Chapter 3
Hella struggled over rough patches of knotted brown grass. Her ankle throbbed with every step, and hurt even when she took her weight off it. The sky had gone thick and white-grey like whipped cream, and snow was starting to fall. She shivered as it dampened her skin and hair. They'd left the inn behind a few hours ago. When they'd walked a quarter of a mile down the mountain pass, Hella had turned for a last look and found the spot the inn had occupied moments before was completely empty. There wasn't a house in sight.
'Don't dawdle!' he'd barked at her. Hella looked up and down in every direction, even hobbling as far as she could while he waited, frustrated, for her to return.
'Where is it?' she demanded.
He leaned in, his attention heavy.
'You're raving, woman. Keep up.'
When they stopped for the night, Hella almost collapsed. Her ankle hurt so much that she was scared to take off her boot. She sniffled and wept as she tried to unlace the shoe, which was too small now anyway.
'What ails you?' he looked up from where he was warming his hands. Hella shook her head at him, but she was too tired to bother explaining how much pain she was in. She tugged at the bandage on her leg but her fingers were tired and she felt as weak as a newborn kitten.
'Stop fidgeting with it,' he said, more gently than usual. He crossed the clearing and took her foot in his hands. 'Let me see.'
'You're not a healer,' Hella said uncooperatively.
'No, but...I could always cut off your foot.'
Hella went cold with fear until she realised he was grinning at her like a wolf.
'Very funny.'
'I do try,' he agreed, putting her ankle on his lap. 'Keep still,' he added. He pulled the laces loose, slid the boot off, then picked the bandages off. Her ankle was badly bruised, but there wasn't any blood or bone showing.
'It seems you'll live to walk another day.'
'How can you see to do that?' Hella asked curiously, gathering the bandage out of his hands to be rolled up for later.
He sighed. 'I told you. I see-'
'What the Gods want you to,' she agreed. 'I know. So why do the Gods want you to see my foot?'
'Only the Gods know,' he said cryptically.
She leaned in, both vexed and amused by him.
'Maybe you're not so wise after all,' she said lightly.
He turned to look at her. 'A good deal wiser than you.'
Hella smiled. At least she had SOME company on the road, even if it was only this old goat.
'Do we have any food left?'
'Mushrooms,' he said, making a face that demonstrated his dislike plainly.
'If you hate them so much why are you always eating them?'
He smirked.
'You are VERY young.'
'What does that mean?'
'It means,' he said, looking mildly aggravated, 'That they taste disgusting, but they produce the most wonderful flavours of...light. And sound. In the mind.'
Hella shook her head at him, realising what he meant.
'You're the least holy holy man I've ever met.'
'What is holy?' he asked, looking a little devious. 'You were born in a small village, far from civilisation. You think you've lived a long time, all of seventeen years. You have this clear divide...in your head. This is holy, that is simply human behaviour. He cannot be holy because he's human. I cannot be real, my Sight is fake,' he grinned at her toothily. 'I lie. Stop spending so much time thinking about me. Or I'll assume you find me comely. At least...from the nose down.'
Hella went bright red.
'Now you don't know what to say,' he added. 'If you deny it, you insult me, but if you confirm it I might sneak under your fur tonight.' He sighed and shook his head. 'You think too much. Stop thinking.'
'You're a strange old man,' she observed. 'How do you know so much about me, hmm? You seem to...understand...the way my mind works.'
He shrugged. 'I'm old. I've lived many lives.'
'That's obvious,' she said pointedly, hoping for a reaction.
He patted her wounded ankle firmly, making her gasp. Hella cursed him softly. He only chuckled.
'Go to sleep,' he told her.
'I don't want to,' Hella admitted quietly. 'Not here. In this...blackness.'
'You are safer at night than you are in the day.'
'How does that make sense?'
'In the dark, nobody can see you.'
