The Head of Mimir

by Richard Lee Byers - (ebook by Undead)

  The cloak could only snare the swords for a moment before the entranced guards jerked them free. Sif used that second to shift in close to the warrior on the right and punch him in the face. The warrior lurched backward and fell.

  At the same time, his comrade stepped behind Sif and poised his sword to run her through. Then, however, Uschi and the two other Valkyries who’d belatedly recognized the threat to the queen swarmed on him, twisted his arm till he dropped his sword, and bore him to the floor.

  Meanwhile, Amora raced back down the hallway and rounded the corner at the end.

  The Valkyries let Heimdall through. He charged after the traitorous sorceress and turned the corner just as she flourished her hands to complete a spell. With a flash of green light, a doorway appeared before her. Her conjuring chamber in Skrymir’s castle was on the other side, and she hurried across the threshold.

  Heimdall lunged after her but was an instant too slow. The portal vanished before him, and he staggered on through the space it had vacated. Amora was gone beyond his reach. He sought to console himself with the thought that at least her overt treachery had finally made it clear to all that he and Sif were telling the truth.

  As he tramped back to his sister, Frigga, Uschi, and the others, the queen was declaiming the words of a spell. When she finished, the bewitched guard who was still conscious closed his eyes and slumped in the grip of the Valkyries restraining him. The fellow Sif had struck unconscious let out a snore that suggested the magic had affected him as well.

  “They’ll sleep for a time,” Frigga said, “and when they wake, their minds will be clear.” She turned to Sif. “I owe you my life. Thank you.”

  For once, Sif looked shy, albeit only for an instant. “I just did my duty, Majesty.” She looked to Heimdall. “I take it Amora got away?”

  “Yes,” he said. “Magic whisked her back to Skrymir and the frost giants.”

  “Once again,” Sif said, “it’s plain I have to do everything myself.”

  The gibe made the queen smile, but only slightly and only for an instant, after which her expression became serious once more. “Heimdall and Sif, I pardon you for invading the chamber of the Odinsleep and declare you innocent of all other charges laid against you. Now it’s time for us to invade the vault and set things right.”

  With that, Frigga faced the door, raised her hand, and recited another spell. One by one, the runes Heimdall had detected became visible as symbols that glowed like red-hot iron, then crumbled into embers and ash that vanished as they spilled toward the floor. When the last of them were gone, Heimdall took hold of the golden handle and opened the door on the shadowy flight of stairs beyond. Frigga spoke a single word, and a floating orb of silvery glow appeared to light the way.

  At the bottom of the steps, Sif pointed. “That’s where the spikes jump out and you have to crawl underneath.”

  Frigga smiled her flicker of a smile once more. “Let’s hope the Queen of Asgard doesn’t have to sacrifice her royal dignity to that degree.” She spoke more words of power, and Heimdall could see the sections of wall that housed the spikes shiver ever so slightly. At the end of the spell, she walked confidently forward, and nothing stabbed at either her or the warriors who scurried after, frantic to go first to protect her but prevented by the unthinkable disrespect implicit in elbowing the queen out of one’s way.

  Heimdall was pleased to see that Frigga’s magic also quelled the lure of the shackling chairs and poison feast and the power of the silver mirror. The first double seeking to emerge was a replica of the queen herself, but it convulsed and vanished halfway through when her spell crushed the sorcery of the looking glass.

  Avoiding the counterfeit Odin as he had before, Heimdall opened the hidden door that led to the real one. Here, too, all was as he and Sif had seen it last. Barrel-chested and white-bearded, the All-Father lay slumbering atop his bier, and the long table nearby held the threepronged Uru spear Gungnir and the king’s other remaining treasures.

  Most of the Valkyries fell silent at the sight of a sacred mystery they possibly felt on some level that they ought not to be seeing, and never mind that the queen had ordered them here. Heimdall remembered the feeling well. Even after all he and Sif had experienced, he still felt a twinge of it himself.

