So Loki was sent a message, summoning him to Aesgard. As it happened, however, he had received an earlier invitation to visit the Norns—something that no one, except Odin himself, would think of ignoring.
3
The Fatal Web
The Norns dwelt above the northern rim of the great slope of sky that was Aesgard. Their home was a vast tent made of black sheepskin that loomed like a storm cloud over the fleecy turrets of the god-castles. Indeed, the very existence of these dread sisters known as Norns cast a shadow over every life being lived on earth, or above it, or beneath it.
They struck fear into everyone—except Odin, who feared nothing—and in him they excited hatred and disgust. He hated the Norns because they were the only creatures in the world who could sometimes stop him from doing what he wanted to do, and they disgusted him because they were so ugly. Lover of beauty as he was, especially female beauty, the merest glimpse of these hideous sisters could send him into spasms of loathing.
They were hags with hairy faces and popping eyes. Their bodies were round as chariot wheels and studded with arms and legs, three of each. Scuttling on these arms and legs they would glide up the walls and spin webs—each web as big as the mainsail of a Viking ship. When the webs were spun they would open their snag-toothed mouths and sing a magic rune, the first song ever sung: The Song of That-to-Be, Sung by All Three.
At the end of the song, Urd, the chief sister, would fling a handful of lentils into the air; each lentil became a fly. But these were not ordinary flies. Most of them wore human faces. Some of them, the larger ones, wore the faces of Giants, and Ogres, and Dismal Dwarfs—who were smaller than Giants or Ogres, but bigger than humans.
The flies buzzed about, swerving in the air, trying to dodge the webs. Each minute in the Tent of Fate was a half year in human time. But the strands of the web were so fine they were almost invisible, and the spider sisters could shift them swiftly, trapping their prey in midair. One by one the flies landed in a web, were wrapped in silk, and devoured. And each time one was eaten, whoever wore that face on earth, or under earth, or in Jutenheim, died.
The flies with human faces all landed in the webs of Skuld or Verdandi. Urd’s web, the largest, held the Giants and the Ogres, the Dwarfs and the Gnomes. One by one she wrapped them in silk and ate them, and sucked the marrow out of their bones, leaving only dry splinters clinging to the web. She almost filled her fat gut, but still had room for more.
“Aieee!” she howled to herself. “One day I’ll be able to take Gods into my net. What a splendid feast I’ll have then. Not yet. Not yet. Soon perhaps, but not yet. For they are still immortal and have not yet been taught to die. But I’ll teach them. They shall learn. They are stubborn and slow to learn but I am stubborn too, and very patient.”
She motioned to her sisters, who stopped spinning their webs and came to her. She said:
“Sisters mine, we are about to weave a great design—wherein will cross and recross the fates of the arrogant Gods and obnoxious Heroes, forbidden treasures and dire quests, high crimes and stupid generosities, imperiled maidens and doomed rescues. And Giants galore and Ogres aplenty; Dismal Dwarfs and a fine selection of monsters. And the last panel in our tapestry will be a gloriously bloody battle raging across the arch of heavens between Aesgard and Jutenheim. Aye, sisters, the sunset of this age will be the blood of the Gods spilling across the horizon. Enmeshed in our design, Odin and his loathsome tribe will pay for past privilege with their very lives.”
“But the Gods are immortal,” said Skuld. “How can they die?”
“A very good question,” said Urd, “—that has a wonderfully bad answer. And that answer shall be revealed as we weave our design, the first stitch of which will be today’s guest, blackhearted, orange-haired Loki.”
“We don’t understand,” said Skuld and Verdandi together.
“You will … you will. Now back to work, my dears. As we sit here chatting, neglecting our webs, people are living too long, saddening their heirs.”
The two younger hags scuttled up the walls and took up their webs where they had left off. Urd turned to greet Loki, who had just entered.
“Hail, great Norn,” he said. “How may I serve you?”
“It is I who shall serve you this day, my son. Is there nothing you wish to ask of one who has so much to give?”
“Oh, yes, yes,” said Loki. “I don’t know where to start. I want everything of value anyone else happens to possess.”
