The Head of Mimir

by Richard Lee Byers - (ebook by Undead)

  It was a good idea. It would keep either of them from being struck down from behind and ensured that neither would become confused as to which combatant was which.

  But, breathing heavily, fear gnawing at him, Heimdall realized it wasn’t a good enough idea. An endless stream of attackers, each fighting as well as they did, was bound to overwhelm them, and in all likelihood sooner rather than later.

  “Tell your amulet to stop shining!” he said, meanwhile giving that silent command to his own. The lights dangling from the necks of the imitation Heimdalls went out at the same moment.

  “What?” said Sif. “We won’t be able to see!”

  “Trust me!”

  The remaining lights went out, and darkness swallowed the vault. Heimdall listened, but no matter how he strained, couldn’t hear a ring of foes creeping around his sister and him. He extended his arms and swung the great sword in a horizontal arc. It didn’t bump into anything.

  “I’m going to move away,” he said. “You stay where you are. I think everything’s all right now, but stay on guard.”

  “I didn’t need you to tell me that.”

  Feeling his way with the two-handed sword, he crept toward what he judged to be the location of the mirror. Once, the probing weapon touched one of the enchanted chairs and woke the magic inside. Chains rattled and manacles clashed shut repeatedly, and he recoiled from the sudden clatter, but as he himself wasn’t in range, the chair didn’t catch him.

  A few steps later, the great sword touched a different object, and he used it to trace what was surely the frame of the freestanding mirror. He took hold of the looking glass and laid it on the floor facedown.

  With that accomplished, he hoped it was safe to draw light from his medallion once again. He did, and all the counterfeits were gone.

  Lowering her broadsword, now cleansed of blood, Sif woke the light that lived in her own amulet. “Explain,” she said.

  Heimdall smiled. Maybe Sif was right that it had been idiotic to venture here at all, imbecilic to assault the sentry, but even so, there wasn’t just relief but a certain satisfaction in figuring out how to neutralize the mirror creatures and save both their lives. “Reflections can’t exist in the absence of light.”

  For a second, Sif stood as though awaiting more. Then she said, “That’s it? You couldn’t know the magic had that weakness!”

  “Well,” he said, her reaction leaving him less smug than he’d felt a moment before, “I was listening. As soon as I heard one of the things move or breathe in the dark, I would have known I’d guessed wrong and brought back the light.”

  “By that time, we could have both been dead.”

  “But we’re not, and now, with its face to the floor, the mirror can’t reflect us any more.”

  Sif sheathed her broadsword. “I suppose not. And thank you. For saving me from the foul feast and for this too.” She turned toward Odin. “Anyway, you can look him over now. See if there’s anything to see.”

  “Maybe, maybe not.”

  Sif scowled in irritation. “What does that mean? Why else did we come here?”

  “I’m just realizing,” Heimdall said, speaking slowly as he thought it through, “this room is full of defenses, but an enemy of the All-Father could still shoot arrows or cast spells through that open doorway. It seems a strange vulnerability unless that isn’t really Odin on the bier. Perhaps it’s a decoy. Maybe it’s even another creature of magic made to look like him, something that will rouse and attack if we disturb it.”

  “But everyone knows this is where the All-Father comes when it’s time for the Odinsleep. There’s nowhere else he could be.” Sif hesitated. “Unless there’s a hidden vault beyond this one.”

  “We’re finally thinking alike.”

  “I hope not.” Sif gave him a smile that took some of the sting out of her reply. “Look for a secret door, and be wary of more traps. If we don’t find another chamber, then you can look closely at the Odin in this one.”

  Heimdall stayed close to Sif as they felt along the walls. That way, if one of them fell into another magical daze, with luck the other would notice immediately. Neither did, however, and in due course, Sif found a concealed catch. She pulled it, and a section of stone wall pivoted.