  Plainly not sharing the general feeling of reverence and awe, or unwilling to show it if she did, Frigga turned to Heimdall. “Can you find the marks of Amora’s sorcery in this chamber as well?”

  He pushed away his lingering awe to perform the service she required of him. “I hope so, Majesty.” He stared at Odin and the bier and beheld the runes impressed on the sides of the block of stone, once again sharply defined but so shallow normal vision would never have noticed. “Yes! Walk with me, please, in case they run all the way around the pedestal.”

  As it turned out, they did, and sketching each with a forefinger for the queen’s benefit made the digit burn and throb. When he and Frigga completed their circuit, she frowned and said, “Give Amora credit. That’s a curse.”

  “But Your Majesty can break it?” Heimdall asked.

  “I think so. Stand back by the doorway with the others. It will be safer for you.”

  He did as she’d commanded and, despite the implied warning, smiled with anticipation. This moment was the culmination of all his and Sif’s dogged struggles, the fulfillment of all their desperate hopes, their victory. In a moment, Odin would wake and set things right.

  Frigga raised her hands over her head and chanted. The phosphorescence of the floating orb turned green, after which verdant shoots erupted from the stone floor. In moments, they bloomed into yellow poppies and orange hawkweed flowers or swelled into pine, birch, and willow saplings that kept growing into trees that shot upward fast as a person could run, their upper reaches somehow existing and visible despite the ceiling that should have prevented it. Heimdall and the other spectators dodged to keep the leaping, thickening trees from bashing them, and Heimdall feared Odin or Frigga would suffer injury in the midst of the chaos, but both the King and the Queen of the Gods remained untouched.

  At the conclusion of the spell, all the riotous growth vanished in an instant, and a seething green radiance gloved Frigga’s hands. No warlock, Heimdall could only guess what was happening, but he suspected the queen had gathered the power of life itself to counter the curse that bound her husband in something approaching a deathlike state. She thrust out her hands, and the emerald light leaped from them to shimmer over the All-Father and his bier for several moments before guttering out.

  To Heimdall’s surprise and dismay, Odin slept on. He felt relieved, however, when it became apparent the queen wasn’t finished yet.

  Frigga drew herself up straight and began another invocation. The light of the floating sphere turned gray, and everything began to shake. Valkyries cried out in surprise as they, like Heimdall and Sif, stumbled and sought to regain their balance. Dust and bits of stone fell from the ceiling, and cracks snaked across the floor, widening as they came.

  Until the quaking stopped and the damage disappeared as suddenly and completely as had the runaway plant growth. A long-hafted mace made of granite-colored light appeared in Frigga’s hands – all the violence of the angry earth, Heimdall surmised, concentrated for her use – and she once again circled the bier smashing at each rune in turn.

  The blows failed to damage the marks, and Odin slept on.

  At the end of the futile battering, the mace faded away, and Frigga stumbled a step. Uschi started toward her, and the queen raised a trembling hand to order her to stay back. She then took several deep breaths and began whispering a third spell, this one sibilant as the hissing of a snake.

  This time, Heimdall told himself, the magic will work. In nursery tales and sagas, it was always the third effort that succeeded. He knew full well that life didn’t always adhere to the rhythms of a story, but in this moment, he clung
to the hope anyway.

  The glow of the floating ball had reverted to white after the failure of the second spell, and it didn’t change color now. Instead, it dimmed, ever so slowly but steadily, dying by almost imperceptible degrees.

  As it did, aches pained Heimdall’s joints and back. Alarmed, he peered at his hands, which were gnarled and withered, the knuckles swollen. He looked at Sif. His sister’s hair was grizzled, her face etched with new lines, the flesh loose under her chin, and he realized that old age had sunk its claws even into long-lived Asgardians.

  Only for a little while, though, even if it seemed longer. To his relief, when the whispering ended, Sif, the Valkyries, and Heimdall all became youthful and strong again. With the sight of Mimir, he could tell as much even though the chamber had gone entirely dark.

