Asgard

by Fynn F Gunnarson

  Now in his natural giant form, Loki felt that annihilating Sharp Axe and his equally-troublesome comrade should be a lot simpler and, perhaps even more importantly to the Trickster God, considerably more fun.

  The second thought which came into Sharp Axe’s pain-ravaged mind was that the position from which he had observed the unwelcome transformation – perhaps fifteen or twenty paces away – probably constituted no more than two or three of the giant’s strides and, therefore, anything but a safe distance. There was little left for him to do, he concluded through the agony of his injuries and the despondency of defeat, other than to be slaughtered horribly, painfully and, he suspected, quite soon. The image of Knut Cod Killer suddenly came into Sharp Axe’s mind and, although the prospect of spending his death in the noisy, drunken, beer-soaked chaos of Valhalla and its training-fields until his services were required in battle at Ragnarøkkr left a lot to be desired, he nonetheless tightened the grip on his sword instinctively where he lay. Come on, Loki, thought Sharp Axe to himself, finish me off as slowly as you like… the longer you take, the slimmer your chances are of escaping.

  Fynn, by contrast, relatively unscathed as he was, was less inclined than his close friend to concede defeat to Loki just yet. As Loki finished his terrifyingly-impressive metamorphosis, Fynn ran to where his sword lay on the ground, picked it up, turned and headed towards Loki’s back in a tight arc, drew back the sword in a wide sideways movement and brought the blade home powerfully, burying it deeply into the base of the giant’s left leg. The trusty weapon sliced straight through the Trickster God’s soft leather boot and flesh, dividing his Achilles tendon into two useless sections.

  If the previous cries of pain had been loud, they were as nothing compared with the one which immediately followed Fynn’s latest attack, now that Loki had taken on the form of a giant: the trees shook, as startled birds vacated their branches; the ground vibrated, as if an earthquake were in progress; Sharp Axe and Fynn each thought they might be rendered deaf.

  Gingerly, very slowly, Loki raised his left leg slightly; the heel of his foot initially remained planted on the ground, before the continuing action of raising his leg lifted it, agonisingly, a little way into the air. The seemingly-unwise action of placing his foot back down on the ground caused the giant to groan loudly, then to pant rapidly for a few seconds, in what turned out to be a doomed attempt at basic pain management. Loki chose this moment to take proper stock of this latest wound, twisting a little to his left and looking downwards, with some reluctance, in order to survey the damage. Almost unable to believe that luck was giving him yet another (though probably final) chance to strike and having convinced himself that Loki’s preoccupation with his increasing wound count would not last for very long, Fynn immediately swung his sword again as hard as he could. This time, the steel blade sliced clean through the Trickster God’s right Achilles tendon, severing it as completely and effectively as it had its opposite number.

  Loki’s reaction was much the same as the first time around except, on this occasion, he was unable to remain standing. He stumbled backwards and, with a terrible cry of anguish and pain, which surpassed anything and everything which had preceded it in terms of volume and theatricality, he fell clumsily and thunderously to the ground, where he writhed around slowly and moaned loudly, vainly attempting to ease the agonies of his recently-acquired collection of sword-related injuries.

  Fynn ran over to Sharp Axe and helped him, slowly and excruciatingly, to his feet. Breathing uneasily, with quiet, shallow, extremely painful gasps, Sharp Axe thanked his friend in a whisper he could barely manage then, trying hard not to increase the pain he was already having to endure, he looked round carefully, though with urgency in his eyes, for the chariot and goats.

  ‘I think they’ve run away,’ said Fynn, surprisingly calmly, given the circumstances. ‘I can see why Thor’s not especially fond of – ’ but his words were cut short by a series of minor earth tremors caused, the friends could see after turning their attention to the opposite direction, by Loki: he had forced himself up into a kneeling position and was now beating one of his fists on the ground, furiously. In his own severely-weakened state, Loki’s strong, pounding vibrations beneath his feet caused Sharp Axe to stumble and fall painfully to the ground. Fynn kept his feet and tried to hold onto Sharp Axe by the arm, but succeeded only in increasing his friend’s agony still further.

