Early on the morning of the fourth day, Otto was shaken awake. He blinked blearily, and realized it was Britta, who was on the last watch shift. The rain had weakened to a drizzle, barely noticeable given how soaked he already was. No one else was awake yet. "We may have trouble," she said. "Not Ursa, but other monsters."
Otto stood and followed her to the edge of camp, where she pointed to the southeast. It took a moment for him to see what she was gesturing at: gray lumps in the distance, nearing the patchwork grain fields outside a village. The village lay in the opposite direction from Coldriver, a relatively isolated settlement with only a rudimentary wall. The lumps seemed to be moving slowly, and were not the right shape for wolves or dire foxes.
"Trolls," Otto said. Britta nodded with a grimace. Trolls were rare this time of year; they must've been stirred out of their summer sluggishness by Ursa Magnus, emboldened to seek out their favorite meal—humans. Otto hesitated, considering their options. "We're already far behind Ursa, and the trail's weakening in the rain."
"But that village doesn't look prepared for trolls, and unless Coldriver's already sent warriors out, they won't get there until it's already too late," Britta said.
"And we're perhaps an hour's ride away."
Otto weighed his options. They could ignore the trolls and continue on. Now that the weather looked to be breaking, perhaps they'd be able to catch up enough so as not to lose the lingering scent trail. But the corpses yesterday had been a day old, judging by the decay, and Ursa was clearly gaining more distance from them. Pursuing him might be a lost cause anyway.
If they detoured now, though, it would certainly be a lost cause.
All the villages around here were under the domain of Coldriver, but honorable warriors protected any and all from monsters. Pragmatically, if nothing else, slaying all monsters one came across was a good way to ensure they didn't continue thriving and multiplying to come back to one's home—and their hunting party wasn't that far from Thunderhill, not for a hungry band of trolls.
If they lost Ursa's trail, Otto resolved, they would still travel to the Obsidian Mountains, looking for some sign of him or his lair. It would be challenging, but he wouldn't give up. And the longer Otto weighed the choices, the more certain he was that he couldn't leave the villagers to the hands of the trolls.
"Wake the others. We're going after the trolls."
Once everyone was awake and the circumstances had been explained, Otto could tell not everyone agreed with his decision. Elov wouldn't wipe the scowl off his face, and Peder looked troubled, knitting his brow and shaking his head, but neither questioned him. Rolf, however, strode up to Otto as the others were saddling their reindeer, his fists clenched.
"We're out here to hunt down Ursa, not save some stupid peasants from common trolls," he growled.
"We'll resume our hunt once we've slain the trolls," Otto said. Bitty waited at his feet, eyeing Rolf with hostility. Rolf's hounds growled at her from either side of him. "Peasants aside, wandering trolls are a threat to all of us in the region."
"Once we've slain the trolls, the dogs'll not be able to get Ursa's scent again! We're already in trouble with this rain, so why're you making it worse?"
"You heard Otto, and this is not up for discussion." Lukas stepped over, leading his readied reindeer, and giving Rolf a hard look. Rolf looked down at him and sneered.
"What do you care, Lukas?" said Rolf. "You've never been one to roll over obediently for nobles, so why're you starting now?"
"I don't 'roll over' for anyone," Lukas replied, "including you. There are children about to be eaten by trolls, and you're so set on rushing after the great beast that your heart's frozen to everything else. If you want to go off on your own, then go! Don't stand here blustering and wasting everyone's time." Lukas turned away pointedly and pulled himself into his saddle.
Rolf reddened, and for a moment, Otto expected a challenge. But instead, Rolf turned and stomped away in unspoken defeat. Otto's frustration shifted to Lukas, who pulled up beside him as they waited for Rolf to finish preparing his mount.
"You didn't need to step in," Otto said, annoyance making him curt. He couldn't deny that Lukas had defused the situation, perhaps better than he could have, but he was their leader. He didn't want anyone else standing up for him lest it appear he couldn't stand up for himself.
"Every minute we waste is another minute that the trolls are gaining on the village," said Lukas. He looked down toward the village, genuine concern cracking through his stony expression. "So I'd like us to spend as little time on petty squabbles as possible."
"I can speak for myself, petty squabbles or not," Otto said. Still, as he pulled away from Lukas and called for the warriors to follow him, he couldn't help but feel that Lukas had a point. Rolf obviously respected Lukas more than Otto, and pride was less important than results when there were lives on the line.
