Soderberg

Chapter 25

They didn’t have to wait long before a guardsman came trundling out of the corridor leading to the front of the jail. With red and purple blotches on his face, it looked like the man had taken a ...

Chapter 23

The next morning was dreadful. With clothes still sodden from the night before, Vidar shuddered as he hurried down the streets to find the chapter house of the thieves’ guild. The sowilo runes in...

Chapter 22

One hand remained above the surface of the thankfully not too deep rain basin of water. The runes in the wall pushed outward with frightening force, threatening to cast him into the man-made river....

Chapter 21

Vidar followed down the ladder. Each rung was separate and bolted into the side of the wall. They were all rusty and cold enough to make his very soul shiver as he hurriedly made his way down, foll...

Chapter 20

“We, the guild, ran afoul of the scribes a long while back,” Yallander explained. “Since then, they’ve refused selling us new runes and even stopped rejuvenating runes in places that are ob...

Chapter 19

Thoroughly warm and content, Vidar stepped out from his room with a new, triggered sowilo rune in his breast pocket, giving off enough heat to keep the worst cold off him without burning through hi...

Chapter 18

With enough silver to buy himself proper meals for more than a week, and perhaps even a small room, the cold did not have quite the same effect as the days prior. Both keys were tucked away, safe i...

Chapter 17

Vidar woke groggily when someone shook his shoulders.

“Get up, shit goblin! You’re on my foot!”

His eyes were glued shut with gunk and he had to wipe at them and then physically p...

Chapter 16

The small space was dark and, as it turned out, not empty. Two boys pressed themselves against the narrow corners, almost completely covered by blankets. Vidar peered inside but decided not to ente...

Chapter 15

The neighbor’s house, a baker, was thankfully dark as well. They, too, were early risers. Vidar skirted the side of the wall to the small garden his mother kept behind their house. No plants surv...

Chapter 14

A multitude of feet thundered down the old wooden stairs and the front door slammed open, letting the heat escape. Vidar shuddered as he waited for everyone to leave. Not a single one of the others...

Chapter 13

Vidar made his way to the second blockage, but it took far longer than he’d like to pinpoint its exact location since the area marked on the map was so wide.

This time, it wasn’t a hole i...

Chapter 12

Holding the rune out in front of him, Vidar closed his eyes to focus. Bits and pieces of the event down in the sewers were flashing before his inner eye. His state of mind when triggering the broke...

Chapter 11

“Here it is,” Ida said, nodding to a house towering over its neighbors.

“It’s four stories tall. You want to rob a damn tower?”

Vidar glanced to Siv, who would not meet his ey...

Chapter 10

“More runes? You just said there aren’t.”

“Not if you ask the guild, the Crown, the academics, or even the historians.”

He was speaking fast now, looking around to make sure n...

Chapter 9

Vidar grew very aware of his scent as he moved up the streets of Halmstadt. With every passing street, the people were more prosperous. It was like the coin in their pockets made them more suscepti...

Chapter 8

Once back on dry dock, Vidar marveled at the place from which he’d emerged. It was out in the water. Not far from land, where the Dennerish sailors pulled him out, but still in the actual water. ...

Chapter 7

Unable to see his own hand right before his face, Vidar swore and shoved the map into his coat pocket. The heat was getting to him as his heartbeat picked up and his limbs buzzed with energy. He wa...

Chapter 6

Embla made him wait until everyone else was gone before handing over the items he needed for this particular job. A map, a key, and a lantern. The map he’d seen before and the notations were the ...

Chapter 5

The cold was especially bad coming from such a warm house, and the nervous sweating he’d been doing didn’t help. It grew icy even beneath Vidar’s closed coat as he ran around the front of the...

Chapter 4

Before anyone had a chance to catch him, Vidar removed the lock and put it in his coat pocket. There was no way for him to put it back in place after he’d entered, and he didn’t want to yell lo...

Chapter 3

A set of stairs leading up to the second floor faced the front door, but everyone veered left into a large sitting room where rough wooden benches lined the walls.

Fire danced in a fireplace ...

Chapter 2

The door slammed open, startling Vidar awake with a gasp. Cold air rushed in to fill the tiny room in an instant, waking all those who dwelled within. To his surprise, there were twelve boys all in...

Runes of Discovery (Book 1): Chapter 1

The icy wind blew through Vidar’s clothes as he carefully made his way up the three steps leading to the thick wooden door. Cursing under his breath, he reached up and banged on it with the back ...