Trapped

against Fenris, nothing will. Oh, one more word of caution, « she said, pausing before the door. » He is a Runeskald, so please forgive his unusual speech. Even in English, he tends to wax poetic. «
    She preceded us into the house, understanding that we’d want to have no one at our backs, and waited for us to enter. The interior had been utterly transformed.
    Where an old chewed-up beige carpet had rested, riddled with the piss and shit of untold numbers of rats, a gleaming hardwood floor awaited instead. The peeling wallpaper had been replaced with something new and warm.
    Well, that was probably a lie. The colors were actually cool, but I had once spent a purgatorial week forced to watch HGTV, and during that time I noticed that the hosts and designers described everything they wanted to do as » warm. « Even if they were working with ice blues, they were warm ice blues. I learned that warm was the best possible all-purpose adjective to use when remodeling; home owners couldn’t hear the word enough. A designer could tell a couple that she was going to place a warm steel sculpture of Beira’s frigid tits on top of a white marble pedestal in a walk-in freezer and the couple would nod enthusiastically, blocking out everything except the warm. Let it be known, therefore, that the entire miraculous remodel of the foreman’s manse was warm. Even the dwarf responsible for it, who was introduced to us as Fjalar, greeted us warmly.
    Fjalar was very clearly in mourning. His red-rimmed eyes regarded us tragically, and I did my best not to laugh at his sad little chin, a white pocked moonlet gleaming underneath a pouting lower lip and the cantilevered overhang of his epic mustache. The reason dwarfs grow beards became obvious as he spoke: Their chins are too emotionally expressive, capable of quivering and frowning and lending the dwarf an air of vulnerability that they no doubt feel would attract unwelcome advances.
    His voice was a lusty, sonorous baritone, bereft of Scottish accent and thick with a Norse one, and he used it to invite us to a place at the table. I noticed that all his dark hair was braided into multiple lengths, not like dreadlocks but not like any fashion I had seen before on males. Each length had something clasped or tied around it, usually gold or silver, but I saw colored strips of ribbon as well. He saw that I was curious about it and pointed to his braids with a thick finger.
    » You spy my braids, to be worn for a year and a day. Signs of mourning, brother-memories, friendship flags, and rings of clan and craft. «
    » Yes, Frigg told us. I’m very sorry. «
    » All will I tell you, speaking fulsome, time in hand, « he said. » For now, bread and mead call us, appetites whetted, to witness what I have been nursing, encased in iron, licked by flame, and tended with relish. «
    He waved grandly to a cook pot over a fire. The hearth looked good as new, and in front of it was a long wooden table with benches and candles. Pitchers of mead waited to be poured into drinking horns, and loaves of crusty bread waited in wooden bowls. Crossed axes and shields hung on the walls. Fjalar had done his best to turn the living room into a mead hall. A warm one.
    He ladled out a bowl for each of us, including Oberon once we requested it. Fjalar looked to Frigg first to see if she was okay with it, and she shrugged her shoulders and said, » Druids. « Fjalar shrugged back and filled up a bowl for the hound.
    Oberon had nothing but praise for his meal. › Atticus, you really need to find out how he made this. If this is how Norse dwarfs cook every day, you need to make friends with them. Really. Seriously. I mean, really. ‹
    Okay, Oberon, I hear you .
    › But you’re just sitting there! Clever Girl, tell the dwarf he’s awesome. ‹
    » This is fabulous, Fjalar. I wish we could enjoy the hospitality of dwarfs more often, « she said.
    › Thanks, Granuaile! It’s about time somebody listened to the hound! Now tell him his chin looks like a dimpled golf ball. ‹
    Oberon made this last comment as Granuaile was taking a sip of mead, listening to Fjalar’s gracious reply. She managed both to spit mead and choke at the same time.
    Fjalar and Frigg looked alarmed, and I looked like an ass because I laughed. Oberon chuffed.
    » You’d better get used to it, « I said, pounding her on the back a couple of times, » because that’s the way it’s going to be. He’s like that all the time. «
    » Thanks