  Beyond the hidden door was another vault where a second Odin, identical to the one behind them, lay sleeping on his own bier. The space was reassuringly bare compared to the one behind them, with no enchanted chairs, food, or mirrors to destroy intruders. There was, however, one long table, on which reposed a triple-pronged spear forged of the magical metal uru, a scepter fashioned of the same material that doubled as a mace when the King of the Gods saw fit to wield it as such, and a long-ship currently no bigger than a man’s hand. They were Gungnir, Thrudstok, and Skidbladnir, treasures the All-Father had evidently brought with him for safekeeping while he slept the Sleep of Life.

  Sif took a deep breath and let it out slowly. “There he is,” she said. “Do what you came to do.”

  Now that the moment had arrived, a fearful reverence welled up again, and it took an act of will for Heimdall to advance. It was like approaching Frigga in the throne room only worse. This felt like lese-majeste, if not, indeed, outright blasphemy.

  I’m doing it for Asgard, he reminded himself. If the All-Father knew what was happening, he’d want me to do it.

  He circled the bier looking for runes written on the floor or on the sides of the platform. There were none. Then, his heart thumping, he approached the platform.

  As he looked down at the huge figure lying atop the marble bier, he could tell that at least Odin was still alive. The All-Father’s barrel chest rose and fell, and the snowy hairs of his mustache stirred minutely as the breath went in and out of his nostrils. But there were still no runes in evidence, sinister fetishes laid upon his breast, or any other indications the King of the Gods had fallen victim to a curse.

  Heimdall had heard that warlocks sometimes used incense in their rituals, but, increasingly fearful that this intrusion was indeed a fool’s errand, that he’d risked Sif’s life and his own for nothing, he sniffed and could catch no trace of any such scent. He listened just in case the enchantment gave off some sort of faint but audible sound, and that didn’t work either. He sought to feel some sort of crawling or prickling on his skin, and that too availed him nothing.

  He raised his hand, hesitated for a moment, then gripped Odin’s shoulder and gave him a shake.

  “Heimdall, no!” Sif cried.

  He ignored her. “Your Majesty! Odin! Wake up!”

  The All-Father slumbered on.

  Heimdall gave Sif an apologetic look. “I can’t find any sign of evil magic, so I thought, try the obvious. Maybe it’s just simple enough to work.”

  “You mean stupid enough to work,” Sif replied. “If you haven’t found anything, it’s time to leave.”

  She might well have been right, but having come this far he was loath to give up until he was satisfied he’d done absolutely everything he could. “Just one more moment,” he said.

  Sif heaved an exasperated sigh. “One.”

  Heimdall walked to the long table. There were the Spear of Heaven, the mace, and the shrunken long-ship, and nothing else. Still no runes, sigils drawn in blood, or other evidence of hostile magic.

  “All right,” Sif said, “you had your moment, now come on. I’ll drag you out of here if I have to.”

  Feeling defeated as he had after pleading with Frigga – no, worse, because now it seemed he had no choice but to accept that he truly was a fool who’d involved his sister in his dangerous folly – Heimdall started to turn to follow her out. Then, however, he realized there was something else on the tabletop after all. There was dust, and a clear oval space within it. “Come look at this,” he said, his voice vibrant with excitement.

  Scowling, Sif strode up to the table.
“What?”

  Heimdall pointed to the oval. “Something else was here, and now it isn’t.” He should have realized before, but better late than never.

  “Well… all right. So what?”

  “What are the magical treasures of Odin?” he asked.

  Sif frowned. “I know the spear and the ship…”

  “There’s also the scepter, which is here, and the cask containing the head of Mimir, which isn’t.”

  “Mimir?”

  “Famous for his wisdom,” Heimdall said. “By all accounts, he understood things even Odin didn’t. During the war between the Aesir and the Vanir, the All-Father sent him to our people in an exchange of hostages meant to seal a truce. The Vanir grew unhappy with the bargain, however, killed Mimir, and sent his head to Odin. Our king embalmed it, woke it with necromancy, and seeks its counsel still.”

  Sif shook her head. “I’m still having a hard time with all your conjectures. If someone truly got in here before us, why didn’t he just stick a dagger in Odin?”

  “I don’t know yet,” Heimdall said.