  Knowing that he had no chance of escaping, Sharp Axe raised his head to look at Fynn and said quietly, but clearly, ‘Save yourself! Don’t let him kill you, as well... run!’ and run was exactly what Fynn did next, but saving himself was the very last thing on his mind.

  ‘Here, Loki!’ called Fynn, skipping sideways, away from the broken, helpless figure of Sharp Axe and waving his hands to attract the attention of the Trickster God. ‘Here I am! I’m the one who cut you down! I’m going to tell the Nine Worlds how I thwarted Loki’s plan to destroy them! Admit it, Loki! You’ve been beaten by a mere human!’

  Loki was anything but beaten, however and Fynn knew it; his only thought at that moment had been to distract the giant, in order to prevent him from finishing off Sharp Axe and, for the time being at least, his actions appeared to be achieving the desired result.

  ‘Fool!’ hissed Loki, his pain and humiliation starting to make way for sheer rage. ‘I could snap your body in my hands like that!’ and, by way of demonstration, he held up a hand and clicked his fingers, then winced as the sudden movement immediately intensified the pain in the cruel sword wound across the back of his wrist.

  ‘Now’s your chance!’ called Fynn, boldly and defiantly, though in the knowledge that these words might turn out to be his last.

  Loki gnashed his teeth and roared like an oversized, angry wild animal, incensed by the impudence of the human who was mocking him and who was, apparently, unaware of (or, perhaps, unconcerned by) the imminent death sentence he was facing. Looking to his right, Loki set his sights on a suitably-slim, though sufficiently-heavy tree, reached across, grabbed its trunk with one huge hand then, groaning and perspiring with the renewed pain this effort was causing him, dragged the entire structure upwards, out of the earth in which it grew. At first, the tree’s roots stretched, as if reluctant to leave their home but, inevitably, they succumbed to the Trickster God’s strength and, one by one, snapped loudly, as tree and ground finally parted company.

  Sharp Axe and Fynn watched Loki’s demonstration of supreme strength with shivers of fearful astonishment. Loki now held the liberated tree – the trunk of which looked to be more than twice the height of an average-sized man – aloft in his right hand, took casual aim at Fynn and hurled the tree in his direction. Fynn, not used to having whole trees thrown at him stood, paralysed for the briefest moment, then regained his wits and ducked down low; the tree hit the ground just in front of him and bounced through the air, over his bent back, hit the ground once more and rolled on harmlessly, for another thirty or forty paces.

  Loki was not pleased with the outcome of his painful endeavour and cursed loudly. Looking around again, he selected another tree which was just within reach, leaned towards it, tore it slowly and painfully out of the ground and, growling the words, ‘Let’s see how long your luck holds out, most fortunate of humans!’ through gritted teeth, launched it at Fynn.

  This second projectile, like its predecessor, bounced in front of its intended target and, once again, Fynn ducked to allow its safe passage over him; but this time, as if Loki’s words had been spoken by some prophet of doom, Fynn was uncharacteristically unfortunate. As it passed over him, one of the tree’s short, thick branches struck Fynn close to his left temple, accompanied by a noise not unlike that of someone sustaining a fatal blow to the head. The force of the impact sent Fynn spinning and crashing to the ground, where he remained, face-down, motionless and silent.

  Untypically, Loki did not celebrate, but now turned his attention back to Sharp Axe who had, he felt sure, just witnessed the sudden, untimely and
heroic death of his best friend. The Trickster God knew he was running out of time; if he were to have any chance of evading whichever of the Aesir and Vanir Odin had sent to look for him in Midgard, he would have to transform himself soon. A wounded hooded crow would not be able to fly as swiftly as a physically-able one – that was true – but, if he were to despatch Sharp Axe immediately, he estimated that he should still have enough time to transform, fly off and blend in sufficiently with Midgard’s varied wildlife to evade the inevitable search party.

  Loki was not accustomed to experiencing the degree of physical discomfort he was feeling now, but Sharp Axe’s death – like that of the other human, Fynn – would at least provide him with a little consolation and go some way towards easing his pain. That accomplished, it would not, all in all, have been such a bad day for the Trickster God: admittedly, his wounds would take time to heal and the pain he was suffering would last for a while, but the Aesir and their allies would have lost two interfering human helpers, the annoyingly well-loved Baldr was no more and Ragnarøkkr was irreversibly underway.

