“One of you might have warned me about the roof,” I said with a chuckle.
The room was dark and smelled a little musty, to be honest. Meuhlnir pointed at a small door, and I pushed on it, a bit too hard it turned out, and the door slammed open. The hall outside was bright, though there were no light sources visible.
“No need to slam the door,” grumbled someone from the hall.
“Sorry,” I said. “I expected it to be heavier.”
“Do you not know you are in Nitavetlir?”
I stepped into the low-ceilinged hallway.
The person in front of me had to be a Tverkr. He came up to my solar plexus, and he was very ugly. His matted, stringy hair stood out at all angles, and looked brittle and dry, while his beard was long, braided and well-kept. His hair and beard were a combination of a honeydew green and laurel green color. His head was bulbous and misshapen and sat atop a short, stubby neck. His bushy eyebrows looked like fat caterpillars crouched over his malachite eyes, which were too small and too widely-placed in his wreck of a face. His torso was bent and twisted, and entirely too wide. Like both the Svartalfar and the Alfar, his trapezius muscles formed a broad triangle, but unlike the others, his short, stubby neck made the muscles look stunted and gnarled. His arms were too long for his torso, but his legs were too short—another example of stunted, contorted growth. His feet were too wide and too long for the length of his legs, giving the Tverkr an almost comedic look. His skin was mottled—Mikado yellow spots over a dark battleship gray—and pitted with what looked like burn scars.
“Well?” he asked me with spit flying from his thick lips. “Did you not know?”
“I knew we were coming to Nitavetlir, but this is my first trip, and I—”
The Tverkr waved a hand with long, slender fingers. “Yes, but you knew you were coming to Nitavetlir. Why would a door be made in such a shoddy manner as to be heavy?”
“Well, it is stone…”
Meuhlnir stepped around me. “He’s a kanka-ee,” he said in a matter of fact tone.
The short, misshapen man grunted and peered up at me with irritation on his face. “Why’d you not just say? You think I have time to stand around trading meaningless words?” With that, the Tverkr pushed past us and stomped off down the hall.
“Sorry,” I called after him. When he was out of ear shot, I turned to Meuhlnir. “Maybe I’ll just let you speak for me for the rest of the day.”
Meuhlnir laughed. “Don’t take it to heart, my friend. Tverkar are not known for gentle manners. All in all, that was an innocuous exchange for the race.”
The Alfar were trying to hide their grins from me.
“Oh, laugh it up,” I said and cracked a grin of my own, relieved to see them grinning at all.
We set off in the opposite direction than the Tverkr had gone, heading for what Meuhlnir called simply “the Smithy.” After a walk of five or ten minutes, the hallway widened to about twice its previous width and about four times its previous crick-in-the-neck height. Instead of only being broken by featureless stone doors, we began to see wide glass windows displaying wares of various and sundry kinds. We also began to see more of the strange looking Tverkar, with hair colors drawn from the greenish-brown hue family and skin of various shades of dark gray with tinges of yellow and orange mottling. To a one, they looked at us, made a face and then looked away.
Meuhlnir walked forward like he owned the place, not looking at anyone and not speaking at all. We followed as he made turn after turn in the warren-like halls of Nitavetlir. When the hall ended, he led us out onto a balcony that extended to the right and left around a cavernous space. I stepped to the stone railing and looked down. Far below I could see firelight flickering. The ceiling of the vast chamber was lost in the distance and dimness.
The balcony was crowded with Tverkar, each hustling along on whatever business they had. They bumped and jostled each other, which ended with a cantankerous exchange of “pleasantries” and every once in a while, in a shoving match.
Meuhlnir waited while I took it all in and then led us away, pushing through the throng, his face set in stern, no-nonsense lines. We saw many a Tverkar open his or her mouth to bicker with Meuhlnir, but they never said a word once they saw who he was. Meuhlnir led us down stairways and along the balcony, but always to the left, and we found ourselves on the voluminous ground floor of the vast, bell-shaped chamber.
