by Ben Galley
Farden looked back over his shoulder to the western coasts, supposedly of Normont. Dark clouds filled that half of the horizon, masking every glimpse of Mogacha.
‘Better get below, sire. Goin’ to get awful wet and choppy up here. Wouldn’t want any harm to come to our guests now would, we?’
As if to illustrate the captain’s point, the Seventh Sister collided with a heavy wave and lurched to port. Farden had to seize a nearby line to keep from falling. His bones ached beneath his armour. Every day now a new pain or crick appeared in his ageing body, and refused to fade.
Farden eyed each of them, watching their pursed lips before he turned and left. He beckoned to the vampyre and Mithrid. The stairs, not least because they were worn and wet, gave him trouble. His ankles complained with every step. By the time he reached the lower deck, the others had caught up with him. Farden was irked to see the vampyre moving spryer than he was. To think Durnus had used a cane in Scalussen was bewildering. Farden momentarily pondered if he should try sapping souls like Durnus. He shrugged that thought away as quickly as it had come.
They found Warbringer and Aspala in a curious state. Farden reached for his knife at the sight of their broad and chary eyes. They seemed torn between their friends in the open doorway and something within the cabin. Even Aspala looked pale. Farden kicked at the door, splintering its frame. His ankle protested sharply.
Inside, they found nothing but a spiral of candle smoke churning in the corner of the malodorous cabin. The wicks spat and hissed. As Farden stared, wondering which magick had caused it, the smoke took shape. Limbs unfolded from the air. Hair cascaded. Edges were drawn in a pale light like dew on spider’s silk. Colours shone in crystalline hues. Within moments, a woman’s form coalesced in the flickering corner.
Only Durnus and Farden didn’t shrink away. Mithrid even raised her axe to defend herself. But they knew the presence of a goddess when they saw it. The vampyre shut the door.
‘Evernia, goddess of magick,’ Farden breathed. That might have counted as the first time he was actually happy to see the goddess. She was naught but a bearer of ill news, a messenger of meddlers who spoke in riddles. Yet now, she would have the answers Farden wished for.
Before he could speak, another form began to grow from the smoke. Farden recognised its square jaw and build. It was Heimdall, the god who could see and hear from horizon to horizon. He could catch the whisper of a single hair falling, or glimpse the very threads of magick flicker through the air. Farden had not seen Heimdall’s tawny-haired shadow for two decades. Like Evernia, his form still smoked at its very edges, glowing gently with a light the candles had no business casting.
‘Two of your shadows. This must be an important visit,’ Farden greeted them. He spared no bow, not even for the gods.
‘We have come with a warning. Something follows you,’ Heimdall spoke with a voice akin to tumbling boulders.
‘A dark figure with a storm surrounding it. We know, we’ve seen it. But as usual, you’re late,’ said Farden. ‘It has something to do with Loki and my Book, I know it.’
‘Your Book?’ Evernia twitched.
‘Loki stole it,’ said the mage, chewing each of his words. ‘A copy of my Book that I myself made years ago.’
The goddess clasped her hands before her. Despite the stink of candle smoke, he could feel a cold breeze scented with grass.
‘And you yourself have no magick either. How?’ she asked.
Farden avoided her stare and paced around them. ‘The how doesn’t bloody matter. What matters is what or who this… thing is. Can you tell me that?’
Heimdall sounded tortured. ‘Much to my displeasure, Loki still averts my gaze and my ears. Evernia came close to seeing with her own eyes. We do not know what he has forged or birthed, except a twining of daemonblood and magick. As such, it threatens us all. The very existence of Haven, Hel, and all between it.’
‘Whatever Loki has done, he has created a force that bends the flow of magick for leagues around. I have never felt the like of which,’ Evernia said.
Farden couldn’t help but scoff. It had been long ago when he realised the fallacy of gods and humankind’s dogged belief in their sanctity and sacrifice. They could be killed, born. Farden had even drawn blood from a certain god of lies. ‘Even you, the goddess who created magick?’ he asked.
‘Even the Last War pales in comparison to this new danger.’ Evernia tilted her head as though she had heard a distant scream. ‘Magick…’ It was a marvel to see the god hesitate. ‘Was borrowed by the gods. It existed before us and may outlast us. I only harnessed the power of its song to give humans a weapon against the daemons and their elves. It was our right to do so, to save this world from such evils.’
