The Lost Gods

by Francesca Simon

  The Gods looked at one another.

  How could she explain computers to them?

  ‘A computer is … a tablet of wisdom,’ said Freya. ‘A seeress of numbers.’

  Woden’s eye flashed.

  ‘I sacrificed my eye for wisdom,’ he murmured. ‘I hung on the windswept tree Yggdrasil for nine nights, stabbed with a spear, to gain secret knowledge and magic runes. And now you say that these tablets are available to … all?’ He looked sick.

  ‘Well, yes,’ said Freya. ‘Anyone who can afford to buy one.’

  ‘Can these seeresses tell you how to make a dead man speak?’ demanded Woden. ‘Or see the future? Or tell men’s fates? Can they take wisdom and strength from one person and give it to another, as I can with one charm?’

  ‘No,’ said Freya.

  Woden smiled. ‘Thank the Almighty Gods for that,’ he said.

  ‘Who are those people lying in the doorways of the great halls?’ asked Alfi.

  ‘They’re homeless,’ said Freya. ‘They have nowhere else to go.’ Her face brightened. ‘Maybe Woden could help them.’

  Woden turned away.

  ‘The weak must fend for themselves,’ he said. ‘All have a chance to win wealth and glory. Those without luck, those who fail, do not concern us.’

  ‘Oh,’ said Freya. For a moment she felt bleak and wintry. She hoped she would not be one of the luckless ones, scorned by fate, and beneath the Gods’ notice.

  ‘We are now approaching Woden’s Temple, which alone survived the Blitz in World War Two,’ said the bus commentary. ‘It was built in the English Baroque style by the famous architect Sir Kotter Wren in 4677. The 85-metre high dome is one of the largest in the world and has dominated the London skyline for centuries. The earlier Temple was destroyed in the great fire of 4666.’

  ‘That’s my Temple?’ said Woden, craning to see the tall domed building as the bus snaked its way towards All-Father Square. ‘I approve.’

  ‘A Temple dedicated to Woden has existed here for fourteen centuries, and services are held hourly,’ continued the commentary.

  Suddenly Woden stood up.

  ‘Get off the chariot,’ he ordered. ‘I want to see my Temple and appear before my worshippers. We will go inside and witness the devotions.’

  They got off the red tour bus and headed across All-Father Square to the wide entrance. Freya prayed that a bigger Throng would gather here than her mother managed to drum up in Holloway.

  Woden frowned at the tents and banners spread out in front of his great Temple, filling the piazza in front. The Goddess Freyja held her dress tightly to her side, as if the protestors and campers might contaminate her.

  ‘OCCUPY LONDON,’ read Woden. ‘BANKS GOT BAILED OUT, PEOPLE GOT LEFT OUT!’

  ‘Who are these people desecrating my Temple?’ he asked. Snot growled and gripped his axe.

  ‘They’re protesting against greedy bankers making themselves rich,’ said Freya.

  ‘Why?’ said Woden. ‘How did they get wealth? Farming? Trading? Fishing? Raiding?’

  ‘Raiding,’ said Freya. ‘They stole our money.’

  Woden’s eye gleamed.

  ‘So Vikings are called bankers now. Ha. Viking spirit lives on in bankers. Good for them. Are they keen raiders?’

  ‘Yes,’ said Freya.

  ‘Glad to hear it,’ said Woden. ‘Smashing and grabbing, just like the old days.’

  ‘But they’ve stolen from the rest of us,’ said Freya. ‘We had to bail them out, and they’ve kept the money.’

  ‘So demand that your chieftains steal it back.’

  ‘It’s not so easy,’ said Freya.

  Woden snorted. ‘You live in soft times. Hail bankers! Hail the strong!’ His voice boomed around the square, as if magnified by a thousand megaphones.

  ‘Hail bankers! Hail the strong!’ roared Thor. A flock of startled pigeons hurtled skyward as the protestors stared.

  ‘We must send the Valkyries for bankers when they die in battle against the Occupiers,’ said Woden, racing up the wide steps and bounding into the hushed Temple.

  Freya looked around the cavernous stone interior, milling with a few tourists, with the carved, red-timbered high altar at the far end covered with offerings of fruit, vegetables, trinkets and flowers. ‘Offerings are like paying protection money to a sacred Mafia,’ her dad liked to say when he wanted to annoy Clare in the dying days of their marriage. Above the altar was the famous Turner painting of Woden hanging on the World Tree Yggdrasil. Stained-glass windows depicting Woden raising the dead, Thor wrestling with the world-serpent, and Tyr sacrificing his hand to the wolf Fenrir, were blurry with dirt and let little light into the gloomy interior. Statues of Woden clutching his spear which never missed its target, accompanied by eagles and ravens, and the heroes of Valhalla performing valorous deeds of dragon-slaying and troll felling ringed the side shrines, candles flickering before them.