Hella didn't want to tell him that it wasn't just people she feared. Maybe she feared him a little bit too. Hella thought of Eerika, miles above them, fighting her captors and hugged her cloak closer. The old Seer released her foot, his dry fingers soft on her calf for a moment before he let go, leaving her shivery and sensitized in a way she couldn't explain.
She watched him go and lie down and fold his hands on his chest. It didn't make any sense but she almost...sort of...liked him.
000
When they stopped to rest for a midday meal of dried meat and fruit and cold stream water, Hella sat by the stream rubbing her leg. That morning she'd put the bandage back on. It itched where she sweated.
'I doubt you have any coin,' Hella said as he started a fire. 'Nothing less than a hundred years old anyway. How did you get us that room...and fed?'
'What does it matter now? It's long past.'
'It matters. I want to know.'
He looked up, his scraped and pitted skull focused on her.
'What is it that you suspect me of?'
'I think you're a God.'
He laughed.
'I am not a God. Just an old man.'
'Then why do I feel like I can trust you?'
'I have less interest in the things of this world...than most. Perhaps that feels safe to you.'
'Yes,' she whispered her agreement. 'It does.'
He gave her a soft, dark-lipped smile.
Hella could see distant Kattegat from the hillside, but it seemed like a long way. She wondered why she was bothering. Kattegat had only been a temporary home. She had a job there, but she could find another. Then she thought about Uppsala and wondered, if she went back alone, would they even let her see Eerika? The old man was now the only tie she had to the girl, the only person who could vouch for their connection.
Suddenly she felt cheated out of Eerika, as though the trap had been laid for both of them.
'Why did you tell me to take her up there?'
He sighed loudly.
'I told you. It was for the best. It was that or-'
'Or death, yes. Why do I feel like you did this for your own gain?'
'What could I possibly have to gain from walking so many miles with a girl who cannot shut up?'
'I don't know. Maybe you had to get away for a while. You didn't get some wench with child did you?'
'What an absurd notion,' he said, watching her with a strange expression on his dark lips.
'Two wenches? Who want to string you up by your withered manhood, right?'
He smirked. Not the reaction she was hoping for.
'Is that what you were after, looking under my clothes as you were?'
Hella flushed. His smirk grew and grew, widening into a cat-like grin and absolute satisfaction that made Hella go even redder. Dirty old goat.
'I'm blind,' he laughed, walking close to her. 'But even I can see your face is like a beetroot.'
Hella denied it, but her breathless surprise gave her away. 'I-I wasn't doing that. I wanted to know what you're hiding, that's all.'
He straightened, looking satisfied.
'Nothing,' he said.
000
Hella went back to work standing on an old stick for a crutch, her back and arms aching after each long day. Her ankle stubbornly refused to heal after the long walk back to Kattegat and she began to feel trapped here. She had to stay, in the hopes she could see Eerika again. She slept fitfully and woke up tired each morning. She saw the old man only in passing when he came to the market, and she discovered he had a habit of occupying an abandoned cove around the bay, and walking the beach up and down, up and down, speaking to the sea. He wore tracks into the sand with his pacing. Hella watched him from the cliff top sometimes after work where she dried her hair in the wind with the other women.
She woke late and came down to warm up some milk for breakfast, and Helga was white and slumped in the chair, her mouth slack, skin already sunken. She'd probably been dead for most of the night. Hella called the men in the nearby houses to come and take the body away, and Tamas offered an old, half burned rack of logs to be her pyre. Helga had no money to speak of, no valuables, nothing but the house she'd lived in, which was taken by the Earl.
Hella stood in the hall, her back warmed by the fire, wondering where she'd go. She'd just found a place, and now she had nothing once again.
'You need a job?' Ragnar asked.
'No, Lord, I have a job. I need a home. I was living with Helga.'
'I may be able to provide a solution,' said a familiar voice from the back of the room. Through the wreaths of solid grey smoke stepped the old Seer, leaning on his stick. 'I need some...assistance. I'm tired of mushroom broth. Surely you wouldn't deny me this, Earl Ragnar?'
