Promises could go wrong, she knew that, too. It was another thing her mother had taught her, before she had disappeared. Her mother used to live on a farm on the outskirts of a small town. A town was a collection of houses where lots of people lived. Her father was a traveler who had put up at a nearby hotel. He was very rich and handsome in those days, despite having only one eye. He had stayed on for weeks, wooing her. They became lovers. He had taken a room in the farmhouse to be near her. Every night they crept out of their windows and made love in the barn, surrounded by the animals. She was so much in love, she had never hesitated when he suggested they run away together. He was so passionate, so romantic! They would run away to a place where no one would ever find them. He would stay with her forever. That was a promise, and he kept it to the letter, but see how it had ended up. No one had ever found them, and here he still was, even after she had gone. It’s just that he never told her he was taking her to Hel, and that he would be dead within a month of their arrival.
Not so handsome now, hanging upside down by one leg, with his face swollen and black and his arms and free leg hanging awkwardly awry and his clothes the wrong way, like a parody of an acrobat or dancer, caught in a movement he could never finish. The maggots came and went as he rejuvenated himself, but never enough to come back to life. She hoped he would one day, though. Why didn’t he just dissolve away to nothing like dead things usually did, if he didn’t want his body back one day?
Bryony came to see him every day. She talked to him, and although he never replied, Bryony believed he could still see, hear, think, and feel. His expression changed. Today he was wearing a smile.
Bryony laid down her hook, which she used for scratching through the waste heaps for anything useful, and went to crouch by the side of the unconscious boy. He was amazing. The fire had burned him more naked than anyone else had ever been. She ran her hands gingerly across his long, straight limbs and shouted, “Ouch!” He was far too hot to touch. Bryony jumped about waving her hands in the air for a minute. Then she stopped and glared at him. Would she never be able to touch him? In a panic she sat down on her haunches and blew on his fingers until at last she could put one in her mouth and cool it down. She sighed happily. To have and never to hold— that would be unbearable.
Bryony glanced over to the gibbet, where the dead man had stopped turning slowly on his heel and was staring right at them. Taking a strip of cloth from her pocket, she bound up his eye. She suspected that Odin sometimes looked through that eye, and she wanted her first moments with another person to be private. Then she sat down and waited quietly until the boy had cooled down and began to run her hands all over his body. At the base of his back was a short extension to his spine, the remains of what might have turned into a lion’s tail, a legacy of his mother’s line. She pressed her hand against this curiously, before sliding her hand down to the bottom of her own back where she had a similar shape.
At last she stood up, her hands on her hips, and looked him all over. “Beautiful,” she decided. She smiled with anticipation. He was hers.
She bent and lifted him up in one smooth, easy movement. She stood, feeling his lovely weight. He was still hot enough to burn her gently, although she padded her arms with cloth. She was going to take him home. As she walked she called out, “Jenny!” A tiny bird, the same brown-red wren that had guided Slipper there, flew suddenly out of a tangle of twisted metal nearby and landed next to her ear. The bird perched there for a second. Bryony felt the sharp little feet digging into her skin, but whether from fear, or anger, or jealousy, or simply excitement, she had no idea. She opened her mouth; the wren flew inside and perched there, peeping to and fro for a second, until Bryony pursed her lips and blew her out. They played this game on and off all the way home, until Jenny got tired and went to sit in her pocket for the rest of the journey.
He was too hot! As I walked home I wondered if he was a thing that lived in the fire and now he was dying of the cold, but I hadn’t the heart to put him back in. He was no use to me there. I was so relieved when he got cool and he was still alive.
He was red from head to toe. No hair, no eyelashes or eyebrows, no hair on his body at all. No secrets. From head to toe, bare and beautiful. He came through the fire to me. Nothing ever came through the fire before, except Jenny Wren, and so I knew he was a god, or of the gods, or touched by god. He had no fingerprints—the fire had burned those away, too. He’d been through some terrible ordeal, but I had no idea what it was except I could see he’d come out of it brand new—brand new for me, like a baby.
My heart filled up. I thought, I love him! He’s not spoken a word and I love him. But what do I know? No one can guess how little I know or how much I feel.
I laid him down on my bed. I didn’t even think of my mother’s bed, but then I realized where I’d put him and I remembered that he wasn’t a baby, he was a man, and I was embarrassed. Mother always told me Odin would send me a lovely man when I was old enough, but she also told me I mustn’t throw myself at him when he came. I put some water to his lips and he sipped it. He started mumbling and muttering again. His eyes were closed, he was still asleep.
There was never any man there except my father and I would never touch him. I’d never seen a man, or a boy or anything male. Maybe it’s such a small thing it’s not worth the telling, or it’s a private thing of a kind I shouldn’t put down. But because I believe everything should be put down, every tiny detail in case it is forgotten—why else are we here?—I put it down now.