  Huge marble busts of Valkyries stood on either side of the high altar. The hushed damp smell of incense and wax hung over the rows of mostly empty wooden pews, decorated with unlocking fetters and runic inscriptions, the shuffling boy choir in their worn vestments, and the flowers already wilting from a recent baby naming or wedding.

  Woden scowled. ‘This empty barn is my greatest temple?’ he hissed. ‘This is where my raven-rites are performed?’

  Freya nodded.

  ‘Why isn’t it full of worshippers like the Temple of the Bitten Apple?’ he demanded, striding up the gloomy nave past marble statues of all the Immortals. ‘What does that god have that I don’t?’

  Better advertising? thought Freya. Customer service? Phones?

  The Goddess Freyja stopped before a marble statue showing her standing in her cat-drawn chariot.

  ‘Is that ugly sow supposed to be me?’ she shrieked. ‘I’m much more beautiful than that.’ Her jarring voice rang through the Temple.

  Freya counted the Throng assembled in the small, roped-off area at the front, waiting for the service to start. Only seven, not including her and the Gods. It was just like Clare’s Fane, with another old Mrs Kelly already sound asleep in the front row, her wispy iron-grey hair sticking out from under a beanie hat she probably never took off. There was one family who no doubt needed to prove regular Fane attendance in order to get their whiny child into the local Fane school. Freya saw that the dad had already hidden his mobile in his lap. Once they had the school place, they’d never come back.

  ‘Hopefully more people will be along any minute,’ Freya said as brightly as she could. ‘Often there’s a rush just before the services start.’

  Woden surveyed the pitiful Throng.

  ‘Where’s today’s sacrifice?’ he said.

  ‘We don’t do sacrifices,’ whispered Freya.

  ‘What?’ shouted Woden.

  The old lady dozing in the front row woke up, turned round and glared at him.

  ‘SHHHH!’ she hissed.

  ‘No sacrifices,’ said Freya. ‘That stopped ages ago.’

  She shrank back as Woden’s face turned purple and red with rage.

  ‘Not even an ox?’ said Woden.

  ‘A goat?’ said Thor.

  ‘A chicken?’ said Freyja.

  Freya shook her head.

  ‘What kind of worship is this?’ asked Woden.

  ‘No wonder we’ve lost our powers,’ said Thor.

  ‘What do you expect from such creatures?’ said the Goddess.

  ‘You created us,’ said Freya.

  Thor sniffed. ‘What’s on the oath ring?’

  Freya looked at the large plaited silver ring kept on the high altar, reddened with wine from earlier oaths.

  ‘Wine,’ she said.

  ‘Wine? Wine?’ bellowed Thor.

  ‘Shhh,’ said Freya. ‘You’re not supposed to yell in here. It’s red wine.’

  ‘Not sacrificial blood? What kind of useless oath is that?’ growled Thor.

  The Priest, in his long white robes, appeared
from a side door and stood before the Throng. He beckoned them to rise.

  ‘We are gathered to give praise to Woden, the all-wise and all-powerful, who gives victory and riches and wisdom, according to his will, inspiration to poets, following winds to sailors. And we give thanks to all the Immortal Eternal Gods, mighty protectors, providers of bread and wine, for their many gifts.

  ‘Praise is cheap,’ muttered Woden. ‘Where are the drowned slaves?’

  ‘And what about Thor?’ asked Thor.

  ‘Restore us, oh Gods, let us find favour in your sight. You made us in your image—’

  ‘I most certainly did not,’ said Woden.

  ‘Fate is stronger than everything, even stronger than the Gods,’ intoned the Priest. ‘This brief life is all we have; the world to come is reserved for our bravest warriors, and the righteous, and the poets, who will have their own place in Asgard, as our archpriests decreed. Be mindful of your reputation. Our shrouded Life is brief, but fame is forever.’

  ‘So far, not nearly good enough,’ hissed Woden.

  ‘What is the purpose of life? The Gods teach us it is to worship them and to gain renown by brave deeds. While the Immortals cannot always keep us from danger, we give thanks for the blessing of courage to face whatever fate decrees and the chance to gain our place in Valhalla.

