The Lost Gods

by Francesca Simon

  What else? said Woden. What else?

  Freya peered down at the silent fighters defending the narrow passage between the City of London School for Boys and the Asgard Army building. The London skyline of cranes and steeples, the Eye, Big Ben, Tower Bridge, the Gherkin, the Shard, the winding streets and gardens, all looked normal. Except, of course, for the surreal view of massed ranks of armour-clad warriors and the roads jammed with abandoned cars. Freya thought for a crazy moment of a film she’d seen, where warriors were superimposed on a blue screen ready for computer-generated images of orcs and elves to be added. The Gods were hidden … where? Freya had no idea. Would they spring out to fight? Or – and her heart went cold – had they fled, and abandoned them all to their hard fate?

  ‘Look down, you stupid mare, we’re in All-Father Square,’ snapped Woden’s voice. ‘We want to take the giants by surprise. They think they will only be fighting mortals with their storms.’ Freya saw the Gods, light-filled and blazing, spread out among the Sleeping Army. The chess pieces had heard her call and sprung back to life, the kings, queens, knights, rooks, pawns and their snorting horses, pawing the ground, steaming and shining.

  Above them two ravens circled.

  Surely the giants would be no match for the Gods, the Einherjar and the Sleeping Army. With Woden and Thor, how could—

  The noise came first. A great whoosh of cloud and vapour. The bridge shuddered as hurricane winds whipped the Thames, which burst its banks in a tidal wave of ice-strewn water, spattering the shore and splashing the waiting warriors. Torrents of water flooded the streets, sweeping away all parked cars. The lights in the Shard and the Gherkin went out.

  Freya saw Heimdall raise his horn to his lips. The ringing blast shattered every window for miles as the thunderous noise reverberated, rumbling and swelling, pealing and blaring.

  The flaming rainbow road of the Immortals wobbled as it curved out of the dawn sky, hovering above the Millennium Bridge. Frost crackled across the railings, which snapped like brittle old bones and tumbled into the Thames.

  Then the walkway buckled as the first giant lunged off Bifrost.

  ‘They’re here!’ screeched Freya. The Valhalla warriors raised their shields, gripped their swords and charged.

  The giant shook her swamp hair and hailstones fell from her lashes, punching holes in the metal bridge. Freya recoiled in horror. She looked as big as a building. Her hideous curved teeth stuck out from her mouth at crazy angles, like tombstones on a neglected grave mound. Spears of ice sprang from her hands like fingers.

  ‘I am Iron Hag!’ she roared. ‘Prepare to die.’

  More giants followed, dirt grey, with hair frozen into gnarled swirls of filthy snow. They bellowed their names: Hel Power. Whale-Head. Corpse-Eater. Blood Hair. Frost Lightning. Mouth Cramp. Horn-Claw. Spear Nose. Neck-Breaker. Lock-Jaw.

  Jagged spikes burst from their shaking heads, like stalagmites. Half-gnawed seal carcasses tumbled from their matted hair and beards. Their eyes were like black pits with lava boiling behind them. They growled like the rumble of a glacier tearing and splintering into the sea.

  Woden hurled his spear and a giant fell dead. His body shattered like smashed ice, then cracked into rubble, stones and gravel. Then the berserks hurled themselves at the giants pouring off the bridge as Thor’s hammer crushed many of their skulls. Thunder cracked and boomed and lightning criss-crossed the exploding sky every time his hammer whirled.

  ‘Go into the water and go under it,’ Thor cursed them.

  The bridge spun wildly, and broke. Freya heard the wrenching, tearing sound of bolts unbuckling as the bridge screamed beneath the giants’ weight. A grating shriek; then TWANG TWANG TWANG as cables ripped and whipped into the massive bodies, hurling them off the madly swaying bridge. The water exploded around them as the river leapt its banks, burying the riverside buildings.

  The Valhalla warriors continued to charge at the never-ending stream of giants. Several fell through the churning ice and were swept away in the swollen current.

  ‘DIE!’ bellowed the giants, with the bottled rage of centuries.