A break in the clouds brightened the sky, the rain slowing to mist. As they approached the village, Otto saw the trolls moving as well, uninterested in the fields of rye and vegetables, but pausing at a goose coop before they reached the village. The trolls unceremoniously smashed through the coop’s weak walls. When Otto and his warriors came close, the trolls were just finishing up—gray feathers and blood all over, the geese that had managed to escape scattered in all directions, and the trolls gorging on the fowl they'd caught.
They were only a few minutes away when a villager came down the path, apparently on his way to investigate the ruckus. Otto shouted in warning, but it was too late. The trolls had spotted him—and now, thanks to the noise, they'd noticed the incoming warriors. Shaken out of their gluttonous revels, the trolls dropped the remnants of their meals and grabbed fence posts and broken boards from the coop like they were nothing more than twigs.
"Split up—Lukas, Elov, Rolf, and Kennet, loop around to the right to get to the village; the rest of you, with me to intercept the trolls!" Otto called, heart pounding. He'd faced trolls before, but even with expertise and experience, no monster was an easy battle.
As Otto predicted, the trolls didn't stay in a single mob, either. Two chased after the unfortunate villager, while the other five moved toward the incoming warriors.
"Warriors, dismount!" Otto cried. Leif bucked at the sight of the fast-approaching trolls, and Otto was barely able to calm him in time to dismount safely. "Viggo, Cori—stay with the reindeer!"
Trolls were a hideous sight up close. Roughly humanoid with pebbly gray skin, no genitals, and uncanny, huge green eyes, they were more than twice as tall as an adult human, and many times stronger. They did not have the intelligence to craft their own weapons or armor, but they also weren’t curbed by things like reason or fear of death. Britta and Petra kept back, firing arrows at the troll nearest the front. It screamed but didn't slow at the first arrow in its shoulder, nor the second in its side, but a third to the knee hobbled it, slowing its pace substantially. The one behind it caught an arrow right to the throat, and clawed at it in agony, before the trolls reached melee distance.
Fighting trolls was a messy thing. They weren't fast, not compared with many beasts, but one solid blow from their improvised weapons could bash a person's head in, helmet or not.
Given their height, attacking a troll's face was impractical. Instead, Otto relied on the method Johan had perfected the hard way after losing dozens of warriors, including his first husband, to trolls during a bad few years. Otto kept the troll distracted by dancing back and forth, with Bitty and other hounds helping to confuse it by darting in and out of its reach. Its swings became angrier and more erratic, giving Otto the chance to dart behind it and slice into the tendons on one of its naked ankles. The troll howled, trying to spin around, but its leg buckled.
Carefully avoiding the troll's thrashing with its fence post, Otto targeted the other ankle and the backs of its knees, until the troll couldn't walk or stand at all. Its flailing arms were still a threat, one attempting to whack him and the other trying to grab him. Wrists and elbows went next, until Otto could safely approach near enough to stab through the troll's tough muscle and fat, deep into its heart.
Hertha and Peder were well seasoned with trolls, and similarly close to success. But as Otto yanked his sword out of the troll, its foul-smelling blood spurting onto him from its heart’s last desperate beats, there was a sickening thud. Ulf had not been fast enough, and had received the full brunt of a plank, the wood splintering and breaking on impact. He'd fallen, and Otto couldn't tell if he was alive or dead.
Otto leapt in before the troll could grab Ulf, using its distraction to hamstring it immediately. There was nothing else he could do for Ulf in the moment, so Otto pushed his fears aside and kept all his focus on the battle. The troll screamed and collapsed onto its rear, its attention turning to Otto. Furious and determined, Otto sliced one of its hands to the bone before stabbing it in the heart. Its other hand flailed with the ruined wood, forcing Otto to let go of his stuck sword as it swung too close to him. He took up his ax instead, leaving the troll to die as he went to help the other warriors with the remaining trolls.
The trolls were soon reduced to dying heaps, one still waving its ruined arms and another shuddering with final spasms as it bled out. Up the hill, Viggo had managed to keep the reindeer steady, and Cori, seeing the battle was over, ran down, her cloak flying behind her in the wind, to tend to their wounds. The reindeer wouldn't come so close to the scent of trolls, dead or not.
"You four—go up and get your reindeer, and ride down to the village." Lukas, Elov, Rolf, and Kennet should've been able to finish off those two trolls, but Otto wasn't taking any chances. "I'll be right behind you."
