After a few more tearful and semi-tearful goodbyes, we finally made our way over to the car. Hanna had hopped in, and I was reaching for the driver’s-side door, when I heard someone calling my name behind me.
I turned back to see Bryn Aven. Standing at the top of the hill, looking like a vision in white in the bright sun, and I had to blink to be sure it was her. Her crisp guard uniform made her appear older and slicker than when I had seen her last, but the wry smirk on her lips was unmistakably hers.
“You were gonna sneak off without even saying hello?” she asked.
Without thinking, I raced over to her and threw my arms around her, embracing her in a bear hug that was probably a little too tight based on the grunts she made. It had been years since I had seen her, but my feelings of gratitude, friendship, and (a bit of) infatuation remained wholly unchanged.
Once I released her, Bryn smiled at me and smoothed out her uniform. “Either I’ve gotten shorter or you’ve gotten taller.”
“Maybe it’s a little of both.”
“It looks like you’re all packed up. Are you going somewhere?”
“Yeah, I have to be in Merellä by Monday morning, and it’s over a thirty-hour drive.”
She let out a low whistle. “And I thought we had a long trip down from Doldastam. What’s waiting for you in Merellä?”
“An internship at the Mimirin.”
“The Mimirin? As in the Mimirin Talo?” she asked, and the awe in her voice made me blush.
The Mimirin was about the only true neutral space in the troll hierarchy. It was an ancient institution, one that purported to house the entire history of our kind. The Mimirin served as a library, a museum, a university, a research facility, and an opera house.
I nodded. “Yeah, it’s the headquarters for the Inhemsk Project, and that’s really what I’ll be working on.”
“The Inhemsk Project is that Vittra group that reassimilates the trolls of mixed blood, right?”
Trolls of mixed blood. That was the new official term, replacing plenty of more derogatory terms, like halvblud, half-breed, and mongrel. I didn’t know how well it would take off, but it was definitely an improvement. Mr. Tulin had always told me that there was no shame in being the child of mixed tribes, but not everybody felt the same way he did.
“The Vittra started it, but it has no true tribal alliance, like the Mimirin. They’re neutral and open to anyone.”
When the Inhemsk Project had formed a few years ago, it was initially met with a lot of anger and protests. Historically, trolls of mixed parentage were shunned by proper society as punishment for their parents weakening the bloodlines, and by extension, the psychokinetic abilities in our blood that made us so powerful.
Eventually, though, our society had been forced to accept the harsh reality. With tribes like the Vittra and Skojare experiencing record rates of infertility and infant mortality in recent decades, their populations had begun to dwindle.
The Trylle—while not as plagued with medical issues as the others—had begun to suffer their own population decrease because of their heavy reliance on the practice of changelings. In recent years, many of the troll children left as changelings declined to come back, choosing instead to live among the humans.
The Vittra were simply the first to realize how dire the situation had become. Queen Sara Elsing worried about the extinction of her tribe—not just the blood and their supernatural abilities but their way of life, their history, everything that made them the Vittra. It would all be gone if they didn’t find a way to boost their population.
Now the Inhemsk Project worked at reaching out to all the children of mixed blood, hoping to bring them back into the fold to learn about their history and strengthen our society. Initially, the doors had only been open to mixed trolls—like half-Kanin, half-Trylle—but they’d widened their net to include even the ultimate taboo in our world—a child born of a troll and a human.
The two tribes with the largest self-sustaining population—the Kanin and the Omte—had eventually decided on a stance of indifference. They didn’t fund the Inhemsk Project or openly use it, but they wouldn’t stop the others from welcoming trolls of mixed blood into their midst.
“You’re going to find your family?” Bryn asked.
“Well, I’m gonna try.” I shrugged, trying to appear more nonchalant about the whole thing than I actually felt.
“I’d wish you luck, but I know you don’t need it. You always were one tenacious kid.”
I laughed. “Well, we’ll see how far my tenacity gets me.”
“I’m happy for you, but I have to admit that I’m a little disappointed you won’t be at the party tonight. I’m King Linus’s personal guard, so I’ll be working, but I hoped we’d have a little time to catch up.”
“Still living the dream, huh?” I commented.
“Something like that.” She smiled and lowered her gaze.
“Ulla!” Hanna leaned out the window of the Jeep, looking at me over the top of her cat-eye sunglasses. “Are we going or what? Because if we’re staying longer, I’m getting out of the car.”
I bit my lip and glanced back at an impatient Hanna. “No, don’t get out. I’ll be there in a minute.” If she got out, it would be at least another twenty minutes before I’d get her back in, and we were already running so far behind.
“Sorry, I didn’t mean to hold you up,” Bryn said.
“No, don’t be silly. We really do need to catch up soon.”
“You have my number, and you can call me when you’re not swamped with all your work at the Mimirin.” Then she hugged me, holding me close for a second. “Tavvaujutit,” she whispered, saying goodbye in Inuktitut—tah-vow-voo-teet.
“Tavvaujutit,” I replied quietly, letting go of my oldest friend. I walked to the Jeep, looking back once to wave at everyone who was still around, and when I got in, I sat for a second and took a deep breath. It was time to leave behind everything I knew to start on my next adventure.
4
Fathers
The citadel of Merellä sat right on the ocean in southern Oregon, some two thousand miles away from Förening. Almost right in the middle between the two cities was Eftershom—a tiny Trylle village nestled in the mountains of western Montana. That’s where Hanna’s grandparents lived, a mere thirteen hours away.
My goal from the start had been to make the trip to Eftershom in one day, and we’d gotten off to a late start, but I still thought it was doable assuming Hanna’s pit stops didn’t get in the way.
The stop to get fast food had been wonderfully quick, which left me optimistic. Then the three bathroom breaks came after, and that’s not counting the time I had to pull over on the side of the road so she could throw up.
“Ugh.” Hanna groaned and rested her head against the window.
“I told you that the shake and fries were a bad idea.”
I really had tried to talk her out of it, suggesting that she ease herself into new foods with smaller sizes or maybe a salad or fruit. But Hanna insisted that I promised she could eat what she wanted from wherever she wanted, and now she was paying the price.
“Maybe I have the flu.” She peered over at me with an eagerness that belied her intentions. “Maybe we should go back so I can rest up, and we can leave tomorrow.”