by Matt Larkin
“How do we cross this madness?”
The bridge … Golden roofed … it crosses between realms …
“Which way?”
Hermod felt a tug at his arms, pulling Sleipnir along to his right. Taking Keuthos’s advice, he guided the horse along the banks of this river of knives, watchful, though he had seen few beings of late. It seemed the deeper he trod into the Roil, the fewer ghosts dared enter these spaces.
A long time more he rode, until at last coming to a covered bridge, its roof thatched with gilded sheets, its peak easily ten times his height. The bridge spanned the river, but within lay a pervasive darkness that seemed almost alive, and, melding with those shadows, a mist that crept halfway across the bridge.
Frost coated the golden roof on the far side, removing any doubt that remained of what lay beyond.
Niflheim.
World of Mist. Domain of Hel and the damned. The world of desolate cold. Odin had speculated that Hel—or Niflheim itself—eventually rounded up most of the dead that wandered the Astral Realm. Few had the strength to evade the dark goddess forever. Thus, wraiths and draugar and perhaps even vampires eventually found themselves drawn to her, though they were not native to her world.
And now Hermod willingly rode into this place of damnation.
Hermod rode up to the bridge’s threshold. High windows allowed in tiny beams of light that failed to quite drive back all the shadows lurking at the fringes, and only served to reflect off the mist.
Sleipnir shied away, and Hermod had to force the horse’s head back around.
“I’m sorry,” he said. “I don’t want to go, either. But Odin has ordered us to retrieve Baldr, and we must do so, whatever the cost.”
The arrogance of it …
Perhaps.
Hermod squeezed his legs and, finally, the horse began to ease forward. Sleipnir’s eight hooves clanked noisily on the wooden boards that made up the bridge’s floor.
They will not let you enter … living …
“Who?” Hermod’s voice sounded a whisper in his own ears. Even then, it seemed too loud, apt to draw unwanted attention to himself in this haunted place.
The guardians …
Hermod’s pulse hammered in his temples. A cold sweat dribbled down the back of his neck. More than aught else, he wanted to turn away, allow Sleipnir to flee. To ride back to the Mortal Realm …
Baldr. Odin swore that Baldr’s death heralded the end of the world. And if they could recover Baldr … and Sif … Hermod had to try.
For a bare heartbeat, he shut his eyes, trying to steady himself. He dared keep them shut for no longer, though. Not even Odin knew what horrors would lurk in his path.
He clenched his fists so tightly around the reins his hands hurt.
“A little more,” he whispered to Sleipnir.
She is watching you …
Who? Hel? Hermod tried to swallow but found himself unable to do so. Whatever else she had become Hel was … Loki’s daughter. She had been just a woman, a mortal woman, before this. And now, she was … what? A draug? Hermod had fought draugar before. Now, he wasn’t going to fight, but rather to bribe her. To negotiate.
He could do this.
So why did the thought of looking upon Loki’s daughter leave him half ready to piss his trousers?
Sleipnir’s hoofbeats continued to echo off the bridge, loud enough to almost drown out the tumultuous river below.
Ahead, the wind howled too, as if a feral beast, sweeping over misty mountains.
In his youth, Hermod would have prayed to the Vanr gods. It had been a long, long time since he had so missed the comfort of his faith. Now, he had no one to call on.
Maybe there were no true gods. The Vanr were men and women become immortal, as were the Aesir. Hel was a ghost. Maybe … maybe just the so-called Elder Gods that seemed to rule the spirit worlds. Somehow, he doubted they held much interest in his prayers.
As he rode further, the mist grew thicker, swirling around him, seeming more alive than the foul vapors that permeated Midgard. As if the mists themselves saw him, judged him unworthy and an interloper here. He, a man not dead, trespassed in Niflheim, the mists seemed to say.
Thicker and thicker, until he could make out no more than a dozen feet ahead of himself, if that. But at last, he reached the terminus of the bridge, and found himself stepping into a world saturated by mist. It was dark here, almost as dark as the Astral Realm, but, amid mist growing ever thicker, he saw shadows of trees. Twisted, misshapen silhouettes, barely visible through the vapors. The trees had only hints of leaves, and all were bent in unnatural angles, as if writhing in agony.
