by Matt Larkin
A snarl—barely audible over the crash of water—froze Odin in place. He turned, careful not to make any sudden move, to see a brown head rise from the river. Like a monster of the deep, the creature rose and, only as it scrambled ashore, did he recognize it: it was an otter half again as large as Odin himself. Odin tilted Gungnir, trying to bring the spear around.
At his movement, the otter surged forward.
It collided with him before he had gotten Gungnir in place, weight and momentum slamming him down into the icy bank. Claws rent his shirt and chest, and teeth sunk into his shoulder. Odin bellowed in pain, calling upon all his supernatural strength to push the creature away from his face.
The otter’s claws tore great gouges into his flesh. Red agony blinded him. The beast dragged him toward the river, pulling him off the bank with a sudden jerk of its body. The shock of the cold stole his thoughts. Couldn’t move.
Couldn’t act.
He had dropped Gungnir somewhere …
Odin plunged beneath the waters. He thrashed with the creature, but it was too agile in the water. Claws slammed him down into the sludge at the bottom of the river. His breath exploded from his lungs, and freezing water rushed in to take its place. Odin choked, kicked, and struggled with the creature.
Dying …
Audr. Audr! Odin grasped the wraith’s power and shunted himself across the Veil. His body lost substance in the Mortal Realm, and he slipped through the otter’s grasp. The waters had become wrong, not quite substantial. Odin flailed, finding swimming all but impossible.
Audr’s hold over him tightened, squeezed him. Like the roots of Yggdrasil that had once hung him.
Odin stumbled through the sludge until finally his head broke free of the waters. Unable to hold on a moment longer, he plummeted back into the Mortal Realm. Gasping for air, he pitched onto the frozen bank.
The otter splashed behind him as it surged from the waters. Barely able to move, he looked at the descending jaws. A stone crashed into the creature’s skull in midair. The otter toppled over, slapping back down into the river.
A moment later, Loki was pulling him ashore. Odin groaned in agony. Blood continued to seep from his numerous wounds. Everything grew hazy.
The crackle of fire awoke him. Loki must have kindled the small blaze that now warmed Odin. His blood brother had stripped him of his wet clothes and wrapped him in a blanket. Odin tried to sit, but all the blood rushed from his head, and he slumped back down.
The wraith’s claws seemed to dig at his brain, lodging ever deeper. Odin gagged, almost retching at the sensation of finding himself becoming more like this thing inside him. Hollow and wretched, as it ate away memory and soul.
“Your injuries are healing, but it will take days for all the lost blood to replenish itself.”
Odin groaned and rolled over to where Loki sat, examining the corpse of a misshapen man—a dverg?—with a split skull. “What the fuck was that? A wereotter? And a dverg?”
Loki peeled back the corpse’s eyelids as if some answers might lurk in its dead eyes. “I don’t think both kinds of vaettr could possess a single host, but perhaps the dverg somehow managed to bind a Moon spirit and use its power.”
Odin coughed. “Fine. So why the fuck would it take an otter spirit?”
“It is difficult for a man to speculate on why a vaettr does aught that it does.”
“And are you? A man?”
Loki turned from the corpse frowning.
Damn it. His blood brother had just saved his life. No matter how many lifetimes—or eras—Loki had lived through, he deserved gratitude. “Forgive me. That was unworthy of me.”
Loki grunted and stood. “You are still weak from your injuries.”
You are mine …
No. They had an arrangement …
Odin grunted, trying to force the wraith back into dormancy. “So you think that was Andvari?”
His blood brother moved back to the fire and began to stoke it. “Perhaps. It is hard to say for certain, especially with the host dead.”
“If it was, his treasures must lie nearby.” Odin groaned, forcing himself to his knees. “I may not be fit enough to claim them, but you are. I cannot allow that ring to slip away, brother. Not now. Go and find it, I beseech you.”
Loki looked to the fire a moment, then to the falls. “I think …”
“As an otter, he hid the treasure behind the waters?”