What I had taken to be firelight from the balconies above was, in fact, vast pools of molten stone that were being used as massive forges. The clanging of metal on anvils was enough to split my head. I couldn’t see how the Tverkar could stand to work there in the heat and the noise, but work there they did—illimitable numbers of them stretching away into the haze and smoke.
Again, Meuhlnir waited until I met his gaze and then strode off again. I followed him through the smoke and sparks, trying to keep the incessant ringing of metal on metal from driving me insane. The Tverkar smiths around us pointed and glared at us, and though I could see their mouths moving, I couldn’t hear a thing they shouted at us.
Meuhlnir walked up behind a tallish (for his kind) Tverkr and tapped on his shoulder in a rather forceful, rude manner. The Tverkr turned, his mouth open and his blackened face set in an ugly, glaring grimace of anger, but once he saw Meuhlnir standing in front of him, he swallowed whatever curses he had been about to fling in our faces and motioned for us to follow. From his expression, those curses tasted sour going down.
He led us to the side of the chamber and through a door that was covered with soot. He pushed through the door and waited for us to file through, then slammed it shut. “What do you want, Master of Thunder?” he all but snapped.
The office was large but had so much clutter in it that it felt claustrophobic.
“Greetings to you too, Master Prokkr,” said Meuhlnir, his voice mild and light. “May I introduce my new friend, Hank Jensen from Mithgarthr? And these stalwart companions are Yowtgayrr, Urlikr, and Skowvithr.”
Prokkr didn’t even glance our way as he waved his hand at us, but whether it was in greeting or with impatience, I couldn’t say. “Time, Master of Thunder, is important here, even if it is not in Osgarthr.”
“Very well, Master Smith. I have need of a few items of Tverkar make.”
“You don’t say? Why I’d never have guessed you’d come to Nitavetlir and seek out the master smith to obtain anything. Are you sure you didn’t come to invite me to a grand tea?”
Meuhlnir shook his head, suppressing a small smile. “I’m in a hurry.”
“Doesn’t seem much like it,” snapped Prokkr. “Since you are Isir and know no better, I will ask you one more time to make your request or get out of my smithy.”
Meuhlnir put his hand on my shoulder. “I need a set of armor for Hank, here. It must be as strong as granite while being as light as silk.”
The master smith scoffed and sneered, scathing me with a glance. “Oh, is that all?”
“No, it isn’t,” said Meuhlnir with a trace of irritation. “I’ll also need two small bucklers—one for each of his arms. Also, whatever these Alfar request, and I’ll need five helmets to fit Alfar. All the items will need to be enchanted. By Althyof.”
“Fine,” grated Prokkr. “Return in three weeks.” The Tverkr made to push past Meuhlnir and return to his smithy, but Meuhlnir put a hand, which looked huge by comparison, on the Tverkr’s chest.
“No. I will need them today.” Meuhlnir’s voice crackled with command.
Prokkr’s laugh was sardonic, and he slapped Meuhlnir’s hand from his chest. “Shall I pull down the heavens for you as well?”
“No, but you will do as I ask, and without further theatrics,” said Meuhlnir in an icy-cold voice and a dangerous glint in his eye. “I have no more patience for Tverkar manners today, Prokkr.”
The master smith nodded his head, but couldn’t wipe the sneer from his face. “It will cost more. Significantly so. And the armor will have to come from premade s
tock, sized to fit.” He came over to me and pushed my arms up and out to my side, while his eyes moved over me like a laser measuring device. With rough hands, he shoved me this way and that and then noticed the Kimber on my right hip. He looked up at me with wonder in his eyes. “A machine of war?” he asked.
I nodded and pulled the big pistol out of its holster. I ejected the magazine, cleared the chamber and then handed it to the Tverkr.
He smiled—the first genuine smile of delight I had seen in this strange realm—and ran his hands over the machined metal of the slide. He sussed out the locking mechanism for the slide and then took the gun apart as if he had been working with firearms all his life. He pulled every component-part out of the gun, examining each piece with eager eyes and then reassembled it without making a single error. “Chemical propellants?” he asked in the voice of a child on Christmas Eve.
I nodded and pressed one of the bullets out of the magazine and handed it to him. “Do you think you could craft replacements for this?”
