Page 39 of Alien Viking's Passion

She smiled again. “I would like that.”

He quickly built and lit a fire so she would have light to work by. Her basket was almost finished.

Leaning into a tree, he tried to think of a good way to trick the trolls. They were slow and not very smart.

“I suppose we can assume that trolls don’t see any better than we do in the dark,” he thought out loud while Aretha put all the fruits into her basket and closed it like a bag. “We can build a raft and fill it with all kinds of trees and bushes and branches. If we hide among them, perhaps the trolls won’t spot us—”

“Look,” Aretha said and pointed. “Sonic is back.”

Indeed the iglsnutr was trotting into the light thrown by the fire.

“Wanting more nuts, no doubt,” Craxon said and found one of the rolled-up leaves in the hut. “Come here, little creature. We may need all the luck you can give us.” He fed it a nut, and the iglsnutr happily munched on it.

“I’m sure he can swim,” Aretha said. “It feels like this island is too small for him. I mean, where are his friends? His family?”

Sonic finished his nut and sniffed the grass, then trotted back into the darkness.

“Let’s find out,” Craxon said on impulse. “Our luckbringer is keeping secrets from us.” He grabbed a burning branch from the fire and held it up like a torch, following the small creature in among the trees. He was careful to not get too close — he didn’t want the iglsnutr to think it was being hunted.

Aretha followed him quietly.

After twenty paces Sonic went around a tree and was gone.

“Where is he?” Craxon wondered, looking around in the light from the torch. “Can he climb?” He stared up the trunk of the tree, but there was nothing that moved up there.

“Maybe,” Aretha said, her voice tense as she kneeled down by the dry trunk of a tree that had fallen over many moons ago. “But if so, he’s climbingdown.”

Craxon leaned over her, holding the torch up. “That would explain it.”

Under the dry tree there was a small pile of rocks, framing a dark, irregular hole in the ground. It looked like it continued far underground.

“It must be his nest,” Aretha whispered. “Maybe that’s where all his friends live. Let’s not disturb them.”

“Big nest for such a small creature,” Craxon said and bent further down, throwing light with the torch. “It widens greatly further down. You could march a host of warriors through it, three wide. Your Sonic is nowhere to be seen. Nests usually have a rank smell to them, but here I sense nothing but freshness.”

Aretha crawled up to the edge of the hole and peered down. “We could probably crawl through it. Should we?”

“Do you have your little sword?”

She showed him her hands. “Sword and basket.”

Still he wasn’t sure. “There may be little to gain from such a big risk. A deep hole could trap us forever. And tunnels do sometimes collapse.”

“That’s true,” Aretha agreed. “And yet someone told me recently that it is better to err on the side of hope.”

He gazed down into the darkness. “I can’t imagine who would say such a thing.”

“Just a man I know. A good and brave one. Best man I’ve ever met.”

His heart swelled, but he kept a straight face. “I will seek out that man and talk some sense into him.”

“And you said the iglsnutr will bring us luck. Maybe this is that luck.”

“By Zhor’s hammer, let’s go!” Craxon exclaimed. “A man can only take so much of having his own words turned back against him.”

She gave him a grin and then stood up to kiss him on the mouth. “For luck. Mylove.”

“But me first,” he decided, his heart soaring to dizzying heights from her words as he broke several pieces of dry wood off the fallen log. He immediately added one to his dying torch.

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