by Kevin Hearne
“Get closer,” imaginary Kirk said. “I want to hear what they’re saying.”
“I agree,” said imaginary Spock. “The additional intelligence might prove to be useful.” I told them both I liked it better when they argued, as I picked my way carefully forward until I was crouching underneath the front window of the hall.
The warm, rich voice of a woman fluttered into my ears: “… what this means? If the Norns are truly dead, then their prophecies may be null. We could be truly free, Bragi, think of it!”
A sonorous baritone voice rumbled contemplatively. “Ragnarok, null?” A loudy thump and the scrape of chair legs on a wooden floor suggested someone had sat down heavily. “Perhaps then there is hope for us all.”
“Yes!” the woman enthused. I assumed her to be Idunn. “And there is hope for us specifically! Do you not understand? Perhaps we could finally have a child! The doom they laid upon us may have died with them!” I heard kissing noises and then a throaty chuckle from the baritone.
“Ah, I see. Only one way to find out, isn’t there?” The kissing noises became more frequent, and these were shortly followed by other, less chaste noises and heavy breathing. I sank dejectedly onto my haunches, realizing this might take a while. These were not teenagers who finished such business in a few frenzied minutes. The long-lived knew how to love long.
But the brief snatch of conversation I’d overheard gave me plenty to think about. Idunn had implied that the two of them were cursed with infertility, and their current behavior implied that they couldn’t wait to get rid of that curse. Moreover, it implied that they were still in love. Mortals never got a chance to see if their love would last for centuries, but clearly Idunn and Bragi’s had. At first I felt a bit envious, and then heartachingly so for the memories it stirred.
There had been a woman in Africa once whom I loved for more than two hundred years. Upon returning to the fringes of eastern Europe with the hordes of Genghis Khan, I’d quickly ascertained that there was little to be gained by staying there. So I crossed Arabia instead, a strange infidel in the Caliphate, then delved deep into the African continent and lost myself in that wondrous land of savanna and jungle and desert. I did not reemerge until the fifteenth century, happily missing the Black Death in the process. Even more happily for me, Aenghus Óg lost track of me for that whole time; were I superstitious, perhaps I’d assign the credit for that to my love. (More likely I had made enough progress on my amulet to shield me from his divination, and until he thought of new ways to track me, I was safe.)
The source of my long attraction to Tahirah had been perfectly matched chemistry, of course, the same frisson that clearly existed between the Norse gods now snogging behind me. Her sharp wit kept up with mine, and her soft dark eyes soothed my restlessness and chained me willingly to her side. Her low musical voice entered my ears like new velvet, and her laugh was so pure that it struck a tuning fork against my bones and gave me shuddering chills down my spine. She was the last person with whom I’d shared Immortali-Tea. Over the two centuries of our marriage she gave me twenty-five children, all of them a joy; I regretted nothing. Perhaps we would still be in love today, still making babies and trying to keep the young ones from inadvertently marrying the descendants of the old ones (I’m sorry, honey, but you can’t marry him. He’s the great-great-grandson of your brother, you see, who was born back in 1842). I would never know; the Maasai war party we stumbled across ended our chance at eternal love.
The renewed scraping of the chair leg interrupted my reverie and I heard footsteps fading away deeper into the hall, along with some panting and a few wanton giggles.
That was opportunity knocking.
Rising slowly from my crouch, I peeked carefully over the windowsill. The hearth drew my attention first, off to my left. It was heating the contents of an iron pot craned over the flames, which Idunn and Bragi were apparently willing to let stew for some time. Directly in front of me was the kitchen table, a wooden bowl of fruit on it. There were pears, plums, and peaches—but no apples.
Imaginary Kirk spoke up. “Do you dare to eat a peach?”
“Of course I dare,” I whispered.
“May I remind you that we are here for a golden apple?” imaginary Spock said. “We should not be distracted by superfluous fruit.” I reached my hand through the open window and selected a plum from the bowl, figuring there would be no time to enjoy an entire peach. It was ripe and slightly soft underneath my fingers.
“Attaboy,” Kirk said as I took a bite. It was absurdly tasty.
