This time, when I look up, I see a tiny cloud of mist hovering over the sea. A whale is passing. In my hands, Kaetil the Raven Hunter is open to the same page that Frank read aloud in the cabin. I remember being surprised—even annoyed—that he knew about Valkyries and warlords. I didn’t like to think that he was smarter than me. But now the mystery is solved. In his hunt for the man with yellow eyes, Kaetil has come across a group of Skraelings camped by a fjord. In a fury, he slaughters them all. Through the air his sword flashed and whistled, and it sang a song of death and vengeance. It sang like a Valkyrie, one of those beautiful ladies of the warlord. It makes me laugh to read this. That’s so like Frank to pretend to know something he’d only just learned. It seemed in those early days that he was always competing with me, as though he had to prove to himself—over and over—that he was stronger, smarter, better in every way. But when he read, his lips moved and I could hear him, just a little.