  “And why wouldn’t a thief take all the treasures? Why the head and the head alone?”

  “There’s a limit to how much one person can easily carry. Perhaps he stole the one item he deemed most precious of all, or the one he knew how to use.”

  “Well… maybe.”

  “The point is,” Heimdall said, smiling at the vindication of at least one of his ideas, “we now have evidence of an intruder. It’s time to tell the queen what we discovered.”

  “And hope she doesn’t cut off our own heads for our pains.” Sif smiled back at him. “But even if she does, brother, you acquitted yourself well here tonight.”

  Six

  Heimdall and Sif crawled back under the stabbing stone spikes and then hurried up the stairs. They stopped short, however, when the landing at the top came into view, because the guard Heimdall had knocked unconscious was gone.

  “He woke,” said Sif. “We should have tied him up.”

  That gave Heimdall a pang of anxiety, but perhaps it wasn’t catastrophic. “Well,” he said, “we were going to Frigga anyway. The important thing now is to go immediately so it’s clear we’re coming of our own volition and not because warriors arrested us and dragged us there.”

  “Right.” Sif opened the door and balked a second time. Heimdall peered past her. The guard he’d struck was sprawled on the floor outside.

  “He must have woken,” Heimdall said, “stumbled out the door, and passed out again.” He simultaneously felt relief that the man had made it no farther and a fresh twinge of guilt for striking down a brother-in-arms.

  “We should check him,” said Sif. Brother and sister stepped into the hallway, and Sif knelt down. She pressed her fingers to the side of the guard’s neck, cupped her hand in front of the man’s nostrils and mouth, and then cursed.

  Heimdall suddenly felt cold. “What’s wrong?”

  Her expression full of shock and sorrow, Sif looked up and said, “His heart isn’t beating, and he isn’t breathing. You killed him.”

  “No!” Heimdall said, horrified and disbelieving. “I didn’t hit him that hard!”

  “Apparently you did,” Sif said grimly. “Or he had a weak skull. Poor fellow.”

  Guilt came crashing down on Heimdall. He had the same feeling he’d had in the crypt, that he’d somehow stumbled into a nightmare, only this time it was worse. “I’m a murderer,” he said. “I murdered a comrade.”

  Sif stood up. Heimdall had no doubt she was still aghast at the warrior’s death, but, as was her way she’d quickly locked that feeling away to attend to practicalities. Her example reminded him he needed to do the same. “Does this change things?” she asked.

  Heimdall took a long, steadying breath, and though guilt and horror didn’t fall away, the paralysis they’d engendered did. “No,” he said. “The queen still needs to know what we discovered, that Mimir’s head is gone and it’s at least possible that it was a traitor in the citadel who stole it. I’ll accept whatever punishment she exacts for taking the man’s life.”

  Sif frowned. “I don’t like hearing you say that, but it’s what I’d say in your place. Let’s go, then.”

  The tramp of feet, the creak of leather, and the clink of mail announced the approach of warriors. A moment later, ten men-at-arms rounded a corner farther down the hall. Heimdall supposed they were either on a routine patrol of the citadel or on their way to perform some other duty. Either way, their appearance at this moment was the worst of luck.

  The newcomers faltered for an instant when they spied Heimdall and Sif standing over the guard’s body. Then they aimed their spears.

  “Wait!” Heimdall called. “This isn’t what it looks like!”

  Their faces either angry or set with grim resolve, the spearmen trotted forward.

  Evidently surmising the patrol meant to kill her and Heimdall out of hand – based on their expressions and actions it was an impression he shared – Sif whipped her broadsword from its scabbard and pointed it at the fallen guard’s throat. “Stop,” she said, “or he dies!”

  A narrow-eyed, black-bearded warrior in the lead raised his hand, and the men under his command halted. Looking from a distance, the war leader couldn’t tell the guard Sif was threatening was already dead.

  “You’re in the heart of the citadel,” he said. “No matter what you do, you won’t escape. I won’t let you escape.”

  “We don’t want to escape,” Heimdall said.