Worse still, they lacked … substance? Bits of them appeared hazy, bleeding off into the mists, unforming and reforming from the corner of his eyes, though he could catch no movement if he looked directly at any given silhouette.
Transitory lands between shadow and cold …
Keuthos meant this was a liminal place, somewhere between the Roil and the greater expanses of Niflheim.
She’s coming …
Hel?
The guardian …
Hermod grasped Dainsleif’s hilt, but did not draw the runeblade. If he could cross this expanse without a fight, he’d prefer to do so.
The hateful mist had begun to whisper, nonsensical, sibilant sounds that felt like claws digging through his skull.
And there … in the depths of the mist, the blurry form of a naked girl, passing through the shadows. Disappearing behind a tree, only to reappear from another, like a flickering shade, half-formed.
Perhaps he could get through this place without a fight, but Hermod doubted he’d pass without at least confronting this guard. He eased Sleipnir forward, though the horse tried to back away once more. It knew something truly foul lurked nigh.
As Hermod approached the trees, he realized some of the trees were further warped out of shape by chains that grew out of the bark and stretched down into the frozen ground. Locked within these chains, something squirmed beneath the tree’s wood.
A … face?
Oh, fuck. Hermod couldn’t lurch away while in the saddle, but he jerked back. An incomplete human form pushed out from the trunk, for a moment, wriggling beneath the surface.
Bound within …
A soul. Locked here in eternal torment. Literally chained inside a tree. The joints of several fingers reached out toward him, straining against the bindings, begging him to touch them, to offer the comfort of warmth and life.
Unwise …
Mercy was unwise? Sympathy?
You do not know …
Didn’t know what would happen if he touched that hand. Would the damned soul within be able to pull Hermod into its prison? Those fingertips gave over and melted back within the tree trunk, vanishing, save for that slight burrowing beneath the surface.
Grimacing, Hermod pushed on, until the hint of the woman he’d seen before passed beside him, silent as death, seen only from the corner of his eye. And much larger than he’d first suspected.
Close to eight feet tall, he’d wager. A jotunn ghost?
Hermod spun on her, but she’d vanished back into the mist once more.
Well, damn it. That was more than enough of this.
Hermod leapt off Sleipnir’s back, drawing Dainsleif in the process. He paused only to grab a shield.
Modgud …
Her name? Was Keuthos telling him her name?
Yes …
He grimaced. All right then. “Modgud!” he bellowed. “Modgud, come and face me!”
A profound silence settled over this twisted forest. To find a wood with no birds or insects or aught else save those hateful whispers, it left him squirming. Slowly, he turned, seeking the—
The woman stood to his side, not three feet from him, gaping down at him. She was stark naked, her flesh yellowish brown, and she had three pendulous breasts and a mouth that was slightly too wide.
Her half smile exposed misshapen teeth with no s
ense of alignment. “Who are you, living man? Why do you dare to cross my bridge?” Her voice was at once sensuous and resounding, leaving his skin crawling.
He opened his mouth, but his throat was so dry he found it hard to form words.
Tell her …
He swallowed. “I am Hermod Agilazson. I have come seeking the gates of Hel for an audience with Hel herself.”
The woman—or creature—snickered, and cocked her head to the side. A hair too far to the side, in fact, for a human neck ought not to have bent so far. She ran a segmented tongue over her upper teeth. “I do not allow the living to enter nor the dead to leave.”
“And yet, you must allow me to do so. I have come to bargain with the Goddess of Mist.”
Offer her something …
Oh, damn it. He’d brought wealth with which to bribe Hel, not her minions. “I can offer you gems and jewels from across the Mortal Realm.”
The creature blinked and, for a bare instant, Hermod would have sworn her pupils had become slitted discs. Yet when he looked again, they seemed normal. “I don’t need rocks.”
