To her surprise, she met no resistance. Her mental probe passed effortlessly into Larson's mind, and his thought processes spread before her like the workings of a clock. It was not an elven mind; it lacked the wire-thin pathways and array of colors. It was a human mind and badly flawed. Passages looped in blind circles or linked with unrelated thoughtways in random binds and breaks. The effect seemed not unlike the looping chaos of stuffing from a torn doll. Though curious, the dream-reader avoided the strange conglomeration and focused on the faintly-glowing configuration which indicated Larson's present abstraction. Exploring other avenues of thought would betray the trust of her client.

The dream assumed the clarity of a play. The dream-reader saw the trees as Larson's link with the forest of his then current reality. The trunks muted to rivers, and Larson's memory of their names highlighted their importance to his vision. The titles which seemed foreign to Larson rolled through her mind like old friends: Svol the cool and Gunnthra the defiant, Fjorm and loud-bubbling Fimbulthul, Slidr the fearsome river of daggers and swords, Hrid, Sylg, Ylg, and Vid the broad, Leipt which streaks like lightning, and frozen Gjoll. These were the eleven rivers which cascaded through Midgard straight to Hel and the roaring cauldron of the spring, Hvergelmir.

The dream-reader of Forste -Mar saw the glowing form of the sword, Valvitnir, as the dream-Larson tossed it into the tumult of the Helspring. Hungrily, Hvergelmir swallowed the offering, and the dream-reader felt the relief inspired by the powerful being who had invaded Larson's thoughts and fashioned his vision. She found the misstep which caused the dream weaver to trigger unbidden memories of Vietnam and the misplaced circuits which amplified them to pain and awakened