  The roaring giants loomed up everywhere, trailing clouds of frost and ice, stinking of dead fish, blotting out the sky. They heaved into view through the skyscrapers, towering over the Gherkin. Shards of ice fell from their bodies, freezing everything they touched, and the raging wind whirled chunks of ice into the sky. Freya’s ears ached with the great CRUNCH STOMP of their pounding feet as they pulverised houses as if they were dead leaves and swung their arms to topple tower blocks, rip up lampposts and uproot trees, which they hurled at the Asgard warriors.

  ‘The end is nigh,’ shouted a man holding a placard in All-Father Square. A giant foot came down and squashed him.

  Freya caught a flash of the Gods as they raced among the giants, slaughtering and hacking and hewing. And yet still the giants tumbled off Bifrost in an avalanche of fury and hatred. The berserkers charged at them, heedless, racing across the river using the rubble of the giants’ bodies as a makeshift bridge.

  Trees fell as the earth shook and shuddered. Buildings crashed down, lashed by the fury of the winds. Telephone wires tangled on the road, tripping the lumbering giants. The toppled electricity cables spat sparks as they dangled in puddles, hissing. Flood waters gushed through the narrow roads and poured through doorways.

  ‘The power lines will electrocute you, be careful,’ cried Freya.

  ‘Electrocute?’ said Woden.

  ‘Fry you to a crisp,’ said Freya. ‘Don’t fight them, keep away from them.’

  One giant flattened the Globe theatre. Another wrenched the ten-storey chimney stack off the Tate Modern and swung it at Woden. The God ducked, and another giant was walloped in the face, falling into the river with an enormous splash before splintering into rocks. Whole sides of buildings collapsed as the grunting giants shoved them aside as if they were children’s building blocks.

  It’s like the Blitz, thought Freya, as tower blocks gaped open, like overpacked suitcases splitting in flight. Except this time there were upturned cars balancing on roofs, and giants smashing through offices like slow-moving icebergs.

  Thor picked up HMS Wellington and threw the boat into the swarm of giants storming down the Embankment. Several caught fire and exploded into flames as petrol poured down on them.

  Freya saw the Gods for the first time in all their terrible power as they whirled amidst the venomous giants, slashing and destroying, smiting and hewing, figures of superhuman strength and speed amidst the howling wind and roaring flames. Thor hurled his hammer over and over, blinding the giants with flashes of lightning before the weapon shattered their skulls, cracking them into a thousand shards of ice and rocks before returning to his iron-gloved hand. Woden flung his lethal spear again and again. Panic and confusion reigned.

  The frost giants fought back with hunks of masonry torn from buildings, and icicles sharp as daggers, but the nimble Gods were too quick.

  And yet it seemed as if for every giant felled, another two stepped forward, as more and more giants stumbled off Bifrost. The bodies of the Valhalla warriors lay everywhere.

  Then Freya saw the Goddess of Battle, disguised as a large falcon, swooping amidst the giants and blinding them with her talons.

  I could do that, thought Freya.

  Stay put, mortal, ordered Woden.

  As the hacking and hewing and carnage continued, Freya closed her eyes.

  I can’t bear to watch any longer, she thought, as an oozing giant extended his arm and sent several of the Einherjar flying into the Thames.

  ‘Open your eyes!’ commanded Woden. ‘Tell me what you see.’

  Freya forced herself to watch. Pretend it’s a film, she told herself. Just describe a film. Pretend it isn’t happening.

  Freya saw giants scooping up cars and hurling them into the Valhalla warriors. The vehicles whirled through the air like Dinky Toys before landing with a sickening thunk. Freya’s ears throbbed with the clang a
nd hiss of weapons, the hideous thunder as Thor’s hammer smashed skulls, the shrieking of trees splitting and rocks crashing.

  A giant standing in the roaring Thames, the debris-strewn tide lapping his knees, looked straight at Freya. I’m a bird, she thought, curling into herself. Why should he notice me?

  Suddenly the monster scooped up a cargo boat floating in the stormy river and hurled it at the dome of Woden’s Temple. Freya flew off, but the mast caught her tail as the upturned boat landed on the steeple. Freya spun into the air, tumbled backwards, then plunged screeching into the midst of the battle raging in All-Father Square.

  She lay there, stunned and winded, beneath a jumble of running legs while swords flashed above her. Then rough hands grabbed her.