I grinned impishly and hoped it was a sign I could go with Plan C. I’d planned obsessively for this caper, plotting courses of action based on various contingencies all the way up to Q (but unfortunately hadn’t included a duel with the Norns in any of them). Plan C involved leaving a note behind at the scene of the crime. Now the note was taking shape in my mind as I chewed on the plum; all I needed to do was find the apples.
I silently buried the plum pit underneath the window, with a whispered command to the earth. I untied the drawstring to my belt pouch by touch and removed a waterproof package of oilskin, which contained (among other things) some note-sized sheets of paper and a fountain pen for Plan C. I retrieved these after dissolving my camouflage, then quietly entered the hall while its owners took loud delight in each other.
Once past the threshold, I saw to my right a wooden pedestal much like the ones surrounding Freyr’s hall. It had been invisible from the window, but it was prominent as one entered the door, ornately carved with figures that were most likely the Norse gods. A basket full of golden apples rested upon it, clearly an offering to anyone visiting. I grinned and continued to the kitchen table with my paper and pen; Plan C was a go. Taking inspiration from the Modernist poet William Carlos Williams, I wrote a brief poem in Old Norse that would no doubt insult Bragi’s sense of good taste, since skaldic poets had no patience with free verse:
This is just to say
I have stolen
The plums
That were in
Your fruit bowl
And which
You were probably
Saving
For the Norns
Freyja’s tits!
They were delicious
So sweet
And so cold
I signed it, “You’re all stupid. You can lick me, Bacchus,” and then stuffed every one of the plums into my pockets, leaving only pears and peaches in the bowl. I didn’t care if they believed it was written by Bacchus or not. The entire point of the note was to throw them off my trail; they’d be looking for someone with hands capable of writing saucy Modernist poetry, and I was shortly going to be hands-free.
The moment of theft had arrived. Idunn and Bragi were obligingly experimenting with the pleasurable effects of friction in their bedroom, and the golden apples of the gods beckoned invitingly near the open door. Continuing to tread softly, I picked one out of the basket and paused perversely to see if an alarm would sound. Idunn wailed in ecstasy from the back of the hall and demanded that Bragi give her a baby, but I didn’t think that counted.
Moving as quickly as I could without making any noise, I went back to the river and tossed in all the plums. My feet left prints leading down to the riverbank, but that was all right. It would be perfect if they thought I’d jumped in; they’d waste their time searching up- and downstream for where I came out on the other side.
I backed slowly away from the bank and had the earth fill in my prints as I walked, leaving the ones leading to the river alone. Eventually I was under the orchard canopy, where the ground was a bit more firm and strewn with fallen leaves that softened my footfalls and disguised them, since there was a bit of moisture remaining in the leaves and they had yet to turn crunchy. Here, I hoped, was where I’d lose anyone trying to track me by smell.
Placing the golden apple carefully in the crook of a tree branch, I stripped off everything and folded it into a neat pile, glad to be out of the damp lea
ther. I wrote another quick note—“You take unusual delight in sheep asses and everyone knows it. Neener-neener, Bacchus”—and set it on top. The sword I placed off to one side. I asked the earth to part for me and it obliged, opening a hole about two feet deep and about as wide. I placed the pile of clothes and my pouch inside with the note on top and then had the earth bury it for me. I paused to say a few soft words for Ratatosk, because his bones were in my pouch. Then I redistributed leaves over the spot and rose, satisfied. If anyone, such as Heimdall, sniffed me out to this point and then dug up the clothes, they’d get nothing but frustrated.
I sure hoped Odin was missing all of this. I took the apple down from the tree and laid it gently on the ground a few paces away. Then I slung Moralltach across my body and adjusted the strap to a custom length so that it sagged ridiculously on my right side. The sword slid down my back and I hitched it up, then got down on all fours so that the strap hung beneath my torso and even brushed the ground. After a few more tugs and shrugs to position the sword properly across my back, I was ready: I triggered the charm on my necklace that let me shape-shift into a stag, and when the transformation was complete, the sword and its strap was fitted snugly around my body.