  With these comforting thoughts, Loki edged himself along on his knees towards Sharp Axe, gasping with the intense burst of pain each movement brought to the backs of his legs. Pausing only briefly to decide what the most fitting method of execution would be, he reached out with both giant hands and lifted his adversary from the ground, to verify he was still alive before he crushed him to death. The adversary, Loki observed immediately, was still very much alive and, to the Trickster God’s delight, was in considerable agony.

  Abandoning all thoughts of joining his grandfather in Valhalla, Sharp Axe managed one last gesture of defiance. He clenched his jaw resolutely and, though the pain he was feeling caused the sweat to drip from his brow and his vision to blur, he succeeded in raising the handle of his sword high above his own head, then plunged the blade, almost to the hilt, down into the fleshy region between the bases of Loki’s right thumb and forefinger; there he left it, in the forlorn hope that the sudden, painful shock would cause the giant to release him. It was not, however, to be: Loki did, indeed, remove his right hand from Sharp Axe, but kept a grip on him with his left, whilst he raised the wounded hand to his mouth, used his teeth to draw out the diminutive sword, then turned his head slowly and spat it out disdainfully, as far into the distance as he could.

  Sharp Axe soon felt Loki resume his agonising, two-handed grip and, right in front of him, saw the giant’s huge, watering, bloodshot eyes focus on his own. The end was close – but not, Sharp Axe knew, so very close: Loki being Loki, would not grant him the favour of anything close to a merciful, swift death.

  The Trickster God stared at his victim and allowed himself a moment of precious time to savour victory.

  ‘Well… it has been a long, hard road, hasn’t it, Sharp Axe?’ mused Loki, wistfully, wishing he had more time to drag out proceedings even further. As the words came out, the human’s expression changed: his features became more relaxed, as if some kind of profound realisation had suddenly come to him. He has resigned himself to the inevitable, thought Loki, disappointedly. There is no sense in lingering, now; the time has come.

  ‘Tell me,’ gloated Loki, unable to resist one final jibe, ‘how does defeat taste, Sharp Axe?’

  ‘I don’t know, Loki,’ breathed Sharp Axe through his intense pain, still wearing the unfathomable, relaxed expression of apparent resignation. ‘You tell me.’

  What a strange thing to say, thought Loki: And if I didn’t know better, I’d say that was a heavy, flying, short-handled, stone hammer which just hit the back of my head with enough force to fracture my skull.

  And, on this count, Loki was correct, in every respect and detail.

  *

  ‘There’s something I really don’t understand,’ said Fynn quietly, as he lay in complete darkness, on a satisfyingly-comfortable bed in Álfheimr, his battered and bruised head bound with gauze and his best friend and closest comrade not far from his side, occupying an identical, equally-comfortable bed of his own. ‘Why is it that Frygga didn’t bother to get mistletoe to swear an oath never to harm Baldr?’

  ‘She forgot. That’s why its name didn’t appear on the list,’ replied Sharp Axe, in a slightly-impatient, I-thought-you would-have-worked-that-out-already-for-yourself tone of voice.

  ‘Yes, I know that,’ came back Fynn, dismissively, ‘but if Loki had acquired the list for himself in Jarnvidr, as he so nearly did, he would have found out from it what in the Nine Worlds refused to kill Baldr… so, by the process of elimination (probably a very long one, admittedly), he would have been able to establish anything that would or could kill him.’

  ‘Hmmm… I suppose so, yes… ’ conceded Sharp Axe, though unsure of where Fynn was going with his argument.

  ‘Well… you’d have thought that would have acted as a bit of a wake-up call to Frygga and Co, wouldn’t you?’ chided Fynn. ‘I mean, if I were Frygga, knowing how close Loki had come to finding out my secret, I’d have got myself over to Midgard – or anywhere else mistletoe grows – pretty fast, to start the belated negotiations with the stuff. But she didn’t. She seems to have assumed everything would be all right, because no mistletoe grew in Asgard. At best, I think that’s pretty naïve… at worst, it’s irresponsible parenting… I mean, from what you told me of Baldr, he didn’t sound like the sort who could look after himself all that well.’

