Someone was calling softly at the entrance to my tent. It took a few seconds to fully emerge from dreams. Charlotte groaned and struggle to sit up.
What had I been dreaming about this time? There were pictures in my mind, faint, slipping away now. Were my genetic memories no longer going to show up as dreams now that I knew what I needed to know about the Queen? It was almost like Amora had been trying to warn me. I shook my head, like I was trying to shake off the silly idea. Charlotte threw off the fur blanket and crawled over to the entrance, pushing the flap back. The blast of daylight made me squint, and I crawled after her and emerged into the crisp air, eyes slowly adjusting to the sudden change. Everyone in the camp seemed to be awake now, and they were all passing through the tents, heading in the same direction, to the open space just behind where the horses were tethered.
“I had weird dreams,” one of the girls – Stacey – emerged from the tent beside ours, rubbing at her eyes. Suddenly I remembered back to when I had first met the girls, how they had strange dreams about battle as well. I frowned, trying to think. Did that mean the Queen had put a spell on their mother’s too?
“About battle?” I asked her.
She nodded, “I have battle dreams from time to time, Lief would tell us that they were just passed down to us, the memories of our fathers.”
So they were genetic memories. I wasn’t the only freaky magically engineered one? I felt a little lighter inside, “Do you ever dream anything specific? Or feel like you’re someone else in the dream?”
Stacy looked confused, “no, I just dream about battle. And it’s always kind of a blur.”
I couldn’t help feeling disappointed. Margaret and Becca pushed through the tent flap, Margaret still stretching and yawning as she went, “That was the best sleep I’ve had in a long time.”
I turned to see Loki stumble out of the far tent. His dark curls were a mess. He blinked sleepily at me and my heart lurched. He was adorable. I resisted the urge to run over and squeeze him.
Someone cleared their throat. We fell silent. Turning around, I spotted a tall, broad shouldered woman leaning against a tree just outside the tents. Obviously she was the one who had woken us up. I recognized her as the same woman who had swooped Loki up onto her horse. When I looked sideways at him he was still staring around himself dazedly. He hadn’t woken up yet enough to realize it was her.
She said, “Now, if you are all ready, you can come with me. I’ll show you the way to the council meeting. Everyone is heading that way now.” She turned abruptly and marched off, and we hurried to follow her. We passed jotun who were damping down their fires in preparation to leave them, and other jotun hurried along beside us as if they had become swept up in our tide. Everyone was heading for the meadow beside the horses. Already a large crowd had begun to form there. People placed skins down on the snow and then sat down cross legged on them, waiting patiently for something to happen.
I spotted Erik already there, standing at the front of the crowd, arms crossed over his leather jerkin, eyes travelling over his people. When he saw us coming he gave us a smile and a wave.
“Thank you, Gerdie. Amora, you and your friend can come stand by me.”
Gerdie? I glanced at the broad woman’s back, thinking that she could not have possibly been landed with a more unpleasant name.
Gerdie melted – as much as she could be said to melt – in with the others, and we took our place beside Erik. I found myself standing between Loki and Erik, and I noticed the difference immediately. Loki seemed to radiate heat from his skin, and whenever his arm brushed mine I could feel it warming me. Erik and I were the same natural temperature. I didn’t have long to think about this, because apparently the last couple people had trickled in at the back of the crowd, and the meeting was starting. Erik cleared his throat, and the gentle murmur of conversation died away.
“My friends,” his voice was powerful, carrying out over the crowd clearly, “today we robbed the Queen of something she holds very dear.”
The crowd went from silent to erupting into cheers so abruptly that I jumped. Many of the rebels in the front jumped up from the ground, pumping their fists in the air in approval, hooting and cheering.
Erik made a slashing motion in the air and they fell silent, “However, she is not going to be content to leave us alone. She wants Amora back.”
Everyone was looking at me now. Hundreds of pairs of eyes were fixed on me. Some judgmental and brooding, some shining with a triumphant light, some carefully calculating. My face was turning bright red, and I felt a bit dizzy. What could they be thinking of me right now?
Someone in the back piped up, “Well she can’t have her back!”
More shouting, some booing, some cheering. Again Erik motioned for silence,
“Like it or not, we are now in danger of being hunted down by the Queen…”
A few more hisses and boos, and I had to force myself not to shrink back at some of the looks I was getting. Clearly some of the crowd blamed me for this.
Erik’s voice had an edge to it, “Stop that! Are you not more courteous than those at the palace?”
Grumbling now, ashamed muttering. Erik continued to speak,
“We knew this was going to happen sooner or later. There’s only so long you can keep a rebellion secret, and ours has been growing daily. Growing stronger. There are too many of a us to be secret any longer, but too few to attack the Queen directly. We only have a few choices.”
He paused, maybe for effect, and the crowd was silent, almost leaning forward in their eagerness to hear what he had to say.
“This is Loki,” Erik motioned across me. Loki looked startled, but he recovered well, stepping forward to give the crowd a little wave, “As you can see, my friends, he’s a fire jotun.”
Surprisingly, the crowd was utterly silent. Now all the eyes were staring at Loki, examining him, pulling him apart. I could feel him stiffen, but he still kept the easy grin on his face.
Erik continued, “Not only is he fire jotun, he’s the son of King Surtr.”
