The Strange Maid by Tessa Gratton Page A

legs and hips grow so cold so fast I think they’ll shatter.
    But we make it. Before we die of hypothermia, we head into the tower to strip and heat up the iron oven that warms the entire living space. It’s an old signal tower, three stories, with a giant bell hanging forgotten at the top. On clear days, Unferth says, there’s a view across Leif’s Channel to the Canadian coast. While digging around on the bottom floor last year he found fifty-year-old letters that claimed the bell was part of a troll warning system put in place after the Montreal Troll Wars. Leif’s Channel used to be one of the most dangerous crossing points for the greater mountain troll herds who wished to avoid the heavy patrols of the mainland.
    And so it’s best not to show up unannounced in the Jellyfish Cove bay, even sixty years later, with a greater mountain troll.
    Tonight we’ll take the rowboat leaning against the whitewashed side of the tower out to unchain Red Stripe, lead him through the water to shore. Tomorrow we’ll sail the ferry around to the eastern side of this long peninsula to the town of Jellyfish Cove. We’ll dock there and offload the truck. Give them all warning about Red Stripe.
    Unferth and I wrap blankets around ourselves and get the oven going. It’s a wide iron chimney up one side of the tower, with a hearth on the first and second floors. He claims the bottom-level bedroom on account of his leg and says there should be some old clothes up on the second floor. Out of fashion, no doubt, but made for the Vinland winter.
    The metal stair winds around to the second story, which is divided into two rooms by a thin partition. One must’ve been an office or library, with a metal desk full of tiny drawers, a key closet, and one curved wall covered in old books and dusty magazines. I go into the next room, which has a twin bed and sink-toilet combo popular in army movies and prison. There’s a porthole window with a frosted view down the eastern coast. Against the aggressively blue sky I can just make out lines of smoke from Jellyfish Cove.
    I dig through a trunk of discarded clothes, mostly heavy canvas pants and fisherman’s coats, until I find patchy thermal shirts and a long wool sweater that’ll come to my knees like a dress. Some men’s long underwear work as leggings, and I’ve practically got an acceptable outfit once my boots are back on.
    In the mottled little mirror over the sink, the first I’ve seen in a month, I stare at myself. Precia of the South used to call me once a month and ask what runes I saw in my own green-gray irises. I answered for a few years, usually fate or choice or death, typical things one might expect of a Valkyrie’s heart, until it became clear none of them would tell me what they saw in me.
    I lean in to focus close on my left eye. There I see torch, a rune of passion that burns destructively.
    Rubbing my chest, I clomp down again, rattling the entire frame of the staircase. Unferth says, “We do have to live here, little raven.”
    He’s looking fresh and devilish in a dark red sweater rolled up at his wrists, his hair loose from braids so it blankets his shoulders in a hundred tiny kinks. I don’t bother to hide my stare. When he turns away from the fire, hair sweeps away from his face and there’s something vulnerable in the loose smile he offers me. I’m too surprised to return it or say anything. He rubs the heel of his hand into his thigh and stands. I reach out to skim the feathery ends of his hair that dangle beside his elbow. It’s nearly as long as mine. Unferth slaps my hand away and swiftly twists all his hair up to the nape of his neck, tying it there in a knot.
    He says, “It’ll take a few hours of work to get the water heater up and running again, so if we want real food we should go into town. It’s slightly less than two kilometers’ walk.”
    I grimace; I’d rather stay here than play nice in a small town. Or face the Summerlings.
    The sun is low in