by Angus Watson
Paloma, who’d been off scouting as usual, came tearing across the slickrock from the east and leapt into the fray, killing stick swinging.
Sitsi and Sassa ran to a perch over to their right, a couple of paces up the rocky valley side and began to shoot arrows into the spiders.
“Finn, Freydis, over here!” Erik dropped Ottar from his shoulders next to Sitsi and Sassa, and pulled the coffin off the sand. Freydis ran to join them.
“You look after Ottar, I’m going to fight,” Finn yelled to Erik, holding Foe Slicer aloft.
“No, Finn. Get off the sand.”
“But…”
“Try and get into their minds! We can stop this attack!”
“But…” His father was right.
He skipped onto the slickrock as the others ran up the valley towards the beleaguered warriors and warlocks. He was still holding Foe Slicer. The sword seemed to twitch in his hand as the others reached the spiders. He wanted to fight.
More and more of the huge beasts were bursting from the sand. He saw Keef shear spider legs with Arse Splitter, then there were too many of the monsters and he could no longer see any humans. It was all a mess of sand, screams and hisses.
He closed his eyes and tried to reach the monsters’ minds. He found them. They weren’t angry or even hungry, they were simply filled with a dogged desire to kill humans.
No, not humans, we must kill each other, he thought. Humans are good and we are bad. Spiders like us must die and –
BE GONE! a huge voice shouted and all went black.
He woke. He’d been out for only a moment. Sassa, Sitsi, Paloma and Freydis were still standing on the slickrock shooting arrows. Ottar was jumping up and down, watching the battle and flailing his hands. Erik was sitting next to him, shaking his head and blinking.
“Same for you?” he asked Erik.
“Warlock Queen,” his father replied.
“I guess so.” Despite the intense sun Finn was suddenly cold. He had felt her power. She was a landslide and he was a spring flower in her path. If he tried to take over the spiders’ minds again she would crush him.
“I don’t want to…” he said to his father.
“No,” agreed Erik. “Back to traditional means.” He hefted Turkey Friend. “Ottar, stay next to Sassa, all right?”
The boy nodded.
“Finn, come with me.”
Father and son ran down onto the sand, club and sword in hand, towards the melee of spiders and people.
A warrior staggered towards them, face bloodied. A spider leapt onto him, grabbed him with all eight legs, then flipped onto its back and tossed him about as it spurted thick silk from what looked like its arse. Two heartbeats later the man was wrapped in white web.
“Wootah!” shouted Erik.
“Wootah!” shouted Finn. He reached the spider first. There was a narrow join between its chest and its big bulbous arse part. Finn slashed and struck true. The beast fell away, split in two.
As Erik ran past, Finn severed the silk around the man’s chest with his blade and the warrior struggled free.
Finn followed his father into the melee.
He saw Chogolisa with a warrior’s hefty spear in each hand, beating at the beasts like a two-hammered blacksmith. A smaller spider clamped onto her shoulder but Thyri was there, slicing into its abdomen with her sax and flicking it away.
Wulf and Keef were back-to-back, Keef impaling with Arse Splitter and Wulf whacking away with Thunderbolt like Tor himself.
Sofi darted past, hand axe and dagger-tooth knife held high, and leapt into a knot of spiders. Finn lost sight of her, but she emerged and all the spiders that had surrounded her–all of them–fell dead.
But there were still many, many more.
He shook his head. He had to stop gawping like an idiot. He saw a spider bat the spear out of a warrior’s hand. He ran to help.
The warrior–it was Maya, the chief–slipped a coil of rope from her shoulders and beat the beast. The spider pressed. She tripped and fell. Finn jumped over her and slashed through the eight-eyed head with a backhanded upper cut. The spider fell back.
He helped Maya up and looked about for what to do next. The spiders didn’t seem interested in him but Zeg–the warrior he’d called a twat–was separated from the rest, hard pressed by three of the buggers.
Finn raised his sword and ran. He was maybe halfway when one of the spiders clamped its fangs around Zeg’s shoulder. Zeg yelped and whacked at the biter’s head, but his strength seemed to fail and he dropped his spear.