Loki sighed and tugged off his tunic, then his breeches. Without another word, he stalked over toward the river.
Odin watched him go, prodding at his wounds. Damn otter’s claws had rent him deep.
None of that mattered, though. Not if Loki returned with the ring. Very soon, Odin might rejoin Freyja. That thought would carry him through any hardship.
Now, he needed to force Audr back into his place. And hope not to lose aught too valuable of himself in the process.
43
Year 31, Age of the Aesir
Fitela pointed to the march of people headed for the gate.
Sigmund folded his arms. With summer here, the king was compelled to host a feast to reaffirm his allies and declare his foes. Of course, the greater part of his host had already travelled north to meet Olof’s force, but Wolfsblood had to follow tradition.
A great many travelers followed the dirt road through the main gate to the fortress. Some laden with gifts and tributes, some whole families. Amongst such crowds they might pass unnoticed, true, but it meant gambling their success on the hope no one would recognize either Sigmund himself—who had fought them long ago—or Fitela, who had lived among them. In either case, Hel would have them the moment someone noticed them.
“We cannot risk it,” Sigmund said. “Not if you yet hope to avoid an all-out assault.”
Fitela shook his head. “I do not think to pass freely there. Wolfsblood brings in cart after cart of meat, vegetables, ale—all to appease his guests. Because we have cost him so much this last years, he has begun to look weak, forcing him to strain himself to appear the opposite.”
“So?”
“So … they bring the ale in giant casks, up from the town, yes?”
Sigmund nodded, not liking where this seemed to be heading. “I would not poison the king, much less all his guests. I will claim his life with my own blade, not through some—”
“We don’t need the ale, uncle. We just need to be inside those casks, and Wolfsblood’s men will happily escort us inside his very hall.”
Sigmund groaned, unfolding his arms. A plan born of mist-madness if he ever heard one, and yet, he had naught better to offer. Frowning, he started back toward the seaside town.
In the town, men unloaded the ale from longships onto the pier, rolling the casks along toward carts by the harbor.
Sigmund stood watching, arms folded, as sailors deposited the last of their goods. The day had dragged on, and they could never reach the fort before darkness fell, which, he supposed, might well work in his favor. No one paid him overmuch mind as he drifted among the casks.
Fitela was correct—they could fit inside. Assuming they were willing to scrunch up with their knees rammed against their faces and their spines feeling like a troll had stomped on them. Such a plan precluded carrying swords, but he could bring a knife and hope to plunder a larger blade.
Great as the risks of this plan, it was bold. That alone spoke volumes in its favor. So be it then. Tomorrow night, he would face his foe and one—or both—would die. And Fitela? Well, they had already agreed on the necessity and the cost, both. The young man had courage.
Sigmund glanced at Fitela, who remained sitting on a crate by the pier. His nephew nodded at him. Yes, he knew.
But their deaths mattered little, so long as Wolfsblood paid an even greater price.
Sigmund drifted amidst the town, finally picking an alley filled with discarded debris in which to rest.
And to wait.
Off and on he slept, dreaming of blood and death and valkyri
es.
As twilight settled on, men had lit torches around town, but most retreated inside to huddle around the warmth and protection of fire pits. The mist thickened, and it drove all men away. Thanks to what Gudrun had done to him, Sigmund was not quite a man anymore. So he lingered, unnoticed, until most all the townsfolk had disappeared behind closed doors.
At last he rose and stretched, working out the kinks in his aching back and neck. The better part of a day sleeping in an alley had done him no favors, nor made more inclined to squeeze into a fucking cask. Sigmund spit. Comfort mattered naught compared to the task before him.
By the time he returned to the carts, Fitela had already stuck a wedge into one, trying to pry off the top without making any sound. Sigmund grabbed another bar and began to do the same. It popped off easily enough. The moment it did, though, the smell hit him. Strong, hearty, Hunalander ale. Odin’s beard! How long it had been since he’d tasted ale from home?
Fitela tipped over his cask, spilling the succulent brew into the mud without hesitation or ceremony. Sigmund cringed.
