Well, of course, it might have been day. By then there was no difference. In any case, they arrived at my tent in human, rather than raven form; Odin’s Spirit and Odin’s mind, finally wanting to make a deal.
I’d only seen them in their human Aspects a handful of times over the years. Odin’s messengers favoured bird form, and even now their Aspects were more raven than human; both dark-haired and golden-eyed and with a tendency to crow when they got excited. Hugin was male, Munin female; other than that, and the white streak in her hair, they could easily have been twins. Both wore a great deal of jewellery: bracelets that jangled as they moved; rings in the shape of birds’ skulls on their long, dark fingers.
Hugin was the most talkative; Munin seemed the most alert. Both were nervous, and rightly so; Ironwood was no place for them now, not with Fenris running wild and my army of Firefolk and half-blood demons so close by. But I guessed they had come to talk, and although I had no intention of cutting the Old Man any more slack than he had cut me, I wouldn’t have missed this chance for the Worlds.
I shot them my friendliest smile. ‘Come in.’
They followed me into the tent and sat down on the cushions. There was a dish of crystallized fruit standing on one of the tables. Munin crawked and took a pear, eating it deftly with small, nervous bites.
‘And to what do I owe this visit?’ I said. ‘Is the Old Man lonely? Could it be that he’s having second thoughts about throwing his brother onto the pile? And if that’s the case, then why didn’t he call by in person?’
‘We speak for the Auld Man,’ said Hugin, in his hoarse voice. ‘Our words are his words.’
Munin crawked agreement and started on an orange.
‘He wants ye to know it’s not too late. We can still avert the prophecy.’
‘Avert it? Why would I want to?’ I said.
‘Because ye want tae survive,’ he said, ‘and the only way tae do that is tae go against the Oracle.’
I had to laugh. ‘So basically, what you’re telling me is that Odin wants me back?’
‘Aye. On certain terms.’
‘What?’ My laughter redoubled. ‘Terms? Has that eye of his gone blind? Those are rivers of steel, ice and flame, not three strings of tinsel. And if he thinks he can just say the word and I’ll come crawling back to his side . . .’
‘He thinks the Oracle planned all this. That Gullveig made a deal with him while he was in the Vanir camp. A deal in which she promised him revenge against the Aesir.’
‘How very creative of Odin,’ I said. ‘But how could Gullveig have possibly known that Mimir would one day need revenge? When he arrived in the Vanir camp, everything was peachy. There was no cause for him to believe that his loving nephew was planning to sacrifice him to his ambition.’
‘She’s a Seeress,’ Hugin said. ‘She too may have made a prophecy.’
Ouch. That was too close to what Angie had already hinted at.
I shrugged. ‘Never trust an Oracle. Doesn’t prove a thing, I’m afraid.’
‘The Auld Man says to tell ye that she’s using you to get to him. And that when Surt crosses over, she’s planning to use you to buy herself a place on the side of Chaos.’
I grinned. ‘Is that the best he can do? The Old Man must be desperate. If I were him, I’d concentrate on choosing the outfit he wants to be buried in. That is, if there’s anything left to bury when we’ve finished with him.’
Hugin shook his dark head. ‘You’re making a mistake,’ he said. ‘Surt will never take ye back. But Odin will, if ye help him now. It’s not too late.’
I grinned again. ‘I get it. This is a ploy to make me laugh myself into a fatal seizure. Nice try, Odin. But in this case, you’re not paranoid. Everyone is out to get you. And when you fall from that parapet, the sound you’ll be hearing as you go down will be me, laughing my head off.’
Crawk, said Munin morosely, helping herself to a pineapple.
‘Does she not talk at all?’ I said.
‘Not much,’ said Hugin. ‘But what she says is usually worth listening to. And she says that the only way to stop the End of the Worlds is to combat Chaos with Chaos, which means to set free will against determinism. If we believe the Oracle, free will is merely an illusion, and all our actions were written in runes that were preordained from the beginning of time. But if we take matters into our own hands, then we can write our own runes, remake our own reality.’
‘She said all that in a crawk?’ I said.
‘More or less,’ said Hugin.
‘Well, thanks for the offer,’ I said. ‘But I’m enjoying this too much. Tell him I’ll see him at Ragnarók. Tell him to watch out for werewolves.’
