by Matt Larkin
The impact jolted her, all too real despite the ghost seeming ethereal. Shrieking, she struck again and again.
The ghost parried with shocking grace, until it turned in riposte, forcing her back. Its own attacks came at her with Otherworldly speed. Starkad pushed her out of the way of one such blow and rained attacks upon the ghost.
One of his blades scraped off its mail. The other tore through what should have been flesh and seemed to meet only air. The ghost shuddered, its form flickering as Hervor came around at it again.
The entity brought its blade around in a counter that forced Starkad to fall back.
Hervor launched herself forward and plunged Tyrfing through mail and etheric form. The ghost flickered again, shrieking this time. It vanished in a puff of blue flame.
Panting, Hervor let Tyrfing fall to her side. It wasn’t pounding in her ears, so maybe it was satisfied with killing ghosts. “What in the gates of Hel, Starkad?”
“I … I have never known ghosts to be able to fight with a man like that … save in fanciful tales.” He looked around, for once seeming as lost as she felt.
Oh, and that did not comfort her in the least. “Starkad … are you certain whatever you seek here is worth such madness? Let us leave this place and tell Gylfi the lengths we went to in order to—”
“I cannot turn back.” Saying it almost seemed to pain him. Was that all part of his curse as well?
He tromped forward a few steps, then paused. Looked around down a street she could not see, shaking his head.
Oh, that couldn’t be good.
Hervor raced over to join him. Another blue-flamed ghost drifted toward them, sword in hand. “Not more of these things.”
“No, Hervor. Not more. Look at the rent in its mail, just where you pierced it. This is the same one.”
She faltered, falling back a step. That was impossible. Tyrfing had struck down that ghost. She had slain it.
“If we cannot kill them …”
Starkad pointed down another alley. “Run.”
17
They dashed down the alley and back out onto a main street.
Here, Starkad stumbled to a stop. Dozens of figures flitted about in a market. The light settled wrong on features ever so faintly translucent, as those people—those ghosts—drifted about. Some looked to be selling wares, though without the merest sound. Others inspected goods or wandered without obvious intent.
Hervor collided with his shoulder, then gasped. “What the …”
Starkad guided her along the street, as far away from the ghosts as he could, his strides just short of a run.
Down the street, another ghostly warrior drifted out from around a corner. Starkad darted behind an empty stall, shoving Hervor in front of him.
The ghost warrior bypassed them without even looking their way. In fact, many of the ghosts seemed intent on aught going on in the east.
Starkad exchanged a glance with Hervor, who sat gaping at the scene. Most of the ghosts didn’t even seem aware of their presence. These shades acted like they yet lived, like they might need to buy supplies to cook the night meal.
But if so, the market was actually rather empty for a town this size. So where were the rest of the inhabitants?
“What the fuck is going on here?” Hervor whispered.
Starkad shook his head. He wished he knew. He was no expert on ghosts, but he’d hardly thought they behaved like this. Nor would he have expected to be able to even see them. Were ghosts not trapped in the Otherworlds, across the Veil?
“Come on.” He guided her up, and they set out down the road again.
Twice more, they had to hide as ghost warriors wandered nearby. The second time, they ducked behind a large stone hall. Beyond this, a greater number of ghosts had gathered toward the center of the valley, standing around a lake.
The mist made it hard to judge numbers, but at least two score of them had flocked there, moving almost in a procession, one led by a robed female ghost.
He pointed. “Whatever is happening here, the source of it lies down by the lake.”
“And you want to go look? Why?”
Despite her tone, he couldn’t quite keep the excitement from his face. Yes, like a moth to flame, he had to know. He just had to. After flashing her a slight grin, he turned away and crept down toward the water.
Behind him, Hervor mumbled some curse under her breath. That only made him smile wider.
Here, he had travelled beyond the edge of Midgard. Yes, he sought a runeblade, but it was more than that. He had to brave this. He had to brave everything. It was the only way he knew he was truly alive.
A sheet of mist rose up from the waters below. Too small to be a lake, this looked more like a natural spring. Certainly this valley must have seemed a well-sheltered refuge. The ghosts ringed the waters, and Starkad had to skirt the far edge, unwilling to draw too nigh to them.
None looked at him, in any event.
All of these shades were intent on a trail leading east from the spring, up toward the rocky hillside. Many of the ghosts trod that path now, though Starkad could not make out what lay at the end of it.
Hervor’s hand fell upon his shoulder. “Are these creatures wraiths?”
He shook his head. “I don’t think so. The warriors, maybe. Wraiths are the darkest ghosts in any tale. These … I don’t know. We have to see what lies up amongst the rocks.”
“Do we really?”
Offering a wry smile, he shrugged out of her grip and crept forward more, flanking the trail while giving the shades a wide berth. The path grew steeper as they drew nigh to the cliff. Loose rock and snow shifted under his feet, and he had to slow his pace further to keep from making any noise. Hervor kept close behind.
Ahead, the ground rose up in a lip, then dropped away steeply into a path that almost seemed to run under the cliff. On his belly, Starkad crawled up to that lip. A smooth rock tunnel ran down there, boring underground. A lava tube, maybe?