Finn sped up as the other two spiders closed in. The ground disappeared and he fell, realising as it happened that he’d stepped into one of the holes that the spiders had emerged from. He lifted his arms and they thumped onto sand, preventing him from disappearing under the desert floor. He heaved, but was stuck firm, head in the air, torso clamped, legs dangling who-knew-where, tempting targets perhaps for who-knew-what.
The largest of Zeg’s attackers grabbed the warrior’s lolling face with its forearms and opened its great fangs.
“Someone help Zeg!” Finn shouted, struggling to get a purchase and heave himself out.
Erik steamed past a moment later, Turkey Friend swinging. He whacked his club down into the largest spider’s abdomen, half crushing it. The beast fell away. Erik backhanded the other monster, cracking its head in two, then set about the spider clamped onto Zeg’s shoulder. This one seemed tougher and took a good few whacks.
Finn managed to dig Foe Slicer into the sand and pull himself halfway out.
Another spider–the largest Finn had seen so far–appeared behind Erik as he tried to smash the beast off Zeg’s shoulder.
“Dad!” Finn shouted.
His father turned to him, mouth open with concern. He thinks I need his help, thought Finn.
“No! Behind y—”
The gigantic spider punched a spiked leg up through Erik’s back and out of his chest, then gripped his head with giant fangs.
Finn roared and pulled on the sword with everything he had. He finally came clear but the spider fell backwards, dragging Erik by the head. Both disappeared underground.
Finn looked about. Maya was behind him, finishing off a spider with her stout spear. Her rope was back around her shoulder.
“Maya! Tie the rope to my ankle!” he shouted.
She’d seen what had happened and knew what he intended. She ran to him.
Rope attached with Maya holding one end, Finn ran, leapt and dived at the spot where his father had disappeared.
The sand gave way and he was falling, first through loose sand and then air. He saw the ground coming and tried to roll, but he crunched down painfully. He struggled to his feet.
He was in a long, high chamber, lit red by sunlight punching through holes in the ceiling. Sand showered like red rain.
The huge spider was five paces off on its back, tossing a white, Erik-sized bundle in the air, trussing him with silk.
Finn ran in. He cut through three legs with one slice, then chopped through the narrow link between abdomen and thorax.
His bundled father fell to the ground. His head was free. One side of his face was a mess of blood and bone. He looked dead.
The rapid patter of gigantic arachnid feet roused Finn from his horrified trance. Dozens of the beasts poured into the chamber and headed for them.
Finn stood by his dad and circled, brandishing Foe Slicer. The spiders seemed to realise that the blade was dangerous and slowed their charge. They closed in with steady menace.
Finn dropped to the ground next to his father’s trussed body, gripped him in his arms, then kicked again and again, yanking the rope attached to his ankle. He hadn’t agreed a signal with Maya. He hoped she would understand.
The spiders advanced. The nearest one reared, pointed feet ready to stab. Finn pumped his leg like a madman. The spider struck. Finn dodged, but not enough. He felt a searing pain as the end of the beast’s legs pierced his arm like a spear.
The spider reared again.
Finn closed his eyes and gripped his dad. He was going to die holding his father.
Next moment he was flying feet first across the chamber floor. He held Erik with all his strength as his leg whipped up and they were turned upside down.
Spiders ran in and slashed with sharp limbs.
Finn was sure they’d get him, but suddenly he and Erik were shooting upwards. Only the sticky spider silk gluing their bodies together prevented him dropping his father.
They rose through the sand and then they were out. Something caught Finn. He choked up sand as strong hands laid him down.
He blinked sand out of his eyes and opened them to see Chogolisa running off, Erik cradled in her arms.
“Can you run?” Maya asked.
“I think so.”
“Then come on. Get off the sand.”
They reached the rock. Finn ran to where Chogolisa and Paloma were ripping spider silk off his father. He was vaguely aware that the battle must be over if Paloma was tending to the wounded. Or the dead.
