by Matt Larkin
It had … turned back time?
For a moment, he could only gape.
Well, how fast could it do that?
The Norns had wanted a Destroyer. They’d fucking get one.
Growling, Odin lunged forward, whipping Gungnir around in vicious arcs, slicing into leg after leg as he made his way toward the bulbous central body. Legs slammed down around him, vanishing from one place and appearing right where he’d stood an instant before.
Desperately, Odin caught hold of prescient Sight—it kept trying to slip from his grasp!—allowing him to predict where a leg would appear and dodge around it. His growl had become a roar of defiance. A refusal to accept fate.
Ichor had washed over him, though it continually flowed back from his clothes in all directions, sucking once more inside the creature’s dozens of wounds.
Odin dashed around one leg and drove Gungnir straight into one of the Norn’s multitude of eyes. The lens exploded in a shower of gore and the creature bellowed, for the first time seeming more pained than simply enraged.
With a snarl, Odin yanked the blade sideways, tearing out flesh, cutting straight into another eye.
“I’ll hack you into a thousand pieces! Can you turn back time when I cut out your fucking brain?”
Again and again, he hewed into the abomination. So fast, even the creature could not seem to turn back time quickly enough to heal all the wounds he dealt. Nor did it seem half so easy for it to fix the damage he’d done to its central core.
It kept thrusting at him with those spider legs, and only his own prescient insight allowed him to avoid getting skewered. He leapt over a leg just as it appeared and thrust Gungnir out, once more impaling the Norn.
All he had to do was cause so much damage its brain gave out. At least, he hoped all he had to do—
Another dís appeared from nowhere. Space bent around her, and she stepped out, almost like stepping through the Veil, only she had not come from the Penumbra. Before Odin could react, a spider leg thrust down, impaling his shoulder.
Gungnir slipped from nerveless fingers.
With a shriek, the creature jerked the leg up, flinging Odin free of it and sending him bodily tumbling through the air. One of the Norn’s more massive legs caught him midair and smacked into him like a giant club, sending him colliding with the cavern wall.
Breath blasted from his lungs.
Everything grew hazy.
Before he could even start to rise, the dís appeared next to him, hefting him up with her human hand. A spider leg plunged through his other shoulder and drove him back against the wall.
Odin tried to scream in pain but couldn’t even get a breath in. The dís reared back and slammed her fist into his face. Odin’s head cracked against the wall. That fist came back and smacked into his chin, sending him colliding with the wall once more.
A flash of white.
A ringing sound.
More blows landing on his head. His ribs. His gut.
Everything swirling around him. A weightlessness as he fell into oblivion.
29
The narrow tunnel seemed to want to close in around Narfi. On his belly, he crawled forward by his elbows, trying to ignore his injuries and the fresh scrapes along his arms. Sweat and dirt mingled to sting his eyes. Not that he could see a damn thing in here, regardless.
Every so often, a fibrous root blocked the way forward, and he had to wriggle his way around it. If any of those totally barred the tunnel he’d be well and truly fucked, no mistake. There weren’t no turning around in here and he didn’t even want to think on crawling backward for the next hour or more.
How had it come to this?
Every bone in his body ached now. Hard to breathe, even … What with his army, he should have been able to overcome the blundering oaf Thor. Instead, he found himself half-dead, crawling through the dark into some warren beneath the World Tree.
Nidhogg’s realm?
Shit. No. The dark dragon weren’t down here. Sure enough, he’d heard it told Odin had encountered the serpents in Naströnd, far below the World Tree. Vafthrudnir knew the dark dragon, too, and feared it more than aught else. But Narfi had to believe that this space weren’t so liminal as to allow him to slip through the boundaries between worlds to whatever abominable landscape held that reality. Because if it was, if the Veil had grown so thin …
Don’t think on it. He couldn’t hardly afford such thoughts. That sort of thing would just get him killed all the faster. Only way left to him was forward, he reckoned, and that meant he had to just keep crawling and hope he weren’t edging his way close to the bounds of that place.