After the ravens had flown away, I opened a bottle of wine and got drunk. Damn the Old Man. Damn them all. Because he’d got to me, of course, in spite of all he’d put me through. When Angie had tried to warn me, I’d dismissed her suspicions. But now they returned, and suddenly everything made sense to me. That Gullveig had worked with the Oracle – or perhaps even with Chaos – from the very beginning; that she had used Mimir’s Head to manipulate Odin; to summon me; to bring about the end of the gods; and that she was planning to give me up to Surt along with all the rest of them as soon my usefulness had run out.
A cycle of betrayal, beginning and ending with Gullveig-Heid. Gullveig, who first came to Asgard to show off her demonic skills; who provoked Odin’s envy and Mimir’s death; and who then sent Mimir’s Head back to Asgard, knowing that it contained all the knowledge Odin needed to plant the seeds of his own downfall.
Did she plan it this way from the start? Did Chaos put her up to it? Was it all part of a greater plan – one that ensured that from the first, Chaos held the winning cards? That sinking feeling of having been had – that feeling of belated realization as the pieces of the complex puzzle fall into place just at the time when you realize there’s no going back . . .
There has to be a word for that, right? If not, I’ll have to invent one. Gullible. I think that’s it. It even has part of her name in it. And who was Gullveig, anyway? None of the Vanir remembered when she had first appeared on the scene. Was she one of them at all, or was she something different – an older being, from another place?
I speak now of the Sorceress,
Gullveig-Heid, thrice-burned, thrice-born,
Seeress, mistress of the Fire
Vengeful, bloated with desire.
And there she was, in the prophecy Mimir made to Odin. I hadn’t paid much attention before, concentrating as I had on future, rather than past events. But there she was, in one stanza; Wildfire’s mistress, out for revenge – but against whom? Odin? The gods? Or was this revenge for a future crime – a crime that would only come about because of her intervention?
It made my head hurt just to think about it. But could it be that all of this had been an attempt by Gullveig to lure me out of Chaos, to use my betrayal to bring down the gods, then to take my place by Lord Surt in the Aspect of Burning Ambition, surpassing even Wildfire in sheer destructiveness and guile?
Oh, gods. Could it be?
Er . . .
Yes, it made perfect sense. Really, it was beautiful. And yet I could not bring myself to go back to the General. Call it pride – that was always my downfall – but if it meant playing the Oracle’s game, allowing Heidi to use me, even dying in battle, or worse – then so be it. I was ready. All those things were preferable to admitting that Odin might have been right.
And so I got bleakly, blackly drunk, and awoke with a shocking hangover to find that Heidi had finally given the word to move the troops out of Ironwood, onto the plain of Ida.
LESSON 4
Ida
When the going gets tough, choose your cliché.
Lokabrenna
WE WAITED THERE for nine days, making our camp on the open plain. It was cold; the sun’s absence had brought on a fierce, harsh winter. Frost scoured the land; black winds blew; clouds of ash and smoke and dust mingled with the d
riving snow. Above us, Asgard’s citadel looked like a cradle of brilliance, all shrouded in Northlights and shining with runes, with Bif-rost, the Rainbow Bridge, arching from the parapet.
It made me feel almost sorry that we had to bring it down. It was the last, most beautiful thing left in that dying, tenebrous world. But it was too late for regrets. We were engaged; the die was cast; the Gunnthrà was breached; choose your cliché.
This was the last part of Gullveig’s plan: the final confrontation. The Ice People stood on the northern side; the Rock Folk to the east. To the west, the Folk still stood – or at least, what was left of them after Phase Two – ragged, hungry and afraid, but stubbornly holding to their gods. From the south, from Ironwood, came the rest of our army. Ten thousand strong; magnificent; spreading out across the plain in open defiance of Asgard. There were demons and trolls; werewolves and hags; goblins and ephemera and human monsters and the undead. I had my fire-ship, my fleet to navigate between the Worlds; I had my crew of skulls and bones. And yes, I was fabulous. Even with the knowledge that Gullveig would betray me, that the Worlds would plunge into the abyss and that the best I could hope for was eternal oblivion, I was prepared to go out on a high.