Damn.
With a cupped hand, he sipped the ale. Gods, it was good. He shook his head. What a waste. What a fucking waste. He pushed over the cask, turning the ground at his feet into a sloshy mess.
Lid in hand, Fitela had already started climbing into his, and, with a last look at Sigmund, settled down inside.
Hel take this whole damn plan.
Sigmund groaned as he climbed inside. As expected, he barely fit. His knees jammed against his jaw, his spine scraped the wood, and, once he lowered the lid, he could see not a damn thing. The heavy odor of ale left his head spinning after even a few breaths inside.
This was going to be a long, long night.
44
Six Years Ago
The king’s last man blundered through the woods, banged his shoulder against a tree, and spun around, his axe tumbling from his grasp as he did so. Sigmund advanced on him in a steady gait. The man glanced over his shoulder, clearly debating trying to hide in the woods.
“Naught that way but swamp,” Sigmund said. He nodded toward the fallen weapon. “Pick it up. Face me with whatever honor remains to you.”
The man’s gaze darted to the weapon, but he didn’t move. Craven bastard. “Y-you’re the wraith of the bog …”
Sigmund sneered at the little fool. By now, most men knew to avoid the wood and the swamps that fed into it, but some wretched fools occasionally thought to try their luck. Most never made it out, though not all fell to Sigmund. This man’s companions had, four of them, chancing the woods. “I am flesh. Pick. It. Up.”
The warrior—barely worthy of the name—finally stooped and snatched up the axe.
The moment he stood, Sigmund was on him, feinting left with his sword. The man tried to use the axe to deflect, but Sigmund reversed his feint, hewing low across the warrior’s belly. Steaming guts spilled out over the forest floor. The man again dropped his axe, this time slumping down to fumble with his own entrails, as if pushing them back inside might spare him his urd. Some said men dying thus might have visions of snow maidens come to drag them down to Niflheim. Certainly not of valkyries, not for a coward like this.
Sigmund cleaned his blade—claimed as spoils from a similar kill last winter—and left the man to die and, perhaps, to become an actual ghost of these woods.
One by one, Sigmund was going to hunt down every last man loyal to Siggeir Wolfsblood. None could stand before him in fair fight, not he, blessed and chosen by Odin himself. Sigmund stalked them through the woods, yes, but he did give all a fair fight when he could, any who would face him in single combat. If they attacked in a swarm like a pack of wolves, well then, he gut them like animals.
He meandered back through the woods, an eye out for game though his last kill had not yet run out. One day soon he might need to take his personal war against the king beyond the bounds of this wood. But Sigmund, mighty as he was, remained but one man and could not well storm Wolfsblood’s keep singlehandedly. That being the case …
Tracks in the mud led into the cave where he sheltered. Human tracks, albeit small ones, like those of a woman or child. Had Sieglinde returned? Sigmund dropped into the crouch, making not the slightest sound as he drew his blade nor as he crept forward into the cave. The fire had dwindled down to embers, barely enough to keep the mist from saturating his home. Beside it sat a boy, maybe ten winters, a crop of sandy hair atop his head.
Relaxing and lowering his weapon, Sigmund advanced. The boy spun at the sound of his footfalls so close and jumped up, his eyes darting about the cave like a cornered beast.
“Who are you?” Sigmund demanded.
“I … uh … I’m Kettil. Your sister’s son.”
Sigmund sheathed his sword then folded his arms across his chest. “And what are you doing here?”
“Mother says you are to train me so we can avenge grandfather and my uncles.”
Not so long ago, Sigmund had lamented to his twin that he could not overthrow Wolfsblood by himself, nor could he trust any man in the king’s realm. This, however, is not what he’d had in mind. A child and the spawn of the very man Sigmund aimed to murder no less, even if he was also Sieglinde’s son. Still, ten winters he had waited for his vengeance already. If needs be, he might wait ten more. Not even the snows of the direst winter could quench the flames of vengeance.
