Being Ace, page 29
“I know what I saw!” Gerdy turns to me. “You believe me, yes?”
I shouldn’t be the only one. These people demanded proof; they ought to recognize when it stands sun-bright before them. We all heard the song. No human violinist could make their music heard in our village all the way from Festafallet. Or dwell in a waterfall and, through a song, compel girls to meet them.
“Fossegrim,” I whisper. “We have a fossegrim in our forest.”
The violinist and Rúna’s killer are one and the same. She was the fossegrim’s first prey.
If I’d uncovered the truth sooner, she would have been its last.
“Nonsense,” Odulf the Tyrant declares. “Fossegrim are children’s tales. Anyway, in those stories, fossegrim keep to themselves, toying with their violins, sometimes teaching a bold young man to play.”
“You don’t know enough of the stories,” I tell Odulf. “Others speak of fossegrim who enchant people with their music, then drown the victims.” I nod toward Gerdy.
She nods back, once, lips parted but no more words rising from her tongue.
Odulf rounds on me, towering so high he blocks half the firelight. Too big for this cabin. Too big for this world. “If there is a fossegrim,” he says, “how do we know you didn’t summon him with your witch songs?”
“He took Rúna! I wouldn’t hurt her.”
“So you claim. All we know is that you went into the woods with your cousin, and only you returned. If you had anything to do with Lorine’s death as well … you’d better pray to God for the welfare of your soul.”
“Leave my home,” Gerdy’s mother shouts at me. “This instant!”
I leave—because I’ve finally found my task. The fossegrim has taken his last victim.
This ends tonight.
Inside my cabin, I snatch spun wool and my cradle loom. It looks exactly as it sounds, shaped like a baby’s bed and small enough to carry in my arms. Mamma and I use these to weave narrow yet sturdy bands.
Perhaps those can bind up more than stockings.
Halldor trails after me. He followed when I ran back to my cabin, and now he chases my every step. “What are you doing? Birga, talk to me.”
Loom still in my arms, I turn to face him. “You know the tales of fossegrim. This creature cannot remain in these woods. I’ll find the monster, and one way or another, I’ll end him.”
“I do know the tales of fossegrim!” Halldor closes the distance between us. The sunlight from outside, going amber as the day nears its end, catches his fierce red hair and makes it appear as flames. He looks like a creature of myth and tale.
But when his hand clutches mine, it’s solid, warm—human.
“I do know the tales of fossegrim,” he whispers. “That’s why I know you must not approach this creature. It’s too dangerous!”
“That monster took Rúna. And more people will suffer if I do nothing.”
“You don’t owe this village anything. Especially not your life! If you go to that fossegrim, you’ll be drowned like Rúna and Lorine.”
“Hardly.” I set the cradle loom on a table, then cup a hand beneath Halldor’s chin. At my touch, his breathing slows, his eyes focus until our gazes lock. “I can’t fall under the fossegrim’s spell.”
“How can you know that?” When I lift my eyebrows, his cheeks flush. “Because you … don’t desire, in that way? You believe that will keep you safe?”
“It’s a better chance than anyone else can claim.”
“Birga, listen to me.” He clings like we’ve been dropped in the river and only I might keep him from drowning. “I can’t stay in this village anymore.”
Acid floods my mouth. “I … know you deserve Bergen. To find a teacher. Paint.”
“Never mind the painting!” Halldor wraps his arms around my shoulders and tugs me close. “I can’t stay here with monsters in the trees and worse monsters in the cabins. Where only one way of life is allowed, and anything else—” His face goes pale until his freckles stand out, like the night sky in reverse.
A tremor rips down my spine. What would the people here do if they learned the truth about him?
“I don’t want to leave you,” Halldor whispers, “in this place where you aren’t safe. But I can’t stay here. And these people … they don’t deserve your help. Come with me. If we go now, we might reach Bergen before your parents leave. Maybe convince them to stay, too. Please, come with me.”
It’s so tempting I can taste the longing, sharp and piercing like lingonberry wine. With Rúna gone, Halldor at my side, and my parents already in Bergen … there’s no reason to remain. I’d miss the sheep, yes, but they don’t need me.