Ragnar smiled, obviously amused. Hella wondered what he was playing at.
'Can you cook?' Ragnar asked Hella drily.
'No, Lord,' she teased. 'But I'll wager I can do a better job than the old man.'
'Have you tasted his soup?' Ragnar asked.
'No.'
'You're right,' Ragnar smiled.
The Seer made a face and said nothing.
'If that's your wish then,' Ragnar gestured to the Seer. 'Go with him. It's not my concern, is it?'
'There is one more thing,' the old man said mildly. 'We spoke of it a moon ago. I have yet to hear your answer.'
'You receive gifts from the populace don't you?'
The old man said nothing.
'Fine, fine,' Ragnar agreed to terms Hella hadn't been privy to. 'You'll have a salary. I know a man can't live by bread alone. And all that.'
The old man smiled broadly, then he tugged Hella outside by the arm. She pulled away.
'I'm not your slave,' she bit. 'How dare you try to make me one!'
'If not for me, you would be living in the hedgerow!' He snipped back. 'You should be grateful. Besides. You owe me for saving your skin in the mountains.'
'I owe you nothing. It was a stupid idea to take her up there, and as soon as I can I'm going to get her back-'
'Remember what I told you, girl. It was this...or death.'
'I don't believe in your prophecies!' Hella snapped.
'You should. The Gods speak through me.'
'Well then ask the Gods who's cooking your dinner tonight, because it won't be me. I'm not a housemaid.'
'I have asked them,' he said. 'They told me it would be you.'
Hella folded her arms. 'I'm not your slave,' she said again.
The old man smiled. 'You are not my slave, no.'
'And are you going to pay me?'
'Payment is room and board,' he said snappishly. 'Don't get...cheeky.'
Hella thought about it. How hard could feeding the old coot three good meals a day be? And if it kept her ear in the right place for news of Eerika, maybe it would be worth it. Surely he travelled to Uppsala sometimes, it was where his order trained. It made sense to stick close.
'Fine,' Hella agreed. 'Fine. But I'm going to negotiate with Tamas. I want to work. I'm not going to sit around your hovel all day counting bones!'
'Do as you like,' he said, his teeth bared again. 'I couldn't care, as long as I eat.'
'Fine,' she said.
'Fine,' he echoed.
Hella slopped the best rabbit stew she could make into a bowl with fresh bread fetched from the market and put it down in front of him. He grinned.
'Ahhh,' he sniffed at it. 'Now this is a bit...more like it.'
Hella rolled her eyes as he began devouring it.
'Why aren't you eating?' he asked after a minute. Hella didn't know what to say. She'd figured she was just there to cook his dinner, not eat, drink, make merry and have a conversation. 'Eat,' he insisted. 'I said room and board and I meant it, now that I have our Earl paying me a wage I can eat rabbit. About time too.'
'What do you mean? You didn't get paid before?'
'No,' he smirked, pleased with himself. 'Now I do. And why not? When I need to travel to the temple I have to walk. Why should I walk? He should pay me to stay here and speak to people all day about the future. It's as good as a job and it takes up all my time.'
'Isn't there some sort of law against you being paid?'
'Don't be absurd,' he said. 'It's up to the Earl how he compensates a temple Seer for his time. Personally, I rather like gold. And silver. And I'd relish a new bear skin.'
Hella couldn't help but chuckle.
'You want to live the good life.'
'I wish to be comfortable,' he said. 'What's wrong with that? I'm an old man. This damned hut gets cold. If our Earl wishes to engage my services, he can damned well keep me warm.'
'I thought you weren't allowed to leave Kattegat. Wouldn't your order punish you?'
'Who said anything about leaving?' he said mildly. 'I have no reason to leave.'
'But-'
'I know what you meant,' he waved her off. 'What more can they do to me?' he gestured to his own skull.