Hermod nodded, slowly. Whatever he gave this Modgud would be one less thing he had to offer Hel, and he didn’t even know for certain if the goddess would accept his offerings. If she refused, then what? Was he to give up on Baldr? On Sif?
Or perhaps he ought to simply run Modgud through with Dainsleif. Could this oversized guardian survive a runeblade through her heart?
The ring …
Draupnir? He’d intended to offer that to Hel, as well. But if it meant surviving this encounter, maybe he had no choice. Grimacing, he lowered his shield to the ground, then slipped Odin’s ring from his finger and held it up in his palm so she could inspect it. “Orichalcum.”
The creature leaned down to inspect the ring a moment, then plucked it up with her thumb and forefinger. “And thick with souls. Mmmm.” She snickered. “Very well. Ride on, north, to the wood’s edge where the Hoar Caverns are cut into the glacial wall. Pass through the caverns and beyond the mountain, following the river to its source in the spring of Hvelgemir. Thence flows another river, one that cuts through the Helwind Chasm and leads you to the gates of Hel.”
Hermod hardly trusted himself to speak. Or to keep from fainting at the impossibility of her words. He had truly passed into Niflheim, the most feared world in all creation. “Thank you.”
How timid he sounded.
Modgud didn’t answer, but rather, stepped back into the mist and disappeared once more. All around issued forth the sound of wood cracking, warping. Trees bending into further unnatural shapes at her command.
Much as he misliked parting with Draupnir, Keuthos had given him a way past Modgud.
Yes … But greater peril lies ahead … You will not love this land …
An understatement.
Hermod mounted Sleipnir once more.
Whatever lay ahead, though, he’d face it. He had not come so far to turn back now.
7
Walking along the Bilröst seemed surreal, even after having taken it several times before. Saule walked beside Freyja, with the Sun Knight’s retinue trailing behind. The closer they drew to the Mortal Realm, the less substantial the other liosalfar seemed. Despite the bridge’s power to allow passage across the Veil, it couldn’t allow non-physical beings to retain substance in the Mortal Realm.
Perhaps the Veil itself ensured that remained impossible.
As promised, Odin had arranged numerous hosts on the far side, all bound and kneeling, probably having no idea what awaited them. The sight made Freyja frown. Only the strongest of spirits could claim a totally unwilling host. Most of the time, a host unknowingly invited the spirit in, often as they drew nigh to death and sought for any recourse to avert that end. Even those spirits who could claim a host without a faltering of the subject’s will could most oft only do so if they were already across the Veil.
Thanks to the Bilröst, Odin had arranged just that. Victims, hale, and yet about to lose themselves. Would they see it coming? Oh, they stared at her as she descended the shimmering arc and stepped down before Yggdrasil. When she looked back, though, she could no longer see Saule or those who had sworn to her.
Freyja embraced the Sight to look across the Veil, and, sure enough, there Saule was, treading among the kneeling victims, examining each in turn, even as her people did the same.
She’d want a female, of course. Most spirits preferred hosts of the same gender, and they were easier to claim, according to most sources.
Odin’s prisoners comprised a roughly even mix of male and female hosts, a score of them, though Saule had only brought a dozen liosalfar along. Still, more than half her followers were female too, so the majority of the women here were like to lose themselves this day.
Centuries ago, Freyja would have objected. Even as a Vanr, immortal, she’d have stood in outrage at such an affront to humanity, as unwilling subjects were offered up to spirits as vessels. Yes, she had made such sacrifices when working sorcery, and yes, it had bothered her less and less with each passing offering. Now, though … now she found it hard to even hold on to the feelings of indignation she knew she ought to have felt. She could remember the sensation, but she couldn’t quite pull herself out of the apathy that had her transfixed.
Even as Eguzki selected a girl Saule had passed up, one probably with no more than sixteen winters behind her. Eguzki placed her hands upon the girl’s head and her victim shuddered. She wouldn’t feel the touch as a touch, so much as a chill, a profound sense of wrongness brushing against her. Eguzki leaned in and kissed the girl, deeply, and the host stiffened, moaning in distress.