Otto went to Ulf. He was groaning, so he was alive, at least, but he wasn't looking good. His right arm was at an unnatural angle, and blood had soaked much of his armor. His helmet was dented, but it seemed he'd taken the brunt of the blow with his shoulder, and his eyes were open as Otto knelt beside him.
"Damn troll got me," Ulf said, his voice strained, barely more than a whisper.
"But we got them right back," said Otto. He took Ulf's uninjured hand and gave it a reassuring squeeze. "Cori's almost here; she'll fix you right up."
"I have my doubts." Ulf's smile was not reassuring, and Otto felt a pang of guilt. He knew he'd done the right thing, but on the other hand, it was thanks to his decision that Ulf was badly injured. Ulf would likely never fight again, if he survived.
"Go on; I'll be all right with Ulf," Cori called as she hurried over. She was breathing heavily from running, but not too badly; sorcerers had to stay in good shape to keep up with warriors.
"Once the situation's resolved, I'll send someone up to help you," Otto said to Cori as he gave Ulf's hand another squeeze, then stood.
Otto left before he could see Cori's expression as she examined the fallen warrior. He grabbed his sword from the dead troll, wiping it as clean as he could on the grass. There was nothing more he could do here, so he jogged up the hill to meet Viggo, carefully approaching with the reindeer.
"You all right to take them around, meet us down in the village?" Otto asked as he pulled himself into the saddle.
"Aye." Viggo cast a worried glance at Cori leaning over Ulf, but they both knew now wasn't the time for questions.
When Otto arrived in the village, the trolls were already slain. Scared and confused villagers crowded around the warriors while goats bleated and dogs barked nearby, all manner of livestock disturbed by the recent sounds and sick smells of the trolls. Lukas gave a single, serious nod to Otto as he slowed his reindeer, and despite the grave circumstances, Otto felt a youthful jolt of excitement at the modicum of respect—and at seeing that Lukas was uninjured. Otto couldn't help but realize he had been paying an inordinate amount of attention to Lukas lately, caught by an attraction that was deepening each day. He put the thought out of his mind to focus on the matter at hand.
"Greetings." Otto raised a hand to greet the villagers and dismounted. "I'm Lord Otto Johanson of Thunderhill. Pardon our bloody intrusion onto Coldriver lands—when we saw the trolls approaching, I felt it was best to come to your aid without delay."
A well-muscled woman in a simple leather breastplate with a large handax at her side stepped forward to shake his hand.
"I'm Astrid Melkerson," she said. "Headwoman of this village. I thank you and all of your warriors for your quick action. While I prepared myself to fight," she said, gesturing to her rudimentary armor, "our small group would've stood no chance against that many trolls. We owe our children's lives to your bravery and skill."
It was no exaggeration. For all that trolls were used as a threat to poorly behaved tots in Thunderhill, if they broke into houses and were not stopped, it was true that they preferred to eat human children. The village was lucky all it had lost was its geese.
"Your warriors told me you're in pursuit of Ursa Magnus," Astrid continued. "We've not sighted him, but last night, the men gathering firewood found corpses of reindeer and nomads alike at the edge of the forest. The nomads only left Coldriver a few days ago, and some bands were due to travel east through the woods to the open grassland beyond."
"Noll rest their souls," Otto said. All he could think of was the bloody field with the deer hoof, but this time with a bloody human hand in its place. "That does sound like the work of Ursa. Thank you for the information."
"If there's anything we can do to aid you, we would be honored. Please, at least enjoy a meal and a bath. Our village may be humble, but we can offer you that much."
"While we must be back on our way soon, a hearty meal and a bath would be much appreciated." Otto scanned his warriors' reactions. A few, including Elov, looked openly relieved, and the only one who scowled was Rolf, though he seemed to have wised up enough to make no comment. "There are three more of us—one with the reindeer, and our green mage is with a badly injured warrior."
"We don't have a green mage in our village, but Greta and Gerd are herbwives—I'll send them to help." Two women in the crowd, both with delicate blond hair and appearing to be mother and daughter, stepped forward.
"Petra and Peder, take these women up to Cori and Ulf," Otto said. "The rest of us will help the villagers burn the trolls." If left unattended, troll bodies would slowly knit themselves back together, and could become dangerously viable overnight, or even in a matter of hours, in the worst of circumstances. Otto was taking no chances.
