Nearby lay Hrut’s war axe. He snatched it up, raising it over Thrym. Paling at the sight of his bloodthirsty sneer, Astrid closed her eyes, unwilling to watch her giant friend meet his end. But the next sound she heard wasn’t that of Thrym’s head cracking off. It was a new booming voice.
“Hrut! It’s over!”
She opened her eyes, surprised to see that another frost giant, emboldened by Thrym’s courageous stand, had climbed down into the arena and was calling to Hrut in defiance. Seeing the new challenger, Hrut merely grinned in anticipation, believing the giant easy prey. But more mutinous cries were heard, and slowly, one by one, down came more frost giants out of the stands and onto the arena floor, forming a circle around Hrut until there were ten standing in open rebellion against him. Astrid could scarce believe it; they were standing up to him! She was further amazed as slowly the chant began anew, “Kill!…Kill!…Kill!” and this time she knew it wasn’t Thrym’s death they were chanting for; it was Hrut’s. And Astrid would never forget the look on Hrut’s deformed face as he realized that his reign was over.
At first it thrilled Thrym to see that his words had worked! His fellow frost giants had found the strength to say no to Hrut. From where Thrym lay on the arena floor, he could see the sneer on Hrut’s face turn to abject fear as the rebel giants began to attack him, taking him on two and three at a time, landing thunderous blows that cracked and cratered Hrut’s face and body. Hrut tried to fight back but was too outnumbered to defend himself. And as the right side of the warlord’s face shattered like glass and fell away, Hrut crumpled to the floor with a resounding boom and the chants of the crowd grew even louder, “KILL!…KILL!…KILL!”
As Thrym watched the whimpering warlord trying to crawl away, he could feel only pity for the beaten brute, the sight of him now so weak and defenseless seeming more sad than satisfying. More cheers rose from the crowd as the tide of fear turned and more frost giants came out of the stands, dozens upon dozens, all wanting a piece of their former dictator. Hrut went down on his knees, begging for mercy, the frenzied chants of “Kill!” growing louder still. And Thrym was unable to look away as the giants tore him apart.
Soon, like those of so many of his innumerable victims, Hrut’s dismembered parts were strewn about the arena floor, an arm here, a leg there. The victorious frost giants took turns holding up Hrut’s smashed and decapitated head, cheering in joyous celebration! At last they were free! The brutal tyrant was dead!
Thyrm rose to his feet, elated to see Astrid waving from the entranceway, relieved to know she and her friends were safe. Bursting with pride, he moved toward her, wanting to share the moment with the one who had inspired him. But the din of raucous celebration was abruptly cut short, as from the heavens came a rain of deadly fire.
27
GIANTS 34, TROLLS 3
From outside the arena the troll army launched their catapults. Clay pots full of flammable pitch were ignited and shot over the upper rim of the arena. The pots rained down upon the crowd and broke apart, splashing white ribbons of fire over the panicked giants, who furiously tried to brush the flaming pitch from their bodies; this only spread the fire onto their fingers and hands, melting them. As one giant was hit in the forehead, the fire-bomb exploded and his entire head was enveloped in flames. Within moments his horrible screams died and all that was left was a headless corpse. Another giant was hit in the legs and he tried to run, but soon his feet were eaten away and then both legs were gone and all he could do was try to drag himself away on melted stumps. The giants stampeded for the exits, only to be driven back by hailstorms of fire arrows shot by phalanxes of trolls positioned there.
From his vantage point outside the arena, Ragnar watched the troll catapults launch the flaming projectiles and heard the resultant screams of the frost giants inside. Godrek’s nefarious scheme was proceeding well. He had convinced the trolls that he was their ally and that he would help them kill frost giants. Of course, it was all a subterfuge. Godrek had no plans to partner with the trolls, and cared not a whit if they were all slaughtered, for the attack was just a feint, a way of creating havoc. While the giants were locked in battle with their chief enemy, the trolls, they would be less inclined to worry about a few humans in their midst, and Godrek would have plenty of time to find the other half of the rune sword. If Geldrun’s son already had it, then all the better, Godrek had told Ragnar. He would easily kill the boy and seize it without interference from the boy’s frost giant protector. In one stroke he would possess the final key to finding the treasure and could at last eliminate the defiant one who had been such a thorn in his side.