  He could likewise see that Frigga had cloaked herself in the aspect of something murky and gaunt, something that gave him an instinctive pang of dread even though he knew that the object of all her conjuring was only to help her husband. He wondered if she’d become the personification of time itself, time that obliterates everything in the end. She clenched her claw-like fingers into fists as though crushing something inside.

  Amora’s runes glowed orange and crumbled to nothing like the marks she’d left on the door above. Any awe or fear forgotten, several of the onlookers gasped and babbled to one another that the counter-magic was working. When the last vestige of the traitor’s spell casting turned to ash and vanished, the hovering orb glowed back to life, and a couple Valkyries started to cheer.

  But then they stopped, because Odin slept on. Once again, Heimdall understood just how they felt. He too was aghast.

  Frigga hobbled to the All-Father’s side. The semblance of some ghastly wraith had fallen away, but she still wasn’t herself. She had a stoop, wrinkles on her face, and her hair looked sparse and brittle. She laid her hand on Odin’s shoulder. “Husband!” she quavered. “Wake up! Your people need you!”

  Odin slept on.

  Horrified that the magic had failed, that the All-Father hadn’t roused to save his kingdom, that he and Sif truly had fallen at the last, Heimdall forgot deference and strode back to Frigga unbidden. “Can you tell why it didn’t work?” he asked.

  Blue eyes rheumy in their pouches, the queen gave him a rueful look. “You see me. The forces I invoked took a toll, and at the moment I have little magic left. Still, I have to keep trying, don’t I? Stand there quietly and let me work.”

  She muttered to herself, and in due course used a forefinger to write runes on the air. For just a moment, his improved sight allowed Heimdall to see the signs as streaks of rippling distortion, as though the ambient light were passing through water. At the conclusion of her divination, Frigga slumped and said, “Oh, no.”

  “What is it?” Heimdall asked.

  “I did lift the curse of endless sleep,” said the queen, “but it appears Amora cast it just a day or two after the All-Father entered the vault. With it dissolved, the natural Odinsleep still has the better part of a week to run.”

  Heimdall felt as if someone had kicked him in the stomach. “The frost giants will be here in a day or two.”

  “I know,” Frigga said. “We meant well, but in terms of the war, all we’ve accomplished is to deplete my magic when Asgard needs it most.”

  “Majesty, I am so sorry–”

  The queen raised her hand to silence him, and if youth wasn’t yet returning to her countenance, resolve did. “I thought this was a good idea the same as you did. Now we must manage with the resources we have. I’ve squandered my sorcery for the time being, but the royal mages – the loyal ones – haven’t. Odin can’t help us, but the talisman he depended on for secret wisdom lives on in you. You’ll advise me as I direct the defense.”

  “Me?” Heimdall asked, shocked. His confidence in his own judgment and battle prowess had grown considerably during his journey, but this sudden elevation still felt like far too much. “Majesty, it’s true I now see and hear things better than before, but I’m not an experienced commander. I’m only–”

  “Shut up,” said Sif. “Now’s not the time to be modest. My brother has a sharp mind, Your Majesty, sharp as anyone you’ll find, and now these new gifts as well.”

  The words eased Heimdall’s mind a little. Sif knew him better than anyone, and if she believed he was equal to this challenge, perhaps he actually was. It was at least true that he did have Mimir’s abilities to draw on.

  “If Your Majesty truly does want me,” he said, “I promise to do my best.” He took a breath. “I actually do have an idea or two about how to defend the city.”

  “Then it’s decided,” Frigga said.

  Twenty-Nine

  The frost giants hadn’t quite brought snow to the city of Asgard, but the day was overcast, and a wind colder than the Realm Eternal’s perpetual summer should have permitted gusted out of the north to lash the banners. War bands of Jotuns stood at a safe distance beyond the outer defenses waiting for Skrymir’s signal to attack and giving the defenders ample time to take in the demoralizing spectacle of their hugeness and manifest power.

  Feeling strange in the fancy armor and garments befitting his new status, Heimdall stood with the queen on the highest ramparts of the central keep of the citadel, which afforded them an unobstructed view of the entire city and the ground beyond. Also present were a half dozen royal guards and a mage. Among other duties, the warlock would instantly transmit Frigga’s orders – and Heimdall’s, too, apparently – to Asgardian commanders wherever they might be fighting.

