Free Arthur and the Fenris Wolf by Alan Early

pulling up beside a frozen lake. He knew from the intensity of the pendant’s signal that he should be able to see Arthur, but all he could see was a pile of clothes and some sort of animal beside a large hole in the ice. The pendant was clearly there, but where was Arthur? Eirik swung himself down from the horse, looking around uncertainly. He had been sent to protect the boy, but it looked like he might already be too late.

    Back in Dublin, under Arthur’s bed, the hammer started to glow.

    Arthur found it hard to move his limbs under the water. Or, rather, he found it hard to know if they were moving. He couldn’t feel anything. But somehow he reached Ash. He shook her shoulder but she didn’t open her eyes. He shook more furiously, gripping her biceps a little too tightly. Suddenly her eyelids shot up and she opened her mouth to scream, bubbles flowing out of her mouth and taking her remaining oxygen with them. Arthur quickly clamped his hand over her lips, forcing her to stop. He pointed urgently upwards.
    She looked at him with wide-eyed terror, then nodded quickly. Together they kicked hard, pushing themselves towards the surface. Arthur would never forget the physical strain it took to kick his legs and swim upwards under that lake.
    They reached the top of the water and hit the bottom of the ice. Arthur scanned the ice around him. He didn’t think they could be that far from the hole, but in the murkiness he couldn’t see it anywhere nearby and there was no shaft of light to indicate where it might be. They were lost under the lake and, from her expression, Ash had also just realised it.
    They could just about see the faint glow of the sun through the thick ice. With no other obvious escape option, Arthur started pounding his fists against it in a desperate attempt to break through but, with his strength failing him, he made little impact and the white wall above them remained solid.

    The hammer flew out from underneath Arthur’s bed, radiating green light. It smashed through his bedroom window and soared over the city of Dublin at an impossible speed. A handful of people noticed the tiny trail of light disappear across the sky. Most assumed it had been a trick of their eye – only one man was certain that aliens were invading.

    Arthur felt the air seeping out of his lungs with the exertion of knocking on the ice. Ash would soon be completely out of oxygen, followed closely by himself. They were done for. This was it. They would die under the lake. They probably wouldn’t be discovered for days. Days in which Joe and Cousin Maggie and everyone else who cared for them would be tearing their hair out in frustration. Days in which Loki could enact some evil plan without Arthur around to stop it. He couldn’t die under here. He wouldn’t.
    Ash’s eyes fluttered shut once more, her whole body starved of precious oxygen. Arthur shook her again with the little energy he had left, but to no avail. Her arms drifted lifelessly at her sides as Arthur studied her face. She looked asleep, peaceful. Her body was losing the fight to stay alive.
    Then a movement behind her caught his eye. Something had plunged into the depths of the water, with a white plume of bubbles marking its path. But it quickly stopped its descent and started racing towards them. For a moment Arthur wondered what new disaster was about to hit them, but then he realised the object was glowing and the glow was a familiar green colour. His heart
leapt.
    As it drew rapidly closer, the item came into focus. An iron top, a small handle covered in rope: it was his hammer!
    It didn’t even slow as it approached him. Arthur swiftly wrapped one arm around Ash and stretched the other one out, his palm open. The hammer slammed into his hand and he curled his fingers tightly around the handle. It kept moving, dragging them through the water at breakneck speed.
    The hammer dived deeper, taking them with it, then turned