  ‘Now, my assistant Priestess will get out her guitar, and let’s all sing together, hymn 27 in your Eddas, “Woden loves us every one”.

  Woden loves us one and all;

  Thor protects in stormy squall—’

  ‘You call this heap of mare droppings worship?’ said Woden loudly. ‘This mewling? Where are the hanged men pierced with spears?’

  ‘Where’s my altar of sacred rocks?’ grunted Thor.

  ‘Where are the sacred groves?’ asked Freyja.

  ‘Where are all the worshippers?’ shouted Woden.

  ‘Shush!’ hissed a middle-aged woman in a hat in front of him, singing loudly. ‘Show some respect.’

  ‘Let us now recite the Wodenic Creed together,’ continued the Priest. Freya saw him catch the eye of the security guards at the exits.

  The Throng chanted:

  I believe in the All-Father, creator of heaven and earth; and in Thor his son, Frigg his wife, and Freyja, Frey, Njord, Heimdall, Baldr, Tyr, and the All-Mighty Immortals. I believe they alone are the true Gods. I believe that Tyr sacrificed his right hand to keep the world safe from the Wolf. I believe that Woden hung for nine nights on the sacred tree, Yggdrasil. Long may they reign over us, until the Wolf swallows the sun. Amen.

  The organ struck up a solemn melody, and the Throng stood for the final prayers and hymns.

  ‘Stop! This is a travesty! Call this worship?’ bellowed Thor. He jumped up and stood on the pew, red-faced and furious. ‘What an insult!’ His voice boomed and echoed around the Temple, ringing out over the organ, which tried to drown him out with a vociferous cadenza. Woden leapt to his feet and strode down the aisle towards the priest. ‘I am Woden! The All-Father! May you be people without luck! May you never enter Valhalla! The trolls take you all! Where are the sacrifices? Where are the offerings? Where are the two-day feasts? Call this caterwauling the worship of the Gods who made you? You ungrateful sacks of wood! You hags, you pisshorns! ON YOUR KNEES! WE ARE THE LORDS YOUR GODS!’

  Freya shrank into her seat.

  ‘I’m going to have to ask you all to leave now, sir,’ said a Fane official.

  ‘This is my Temple, how dare you ask me to leave?’ said Woden. ‘Don’t you know who I am?’

  ‘You’re a very rude man,’ shouted the old lady in the front.

  ‘Disgraceful,’ muttered another elderly lady.

  ‘Come on, we should go,’ hissed Freya. She was hot and embarrassed. If she’d had her falcon skin with her she’d have taken flight. How did he expect people to worship him if he called them pisshorns?

  ‘Say the word, and I’ll kill them all,’ growled Snot.

  ‘No!’ said Freya. ‘You won’t help our cause by killing people in your temple.’

  ‘Master, we should go,’ said Alfi.

  ‘You can punish these people later,’ said Roskva.

  The Gods stormed out of the temple, ranting.

  ‘Those weren’t worshippers,’ said Woden. ‘They were gawpers. Sightseers. Their paltry prayers were without fervour. I felt nothing. Nothing! Not an ounce of extra strength.’

  ‘That’s why,’ said Freya, feeling more and more like a cheerleader rallying her dispirited team, ‘we are going out right now to get worshippers. I know we can do this. Follow me.’

  Your Gods Need You!

  A few hours later Freya stood on Oxford Street outside the Bond Street Tube shops. The intense rain had turned into a thundery storm, flooding the street. The soaked Gods clustered under a jeweller’s awning, where diamonds and sapphires twinkled behind thick glass. The jewels dispelled for a moment their grumpiness. Roskva and Alfi watched the milling crowds nervously. Snot stood with his right hand gripping the hilt of his concealed sword.

  ‘I want that one,’ said the Goddess, eyeing a heavy diamond and gold bracelet. She raised her arm to smash in the window.

  ‘NO!’ yelled Freya. ‘You can’t just snatch stuff here.’

  ‘I want and I don’t see why I shouldn’t get,’ said Freyja. ‘What’s the point of being a Goddess if you can’t get what you want when you want it?’

  ‘We can raid later,’ said Woden. ‘Keep your mind on our great task.’

  The Goddess scowled, but said nothing.

  Freya held a microphone, one of Clare’s that she used for Fane socials and the annual square dance. She glanced at her uneasy companions, so strange and foreign-looking in their tunics and cloaks with brooches and gold armbands and flowing hair. ‘Great costumes,’ muttered one girl as she passed them, shoulders braced against the wind and rain, her umbrella blown inside out.