  He hoped those orders, and the advice he’d already given in the two days since the return to the vault of the Odinsleep, for that matter, would prove useful. The Gjallarhorn still hung at his side, and he touched it as if it might bring him luck. That was irrational, he knew, but having the instrument provided a trace of comfort nonetheless. It had, after all, saved his life and Sif’s back in Jotunheim.

  Just as he’d intended, he’d asked a couple of the royal mages to look at the trumpet, and even though they were working as frantically to prepare for the Jotun onslaught as everyone else, they’d given it a cursory examination. As far as they could tell from that brief assessment, its only magical property was to sound very loudly when required. Since it hadn’t turned out to be the devastating weapon Heimdall had hoped it would be, he’d seen no particular reason he shouldn’t retain possession.

  He looked for Sif and found her where she’d been before, crouching with other skirmishers behind one of the houses that still stood in the very outermost defenses. Even though nothing was happening yet, he kept having the impulse to check on her. But his task was to peer in all directions and observe everything, and after a moment he turned his gaze elsewhere.

  Evidently sensing his restlessness, Frigga said, “It won’t be much longer.” Though she didn’t look as old as she had immediately after lifting Amora’s curse, her face was still lined, and she carried herself as if her gilded armor and the tall ornate headpiece that was half helm and half crown weighed on her. Heimdall had little doubt that, just as she’d warned, any major works of magic – or mighty feats of arms, for that matter – were currently beyond her. Even so, he thought with a flicker of humor, he was the one who was nervous.

  “I’m ready, Majesty,” he answered. He stood up straight and tried to look as calm and confident as she did.

  “Do you still see Skrymir?” Frigga asked, eyes narrowing as she peered out at the enemy forces.

  “Yes.” Heimdall pointed. “He’s still over that way with some of the biggest giants.”

  “What about Amora?”

  “So far, there’s no sign of her.”

  “For all her powers and ambitions, she’s never been keen to fight in the forefront of a war. It wouldn’t surprise me if–” The clouds overhead churned and thickened, and the day grew nearly dark as night. A sh
aft of lightning blazed down to strike among the outer defenses, and thunder crashed an instant after.

  Heimdall wasn’t surprised. He’d predicted Skrymir would bring storm giants to the actual siege of Asgard, and though the creatures were staying well back from the front lines, he’d had little trouble spotting them.

  Because Heimdall had warned his fellow Asgardians to expect them, Thor had taken upon himself the task of countering the storm giants’ powers with his own. It was plain he’d set about his work when further blasts of lightning fell not on the defenders but among their foes, and even as it blew stronger and stronger, the wind gusted outward from the city into the giants’ faces.

  But even the God of Thunder couldn’t simultaneously invoke the powers of the storm and clear the sky. As he pitted himself against the storm giants, the day grew darker still, and, possibly hoping the confusion of gloom split by dazzling lighting bursts and full of booming thunderclaps would work to his advantage, Skrymir bellowed and ordered a wave of attackers forward.

  Fortunately, neither the darkness, the glare of the lightning, nor the roar of the thunder befuddled Heimdall’s senses. Even so, when Skrymir brandished his staff of ice and cast a spell, he didn’t see any effect and cast about frantically in an effort to determine what had changed.

  It took several moments before he realized he saw the change but at first hadn’t registered it. There were dozens more frost giants advancing than there had been before their ruler cast the spell, and the figures of the new ones lacked detail. As compared to those that had been pounding along previously, it was the difference between a sketch of a warrior and the warrior himself.

  Heimdall turned to the mage. The latter was a frowning, cadaverous fellow with a pointed goatee, dangling mustachios, and a star-bedizened high-collared cloak who looked like he’d modeled his appearance on that of the wicked warlock characters in many a pantomime and puppet theater. “Some of the advancing giants are illusions meant to divert attention from the ones that are real!”