'I suppose they could kill you.'
'I am not afraid of dying,' he pointed at her nose, chuckling. 'You are closer to it than I am.'
'You won't outlive me,' Hella returned his teasing. 'Come on. What are you, a hundred now?'
'I have cheated death five times,' he held up all his fingers. 'You wouldn't understand. You barely know you are born.'
Hella shook her head at him.
'I think I am going to enjoy this,' he announced, as he sat back, apparently satisfied, the bowl empty, bread gone. 'It's much nicer to eat when someone else has cooked!'
Hella erected a curtain to separate the room she was going to use from the hut. It was spacious enough that she could fit a cot and a chair and table inside, and there were shelves full of his dusty bones and antlers that she moved into his space, then she sat looking at the sea, her hands wrapped in strips of cloth, ready for work. Tamas would let her work from dawn to midday and pay her half the normal wage, which suited Hella, as the Seer wasn't a picky eater, and she'd found he would inhale everything she put in front of him without complaint.
He was satisfied as long as she swept up the dust and he seemed to enjoy baiting her as she emptied the hearth and laid a new fire. Hella was done long before it was time to eat again, and as the weeks ground by she began to realise that by asking for her services, the old man had done her a favour. She no longer had to toil on the boats from dawn until dusk and she was still earning enough that she could afford a new dress.
When she made friends with a fisherman's wife, she started to pay attention to how she cooked for her husband and daughters. Hella settled far too easily into the new routine, but she couldn't get her thoughts off Eerika and what she'd done to the girl.
Hella was in the larder, which was now well stocked with milk and cheese and meat for the nights meal, listening when Earl Ragnar came to visit. She heard the old man greet him.
'It's tidy,' Ragnar said mildly. 'And if I'm not mistaken you have colour in your cheeks. What has she been doing for you?'
'I wouldn't speak too loudly,' the old man said. Hella could hear the smile in his voice. 'She has quite the temper, you know.'
'I'm sure she does. Keeps you in your place. It's about time someone did.'
'And what does that mean, Earl Ragnar?'
'This extortion is intolerable,' Ragnar said, putting a bag of coins down on the table with a clink. The old man scooped them up and pocketed them. Hella got the feeling the Earl was teasing, but she wouldn't have wanted to bet her hand on it.
'For you,' the old man smirked knowingly. 'I could answer a few more questions.'
'Mmm,' Ragnar nodded approvingly. 'Then I think we have an arrangement.'
'Excellent,' the old man hissed.
Hella had to bite her lip to keep from laughing. He was a cunning old goat at the best of times, witty and dry and very moody, but she was coming to find him quite endearing. He had a way of digging under her skin to get to her weak spots, but when he found them he rarely did more than poke and then accept their presence. Not like some people she'd met, who found vulnerabilities only to expose them before the whole town, and torment her endlessly for being so weak. Just for that reason alone, Hella had decided to herself that the Seer was good natured, really, as long as he wasn't hungry. At those times his dark humour became as dry as his dusty old bones, and bordered incisive.
That night, Hella set a baked pastry down in front of the old man and the hot, spicy tea he enjoyed.
'Do you ever see Eerika in your visions?' Hella asked him.
'No. I never see her. But you...you worry for her.'
Hella swallowed the lump in her throat.
'What if you're wrong?' Hella asked. 'And she's in trouble.'
'Why would you believe she's in trouble?'
'I dream about her,' Hella said quietly. 'I see her...bloody...and screaming.'
He licked crumbs off his fingers.
'I see nothing but what was always meant to be.'
'What does that mean? Is she in pain or isn't she?'
'If I told you she suffers, you'd go to her. But not all suffering is an evil,' he leaned in slightly and added; 'Hella.'
Hella shivered. He said her name like it was something indulgent and tasty.
