The Raven and the Reindeer Read Online Free PDF

their own echoes.  
    “He’s my friend. The Snow Queen took him.”
    The bees buzzed angrily, for bees fear snow, but the peas laughed, because frost on their stems does not bother them. The movement of leaves formed a stream of outlines, in curling green threads—a girl, a goat, a monster, a spoon.  
    Gerta shook her head.
    The threads twined together like a tapestry. She saw a boat on the ocean, a great beast under the water, an island. Someone stood in the prow of the boat. The drone of the bees became a roar of triumph.  
    “No,” said Gerta. “No, I don’t know who that is. I’m sorry.”  
    The tapestry came apart, and Gerta woke.  

    She was lying in the trundlebed, with the red quilt. Her fingers moved over the embroidered roses and she smiled.  
    Helga came to the door, in her painted hat. “Come and have breakfast.”
    “I should work in the garden,” said Gerta.
    “After breakfast,” said Helga.  
    The peas were nearly spent. She harvested the pods. The bees had moved on to the earliest roses, and Gerta was busy picking beetles and slugs off the roses until mid-afternoon. Then came a long evening of shelling peas.  
    It seemed, as she stared down at her hands, her thumb splitting open the pods and sliding the peas out into the bowl, that she was forgetting something. There was something she was supposed to do…something important…
    “Is everything all right, my dear?” asked Helga.  
    “Fine,” said Gerta slowly. “Fine. Is there something I am supposed to be doing? I can’t seem to remember…”
    “Just keep me company,” said Helga, patting Gerta’s knee. “I’m so glad to have you here, my dear. I was so lonely without you.”  
    Tomorrow, Gerta thought. I’ll remember it tomorrow.  

    When she lay down in the trundlebed that night, Helga brought her a cup of something hot. The steam smelled of herbs.  
    “Drink,” Helga said. “You’re looking tired.”
    “A long day weeding,” said Gerta, and smiled. “I’m fine, truly.”
    But she drank the cup obediently, and laid back in bed, under the red quilt.
    Her hands moved fitfully over the embroidered roses, and it was not until she jabbed herself on a thorn that she realized she was dreaming.
    She put her finger in her mouth. The taste of blood bloomed on her tongue and she stood in a courtyard surrounded by sweet-scented roses. They were larger than the ones in Helga’s garden, nearly as large as Gerta’s head, and vines scrambled between them, covered in golden trumpet flowers. A fountain sprayed into a pond full of darting fish.  
    There was a boy in the courtyard. He was looking into the water, and as Gerta watched, he smiled, showing a wide gap in his front teeth.
    “No,” she whispered to the roses, “no, this isn’t who I’m looking for.” She could not quite remember who she was looking for, but this was certainly not him.  
    She came half-awake and turned over on her side, pulling the quilt up. She thought Helga was standing in the doorway, watching her, but turning her head seemed too much effort and she slept again, without dreams.

    The days passed, and the spell on Gerta deepened. Helga was not a powerful witch, as such things are measured, but she did not need to be powerful for this. Gerta’s desire to be useful was an open road down which nearly any magic could walk.
    “It is for her own good,” Helga whispered to herself, fiercely. “It is for her own good. She would never reach the Snow Queen. She would be set upon by bandits, wolves, bears, anyone at all. And if she did somehow reach the Snow Queen…”
    She shuddered. The notion of Gerta, who was sturdy and cheerful and kind and quite desperately mortal standing up against that terrible icy power...
    “She is safe here,” said Helga. She rested her forehead against the windowpane, gazing out at the garden. “She is safe and she is not unhappy and I am glad of the company.”
    In the garden, the plants shivered. A rose dropped its