Twenty-four – 06

Sif broke the silence, a tremor in her voice as she sat rigid by the fire, seeing nothing and no one but Thordin.  “What became of you?”

“I went to live with Grayson,” he said quietly, both hands wrapped around his mug.  The steam that still rose from it wreathed his face, his gaze faraway.  “His daughter was grown and moved away and his wife was dead.  Laura came a lot.  She was his deputy and she worried about the two of us.  She and her husband didn’t have any children of their own.  I’d stay with them sometimes.  John helped me remember who I’d been in the long ago, showed me the ways of his people.  They weren’t unlike ours in the days long gone.  I was happy there despite everything.  I was happy for a long time.”

“How did you end up this far east?”  Neve asked.  “You were even further east when you met up with Cameron and I.  If you were so happy in Wyoming…?”

“There was more family,” Thordin said.  “They lived in Minnesota.  When they finally found out about what had happened to Lili and Sven, they wanted me.  I was eighteen, then.  It was my decision.  I wasn’t sure what I wanted.  They wanted to know me and they said that they’d…acch, it doesn’t matter what they said they’d do.  I went and stayed there for a time, read too many books and became curious about too many things.”  His eyes slid closed.  “Did you know that there are legends about the Vikings landing in Canada and spreading down the St. Lawrence and up and down the coast?  They left stones carved with runes to mark their passage.  I decided I had to see for myself, so I quit my job as a ranger for the parks service and headed east.  The world ended while I was hiking back from Maine.”

“I’d heard those stories,” Marin said softly.  “Phelan talked about it, too, but he made it sound like it was people from Ireland, not Vikings.”

Neve glanced at her.  “He told you that tale?”

“He had to,” Marin said.  “He was telling me the whole story about Vammatar and that…explained part of it.”

“Damn those bitches,” Sif growled, shaking her head hard.  “They never did know when to quit.”

“They do bear some serious grudges,” Thordin agreed quietly.  “And now their grudge against him has been extended to everyone else, though it’s worse than that.”  His lips thinned.  “The Hecate walks, Sif.

“She walks and she wants the Taliesin for herself.”

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