‘If this creature following us is made of magick, then I can fight it,’ Mithrid blurted, standing tall beside the mage. ‘I can kill it. That’s what I was made for.’
Evernia regarded her for the first time. Farden might have been mistaken, but he would have argued he saw a slight frown upon the goddess’ porcelain face.
‘You have done enough already, Mithrid of Hâlorn,’ whispered Evernia. ‘Irminsul was a daring gamble. You know not of what you trifled with.’
‘We did what we had to do,’ said Farden.
Mithrid was more concerned with how a goddess knew her name. ‘You know me?’
‘We have watched you ever since you stepped onto the ice, Mithrid,’ said Heimdall.
Evernia’s eyes were like those of an eagle’s, silently calculative and emotionless. ‘You stoked the volcano and stopped Farden from consuming Emaneska in fire.’
Farden had to bite his lip to keep silent.
‘That is what you were made for. That is what should remain your crowning achievement besides continuing to protect your king. I do not understand you, girl. You are not what was expected or foretold, and that is dangerous.’
Farden interrupted any complaint that might have been hovering on Mithrid’s tongue. The girl looked fit to show some spit to the goddess. He saved her the trouble. Once again, the gods had proved useless. ‘So what you’re saying is you have no information for us? Something or someone of great power follows us, but you have no idea what? Wonderful.’
‘We have not come to warn you of this creature, nor of the magick that follows you. We had to roam far and wide to find you,’ spoke Evernia, regarding the cabin’s occupants with slow drifts of her head.
Farden raised an eyebrow. ‘I haven’t been hard to find, surely? I’ve been calling for you for days. Even you, Heimdall?’
The stoic god had never learned the meaning of a facial expression. ‘We have come to tell you a magick keeps you from my eyes and ears. The same magick that hides Loki.’
Farden heard Warbringer growl behind him.
Evernia’s bare feet made no noise upon the deck as she approached.
‘This trinket,’ Evernia pointed to the knife in Farden’s hand. Her fingers never touched him, but weaved shapes around his. ‘It is of mortal making but it has a god’s charm upon it. A spell. An unseen thread that reaches for countless miles through mountain and forest. Heimdall can sense it faintly now that we have found you.’
‘He is tracking that knife like your own footprints,’ Heimdall explained.
With a deep scowl, the mage stared at the gold filigree wrapped around the silver blade. Farden resisted the urge to march up to the deck and hurl the knife into the sea.
‘So that’s how he found us, no matter the distance we’ve travelled.’
‘And why he will keep following us,’ added Durnus. ‘Until we have found the spear. It would appear we are doing his bidding after all. We should throw the knife away.’
Evernia drifted closer to the vampyre. ‘The spear? Which spear?’
Durnus caught Farden’s glance. There was a perturbed nature to the goddess’ tone.
Evernia’s hair rose up around her as if she was underwater. ‘Which spear, mage? Speak.’
Farden
crossed his arms in challenge. ‘The spear of Teh’Mani. The God-Corpser. The Skyrender. The Allfather’s spear that killed Sigrimur. Gunnir. Have you heard of it?’
‘Of course I have, insolent mage,’ Evernia hissed, light flashing beneath her pearlescent skin. All gods remember Gunnir. Built by the elves for evil until the gods recovered the weapon. It was that spear the Allfather entrusted to humanity as protection against those that escaped the sky. We realised it was not meant for mortal hands. It was hidden to keep it from greed and evil and it should stay hidden. This is why you are so far from the others of Scalussen?’
‘And so it does exist!’ Farden laughed. The sound was harsh in the diminutive cabin. He had his answers, no matter. ‘It is good to know for sure at last, and the fact that you so clearly fear it is exactly what I needed to hear. That proves it’s the weapon I need against Loki. Unless, of course, for some reason you don’t want him dead?’
Evernia drew tall, haughty. Wind blew about the cabin like the vanguard of an oncoming storm. The light fell from her face. Shadows lengthened.
‘That god has betrayed everything we have ever stood for. Once we were trapped in the heavens, we poured our all into new gods such as Loki, all of our faith and hope for mortal-kind. We gave him the task of raising the dawn, named him the Morningstar, and yet he has become our darkest failure. My darkest failure. He is the only one of the gods that walks in our true, full form, yet he works to destroy his own kind. He turns our world against us.’
