by Jenny Trout
Hamlet’s mind whirled. If he collected the keys, he would be able to walk between the worlds freely. What better way to avenge his father’s death than to revoke it completely? The king could return to his throne. Denmark would become more powerful than any other kingdom.
“Then give me the key.”
“It is not mine to give away.” The wolf sounded disappointed at that.
“Then all of this was for nothing? I’ll just live on, ruining lives all around me?” The words were bile in Hamlet’s mouth.
“You can take the key, but I cannot give it.” Fenrir’s enormous paw flexed, the black claws scratching at the dirt.”
“I must fight you?” Why hadn’t the wolf chosen Romeo? Was he not the better fighter?
A leader does not lead by the sword, but he may wield it in defense of his people. King Hamlet had been wise, and his son despaired of ever matching him.
“We are alike, you and I. We are harbingers of destruction.” The wolf settled down, his bushy tail curled around him. “You can change the course of mortality and rescue your friends. Or you can die here.”
Hamlet’s mind raced. Fenrir had a destiny in the lore of the end of the world. “If I take the key and rescue a mortal from death, I will be changing all that has ever been written.”
“We are old legends, wisps of memory. Bedtime stories, fables. We are no longer worshipped. When there is no one left to remember the old gods, the pantheon dies. Ragnarok is coming but not as we expected. And I will not fall to the blade of some unworthy god.” Fenrir’s eyes narrowed to glowing yellow slits. “Even if it means tearing apart the laws of this world and the next.”
“So…you’re committing suicide, then? You’ll just let me kill you and I’ll take the key and be on my way?”
“Killing takes a piece of you, every time you do it. I am but a shade of my former self, and I am living for what? For the chance to commit one last, glorious murder at Ragnarok. Fie on that, I say.” The wolf rambled now. “No, boy, it won’t be murder that you do, nor will I murder myself. You will fight me, and you will win, because you must.”
“And if I don’t?” Hamlet didn’t want to think about the heaps of rotting bones and scraps of flesh all around him, the bloody stains on the rock.
“Then you will walk from this battle ground. You may take two steps. Perhaps three. But you will go no further.” Fenrir pulled himself up again, swaying on his legs that did not look so powerful as before. “Come, boy. Fight me.”
Hamlet drew his sword. His fingers trembled around the hilt.
“I have one last question!” he called as the beast tensed to spring. Fenrir blinked slowly, and did not make his lunge, so Hamlet continued. “What of my friends here in the Afterjord? The Norn said Juliet couldn’t return to Midgard. But if we have all of the keys—”
“Romeo and Juliet have been marked from birth to love each other across impossible barriers. Nothing you do can change that.”
“But if I had all of the keys, I could change things. Couldn’t I?” Hamlet shouted, his arms aching from holding his sword at the ready.
But the beast did not answer him. Jaws snapping, he charged, and Hamlet did what he knew he must.
…
A loud caw broke the air.
Juliet looked up. Beside her, Romeo still slept. She did not disturb him.
She’d donned her gown again, though the front of it was stiff and itchy with blood. She gathered her skirt around her as she rose, looking about for a sign of black wings against the darker sky. In the distance, she spotted the figure of Hamlet by the white of his shirtsleeves.
“He came back,” she breathed, joy and terror warring in her breast. “He came back.”
She dropped to Romeo’s side, shaking him gently. “He’s back! Hamlet is back!”
Romeo’s eyes opened slowly, and he blinked in confusion. He pushed himself up on his elbows. “What?”
Juliet pointed toward the horizon. Romeo’s eyes widened. He got to his feet and found his clothes, his boots, and hastily put them on. He stopped in the middle of buckling his belt to lift his arm and wave.
It had seemed strange to her to think of Romeo as friendless; in Verona, he’d been popular with everyone. Well, everyone not named Capulet. It must have caused him much pain to leave that life behind. Though he’d traveled with Friar Laurence, it was much different to having friends of one’s own age. As much as Romeo professed to annoyance at the prince, he was as close to a friend as Romeo had at the moment.