The thought of the young man’s death pained Ragnar, but what could he do to stop it? Take on Godrek and his liegemen single-handedly? His feelings for Dane’s mother had nearly caused his demise once already. At the troll village Svein and Thorfinn had returned just before he and the woman were to make their escape. Another moment or two and they would have been seen galloping off, and there would have been a quick chase followed by his slow and painful execution. Svein had shown a sudden coldness to Ragnar after the incident, as if he suspected the Ripper’s traitorous intentions, and thus had kept close watch on him and Geldrun, never leaving their side. He was with them now, camped outside the arena behind a statue of one of the giants, a monstrous-looking beast with a face right out of a nightmare.
Godrek and the others had gone off to find the rune blade’s other half, the source, Ragnar suspected, of his lord’s increasing mania. A mad shine had come into his lordship’s eyes, and the closer they had come to Utgard, the greater grew his look of hunger. Godrek had begun to talk to himself in harsh whispers, behaving oddly, and to Ragnar it seemed as if his lordship was hearing voices no one else could hear.
Movement high atop the arena caught Ragnar’s eye. A frost giant made a suicidal leap from the uppermost rim, plummeting toward a company of troll soldiers below. One of the soldiers looked up and started to cry an alarm when the giant’s body crushed them all flat. Pieces of the giant’s shattered body ricocheted off in all directions, killing more trolls and hitting one of the catapults just as it fired, causing the shot to go awry. The flaming bomb arced across the sky, coming straight for them, and Ragnar threw himself over Geldrun to protect her. The pot broke upon the statue, raining fiery pitch down on Svein instead, and Ragnar watched in horror as his friend ran screaming in circles, looking like a skewer of flaming meat. Ragnar leaped up and ran toward his friend, tackling him into a snowdrift. Svein rolled frantically about in the fluffs of snow as Ragnar heaped on more, but the flaming pitch was hard to put out and Ragnar’s gloves caught fire. At last the pitch was extinguished and Ragnar looked into the eyes of his companion whom he had fought and drunk beside nearly all his warrior life.
“A demon has taken his lordship,” Svein gasped, “so best you save yourselves and go.” So it was true! Svein had suspected Ragnar’s intentions. And now as One Brow lay dying, he was giving his friend leave to follow his heart. Slipping Svein’s sword from its scabbard, Ragnar closed his comrade’s hand around it. Gravely he watched as Svein took his last labored breath and his eyes fell shut with sad finality.
“May you dine at Odin’s table,” Ragnar uttered respectfully. “I knew none more worthy.” The sounds of more explosions nearby drew him back to what was happening around him. He turned round, anxious to help Geldrun, but she was gone. And so was the knife from his belt, taken, Ragnar now realized, while he lay shielding her from the rain of flaming pitch.
Godrek loved the chaos of battle, a time when all the stifling codes of morality ceased to exist. All the virtues that weakened men—mercy, kindness, compassion—were tossed aside, replaced with a single vital need: to kill and take whatever you wanted. And what Godrek wanted was one thing: the remaining half of the rune sword. But Dane, he knew, had the giant on his side and quite possibly had already found the blade. If this was so, his task would be made even easier, for all he had to do now to find the blade was to find
the boy.
His only enemy was time. The troll army could create havoc for only so long; the giants would use their superior size and numbers to soon crush them. Godrek saw a giant rush out from the arena and wipe out a score of troll archers before he was driven back by a fusillade of fire arrows. The tide was already beginning to turn, and Godrek knew that before the giants regained control, he needed to have the rest of the rune sword and already be out the gates or risk the giants’ wrath.