Evernia spoke as a mother staring at her murderer of a son upon the gallows. Farden watched her with interest. The disappointment was raw. He had never seen such emotion in the goddess. Perhaps Loki was closer to her than the other gods. More offspring than brother.
It was Heimdall who saw to the heart of the matter. ‘If Loki follows you, then his gaze is undoubtedly fixed on the spear. To unearth it would be to risk it falling into his possession. With Gunnir, Loki could rule every scrap of land between east and west. The daemons would fall at his feet. He could bring back the elves from their banishment. He would be unstoppable.’
‘Then that is what he wants. That is his goal,’ Durnus breathed.
Evernia was solemn. Heimdall spoke for her.
‘He is determined to bring chaos to the lands. From his very lips came promises of carnage and a world aflame. Loki would watch us all burn. Mage, god, beast. Emaneska to this Easterealm. That is what he strives for.’
Farden swallowed his hesitation. ‘Then all the more reason to find the spear. I will find it, I will keep it from Loki’s hands, and with it, I will fix this world of its evil once and for all. If you want to stop me, Evernia, then you are welcome to try.’
Heimdall said no more and faded into the shadows in the corner. Evernia remained, battling to hold the mage’s stare. It was a while until she managed words.
‘Be careful, mage. Not merely because you hold the world in your stubborn hands once more, but fear what Gunnir may bring you, if you do succeed against the great odds of finding it. The cost of the spear’s earning is greater than its wielding. Even the Allfather knew that. It broke Sigrimur, and it can break you.’
Farden made no reply as the goddess deliquesced into nothing but smoke. The others, save Durnus, were left staring at the dark corner and wondering whether they could trust their eyes. The vampyre just levelled a tired leer at him, as if the gods deserved a bent knee and a lit candle instead of Farden’s rebellion.
It was Warbringer who spoke first. ‘Who was that?’ she grunted. Her broad cow-eyes blinked unevenly. Her nostrils flared over and over.
‘A goddess and a god, my good minotaur,’ answered Durnus. ‘Here to warn us.’
Farden scoffed.
Aspala piped up, drawing Mithrid’s guilty attention.
‘Did you just… did you just insult a god?’ she asked.
‘Two, most likely,’ answered Farden, as nonchalant as if he had just slapped a peasant.
Mithrid was still staring at Farden’s knife. It still hadn’t left the mage’s hand. Guilt wracked her. Though she still took Loki as an enemy by rote, the god had saved her life. She felt she betrayed her own life by speaking the truth, and yet it had gone too long without being voiced. Too important now.
‘Farden,’ she began, hesitant when the mage whirled on her. ‘The knife is mine.’
She could feel the weight of Aspala and Warbringer’s eyes. They were nothing compared to the fiery attention of the mage.
‘Excuse me?’
‘The knife is mine,’ Mithrid admitted again. Confessions always came easier with repetition, no matter the crime they told. ‘Loki gave it to me.’
‘You better talk faster than that,’ barked Farden.
‘If I might interject,’ Durnus said, trying to maintain the peace, ‘though the question of our mysterious enemy might fox even the gods, their reaction to the mention of the spear is encour—’
Mithrid cut across him, talking only to Farden. The rest of the cabin might as well not have existed. ‘In the battle with the steel dragon, I almost died. One of my friends I thought dead in Troughwake – one of Malvus’ soldiers – she almost stabbed me. She would have, had Loki not appeared at the last moment, dropped this knife on my chest, and then disappeared. I threw it away on the Cathak’s mountain, outside Lilerosk. The two Cathak found it, and shortly after that, you took it from them. I didn’t want to say anything when you picked it up, in case you doubted me. Now, I’ve realised my mistake. We should have thrown it away or buried it long ago.’
Farden held up the knife, examining it in the light as if he wondered what Mithrid’s blood would look like decorating it. As she was about to fill the silence with more explanation, he spoke.
‘The god saved your life?’ asked Farden.
‘That he did.’
‘Why?’
Mithrid shrugged. The question had never left her mind. ‘How should I know what a god thinks? I’m just glad he did it, I don’t care why.’