  ‘Get out of here before I kill you,’ yelled Snot, flinging her back into the air.

  Freya flapped her wings, then flew up and regained her high perch on the Temple, breathless and trembling, her shining feathers speckled with blood.

  ‘Stop moaning – tell me where the leader is,’ said Woden.

  ‘Who?’ said Freya.

  ‘Thrym,’ said Woden. ‘The one who attacked you. Thrym.’

  ‘He’s breaking the Shard,’ yelped Freya.

  With a hideous howling yank, Thrym tore the Shard from its base. Then several giants carried it like a battering ram as they crashed their way through the City of London towards Trafalgar Square, wind and fire swirling round them, their hideous breath like a squalling cyclone.

  Great dust clouds rose as the Gherkin disintegrated, blinding the fighters and obliterating her view. Woden screamed at her to tell him what she saw through the eruptions of dirt and metal and flying rubble. She flew about frantically, trying to catch a glimpse of the apocalypse taking place in Trafalgar Square below.

  Freya twisted round and flew into a small patch of open sky to see Thor grabbing Cleopatra’s Needle and bashing in a giant’s mouth. The giant’s chipped graveyard teeth sprayed out and clattered to the ground, like hail studded with nails.

  ‘Take that, Iron Skull,’ roared Thor.

  Iron Skull snarled and grabbed Nelson’s Column, which he swung at Thor and missed, knocking into the National Gallery instead, which crumpled into a heap.

  Another giant yanked the London Eye off its axis and turned it into a Frisbee.

  ‘Not this time, Grit-Teeth,’ yelled Heimdall, catching it and whirling it back, slicing through Grit-Teeth’s legs.

  ‘Watch out, he’s gnawing off the steeple behind you,’ cried Freya, as other giants swatted at the Gods with the Fane’s pointed tower.

  The tide of battle swung back and forth. Sometimes it seemed the Gods were prevailing. Then the giants pushed back and the Gods and Valhalla army retreated, only to regroup and charge again.

  With a terrible roar and a tearing of iron and sinew, Thrym and a host of giants ripped Big Ben off its foundations and hurled it at Thor. Thor fell to the ground and the missile flew over his head and crashed into Westminster Abbey.

  ‘I’ve got Lock-Jaw,’ yelled Woden, as a giant collapsed, howling.

  ‘And I’ve killed Mud Bone,’ whooped Thor, picking up the Shard which the giants had dropped and stabbing his prey, as Njord grabbed Nelson’s Column from the ground and whacked Spear Nose, who retaliated with a massive plane tree, which he jabbed at Njord until Thor rescued him.

  Other giants scooped up the lion statues from their plinths in Trafalgar Square and threw them at the berserkers chasing them. A green-haired giant picked up a red double-decker bus and hurled it through Charing Hammer station, trying to stop the remaining Valhalla warriors from attacking. Freya gasped as she recognised Skadi, the hideous giantess whose father Freya had led to his death. Freya shrank inside herself, hoping that Skadi couldn’t smell her.

  And still the battle raged, on and on throughout that long storm-dark day. The remaining giants rampaged through St James’s Park, trampling trees and uprooting bushes. The battle-weary Gods held them off in Green Park till the giants, roaring and snarling, retreated as the angry sky dimmed into darkness and the thumping, thudding battle sounds faded.

  ‘Tomorrow we will destroy you!’ bellowed Thrym. ‘We will take over this land, seize the great gleaming halls, and command a host of followers.’

  ‘Tomorrow we will destroy you!’ bellowed Thor. He gripped his bloody hammer in his huge bruised fist. ‘Let every evil being have you.’ His voice rang out across the dark, deserted, devastated city as night fell and the storm abated.

  A Radiant Bride

  Freya soared over the storm-battered, flooded, rubble-filled city. Flames rose from the fires raging along the Thames and throughout central London. The familiar skyline, with great holes ripped where Big Ben, the Shard, and the Eye once stood was almost unrecognisable. Dead giants, crumpled to rock and boulders, littered the streets, along with uprooted trees, destroyed buildings and the twisted bodies of Woden’s warriors. She watched, awestruck, as the Einherjar slowly rose from the dead, their bloody wounds healed, to regroup for the next day’s battle.