This mess with the fossegrim, though, was never about us. Stepping from Halldor, I move back to the table and heft the cradle loom into my arms. “Rúna would be in agony knowing another girl was taken by the same monster … and that more people will be, if I do nothing. I can’t bring Rúna back, but I can make her death not be meaningless. That’s the best I can give her, and I will.”
Halldor turns away—not before I see his face crumpling. A fierce sting sears through me, to disappoint him, to send my best friend on his way alone. He draws a ragged breath, and I fear his words will be a farewell that I must accept. But instead he says, “I’m coming, too.”
Of course he is, this boy I trust more than anyone on Earth. Cool relief floods through me … even though I know I can’t accept his offer. “Think about it … I don’t believe you are safe from the fossegrim.”
He grits his teeth. “I’ll come as far as I can.”
As we enter the woods, Halldor takes my hand, intertwining his fingers with mine like we did as children, when such gestures were merely a way to keep a friend close.
“What exactly is your plan?” He peers at Mats, the sheep we lead on a rope leash. “Tell me it’s more than giving the fossegrim this sheep as an offering, then asking him politely to leave.”
“Hardly.” I nod to the cradle loom bound to my side in a sling. “Rúna taught me to weave secret messages into bands. And some of her ancient songs were said to bestow protection. Maybe spells woven into a band can trap a monster. Especially if I weave them with a few strands of his glorious, starlight hair. If nothing else, the bands will hold him while I shove his violin bow down his throat.”
Halldor sucks in a breath. “Remind me never to make you angry.”
“Don’t murder anyone I love and we’ll have no quarrel.”
For a long while, the only sound is the wind sighing through the trees and our sheepskin boots crunching over leaves and twigs. The evening air—properly dying daylight, as the hour approaches eleven—isn’t chilly, but it’s cool enough that Halldor and I lean together, sharing warmth.
But when the roar of Festafallet becomes the barest whisper in the distance, I tug Halldor’s hand. “This is as far as you go.”
“There isn’t even any music!”
“By the time we hear the first notes, it will be too late for you. Either you stop here, or we both turn back. And the fossegrim will continue to prey on innocent people.”
That shuts Halldor’s mouth. But his eyes glisten as they did when he stood over my bedside, my head bandaged, blood soaking through the linen.
I don’t want to leave with sour words between us. So I kiss his knuckles and say, “Keep watch. Do not let anyone else approach the falls. And”—I hand him tufts of unspun wool—“if you hear violin music, stuff this in your ears. Do not make me walk out of these woods while leaving another piece of my heart behind.”
“We’ll leave this forest together! Promise me.”
“I love you, Halldor.” I wish there was a different word for it, to fully capture my meaning: devotion with roots that burrow deep, enduring and everlasting.
He hugs me against him, so close I breathe in his fragrance: leaves, apples, and the last rays of sunshine still clinging to the sky. “Whatever happens at Festafallet,” he whispers, “you deserve peace. When Rúna needed a haven, you were there for her. You listened, held her, loved her. Now, you face a fossegrim for her. You deserve peace again. But only you can let yourself have it.”
All these words are fogging my brain. I must move on. “Stay safe,” I tell him.
After Halldor has tucked himself behind a particularly tall birch, and I’ve gone on ahead with Mats and checked, three times, to make sure Halldor has stayed behind, I sing the first lines of the witch’s prophecy.
Moments later, a violin melody coils through the trees.
“Be ready,” I whisper, not sure if I’m speaking to the fossegrim or myself. Gripping Mats’s leash in my hand, launching back into the witch’s song, I march toward the waterfall.
Festafallet is a force to be reckoned with at any time—taller than twenty men. But what makes it especially suited to a fossegrim is that it’s secluded. The Festa River flows out of the long and narrow, almost snakelike, Lake Gjevilvatnet northwest of my village. In between weaving through canyons alongside the forest, and before joining with the larger Driva River, the Festa River cascades into a perfect pool of water, almost a cove.
