Part 5: Chap. 1: Into the Fire

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Part 5

Chapter 1: Into the Fire

When they took you back, it started with a scream. Or a shout. Or a howl. It was a little of each of these, and it lasted for a split second, but it was definitely a cry of pain.

When Kristen Hawke heard this cry for the first time, she was leaning against the cave wall, hugging herself against the cold, though she wore a coat and two sweaters. Below her, a few feet away, Stephen was sitting on his sleeping bag with his arms crossed and his head bowed, also trying to keep warm, while Imogen Cray crouched nearby and asked him questions. She had started out arguing with him, but Imogen was too smart to do that for long. Once she figured out Stephen wasn’t going to argue back, she started acting like the school psychologist, interrogating him in a warm, reassuring voice. Kristen heard her ask him how many Jotuns were in the cave right now, and how many had left the cave, and how many would need to leave the cave before it became winter everywhere forever.

Stephen looked as if the questions were giving him a splitting headache. “I’m not sure,” he kept repeating. “You’ll see for yourself. I don’t know.”

“And all of us being here, waiting, that helps them leave the cave? It kind of pushes them?”

Though Imogen was pretending to be the voice of reason, she was terrified underneath. Kristen could tell, and so could the Jotuns hovering nearby. They were like bats, used to staying dormant in their cave; they didn’t like daylight or noise. Imogen’s agitation was making them shiver and mutter to themselves.

“There’s a Jotun behind you,” Kristen said to Imogen.

Imogen whirled and brandished the back of her right hand, where she’d Sharpied a design very similar to the tattoo Stephen used to have.

The nearest Jotun vibrated all over, responding to her fear, and shrank away. Imogen looked right through it, at Billy Corcoran spitting on the floor of the cave. That made her grimace.

“Next time I won’t tell you,” said Kristen. “You really can’t see them, can you?”

“No.”

“They’ll have you when they want you. That stupid doodle isn’t going to help.”

“It’s not a doodle, it’s-” said Imogen. But before she could explain what it was, Stephen screamed.

Not a high-pitched, shrieky scream; really more of a groan that frayed at the end. It was like nothing Kristen had ever heard, and it made her drop to her knees beside Stephen, expecting to see stab wounds.

There was no blood. Stephen was staring wide-eyed into space. He didn’t seem to notice when she grabbed his hand - or when she had to drop it again because it nearly burned her.

He paid no more attention when Imogen knelt on his other side and peered into his face, but when she took him by the shoulder, he recoiled. He pulled his knees to his chest and pressed his head against them and swayed back and forth, like someone with a high fever.

“Stephen, it’s all right,” said Imogen, reaching for him again.

Stephen tottered to his feet, steadied himself against the rock face and made a series of clumsy, trembling gestures with his other hand. It looked like he might be trying to cross himself. He said some words that weren’t English.

“What’s happening?” Imogen turned to Kristen accusingly, as if she might have orchestrated this.

“Search me,” said Kristen. How should she know why Stephen was talking gibberish?

When Imogen implored him to calm down, he sat on the floor again and clasped his hands and muttered. “Maybe he’s praying,” said Kristen.

“He looks cold. Maybe hypothermic. You’ve been here all night, haven’t you? The two of you.”

“And Jeremy,” said Kristen, and turned away. This scene was already boring her. She knew she had lost Stephen, even if she didn’t know how. He was gone. She’d felt it in the warmth of his hand and seen it in his frightened eyes.

And she’d had him for such a short time, too.

She remembered last night, when she and Jeremy emerged from the deeper caves, cold and sick of each other, to find Stephen sitting in the very center of this outer room, shining a flashlight up to fill his face with shadows. He lowered the flashlight and laughed, and then Kristen saw Jotuns milling around the cave to either side of him. “What do you do down there underground?” he asked.

“Nothing,” Kristen said. “It’s dark. There are more of them. If you get far enough, there’s snow.”

At that, Stephen stood up. Rather than springing to his feet, he stood up carefully, like an old man, and Kristen knew he was on their side now. He said, “Is it always this boring?”

It was always this boring, more or less, but he made it better. They’d ended up talking all night while Jeremy slept or sulked. Stephen explained a lot of things to her, like who the gods were and how they had gone away with no explanation, leaving all the prophecies for the world’s end on hold. That was why being alive was so boring, he said. When the Freeze came, no one would be able to think or want enough to be bored.

Now Stephen was worse than bored. He was on fire with terror and anger and deep bewilderment, like a wild animal scooped up and locked in a cage. Kristen didn’t like even being close to him anymore. But she was reluctant to leave him in Imogen’s care.

Imogen kept hovering. She had given her cellphone to Orin Crenshaw and sent him out into the snow to find better reception, insisting they needed paramedics. “For what?” Kristen asked.

“He’s in shock.”

“You should just let him alone.” She couldn’t contain her disgust. “Whatever happened to Stephen, it’s not his fault.”

Imogen raised her head and pinned Kristen with those awful eyes. “I thought you weren’t supposed to care about anything.”

“I don’t have to care.”