  ‘True… ’ acknowledged a cautious Sharp Axe, who had never really subscribed to the whole, inexplicably-popular what-a-truly-wonderful-guy-Baldr-is philosophy, ‘… but you know, we can’t hope to understand the way the Aesir think and act.’

  ‘Also… how will we know…?’ went on Fynn, now on a roll and not discouraged in the least by the obvious fact that Sharp Axe could not really answer his previous question satisfactorily, ‘… how exactly will we know when Ragnarøkkr is actually underway?’

  Sharp Axe pondered Fynn’s question drawing, as he did so, on all the knowledge he had acquired from the many and varied experiences of his life so far: the tales his grandfather had told him as a child; the time he had spent in the company of Odin, Thor and the rest of the Aesir and Vanir in recent weeks; the journey to Helheimr and back with Surtr; his encounters with Loki and Angrboda in the Iron Wood and beyond. There was a lengthy pause, whilst all these things were given the careful consideration they merited and required.

  ‘I have no idea,’ sighed Sharp Axe, eventually.

  ‘No,’ groaned Fynn. ‘Same here.’

  ‘All I do know,’ added Sharp Axe, as he gingerly shifted his position in the bed slightly, ‘is that it’s going to happen... at some point... perhaps not even in our lifetimes... but that we can’t stop it.’

  ‘Probably best to forget about it, then,’ concluded Fynn, philosophically. ‘Live life to the full, from one day to the next.’

  ‘I’ll drink to that… ’ concurred Sharp Axe, with a short, tentative nod, ‘… or at least, I would… if only I had a drink.’

  ‘Was it really all for nothing, though?’ asked Fynn, now in very real danger of starting to sound rather annoying. ‘You know… all those things we did... everything we went through?’

  Sharp Axe sighed again. ‘Who knows?’ he muttered but, despite his apparent indifference, he was worried: worried that the world as he knew it was about to end; worried, despite the fact that Odin and Thor had arrived on Sleipnir in the nick of time to save his life and take Loki captive, that the Trickster God would not remain their prisoner for long and would, eventually, come back to Midgard looking to avenge himself on Sharp Axe, on Fynn and, worse still, on Mithrén; worried that Fynn might try to talk to him all night, when all he wanted to do – needed to do, in fact – was to get some well-deserved sleep.

  ‘We did what we could... what we believed to be right... we couldn’t have done any more... and even if we failed in the end, we shouldn’t say it was all for nothing,’ offered Sharp Axe eventually, after a long, weary silence.

  ‘Perhaps
we didn’t fail,’ offered Fynn. ‘Perhaps, if Ragnarøkkr was always going to happen, there was nothing you, or I, or anyone else could have done… just think about it, Sharp Axe: even the mighty Odin himself couldn’t prevent it!’

  ‘Would it make you feel better to think that we had succeeded, in some small way?’ enquired Sharp Axe, through a lengthy and rather noisy yawn which he made no attempt to disguise.

  ‘Yes… ’ replied Fynn, after a moment’s consideration, ‘… yes, I think it would.’

  ‘Then, in that case, Fynn, my trusted friend, confidant and comrade in arms... in some small way... we succeeded... now, can we please get some sleep? Mithrén and Imrén will be expecting us to marry them in the morning!’

  With thoughts of Ragnarøkkr, Asgard and Loki temporarily banished from his mind, Sharp Axe allowed his exhaustion to wash over him. As he finally drifted off into a blissfully-painless sleep – which was possible, in the main, thanks to the skilled work of the Elven healers who, at the insistence of Mithrén, had been working in shifts on Sharp Axe and Fynn ever since their arrival back in Álfheimr, almost two weeks previously – his last conscious thought was a promise to himself, to live a peaceful life, free from adventure, free from danger and, most importantly of all, completely free from the gods of Asgard and Vanir.

  Epilogue

  A tense silence fell all around the dying fire; an old storyteller had concluded a very long tale and his final words hung uneasily in the cool night air. The group of children seated in front of the man, looked at one another, barely able to believe that the story had ended so abruptly.

  Then, all at once, the old storyteller received a sudden, quite unexpected and rather noisy barrage of questions from his audience.