“How is falling back on flimsy weaponry going to help us?”
“We can’t very well kill the water beast with axes! We’d never be able to throw or swing them through the water. But spears can be thrown from above the water. They can impale things beneath it! They may be older weapons, but they have their purposes!” Iric points to a space on one of the spears just beneath the sharp tip. “We can attach the end of a length of rope here, so after we cast a throw, we can haul the spear back to us and throw again.”
Iric looks from Soren to me and back again, a boyish hope spread across his face.
“I think it’s brilliant,” I say.
“But spears?” Soren asks.
“If you don’t like them, you don’t have to help us with the hyggja,” Iric snaps. “Raz and I can go home, and you can climb the mountain on your own.”
“Fat chance,” Soren says. “I’m in, but I have no idea how to use a spear.”
“Good thing we have nothing but time out here to practice.”
* * *
IN THE WASHING POOLS, we hold our breath under the water, challenging each other to see who can withstand the longest.
Surprisingly, Iric always wins. But then, he is the one who has the most riding on this.
We practice with Iric’s spears, throwing them both while above the water and while in it. It’s different than throwing an ax or throwing a rock. While the ax was meant to turn end over end when thrown, a spear is supposed to cut through the air like a bird. Straight, unwavering.
It’s difficult. My wrist always wants to snap at the last moment, and I have to force it to be still, to let my fingers release the rod while holding my arm straight, but after a while, I get the hang of it.
Soren, however, is abysmal at it, and he has no problem letting his frustration show.
“These things are ridiculous!” he says after a throw that sends his spear straight into the ground a short distance away.
“You’re just not used to being terrible at handling a weapon,” Iric says. “Try again.”
Soren rips his spear from the ground. “Flimsy, skinny, useless. People were not meant to kill things with these!” He turns his angry gaze on the spear. “You’re an overly large eating utensil!”
“Try throwing higher,” Iric suggests.
Soren throws again. The spear goes farther, but he somehow manages to make the wrong end strike the ground first.
Iric clutches his stomach while he laughs, and Soren looks ready to traipse over and bash him over the head with his fist.
I step in before he can turn those thoughts into actions.
“Here,” I say, handing Soren my spear.
He grips the shaft, and I wrap my hand over his. Being pressed so close against him is odd, and thoughts of Torrin threaten to surface, but I put my focus into teaching Soren.
“Arc back, swing forward, and release. That’s all. Don’t bend your wrist,” I say. We mimic the motion together, going through the steps without releasing the spear just yet.
“Good,” I say, stepping back. “Now don’t be so concerned with throwing it hard. Focus on throwing it straight first. Speed and strength can come later.”
Soren stares at a point in front of him, taking aim, I think. He puts his arm through the motions we just practiced, and at the perfect moment, he releases.
The spear goes sailing, thudding satisfactorily into a tree trunk some ways away.
“Whoop!” Iric hollers, slapping him on the back.
“Well done,” I say.
Soren walks off to retrieve the spear, a new spring in his step. As he does so, his left hand rubs over his right. Just not in the spot where his skin was touching the spear.
He rubs where my hand made contact with his.
PART 3
THE
MATTUGRS
CHAPTER
15
The lake is just as I remember it: massive, eerie, and surrounded by smooth stones. The water is clear in some places and murky in others, where plants cover the ground and mud is churned up by unseen critters.
I step up to the edge of the lake, staring out across the water. It looks so peaceful right now. One would never know a deadly beast lies hidden within.
Iric takes an especially long length of rope and ties it sturdily around the base of one of the thick trees. He then begins uncoiling the rest of it in the direction of the lake’s edge. When he reaches the water, he drops the rest of the coil right on the ground.
Once we catch the hyggja, we’ll need a way to get it out of the water. Iric’s already thought of that.
The lake is quiet save for a few bubbles that breach the top. I think they’re too small to have been caused by the hyggja.
“We have the advantage so long as we can stay on land,” Iric says. He’s already told us this multiple times on the trek to the lake, but I think he needs to say it again to reassure himself. “We throw our spears at the beast until it’s weakened, and then we haul it on land, where I’ll deliver the final blow. We do not go in the water.”
Teaching Iric to swim was a precaution. Should anything go wrong, he needs to know how to swim, and he needs the extra confidence while standing near the water’s edge.
“Do you suppose the hyggja has finished off the gunda’s corpse yet?” Soren asks. “Maybe it won’t be hungry.”
“If that’s the case,” Iric says, “it might not leave the bottom of the lake. Then we’ll have to come back later.”
I do not like the sound of that. I don’t want to wait to continue my task of killing Peruxolo. I can’t. I need that armor.
Soren makes a face. “If anyone falls in, they’ll be swimming in rotting gunda guts.”
“I could have done without that image in my mind,” I say.
“Just don’t drink the water.”
I gag.
“Enough,” Iric says. “Let’s get this over with.” He reaches down, picks up a round rock, and casts it as far as his arm will reach. It sends up a great splash, and we watch until the rippling water stills once more.
“Maybe it’s sick,” Iric says. “Gunda didn’t sit well with it.”
Soren grabs his own rock, selecting a round, flat one. He casts it from his side, and we watch as the rock skips across the water’s surface. One. Two. Three. Then it plunks down below, just a ways farther than where Iric’s landed.
I grab my own flat stone, size up the water, and cast it. One. Two. Three. Four. Five.
“I was just getting warmed up!” Soren insists.
“Everything doesn’t have to be a competition,” I say.
“No,” he agrees, “but it’s far more fun that way.”
He throws a second rock, and we count the bounces. One. Two. Three. Fou—
The rock barely hits for the fourth time before an enormous body launches out of the water, attempting to catch the rock in its jaws. All three of us stagger backward from the shock of it, instinctively putting more space between the hyggja and us.
It’s easily three times the length of a man from head to tail, though only twice as wide. One would expect something flat like a fish, but no. If two men were to lie on their stomachs, one atop the other, it would be similar to the hyggja’s shape. It has fins placed where a four-legged monster would have legs. They’re thick and membranous, and I think it must use them to help swim and maybe move along the lake’s bottom. But there’s no way it can use them above the surface.
It cannot leave the water.
The hyggja’s skin is a dark green, like grass under the pale glow of moonlight, but it doesn’t bear scales. No, the texture is wrong. It’s bumpy and hardened, just like the rock-strewn bottom of the lake.
And its mouth—
Oh goddess, its triangle-shaped mouth seems to go on forever. It’s partially open with a row of top and bottom teeth peeking through the gap.
I see all of this in the second it takes for the beast to fall back down into the water.
“This was a terrible idea,” Iric says into the silence that follows. I look to find him already turned around, heading away from the lake.
“Wait a moment!” I call after him. I follow him at a run, not stopping until I’ve cut him off.