Landfall by Suzie Wilde

Author:Suzie Wilde
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9781800181496
Publisher: Unbound
Published: 2022-11-21T16:37:36+00:00

17

Bera went to the anvil, asking the Vallas and skern to help her scry.

‘I need to keep him dead.’ She rested her cheek on the cold metal, gazing past her skern’s spindly legs. ‘Where is this special place? When is this special day?’

Nothing. Was this a punishment for taking on another belief, even as a lie?

Dellingr hissed. ‘Get up, he’ll see you. Vallas can’t use the old magic anyway.’

The Abbot came round the corner of the forge with Bjarni, who was as silent and waxy as a drowned man.

‘We have consulted and my council of Abbots agree with me,’ the Abbot declared. ‘Once your brother is restored to the living, I must handfast you both here. There will be a feast.’

Dellingr gave Bera a warning look.

Bjarni looks so sour because he thought this handfasting charade would be you and him.

The Abbot had asked her something. ‘Brid?’

‘My… um… they speak of “the long dead”. Is my brother long dead?’

‘No, that sounds like a riddle. I’m good at them.’ The Abbot tapped his chin in a show of thinking. ‘So clever of you, Brid, to make it hard. Oh, I know! It’s what we call a barrow.’

Her skern sulked. He already knew the answer.

‘As I told you, Bjarni.’ He kept his gaze skywards. ‘The barrow is where Brid’s brother lies. The ultimate reach is where he must be woken at the coming Blood Moon, before the war begins.’

‘Then my smith must come with me.’ It was Bera’s last chance to save Dellingr.

‘Brid’ – the Abbot smiled at a cloud – ‘you declared yourself the three-in-one. My smith has secret work to do, which is more safely done within both city and palace walls. He stays.’

‘We would be safer still aboard the Raven.’

The Abbot looked pitying. ‘How could he work metal?’

‘We need’ – Bera crossed her fingers – ‘to discuss our ancient magic over water.’

‘I have a voice!’ Dellingr thrust the sword into the earth. ‘I choose to stay where I belong, in my smithy, with the song of anvil and hammer. It’s where any smith belongs, between fire, iron and water.’

Dellingr had rediscovered himself and was in earnest. His home, his love, was fire and iron. Bera envied his strong sense of belonging.

Your home is the sea path.

‘Yet to be at sea is to be forever restless.’

That’s precisely why you belong there.

It gave Bera an idea. ‘Most Venerable Abbot Thing— ’

Her skern winced.

‘Ah.’ The Abbot coughed. ‘Bjarni has persuaded me, and my council agrees, that henceforth I shall be known as the Warrior Abbot. To match our warrior maiden, Brid.’

He’s up to something.

Bera was playing her own long game. ‘Most Warrior Abbot, I request that since Dellingr has chosen to stay here of his own accord, he should be reunited with his daughter, Ginna. He will work better knowing she is safe and beside him.’

Dellingr looked at her. Straight to the heart in respect and trust. ‘Brid is right, and I thank her. I need Ginna with me to aid my work and strengthen the magic.

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