Gullveig had stayed in Ironwood to supervise our remaining troops as they passed through from Dream and beyond. I stayed to shiver on the plain, enclosed within concentric rings of torches, braziers and campfires. Fenris came to join me, in wolf form; monosyllabic as always, but bristling with excitement at the prospect of a battle. His friends, Skól and Haiti, were there too, and they ran around as a threesome, snapping at shadows, devouring things and generally running amok.
Not great company for Yours Truly, who was getting restless. I’d waited enough. I wanted to fight. I hated hanging around like this, discussing terms and strategy. I wanted the cleanness of carnage. I wanted certainties. Is that so bad?
Looking up, I saw Odin’s birds outlined against the battlements. Since their visit, they had not tried to contact me again. I found myself feeling obscurely resentful for this, as if Odin had abandoned me for the second time.
I asked myself, if he’d wanted me to come back home to Asgard, surely he would have asked me himself instead of sending those stupid birds? And, having failed to persuade me then, why had he given up so fast?
Damn him, I thought, and helped myself to another bottle of our dwindling stock of wine. There was no point in trying to save any of it; after all, the Worlds were due to end in less than nine days. Might as well end in a party.
Ten hours later, hung-over and feeling rather sorry for myself, I was rather regretting the decision. King of the Worlds I might be, but impromptu regurgitation and a thumping headache were not among the sensations I’d first signed up for in this Aspect. I found myself sorely missing my pure and elemental form, and wishing I could somehow go back, nameless, blameless, into Chaos.
No chance of that now. I was marked. All I could hope for was the chance to bring down as many of my enemies as possible – and, hopefully, Mimir’s Head – before going out in flames. As for Heidi, I promised myself that if I could rob her of the chance of handing me over to Lord Surt, then I might even die happy. I had the germ of a plan – not great, but all I could think of at the time – and if it worked, I told myself that maybe, just maybe . . .
But I’m getting ahead of myself. That came nine days later.
I left my tent and my circle of fires and walked out alone to the edge of the plain, where the icy winds scoured the frozen ground and the snow was like iron filings. Even in my thick furs, I was cold; my feet were numb; my hands were claws; the air in my lungs was shards of steel. Across the plain, I could see my army; my hordes of ephemera; my legions of undead; my snakes and trolls and werewolves; my ships and vessels of dark fire.
Above me, Asgard. Defiant; doomed; flying its colours across the sky. I wondered if the Old Man was watching me from that throne of his. Then I stood in the wilderness and wished that I could see the stars, but the light from Asgard’s battlements and the glow of the fires on Ida’s plain had made them all but invisible.
One star still shone out. My star – the Dogstar – still made its mark. Then, as I watched, a bracket of smoke rose up from the plain and engulfed it.
Darkness beckoned. I had to obey. Call it Destiny, if you like, or predetermination, but my path was written in runes of stone, even though I knew it would lead to darkness. The Old Man had known even before he sent his birds that I would not yield any more than he would himself. The Aesir would fall. Asgard would fall. The Vanir would fall, and I . . .
Well. In any case, it wasn’t my fault. I was as much a victim of this as any of the others. If the gods had trusted me; if Odin had swallowed his pride; if I hadn’t listened to the Oracle’s thrice-damned prophecy . . .
In his eyrie above Bif-rost, I knew Odin was watching me. I gave him the finger. Damn him. Damn the lot of them. Because I could have stopped it all, and the bastard knew it. But even so, his colossal pride prevented him from asking for help; instead he’d sent those ridiculous birds with his terms and his ultimatum, even though he needed me so badly that it was killing him.
All right, then. Let him fall. Let the stubborn old man fall. I wouldn’t shed a tear for him. Let him fall, and let his last, desperate, dying moments be infused with sorrow and regret and the knowledge that his downfall was all because of his monstrous pride.
He’d driven me to it, I told myself. Hadn’t he?
Hadn’t he?
LESSON 5
Settling Scores
There goes free will.
Lokabrenna
ON THE NINTH DAY, we attacked. Nine is the perfect number. Nine Worlds: nine days, nine nights till the end of the Worlds. There is a curious poetry to such an equation. Nine days, nine nights. And on the ninth day, everyone died.
Everyone who matters, that is.