Some told it like Naströnd bordered on Hel’s domain. An irony that. Would his sister actually help him, if he stumbled up to her gates?
Well, the Sight kept on pulling him forward, which meant, one way or another, his path lay down this tunnel. He reckoned he’d not have seen himself crawling in the dark unless he was meant to do so.
The ground beneath his hands became slick, slimy almost, but harder, like wet rock. Huh. Found a cavern? Narfi patted around until he found an opening, almost too narrow to squeeze through, but it did seem the only way forward.
So.
What did that leave him? Crawling arse-first back the way he’d come, or risking getting stuck in the rock and starving to death. Didn’t reckon either option sounded too enticing.
“Oh, fuck it all.”
Narfi grabbed the lip of rock and slid himself forward, up until his brow was pushing against that slimy surface. He had to turn his head sideways to manage through it. Cold moisture brushed over his cheek, but the slickness made it easier to squeeze through. Once he’d got his shoulders in, he caught a faint glimmer of light.
If he hadn’t been crawling around in the dark for an hour or more, he probably wouldn’t have noticed it, not that low. But there was some light source ahead, no mistake. Light had to mean a way out, he reckoned, and aught was better than staying here a moment longer.
Grunting, and wriggling, he pulled himself along the rock surface. His hands kept slipping out from under him, and the path seemed to be sloping a bit forward, water dribbling down along it like—
His hand brushed over open air. Narfi grabbed at the tunnel’s side to steady himself, only water had slicked that too, and his hand slipped. He pitched forward, slid down a crack, and then flailed, plummeting through open air for a heartbeat. Enough to catch a flicker of light. Not half enough to figure on where he was.
Then he slammed hard into water. It knocked the wind from him. Shot up his nose, burning. Blackness all around.
Struggling, not half sure which way was even up, he flailed around. His fingers burst through the surface, then his head. Then he set to choking and coughing, scarce able to keep himself from sinking under again.
“Get out of the water!” someone shouted.
Narfi reckoned that sounded wise. Over to his left, a torch on a pole provided the only source of light. Gasping, he swam for it. Something brushed against his leg. Something large and slick, sinuous.
Oh, fuck!
Frantic, Narfi swam faster, trying to ignore his injuries.
Don’t let it be a serpent. Not one of Nidhogg’s brood. That’d be the last damn thing he needed, no mistake. His legs brushed the rock surface beneath, and then he was scrambling out of the waters and onto the shore.
There was a raft there, tied up, and beside it, two dead guards. Lying in pools of their own blood, ice crystals over their faces, though it weren’t over-cold down here.
“Narfi?”
He looked up sharply at his name, and there, chained to a stalagmite in a pool of water, stood Father. The man looked wrung-out ragged, maybe worse than Narfi felt.
Unless this were all some fever dream.
Narfi climbed to his feet and limped his way over to his father. Then he poked him with one finger.
Father grabbed him and drew him into an embrace. “What happened?”
“
Shouldn’t you know?”
“I’m too far away from the flame to see things. I only know what I’ve seen in the past.”
“Reckon that weren’t enough to keep you from getting chained down here. We under a mountain?”
Father nodded.
Narfi blew out a breath. His throat and sinuses still hurt from having saltwater running over them. Grimacing, he planted a foot on the stalagmite and grabbed the chain. Then he called pneuma to his arms and heaved. The chain creaked but didn’t budge.
“It’s orichalcum,” Father said. “You can’t break it.”
No. He refused to believe that. He’d already lost half his army, but he’d see the rest of the Aesir paid for what they’d done. Drawing in a deep breath, Narfi heaved again. Pulled until he felt like his guts would spill out, then collapsed to the ground, splashing the water around father.
Damn it.
Narfi wiped his brow with his elbow. “Has to be a way to sever this.”
Father’s eyes were red as he looked at him, like he’d wept. Didn’t hardly seem like him in the least, not as Narfi knew him.
“For my brother?” Narfi asked. “That’s why I’m here. I killed Frigg and I aim to see all the rest dead for what they’ve done. Where’s Mother?”