“A good start,” said Urd. “A bit modest.… But I can offer you something even sweeter.”
“What could that be?”
“Vengeance.”
“Against whom?”
“Against him whom you hate the most in the world. We shall not utter his name, but you know who it is, and I know it. For I can read your secret thoughts.”
“I am all attention, wise and powerful Urd.”
“Harken, Loki,” said Urd. “For you a glorious destiny is being designed. You, who were born a Giant of Jutenheim and despise your kin, you who are a guest of the Gods and loathe your hosts—you, Loki, perpetual stranger, clown, trickster, arch-traitor, it is you who shall drag the Gods down from their high places. You who are Odin’s toady shall be Odin’s doom.”
“How?” whispered Loki. “How?”
“Shall I teach you how?”
“No! I shan’t listen. This is some trick to destroy me. How can I be the doom of one who is immortal?”
“You shall strip him of his immortality.”
“That is beyond my power, or your power, or anyone’s. He is King of the Gods who are all immortal, and he the most.”
“You are right, Loki, you clever one. No one can strip Odin of his immortality, except …”
“Except?”
“Except Odin himself.”
“Why should he do that?”
“You shall persuade him. Does he not depend upon you to ease his boredom, to show him fresh pleasures?”
“He does, occasionally.”
“Occasionally is enough. You shall use his own nature against him—his restlessness, his curiosity, his courage.”
“Easy to say, hard to do. Odin may favor me from time to time, but the favor of kings, as you know, is most unreliable. Besides, he is surrounded by those who loathe the sight of me. Frigga, his wife, hisses when I approach, arches her back like a great cat, seems to grow talons.… Thor, that murderous brute, his red-furred fingers tighten on his hammer as soon as he sees me. Once he actually threw it at me; it passed so close the wind of its going knocked me down.”
“Don’t you want to do as I ask?” said Urd very softly. “I want to, yes. But I’m afraid. I’m afraid.” “You don’t yet know what fear is. Observe that large fly up there.”
“That one?”
“Yes. Notice anything strange about him?”
“He seems to be wearing a woolly orange wig. And his eyes … they’re yellow. It’s me! He’s wearing a mask of my face!”
“And now,” said Urd, “I cast a strand of my web—thus. He is snared—thus. I approach—so … my next move will be to wrap him swiftly in silk, and eat him slowly. As I do this, Loki, you will feel the fangs of death entering your own gut, and will die, cursing your fate.”
“Don’t eat him, Urd. Please!”
“But I will—unless …”
“Unless I do as you say? Is that what you mean?”
“Exactly what I mean. But if you obey me, I shall let him fly free. And he will fall into no web of mine until The End of All Things. Obey me in this, trick Odin into yielding the shield of his immortality, and you shall outlive him and all the Gods. And everyone else on earth, or beneath it, or above it. Everyone, in fact, except me.”
“Great Urd, your will shall be performed. But, I pray, give me a hint how to proceed.”
“Come here. Let me whisper. This is the deepest, darkest, most dangerous secret in the universe. I don’t even want my sisters to hear …”
4
The Trickster
Leading from the Norns’ black tent to Aesgard was a span of intertwined icicles. And this ice was so cold it stayed unmelted even by the summer sun. But the sun did melt the surface of the icy bridge, making it very slick. And Loki, skipping out of the Norns’ gloomy den into a blaze of sunlight, slid gleefully all the way to Aesgard. He rushed to the cloud castle but was met by Odin outside the gates. One look told him that the King of the Gods was in a very ugly mood.
“Where have you been?” roared Odin. “I sent for you hours ago.”
“Oh pardon, my master, but no message reached me. I was summoned by Urd this morning and have spent half a day in the tent of the Norns.”
“What did the old bitch want?”
“I’m not sure,” said Loki. “She made me observe how they spin their foul webs and decree their daily dooms. Then she mumbled a string of warnings at me—so many that I lost track of what she was talking about. I think she wanted to frighten me for some reason. But I’m here now, sire. And at your service.”