"I'll have the sauna master prepare for you," said Astrid. "And we'll have a meal ready for you afterward."
*~*~*
Burning trolls was unpleasant business. They began with the two felled in the village streets. Hauling stones around them to contain the fire was laborious work, and once the fire was begun, the smell of living trolls seemed downright tolerable in comparison. Warriors and villagers alike covered their mouths with their cloaks, coughing and choking on the putrid smoke. Otto was ironically grateful for the smell of wet wool and festering mildew from the rains, as it was much more pleasant than the gore-and-shit smell of burning troll. One of the villagers was overcome by the vileness of the bodies going up in flames, and vomited.
Astrid offered to handle the other troll corpses with villagers alone, but Otto refused. There were barely more than twenty able villagers for the task, and without the warriors' help, it would've been even longer. They helped pile stones into a large cart, which they pulled with them up the hill where Cori sat with Greta and Gerd beside Ulf. His eyes were closed, and Otto assumed the worst.
"He won't die," Cori corrected Otto, seeing the look on his face. "But even moving him will be dangerous, and he's in no shape to ride."
"Dangerous, but possible?" Astrid asked. She turned to Otto. "We can't leave him out here, but I can see to it that he's taken care of until he recovers enough to return to your burg."
"I would greatly appreciate that."
Astrid sent two of the villagers down to fetch the stretcher from Greta's home as the others got to work. A few of the trolls' limbs were already twitching again, and the one Otto had first slain was giving shuddering blinks, its eyes rolled back in its head. An unpleasant sight, and all the more reason to finish their task quickly.
"I'm sorry about Ulf," Lukas said as he helped pile stones. It took a moment for Otto to realize Lukas was speaking to him. "He's a good warrior, and I'm sure that he fought valiantly. I'll pray for his recovery."
"Thank you," Otto said. "I will be as well."
Otto tried to think of something else to say, but his lungs were tired from the battle followed by manual labor, and his mind was tired from too many things to think of. The trolls, the quest, what was happening back in Thunderhill, how many more people Ursa would slay before they reached him… if they could find Ursa again at all.
*~*~*
By the time their work was finished, the sun was high in the cloud-dotted sky. Otto had never felt filthier, but he and his warriors were ravenous from the backbreaking work and accepted a cold lunch of bread, butter, and pickled vegetables from the villagers before heading to bathe. The hounds enjoyed sniffing through the new village, feasting on mutton scraps and gnawing on bones the villagers gifted them. The reindeer were not in the best of spirits after their encounter, but Viggo's steady hands and hay offered by the villagers soothed them.
The village sauna hut was rudimentary, but after days on the road, it felt heavenly. They scrubbed themselves with warm water and the rough soap provided, removing layers of blood, dirt, and sweat. Then they moved to the stone benches of the steamy sweatroom, breathing in the clarifying vapors and finally letting some of the tension out of their muscles.
Otto leaned back on his bench against the wooden wall of the hut, relatively cooler since the hut was stand-alone. Not the best design, but at least they weren't here in winter. The hot, humid air was comforting and invigorating, even as he noticed the aches in his body from today's work and days in the saddle.
A few of the warriors were carrying on low conversations; more were silent. The sauna was a social experience, but not necessarily a talkative one. Lukas, unsurprisingly, was one of the quiet ones. He sat on the end of a bench across the room from Otto, near the steaming stones. His nomad fellows sat nearby, Rolf joking with a mildly interested Britta, but Lukas ignored them, only occasionally reaching out to ladle another scoop of water onto the stones.
Otto didn't want to leer, but he couldn't help using the opportunity to take in Lukas's body. Nudity was nothing shameful, after all, just another state of the body, rarely seen due to pragmatism, not propriety. When Otto first snuck a look, he thought he caught Lukas staring back, but when Otto chanced a second look, Lukas’s gaze was elsewhere, and Otto put it out of his mind.
Lukas looked as wiry as he did with clothes on, but his leanness only emphasized the muscles of his shoulders, his legs, his abdomen. He had a modest amount of dark body hair, not much on his chest, but thickening down on his taut stomach. Numerous white scars marked him a veteran warrior: a long jagged one on his upper left arm, a small one on his left side, and a patchwork on his right knee. Rasmus had had a scar on his knee too, though lower and more of a slash than a patchwork. Being steeped in a memory of his old lover while looking at a new man made Otto feel odd, threatening to unearth his mostly buried grief, so he averted his eyes again.
