrowed her eyes. “You don’t know?

No, of course you wouldn’t remember. That’s so obvious.”

Aia didn’t say anything as Merian rambled on. She wished she could stop, but words just kept falling out of her mouth like vomit.

“Doesn’t your family know what happened? Did you fall ill or was it an accident? And you’ve remembered nothing at all for an entire year?

You don’t remember anyone?”

Merian finally stopped when Aia looked up with an annoyed glance. She sighed and leaned back in her seat, folding her arms in front of her chest.

“I was found in a lake, dead, and was then resuscitated,” she said as if she’d told the story many times before. “No one knew me. I don’t know who my family is. Obviously, my real name isn’t Aia; it’s just the name I was given because I don’t remember what it really is.

No one has ever claimed they knew me so they could help me figure out my identity. I live with the widow of the man who found me and saved me. And I work in the forest, stacking wood, and sometimes I deliver logs for the villagers, especially for winter.”

Merian gawked at her. “You were dead?”

“Yes.” “In a lake? Did you drown?”

Aia just stared at her like she was dumb or something. Merian clicked her tongue. “Well, you could have been killed and then thrown into the lake later is what I mean.”

“I was stabbed, actually,” Aia remarked dryly.

“Really?” Merian leaned over the table.

Aia didn’t move. She just followed Merian with her eyes. “But that isn’t what killed me,” she said.

“The drowning did.” Merian nodded. She was so intrigued that she couldn’t stop smiling. This was so incredibly exciting, and she’d thought nothing exciting ever happened up here in Northland. “Where were you stabbed?” she asked.

Aia pointed towards her left shoulder with her chin.

“Can I see the scar?”

Was that too morbid? Oh no, the look on Aia’s face gave it all away; the look of surprise that would soon turn into that of disgust.

Merian knew the look all too well. She sat back in her chair and awaited the awkward silence that always followed.

But the look of disgust never came. Instead, Aia just shrugged. “If you want,” she then said and pulled down the blouse over her shoulder. Between the left shoulder and the torso, right next to the armpit, was a jagged scar, almost four inches long. It must have nearly severed her arm off.

Merian gasped in awe. “Someone really wanted to get rid of you. Could you imagine what would happen if the killer knew you were still alive?” She looked up in Aia’s brown eyes. They were staring back at her with a spooky calmness.

“I think up scenarios every day,” Aia revealed in a dead tone.

“I imagine what I would do to defend myself, and I see weapons in everything. In every scenario he still defeats me, though.”

“How come? They are your thoughts. You can make yourself win in your own thoughts.”

Aia shook her head. Her sudden sadness sent shivers down Merian’s spine. “I may not remember who he is, but deep down I know that I can’t beat him.”

It made Merian fall silent, and they both sat a while staring at the table.

Outside, the rain seemed to be dying down. For a split second, Merian contemplated commenting on the weather, but quickly decided that that was just stupid. She really ought to be saying something to comfort Aia seeing as it was Merian who’d ripped up the wound. Maybe she could teach her to fight with a sword? Lyder had taught Merian. He’d said she was a natural. “That or you’re fucking insane,” he’d said. The memory made Merian smile. That was before the war broke out, before they were torn apart, and before he turned into an arsehole.

“So you go to university?” Aia then said in a small voice.

“Yes, I do.”

“What’s it like?”

“Hell on Earth.” Merian started biting the nail on her little finger. Her nails had never looked uglier since after she’d started the fourth semester.

“I heard that Vithar encourages people to take an education,” Aia continued, obviously determined to get as far away from the subject of her death as possible.

“Yeah, right,” Merian scoffed. “And once they graduate, he expects them to use their new skills in his army or he’ll send them to Tooth Island. Only exception is if you’re girl or really stupid or only have one leg or something. Mostly, it’s best if you’re a girl. Well, except if you’re really clever and know how to build a bomb or something.” Merian shook her head.

“Are you that clever?” Aia asked.

“I’ll take Tooth Island over joining Vithar any day! But no, I don’t know how to build bombs. But Birk will be recruited once he graduates. They have their eyes on him because his uncle is Professor Dane, so they think he’s really brainy. Oh, they’ll be so disappointed,” she giggled. “All Birk excels at is looking good and making girls forget their intelligence and fawn at his feet.”

Aia looked down and coughed. “What happens on Tooth Island? No one back home in Norden ever really wants to talk about it.”

“It’s one large prison, basically. It’s where they keep those who don’t comply and those with special gifts and abilities. I’ve heard there is a massive fortress where they are kept locked up in small cells. And apparently Vithar has joined forces with a rather powerful witch who is so dangerous that she was actually locked up in the tower on Tooth Island for years. But he released her, made her his accomplice. I also heard that she’s draining people of their special powers, making her even more powerful and dangerous. And then she leaves them to die.”

Merian could see Aia swallow hard. She looked shocked and confused. Merian leaned over the table. “Some of the supernaturals, like the wood spirits and the elven maidens, managed to flee to other planes of existence. But witches and normal people who might just happen to be cursed with certain abnormal abilities, so to speak, they’re being hunted down and thrown in jail or killed on the spot.”

“You think he’ll win?”

“Vithar?”

Aia nodded and Merian shook her head. It made Aia widen her eyes. “You think people will rebel? You think there’ll be a revolution?”

“I know there will.”

“I would be careful airing such views,” Regin suddenly growled from the doorway.

“And why is that?” Merian said, getting all worked up. Her blood was pumping hard and her cheeks flushed with anger.

Regin walked into the kitchen with eggs in a small basket.

“People have been killed for less,” he said quietly.

“Yeah? Well, I won’t be intimidated. I hate that man. I wish I could stab him in the eyeballs and gouge them out and make him choke on them. And then, when he was dead I’d hang him from a tree, letting him rot and get eaten by birds. And when there was nothing left but bones I’d piss all over them.”

Regin nearly dropped the eggs. “Good grief, girl, remind me not to get on your bad side.”

“The greys killed my father, and...” Merian’s voice broke. She pressed her lips together and then got up so quickly that her chair fell over. “I’m sorry, but I just lost my appetite.”

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