I’m trying to tell you it was just because I was curious, but anyway, I lifted the blanket and had a good look. My mother always called it a thing, but there was more than one, that’s all. I thought, It’s like a load of old giblets! What can he do with them, flap them at me? But an awful lot of old giblets. I giggled and dropped the blanket. Then I thought that maybe there was something wrong with him or it had been damaged and I was disappointed. I was angry, suddenly, and I stamped about a bit and shouted, but he called for water in his sleep and I told myself, He’s just a baby after all, and I went to pour some more between his lips.
I sat by him and waited. He began to ramble. Words. Dreams. I listened carefully. Was it a prophecy? Tales of the outside? Dreams, or reality, how could I tell? What was it that Odin had sent through the fire—a lover or a baby, a friend or a brother? A patient, perhaps? I couldn’t know, so for the time being I decided to watch over him like a mother—like my mother did when I was sick, covering him with blankets, touching his head to see if he was too hot or too cool. I gave him some soup, and soon he became quiet. I was tired. I lay down on the bed next to him and closed my eyes.
There was a girl bending over him with dark eyes. He felt scared of her and moved his head deeper into the pillow. She licked her lips; she had eye teeth like a cat’s. No, thicker. Like a lion’s. Like his.
“Are you from the outside?” she demanded.
“Where am I?”
“Hel.” She laughed.
“Then I’m from the outside.”
She stood up and clenched her fists. Her eyes shot from side to side, trying to find a question that would ask all the things she needed to know.
“Is it grassy outside?” she blurted.
“No,” he answered, surprised.
She frowned. “Where is it, then? The grass, has it gone?”
“It’s just farther away.”
“Has it moved?”
“I don’t understand.”
She glared at him.
“There’s lots of grass, it’s just not near here because of the dragon.”
“Dragons! So they’re real?”
“This one was. Except he sort of . . . sort of made himself up.”
“I see,” said the girl, not seeing anything really.
“Listen! There’s a way out. You came here. You know the way!”
“I don’t know.”
“You’re from outside. You got down. Tell me the way.”
“I can�
�t remember. I was unconscious.”
“You can’t remember? You can’t remember? You idiot!”
Sigurd stared back up at her in fear. Tears sprang to his eyes. She looked curiously at him.
“What’s the matter?” she asked.
“You’re scaring me.”
“Huh!” She snorted in derision. “You’re frightened of questions! Who are you?”
Sigurd had to think about it. She was right; he was scared of questions. In fact he was scared of everything—her bright eyes, her sharp teeth, her questions. He tried to sit up, but his body was as exhausted as his mind and he fell back down. She put her hands on her hips and stared aggressively at him.
“I died. Then I killed the dragon,” he said.
“Then my teacher tried to kill me so I killed him, as well. I need to rest.” The girl stared down at him.
“You died?” she asked. Well, why not? Her father had stopped just the other side of death, her mother had just disappeared. Perhaps people didn’t die in the same way as animals did.
“What’s it like?” she asked.
“What?”
“Dying.”
“Hard.”
She laughed at him, and he smiled back up at her. She nodded. “I’ll look after you. And then we’ll see.”
“See what?”
“What you are. To me.”
Sigurd sighed. More tests! He closed his eyes and went back to sleep. Looking down at him, the girl bit her lip. She’d made a bad impression. She was too excited. He wasn’t a weakling at all. He’d killed a dragon; he’d died and returned to life. He was a wounded hero! She would nurse him, she would love him. She would love him with all her heart if only he would let her.
Bryony sighed and sat down in a chair by the bed, her eyes soaking up the form of the sleeping boy. He was everything to her already, all her hopes and ambitions, and she didn’t even know him. Escape—perhaps! If not—love, a baby. At the very least someone to care for. Someone to talk to! Even that would transform her utterly. Just to talk to someone, just that could make her happy.
But that wasn’t really true. She knew that. To be happy, Bryony needed everything—the whole world. Look at that pretty head of his! It was full of memories—the memories of outside! Yes, he’d seen a lot. She’d like to crack it open and eat them all up. Memories were holy. She only hoped she had enough time to make them all hers.
As she sat there, the little wren appeared suddenly on the edge of the bed. In her beak she held a small twig with a little cluster of pale white flowers on it. Bryony took it carefully in her hand, sniffed the flowers, sniffed the bark. She peeled a bit off, tasted it, and spat it out. She got up and put it in a jar of water on the windowsill by the boy’s head.
“Thank you,” she said, although it sometimes seemed to her that the bird was teasing her with these scraps of evidence of a wonderful world that she brought to her every few days. She put her hands behind her head and looked carefully at the flowers. She ought to be going out to find something for them to eat, but she was scared to leave him. He might be gone by the time she got back. He might be a dream! With this thought, Bryony got up and prowled a couple of times around the room anxiously. She resisted an urge to wake him up and make him speak.
On a whim, she got into the bed with him. She could keep guard over him there. Feeling her there, Sigurd moved, and murmured something and put his arms around her. Bryony was thrilled, thrilled! He was holding her! They were cuddling! Gently, so as not to disturb the magic, she put her arms around him and laughed softly to herself with pleasure. He snuggled his nose into her neck and sniffed her skin. It tickled. She had to hold her breath so as not to giggle.
