Min began by following the woman for a while. Watching the classes, watching ‘Lorelei’ bind the harpy community together. Welcoming new members, staggering in from Hellas, most of them looking battered and scarred—relics of fights with centaur, satyr, and minotaur bands, Minori overheard, as she observed. Hellas, like northern Europa, was now a land under siege. Some of the cities and certain protected highways were intact, but other cities had been destroyed entirely, the humans and humanoids in them driven insane. The countryside was, therefore, exceedingly dangerous, with roving bands of monsters. Though few besides the minotaurs and cyclopeans were as individually fearsome as a jotun or a fenris, the Hellene humanoids roved in bands and packs.
And as Reginleif had said, each of these harpies has been unmaddened by Saraid, and most, mercifully, had little recollection of their mad period. Just enough to know that they had attacked travelers, other humanoids. Eaten gobbets of raw flesh. Sometimes deer.
Sometimes other things.
They all required comfort. The understanding that they had not been in control of themselves. They required training, too, and many of them wanted to be able to defend this new land that had taken them in. Minori watched, quietly, from sheltered alcoves, as Reginleif taught these creatures how to fight. To use spears and bows and arrows, and a few began taking lessons in firearms at Judean gun ranges. She trained the sirens in using their voices, teaching them to sing in harmony for control, and then how to shatter glass with precise vocal harmonics.
And then Minori began to meet Regin at a café, once a month, for lunch. Nothing more. Basically just a status report. As she did again, today. “Ah, my parole officer has arrived,” Reginleif told her as she sat down.
“No, indeed. Call me an interested observer.” Minori pointed to the menu. “Have you already decided?”
Reginleif still had the digestion, for better or worse, of a swan. Which, ironically, meant that traditional Nipponese foods like sashimi and sushi were actually very good for her. Unfortunately, the price of sashimi-grade fish had gone up, enormously. Nippon’s fishing fleet was scattered, and the boats were largely being used to haul illegal refugees to other countries at the moment, and cargo freighters and cargo planes were in short supply, as well. The gods of Nippon were still fighting off mad god attacks, and volcanoes continued to erupt, nearly on a weekly basis. The North Sea fishing fleets still had ports in Germania, Gaul, and Britannia, and the fish could be trucked or sent by refrigerated trains, all across Europa, but the freshest sources of fish in Judea had always been the Mediterranean, the Red Sea, and the Persian Gulf. The Red Sea and the Mediterranean now had a large, natural causeway between them, caused by the earthquakes that had spawned in the wake of Baal’s death. There were some disruptions to Mediterranean fishing—rumors of vast creatures out there in the ocean—but so long as one stuck to local varieties, the cost could be kept down.
“Spider roll,” Reginleif said, pointing at soft-shelled crab rolled in rice and seaweed.
“That’s it?”
“My food voucher from the refugee center won’t cover much.”
“I’m paying,” Minori said, firmly. “Order enough that you can take some with you for dinner, as well.” She paused. “I can introduce you to Frittigil Chatti. She’s the refugee coordinator. All the work you’re doing with the harpies should get you a stipend of some sort. And then you could afford an apartment in Little Hellas.”
Reginleif sent her an ironic, strained glance. “I have declined invitations to meet the bride of my god and mother of his son several times, when other refugees have put me forward as some sort of ‘community leader.’ I’ve managed to decline her personal invitation to her office on no less than three occasions. I probably cannot avoid the meeting forever, but I would prefer to put it off as long as possible. For many reasons.” An uncomfortable shift of her shoulders.
Minori sighed. “You have a point. Still . . .” she pointed at the menu. “Eat properly. You’re far too thin.”
Reginleif shrugged. She’d been knife-slender even in Fennmark, with none of the generous curves of other valkyrie that Minori had seen. “Then I thank you. Maki, then. And some amaebi . . . and . . . salmon roe. I’ll admit that I’m starving.” The conger eels for the maki came from the Red Sea, and the shrimp from the Persian Gulf.
Minori suppressed a smile, and made her own order. In the main, pure sashimi for her: Hokkigai, or raw fresh clams, maguro, or raw tuna, and a little tako, or cooked octopus, over a bed of rice. She wouldn’t eat much of a dinner tonight, for certain. As she began to eat with her chopsticks, looking around the café, which here in little Nippon, was filled with mostly Asian faces, with a handful of Hellenes and one or two adventurous Goths, she heard a distinct noise from across the table, and smothered a smile. “You do not need to hold back for my sake, Regin. I am aware of how much you appreciate food.”