“So be it,” he said at last. “Come then, and show me what you can do.”
Sigmund led Kettil through the woods to the marsh at first, casting back an occasional glance. But with him guiding the way, he could not garner the true extent of the boy’s woodcraft. Finally he paused, folded his arms, and nodded at the boy. “Now you lead. Take us east to the edge of the swamp but not into the regions where footing becomes unstable. Take care to make no noise as you move, for we do not want to alert aught to our presence here.”
The bog wraith legend might have cropped up because of Sigmund, but true vaettir and trolls did lurk in the darker places. Though they wakened most at night, a bumbling fool could well bestir some of them even in daylight.
Kettil glanced around with obvious doubt for a while, before setting off to the south.
Sigmund groaned. By the time he’d been ten winters, he could have found east even in the forest. “Boy. That way.”
“Ugh.” Kettil trotted in the direction Sigmund had pointed, leaving easily followed boot prints in the mud and seeming to step on every loose twig and rotting root in the entire realm.
So Sieglinde had not taught her son the least bit of woodcraft. Sigmund scowled as he trailed after the boy, much more careful of his own steps. Still, such things could yet be learned. Kettil needed time to grow before he could serve Sigmund’s purpose, and in that time, he’d train the boy in stealth. He just prayed Kettil had more experience at arms. Surely the son of a king ought to have received tutelage with the bow, spear, and sword? In Sigmund’s youth, his father had taught him much, along with masters hired from across Hunaland.
Sigmund allowed Kettil to draw further ahead. Would he notice the edge of the swamp when he reached it? Or would he plunge in with both feet? Standing waist-deep in freezing water might well serve as a lesson the boy would not soon forget about watching where he walked.
Ahead, Kettil shrieked like an old woman.
Damn it.
Sigmund rushed ahead, jerking his plundered blade from over his shoulder as he did so.
Kettil stood frozen at the edge of the swamp, eyes locked on an adder a few feet away from his face. Sigmund glowered, careful to make no sudden moves as he drew nigh. Not until the last moment … His blade caught the serpent solidly, half cleaving through it, half carrying it away with sheer momentum. He flung the dying beast out into the murk, then turned to stare down at the trembling boy.
Fuck.
“T-that was poisonous!”
Sigmund did not bother answering. Instead, he stalked away from the swamp and back in the direction of his cave.
A moment later, the sound of shuffling feet followed behind him.
Sigmund said no word the entire time they walked back to the cave, ignoring the boy’s attempts to engage in conversation. Twilight had drawn on by the time they reached his home, and Sigmund paused only to gather extra wood to stoke the fire. A man needed fire most in the night, when the mist thickened and all manner of beast and vaettr came looking for prey.
Inside, while he tended the flame, Kettil settled down against the wall. “Do we have aught to eat? It must surely be time for the night meal.”
Sigmund tried not to sneer. “Indeed we do. All through the forest there is food. Go out and catch some.”
At that the boy glanced at the entrance. Beyond, a wolf howled, followed by another. Kettil must have decided Sigmund did not mean it—though Sigmund was not certain on that himself—because he simply curled up on the floor.
Shaking his head, Sigmund grabbed what remained of his kill, a different serpent in fact, and tossed it at Kettil, drawing another shriek from him. Now Sigmund rolled his eyes. “Eat it. Or starve. As it pleases you.”
And he rolled over himself by the fire, trying not to think of the useless boy Sieglinde had now saddled him with.
In the early morning, Sigmund left to gather roots, and, while he was out, heard footfalls in the forest. Probably not Kettil—he’d left the boy snoring away not an hour before, besides which, that boy couldn’t track his way across an empty room.
Hand on sword hilt, Sigmund crept toward the intruder. This time, it was Sieglinde. Cloaked and concealed, but he’d recognize the silhouette and walk of his twin anywhere. He stepped out to meet her, and she threw back her hood.
“Brother. Forgive me for not staying longer yesterday, but I could not afford to await your return. Wolfsblood might have noticed my absence.”