Eventually, the heat in the sweatroom started to feel heavy rather than rejuvenating. Otto stood and left, the others slowly following his lead. After a quick, refreshing dunk in the pool outside, Otto dressed and combed his hair and beard. Village women had washed their clothes as best they could in the limited time while they were bathing. His drawers were still damp and not all the blood was out of his tunic, but at least his attire no longer stank of troll.
It was too early for supper when they finished, but Astrid delivered on her promise of a hot meal nevertheless. It was for the best, as Otto wanted to get a few hours of journeying in before making camp for the night.
They left the village with more thanks, and the promise that Greta and Gerd would take good care of Ulf.
"There's not much more I could do for him now that a herbwife couldn't do," Cori told Otto. "He needs steady care and plentiful rest, neither of which he'd get by leaving the village."
Otto led the warriors east, following the villagers' directions towards the slaughtered nomad band. If they had any hope of picking up the trail again, it'd be there. But when they arrived on the grisly scene, the bones had already been well picked over—by carrion-eaters, it appeared—and the hounds gave no clear signs of his direction. There were a few fallen trees, but not many more than usual; the forest wasn't so dense that Ursa left a clear trail. Otto regarded the scene with his jaw clenched, thinking of how much more carnage awaited them, Ursa having outpaced them. Without a clear lead, the Obsidian Mountains were their best bet. For now, though, Otto just needed to urge the group on, and he could think on it over the night, after giving one last chance for the dogs to find Ursa's scent.
"We'll continue east through the woods," he said. "Not far through, we’ll reach open fields again, where we'll rest for the night."
"The hounds can't get the scent," said Kennet, "and by now, Ursa must be two days' ride ahead of us. Even if we rode through the night and next day, we'd be hard-pressed to get close enough for them to smell him again."
"And that's assuming no more rain," Peder said sourly.
"We head east," Otto repeated. "Get through the woods before we make camp, and in the morning, if there's still nothing for the hounds, I will tell you our next move. But our next move is not to put our tails between our legs and slink home in defeat." Petra nodded in support, though she was in the minority. Rolf wasn't the only one in the group looking skeptical. Lukas's expression was neutral, unreadable.
It wasn't until the sun hovered at the horizon that they passed through the other side of the woods and set up their camp in exhaustion. The good meals and bath had helped, but even as the others snacked on jerky and suet cake, heading to their bedrolls with varying degrees of hurry, Otto found himself too restless with thought to head to sleep yet.
After Otto, sitting by the fire, told Petra he'd take the first watch and she left him to go sleep, Lukas approached.
"Mind company?" he asked.
"I'd welcome it."
Lukas sat down close, but not quite next to Otto. The ground beneath them was mostly dry, the night's coolness melted away by the crackling flames. Nearby, Otto could hear Elov's characteristic nasal snoring, and Viggo and Peder rustling on a shared bedroll. Lukas didn't speak at first, and Otto regarded the landscape around him again, the shadows of grasses and trees in the moonlight and the bright constellations of stars overhead. The War Stag, an eight-point constellation of Orvar's steed, was high in the sky. Otto and Rasmus had first coupled on a night like this, warm and quiet and clear, with the majestic War Stag above them, and the memory infused Otto's silence with sorrow.
"Do you actually have a plan to catch up with Ursa?" Lukas asked. "The dogs won't catch his scent again, and even if we stumble across some giant pile of Ursa shit, it won't be enough to get back on the hunt, not for long."
"We're going to the Obsidian Mountains, hot on Ursa's heels or not," Otto said.
"Not, it'll be."
"I'm well aware. But legend and lore tell us that the great monsters, Ursa Magnus included, hole up in the mountains. I'll search high and low, through every cave complex if I must." He sighed heavily. Just saying it made it sink in how gargantuan, nearly insurmountable, such a task would be. "There are temples in the mountains, too. I may visit Volha's, and pray to her for wisdom, and the path to Ursa."
"I thought so." Otto bit back a snarky reply, letting Lukas continue. "He'll be in the Obsidian Mountains; I've no doubt of that. But precisely where will be impossible to find without guidance. We could search for years—and we have only a few months before he goes back to his long sleep."
