Free The Raven and the Reindeer by T. Kingfisher Page B

a human road. You’ll need to find another way.” Her eyes rested on Mousebones for a moment. “Still, walking north with a raven on your shoulder is a good start. Keep your eyes closed and your heart open. The way will open, or it won’t. You’ll know if it doesn’t, if you come at last to the sea.”
    She took another sip. “ That one delights in the cold and oversees it. I knew an old Sámi woman—long and long ago it was. She might be dead now. She told me that one was not one of their spirits, but they knew of her, for all that they’re good Christians now.”  
    Gran Aischa frowned into her drink. “I’ve heard a great many stories about her, but you know that stories are not always true. Some say she was a human girl unlucky in love and it froze her heart, and now she searches the world for pretty boys to freeze in turn.” She shook her head. “I doubt that. The shape of her in my head is not human, and I’ve learned to trust such things. I think she was a spirit born of ice and she steals away human children. Cut from the same cloth as the Fair Folk, anyway.”
    Gerta shook her head, puzzled.
    “Creatures of the south,” said Gran Aischa. “They live a little outside the world and steal people from our world into theirs. When the plagues came so long ago, most of the people died, but I imagine the Fair Folk lived.” She took another drink. “I won’t get to the great port again in my lifetime, or I’d ask a trader there if they still put out milk for the fairies. I’d be surprised if they didn’t.” She leaned forward and poked a withered finger at Gerta. “Not like us. The tonttu were never as cruel as the Fair Folk.”  
    Gerta nodded politely. The old storyteller was rambling now, and Gerta wasn’t sure if there was much more sense to be gotten from her. Her grandmother had put out hot oatmeal for the tonttu, the spirits of the house and the sauna, but those little household magics were a long way from the Snow Queen.  
    “Stay the night,” said Gran Aischa abruptly, her eyes sharpening. “Stay and sleep well, and have a good meal. Go in the sauna and bake the sorrow out of your bones. It may be the last chance you get. And in the morning, when you walk north with your raven—well. If you walk all the way to Sápmi on this road, look for a woman named Livli. She used to live just over the border. She was old then and will be older now, but some women age like tree roots and last nearly forever.”  
    Gerta’s heart sank at the thought of walking clear to Sápmi—how far would that even be?  
    Still, for Kay. If I must walk to the end of the world, so be it. Sápmi is not so far, compared to that. And I will have a meal and not have to sleep under a hedge tonight.  
    “I would be glad to stay,” she said.
    “If you do meet Livli,” said Gran Aischa, “tell her that your story is written on the hides of herring. She’ll find that funny.” She smiled herself, but it was sad, and did not quite touch her eyes.  

    Her dreams that night were quiet. She stayed in the sauna until she could not stop from yawning, and slept immediately.
    The wooden floor and the long wooden ceiling beams had been an inn far longer than they had been trees. Their dreams were of polishing and dust motes and footsteps, and overwhelmingly of travelers sleeping. So Gerta slept and in her dreams she slept again, and she woke feeling strong and hungry.  
    Gran Aischa’s daughter fed her an enormous meal of spiced sausages and eggs and onions, and sent her on her way with a pack that groaned with food.
    “What do I owe you?” asked Gerta, reaching for the small pouch of coins at her side.
    “You don’t,” said the storyteller’s daughter. “My mother tells me that you are going to your death, and we don’t charge the dying for their last meals.”  
    Gerta blinked. On her shoulder, Mousebones shifted from foot to foot.  
    “Mother is not very tactful,” said the innkeeper, sighing. “But