Free Daughter of the Wind by Michael Cadnum

to make a game of trying out a new initiate’s powers. Odin had long ago fashioned the world from the blood and bones of a giant named Ymir, and the god had surrendered an eye as the price for drinking from the fountain of wisdom. Odin was the most knowledgeable of all the deities, but he was also the one most in love with bloodshed.
    This is where the god will give me strength, Gauk reminded himself. When I put on the bear belt and ask for Odin’s strength, it will come.
    Gauk shortened Strider ’s sail. The vessel slowed, veering, and the ship bulked past, unable to slow down quickly enough. The pirates called out rude advice to their helmsman, and as the vessel came slowly about, Gauk stepped to the prow and picked up a black-stained packet of bear fur.
    Gauk shook out a long, blood-grimed length of raw bear pelt. He had long dreamed of such a moment, but now that it was here he felt unsteady. He flung the length of ripe fur over his shoulder, fastening it with a bronze cloak clasp. Despite the chill in the air, the bear skin smelled of death.

Fourteen
    Once more, the shadow of the sea-battered ship fell over Strider .
    The spearman in the prow called to the helmsman, words impossible to make out as the larger vessel’s sail luffed and flapped in the wind. This was a rank, untidy ship, with a knotted length of festr —mooring rope—dangling from the side.
    Gauk had heard the old poems, how a berserker actually feels the bear-spirit enter his body, changing his essence. To the bystanders—and to a startled enemy—an Odin initiate was a frightening sight. Gauk had heard this lore, but never quite believed it, even when Errik told one of his best poems, of ancient battle, an Odin initiate taking on an entire fifteen-bench warship, killing every warrior.
    As the spearman made a halfhearted, lunging jab with the bronze-tipped weapon, a sound filled the sunny air like the panting growls of a she-bear when she defends her young. The fighting creature from Strider climbed over the side of the ship, and the spearman cried out for help.
    The bear-man thrust once, and his spear sank deep into the spearman’s breast. The berserker wrenched the spear free, and killed a swordsman with a thrust to the throat. A sword cut the air, missing badly, and the bear-creature’s roar paralyzed this new attacker before he could ready another blow.
    The creature who had been Gauk drew a hunting blade, slashed, and the swordsman fell to the deck, gagging on his own blood-rich howls. The helmsman leaped from the vessel, followed by his two remaining companions, but not before the bear-like beast slashed one of the fleeing men across the throat.
    The two remaining dived into the sea.
    No man could stay in the water long and live.
    The cold already blanched the two still struggling on the surface, coughing, instantly too cold to beg for their lives. The bear-creature looked down at them from the ship, surprised at the shape of his own shadow on the water, a human being.

Fifteen
    â€œYour father is unhurt.”
    Thrand offered Hallgerd this reassurance as the salt wind hummed. She wished she could trust his word, but said nothing. Silence, she believed, was her sole defense.
    â€œThe Spjotmen fought with spirit, but none of them was killed,” he continued, gazing out over the rise and fall of the sea.
    They spoke during the second sunset of their voyage, a flock of heavy-beaked puffins fanning out ahead of the ship.
    â€œHow can I believe you?” said Hallgerd.
    The gray-eyed man considered, and asked, with a gentle laugh, “Are Danes famous as liars in your village?”
    She did not respond. Danes were held in no high regard, but it would be bad manners to say so.
    â€œI swear by Odin’s high-throne,” said Thrand, “that the only harm your village suffered, aside from a charred alehouse, was the loss of a wedding prize, Hallgerd—you.”
    She believed him. Every color in