The Monstrous Child Read Online Free Page B

speak. Probably because the little toad thought I wasn’t worth speaking to. Vidar whistled at Fen. The wolf hesitated, trotted a few steps towards him, then stopped, his grey fur bristling, his tail rigid, then retreated, snarling. Vidar burst into tears and his mother whisked him away.
    Thor’s beefy daughter Thrud, with sticky-out teeth like tumbled rocks, looked at me, recoiled, and ran tojoin her brothers chasing Fen in the meadow.
    I just wanted everyone to go away and leave me alone, but two boys remained. They whispered and pointed. I pulled my bearskin robe around me, despite the heat, trying to hide my legs. I heard the names they called me behind their hands. Cripple girl. Rotten herring. Death daughter.
    They crept closer, and their mother turned and gave me a look of hate.
    ‘Keep away from that monster,’ Sigyn hissed, shooing her boys from me. That’s how I met my half-brothers for the first time. I didn’t know Dad had other children in Asgard. I didn’t even know he had a wife. I just stood there, shaking, my mouth gaping. Dad’s other family. The ones he can dress up and show the world. We embarrassed him. We shamed him. That’s why he isn’t here . We’re like the uncouth country cousins breaking into the great hall expecting a rousing gift-filled welcome and then stopping short as no high table seat is offered and our kin won’t acknowledge us.
    I don’t think they needed to be told to keep awayfrom me. I’d never been the most popular girl at the feast. In fact, I’m not usually at the feast. Somehow the messenger never arrives to invite me.
    Now it’s just me, and a single god, Hod. Everyone else has fled.
    I stumble over to him. He’s blind, oblivious that he’s alone.
    ‘Where’s Loki?’ I ask.
    ‘Loki has business with the mason building our walls,’ said the blind one, crinkling his nose, looking in the wrong direction.
    ‘Will he be back soon?’
    Hod shrugs. ‘Loki comes and goes.’
    How awful to be blind , I think.
    Then someone shouts at me:
    ‘Leave this sacred place. Council is over. What are you waiting around for?’
    It is Heimdall, watchman of the gods. His gold teeth flash as he orders us away. I wonder if one day a dwarf will come and tear out his teeth, to fashion into bracelets.

10
I ALLOW MYSELF TO DREAM

    SGARD WAS A building site. Everywhere I roamed I heard hammering and pounding, saw walls rising, masons shouting and roofs being thatched with silver and gold. The vast half-built palaces cascaded into the distance, glowing in the sunshine. My storm-home was bleak and dim, blue-cold. Here, all was brilliance and warmth, golden pillars andshining roofs. This was the beginning of eternity, the start of the gods’ reign. They’d conquered the giants and established their dominion over the nine worlds. Now they were building their heavenly stronghold and I was joining them.
    ‘Go on, give us a smile,’ yelled a spike-nosed builder, standing high on a roof.
    ‘Why so grim?’ another giant shouts down at me.
    There’s nothing that makes a girl feel less like smiling than some oaf leering at her to change her face. My face isn’t the problem.
    I ignored them and lumbered past, hoping they’d fall to their deaths.
    Everything here was so much taller, brighter, better. I wondered if any of these palaces would be mine. I hoped I wouldn’t have to share with Fen and Dad. If I were allowed to build a hall of my own, I’d already found the perfect spot: by a stream, in the shade. I smell like a corpse whenever the sun leaves her tomb. I prefer it when the moon leaves his grave mound to circle the sky.Vast, sweltering Asgard was my home now, and I would try to belong. I allowed myself to dream.
    I wandered like an exultant ghost. I still could not believe I would be living in this gilded kingdom. Only one palace was complete, Gladsheim, where the gods and goddesses had their thrones. I peeked inside. Everything in the great council chamber was made of gold.
    I