Skull of Oghren

by Tuomas Vainio

  As the metal cools down under enough that it cannot be shaped by blows of Hati's hammer, Narvi pulls it back and shoves it back inside the burning furnace. A moment of waiting, a moment for the twins to catch a cooling drink of water, before pulling the piece out and continuing to work with it. Hati grabs a metal spike, and begins to hammer it through the red hot metal. With every strike the metal bends aside, and a little while later Narvi flips the piece around for Hati to do the same on the other side. Soon the spike strikes and clangs against the anvil. Hati steps back and Narvi moves the nearly molten metal to a barrel of icy cold water, the water explodes with steam and slowly whittles down with a loud hiss.

  Narvi loosens the cooled piece of metal to Hati's palms, and the piece of metal begins to shift ever so slightly. One by one all the tiny imperfections that would have taken hours if not days to correct simply disappear from the surface of the hammer head. Once the deed is done, Hati hands the head to his brother Narvi who closes his eyes and further hardens it through his own enchantments. Strengthening the bond between the tiniest of metal fragments.

  Thus the hammer head is finished. The twins look at one and another and give an accepting nod and wink of eye to each other. All that lies left is to attach the hammerhead to the wooden shaft, and strike against the five hammer heads made with the strongest recipe thus far.

  The twins hand the hammer to Atlas, who ensures that his shirt sleeves are rolled up as the twins place the five other heads onto their anvil. Atlas swings the hammer well behind his back, and strikes it down against the first waiting in line. But unfortunately, only the hammer head swung by Atlas shatters and splinters to pieces.

  The boys sigh in disappointment as they move the five solid hammer heads back to the table and turn to Hip for what they should try out next. He scratches his own head, and points towards the jars with yellow and grey powder. The grey is common iron, and as for the yellow, the jar only has mention of experiment 243.

  Hati grabs a fistful of both, and ash he smashes the two piles together, he begins to shift the tiny fragments in an attempt to build a solid whole that could be forged into something indestructible. When he is done, he pours most of the experiment 243 back to its jar and hands the slab to his brother. Hip sketches down the amounts to his notes and seals the jars while Atlas flexes his muscles to get ready for the new burst of sparks.

  Narvi gulps as he slowly extends the block to the fiery furnace of the fireplace, the twins could never be truly sure how the block will react to the heat. In fact, the fiery furnace of the fireplace is a result of one failed try. A combination that refused to stop burning unless the flames were devoured. Slowly, the tongs let go, and the grey block with hint of yellow falls onto the red flames.

  At first nothing happens. But then, bubbles appear and burst on the surface of the block. At first the holes are tiny like holes left to wood by bugs, but soon the bubbles begin to grow larger and larger. Ever bigger and the boys can no longer determine where one bubble begins and another ends, a chain reaction that bursts straight of the fireplace. The yellow formation claims and consumes more and more space around it, growing wildly like a living mushroom rising from the abyss itself. Growing, nudging, and jerking onwards until it extinguishes and covers the fire beneath. The boys ran away from its reach.

  The boys just stare at it silently. 'It is not the worst we've had… Remember the smoke one?' The boys nod and so Hyperion's gaze turns to towards Atlas. He nods after a while and proceeds to grab one of the five hammer heads under the yellow tendrils. He retreats and takes a good aim even though the throwing distance remains close enough to hit it even while blinded.

  The hammerhead hits. But it does not bounce away, it doesn't fall down to the floor, it only stops and then begins to sink into the strange mushroom rising from the fireplace. The boys scratch their head as a distinct sound of whistling reaches their ears. The sound is almost as if water was boiling from a kettle, and then the yellowish mushroom quickly explodes right in front of their eyes.

  The yellow powder is everywhere except on the fireplace that peacefully continues to burn as if nothing out of the ordinary had transpired. The boys blink few times before they begin to cough it from their lungs and swipe it from their eyes and mouths. After that they pat it off their clothes. As the twins swipe the yellow powder from each others faces, they state in unison; 'Perhaps we should start making even smaller hammers?'