Father swallowed hard, and sank down to kneel in the pool in front of Narfi. “Gone. Hermod murdered her.”
“What? B-because of my attack?”
“No. Old vengeance for a mistake made centuries ago.”
Narfi spit. “One worth killing his own sister over?” Father opened his mouth, but Narfi didn’t want to hear no excuses. “Don’t reckon that matters none. If you’re down here, I know who else is, too. And now I know what it meant, me seeing the wolf.”
Father reached out to grab his wrist, but Narfi pulled away. “Don’t do this.”
“You’re saying I can’t break these chains. You know I would if I could, but I reckon you’d know, one way or the other. Seeing as it stands, I’m gonna find a different ally, and I’m gonna see every last Ás sent down to Hel. They deserve it, whatever she’ll do to them.”
“No one deserves that. Narfi, please—”
He backed away, shaking his head. “I’m gonna find a way to get you free, too, then we’ll see about avenging Hödr and Mother, both. Reckon the wolf is the way to end this dynasty for good.”
“You cannot control Fenrir.”
“Don’t need to control him. Just need to point him at them trollfuckers what I want eaten, and let him do the rest.”
Father grimaced, but Narfi turned away so he wouldn’t have to look on it. Grief had made the man weak, maybe. Could be, but it had only strengthened Narfi’s resolve. If Fenrir was the way to vengeance, well then, Fenrir was the one he needed to see.
He grabbed the torch first, then the guide pole, and shoved the raft off the shore, steering toward the island in the distance.
It weren’t too far, and then the raft scraped up against another rocky shore.
A snarl greeted him. Deep, guttural, resounding over the waters. The object of his search. Still, his own damn feet didn’t much want to tread onward. Traitorous feet, truth be told. They had him edging his way forward like he hadn’t ridden a varg or fought a war.
The firelight, it glinted red off those eyes. Over there, at the small island’s heart, a man stood bound by another orichalcum chain, and that run through a bored out rock. The man wore naught save some rags around his loins, and his hair and beard were long. Fierce and wild.
“The king sends me another meal?” the man said, voice half a growl.
Those chains, they reached long enough Narfi judged the varulf could almost reach him.
He had to reckon that meant he’d gone quite far enough. “You are Fenrir.”
“Yes.” The man trod forward, to the extent of the chains. Close enough Narfi could feel his hot breath. The varulf sniffed him. “Not human. Not quite. Half jotunn?”
Narfi didn’t see much reason to answer that. “I’m looking for an ally.”
It began as a chuckle, deep in the varulf’s throat, before rumbling upward into full-blown mocking laughter. “And you come here? Has the mist addled your simple brain?”
Maybe it had at that. “You’re no friend to Odin, that much I know.” That, and that the wolf would kill the Ás king and shatter the whole dynasty.
“Ahhh. So the king did not send you. I thought I smelled blood over the water a time ago.”
Well, that weren’t Narfi, but he didn’t reckon it made much difference. “The Aesir murdered my brother. My mother. Bound my father in chains what I can’t break.”
“Oh. You're his son, then. Hmmm.” Fenrir jerked on his fetters, setting them to jangling. “You seem to not realize the same bindings hold me.”
“Reckoned you’d know of a way to break them.”
The varulf chortled again, shaking his head. “These chains are forged from the tormented souls of the damned. Their sufferings resound through eternity. No mortal effort could end that.”
Narfi worked his jaw. He refused to believe he’d wasted the trip out here. Fenrir would kill Odin, this he knew. “You must know something that can release you.”
The varulf licked his lips. “I can smell it on you. The desperation. The burning need for vengeance even as it slips from your fingers. You’ve lost, haven’t you? You struggled and you failed. You teeter on the precipice between glory and wretchedness.”
Narfi stepped forward, not caring it brought him into reach of the varulf. “Reckon we both want to avenge ourselves against Odin and his kin. Me, I’ve sworn to see Asgard brought down. So you tell me how we can do that, and you won’t never have a truer ally than me.”
