Page 72 of The Fanged One

"Okay," Layla said slowly. "So this is exactly how every horror movie I have ever watched begins."

"It's a trap," Ciara said. She had walked into enough of them to be sure. "Obviously Baba Yaga lives here."

"I doubt it. She lives in a house built on chicken legs." Von rested his fist under his chin, staring at the sign. "It's a very polite trap. Most traps don't leave a welcome note. They make it welcoming like ensuring the walls are made of gingerbread."

"It isn't a trap. If my sister wanted us dead in there, she wouldn't have wasted good wood on a sign." Fenris smiled at the burned wood. "The sign is her being kind in the only way she knows how. I'm not going to insult her by sleeping in the dirt out of pride."

Linnea looked past the hall, and the gray light that had not so much as flickered since they walked out of Hel's doors was dimming. It was the first night they had seen, and it was pooling up from the ground between the trees, rising like floodwater.

Shapes moved in it past the tree line, too tall and too thin, drifting between the trunks with nothing under them to call feet.

"Ohhhh, fuck this scary ass place," Layla muttered, staring at the shades.

"Yup! That's me decided," Linnea said, going up to the doors of the hall. "Inside. Right now."

There was a mumble of agreements, and they pulled back one of the heavy wooden doors.

A glowing fire pit ran the length of the hall, a long spine of banked coals. It was flanked by tables and benches, but the real miracle lay past them. Through low doorways were small, private rooms, and in each was a proper bed that had a real frame, thick furs, and pillows that looked impossibly soft. Hel had built a roadside inn at the bottom of the world.

"I still don't trust it," Tor said, even as he swung his pack down off his shoulder.

"You don't trust soft towels either."

"That's because they don't dry you properly," he argued.

Linnea turned a slow circle in the firelight and let her volvä magic unspool, feeling into the hall's corners for anything suspicious lingering in the shadows. Nothing pushed back. No malice, no hunger, no cold watching presence behind the walls. "There's nothing here that I can sense that's going to jump out at us."

Von's magic tickled at her energy as he ran his own version of the same check, eyes half shut. "She's right. It's clean. I haven't been this suspicious of a nice thing since my last good relationship."

They decided on wards anyway because none of them had gotten this far by being stupid. Linnea and Von went room to room together, and she cut the bind rune into each door frame with the tip of her knife and a thread of will, Algiz for protection, Othala for a safe hearth, the shapes flaring gold before they sank into the wood. Von layered his own craft over hers, a low hum and a handful of words in a tongue that sounded a little like Sami, and the two magics settled against each other like they had done it a hundred times.

By the time the last ward sealed, the others claimed their rooms and said good night, and the hall had gone quiet behind closed doors. They were all exhausted from the constant light, the emotional drain of travel, and the trials poking at their tender insides. Linnea wanted quiet time almost as much as she wanted the cheeseburger in her imagination.

Fenris pushed the door to their room open, and Linnea stepped inside. The ward knit shut at her back with a soft sigh, and for the first time since they had walked out of Hel's hall, they were alone.

The room had a bathing chamber off to one side, a stone bath sunk into the floor, big enough for two, a wide wooden counter, and a bowl beside it. Water had already been pumped into both and was sitting cold.

Linnea crouched at the rim, dipped two fingers into the chill, and grimaced.

"I've had enough to deal with in the past few days. I'm not having a cold bath too," she declared.

"Would you like me to see if there is a way to heat it from underneath? There might be a house spirit that Hel uses to keep the place maintained," Fenris suggested.

"No need. I have something for this." Linnea cracked her knuckles and let the galdr roll off her tongue. "Lögr ok eldr, blandisk nú. Vatn verði heitt sem sumarsól."

Water and fire, mix now. May water become hot as the summer sun.

The old words asked and her magic answered her, rising up from the unfathomable well inside her. The spell rippled out into the water, and steam rose off the surface in slow curling whisps. Linnea kept testing the temperature and repeating the words until the water was just right.

"Show-off," Fenris said behind her with a grin.

"You have no idea how much I hate cold water. I use this spell at home when I'm reading in the bath and don't want to get out." She stood and turned to find that Fenris had already taken off his coat and shirt. It suddenly made her hungry for something more than cheeseburgers.

"Strip," Fenris said, unbuckling his belt.

"Who said you're invited to this bath?" Linnea asked, slipping her coat from her shoulders.

Fenris looked her over, slow and hungry. "You need someone to help wash your back."