There is no better place for a fossegrim to lie in wait. I do not hide my approach as we follow the river through the stony canyon, singing at the top of my lungs while Mats bleats along. The rocks around us, well-weathered by water and wind, are the pale gray of trolls that let themselves get caught in the light. Though the sun is fast dipping away, there’s still enough light to see by, all amber and orange flame.
My voice echoes along the canyon walls, making it sound like more than one witch approaches.
All the better. Let the fossegrim tremble.
The sun is kissing the treetops, bidding them good night, when the canyon walls part and I reach the cove. Festafallet pours down the opposite side, veils of frothy water streaming into the basin.
The fossegrim is there, seated in the falls as Gerdy said, sawing away on his violin. He’s much too far to make out any details of his face, but his hair shines like spun gold, and he has perfect posture, despite the water crashing around him. Though any human would be shivering too hard to put a bow to the strings, he creates a harmony to my witch’s song that’s so intricate, if it were played by anyone else in any other place, I’d be a puddle of tears.
I don’t go to him, of course. If the fossegrim wants another girl, he must come to me.
While Mats wanders around the rocks, searching for moss and river weeds, I sit at the water’s edge and free my cradle loom from its sling. I prepped the loom at home, threading the heddle and spooling spun wool around the shuttle. Picking up that shuttle, I begin to weave.
While I work, I chant Rúna’s old protective verse. Beneath my fingers, a narrow band takes shape, all undyed wool—the better to hide the spell against this monster.
The violin music screeches to a halt, and a splash echoes through the cove. Without pausing my weaving, I glance up. The fossegrim has disappeared from the falls. My lips twitch, once, into an almost-smile. I return my attention to weaving, not looking away again until there’s another splash directly in front of me. A head rises from the pond.
“Why aren’t you in my water?” the fossegrim asks.
Mats bleats in alarm, skittering around the rocks. My skin crawls at the fossegrim’s voice, though not for the reasons I expected. His tones are shockingly youthful, but also weighted and barbed, as though below his handsome exterior he drags a heart raw from grief.
Again he asks, “Why aren’t you in my water?”
I set aside my loom and lean toward the creature. “You have no power over me.”
The fossegrim lifts one slim eyebrow. Gerdy spoke true; his face is perfection, the kind of beautiful that could turn anyone’s head. Eyes like amber, golden hair still waving even when it’s soaked, a square jaw, and a nose that belongs on a statue. He looks like an artist’s conception of an absurdly beautiful man.
“Everyone has a type,” the fossegrim says. He transforms, hair turning earth-dark, eyes becoming moss-green, and chin narrowing, elegantly pointed. When I stare blankly, he changes again, hair sunset-red—Halldor’s hair, and even his adorable freckles, though the fossegrim carries none of Halldor’s light and warmth.
“Still no?” The fossegrim clucks his tongue. “Perhaps it isn’t men you seek.” He shifts his face once more, softening it, rounding the cheeks. His nose and chin become delicate, eyes wide, hair lengthening, swirling around him in the water, silver-white like the moon.
A gorgeous woman, to be sure. I could admire her beauty for the art it is. But that’s all I’d do.
I turn back to my loom, passing the shuttle and its spun wool through the warp. “I desire no person.”
The fossegrim scoffs. With a blink, he’s back to the golden-haired, square-jawed version of himself. “Then do you seek music lessons? I see you’ve brought the payment for it.”
He peers at Mats and licks his lips with a tongue horrifyingly long and gray.
“I am no musician. But the sheep is for you.” Swallowing hard, I nudge Mats toward the fossegrim, whispering in his ear as he trots past, “I’m sorry.”
Fossegrim have fastidious—persnickety—rules about how a sheep must be presented. I steer Mats around so his hindquarters face the waterfall, then lower him toward the pond. The poor thing kicks only a few times before letting me push him into the water.
“Thank you.” I kiss his woolly head, and he bleats once.
The fossegrim dips out of sight and yanks Mats beneath the surface.