“I’m bored, Loki, hideously bored. Not a torpor, mind you. I’m boiling with restlessness. I feel that I might tear the sky apart. Perhaps I’ll start with the tent of the Norns.”
“I’ve been thinking about you, my lord,” said Loki. “In fact, I think of little else but how best to serve you. And I believe I may have discovered the key to your dissatisfaction.”
“Speak!”
“Of all the qualities of life, you admire courage the most. Yet you are forbidden to exercise it.”
“What do you mean?”
“Look down upon Midgard, Master, and observe men and women as they lead their daily lives.”
Odin looked down upon earth and its seven seas. It was summertime, and men had gone a-viking. He picked out one crew of yellow-haired, yellow-bearded men who had launched their vessel, and, having raised their single sail, were riding the wind over huge swells. The wind was astern now, but when it shifted, Odin knew, they would drop sail, unship their long oars, and row across hundreds of miles of broken water. And these northern seas could be almost as stormy in summer as in winter. The Vikings had slung their shields over the coaming; the ship wore the targes like a necklace. Swords and spears and battle-axes were wrapped carefully in oiled cloth.
“Observe them,” said Loki, “as their tiny splinter of a ship crawls across the vast, implacable sea. Nor do they consider such a voyage anything to brag about. Real peril, they know, will begin when they hit shore. For they sail in search of booty—which means they will raid another coast, strike inland, hurl themselves upon forces many times their number, seize treasure and slaves, and put out to sea again. And by this time, perhaps, winter will have set in, and ice-fanged gales will savage them as they make the long voyage home.”
Odin nodded wordlessly and turned his gaze toward shore. There he saw embattled men, and women too—for the tall northern women often fought alongside their men. He watched them hunting or being hunted. Watched them fighting, winning, losing. Watched as they farmed the earth and fished the sea, bore their young and buried their dead. He returned to the Viking crew and studied their faces, noted their look of grim joy.
“Well, my lord,” said Loki, “how do they look to you?”
“Some look glad, some look sad. None of them look bored. Is that what you wanted me to see?”
“Yes,” said Loki. “And the lesson these earthlings can teach us who live on high is the value of risk.”
Odin’s eye raked Loki’s face, but he said nothing.
“Yes, risk!” cried Loki. “Utter risk! Life grows most precious when most threatened. Then, every filament glows. The endangered one plunders each hour of its possibilities like a bee looting a rose.”
“You grow strangely eloquent, Loki.”
“Ah, my king, I must tell you that man, that lesser breed, enjoys himself in a way that the Gods will never know.”
“Let us change ourselves into men, then, and seek adventure.”
“Useless, my lord. It won’t work.”
“Why not?” roared Odin.
“You can cast off godhead for a while, put on the guise of a man and seek dire adventure, but all that while, inside your impersonation, you will know yourself to be Odin, who cannot die. So you shall never know the pleasure of true risk.”
“Enough said!” cried Odin. “I hereby, for the space of this adventure, cast off immortality and shrink myself into manhood—thus!”
Odin stood before the massive gates, looking ludicrously small. His ermine robes had vanished with his divine stature and he was clad now in a blue cape. Tilted over his eye was a wide-brimmed black hat.
“Now, Loki,” he said, “do you likewise.”
Loki shrank himself down to the size of a man. They looked at each other and laughed uneasily.
“I feel so puny,” said Odin. “So powerless. No use even taking my good spear, Gugnir. I wouldn’t have the strength to lift it.”
“True, my lord,” said Loki. “But invincible weapons would deny you the pleasure of risk. We shall, of course, arm ourselves as befits our human condition.”
“Suppose we are attacked by Giants or magic-wielding dwarfs. What good would our human weapons be then? Oh, I know, I know. The greater the risk, the greater the pleasure.”
“On further consideration,” said Loki, “I think we may allow ourselves a single weapon pulsing with the divine energy, but one of medium range. A hurling stone of Aesgard, perhaps. Such a stone well thrown should delay a Giant, say, giving us a chance to escape, and still allow a fine margin of risk.”