Of course, the sun didn’t rise that day. Nevertheless, we followed tradition and attacked more or less at dawn. The Ice and Rock Folk launched a two-pronged assault to the north and east of Asgard, while the rest of our army gathered to wipe up the rest of the Folk and, as Heidi’s people moved up out of Iron-wood to challenge Bif-rost, I, in Wildfire Aspect, at the helm of my fire-ship, led my fleet across the plain to scour the land in a thin red line.
Finally, I knew what to do. I was in my element. Lighting up the darkness in glorious red-gold, deadly bursts; eating through wood and bone and flesh; clashing joyfully on steel. Within an hour, the snowfields of Ida were nothing but a grid of flame, and Bif-rost’s gleaming parapet was alive with capering figures. Wolves howled; witches flew; ephemera surged out of Dream to take any shape they chose to take from the fears of those who assailed us. The gods were outnumbered ten thousand to one. Ice Folk here; Rock Folk there; Wildfire in the middle. And on the Bridge, our champions, howling their defiance and rage at the beleaguered Aesir; Fenris, the Wolf; Jormungand, lolling in his sheath of slime; and a host of vile ephemera dragged from the bed of the River Dream.
The air was black with smoke and ash; the plain of Ida slick with blood. Of course, in my Wildfire Aspect, I could not hear the blood in my veins; or smell the stench of carnage; or see the millions of ephemera flying like moths towards the Bridge; or taste the salt of sweat on my tongue; or feel the fear in the back of my throat like an animal trying to get out; or hear the howl of battle like the voice of ten thousand winds . . .
But there was carnage; delirium; joy – and a kind of purity. It had been such a long time since I’d last experienced the thrill of unbridled destruction, untrammelled by conscience, fear or guilt or any of those other feelings with which Odin had corrupted me. For the first time in an Age, I was free, and I meant to enjoy it to the full.
I launched my fire-ship at the Bridge. It cast a bloody pall across the plain. Cutting through Worlds like a razor, slashing between Death, Dream and beyond, releasing fragments of Chaos into the charged and rapturous air. All that stood between Asgard and us was that Bri
dge; cloaked in Northlights; gleaming like eternity.
And now, a figure came to stand halfway across its narrow expanse. Odin in full Aspect; spear in hand; colours flying. Sleipnir stood by him, in giant Aspect, his eight legs spanning the sky like a spider’s web; a nimbus of flame around them both gave them a twin corona. I had to admit that at that moment there was something magnificent in the Old Man; something noble and melancholy that might almost have touched my heart – that is, if I had one. As it was, I dropped my Wildfire Aspect, the better to enjoy the scene about to unfurl in front of me. The noise of the battle fell silent. All eyes turned to the Rainbow
Bridge.
Now Odin comes to face the foe.
Against the Fenris wolf he stands.
He fights; he falls. Need I say more?
The verse was as clear as Mimir’s well, but still, I didn’t believe it. Odin must have had plenty of time to study the Oracle’s small print; to tease the weft of the prophecy into some kind of a safety net. I knew him. He wouldn’t go gently; and although Fenris was powerful, a part of me expected – feared – that Odin’s guile might still win through.
Behind me came an eerie lull as the hordes of Chaos waited. I watched him from the prow of my ship; naked; in human Aspect. Now I could feel the fire at my back; the chill in the air; the smoke in my lungs. All kinds of sensations flooded me – triumph; admiration . . .
Hope?
He looked at me from the parapet, his one eye filled with blue fire. And then he raised his battle-spear and launched it at the fire-ship.
Was he aiming at me? Who knows? If so, he missed his target. I saw the missile coming; swore; slipped back into Wild-fire Aspect. The spear, with its shaft of laddered runes, passed right through the fire-ship and struck the fiery plain below in an icy eruption of glam. He took another step forward and slowly drew his mindsword.
‘Fenris, are you ready?’ he said.
There came a ripple from the ranks. The Fenris Wolf came forward. Fenris, the Devourer; thirty feet from nose to tail: fangs as long as a man’s arm; fearless as hunger incarnate. For a moment, Old Man and Wolf faced each other in silence. I’d resumed my human Aspect to watch; now I felt the hairs on my neck stand up like a hedge of upraised spears. Behind me, all Chaos was watching; even the dying took notice. We all knew that something legendary was about to happen. And then . . .