“But you do, don’t you? You care about him, and I bet he doesn’t even…”

She trailed off, as they both noticed that people in the rear of the cave were gasping and rustling. “Sheesh, what the…?” said Evie Carlsson.

“Where’d she come from?” asked someone else.

“Aslaug?” Imogen whispered, as if she were afraid to say it out loud.

The Jotuns noticed something, too. They stopped their floating and hovering and stood rooted, only their white eyes flinching and wheeling. The Jotun-touched people in the room drew in their breaths and put their hands to their hearts or clasped them, lowering their eyes. Kristen knew they felt the way she did. Pretty much the way you would if someone entered your living-room carrying a severed head.

People made way, both touched and untouched, to let Aslaug Andersson walk to the center of the cavern. She was walking in a zigzag, which was understandable, since she had taken off her scarf and tied it around her head so it covered her eyes.

Aslaug’s parka was gray with dirt and her hair was snarled; gravel pattered when she turned her head. The untouched people in the room made hissing, embarrassed, giggling noises.

Except Imogen, who darted out of the crowd. “What were you doing in there?” she said. “I thought you were dead. Something’s happened to Stephen, and I don’t know what to do.”

As she spoke, she reached for Aslaug’s hand. Instead of giving it to her, Aslaug lifted it, showing them her palm.

Kristen felt her stomach turn over. Before she knew what she had seen, she was gasping for air.

She closed her eyes and went to a place in her mind where she always escaped when things got too crowded and loud. In the place it was snowing, and snow was all you could see for miles. No trees, hills, houses, cars, other people.

Except now she did see something. A wall of fire rose high in the air, like a shimmering red-gold curtain. It pulled Kristen closer, its hot wind whipping her, and through the curtain she saw other things.

Her cheeks were wet; she remembered. Just for an instant, she remembered how it felt. She remembered why, instead of going home that night, she had climbed the mountain with Billy, Ashley, Jeremy, and Orin and gone in the cave. She remembered why, when they dared her, she stepped into the darkness to the place where Mr. Blanding waited, and felt almost no fear.

It was stupid, really. It was because of the toothpaste.

Her dad had been out of work since last March. He stayed at home now, trudging around the house in his pajama bottoms, eating too much ice cream and surfing the web - checking the job sites, he said. Kristen’s mom went to work early every morning with a tight smile on her face.

But that particular morning, her dad had an interview with a big company in the city. He came into the breakfast nook, smelling of Listerine and wearing a shirt and tie, to yell at Kristen because she had used up all the toothpaste that supposedly whitened your teeth. “I bought that stuff for me, sweetheart!” he said, smiling but not lowering his voice, while Kristen’s sister hid her face with a napkin. “I need it now, you understand? I’m trying to make a good impression here.” He kept yelling until Kristen said, “It wouldn’t have helped anyway. Your teeth are yellow, Dad. They get that way when you’re old.”

Did he get the job? Was he still out of work? Kristen couldn’t remember. She only knew she didn’t want to go home that day, because she didn’t want to find her dad sitting at the computer in his pajamas. She didn’t want to ask him how the interview went. She didn’t want to apologize.

She didn’t want.

And now she opened her eyes.

In front of her stood Aslaug Andersson, blindfolded but still dangerous. On the palm of Aslaug’s raised right hand was a design drawn in blood. It looked as if she had done it herself. The cuts were shallow, but oozing at the edges.

And it was not just a design, Kristen knew, but a word. A word in an old, lost language, but easy enough to understand. The word meant the fire. It meant the memories.

“She’s totally lost it,” somebody said.

Aslaug raised the bloody hand over her head so they could all see it. “If you want this,” she said, “come here. I think I can give it to you. You have to want it, though.”

As explanations go, it was minimal. But this didn’t stop Jeremy Bliss, who shouldered his way past Kristen. “I want it,” he said.

Kristen drew in her breath. “Don’t. Jeremy. You’ll never -”

Too late. Aslaug had already stretched out her hand to plant her palm on Jeremy’s forehead. She drew it back, leaving a bloody stamp. While Jeremy stood frozen, she tugged at the edge of her blindfold with her other hand. Kristen realized what was going to happen and shut her eyes.

It didn’t matter. She saw the flash of fire through her lids, and she heard Jeremy’s yelp of pain.

When she opened her eyes again, shuddering, he was still there. But he was on his knees in front of Aslaug, whose blindfold was safely back where it should be.

Jeremy staggered to his feet, hugging himself as if he were cold. “What are we all doing here, Kris? It’s, like, a school day.”

“Aslaug, what did you do?” said Imogen. “Why didn’t he …?” She trailed off, obviously not wanting to use the word burn.

Aslaug had burned Jeremy with her eyes, Kristen knew. But, because she’d given him the fire-rune first, the fire had not consumed him. It had gone deep inside him, where it could do more damage in the long run. Even now, warmth and fear pulsed in his eyes and shaped the curve of his lips.

“Where’s my phone?” he asked, searching his pockets. “Where’d I park, dudes? Anybody remember how we got here?”