He crested the lip and dropped down to the tube. The path was slick, and his feet immediately slid forward. It took him a few steps to catch his balance. Then he glanced back up at Hervor where she stood, glaring down at him.
“You can stay there if you want.” With that, he trod into the tunnel.
A moment later, he heard Hervor sliding down into the tube as well.
He pushed forward toward where it delved into the mountainside.
The ghosts who had trod this path now continued down the tunnel into some underground chamber. More disconcerting, wet red stains marred the tube walls. Those were runes … painted in blood all around them. The top of the tube was twelve, maybe thirteen feet in the air, and still, someone had painted a great many of those runes.
“Odin’s stones …” Hervor mumbled.
Starkad pushed forward ever so slightly more.
And then a shriek filled the tunnel. It echoed off the tube walls, a cry of pain and damnation, reverberating not only in the tunnel but in his own skull. It pounded so intently he pressed his forearms against his ears to try to still the sound.
Etheric blue flame washed out of the lava tube in a wave.
Starkad flung himself backward, driving Hervor down. They rolled several times away from the tunnel.
When he managed to right himself and look up, the flames were gone. The ghosts were gone. Naught but the tunnel remained.
Grunting, he pushed himself up. “You all right?”
Hervor turned over. Fresh scrapes marred her face and arms. Snow plastered her black hair to her face. The look she gave him might have soured milk.
She spit out a glob of blood to the side. “Having fun?”
He shrugged. Kind of … No sign of ghosts or aught else here now.
“Wait,” Hervor called. “You’re not serious. You cannot actually intend to go in there after that … whatever the fuck just happened.”
Without answering, Starkad crept back toward the tunnel. He lifted his torch to inspect the runes painted
on the walls. The symbols writhed in his mind, seeming to defy analysis. Like the angles kept changing directions, even though he never actually saw them move. The longer he looked upon the designs, the more his head hurt.
“Gylfi painted such vile things …” Hervor said. “Back when he …”
Starkad nodded. “Workings of sorcery.”
Torch out to his side, he pressed inward. Another forty feet into the tunnel, an obsidian altar stood in the middle of the path. Around this, even more runes had been painted, this blood too looking fresh.
Starkad raised a hand toward the altar but stopped short of touching it. “If there is a curse holding these ghosts here … I think we found it.”
“They sacrificed something here. Someone?” She stepped around the back of the altar, and he followed her gaze. A skeleton lay there, sprawled against the stone.
“So it appears.”
Hervor turned about, waving her own torch around to inspect the unnerving designs on the wall. “Your runeblade is not here.” She glanced further down the tunnel. “Unless you think …”
“Maybe.” Who could say how deep the lava tube might run? Miles? Farther? Before delving so far underground, he supposed it best to finish searching the actual town.
“Starkad. If you have some idea what happened in this place …”
He shook his head. “Like you said. A sacrifice.”
“This was before the rise of the Aesir, right? So a sacrifice to the Vanir?”
Careful not to touch the blood runes, Starkad knelt beside the altar. It too bore strange markings that sent his mind reeling, these lightly etched onto the surface. “Maybe. There are some few tales of gods older even than the Vanir. Older and darker. And the rumor that sometimes those of the Old Kingdoms turned to these ancient powers.”
“Wonderful … Can we leave this damned cave?”
“It’s not a cave, but yes.” He stood. “Let’s go.”
They followed the slope back up to the hillside, where the ground dropped away into the tube. With the ghosts clear of the actual path, they could simply walk out, albeit at a steep hike.
Even down by the spring, the ghosts had vanished.
Starkad scratched his beard. Some fell curse had surely settled upon this valley.
More etheric blue light flitted up from the town, and as he turned back, a new procession began to head toward the spring.
“Oh, damn it,” Hervor said.
Starkad squinted. No, not a new procession. Those were the exact same ghosts, following the same steps, led by the same woman. All over again.
And heading this way.
He grabbed Hervor and pulled away from the path, away from the spring. Side by side, they crouched, watching the ghosts make their trek again.
18
At the head of the procession walked a woman, pale flame shrouding her hands. Hervor almost gasped at the sight of her. The ghost led these people like a völva—and maybe she was. The witch in charge of this profane sacrifice.
As to who or what the witch wanted to appease, Hervor wasn’t even certain she wished to know.
The ghost-witch drew ever closer to the spring, the people flocking about her as though they at once worshipped and feared her. And why not? Who wouldn’t?
Hervor pointed to the figure.
Starkad nodded. “I see her.”
“Her hands …”
“Yes. I’ve never seen aught like that. It’s like she controls the flames themselves … I mean, I heard a story of a man doing that once. When I was young.”
What was he on about now? Starkad seemed lost inside himself, inside memories he refused to share. And now was not the time.
Hervor rose up as the ghosts passed, all headed back down toward that tube. “It’s like they’re just doing the same things over and over.”
“Indeed. They seem to be damned to relive some moment in their lives.”
Huh. Hervor looked back at him. “Their last moments?”
“Perhaps.”
As she headed back toward the town, another of those ghostly warriors stepped onto the path, joined by a second an instant later.