This procedure had taken much practice and many hours of making custom straps, but it was worth it since it was a part of Plans A through Q. Now I could run much faster and still have the sword available in case I had to fight in close quarters. I gingerly picked up the golden apple between my deer lips and cast camouflage on myself, the apple, and Moralltach. I was exuding a markedly different scent now that I was a deer—my werewolf friends in Arizona confirmed for me that they could not tell, strictly by scent, that I was the same being when I shape-shifted—and unless Odin somehow figured out what was going on, I didn’t foresee any trouble getting back to Yggdrasil in maybe five or six hours, compared to the eight it had taken me to get out here. Who was going to see a camouflaged stag running at night across the Plain of Idavoll?
I wasn’t naïve enough to seriously believe I’d have no trouble, though. I just didn’t foresee it.
Chapter 4
Occasionally I am smitten with an acute case of Smug. It can happen to anyone, but it happens most often to people who think they’ve been especially clever. I felt a case of it coming on as I got closer and closer to Yggdrasil with no signs of pursuit or even alarm. Through a combination of surprise, speed, and guile, I had thrown an entire pantheon into such confusion that they didn’t know their legs from lutefisk. My supreme cock-up with the Norns should have balanced that out, but I was firmly blocking that and choosing to feel the Smug instead.
With about ten miles to go, near the trunk of Yggdrasil but still miles away from the root leading to Jötunheim, my acute case of Smug turned to a gibbering case of Oh, Shit! I believe that’s a bona fide psychological term; if it isn’t, it should be.
I present my facts to a candid world: When a person steals anything from anyone and runs away, the first thing they say when they realize they’re being chased is “Oh, shit!” in whatever language they spoke as a child. It’s really not possible to say anything else at that point. Some Britons cling to long-standing tradition and say “Oh, bugger!” first, but once they confirm that they are, in fact, being chased, they invariably correct course and join the rest of humanity in saying “Shit!”
Except for the part where I was a stag and I had an apple between lips that couldn’t say it out loud anyway, I went the conventional route. When I saw what was after me, I screamed “Oh, shit!” in my mind and did my best to achieve maximum warp, Scotty and his engines be damned.
A routine paranoid check of my surroundings had revealed two ravens keeping pace above me. They hadn’t been there ten minutes earlier, during my last routine paranoid check. It meant Odin knew where I was, and it might also mean he was on his way to intercept me. I’m not sure how well the ravens could see me while I was camouflaged and running in the dark, but clearly it was well enough to locate my relative position. If nothing else, they could follow the sound of my hooves pounding across the plain.
An hour earlier I had seen the golden trail of Gullinbursti and dark clouds of Thor returning to Freyr’s hall. They appeared in the sky to the north, since I was returning a few miles to the south to avoid running into just such a party. They knew the Norns were missing, and perhaps they knew about Ratatosk as well; now they were following the trail I’d left them. At least I knew they wouldn’t be waiting for me at Yggdrasil.
Yet a whisper of thunder behind me caused me to risk a look. The sound suggested a mass of cavalry, but instead it was only a single horse on the horizon. It was a massive horse, the height of a camel rather than any thoroughbred, and it had eight legs rather than the four I was accustomed to seeing. It was Sleipnir, the steed of Odin, and on its back rode the one-eyed god, spear in hand. Above the horizon, twelve flying horses galloped in the air, each bearing an armored maiden with shield and sword. They were Valkyries, which meant the shit I was in was deeper than the Mariana Trench. They were the Choosers of the Slain on this plane, the Norse equivalent of the Morrigan except with funny winged helmets, and somehow I didn’t think they would choose Odin to die.
I turned tail and ran for it. Cool, a chase scene, I thought manically as I huffed around the apple in my lips. If I’d brought my iPod, I could have loaded in Wagner’s “Ride of the Valkyries” for the soundtrack. Though, on reflection, it was dreary stuff and wouldn’t lend me any speed. Perhaps it would have been more amusing and inspirational to play something culturally jarring and utterly absurd, like Jerry Reed’s banjo anthem for those seventies bootlegging movies; Odin and the Valkyries could play the role of Smokey, and I’d be the legendary Bandit. Odin looked a bit more competent than Sheriff Buford T. Justice, unfortunately, and I wasn’t exactly moving like a 1977 Trans Am. The rumble of Sleipnir’s hooves was growing steadily louder; he was gaining on me.