Sigurd snuffled and turned half over toward her, cupped her breast in his hand. What? she thought. This already? Her mother had always said to her, “Not the first one, Bryony!” very sharply, because she was as keen to do that as she was keen to do everything else. Ridiculous! As if she could pick and choose.
She moved her hand and touched him down there. It was all soft and warm: Sigurd had not been thinking of sex, he was just cuddling up. She smiled and relaxed. This was lovely. Oh, yes, she liked cuddling! She rested her face gently on his, stroked the bare skin of his scalp, and after a time fell asleep in his arms.
When I awoke, he was still fast asleep. I bent over him and smelled his breath, then I sniffed his face, his neck, his scalp— I wanted to know him all over. He didn’t move. I took the cover off him and looked at him. He was the most beautiful thing I had ever seen. I put my ear to his chest and listened to his heart—ba-boom, ba-boom, ba-boom. I listened to his head and his stomach. I pressed my ear to his things; they made no noise. I felt him all over. He was delicious.
I covered him up and lay there a bit, but I was so full of what was happening I couldn’t keep still. I had to go outside to think. I took the twig Jenny had brought me and went out.
I’m always dreaming of things. What the sky’s like, or the moon over water, or how about grass? My mother was a farmer’s daughter, she was always talking about grass. Dried grass that smells sweet, cut grass that smells fresh, grass under your bare feet, grass hissing in the wind. And all the other things she told me, like rain and sunshine and sand and sea and dogs and . . . everything. The world. The wide world, she used to say.
Now things are coming true. The boy, the first promise. Him with all his precious memories. That’s why I’m here, to honor memories, to worship them, to dedicate them to Odin. I’m his priest. Most people have so many memories they don’t know what they’re worth, so Odin gives me just a few. That’s what my mother believed anyway. Since she disappeared, it’s just me, so whenever anything happens, or whenever Jenny brings me something from outside, I honor it. I hope that one day there’ll be a reward, a release. I want to be set free.
Perhaps the boy is my reward. If he can’t get me out, I have to make sure he never leaves.
I have a memory of my own now. He is a boy. We slept together. I thought to myself, Maybe I won’t dedicate that to Odin. Maybe that’s just for me. Why should he have everything? He knows everything that has gone and everything that will be. Everything, down to the smallest cinder. Imagine that! Knowing everything. Why should he have this, as well?
I ran down the pipes and corridors to the dead man’s place. The flames were high today. I could see them licking over the walls, out across the roofs, creeping along the floors. Some places burn all the time even though you can’t see anything to burn. Fire that doesn’t consume—that must be Odin’s work. But it consumes you quickly enough if you go near it. Except for this boy. He had been burned only on the surface.
Another person here with me! You don’t understand. How could you?
There he was, turning on his heel. My father, Odin. There was a trickle of blood coming out of his mouth. I took the flowers and put them in the glass jar under him. There were hundreds of other little bits and pieces there. He had old leaves turned brown in his buttonhole and a handful of sand scattered over him, and a bunch of flowers stuffed down his trouser pockets. All his. Gifts to me from Jenny from the outside world that I had given to him. Each day I come and tell him about my day, offer him my memories, but I said nothing about the boy. He was mine. Odin had given him to me—the only thing he had ever given back. He was mine and I wasn’t going to share him ever, not with anyone. You understand? He was mine.
I went to the edge where the fire began and put my hand low to the ground, into the flames. Perhaps I had become like the boy—my hair would burn and the skin would shrivel off, but I would remain unharmed. I watched as the little downy hairs on the back of my hand burned and shriveled—but then the fire scorched me and I had to whip it out with a little yelp of pain. It hurt like Hel. I was jumping about waving it in the air and blowing on it to cool it down. I was furious! I turned to the dead man and shouted, “You won’t ever trust me, then!” But he just hung there, spun slowly around on the rope on his ankle, and never gave a sign.
/> “How long, oh Lord, how long?” I asked him. It was a prayer that my mother taught me. I think maybe he smiled slightly but as usual he never said a word.
Sigurd recovered slowly. Physically there wasn’t much wrong with him—his burns weren’t even skin deep. But he was exhausted in body, spirit, and mind.
In a couple of days his red shine was gone and in a few more a soft fuzz began to cover his whole body. It was as if the fire had burned away a human layer of him and the lion in his genes was showing through. He began to grow a soft, short covering of tawny fur. Where his skin showed through it glowed and shimmered like the dragon’s, and never again did he have finger or toe prints. Within a week, he was golden. His hair grew down his neck and across his shoulders, flecked with silver and chocolate brown.
He recovered in a dream, in which the past and present lost their boundaries. He spoke with his mother, or Alf, or Regin, he played with his childhood friends and made love with the girls who grew up with him among the dunes. He spoke with Bryony, inspected the little gifts that she showed him—a tiny cream-colored shell, the broken lock from a bracelet, the petal from a daffodil, a blade of grass, things small enough for a wren to carry in her beak. She often didn’t know what they were and she was thrilled when he gave them a name.
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