Eira had fourteen winters and her own short axe after her grandmother. She was not the strongest in the settlement, but she was very fast and stubborn. The fjord breathed fog, and the ice sounded quietly against the stone shore. That morning, jarl Torvin called out the youngsters for the spring great trial. The winners were to sail the drakkar to where the settlement map ends. Eira wanted to prove that she was more than a carpenter's daughter. However, she was hiding a secret that she had not even told her elder brother. At night, she heard singing, as if the water was humming old songs about wandering. The melody led her to a rock with a rune, hidden by a waterfall. The rune faded in the dawn, but under her hand it pulsed like a heart. Seagulls screamed in the square and shields glistened with fresh tar today. Torvin looked over the faces, stopped his gaze on Eira and nodded briefly. - Run along the path of the ravens, then cross by boat and return without frolicking. Those who come before sunset will see the world beyond Hornarstad tomorrow. Eira set off first, followed by Sven, the blacksmith's son. The path winded over a cliff where the wind blew hoods and breaths. Sven laughed loudly, but Eira listened to the unsettling melody. At the waterfall, the water splashed with sparks, as if someone was forging cold iron. - 'Here's a shortcut,' she said, showing a gap behind a curtain of wet ferns there. Sven snorted, but went, because he trusted Eira in such matters. Beyond the crevice they found a niche where a rocky threshold led dry-footed into the darkness. In the middle lay a stone with a rune, now glowing like an aurora. Eira touched the mark, and the air vibrated as if a bag of storms had opened. A ripple went over the waterfall, then across the fjord, until the drakkar creaked. Sven grabbed her arm, as an alien prow emerged from the darkness. It was unpainted by any family from the north, and a falcon glimmered on the shields. - Who sails the fjord without a rune of consent today? - she whispered tremblingly, quietly. An answer came from the foreign ship, short, sharp, like the flutter of wings. - We are looking for the one who woke the stone, and we will not turn back before night.