“Can I keep this?” he asked, bouncing the bullet in one of his callused hands. “I’ll need to pull it apart. Oh, and I’ll need to examine this further,” he said lifting the Kimber as if it were an afterthought.
“Sure,” I said, figuring that one less bullet made very little difference one way or another.
“Then I will figure it out, Master Jensen,” he said in a pleasant tone. “Is this why you require two bucklers?” He held up the gun, pointing it at the door. “You use it like this?”
“Yes, that’s pretty close. I need to have plenty of freedom to move my arms, though.”
“You have another of these?” asked Prokkr with wide eyes.
I shrugged and brought out the HK .40 caliber pistol, made it safe and then passed it Prokkr. He put the Kimber into a pouch of his work belt, as if it had already lost his interest, and then repeated the discovery process with the HK. He looked at the barrel and tsked. “Different,” he muttered.
Trying to suppress a grin at how different his manner was now, I took out one of the .40 caliber bullets and passed it to him. “Smaller caliber,” I said. “Same principle, though.”
“Yes,” he said. He had put both bullets into a different pouch of his belt and had both pistols out and was looking from one to the other with assessing eyes.
“You don’t mind working on the bullets?” I asked, thinking of Freyr’s reaction to seeing the Kimber on my hip.
“Why would I?” He glanced up at me, nonplussed, and then back down at the pistols. “So, this piece here is propelled backward on these rails when the chemical ignites?” He was moving the slide of the Kimber back and forth.
“Yes. You have a quick eye,” I said.
“I am a master smith,” he said with more than a little impatience.
“Of course,” I said.
Meuhlnir cleared his throat. “Now, Prokkr, about these items—”
“Anything for you, Master of Thunder?” asked Master Prokkr.
“No, no.” Meuhlnir patted his hammer. “The hammer you made for me so long ago is still more than sufficient.”
“Come back in a few hours,” said Prokkr in a dismissing tone. He grunted and opened the door to the smithy, bellowing at his subordinates before the door hit the jam. Then, he turned to Meuhlnir and made a mocking bow. “Is that sufficient, Master of Thunder?”
“Hank, you four wait for me outside a moment. I need a word with Master Prokkr in private.”
Prokkr scoffed and rolled his eyes as we went out into the smithy.
“Come on,” said Meuhlnir when he rejoined us. “We have time to kill, so we might as well find a tavern. I’ll tell you another short tale of Luka—one from before he fell, and then I have to find a pair of equal, but different gifts for Sif and Yowrnsaxa.” He looked at me with mirth dancing in his eyes. “I bet you thought having two wives was the best idea you’d ever heard.”
Truth was, it sounded like a very bad idea, but I smiled and gestured for him to lead on.
The tavern was three levels above the smithy, and still, the noise level was like sitting inside the engine compartment of a big tractor, but at least it was cooler. Meuhlnir ordered mead for the table and then sprawled into a cramped booth that was considered large by the Tverkr barman. He sat with his arms crossed in front of him on the table and watched as the barmaid brought a large pitcher of mead and poured it into five flagons.
“Tell me this story about Luka,” I said.
Meuhlnir grunted and looked down at the part of the table bracketed by his muscled arms. “It was a short time after the first assassination attempt on the queen, but after she’d gifted me the hammer. She wanted to get away from the politics for a while. A short holiday, you see? She was still trying to recover her voice—it was still very hoarse and shaky, and she couldn’t maintain much volume.
“We traveled to a village we hadn’t visited before—me, the queen, Luka, Veethar, Paltr, Sif, Yowrnsaxa, Frikka, and Freya. We rode Veethar’s magnificent horses then, too. The village children ran along beside us as we walked the horses the last mile or so into the village square…”
Thirty-seven
The queen’s party slowed their horses to a walk as village children began to appear on the sides of the road, running alongside and shouting the kinds of questions excited children shouted at extravagantly equipped strangers. The queen smiled at this and waved, but her voice was still too broken to shout answers back. She nodded her head at her sister Freya.