A murmur swept through the crowd, rising in volume. Erik spoke more loudly,
“He has offered us refuge, if we decide to take it.”
The murmur grew to a rumble. Someone stood up at the back and shouted, “That’s insanity!”
Erik waved his hands, “These are our choices. We can stay here in the realm of Niflheim and just hope to avoid the Queen by continuing to move around. Or we can go hide in the human world…”
The brought even more rumbles of outrage, and Erik gestured more wildly this time, raising his voice until he was almost shouting, “Or we can go with Loki to Muspellheim and help them bring the Queen down!”
The noise from the crowd was uproarious now. Everyone was up on their feet, arguing with one another and shouting towards the front at Erik. Panic was starting to rise up in throat, choking me. How were these people going to decide anything? It seemed like they were just going to stay here and yell at one another till the Queen found their camp and killed them all.
Someone shouted in a deep baritone voice that carried over all the racket, “let the princess speak!” Later I would swear it was the blacksmith, Jarll.
The noise trailed to a stop, and every eye was back on me again. My breath froze in my lungs and the forest seemed to blur in front of my eyes. They expected me to speak? Terror coated the inside of my throat like a thick layer of frost, I wouldn’t be able to get any words out.
Erik turned to me and said softly, “they really need to hear from you. You wouldn’t think it, but they need you.”
My voice was a strangled whisper, “What do I say?”
“Just tell them, as honestly as possible…what you feel. Tell them what you think we should do and why.”
His hand was on my back, pushing me forward gently, “You can do it, Amora.”
Amora. I clung to the name like a life preserver in that moment. If I could just channel Amora, who was a real princess and a leader, I might be okay. What would she do right now? I tried to stand up straight and push my shoulders back. Pretend you’re her, I told myself, right now, you are Amora.
“I didn’t know much about the Queen,” I was surprised at how strong my voice was, “only what she told me herself. Now it’s clear that it was all a lie. I have Amora’s memories, as much as sometimes…I don’t want them…they’ve shown me one thing that has helped me.” As my eyes scanned the crowd I spotted Marian, and my anger surged. The Queen had killed her own daughter, she had cut out this woman’s tongue and left her to die, she had thrust the identity of a dead girl on me and kept my real mother from me. There was more, so much more.
“The memories showed me that Amora had orders to kill the women and children of the fire jotun,” my voice was ringing out over the crowd. Yes, everyone eye was still fixed on me, and some didn’t look friendly, but I didn’t care now. I was too angry. All I could think of was the dream, of the compassion I - Amora, had felt for the captive fire jotun, of the betrayel and hurt she'd felt when her mother had called for her death, “but she refused. She wasn’t a tyrant like her mother. The Queen killed her for that. Branded her a traitor and had her own daughter killed. How many horrible things has Eria done to you?”
I could hear rumblings stirring in the crowd. People were probably unhappy with my speech, but I ignored it and pressed on.
“How many of your friends has she killed? How many of your loved ones has she murdered? She killed her own daughter, do you think anything is off limits to this woman?”
The rumbling was growing louder.
“Yes, Amora went to battle against the fire jotun. But she had honor. The Queen has none! When it came down to it, Amora made the right decision. She stood up to the Queen! What decision are you going to make?”
The rumbles erupted into cheers, startling me so much that I actually backed up a step. In seconds the shock turned to fierce happiness, and I stepped forward again,
“Don’t you see…we have an ally waiting for us in Muspellheim!” The words were rolling off my tongue now, I wasn’t even sure how I knew to pronounce the name of the fire dimension, Erik had only said it once. It was like my lips moved of their own accord, “the fire jotun are also victims of the Queen’s mad crusade! They have been equally injured by her, even more so! They have every reason to ally with us and take the Queen down. We can finally have peace!”
More cheers. People were leaping up and pumping their fists in the air, stomping their feet and letting war cries loose. I had to raise my voice over the clamor,
“Come with me to Muspellheim! Stand at the side of Loki, son of Surtr,” I reached back and grabbed Loki’s hand, jerking him forward. He recovered from his surprise quickly and to my delight he held my hand tightly and brought our hands up into the air in a triumphant gesture.
The cheering grew louder. Loki’s voice rang out, deep and strong over the noise,
“We welcome you, Niflheim! Together we will bring down the Queen and end her reign of tyranny!”
Erik stepped forward and grabbed my other hand, bringing it into the air as well. He cried out, “With the help of the Muspellheim we will appoint a new Queen! A good and just ruler, the one who will lead you in bringing down the old monarchy. Who will appoint Amora, daughter of Niflheim?”
The cheers only grew louder, but there seemed to be a sudden ringing in my ears that made the celebrations sound hollow and far away. Erik’s words were repeating like an old record that kept skipping in my head.
Who will appoint Amora?
Me. That was me he was talking about. They wanted me to be a Queen.
It was a good thing that Loki and Erik were holding my hands up on either side, because it felt like my knees suddenly turned to water. In front of me the crowd was an ever moving tide, jumping and shaking their hands in the air, but suddenly they weren’t real. This had to be a dream. I would wake up any moment now, shaking my head at how silly these dreams were, telling myself that Amora must have had this experience and it was just the genetic memories. But my surrounding didn’t waver, they were solid, and the crowd didn’t vanish, they just kept cheering. And Loki and Erik’s grips on my hands were both very solid and real.
Who will appoint Amora?