  Hip nods almost instantly; 'It is not the worst, but yeah, let us start making way smaller hammers. Nails perhaps?'

  'Sure.' The twins nod, before they join Hip's silent stare towards Atlas.

  'What?!?' The large boy asks before getting it. 'Oh, clean up.'

  'It is not like swiping the floor from blood like at your home...' Hip tries his best to find a silver lining for the task.

  Atlas doesn't smile of course. He just goes to pick the rags, and brooms. 'You are going to help me, and anyhow, what are we even going to do with this powder?'

  The twins and Hip exchange gazes, until Hip suggests; 'We'll put it in buckets and bring it to Yarn?' The twins nod in agreement. 'Who knows what she can make out of it.'

  Thus with some buckets fetched from the cellar, the boys begin their work to clean up the mess left after the strange mushroom tendrils. Atlas and the twins brush the powder on the floor to reasonably sized piles to make it easier to get the stuff into the buckets, while Hip sees it as his effort to scrub and wipe the different jars clean. They make a slow progress, but it is progress nonetheless.

  Hip's mind is first to wonder away from the task at hand. His gaze keeps turning towards the fireplace free of the powder, and so he swipes a palm full of it from the table, and throws it into the fire. The flames simply swallow it, leaving no noxious cloud or anything like it behind. His nose registers no stench, nor does he feel off. 'What are you thinking?' Atlas asks while standing behind Hyperion.

  'If Yarn could transform the Skull of Oghren to this yellow powder... We could just burn it.' The weight of his words stop even the twins racing from side to side with their brooms. He chuckles, and then shakes his head disappointingly. 'We do not actually know what the skull is, if it can be changed, and you've seen how Yarn works... It takes time for her to figure out how to nudge things in the right way to make them change.' The twins continue their broom work slowly.

  Atlas ponders for a while, before he asks; 'Should we try and see how it reacts to water and ice? It could make the cleaning bit more easier. Throw bit of water around, freeze it, smash the ice, and put it to the buckets.'

  Hip blinks, 'I guess we could try. In small scale at first.'

  'Right!' Shouts the largest of the boys. 'Hati, Narvi, can you put the piles you made to the buckets for Yarnsaxa?' The twins stare for a bit, before nodding and spurring into hasted action.

  Thus Atlas and Hip take an empty jar, and Hip gently conjures some water inside it. Hyperion waves his fingers above the mouth of the glass vessel, and drops begin to trip to the bottom. A pinch of the yellow powdery dust, at it slowly breaks the surface tension with no other visible effect. Not even when the glass jar is stirred around.

  Hip then hands the jar to Atlas, who carefully pokes his finger to the water in order to freeze it solid. It takes a blink of an eye, and Atlas can finally throw the frozen jar up and down before presenting it to Hip for a closer look. The water is just frozen, and the yellow specks remain inside without any reaction to the cold ice.

  Thus, Hip declares that the last thing for them to test is to see what happens when they let the ice melt. Therefore they place the jar in front of their seemingly eternal fire to see what happens. They stand in place watching as the jar sits next to the fire. After a moment or two, Atlas cannot help but to mention; 'You know, I guess I could take care of the ice myself to save some of our time...'

  Hip's stare in response is almost murderous, but Atlas grabs the the tongs to pick up the jar, and carefully pokes his finger against the wet ice surface. His face focuses with the
mental effort, and then slowly the ice begins to melt right before their eyes.

  At the end of it he just pants exhausted, mentioning how it is much easier for him to steal the warmth than to give it away. Hip nods at first in acknowledgement, and he gets ready to conjure enough water to flood the whole room, but he hesitates. He stops, and asks Atlas to place the jar to the middle of the fire. Hip realised that there was one more thing he needed to know; what happens to the powder when the water boils.

  The flames sweep against the side of the jar slowly dimming the glass dark. The water begins to bubble behind the flames and tarnished glass. Tiny bubbles making the way for the larger ones, until the boys can finally hear the boiling water past the dance of flames. Atlas raises the jar with the tongs, and gets ready to to lower it to the barrel of cold water. But he is stopped by Hip warning that the jar might shatter, and suggests Atlas to instead pour the contents to a new glass jar, carefully.

