Thief Eyes - Janni Lee Simner [41]
Ari’s jacket turned to liquid and began to flow. My breath caught. The change was much faster than before—Ari didn’t stop, didn’t fall to his knees. In moments he turned into a huge white bear, loping on all fours.
A bear that roared and kept running, right at Svan.
Chapter 10
Even as the bear began to leap, Svan pointed at Ari and chanted:
May you shed this form and show
Your true self.
I will fear no bear-kin!
Fur and bearskin melted away. It was a human boy who knocked Svan to the ground and landed crouched on top of him. Sweat streamed down Ari’s face. “Leave her alone.”
Svan chuckled. “So you’re a berserk, are you? I underestimated you, boy.” The sorcerer got to his feet, dumping Ari roughly to the ground. Ari scrambled up, shoulders tensed. I hurried to his side. His legs wobbled, and he grabbed my arm for balance.
“That’s the thing about the berserks,” Svan said. “You’re strong enough during a change, but not much use afterward. Even so”—he grinned, as if he hadn’t attacked me a moment before—“you could do worse, Haley.”
Ari and I took a few steps back. “Just stay away,” I said.
Svan held out his hands as if to say, Whatever. His palms were burned and beginning to blister. He hardly seemed to notice. I did that. The thought didn’t bother me as much as it should have.
Svan looked at Ari. “So whose line are you through? Skallagrim, perhaps?”
Ari eyed him warily. “Mom and I are through Hallgerd’s line, actually, just like Haley.”
“Indeed?” Svan stroked his beard. “What of your father’s people?”
Ari drew his arms across his chest. “My father has nothing to do with anything. He ran away before I was born.” Yet he glanced at his jacket, as if uncertain.
Svan reached toward the jacket. Ari growled at him, and Svan stepped back. Score one for us.
“My dad left it behind.” Ari switched to English—words for me, not Svan. His wary gaze never left the sorcerer, though. “I found the jacket in Mom’s closet a few years ago. I do not know why she didn’t get rid of it. I do not know why he didn’t take it with him.”
“Do you think he knew? About being a bear?” I spoke English, too, while Svan stared at us both.
“How should I know?” Ari snapped. “It is not like he ever calls.”
Wind tugged at my sleeves, my strange short hair. “I’m sorry.” I tried to imagine never having known my dad. Angry as I was, the thought brought no comfort.
Ari shifted uneasily. “He is the one who should be sorry, yeah?” Silence thickened around us, no sound but the wind.
“So,” Svan said, “if you two are done with your love talk, perhaps we can get back to business?” Tension crept into his casual words. “You felt the earthquake, Haley. That was Hallgerd’s work, of course.” He glanced down at his burned hands. “I did not know Hallgerd’s magic had rooted in you so deeply.”
Svan didn’t know the fire in me hadn’t come from Hallgerd. The coin remained in my pocket, but its power seemed a small thing beside the fire banked beneath my skin. Would Svan decide he needed to destroy me, too, if he knew I held fire of my own?
Was it really my fire that had caused the earth to shake? Wouldn’t Dad love that? Earthquakes whenever he wants them. I fought down a hysterical giggle.
“The earthquakes will only get worse, the longer the coin remains intact,” Svan said. “If you will not destroy it, give it to me. The spell will be weaker if I cast it, but at least I don’t lack the will to do what needs to be done.” Svan stepped toward me. Ari tensed at my side. The sorcerer held out his hand.
The sky and clouds were dark now, the world around us mostly shadow. I looked toward the overhang. A huge boulder had slid down from the hill above it, half blocking the opening. In the distance, other piles of rubble lay at the base of other hills, sent tumbling down by the quake.
People died in earthquakes. Had Muninn been right to hide me away, where I couldn’t do any harm?