  “No,” said the black-bearded warrior, “you want to go where everyone is forbidden to go on pain of death. Be glad we caught you. You’ll likely die easier up here than caught in a trap below.”

  “We’ve already been below,” Heimdall said, “and discovered something of the utmost importance to the Realm. Come with us and I’ll show you.” He tried to twist the door handle.

  To his surprise and his horror, the door wouldn’t open. Sif must have engaged a locking mechanism without noticing it was there.

  “I give you my word,” Heimdall said. “Sif and I truly did visit the All-Father’s vault. The head of Mimir–”

  “Liar and traitor,” the black-bearded warrior said. He advanced, and his men followed. Evidently, he’d decided the duty to deal with treachery was more important than protecting Sif’s supposed hostage.

  For a heartbeat, Heimdall considered surrender. With luck, it would bring him before the queen again, albeit in chains, and wasn’t that what he wanted?

  But would he truly be afforded that opportunity? The faces behind the poised spears suggested otherwise. It still seemed likely the angry warriors meant to strike down his sister and him no matter what they did, and he didn’t see how they could even fight back. He didn’t want to kill still more Asgardian warriors who were only doing their duty as they understood it, and even if he were willing, he and Sif were heavily outnumbered.

  “Run!” he said.

  He and his sister bolted in the opposite direction from the patrol. A lance flew between them and clattered on the floor several strides farther along. The long weapons were made for thrusting, not throwing, and perhaps that was the only reason it didn’t find its target.

  Desperate, his thoughts now focused solely on escape, Heimdall led his sister up another flight of stairs, then along another passage. It was more crowded, with functionaries and servants scurrying about in the performance of their duties, and the pair had to shove through them and even knock some aside. But the congestion would slow down the spearmen too and likewise keep them from throwing any more of their weapons. Or so he hoped.

  Another turn brought an arched doorway and the stairs beyond into view. These steps led down into a courtyard. He and Sif dashed down them and found themselves facing a company of horsemen climbing down from their mounts. By the looks of it, the riders had just come
back from a patrol or some other errand. They turned to peer in surprise at the two Vanir rushing into view.

  Heimdall picked out a bow-legged warrior with long brown hair. The man’s air of authority suggested he was in command no less than the golden badge bearing a stylized image of Sleipnir, Odin’s eight-legged steed, gleaming in the torchlight illuminating the courtyard.

  Heimdall rushed up to him. “Impostors!” he cried. “Disguised as Asgardian warriors, but they’re not! They’re right behind my sister and me!”

  The cavalry commander frowned. “What?”

  “There’s no time!” Heimdall said. He was lying, but there was no need to manufacture whatever frantic urgency was manifest in his voice and expression. That was altogether real. “If your men are going to defend themselves, they have to do it now!”

  The war leader looked around at his warriors. “Swords out! Shields up! Make a line facing that door!”

  Heimdall had caught the cavalry commander by surprise, but the confusion was unlikely to last more than a moment when the two groups of warriors came face to face. He and Sif ran towards the steeds the horsemen had been riding and the grooms who had taken charge of them. Fresh mounts would be preferable, but there was no time to procure them.

  He fixed on a gray stallion simply because the groom hadn’t yet begun removing its saddle and tack. He jerked the reins from the startled attendant’s grasp and swung himself into the saddle. The warhorse, which had no doubt assumed he was all done carrying a rider for a while and had nothing but feed and rest in his immediate future, turned back his ears and stamped a hoof.

  “That’s–” began the groom.

  “I’m in a hurry!” Heimdall said, and that at least was true enough.

  “Go!” Sif called. She was astride her own purloined steed, one dappled brown and white.

  Brother and sister kicked back with their heels, and unhappy though they were the two warhorses sprang toward the gate in the wall around the courtyard. Still fearful as he was, Heimdall half expected someone to jump in his way and try to stop him, but nobody did. His ruse still had everybody flummoxed. He and Sif thundered through the gate of the citadel, across the clear ring of ground encircling it, and into the city beyond.