“Here, take this.” Juliet helped Romeo to straighten his doublet, and they walked out to meet Hamlet.
It was the ravens reached them first, cawing and crowing as they came.
“Look who survived!” Hugin cackled. “You all must be very impressed.
“What happened?” Romeo called to Hamlet. “Where did they take you?”
“They took me to the second key.”
Juliet gasped at the sight of him as he drew closer. His face was smudged with soot, the soot streaked with sweat and blood. His sleeves were ripped; blood stained them. He reached for the key, held round his neck on an impossibly slender silver chain. He held it out.
“My god, what happened?” Romeo asked, crossing himself.
Hamlet’s eyes met Juliet’s. There was a haunted look in them that cautioned her to silence.
“I found the second key,” was all he said. Then casting his gaze to the ravens overhead, he growled, “Tell us how to call the third.”
“You don’t just call the third.” Hugin landed on the ground and scratched his feet in the clay. “If you had three sheep, and one went missing, as the shepherd, would you merely stand and call to it?”
“Of course not, you’d go and find it,” Romeo replied. “So what, we use these two like dowsing rods to track the third?”
“Don’t be stupid, dowsing rods don’t work.” Munin landed beside his fellow and puffed out his feathers. “You put them together, the two keys, and they’ll find the third.”
“Be sure to hold hands,” Hugin warned. “Don’t want any of you to get left behind.”
Hamlet put one hand out. He held up the key in the other. “Everyone put a hand in. Hold on.”
“What’s going to happen?” Juliet asked uncertainly. She remembered the unpleasant feeling of shattering in the hall of mirrors and reforming in the waste. If there was no way to avoid that feeling, she at least wanted to be ready for it.
“Who knows?” Munin squawked. “Nobody’s done it before.”
Juliet gripped Hamlet’s hand and raised the other key.
Romeo looped his arm through hers and grasped Hamlet’s hand, as well. “If this doesn’t work…we can’t say we didn’t try.”
“No, that we can’t,” Hamlet agreed, grim.
What had he done to gain the second key? What horrible task had he been forced to endure?
There was no time to ask it. Hamlet brought the tip of his key to touch the one she held. At once, the wasteland began to spin. As it picked up speed, Hugin and Munin became two dark blurs.
“Ooh, watching that will make me sick,” Hugin cawed.
“Good luck,” Munin called to them. “You’re going to need it.”
Juliet shut her eyes. When she opened them, the light was so bright, she stumbled.
“Careful!” Romeo caught her, and she leaned against him, her chin tucked to her chest.
“What?” Hamlet’s indignant cry forced her to open her eyes, and Juliet saw that beneath her feet, the only thing keeping her from plunging into a black void was gossamer light.
“We’ve been here before,” Romeo murmured. “It takes a moment to get used to.”
“I suppose it would.” She lifted her head, then blinked in wonder at the ripples of rainbow light all around them.
“I don’t understand.” Hamlet walked in a very brave circle, skirting the edge of the ribbon of light. “Why would it bring us back here? There is no key to be found. The Valkyrie are in Valhalla; i
t should have taken us there.”
Juliet followed Hamlet’s gaze. Far in the distance, a shimmering golden fortress stood against a similarly gilded sky. “We’re going in there?”
“We were banished from there. By some very insistent warrior women.” Romeo sighed wearily. “What shall we do now?”
“I haven’t a clue. I suppose we could try knocking on the door and asking politely.” Hamlet stroked his chin as he considered.
A breeze stirred the light, and the wisps of a curl brushed her cheek. There was a familiar sound, so maddeningly faint that Juliet worried for a moment that she had imagined it.
“Juliet?” Romeo asked. He and Hamlet had moved away from her, toward the fortress in the distance.
But her heart pulled her away from them, toward the sound. “I hear something… something from my childhood.”
The tone and inflection were clear, even though they were faint. It was…
“Juliet, this place is full of tricks,” Hamlet reminded her.