Through the thick smoke of the burning pitch he saw one of his liegemen moving among the lines of troll soldiers. Godrek called to him. The man stopped, and Godrek saw it was Ragnar. But where was Geldrun? He saw a look of indecision flash across Ragnar’s face for a moment, but it passed and he quickly hurried to join his lord and the other liegemen.
“The woman! Where is she?” Godrek demanded.
“One Brow met his end in a bombardment,” the breathless Ragnar said, “and she…escaped.”
An enraged Godrek grabbed Ragnar by the front of his coat. “Escaped? Do you know what befalls those who fail me?”
Ragnar paled as Godrek’s hand went for his sword. “Wait! My lord, I…caught sight of her. I think I know where she’s heading.”
“Then we’d best find her…or you’ll be joining Svein.”
Dane had never seen such chaos. The rain of fiery pitch, the dense smoke, the mad stampede of panicked frost giants—it had sent the arena into mass confusion and terror. Dane groped blindly, coughing as he cried out to his friends, the acrid smoke filling his lungs. Amid the din he felt the earth shake beneath him and heard thundering footfalls coming his way. From out of the billowing smoke stumbled a terrified giant, the whole top of his head melted away by flaming tar. At the last instant Dane leaped aside as the giant charged past, disappearing once more.
Again and again Dane shouted, until faintly in the distance he heard Astrid call back. Following her cries he found her and Kára crouched over the prostrate Lut, trying to help the old man up. Hearing a sudden hissing overhead, he looked up—a fireball, falling like a shooting star, was heading right at them. Dane hurried to throw Lut over his shoulder and drag him away. Ka-bloom! The flaming pot crashed to earth, engulfing with white-hot fire the spot where Lut had lain.
Dane knew survival depended on their finding shelter from the charging giants and fire bombs. When the smoke cleared, he could return for the others.
They reached the outer wall of the arena and, feeling their way along it, came at last to a passageway that, though still smoky, seemed to offer some degree of shelter. His eyes burning from the smoke, Dane led them down the tunnel, feeling his way along, until the haze lifted a bit and he found himself outside the arena proper, able now to breathe easier. Pulling Kára and Astrid further into the fresh air, he could clearly see, far to the right, that the retreating trolls were scurrying to re-form their lines.
And then he heard it. “Dane!”
He turned. There she was—his mother—free and unfettered, emerging from a cloud of smoke. Into his arms she ran, and having her again so near, the warmth of her cheeks on his, brought him to tears. What joy to be reunited at last, to find her unharmed. Astrid too embraced her, as Geldrun excitedly spilled out an explanation of how she had escaped.
“We’ll talk on the long journey home,” Dane said, “but first I must gather the others.” The sight of his mother’s smile lit Dane with hope, and he started up the tunnel, intent on finding his friends. But a chill ran through him as a new voice rang out.
“Stay where you are!” From out of the darkness strode Godrek and his men, weapons in hand. Dane went for his sword, Astrid and Kára for their axes—but the sound of sinew stretching froze them. Three of Godrek’s bowmen had arrows aimed at their chests. Godrek stepped forth and stood before Dane, his eyes twitching in impatience.
“I must thank your mother—she led us right to you.” Godrek wore the same look, Dane noticed, that he had shown when he had first laid eyes on the glowing rune sword that night in the Skrellborg stables. “Where is it—my blade?”
“Hidden,” Dane said. “I’ll take you to it when my mother and friends are out of the gate and safely away.”
“Hidden? But it’s close,” Godrek purred, cocking an ear to the air. “I can…hear it calling.”
Commander Greb rushed up, flushed and out of breath. “Where is the manpower you promised?” he bellowed to Godrek. “My lines are breaking, my soldiers dying—and you have not lifted a sword!”
Godrek thrust his sword straight through Greb’s neck and held it there for a moment, keeping the commander propped up. “I have lifted my sword, troll,” he said with a cold grin. “Happy now?” He withdrew the blade and Greb stood for a moment, wearing a look of pained bewilderment, unable to fathom what had just happened. He collapsed like a rag doll without uttering another sound.