“Greetings, children of Hyatlanes,” Freya called. “We are the Isir, and we’ve come in peace and friendship from across the Kyatlerproo. From another realm.”
“Your horses are so pretty! How did you make them so tall and shiny?” shouted a tall, red-headed girl in her preteens.
“For that, young Miss, you’d have to ask my friend Veethar.” Freya waved her hand at a terrified-looking Veethar. “But be warned, he doesn’t talk much, unless you count grunts.”
Veethar looked like he wanted to fade into the mists, like he’d rather wrestle a bear than talk to a young girl.
“How come their coats shine so much, Veethar?” asked the girl.
“Good feed. Brushed every day,” said Veethar in a voice that was only just audible to Meuhlnir who was riding next to him.
“What?”
Veethar repeated his five-word sermon again, with a touch more volume, and then blushed and looked down at the mane of his horse.
Freya laughed, and Meuhlnir felt a pang of loss. Her voice sounded so much like Queen Suel’s had before she had broken it saving his life. “I warned you, girl,” she said with a touch of mischief in her voice. “Veethar is shy.”
“Might as well ask a lamb to roar like a lion,” said Meuhlnir as he leaned over to clap his friend on the back. “Although this lamb fights like a lion when cornered, so don’t press him too much.”
Veethar glanced at him, and then away, blushing.
“What’s an Isir? What is the Kyatlerproo?” shouted a young teenage boy, who was having a hard time keeping his eyes off Freya’s chest.
She caught him looking and unleashed another tinkling, musical laugh. “The Isir are a race of people. The Kyatlerproo is like a bridge made of rainbows that spans the void between our realm and yours.”
“Who are you,” asked the boy, in a crackling, breathless voice that only a boy in puberty can ever hope to imitate.
Freya smiled and batted her eyelashes at him. “You first. What is your name?”
“I’m Dilyar. You are very pretty,” he said and then blushed as red as Veethar.
“Many thanks, Master Dilyar. I fear you are going to cause a lot of problems for the fathers of girls in this village.”
Dilyar looked confused, and Freya laughed again.
“Pay her no mind, boy,” said Paltr with a grin. “She is an unrepentant flirt.”
The boy looked even more confused than ever and slowed a little to consider if he was being mocked or not.
&nbs
p; “Is your realm in the branches of Yggdrasil?” asked another boy. “What is its name?”
“Its name is of no account. We told your ancestors of the World Tree, though, and our realm is at its peak,” said Freya with a grin.
“You’ve come to Mithgarthr in peace and friendship, you said.”
Freya nodded. “Indeed, we have.”
“I heard my father talking about the Isir. He said you are gods of great power.”
“How far to your village, boy?” grunted Meuhlnir.
The boy squinted up at him, his eyes roving across his armor and lingering on his shiny warhammer. “Are you the Thunder God?” he asked in an awestruck voice.
“Don’t be rude, Ernir,” said a teenage girl who looked a lot like the boy. “Our village is just around that bend ahead.”
“And your name?” Meuhlnir asked.
“Forward of you, Pror,” said Luka with a smirk.
“I am Erna,” she said with evident pride. “Erinir and I are spayl.”
Meuhlnir shook his head. “I don’t understand that word.”
She smiled. “We were born at the same time.”
“Ah, tveeburar,” said Paltr. “I am also a twin.”
Her eyes widened. “Is your sister here?” She looked at each of the females in the queen’s party, and then back at Paltr.
“My twin is a brother,” said Paltr. “He no longer travels with us—he lost his sight, you see, and it makes traveling to unfamiliar places hard for him.”
“You are a leeta ayns, then?” she asked in hushed tones.
“If that means that my brother and I look the same, then the answer is yes.”
Erna nudged Ernir and whispered something in his ear. The boy sprinted into the woods.
“There’s nothing to fear,” said Paltr.
“No, sir,” said Erna. “I’ve sent him to summon the Veulva. She will want to see you. I hope this does not offend you.”
Paltr laughed. “I’d have to have pretty thin bark to be offended by meeting a wand carrier.”
The girl smiled and bobbed her head.
Blood of the Isir Omnibus Page 38