But it wasn’t a trick.
“It’s my nurse.”
Chapter Seventeen
Juliet bolted in the direction of the sound, ignoring Hamlet’s shout. Romeo was but steps behind her.
“Wait,” he panted, reaching for her arm. “Wait, you don’t know what you’re doing.”
“I hear her, Romeo.” She continued on, but slowed her steps so that he could walk beside her. “I know this place is deceptive, but I’ve seen through its tricks before.”
“Not in the hall of mirrors,” Hamlet reminded her as he fell in step beside them. “You didn’t see that for the illusion it was. You had to trust my senses.”
“Then loan me your senses,” Juliet demanded. “Follow me or don’t, it matters not. I hear Nurse. If she is here, I will not miss the chance to speak with her again.”
“If she’s here, she is dead,” Hamlet said, and that slowed Juliet’s steps.
Nurse had not been young. And not in the best of health, that was true, but certainly she had not been so close to death.
Surely she had not died.
The question only firmed Juliet’s resolve. When she’d arrived in the Afterjord, she had been frightened and confused. Her heart broke to think of Nurse in such a state, dear woman that she had been.
Juliet stopped to face them both. “If this is a trick, then so be it. I will rejoice if it is, for it will mean my beloved Nurse has been spared the horrors of death. But I must know, either way, and the only way to find out is to go to the sound.”
“The key—” Hamlet began.
Romeo cut him off. “The key can wait. I doubt Valhalla will fall in a span of minutes.”
Juliet gave him as much of a smile as she could conjure. It wasn’t much, but she hoped it showed him the depth of her gratitude.
Hamlet was not yet convinced. “We are closer than ever to the escape that will rescue you from the grave. You’re willing to turn your back on that for an illusion?”
She drew herself up tall. “This woman held me to her breast and dried my tears and loved me as though I were her own babe. I would gladly turn my back on a chance at second life to comfort her.”
Romeo and Hamlet looked at each other in silence, and it was Hamlet who glanced away first, a simple defeat expressed in the briefest downward flick of his eyes.
“Fine. We’ll go. But I won’t venture into Sheol again, not for you, your nurse, nor anyone else.”
They made their way from the light bridge to the sturdy stone of a tree-lined plaza. Juliet marveled at the mass of humanity that swarmed the area. Souls of all kinds, from all over the earth, wandered in the space. She recognized it at once.
She recognized, too, the plump woman weaving among the bodies, her gray curls askew. She held her hand to her forehead and shouted, “Juliet! Juliet, where have you gone?”
“Go to her,” Romeo urged. Then, he grabbed Juliet’s arm. “Wait. Hamlet, give me one of the keys.”
Uncertain, Hamlet took the Berserker’s key from his doublet and handed it over.
“Take this,” Romeo said, folding the key into her palm. His fingers burned where they touched hers. “We will look out for the shades that guard this realm, and keep them from you. If we are separated—”
“It takes two keys to call to one,” Hamlet reminded him.
“If we are separated from you,” Romeo began again, ignoring the prince, “Hamlet and I will retrieve the third key and use it to find you.”
Juliet squeezed his hand, took the key, and walked toward the figure that appeared to be her nurse.
“Juliet!” Nurse turned, scanning the sky that was not there. Juliet wondered if she saw the gilded Venetian blue over Verona, and not the cavernous darkness looming above them now.
“Good woman, what causes you such distress?” Juliet asked, and the moment Nurse’s terrified gaze fell upon her, she knew. It was her Nurse, not some vision.
Nurse had died.
The grief in Juliet’s heart surprised her; what mattered life or death when both of them were in the Afterjord together? But the mortal thread that still wound within Juliet wove an emblem of sorrow on her soul. Since the moment Juliet had learned about death, she’d feared most that it would steal away those that she loved.
It did not seem that Nurse recognized her, for her distress did not abate. “Oh, I have lost my sweet babe! I have lost my Juliet! I looked away only for a moment…the river!”