  Thus the boys stare at the poured water in its new jar. It is not very exciting, and so the twins just remark that the tiny grey fragments at the bottom of the jar are just iron. Hip continues; 'A reaction caused by heat; a rapid growth followed by expulsion of powder.'

  The twins look at each other before saying what they think of it; 'It is kind of lame; iron and 243.' Atlas nods and Hip just goes along with them, but he does etch the results down to his notes with great detail just in case.

  Hip and Atlas begin to stretch their bodies, as if to prepare for a midsummer run through the block. The twins hop out of the way and sit on the stools around the table, kicking their feet as they wait. Hip starts to conjure water by slowly weaving his hands around a fixed point to focus and control the water. Little by little a single drop grows towards several litres and the bigger this body of water grows, the less fluidly it spins around in air. Hip's arms just cannot stretch far enough, cannot cover the whole misshaped ball of water, and so it can only burst wide open and flood the floor.

  Atlas gives a pat on Hip's shoulder, encouraging him to do more physical exercise as clever mind does not quite cut it out on its own. He proceeds to flex his own muscles for a bit fun, before he focuses his mind and punches the air. The water freezes in a wave that expands from where his fist stopped, and so he darts onwards and throws another punch or kick, and thus little by little the water on the floor freezes solid trapping the yellow powder within.

  The other three boys cannot quite stand straight without the occasional slip of the foot on the slippery ice, but they do get around eventually and each of them grabs one of the hammer heads for smashing. They get down on all fours, and little by little start shattering the ice around them. Hitting it down at one point, then at another, until the ice covering the floor is as fragmented as the world's largest jigsaw puzzle.

  After the initial struggle of picking up the few pieces of ice here and there to reveal the floor beneath it becomes considerably easier. The can just lift from one of the sides, and sooner or later a piece will rise up. They pile them into tall pillars of ice, which are shoved onwards as the boys continue to work. Until all that is left is to just brush the smaller pieces of ice, and lump them into the buckets with the larger fragments of ice. It is cleaning made fun, and the boys happily gaze at the fruits of their labour. The buckets and vats filled with ice.

  'So...' Begins Atlas as he places the brooms back to the corner they were taken. 'Will we start making those nails today, or will we call it quits for today?' The three other boys just look at each other silently before they all get down on their backs declaring that they have done enough for today. Atlas chuckles, before he too decides to lie down on his back.

  For a while there is not a peep to be heard beyond the cackling of the fireplace. Atlas wonders if the other boys somehow fell asleep. But then he does hear some strange rustling coming from under his ear. Atlas shifts his body to look underneath, but all he can see is a floor plank. A normal floor plank. He presses his ear against the wood, and he does genuinely hear something coming from underneath the plank.

  He follows the slow progress of the sound while crawling ahead with his ear sticking against the floor. Slowly the other boys start to take notice and get up to stare at Atlas' slow progress towards the nearby wall, towards one of the wooden support pillars, and how his ear climbs up along the surface.

  The other boys can only scratch their heads, until suddenly, Atlas jumps away from the pillar and shouts in pain while covering his ear with his hand. He curses by shouting the names of the eleven Rat-Kings of the city; 'Bos, Tigris, Lepus, Draco, Anguis, Caballus, Capra, Simia, Gallus, Canis, Sus!'

  The support pillar is no longer as straight as it had been before, a piece of branch that had lingered within the wood is now sticking out like cork. It moves and shifts, as if there was something kicking it from within. The other boys dash to Atlas, to get ready to face whatever comes out of there. They dare not to breath, not until the circular piece of wood falls off and the see the somewhat familiar head of the resident talking rat. Although, the old rat does not seem quite so relaxed at first as he inspects the scorch marks left over his head by the recent bolt of thunder from Hyperion's finger tips.

  'Sorry!' Hip shouts out embarrassed. 'We did not know what was coming from there.'