Laughing nervously, people shook their heads. Evie Carlsson was the one who finally took pity on Jeremy and led him to his sleeping bag.

Meanwhile, though, Leo Mull took his place in the center. “Listen, OK?” he said to Aslaug in his bullish way. “I see what you’re doing here, but I’m not sure this is the deal for me. If it’s gonna hurt…”

“If you’re scared it’s gonna hurt, you’re a pussy,” said a hoarse voice behind them. Kristen turned and stood on tiptoe. Sure enough, there was Orin Crenshaw, grinning like a Jack o’ Lantern. She glared at him.

But it was too late. “Screw that,” said Leo. He closed his eyes and rocked forward to proffer his forehead. “Do your worst. Jump-start me.”

Aslaug left her bloody rune on his forehead and lifted her blindfold. Kristen had to close her eyes for the second flash of light.

Leo screamed louder than Jeremy; he bellowed. Instead of falling to the ground, though, he twitched several times as if struck by lightning, then gave a shout and pounded his chest. “That’s what I call a jump-start, baby! I got the spirit in me. Hallelujah!”

That changed everything. When Leo liked something, other people decided to like it, too. The touched and even some of the untouched lined up in front of Aslaug. Kristen heard several people talking about how a jump-start was exactly what they needed.

“I feel like I’ve been so sleepy for so long,” said Karin Lind in her whiniest voice. “It must be all the snow; it keeps you from being really productive, you know?”

Kristen wanted to tell them that once they were jump-started, they might not be able to stop. There was old magic in that bloody rune: a magic of love, rage, jealousy, even murder. They would remember their own stories. They would stop being able to ignore things.

But instead of telling them, she went and stood by the entrance to the passage and watched them. The weak ones, like Karin Lind, came first. They took the bloody mark on their foreheads and looked into Aslaug’s eyes and screamed their lungs out and then walked away as if nothing had happened. They walked away talking about cars, phones, tests, dates, babysitting, college applications.

Next came the stronger ones, some of whom weren’t even touched and had no idea what they were doing. Billy Corcoran, for instance, made a great show of being stricken by Aslaug’s bloody hand and then pretended to speak in tongues, as if the whole thing were a joke.

But the untouched ones felt no pain, Kristen knew. If they shouted or screamed, it was only because they were imitating the others, getting into the spirit of the thing. She noticed that a few of the touched ones stayed behind like her, mistrust in their eyes.

But the snow strike had been broken. Each time Aslaug looked into someone’s eyes, the Jotuns in the cave faded to outlines, like a movie projected on a sunny day. Kristen could feel them starting to slip discreetly past her, returning to the safety of their burrows. Meanwhile, the human beings were moving the other way, crawling through the cave entrance and vanishing into the white light.

Kristen watched the sheriff’s deputy offer his brow for Aslaug’s bloody handprint and go. She saw Imogen bending over Stephen again, touching his face. Luce Carncross skipped past, dropping a knitting needle as she went. She was blabbing about auditioning for the school play, the blood still fresh on her forehead.

Only then, when just six or seven people remained in the cave, did Aslaug unwind the scarf from her eyes. She kept them closed, which made her look stupid, like someone pretending to be blind. She stretched out one arm. “Imogen?”

“Here,” said Imogen.

“There’s a knife in my pocket,” said Aslaug, scowling with pain or concentration. “Could you get it for me? It’s on the wrong side. I’m scared it’s scabbing over, and there has to be blood flowing for it to work, he said.”

Imogen looked as if she wasn’t sure whether to help her friend or straitjacket her. “Why does it make them scream?” she asked.

“Because it hurts,” said Aslaug. She reached her left arm around to her right side and tried to wiggle her hand into the pocket. “Is there anybody left? I can’t look.”

Imogen’s eyes flicked to Kristen. “What do you mean, anybody?”

“Anybody who wants to be untouched.”

“No,” Kristen said from her place at the back of the cave. She could feel her lips thinning into a straight line.

“Are you sure?” She sounded like her old, timid self again.

Kristen rolled her eyes. “The person has to want your nasty rune, right? If you put it on me, you’ll kill me.”

“Aslaug!” said Imogen. “Did you do this to Stephen? Somehow?”

All eyes flew to Stephen, who now lay curled in a tight ball on his side. “Oh,” said Aslaug, after a pause. “Well, yeah. I guess I did.”

Kristen took advantage of this distraction to slip out of the cave, glancing again at Stephen as he went. His lips were moving. Maybe, she thought, he hadn’t wanted the rune any more than she did. Maybe he wouldn’t get better.

She scrambled through the gap in the rocks and found that, outside, the snow had stopped. The sky directly above was that funny blue just gauzed with clouds that you sometimes see on good skiing days. Several yards down the slope, kids were running, yelling, throwing snowballs.

Kristen made her way into the open and stared up at the dark horns of Cray’s Defile. Late orange sun washed the western sky, turning it a rich cream. She knew no Jotun would venture abroad in weather like this. They needed the world to be cold, colorless, predictable.

“I’m still class president,” she said to the rocks and trees, knowing no one else would hear.