Odin’s spear, Gungnir, was a neat piece of magic like Moralltach or Fragarach. Thanks to the runes carved on its head, it was always supposed to hit its target, and its target always died. That sort of magic tended to work; I had firsthand experience, using both Fragarach and Moralltach. I wondered, though, what kind of range he had. Did the magic work in such a way that he could simply target me, then give the spear a halfhearted throw in my general direction and let the runes do the rest? Or did he have to be within the range of his natural (albeit godlike) strength to chuck it after me? It was times like this when I wished I had a parietal eye.
The blowing of a war horn forced me to look around. Valkyries don’t blow war horns for the fun of it; they do so only with a purpose, as a signal in battle. I was in time to see Odin, still more than a quarter mile away, rise from his saddle and hurl Gungnir up into a high arc, the terminus of which was undoubtedly intended to be my heart or brain. At the same time, the Valkyries surged behind it, raising their swords and then pointing them all at me. My cold iron amulet sprouted frost crystals and trembled on my chest, and I knew that they had just chosen me to die. I suppose I could have depended on my amulet to protect me from their death sentence, but I’m too paranoid to leave everything up to a hunk of metal when I have options. What if the amulet didn’t affect the targeting until the spear hit my aura? I couldn’t let the spear get within a couple of inches of my skin and then try to dodge. I wanted to try out something else.
My idea was to shake off both Gungnir’s targeting and the Valkyries’ doom by changing the nature of the target. I bounded for a couple of leaps to the right to avoid the path of the spear and then did three things in less than a second: I dissolved my camouflage, changed back into human form, and stopped running. The apple popped out of my human lips and I caught it in my left hand. It was covered in deer slobber but otherwise unmarred.
The stag that Gungnir had been sent to kill wasn’t there anymore, and I heard the spear whistle over my head before my eyes caught up to see it thud menacingly into the moor some forty yards along my previous pat
h. I checked on my pursuit and saw Odin and the Valkyries pull up to make sure they weren’t hallucinating.
They couldn’t believe their eyes. The spear that never missed had just missed. The chosen slain wasn’t slain but prancing around naked in the Plain of Idavoll with an apple in his hand and a defiant grin on his face. As they watched, the red-haired demon held up a hand in a clear signal for them to wait, then strode confidently toward Gungnir as if it were no more than a common spear he had thrown himself. Then the creature had the unmitigated gall to lay his hands on it—Odin’s spear!—and yank it disrespectfully out of the ground. And then he—he—
Odin bellowed at the Valkyries as he saw what I intended. He was not clad in full armor, but neither was he abroad as an avuncular traveler with a wide droopy hat and a gray cloak. He wore a spectacled helmet and a mail shirt under a tunic made of reindeer hide. He goaded his horse forward, and the Valkyries followed suit.
It had been a long time since I’d thrown a spear or javelin, but it seemed like a good night to pick up the habit again. If Gungnir hit something, then they’d falter and I’d get a chance to put some distance between us; if it missed, then they’d slow down to retrieve the weapon and I’d still get a chance to put some distance between us.
Directing my strength through my back and shoulder and trying to remember my technique, I hurled the spear powerfully at my enemy’s strategic weakness—not at Odin, but at Sleipnir. Without pausing to watch its flight, I dropped immediately to all fours and shifted back into a stag, grasping the apple between my lips once more and shrugging against the fit of the scabbard strap. As I raised my head to resume my run, I saw the spear sink home at the base of the mighty stallion’s throat, and he reared, neighing in pain and throwing Odin to the ground before he himself toppled.
That almost made me drop the apple. I hadn’t expected my aim to be that good; the runecraft must work for whoever threw the spear. The Valkyries immediately whirled around to help Odin, and I shagged it out of there while I had the chance.