I look away, touching the threads on my cradle loom but not weaving. The pond sloshes and slurps against the rock where I sit. Somewhere in the woods, an owl hoots, then a rodent screeches.
When the fossegrim surfaces, his lips and chin are stained with blood. He climbs onto the rock where I sit, water streaming from his clothes—many centuries out of date: a long-sleeved tunic that extends to his thighs, loose linen breeches, knee-length leather boots. He’d be at home with the poets of Rúna’s ancient songs. It’s a strange contrast to the violin in his hands, an instrument that belongs in a royal palace, carved from deep russet wood so polished the shadowy treetops and night’s first stars reflect across it.
“If you do not wish to learn violin,” the fossegrim says, settling beside me, “and you were not beguiled by my song … then what’s brought you here, sour one?”
His smirking grin contains too many teeth.
I squeeze the pendant portrait of Rúna, reminding myself why I’ve come. “You took someone dear to me.”
The fossegrim lifts a shoulder. “I only take those who surrender to my call.”
I could snatch that shoulder, so casual, careless, and shake the fossegrim until his teeth rattle.
“My cousin was grieving!” I rise to my knees, bringing my eyes level with the monster’s. “She came to these woods for peace, a chance to start life over. You ended it, and for what? Some sick game? Take your violin and go.” I scramble for it, yearning to snap its wooden neck.
He twists away, cradling the instrument as though it’s blown from glass.
“Find another waterfall,” I order the monster. “Barter with fiddlers too big for their britches. But you will not stir more sorrow here.”
“Quite the speech. I could put it to song.” The fossegrim draws the bow across his violin, playing three notes at once. Then, with a flick of his wrist, those notes pitch harsh and piercing, screaming so painfully I have to clap my hands over my ears.
“Humans stole from me,” the fossegrim says as the notes fade. “So humans must pay.”
Turning away, he stares into the pond lapping beside us. The water reflects his face, but the creature’s eyes are so distant, there’s no way he’s seeing himself or anything in this cove.
“Humans murdered my love,” he whispers.
“Your … love?” In all the stories, fossegrim are solitary creatures, their only loves a violin and sheep perfectly plump for eating. “A nøkk?” Another water spirit, even more frightful than the fossegrim, if that can be believed. “A huldra?” A stunningly beautiful forest spirit, who entices and seduces humans only to lead them to their deaths.
“A human woman.” The fossegrim bristles, like he expects me to scoff, but I’m so caught off guard I can’t make any sound. “Not much older than you. She was beautiful. Had hair as dark as yours.” He scowls toward me, like I made my hair black simply to torment him. “Was built like a huntress. Had eyes the color of honey, lips as soft as rosebuds … and a voice that could stop time. When she sang, the world listened. The wind held still, rivers paused in their beds, raindrops hovered between earth and sky. Every night, she’d sneak from her village, join me at my waterfall, and we’d make music together that could sing the stars from the sky.”
The fossegrim plucks his violin’s strings, one after the other, each note descending. “But she’d been promised to another man. And he was a jealous one, didn’t care for his betrothed giving her heart to someone else. When he caught her one night sneaking out to see me … he destroyed her.”
A chill seizes my heart—for the woman. No one listening, until all her choices, even her life, were stolen away.
But fury also sears through me. “My village had nothing to do with this!”
The fossegrim barks a mirthless laugh. “I’ve been traveling upriver from waterfall to waterfall, playing songs that fill humans with unquenchable desire, then destroying those who come to find me. Sorrow begets sorrow. It is only through loss that humans learn.”
Sorrow begets sorrow. Wounds beget wounds. Where does it end? When there are no more lives to be taken, no more tears to shed? “You blame yourself for not saving your love. You’ve put her death on your hands, until you can see only that guilt and pain.”
Peering over one shoulder, the creature considers me from the corners of his too-sharp eyes.
I suck in a ragged breath. “That’s what I’ve felt, every day, since you pulled my cousin into the river.”
“Pretty words won’t save you. If you want my departure, you must work for it.” Snatching my wrist, he drags my fingers over his violin’s strings—which are knife-sharp and slice through my skin.
