The Dark Horse Read Online Free

And after Horn had shouted at them, Olaf had shouted at them, in front of everyone. After that people had begun to be more interested in the box itself, and Mouse and Sigurd had fled the great broch, Sif laughing at them, and Freya chasing after Sigurd, trying to console him.
    Mouse had no idea where Sigurd was now. It seemed he didn’t want even her around. But it wasn’t just his fault that Sif had seen him hide the box. They’d been careless. Mouse wondered what was in the box. Horn would find out now and keep whatever treasures were inside it.
    Mouse had crept into one of the small brochs used as a grain store. She’d put her blanket up onto the pile of wheat and gone to sleep. She’d done it before. It was a place she came to whenever she needed to hide. She wasn’t allowed to sleep with the dogs, so she came here. Not even Siggy knew. If she heard anyone coming, she’d learned how to wriggle down into the grain and hide, and if a few last ears of wheat spilled onto the floor as whoever it was opened the door, they’d say, “Just a mouse,” not knowing how right they were.
    The last time Mouse had hidden in the grain, not that long ago, she’d had to throw her blanket onto the top of the pile, and herself after it. This time she’d only had to step up onto it. They were using up their stores of wheat. The fishing was very bad, and it was a long time till Harvest-month. Olaf had dared to mention this at a gathering in the great broch, and Horn had savaged him with words.
    “You’d have my people starve?” Horn roared. “They must eat something.”
    Horn played up to the assembly, and it worked. They muttered their support. They were tired of being hungry and of worrying about being hungry.
    Olaf tried to argue, but it was no good.
    “If we eat all our wheat now,” he said calmly, “then we shall starve.”
    Horn turned really nasty then.
    “If you continue to spread these ill omens, they will come true. The fishing will improve soon, thanks to Gudrun’s spells! I suggest you concentrate on finding sea cabbage, the task I gave to you. Then we’d have something to eat!”
    Mouse took her blanket with her as she crept out of the grain store at first light. She passed the low stable where Skinfax, Horn’s horse, lived. Horn had bartered half a year’s worth of wheat for that scraggy horse from some traders. It was the Storn’s only horse; they had no use for one, but it was typical of Horn that he should think he needed one. She heard Skinfax give a low whinny as she passed.
    “Shhh,” she whispered, and put out a calming thought to the animal. He snorted, and Mouse walked on.
    She crossed the scrubby fields where they grew the wheat and other stunted vegetables, and made her way up the hills behind the village.
    She was heading for the stones on Bird Rock, and within an hour she was there. The sun had climbed with her, and for the first time in weeks it was going to be a warm day. The sun glinted off the sea way below her, casting it a rich blue.
    By the time she got to the top of the hill, she was hot. She took her clothes off and flung them in a pile at the foot of one of the huge stones. The stones pointed far away into the sky high above her. They were huge, jagged fingers of rock that formed a rough circle. Some slightly taller or wider than others, there was nothing precise about them.
    It was said that however many times you counted them, you would always come up with a different number, but Mouse knew that was rubbish. She counted them often enough to know there were seven of them. They had been there forever—no one knew what they were or who had erected them.
    No one else came up here much, only Gudrun, but she never emerged from her tiny hut before midday. It was something to do with being awake late at night making the spells work. The rest of the village feared the place. It seemed a place of magic to them, ancient magic that they did not understand. More than that, it was the place