The liosalfar’s form turned to light and melted into the girl, who began thrashing, her moans became frantic, wordless cries of terror, like a victim caught in a nightmare, desperate to scream but unable to get it all the way out.
Freyja stood, hands on her hips, watching, even as others began to undergo the same convulsions, overcome with fear and discomfort as alien presences entered their bodies, beat down their consciousnesses, and feasted on the fringes of their souls. Why could she not look away? Why could she not still feel revulsion at this spectacle of mass possession that ought to have terrified the most jaded of mortal criminals?
The answer, of course, was obvious. She’d lost that part of herself, through her sorceries as a mortal, and through her transformation into a liosalf. Maybe one day, she’d even lose the ability to take on corporeal form as she did now. Maybe her only remaining recourse would lie in taking a host, just this way. Damn, how badly she wished that could horrify her.
Instead, she watched, impassive, as Malakbel forced himself inside a scarred warrior. As Malina selected a woman with a single streak of gray in her hair and lines around her eyes. As Saule herself took a sandy-haired shieldmaiden and drove her into convulsions as she struggled in vain against a foe she could not see or touch or ever hope to overcome.
Face dark, Odin moved to Freyja’s side, continuing to watch the spectacle himself. Her lover hardly seemed moved to pity over it, and yet, he did not seem well pleased to witness such a thing either. Driven, not by the self-absorbed lack of empathy of spirits, but rather by the perhaps even more merciless whims of necessity? He had bemoaned the web of urd many times to her, steadfastly refusing to look into the future in the vague hope that might somehow allow him to avert it.
She had pointed out—and he had acknowledged it as if he’d known all along—the flaw in that logic lay in the assumption that the web did not already account for his choosing not to use the Sight at the present juncture. That, just because he did not look at the future, did not mean it did not exist in a fixed progression.
“How to win a game when the rules demand you lose?” he mumbled, as if reading her mind. Or, perhaps, simply caught in the question that never seemed to offer him any respite. It drove him to the brink of madness, whether waking or sleeping. It tormented him, the thought that all he’d become and done and would do
had been decided by urd.
He had said, once, that he’d long accepted a certain inevitability within the visions. But in coming to the realization that such a set course had come from the Norns, from figures who themselves had written their web of urd, it had vexed him beyond endurance.
Or rather, Freyja feared, it had broken him, something that neither a millennium in the Tower of the Eye nor all his sacrifices and losses had managed to achieve. Odin teetered on the edge of utter despondency, such that Freyja feared to add to his burdens by pushing the issue. His mission carried him forward with a desperation and momentum that, alone, kept him from toppling to the ground.
“I don’t have a good answer to that,” she finally said.
“Hmm. I do. Find a way to break the rules.”
Oh, but if the rules themselves accounted even for such an attempt? To think of it made her want to despair, so she dared not give voice to it. The web of urd had them all. But Odin seemed to believe that, given an audacious enough play, he might yet sever the strands that bound him.
And that, at least, allowed Freyja to move beyond the profound apathy that settled upon her when she tried to feel for these victims.
When it was done, Odin had the possessed hosts freed from their bindings, while the others were led away.
He laid a hand upon Freyja’s shoulder. “I’ve a few things to see to. Your brother awaits you in Sessrumnir. We’ll have to leave for the feast soon, though. Before the day is out.”
Well then, she supposed she’d have to call upon Frey.
Sessrumnir was the only part of the Vanaheim Freyja yet recognized. Oh, she could look and imagine where old halls had stood, where the brilliant forests had flowered. But the old halls had been replaced with new ones, and spires she didn’t know, while forests had been cut back only to grow in new directions.
Everything had become like a dream, faded, different, and yet, still drawn from the same canvas. But Sessrumnir, oh, that at least she knew. They’d told her that a woman named Sigyn had kept the library in her absence, though they’d done away with the aspect of Sessrumnir as a school for the Art.