“Remember,” it said. “Remember the verse I taught you.”
The pain in Shef’s eye redoubled, and he shrieked out loud, shrieked and twisted against the spike that restrained him, the bonds that held him down, the soft, gentle, immovable hands. He opened his eye and stared out, not at the panorama of the nine worlds from the great ashtree, but into the face of Hund. Hund with the needle. He shrieked again and threw up a hand to fend him off, and the hand clutched Hund’s arm with desperate force.
“Easy, easy,” said Hund. “It’s all over now. No one can touch you. You are a carl of the army, in the crew of Brand of Halogaland, and the past is forgotten.”
“But I must remember,” cried Shef.
“Remember what?”
Water filled both his eyes, the good one and the ruined socket. “I don’t remember it,” he whispered.
“I have forgotten the king’s message.”