Before she could even take cover, the ghostly pair was running toward them. Hervor jerked Tyrfing free of its sheath. Not this again.
Starkad intercepted the closest of the ghosts before it reached her. Hervor stepped around him to engage the other one. Without a runeblade, maybe Starkad could do naught but slow the ghost down. Still, if he bought her time to drive off this one …
Hervor waved her torch at the ghost. The spirit recoiled a bare instant. Long enough for Hervor to press her attack. Tight cuts with Tyrfing. High, low. Always advancing. She’d never outlast the dead, so she had to do this fast, before the fight sapped her strength.
But the warrior was a master, parrying and dodging with all the grace of the living and even more speed.
It turned her attack into a riposte that gouged her right arm. A shriek escaped her as the torch fell from her grasp. The snow hissed as the fire hit it, throwing up a cloud of steam. Hervor barely got Tyrfing around to parry the ghost’s next slash.
She’d never be as good with her left hand as she had been with her right. Everything was slightly off, just a little slower than normal. And a little slower was a big difference in such fights. She jerked the blade around, tried to thrust, only to get it knocked out of position.
“Hervor!” Starkad bellowed.
She couldn’t spare him a glance.
Metal clashed on metal behind her.
The ghost whipped his sword back down with startling speed. The blade scraped off Hervor’s mail with enough force to drive her to one knee.
There was the torch, right before her.
As the spirit came around again, Hervor snatched the brand and jerked it up into the ghost. The warrior shrieked and retreated several steps away as if singed.
“Hervor!”
She spun to see what he was about. Just behind her, the ghost völva was reaching out a hand, no longer engulfed in flame.
That hand closed around Hervor’s throat.
Numbness surged through Hervor’s limbs. Tyrfing slipped from her hand. The torch fell back to the snows.
Beyond the witch, Starkad rained blow after blow upon his opponent. Naught seemed to drive the ghost off.
Hervor tried to call out to Starkad, but only a moan escaped her. Her body wouldn’t respond. She’d have fallen over completely, if not for the icy hand keeping her on her knees.
With her other hand—flames still dancing about her fingers—the völva reached toward Hervor’s face.
Hervor groaned, tried to wiggle away, but couldn’t move. Closer those flaming digits drew. Closer.
The witch’s fingertips brushed over Hervor’s lips. The flames were warm, almost a comfort rather than a pain. The ghost pried Hervor’s lips apart with her thumb and forefinger. The warmth danced over Hervor’s tongue, massaged it. Coaxed it into surrender.
Her eyes fluttered shut.
That heat filled up her mouth and began to seep down her throat. It coiled around her gut and her heart. It pulsed through her like blood.
Hervor pitched forward and landed on her side. Even as she hit the ground, the snows began to melt around her, as if her own body were aflame. In a few heartbeats, she lay in a pile of muddy slush.
Choking and coughing, unable to stop shudders from wracking her body, still she managed to coax one eye open.
Starkad hit the ground beside her, rolled over, and came up holding Tyrfing. In three quick moves, he landed a blow against his ghostly foe. Now the ghost flickered and winked out. Starkad spun, coming up on the other ghost—who seemed to be hovering over Hervor as if not sure he intended to strike.
She wanted to rise, but her body wasn’t responding.
Starkad cut down that ghost too, then spun back on her. He sheathed Tyrfing on her back, then grabbed her under her arms and dragged her away from the spot. “We have to move. You know they’ll be ba
ck any moment.”
He pulled her further away from the path, away from the town and into the tree line.
A pain built in her chest. Her heart was too hot. Raging like a fire.
It began like a bubble. A pressure building up, growing hotter and hotter. Then the pressure exploded inside her. Convulsions wracked her so violently Starkad stumbled down on top of her.
“Fuck! You’re burning up. Hervor! Can you hear me?”
She tried to retch from the agony of it, but even her stomach refused to obey.
The heat was burning behind her eyes. An inferno in the back of her skull, searing her brain.
Flames … flames dancing in her mind.
Flames in the shape of a life.
19
The crackle of flame was the only sound in the temple. The great fire pit set the shadows at play as Ilona made her way within, drifting between the stone pillars. The fire pit was set in the floor, five feet down, but the flames still licked up almost to the height of her waist. They set her fingers to twitching, enticing the vaettr within her to waken, as it so oft did these days. It whispered in her mind, begged her to reach out and touch the flames, to claim them as her due and bend them to her will …
“The unfortunate reality of life is that not all gifts are suited to all men or women.” The voice came from the shadows behind the fire, but she knew it. Any initiate of the flame would have known it.
“Loge. You sent for me.”
Now the man himself stepped around the edge of the pit, seeming unconcerned with the flames that nearly licked at his flesh. The seidkonur had called him the first of the pyromancers, the one who brought the Art of Fire to the Lofdar in days gone by. The vaettr within him must have sustained him more winters than she could imagine, for still he seemed a man in his prime, his auburn-tinged hair lush, his eyes like sapphires.
Ilona strode to his side, flaring out her slit skirts with practiced ease, exposing her thighs almost up to her hips as she walked. She had waited long for this man to call upon her. The great priest of flame, the lord of pyromancers. With his favor …