Hella woke long before dawn, shaking and sweating. She'd seen through Eerika's eyes as the girl tried to run away. The temple priests caught her and beat her bloody. Hella tugged on her shawl and went outside into the dark, chilly night. When she came back, the rain had drenched her. She was trembling so hard that when she tried to manhandle a log onto the fire, she dropped it on her foot. By morning her face was white and she was cold even under an extra fur. When she didn't turn up for work, Tamas sent Bridgit to check on her. Hella heard her edge into the Seer's hut.
'Ancient One?' she whispered, sounding more anxious than Hella had ever heard her. 'I-Is Hella here?'
'How should I know?' he grunted, as though he'd just woken up. 'She's a free woman. Go and look for yourself.'
Hella managed to push the door open between their living areas and Bridgit saw her. She hustled through the room and shut the door, looking nervous.
'Gods, Hella, you look so sick.'
'I'm fine,' Hella tried to say, but her throat was raw and her body shook uncontrollably. 'Bridgit...will you...just tell Tamas I can't work today? Tell him I have a case of death or something.'
'That's not funny, Hella,' Bridgit said quickly.
'I know, I'm sorry. Just tell him.'
Bridgit back out, seemingly gratefully. When his breakfast didn't come, the Seer thumped on the wall outside.
'I can't,' she managed to croak, reaching over to push the thing over feebly. She didn't care she was laying in nothing but a sheet and her underwear, sweating and shaking. 'I can't,' she whispered again, as his face registered surprise. His attention tracked up her body from her bare, white feet to her naked hip and finally to her sweaty, greasy hair and pale face. He licked his lips. Hella had the feeling he could not only see her, but he was thinking about what he saw.
'It is a fever,' he said finally, crouching by the bed fearlessly to feel her forehead with the backs of his fingers.
'Don't,' she breathed at him. 'You'll catch it too.'
'I've survived worse.'
The fire crackled behind an iron grate built in so long ago that the slab of stone under it was turning to dust. The night wind stirred the little bone chimes in the Seer's hut. Hella took the hot, spicy concoction the old man offered from the pot over the fire and sipped it, her hands growing tired so fast that she could barely hold it up long enough to drink. She wouldn't ask him to feed her. The idea was laughable. But she was glad of the fire, and the spot on the end of his cot near the hearth where she could keep warm against the shivers and shakes that racked her body.
Hella was almost in another world where vivid nightmares came to life, playing in the huts shadows, when he touched her shoulder, trailing warm fingers along her skin. Hella shivered. His skin was dry and hot, and his touch wasn't unpleasant. She'd always imagined he'd have those dirty, chipped nails old people often had. Though his skin was weathered, she felt the life and strength flowing through him when his skin touched hers, and she wondered if that was part of his connection to the Gods. Were they keeping him alive?
'You're freezing cold, Hella.'
'I-I know,' she shook. He lifted his new fur off the floor and lay it over her.
'It won't last forever. Your fever will break soon.'
'How do you know?' Hella whispered. Her throat was so sore.
'I have Seen it.'
Hella huddled under the fur. Her hair was damp, she could feel the sweat running off her.
'I don't think...anyone else would care if I died,' she said, trembling so her teeth chattered. 'Even Bridgit ran when she saw me like this.'
'I could tell you thinks about that woman that would turn your flame-hair white.'
'H-How do you know about her?'
'I See much,' he said quietly. 'But...it is not my job to share it.'
'Why do you stay here and do this?' Hella asked. 'You obviously hate it. Why don't you just leave, find a life somewhere else?'
He laughed and laughed, his black lips stretched into a smile.
'I am old,' he said. 'No amount of willpower could keep this vessel going...if I chose to abandon the Gods. I would die. And I prefer to live, for now.'
'You're a prisoner, then.'
'In a way,' he agreed. 'But no more than any other man. And my position has...certain benefits.'