"Then we'd best start praying now," said Otto. His annoyance was not abated. He knew Lukas wasn't doing it on purpose, but pointing out all the holes in Otto's plans was not endearing.
"We should, but not just to Volha. If we want Ursa to meet his end—"
"Of course!"
"—we should consult with Noll."
Noll. Lord of the underworld, taker of men and monsters alike. The three wife goddesses gave birth to prey, predators, and monsters, but all their children ended up in Noll's embrace in the end. Noll was known by all, but his ways were often mysterious, and his priests were reclusive.
"Why should Noll favor us over Ursa?" Otto asked, trying to hide his unease. He knew Volha well, prayed to her frequently. Noll was a greater unknown.
"The great bear has lived for a millennium now. Even the colossal beasts must die someday, and this wouldn't be the first myth where an impatient Noll gives favors to mortals. We'll die soon enough for him anyway, in the grand scheme of the world." Lukas shrugged. "Or maybe he won't favor us, and we'll walk away empty-handed. Still, in the face of such daunting odds, I would turn to Skullmont."
Otto had never been to Skullmont, knew it only by reputation and rumor. Carved into Mount Kalevar, the temple was the macabre palace of Noll. While many burgs had small temples to the more popular deities, such as Orvar and Volha, Skullmont was only house of Noll in all of Tegland, other than a few mausoleum shrines. Occasionally pilgrims brought the bones of deceased loved ones to Skullmont, for purposes ranging from sentimental to nefarious, but it wasn't customary in many western burgs like Thunderhill.
"Mount Kalevar is one of the nearest peaks, so it's a sensible place to start," Otto said. He had his hesitations, wondering what Noll—and his priests—might ask of the warriors if they came seeking aid. But it seemed a better plan than searching many vast mountains for Ursa Magnus.
Lukas shook his head, exasperated, as if Otto was missing something obvious.
"You're the prince, so whatever you think's sensible," he said, rising. "Night."
"Lukas." Otto didn't want their conversation to end like this. By now, he knew Lukas well enough to recognize when his ego was bruised. Otto had hedged his response because he didn't want to commit to anything without thinking it over, but he wasn't dismissing Lukas's advice.
Lukas paused, but didn't sit again. "What?"
"Thank you for your insight." There was more he could've said, but unnecessary explanations would help neither his pride nor Lukas's.
Lukas's face was hard to read. Thoughtful or doubtful, Otto couldn't tell. Possibly even slightly surprised. "You're welcome. I'm going to get some rest."
Otto nodded, and made himself look back to the fire as Lukas left. The more the two of them spoke, the more he wanted to understand Lukas. But for now, he'd settle for them not being at each other's throats.
*~*~*
The view in the morning was stunning. Clouds lorded over the wide, majestic fields of green grasses, red-berried rowan trees, and bright flowers, dotted by crystal-clear ponds. A river rushed down from the evergreen-forested peaks far to the north; to the south, distant figures of sheep and people could be seen in the pasturelands around the stone towers of Twingate. To the east and northeast, the Obsidian Mountains rose high above anything and everything else, their coal-black peaks streaked with snow even at this time of year. The mountains weren't made of pure obsidian, of course, but with their many jagged edges and darkness contrasted by the white snow, it was easy to see how they’d gotten their name.
But for all that Otto could see, there was no Ursa Magnus. Had the beast turned south through the woods instead? Or north, disappearing into the tall firs of the distant reaches of the Obsidian Mountains? Hesitation would only show weakness, and Otto knew his resolve could not waver. Stories of the priests of Noll helping heroes of old—though not without cost—gave credence to Lukas's suggestion.
Distant birdsong and the gentle music of plants rustling in the winds was broken by a cacophony of cawing as Otto looked out across the land. He turned his face skyward and saw dozens of ravens flying overhead. The birds glinted like polished flecks of night in the sunlight, coming out from the forest to fly right over their camp. The other warriors, startled, paused their food and mount preparations to watch the flock sweep across the valley, flying east toward the distant mountains. The same direction that would take them to Skullmont.
"It's an omen," Kennet said, awed.
"An omen of our impending deaths, ready to take our spirits to Noll?" said Elov. "I'd think so."
"Cease your nonsense, Elov," said Otto. "The ravens did not circle us, nor land by us in hunger. They are a sign that Noll is willing to offer us guidance. His temple is in those same mountains that Ursa Magnus and the other great monsters call home. So saddle up—we're riding to Skullmont."