Blood oozed from Erik’s chest. His face was ruined. One eye was hanging on a string and half his teeth were bared like a dog’s.
Finn stared.
“Out of the way, fast woman,” said a sensible voice. It was Ollia, the warlock.
Paloma jumped clear and Ollia crouched, swinging her backpack onto the rock next to her.
“The spider’s leg went through his chest from behind,” said Finn.
“Help me roll him onto his side.”
She ripped his shirt away and prodded the exit and entry wounds.
“Fast woman, come round this side and press your hand here,” Ollia commanded. “Finn, put your pack under his head. Get that eye back into its socket, then fold his face back and hold it in place.”
“What?” Finn asked.
“Move aside!” cried Chogolisa, running up.
“Back, Chogolisa,” said Paloma.
“Get water, Chogolisa,” said Ollia. “Lots of it.”
Finn lifted Erik’s gory head onto his pack.
He saw what Ollia wanted him to do. One side of Erik’s face skin was folded back over his skull, still attached at his forehead. His eye was lying on his bloody cheek, a string leading back to the socket–or at least to a mess of blood and spurs of bone where the socket was meant to be.
As Ollia cleaned the wound on Erik’s back, Finn picked up his father’s eye between finger and thumb. It looked back at him.
“Wait,” said Ollia. “Snap off any shards of bone that may puncture his eye before you put it back in its hole.”
Finn laid the eye gently back on his father’s cheek, grabbed the largest of the bone splinters around the socket and twisted. He felt a pop as the point of the bone pierced his skin.
“Fuck!” The ball of his finger was gashed and bleeding. He’d cut himself on his father’s broken face bone. He heaved. Vomit filled his mouth. He swallowed. Erik probably wouldn’t thank him for puking on his skinned face.
“Here.” Paloma, one hand still pressed on Erik’s chest wound, leant across and, with deft flicks, snapped off the shards from around the socket.
“Thanks,” said Finn.
He picked up the eye again. Was it looking at him reproachfully? With his other hand, he poked the cord back into the hole, then pushed the eye down onto it. Cord was still sticking out on one side, so he lifted the eye and poked the cord further down into the hole. My finger is in my dad’s head, he couldn’t help thinking. Cord more neatly stowed, he pressed the eye in.
“That’s upside down,” said Paloma.
“Are you sure? How can you—”
“She’s right,” said the warlock.
Finn lifted the eye, twisted it half a turn and placed it back in its gory hole.
“Hold it there a moment,” said Ollia.
He did and she tipped a skin of water over the skinless face.
“Fold his face back on now,” she said, as another warlock handed her sinew threaded on a bone needle. She began to sew up his back wound. “Make sure you leave his mouth clear for breathing. I’ll do his chest next, then sew his face back on.”
Finn wasn’t sure that his father was still breathing, but he gathered up the fatty flap and rolled it back down into place. He had to poke the eye about a bit and pull his cheek and eyebrow apart, but soon he had the eye looking out of the hole and all the rest of Erik’s face in roughly the right place. Blood oozed and he didn’t look good, but he looked a lot better than he had done.
Blood bubbled around his lips. He was alive.
They carried those who couldn’t walk away from the valley of spiders to a clearing by a small pool in a rock cleft.
Chogolisa laid Erik down and knelt next to him. Finn stood, feeling useless and terrified. All around were moans and groans as the warlocks tended to the wounded. Sassa was a little distance away, sitting with Freydis and Ottar and holding their hands. Of the Wootah and Calnians, only Erik had been wounded. Finn could see the rest of them standing on higher ground with the warriors, weapons in hand and watching for more trouble.
He looked back at his father. Erik’s face was bloodied and misshapen, but at least he looked like himself again. In fact he looked very peaceful. Very peaceful…
“Chogolisa, is he…?”
The strongest of the Owsla looked up, eyes wet with tears, lower lip wobbling.
“No,” Finn managed.
Chogoslia shook her head. “I’m so sorry,” she said. “Your dad’s dead.”
