‘The water was cold.’

‘Isn’t that what they all—’

Folkvar cleared his throat. Everyone stopped, shrugged off their packs and lowered them to the heather. Then they moved their shoulders, getting rid of the ache.

‘We move forward now,’ he said. ‘Slowly.’

In the river bank were hollows, not quite caves; farther along was a tumbledown wooden bridge; here and there lay boulders and thickets of heather. All were potential hiding-places, so the men kept watch in all directions as they advanced.

The other party had also laid down their packs. One of their number, a hefty man with a braided beard, advanced.

‘Hail,’ he called out. ‘I am Gulbrandr, chieftain of these good folk.’

‘And I am Folkvar, likewise chieftain.’

‘Fellow travellers for the gathering?’

‘That we are.’

Men in both parties relaxed a little as they leaned on their spears.

‘So if we are peacefully bound for the same destination, good Folkvar, perhaps we should—’

‘Look out!’ yelled someone.

‘Troll!’

‘It’s attacking—’

With a grinding screech, the thing came running from beneath the bridge: formed of moving boulders and stones, roughly man-shaped but twice as big. From gaps between stones came flashes of scarlet light.

By the Gods, it’s real.

Then the troll was on the other party, crushing two men. Blood spurted.

‘By Thórr!’ roared Hallsteinn.

‘Attack!’ yelled Folkvar.

They spread out as they ran, Hallsteinn hurling his spear. It stuck alongside several spears thrown by the other party. Two pierced gaps between the moving stones; then they were splintered as the troll’s limbs brushed them away.

Beside Ulfr, Steinn’s face was deathly white. Big Vermundr unslung his great hammer as he lumbered on, and began swinging it.

We can’t kill it.

Brandr and Griggr were racing ahead. They were going to die. But the troll was moving away, swinging at the other warriors who were backing away in fear.

No, not in fear. To draw the troll away from a woman lying on the ground, her leg glistening with blood and badly bent.

Ulfr’s run was taking him past her, very close.

‘No, warrior!’

Her hand caught his ankle and he stopped, hand rising as he looked down, ready to strike although she was not the enemy. From up ahead came barking, shouts, and a scream as someone fell.

The woman’s face glistened with pain.

‘Use . . . this.’

What she held was a staff tipped with crystal, black runes on the shaft and a single red rune inside the crystal. How that could be, Ulfr had no idea.

Nor could he understand how the rune appeared to glow as if on fire.

‘Strike . . . inside . . .’

Something about her was similar to Eira - she’s a volva, has to be - and in an instant he had already decided, snatching the staff and running forward with it, raising it to his shoulder - I’m going to die - as the troll turned, its massive hard presence dominating the world, and the stone appeared to look at him as a boulder-fist rose to crush him - now - and then he was twisting, both hands on the staff as he rammed it forward - Valkyries, take my spirit - and the crystal tip blazed for an instant before he slammed it between stones, into the creature’s body.

The world blew apart.

Like a volcano whose incandescent fire-river heart runs all the way from Surturheim, home of Fire Giants, the troll exploded stones in all directions, revealing crimson fire.

Then it was uncovered, a complex lattice of naked red light glowing in the air, while simultaneous words sounded inside everyone’s head.

<<Beware it, children of men.>>

<<Do you not see the darkness?>>

<<They are not of you, yet among you.>>

<<Foolish creatures, regard your danger.>>

Above the ground, it twisted, perhaps wounded. Then it floated north, moving faster than a man could run; and after a moment it turned in a way that was impossible, into itself, and then it was gone like a dream in the brightness of morning.

Leaving behind strewn boulders, whimpering wounded, and several crushed corpses.

After several moments, warriors from both parties began to move, converging on the fallen. From behind a large tussock rose a narrow man with a wide-brimmed hat. Clearly he had been hiding.

‘Good poet,’ called the other party’s chief, Gulbrandr, ‘are you intact?’

‘I am, sir.’

‘Then we shall pay more heed to your songs of dread, Stígr.’

The poet’s one eye shone as his gaze fastened on Ulfr.

‘You carried out a brave deed, warrior.’

Ulfr said nothing, disquieted by the twists of shadow above this Stígr’s shoulders, a darkness that Gulbrandr seemed not to see.

Then Folkvar was clasping first Gulbrandr’s arm, then Stígr’s.

Can no one tell what he is?

Perhaps killing the troll - if that was what Ulfr had done - had not been for the best. Something about the poet made his skin crawl.

What if the troll had been after Stígr alone?

Then Steinn called out to Griggr, and Ulfr felt sick, remembering. Breaking eye contact, he went to Brandr.

‘Good boy. Good boy.’

The warhound licked his face.

‘How is he?’ called Steinn.

‘Minor cuts only,’ he said. ‘Unbelievable.’

‘Likewise my Griggr. She was lucky.’

‘We all were.’

‘And you were amazing, Ulfr.’

‘I don’t think so.’

That night, after burying the dead beneath stone cairns, the conjoined bands talked together, getting to know each other. When Stígr rose to declaim a poem, Ulfr left the circle and went to where the wounded volva, Heithrún, was resting. Her injured leg was bound with leather straps; and her face was clear of pain.

If it had been Ulfr with the wound, he would be moaning in agony; Heithrún’s control of her spirit was tremendous.

‘What is it that haunts you, son of the wolf?’

‘I don’t know.’ Ulfr looked back towards the fire. ‘What is our purpose? Why are the chieftains gathering?’

‘That’s not what troubles you.’

‘No, I—’

‘Stígr is a strange one, but I think you see something more.’

‘Why only me?’

‘That I cannot understand. Please hand me my staff.’

‘Here.’

The crystal seemed clear. What had happened to the embedded rune glowing so strongly earlier?

‘We both need to spend time in dreamworld, Ulfr. I to heal, you to explore questions.’

‘Yes . . .’

‘And we can begin our journey together as you cannot help but blink your eyes now, yes, and my verse will accompany our descent’ - the world flickered, then his eyelids closed, and Heithrún’s singsong chant carried him, his spirit, into trance - ‘as it doesn’t matter whether you cannot see the things that are not invisible or let go the things you cannot grasp or grasp what you cannot let go here as we drift deeper and deeper into dreamworld now . . .’

He sank very deep.

This was a hall unlike any he had seen before, though its glass-and-sapphire walls were hung with shields that looked familiar. Around a table stood chairs carved with tiny runes, difficult to make out; and it was when he reached to the nearest chair that the full impact shook him, because his hand looked transparent, like living ice, or rather crystal.

As was his entire body, beneath a clear tunic that draped and fell like fabric, yet could not be such.

—Welcome, good Ulfr.

A regal woman stood at the table’s head, and she was of crystal too.

—Who are you?

—My name, good warrior, is Kenna.

—Are you a Soul-Fetcher? But I am not dead.

She gestured to the table.