As if he had done nothing more than brush away a bothersome fly, Godrek now turned back to Dane.
“Time is precious, son. The blade!”
“My friends must go free,” Dane demanded.
Godrek’s men threw anxious looks behind them, expecting attack at any moment. They could hear troll cries of panic from out on the arena floor, as if the battle were soon to be lost.
Godrek nodded at Thorfinn, who in a lightning-quick move seized Astrid from behind, placing his knife at her throat. “Produce it now,” Godrek said. “Or on the count of three the girl dies. Then the princess. One…”
Dane knew it useless to bargain with a madman. Apparently so did Lut. Before Godrek reached the count of “two,” Lut produced the broken blade from under his cloak and threw it at Godrek’s feet.
“It’s yours now!” Geldrun said. “If there be any soul left within you, take it and free my son and his friends!”
But Godrek hadn’t heard a word, the irresistible call of the blade having seized his mind and rendered him immune to anyone’s pleas. Dane watched in growing alarm as Godrek, his eyes fixed upon the broken blade, reached down with his left hand and raised it above his head, whispering in unholy reverence, unaware that the blade had cut into the flesh of his hand and sent rivulets of his own blood dripping down his arm. With his right hand he took out the snake-handled half of the sword—the piece Dane had found in his father’s war chest. His eyes shining madly, Godrek brought the two pieces together. The dull gray steel of the blade began to glow, once more turning a bright orange as if lit from within. The long row of runic inscriptions again became visible along the length of the blade, faintly at first, then more sharply apparent, the symbols themselves showing white-hot against the orange. There were murmurs of awe from the men. Godrek’s left hand suddenly jerked away from the blade, Dane first assuming that the heat of the blade had made him let go. But then he saw what the others already had—the pieces had fused and become one! It was one unbroken blade again. The gods—or some other unseen power—had rejoined the ancient rune sword.
Godrek held it aloft, gazing up in worship at the gleaming blade, Dane fully expecting it to soon come plunging into his very chest. The mesmerized Godrek seemed to have forgotten all but the rune sword, his enraptured look telling Dane that the greed-madness had taken hold in him. Indeed, it was calling to Dane too, now louder and more alluring than ever.
Godrek ordered his men to seize Dane and his friends—he was taking them all. All but Lut, whom he told Ragnar to “take care of.”
Many hours later, after the battle had subsided at last and the smoke had begun to clear, the defeated troll soldiers who had been hunted down and rounded up were brought into the arena. Fulnir had found Jarl, Drott, William, and the others still alive, and had joined them in their hiding place near the blódíss vat. Still missing were Dane, Kára, Astrid, and Lut, and Fulnir and the others hoped they had somehow escaped the arena unscathed.
Now Fulnir watched in fear and fascination as the frost giants debated the fate of the trolls. Understandably, the mob of giants was in a mood to massacre them all, and the first troll t
hey brought forth to be killed was Dvalin, the troll chieftain. Looking beaten and bedraggled and resigned to his fate, he stood in stony silence as, without ado, a giant doused him with pitch and prepared to set him afire. And just as a torch was raised to ignite him, Fulnir was surprised to see Thrym burst through the crowd and protectively stand over Lord Dvalin.
“Why do you protect him?” said a giant in the crowd. “They attacked us!”
“After we attacked them. We destroyed their village. Can anyone here tell me what this war is about? Is there one thing the trolls have that you want?” he asked the giants.
The frost giants all looked at each other with blank faces, unable to think of a thing. Thrym asked the same question of the trolls, and none of them could think of one either. “This war is not about land or possessions. No, it is about one thing. Revenge. And who stoked that fire? Hrut!” Several giants nodded their heads, murmuring agreement.
“And my Commander Greb,” Dvalin said. “He more than I wanted war, and now he is dead.”
“Hrut too is dead. So unless someone can give me good reason why this war should continue, I am officially ending it here and now.” Thrym waited, but no one, giant or troll, could think of why the war should go on.
Sword of Doom Page 24