Chapter 5
Small Sullen Sheep
Erik the Angry blinked.
The land was cold, wet and green. The wind whooshed in his ears with an echo as if he was underwater. There were no trees, only a few leafless bushes bristling with thorns. Small sullen sheep nibbled the already short grass and paid no attention to the large, bearded man. To his right, a soaring black slab of rock towered over the dank scrub–a drabber yet more foreboding mountain than any he’d seen before. Off to his left and far below was an iron-grey ocean flecked with white. A wooden ship lay at anchor. Its mast was a cross and its elongated prow carved into a dragon’s head.
There was a path running along the cliff top. Erik walked across the wet grass, then along the path.
Screaming grew louder as he approached the cliff edge. Thousands of seabirds, white and black, circled below and perched on the cliff, beaks open and yelling for all they were worth.
He followed the path, revelling in the salty tang of the cold wind and the moisture on his beard. It was a soggy, cold, alien land. But he felt at home.
The trail crested a hill to reveal more of the same–grey and black cliffs, treeless heath and more sodden sheep. Perhaps half a mile off was an enormous longhouse. High windows glowed orange and vented smoke up into the wet sky. The faint sound of singing drifted across the damp moor.
Erik noticed a man sitting on a rock, watching him. The man stood. How had Erik not spotted him immediately? He was enormous. He was a bigger, older, bearded version of Wulf–long blond, curly hair, a welcoming face and sparkling blue eyes. He had a hammer identical to Wulf’s strapped to his waist.
“Greetings, Erik,” said the man in a voice so deep and warm that it made Erik’s arm hairs stand on end.
“Tor?”
“That’s what some call me.”
“So I am dead.”
“It happens to everyone, my friend.”
Erik blinked and looked around. It was pretty much as he’d expected. Apart from the sheep. “And this is Valhalla?”
“It is a Valhalla. It’s your Valhalla. Don’t worry, the weather will improve. We swim in the sea here for most of the year.”
“And that hall is…?”
“Full of people like you.”
“People who fell in battle?”
The god smiled. “Some of them. But I don’t only choose people who die in battle. I really don’t know where humans got that idea.”
> “Who do you choose?”
“My main rule is no twats. I’d happily sit next to every man and woman in that hall, or any of my halls, for the entirety of a feast. You will find the same. You belong here.”
“So there’s drinking?”
“There’s a lot of drinking.”
“Hangovers?”
Tor smiled. “Have you ever had a hangover when you felt a little slower, a little less clever, but filled with a warm sense of peace and happiness as you watch other people get on with the work?”
“Yes.”
“That’s a Valhalla hangover.”
A nearby sheep bleated unhappily.
“Are there other animals?” asked Erik.
Tor pointed towards the longhouse. There was a lower but longer building next to it. Erik could have sworn it hadn’t been there before.
“Many fine animals roam the island. Some spend their nights in that smaller building,” said Tor. “These sheep are food for people and animals. That’s probably why the wooly little bastards are so miserable. The island is large. You may go wherever you want, whenever you like. There are interesting things to see, but no dangers.”
“Any bears?”
“Your friend Astrid the bear is not here, Erik. She’s living next to the Rock River on her own, and she is pregnant. She is mostly happy, looking forward to having a cub, but she does pine for you in her quieter moments. She will die in three summer’s time, after her child leaves her.”
“So you do die when you die?”
“You do.”
“And the Wootah? The Calnians? Chogolisa? My son? Will they come here?”
“I like them all, so yes, I should think so,” said Tor. “Your son is interesting. I’ve enjoyed watching him. Many of the great people I’ve watched started off as idiots.”
“Finn is bound for greatness?”
“I didn’t say that.”
“Well, is he?”
“I cannot tell you.”
“You told me about Astrid.”
“I made an exception. I’m a god, Erik. I can do what I want. I’m also not to be pressed.” Tor opened his eyes a fraction wider and Erik felt a brief but intense flash of terror. For all his surprisingly avuncular charm, Erik understood immediately that Tor was not to be fucked with.