  Well the Hari Krishnas looked even weirder in their orange robes prancing around with tambourines and chanting, thought Freya, so hopefully the Gods won’t stick out too much. Just enough to make an impact.

  ‘We tried announcing our return on the bridge, you know,’ said Woden. ‘And we got trampled for our pains.’

  ‘Yes but this time we are urging people to worship you by telling them why they should,’ said Freya. ‘Trust me,’ she added, with a confidence she didn’t feel.

  All six held cardboard placards. Freya had worked hard on her slogans before setting out. She’d considered ‘The Gods love you,’ but since they didn’t, not really, she’d decided it would be better to write more truthful sayings, like ‘The Gods give victory’; ‘Pray to Woden and triumph over your enemies’; or ‘Without Woden we’re snowed in!’ That was catchy – and true. But she needed to exhort people to action so she’d printed on hers: COME BACK TO THE GODS on the front and A PRAYER A DAY KEEPS THE FROST GIANTS AWAY on the back.

  Thor carried THOR GIVES YOU MORE.

  Woden had BE A WINNER WITH WODEN.

  Freyja, looking sulky, held up LUCK AND LOVE WITH FREYJA.

  Roskva’s read PRAY TO FREY HE’LL SAVE THE DAY.

  Alfi’s said GODS ARE GREAT.

  Snot’s proclaimed WORSHIP WODEN OR I’LL KILL YOU.

  Actually, that’s what he’d wanted her to write for him. Freya had written instead: ‘Worship Woden – or else …’ Snot stood scowling, brandishing his sign more like a spear than a placard. His gnarled skin, tree bark arms and grey wolf’s bristle would be enough to scare anyone off, thought Freya uneasily.

  ‘Now what?’ said Roskva.

  ‘We walk up and down the street, and let all the people passing by see our messages,’ said Freya. ‘We also stop people and tell the truth about the frost giants.’

  ‘And this is going to bring mortals back to us?’ said Thor.

  ‘Yes,’ said Freya.

  ‘How long do I have to stand here?’ asked Thor. Rain dripped down his face and beard. ‘This is worse than fighting any giant
.’

  ‘Good luck, everyone,’ said Freya. ‘Go up to as many people as possible and spread the word.’

  The Goddess tossed her head and winked at a handsome young man sauntering by, chatting on his mobile. He stopped dead when the Goddess caught his eye. Soon he was joined by a cluster of men flocking round her.

  ‘Hi, I’m Alfi, and I want to talk to you about the Gods,’ said Alfi.

  ‘Can I talk to you about the Gods?’ said Roskva.

  ‘No,’ said a woman lugging heavy shopping bags.

  ‘I need to talk to you about the Gods,’ said Freya.

  ‘Worship the Gods or I’ll KILL you!’ roared Snot.

  No one stopped.

  ‘The world will end unless we all start worshipping the gods NOW!’ shouted Roskva into the microphone. ‘Stop bartering, you trolls, and listen. The frost giants are coming!’

  ‘Why aren’t you worshipping the Gods, you conceited scum?’ bellowed Thor, fixing people with his blazing eyes.

  The shoppers bustled by as fast as possible and ducked into the Tube station.

  ‘The Gods alone stand between us and the frost giants. Don’t cast Woden’s wise words to the winds,’ yelled Alfi.

  ‘The Gods, may their names live forever, have given us so many gifts,’ shouted Freya. ‘But in your strivings for wealth and fame, never forget Tyr, who gave his right hand to the Wolf for the greater good of all and saved us from certain destruction. We must all strive to be worthy of a God’s sacrifice. Mighty Thor protects us. Glorious Frey and his sister Freyja give us prosperity. Woden gives us—’

  Woden yanked the microphone from her.

  ‘We created you from pieces of driftwood,’ he boomed, his voice drowning out the din of traffic and hurrying feet. ‘Then we gave you luck, to keep you hopeful when life gets tough and the chance to win the fame, which alone outlives death.’ Woden’s voice rose and his face reddened. ‘So now it’s your turn to thank us with your worship, you ungrateful herrings. If you don’t, may fire play over your possessions and may it burn your backs!’

  ‘I don’t think cursing people is the right way to win them over,’ said Freya.

  ‘It’s time to thank the Gods for all their gifts by worshipping them,’ she shouted.