  Freya could see people huddled around campfires on Hampstead Heath, praying the hurricane would spare them, lighting candles at hastily erected altars, watching the battle-storm die out below. The wind had dropped, as if no hurricane had ever raged, but the freezing cold continued.

  Suddenly, every fire was extinguished.

  Woden must have used a fire-quenching charm, thought Freya. That’s something at least.

  ‘Freya, come to the Great Hall of the Priestess-Queen,’ ordered Woden. ‘Now.’

  Freya wanted nothing more than to go home and sleep, but wearily she obeyed, turning back towards Green Park and Buckingham Palace.

  Why, she thought. Why does he want me? But she was too tired to speculate further.

  Down she swooped, over the black gates, into the Queen’s great courtyard. The Gods and Goddesses emerged from the arches and shadows. Thor smashed down a door, and they entered the deserted palace.

  Freya shook off her falcon skin and regained her human form. She was exhausted and hungry and cold. Her ears thrummed.

  The shattered Gods gathered in the palatial red and gold throne room, the walls decorated with coats of arms and elaborate carved friezes. For once the Gods didn’t look as if they’d been squeezed into a room and could stand up straight, the palace’s gilt and embossed crisscrossed gold ceilings were so high.

  The Immortals were cut and bruised, their faces smeared with grime, their bodies caked in mud and spattered with gore. Thor’s clothes were torn and his massive fists were red and swollen. The Thunder God’s mighty hammer Mjollnir dangled by his side, dripping oily blood onto the red carpet.

  Only Woden glowed. His ravens sat on his shoulders, whispering in his ears, as he sat beside his wife Frigg on one of the two plush velvet thrones, facing the Gods who gathered below him in the vast gilt-decked room. Freya had never realised before how much the Priestess-Queen seemed to love gold, almost as much as the Gods, her immortal ancestors.

  Idunn, Goddess of Youth, passed quietly among the Gods offering her golden apples. As they ate, their wounds healed. Roskva and Alfi scurried about dragging red and gold chairs into a semi-circle under the massive chandeliers, then took their accustomed places behind Thor. Snot, his grey wolf’s bristle hair standing up, his matted bear skin rank and heavy with dried blood, glowered in the doorway. His gnarled arms gripped his venomous axe. Freya, uncertain, sat by Alfi and Roskva. Her stomach growled.

  Woden stood and spoke.

  ‘I am Woden, I am Oski, All-Father, Lord of Battle, Giver of Victory, and we are the Gods,’ he intoned. ‘Together we will free this world from the frost giants, so that people in Midgard can live according to the Commandments and Wisdom we gave them, united and—’

  Yeah, yeah, thought Freya. Her appetite for this language had waned.

  ‘… certain of victory, and our rightful place in—’

  ‘Fine words you’ve unlocked from your word-hoard,’ interrupted Wo
den’s wife, Frigg. ‘Save them for mortals. Who will be the first among us to say the truth?’

  No one spoke. Woden glared at her.

  ‘Then I must. We can’t defeat them,’ said Frigg. ‘We barely held our own today. There are too many giants. We cannot overcome them. They cannot overcome us.’

  There was silence as the Gods considered her fateful words.

  ‘Frigg is right. We can fight them until neither God nor giant is left standing, then we all lose,’ said Njord.

  The Gods looked at one another. Freya felt a flash of fear.

  ‘Who will be first to ask for a truce?’ said Sif.

  ‘They will,’ piped up a raspy voice behind Woden’s throne.

  Freya screamed.

  There was Loki, tottering up on his withered legs from where he had concealed himself, clutching the throne to keep steady. He smiled at them.

  ‘What’s he doing here?’ yelped Freya. ‘He tried to kill me. He tried to kill all of you.’

  Thor stood up, gripping his hammer. ‘Get out of here, you rodent,’ he bellowed, swinging his hammer over his head.

  Loki yawned.

  ‘Evening all,’ he rasped. ‘I bring a peace offer from the giants.’

  The room exploded. Woden raised his hand. ‘Let my blood brother speak.’

  ‘Thank you, brother. But first I must rest my aching bones,’ said Loki, stumbling down from the raised platform and jabbing Freya with his walking stick. She jumped up, scowling, and Loki sank into her chair.