'Why do you care?' Hella asked, as he rubbed the back of her neck gently, his hand radiating warmth and suddenly; relief. Hella felt her eyes fill up with tears as the pain in her throat eased off. Her headache eased up too and for a long time, she lay there enjoying the feeling. 'You could just throw me out...Ragnar would give you another cook, I'm sure. Why bother with me?'
He smiled. 'Why would I do anything now? I've lived such a long time...the only thing that is new to me...is you. Do you know...how I see? How I know who comes calling?'
'No,' she whispered.
'No,' he echoed. 'Few do. Everyone has their own...smell. Their own sound. Every man, woman and child walks differently, but it's not that. I see them by their shape in my mind...most are little more than shadows, barely here. Barely living, so wrapped up in selfishness, greed and envy that they might as well be dead! A few give off the faintest wisps...of colour, like fog around a torch flame. Those are the...brighter souls.'
Hella had turned her head to look up at him.
'Do I have a colour? Because...sometimes I just feel like a shadow.'
'Yes,' he agreed, his voice dropping to a low hiss as he leaned forwards, his fingers playing over her throat idly. 'You shine...like a snowdrop, hinting at sunlight yellow. Have you ever seen light play off the woodland floor...in Spring when they emerge from the snow? That is your colour.'
Hella was breathless, and not from the fever. She couldn't believe the effect his touch was having on her. It was as though his fingers reached through her flesh to touch the very core of her being, piercing little holes in her, making her feel vulnerable and open. It felt like an invitation. It wasn't lecherous like other men had been with her, and it wasn't pushy. He just seemed hungry to touch her skin, and Hella wanted him to, even though that didn't make sense.
'I've never seen them,' she said.
'I know where they grow. If you can withstand me until the Spring, I will show you where they bow their heads in worship to sun and wind. If you pick them...they wither faster than any other bloom. And here you thought...I was just a blind old man, with no soul.'
'I don't think that,' Hella said, tilting her chin slightly. She felt his breath catch lightly, and saw him lick his open lips. Then he withdrew his hand. She felt a pang of disappointed. Part of her had almost wished he'd kiss her.
'I saw many things before they put out my eyes,' he added. 'Now I only have memories...but they are as clear as the day I stood there.'
'What do the Gods show you?' she asked.
'The truth. Always, the truth, no matter how grotesque.'
'Never good things?'
'Recently, I have been seeing more...good things,' he said quietly, his hand twitching towards her skin. He stopped it before it could connect. Hella wished he'd touch her again.
The fever eased three days later, and Hella walked around like the dead raised up, aching, hurting and sore, preparing food for them even though she really didn't have the strength. When the dark came and they'd both eaten, and no more visitors came to the door, Hella often tried to think of an excuse to sit closer to him, but one never presented itself. She wanted him to touch her again. She lay on her own cot, still weak and sickly, wondering if the touch meant what she thought it did, if she wanted that.
Old man or not, there was something about the Seer that she liked.
When Hella went back to work, exhausted and shaky from the sickness, she suffered a full fortnight before the illness left her body completely. After a few days, he developed a habit of walking down to the beach from to meet her as she finished work. One night, as the days were drawing in, he handed her a silver coin, his fingers dry and warm.
'Bring a fish for our supper. A nice...juicy one.'
Hella smiled at him. She was growing ever fonder of him. More than she'd ever admit aloud.
'How can I tell if a fish is juicy?' she asked.
He leaned in, his eye-ridges going up, black lips tilted with cheeky intent. 'You could give it a little squeeze.'
Hella's heart somersaulted in enjoyment. She knew he wasn't talking about fish.
Then she thought of Eerika, alone in Uppsala and she wanted to cry. She should go back and save the girl, but something inside her was saying...she never would. What if he was right? What if bringing her back meant her death? Hella couldn't live with that. She bought the juiciest, fattest fish she could see and they were half way up the sand when he said;
'I want a walk. The fish will keep a while.'