  The old rat sighs and as his heart beat calms down sufficiently, Albezjer shouts out to Atlas; 'It is Sus. Sus is currently in control of the streets below your homes. Send your curses to the right one, or all of them.'

  'But I mentioned all eleven… Is there is a twelfth Rat-King?' Atlas ask terrified of the whole idea.

  Albezjer smiles and gives his answer; 'Not any more, but there used to be something called Rattus a long time ago.' He repeats the whole list.

  But as the rat and Atlas go over their exchange of ancient history, the twins nudge Hip's trouser sleeves and whisper their question to him. A question that causes Hip to rub his chin as he thinks it through. A question filled with curiosity; 'Why did you get inside the house from there?' He finally asks, interrupting rat's the scholarly lesson of the topic of abbreviated history of the Rat-Kings.

  A wry smile spreads to the face of the old rat. 'Well, I actually had to bring something here. This was the only way I could get inside the house with my current task at hand.'

  Before anyone else can say a word, the twins utter in unison: 'What task?'

  The answer the old rat gives is as vague as it is long winded, but ultimately, Atlas goes back to the pillar to pull out the purple pouch and carry the old rat with it to the table. Hip places the circular piece of wood back to where it fell and he hammers it in with few fast punches.

  The boys gather around the rat and its purple pouch. They stare silently, as the old rat clears his throat, and finally loosens the string that kept the pouch shut. The old rat grabs the bottom of the small bag, and throws the contents onto the table. It is five pieces of bone, the distal phalanges of someone's hand, finger tips in other words.

  The boys are not quite sure what to think of those pieces of bones, they expected to see something more coming out of the purple pouch. Something like gold coins or rare gems, especially after a tale of theft. 'What is great about finger bones?' Asks Hip eventually, while casually poking the one nearest to him.

  The old rat is little hurt that his audience does not appreciate his theatrics, so he shouts out; 'These five bones are none other than the finger tips of Oghren!' And then he continues exceptionally smugly; 'An old acquaintance of mine just had them laying around.'

  The boys protest at first, as everybody knows that the Oghren's other bones have disappeared from the city a long time ago. Stolen, gifted, used for strange things, or frankly just disappeared. Thus the rat suggest the boys to test his claim of authenticity; he commands them to try smashing one between their hammer heads.

  With little choice to do otherwise, the twins place one of the finger bones on top of a spare hammer head, and ready another for Atlas to use. The largest boy musters his strength, and swings down the ham
mer with all his might. The piece of bone does not fly off, it does not shatter, but instead the hammer head under the tooth and the one on the wooden shaft shatter as if those were made of nothing but glass. Fragments of metal fly everywhere, scraping Atlas' hands, causing the other boys to look away.

  Confidently, the rat proclaims; 'The finger bones of Oghren, are at our disposal.'

  Hip runs over to dig up the bone among the pile of metal chunks and powder. He inspects it as well as he could, but he does not see even a single mark on its surface. Hip places the bone next to the other, and ask from the old rat; 'Has anyone tried to use bones of Oghren to smash the skull?'

  'Oh, many times. Hmn, you might be bit too young to have heard of the tavern song about Oghren's Hip and Skull.' Atlas' face runs red from the sheer mention of the song. The old rat chuckles to himself as Atlas does his best to describe the songs shared between father and big brothers.

  The boys put the bones back into the pouch and leave it next to their collection glass jars. After all, who would want to steal a bag of finger bones? They talk and share few words about how they should try to break one of them tomorrow. Their minds turn back in favour of the hammer heads rather than nails as they realise how they must dash back home before their mothers start to worry why their boys are late for supper.

  A short while later, the kids from upstairs come down. The old rat gazes at them, he smells the dried sweat on them, and he cannot help but to notice how Loge seems little off. When the old rat's eyes meet with those of Loge, he does not see the kindles of their burning animosity. To him, Loge's steps down the stairs have become too normal. Her steps are no longer gliding like flame sweeping across. The old rat knows he has to talk to Pan before he can exchange words with Loge ever again.