Nurse clutched her chest, and Juliet’s memory gave way to a long ago tale. Nurse’s calm, steady voice rolled through her mind. When you were but a speck of a thing, barely able to walk, you got away from me at a merchant’s stall. It was midday, market day, and I turned my head for but a moment…I was sure you had slipped over the bridge and into the river.
“Good lady, you misremember,” Juliet said patiently. “That was so long ago. You found your charge, hiding behind the skirts of a noble lady, enthralled by the sight of her pretty lace parasol.”
“Yes…yes, I remember now…” But Nurse’s features did not soften. “She had never seen one before…”
“You found her, and you caught her up and kissed her, and made her promise she would never worry you so terribly again.” Juliet’s tears burned her eyes.
“I did.” Nurse appeared to ease a bit, but her bewilderment did not fade entirely. “How did you know that?”
“Because I am your Juliet.” Her heart ached. Nurse did not remember her, and she had not been able to keep her promise. “I am so sorry.”
“Juliet?” Some of the haze lifted from Nurse’s eyes, only to be replaced with sadness. “But Juliet is…”
“Dead. As you are now.” Juliet motioned to one of the trees rising from its huge stone urn, and led her Nurse to sit with her on the edge. “How did you come to this place?”
“I came down with a fever…” Slowly, Nurse came to understanding, horror and clarity at war in her expression. “I had no reason… I had no…”
She’d had no reason to get well, Juliet realized. The last child she would care for was dead, buried in unconsecrated ground. Nurse would consider that an abysmal failure in her duties to the Capulet family.
Nurse gripped Juliet’s hands too tight. “I should have never delivered you to Friar Laurence. I should have never taken messages to the Montague.”
“You had no way of knowing what would happen,” Juliet soothed her. “It is I who failed you.”
“My sweet child…you could never fail me.”
All Juliet had longed for since the moment she’d arrived in the Afterjord had been the comforting arms of her nurse. Those big, soft arms now enfolded her, pulled her head to rest against Nurse’s round, plump shoulder.
In Nurse’s embrace, Juliet felt like a child again. How she’d longed to grow up, faster than her years. Now she would give anything to be that little child again, living happily with her Nurse, hearing daily how clever she was.
She had failed Nurse, and Mother and Father, and even Tyb
alt. She’d turned her back on her family and caused them this pain.
She cried, and her tears were real tears, not some illusion in death. Her sobs hurt her chest, hurt as though she were living. At once, she was back to the night of Tybalt’s death, the bleak hopelessness and cruel despair. She wished she could erase all of it; all of it but Romeo, and that one perfect night on her balcony, when everything had seemed innocent and utterly possible.
She wanted Romeo. She wanted life. She wanted to undo all the death and pain, and the knowledge that she never would twisted cruelly in her side.
“Juliet!”
It was Romeo’s shout that tore her from her dark thoughts, but when she raised her head, there was nothing but darkness. It swirled around her, compelled her, tore her from her Nurse and swept her along.
This, she remembered. The clawing terror, the sudden realization that all she had been told of death was a lie, and yet none of it had been, too. The knowledge that her deeds in life were counted against her, and she had been found wanting. It was as if her own despair condemned her…
She’d done this all before, and she would not do it again. If she was sole judge of the destination of her soul, she would not send herself back to Sheol. The key was still clutched in her hand. She brandished it like a weapon against the darkness, and roared, “No!”
She saw the raw edges of her scream ripple through the blackness, and the shade that had held her recoiled. From her, or from the key, she could not say, but she held it before her as a weapon, put herself between Nurse and the creatures who would drag her away.
The mistakes of the past were written in stone, and Juliet was no force to wear them away. But she would no longer punish herself for them. She could not force herself to carry that guilt another step.
“Juliet, look!” Romeo was at her side, hand on the hilt of his sword as the shade faded. She followed the line of his arm, to where he pointed at Nurse.
Flowing white rippled around her, a shade made of light instead of darkness. Its arms enfolded her, urged her toward an arch with a chalice carved into the keystone.