“Get your stone, and let’s go,” said Odin.
5
Trapping Two Gods
Regnir was walking along the riverbank, thinking hard. “None of them will be easy to kill,” he said to himself. “But Fafnir will be the hardest, so I’ll leave him till last. He’s always looking for fights, the bully, and the greater the odds the more he enjoys himself. Maybe if I wait long enough someone else will do the job for me.”
He glimpsed his brother, Oter, who was spending this day as an enormous otter, lounging on a rock and picking the backbone out of a salmon. Regnir stared at him in loathing and walked on.
“That one won’t be much easier,” he thought. “They’re all so damned big and strong, my family, and can transform themselves into things even bigger and stronger. While I am caged in this small, hideous body forever. My only power lies in my brains. I can outthink any one of those lard-heads, or all three of them put together. But I have to be very careful not to show what I’m thinking or they’ll squash me like a bug. Oh well. I’ve deceived them so far, so I guess I can go on for a while longer. Nevertheless, the time has come to start getting rid of them. But where shall I start?”
He heard someone coming and hid behind a tree. He saw two strangers walking toward him. One of them was very tall and broad-shouldered, and wore a full white beard. A wide-brimmed black hat was tilted over his eyes. Over his eye, rather. For now Regnir could see that he had only one eye; the other was covered by a patch. But that single eye was a dagger of light so piercing and blue that Regnir thought it must pass through the tree and reveal him hiding there.
The other man was smaller, graceful as a wildcat, had bushy orange hair and yellow eyes.
Regnir studied the strangers. He had no way of knowing that they were the gods Odin and Loki, who had shrunk themselves to human form. They did, indeed, look like mortal men, rather large ones, but they cast an inhuman brightness. And Regnir recognized that they were very important to him. He didn’t know how or why, but felt that upon this hour his entire life was about to change. And feeling hardened into certainty as he heard the bearded one say:
“I’m getting hungry.”
“Well, we’re in a wood,” said the other. “And our summer forests are full of game. And I hear a rushing of waters nearby. Do you fancy meat or fish?”
“Both,” said the bearded man.
Regnir
stepped out from behind his tree, and said: “Good day, sirs.”
“Who are you?” snapped the orange-haired man. “And why were you hiding?”
“My name is Regnir, and I live nearby. I wasn’t hiding; I was searching hollow trees for honeycombs.”
“Honeycombs,” murmured Odin. “Did you find any?”
“No, my lord. But if you’re hungry I can guide you to a stream where you can catch not only salmon but those who hunt them—bears and otters and such.”
“Guide away, little fellow,” said Loki. “Why are you so ugly, incidentally? Are you a dwarf, perhaps? Or some kind of miniature ogre?”
“Something of both,” said Regnir. “And less than either. Follow me if you will.”
He led them to the riverbank and stood there pointing. “See?”
“See what?” said Loki.
“On that rock over there.”
“Can that be a bear?” exclaimed Odin.
“An otter,” said Regnir. “Outsize, but an otter.”
“It’s even big for a bear,” whispered Loki to Odin. “Its hide will make a cape to draw the most beautiful Giantess from hearth and husband.”
“Right now,” growled Odin, “I’m more interested in otter steak.”
“Steak first, pelt later,” said Loki.
His hand flashed to his pouch. He pulled out the hurling stone and held it poised, calculating the distance to his target and the strength of the crosswind. Regnir watched in dismay. He knew that the huge otter’s hide was so dense that it could hardly be pierced by arrow or spear. And its ogreish bones were strong and springy as iron barrel-hoops. Did this ridiculous man really expect to kill such a beast by throwing a stone?
Loki threw it now with an easy sidearm motion. “No force at all,” thought Regnir sadly. “The stone will just tickle him.” But the small round rock that Loki threw seemed to take on a life of its own when it left his hand.
Regnir heard the splat of it hitting Oter’s head, heard his brother’s skull cracking, saw the blood gush out of nostrils and mouth. The enormous shining otter fell dead, still clinging to the salmon he had caught and had not had time to eat.
Monsters of Norse Mythology Page 2