Farden stabbed the air repeatedly with his finger. ‘Nothing that monster does is without some dark purpose. When in Hel were you going to tell me?’
‘I don’t know!’
‘Loki’s own knife,’ Farden snapped.
Before Mithrid could answer him, there came a sharp rapping at the door.
The mage yelled in answer. ‘What is it?’
‘Some trouble you might want to see,’ said a sailor from the passageway beyond.
‘We’ll discuss this later,’ Farden whispered, shortly before whipping open the door to reveal the scrawny fellow that kept looking Mithrid up and down.
‘What kind of trouble?’ asked Farden.
The man chewed something black and viscous with an open mouth. ‘The kind that needs all of youses attention.’
‘Up there?’ the minotaur rumbled.
The sailor said no more and slunk swiftly down the passage.
‘Trouble, he says,’ Aspala sighed. ‘I’m looking forward to a time when there’s no trouble, when we’re not running or being chased. I feel like I’ve spent half my life doing that. I’m tired of running.’
‘As do I,’ muttered the mage. He glowered at Mithrid as he left. ‘We’ll speak of this later.’
The others gathered their things and went aloft one by one.
Mithrid enjoyed the feel of the cold air. The sky was a bruised blue, and the waves peaked in regular intervals that pounded the cumbersome prow of the Seventh Sister. The crew were spread about the ship, idly manning ropes and generally looking useless and work-shy as always. The captain, aloft by the wheel, halted them on the main deck with a hand.
‘Stay right there, the waves are treacherous,’ he forebode them.
Mithrid had decided the captain had the energy and semblance of a plump fish. One that was constantly gasping for air with jiggles of his chins. Even his skin had a slickness to it. Not scales, mind, but the grease of sweat and no soap.
‘Then why are we on deck? What is it? Pirates?
Leviathans, what?’ Durnus called out.
The captain cackled abruptly. ‘Trouble with your payment, it seems!’
Pulleys squealed above them. A net hidden in the rigging descended, wrapping them in its embrace. Mithrid thrashed at the coarse ropes that fell against her head. There was a moment of struggle before she realised the others had remained still.
‘What’s going on?’ Mithrid asked, but the captain was uttering his ultimatum.
‘We know that old man’s got plenty more Golikan leaves. Coin that you thought you could avoid payin’ us. If you want to spend another day alive and aboard my ship, then you can give us the rest of your coin, and we will be kind enough to cast you on the nearest beach without so much as a scratch. If you don’t…’ The captain pressed his fist into his palm, like dough wrapping over a dish. ‘Well, we might be forced to ’urt you.’
Warbringer grunted in amusement.
‘Is this how you treat all your passengers, Captain?’ hollered Farden through the netting.
‘Just the ones that have the coin or leaves to spare and the stupidity to flash it around. Pay us all you’ve got, or we’ll knife you. Or throw you overboard for the whales to eat. I’ll give you that choice.’
‘How generous!’ Farden brayed in an amused tone. Some might have called it fearless, but from Mithrid’s perspective, she viewed it as reckless. Farden’s hands were already on his twin Cathak swords.
‘I’ll give you one more warning,’ he sighed. ‘And then you’ll get what’s coming to you. We’ve worked too hard and travelled too far to have you bilge-stinking reprobates stand in the way. We’ve killed plenty fiercer than you.’
The other sailors looked to their captain for reassurance. Farden’s threat had shaken them. Squeezed into a corner of pride and indecision, and eager to squish the sack of worms he had just opened, the captain blurted an order he would later – and very soon – regret.
‘Kill them!’
‘Durnus? If you please?’ Farden yelled.
The vampyre seized the net with his skeletal hands. It seemed to take him a fraction more concentration than usual, but Mithrid felt the unpleasant pressure of magick on her skin. Flame sprouted from Durnus’ fingertips like the wicks of candles. Despite the sodden nature of the ropes, the magick seared the net’s tendrils. Mithrid grinned at the surprise on the crew’s faces even as the cinders fell across her face. She saw the trout of a captain, who looked decidedly undecided about how his gambit was going, flapping his jaws as if he had forgotten his script. Mithrid seized her axe and stared down the nearest sailor, who wielded a bloody and hooked fish-knife.