“Are you certain? You’re willing to make any sacrifice for your vengeance?”
Narfi shrugged. After what Odin and Frigg and now Hermod had done to his kin … naught could matter next to setting that right. “I’ll do whatever it takes.”
Fenrir snickered. “All right. Do you know what I am?”
“A varulf.”
“The varulf progenitor. Stronger than any other varulf. A prince of my kind. But I cannot simply abandon a host, especially not bound by orichalcum. So for four centuries I waited, fettered in this dismal cavern. Do you know why they don’t simply kill me?”
Narfi could harbor a guess. “Odin has his sick sense of justice, what would have his enemies suffering for all time.”
“No.” Fenrir shook his head, his grin exposing teeth that looked a little too pointed. “No. If my host dies, I can move on, claim almost any other mortal in range. They cannot kill me, because destroying my host body would free me to take another.”
Oh. Huh. Well, fuck. Narfi glowered at the varulf.
“Oh, yes. You see it now. You cannot break my chains. But you … you do not wear chains.” Fenrir’s grin was sickening, truth be told. This weren’t part of the plan. “Kill this body, and I enter yours. And then, I promise you all the vengeance you could dream of against Odin and all who follow him.” If that weren’t the most mist-mad plan he’d ever heard, he’d be damned. “You said you would do whatever it took.”
Right. Narfi had said that, and meant it too. He still fucking meant it. Hadn’t reckoned that included getting turned into no wolf, though.
He sniffed, looking hard into the varulf’s eyes.
Odin’s followers had killed Hödr. They’d murdered both of Narfi’s mothers. They’d bound Father so that he couldn’t be freed. What was Narfi’s life, compared to vengeance for all that? The Aesir had wrought their own damnation.
“Your oath,” he said.
“I swear to destroy everything Odin has built. I swear, I shall taste his blood.”
“Free Father.”
“I can’t break those chains, but I won’t harm him.”
Narfi grunted. Well, he’d reckoned as much, but it won’t not hurt in the asking. “Kill Odin. Use my body to kill that trollfucker.”
“I give you my oath.”
“Reckon that’ll do, then.” Narfi slid a knife free from his belt.
Fenrir grinned once more, grabbing him by both shoulders. So eager.
And why not? Odin’s cruelty had bound him here for so very long.
“Send them all to Hel,” Narfi said. Then he rammed the knife up under Fenrir’s chin and into his skull.
The varulf spasmed and a spray of blood flew from his mouth, splattering Narfi’s face. Fenrir took a faltering step back, then collapsed to the cavern floor. There he lay, thrashing slightly, for a moment. The light in his eyes died.
Narfi’s ears popped.
He could almost feel it, brushing over his skin. Pushing in through his nostrils, his ears, his eyes. Like a cloud trying to suffuse him, though he couldn’t see aught. Like a power, brushing against him.
Slithering up his bowels, writhing in his stomach.
He dropped to his knees, groaning. This was it. This was what he’d bargained for. Come on, then. Let Fenrir come to him. Let him become Odin’s fear. His nightmare. Let all Asgard tremble before him.
All his bones ached. Like every single one was getting yanked out of socket.
Like his body wanted to turn inside out.
At the back of his throat, a howl built.
Part IV
Year 400, Age of the Aesir
Winter
30
“Was it truth?” Odin asked.
Loki shrugged. “What is truth? Your question belies a simplistic worldview, Odin. Do you ask whether it could have been a mere dream? Of course it could have. But then, even dreams may have meaning, though not always literal ones. If what you saw was not actual reality, that does not discount that it may have held some reality worth gleaning.”
Hel’s icy trench, Odin hated when Loki spoke in such riddles. And by the gleam in his eye, the man damned well knew that. Payback for fantasizing about his brother’s woman, perhaps.
“Ymir wanted my father, specifically. Spoke to him. Why would he do that? Why—assuming this was literal truth—would a jotunn speak to a man? Particularly a man he intended to kill.”