They wandered the sand, his robe flicking at her legs as the sun sank and the market packed up. Hella watched the sky change from yellow to orange to gold. It was beautiful.
'Can you see the sun?' she asked him.
'I see nothing...nothing of life at all, except what the Gods give me. Just an expanse of darkness...with warmth from above.'
'But you know what it all looks like.'
'Yes,' he nodded. Hella let her toes dig into the sand, moving them pleasantly against the inrushing water.
'The sun is setting,' she told him. 'Bronze like the colour of leaves in Autumn. Gold like the bracelets and earrings women wear, yellow like fresh narcissus in Spring, red like blood. Right now, the sky is the colour of fire, with flowers growing through the flames as though they were nectar. The sky is like a river of fire, with a single mountain peak made of grey and purple cloud, and the dark is coming in across the bay, turning the sky the colour of ripe plums...I can see six...no...seven stars.'
Slowly, he'd turned his face towards her, his lips open a little, his expression intense even with no eyes to describe it. His chest rose and fell, he was breathing more deeply than usual through his open lips. The bones on his staff clinked in the breeze.
'And the sea?' he asked, his voice a warm caress against the coiled base of her spine. 'What do the waves say?'
Hella breathed in deeply, the smell of salt and seaweed in the back of her throat, familiar and now comforting and alongside it, the smell of his clothes and skin. She wanted him to touch her. More than she could remember ever wanting anything.
'They whip like thick cream in the breeze, I see little sylphs made of foam, the scales of mermaids flicking to and fro just beneath the moving surface. And the water reflects the sky. We could be standing between two worlds here. Can you taste the wind?'
'I taste it,' he nodded. 'And something else. Flowers,' his eyeless skull tilted to the dried flowers she'd worn in her hair. He licked his black lips, the energy around him suddenly crackling. Hella felt like her knees had turned to the soft fat at the bottom of an iron griddle pan after the pork was cooked.
'I see it now,' he confessed quietly. 'As though...through your eyes.'
Hella smiled at him, even though he couldn't see it. His lips tilted up. Then he held out his hand for the basket she carried. She laughed.
'The more I watch you, old man, the more I think you see far more than I do.'
His breath seized. Something crossed his face. He looked at her as though the sky was about to fall, the ground was about to break open and unleash the dead. Then he tore his eyeless stare away as he took the basket.
The Seer sat with his bare feet up by the fire, his fingers buried in the fur Hella had laid over his chair earlier. She could smell the spicy drink he liked. A pot of it bubbled over the fire. He ate their fish supper with relish, crunching on little bones. How was it he still had all his teeth? For someone so old, the skin of his throat was surprisingly smooth. Hella began to wonder if he was old at all, or if his scarred and mutilated face simply gave the impression of age. She glanced down at his bare feet. Someone took good care of them, and his hands. She mapped the lines of his fingers, his knobbly knuckles and the tendons that strung the backs. They weren't the hands of an old man either.
'Do you have a name?' she asked. 'I'm tired of calling you old man. Or old goat when you're not around.'
He snorted. 'Only you,' he pointed at her with a finger, 'Would ever be so bold. I should tell you, girl, a goat is a noble animal! It gives both milk and meat, and it's a wise, potent creature.'
Hella laughed.
'What did your Mother call you?'
He knitted his hands on his belly.
'You must give me something in return if you want to know it. Something noone else can boast.'
'I don't have anything I can give you.'
'Come here,' he patted the spot next to him, his little smirk suggesting he was teasing again, as usual. It was said to softly, so confidently, that Hella couldn't resist. She settled next to him, nervous and exhilarated.
'Closer,' he persisted. 'Unless you're too afraid.'
Hella obeyed. He offered the palm of his hand.
'I think you are as innocent of why they lick my palm as you're innocent of...other things. The Gods are not interested in the mouth...but I am.'
'W-why?' Hella asked, her voice quivering like her core.
'They show me trust,' he said. 'By offering...the face...to my hand. And from it I can read their life, all their memories, the colour of their soul.'
'You want my trust,' Hella whispered, catching on.
'No, I cannot want it, you must give it. If you do...I will tell you my name and you may use it to summon me,' his voice dropped, a clear thread laced into his words; 'That is an honour I've given few others. Do not misuse my gift.'
Hella took his hand and trembling, put out her tongue and licked his palm. He gasped, starting so hard that she jumped too, wondering if she'd done something wrong. She tried to pull away but he grasped her hand, holding her in place. Hella's heart thumped. Then his lips tilted up. She stared at his cross-hatched and mutilated face, at the space where his eyes should be. It was like he was looking through her.
'You are like an ocean of secrets,' he whispered, his lips so close that Hella could almost feel them. Then she looked down. His sleeve had rolled down his arm. She gasped. Before he could catch on, she ripped the fabric aside and snatched up his wrist. His skin was weathered but smooth, much smoother than his face. Then it clicked and Hella realised she was guilty of the same assumptions everyone made.
'You're not an old man,' she whispered. 'Your skin...you aren't wrinkled...but your face-'
'That depends,' he said. 'On what you would consider old.'
'Not this,' Hella said, turning his forearm over. It was why he was still fit and strong, why he could carry her and lift Eerika.
'They cut your face to make you frightening,' she said finally, gazing at the deep slices in the skin there and the thick, white skin that had built up around his missing eyes.
'I was quite frightening to begin with,' he said darkly. 'People do not like a person who can see. It upsets them. It makes them feel...afraid. As though the Gods were watching their sins through my eyes. So they put my eyes out, and made me like this. But I can still see,' he smirked. 'So I had the last laugh. They are all dead now. Like I told you...I have cheated death five times over. When I was still young enough to chase the tavern girls around...I stopped ageing. Death cannot touch me, no matter how old I get. I am too useful.'
'Eerika was right...you had a wife and children, didn't you.'
'You knew that already. I don't see why it surprises you now.'
'It saddens me.'
'Then you are the only one who cares,' he said lightly. 'They are so long dead that they have turned to dust.'
Hella ran her fingers along his forearm, tracing veins full of blue blood through his skin.
'Five times,' she said quietly. 'You mean you've lived five lifetimes?'
'Mmmm,' he nodded, his lips twisted into a cheeky little smirk. 'Nearly six,' he said, like it was a secret.
'Three hundred...' she whispered. 'Over three hundred years.'
He leaned in, grinning. 'Yes,' he said darkly. 'And still as spry as the day I hatched from a hen's egg...incubated by a frog.'
He chuckled, pulling his sleeve back down.
'What if I went outside and told somebody. Aren't you afraid?'
'Nobody would believe you,' he smirked.
'Will you die?' she asked quietly.
'Everyone dies.'
He smiled. 'Let me give you a bit of advice, girl,' he said, gesturing her closer with a crooked finger. 'Have as much fun as you can, before that day comes.'
Hella felt his breath tickle her face and her insides burst open, burning and roiling with sudden feelings she'd never really had the chance to become acquainted with. Before she could stop herself, she wrapped an arm around his neck and accepted the soft brush of lips he pressed to her mouth. She felt his breath grow shaky against her face, felt him move in, then he pushed her head into a better position with his nose and took her mouth, his fingers sneaking into her hair. Hella wrapped herself around him. She'd only done this once before, but it'd never felt so good.
His charcoal stained her lips black. Hella could taste it, along with his patient tongue. Suddenly he pulled away.
'Someone is coming,' he sounded irritated. 'Now of all times.'
Hella bit her lip, smiling.
'Go,' he said, reluctantly releasing her. 'Though it pains me.'
Hella slid off the bed and made a hasty retreat as a shadowy woman pushed the curtain aside.
'Ancient one? Are you in here?'
A/N - Only one more chapter now. It's just a short one, this time.