“I wouldn’t want the people at the tables around us to stare.” The siren picked up another piece of the spider roll, a little awkwardly, with the chopsticks. “People do not know how fortunate they are to have mouths. And taste buds.” Her tone was content at the moment, a striking contrast to the angry woman she had once been. But there was always an underlying note of sorrow. How much of her previous rage was her own, and how much did Hel influence her, I wonder?
There is no way to know, Amaterasu counseled, but when we soul-bond a human, there are often changes to the human’s personality. Often, extreme ones.
A waiter suddenly moved to the far-viewer positioned over the main sushi bar, and turned it on, flipping channels until one of the all-news stations came on. Minori sighed. This was never a good sign.
At first, she wasn’t sure what she was seeing. The camera was on a fishing boat, bobbing up and down on some stretch of deep water, light reflecting off the blue waves. She could see nets being hauled in, and, out of reflex, almost turned to Kanmi to ask if the Phoenician letters on the sides indicated any of the ships on which his family had worked . . . and then she remembered that she couldn’t ask that question. Her lips tightened as the water began to bubble into a white froth, and the captain, evidently not a fool, cut the lines to the nets and turned his ship away. The camera caught sight of another boat in the area, this one not moving yet, and then turned back to record the area aft of the other ship, and the foaming waters as something emerged from them. The camera could only catch pieces of the creature, at first; then more and more of it became visible as the first boat, on which it was positioned, sped away.
At first, Minori thought it was a whale, broaching. But a whale broaches, and then falls back into the water. But this creature rose, and kept rising. Massive body, probably bigger than Dagon’s god-beast form, but bipedal. It stood like a titan . . . no, I’ve met a titan now, this is not what Prometheus is . . . gray-skinned and shining in the sun, and it had a dozen tentacle-like handling appendages, in addition to its arms, complete with squid-like suckers. Atop its shoulders, a disfigured and human-like face, but one with a thousand needle-sharp teeth visible as it opened its mouth to bellow, a roar of sound that evidently shook the camera right out of the invisible operator’s hands, for it fell to the ground. Human hands, visible in the lens, as whoever owned the camera, picked it back up again. And then a blurry focus, tightening in, on the other boat, which only now began to retreat. Too late. The creature reached out and picked up the boat as if it were a toy, and hurled it away. She could see human bodies flying over the rails before the boat hurtled back down into the water, landing with so much force that it broke in half.
The camera spun, shakily, back to the creature, which now pulled up one of the huge trawling nets, filled with fish, from where it was now floating in the sea. And poured the fish inside into its gaping mouth. “This scene was recorded today about a hundred miles west of Crete,” the somber voice of the announcer explained. “The captain of the boat whose crew made the recording retreated to port, and requested that naval ships be sent for retrieval and recov
ery of the sailors of the second ship. If there are any survivors.”
Minori looked down at her meal, her stomach twisting. “The price of seafood just went up,” she muttered, tiredly. It was a bad joke, but it was all she had left. “What was that thing?”
“The kraken,” Reginleif answered. “I hope it is the only one of its kind.”
Minori rubbed at her face. “I feel as if I should be . . . gearing up. Going out to take care of that thing.” Fifteen years ago, I’d have been waiting for the call.
Reginleif shook her head. “Legend has it that the god-born Perseus slew one by turning it to stone with the head of Medusa. Most mortal weapons will do little good against it . . . although Judean and Hellene missiles might have some effect.” She gave Minori a sympathetic look. “I understand, however. I would not mind dazzling its eyes and giving it a hundred wrong targets to attack while others moved in to kill it.”
So why don’t we? Minori thought, grimly, but she couldn’t ask Reginleif to risk her new identity that way.
She did, however, know another valkyrie. Sigrun was back, for the moment, from the Persian front, and had been delighted, if a little confused, by Minori’s suddenly renewed interest in her rusty kendo skills. Then she’d shown Sigrun the sword, a little shyly. “This is Kusanagi-no-Tsurugi. The Grass-Cutting Sword.”
“That is a truly odd name for a weapon.” Sigrun frowned. “If a sword isn’t capable of at least cutting grass, then it is a failure as a sword.” She paused. “Also, as a gardening implement.”
Minori chuckled. Sigrun’s rare forays into the realm of humor were always exceedingly dry. “It’s original name was Murakumo-no-Tsurugi. The Sword of the Gathering Clouds of Heaven.”
Sigrun considered that for a long moment. “I can’t tell if that’s poetic or showy.”
Minori folded her arms across her chest and tapped a foot. “Well? Your people have Caliburn.”
“Not my people. Trennus’.”
“And your people have no names for great legendary weapons?” Minori raised her eyebrows.
“Nægling, or Nagelring, depending on your region. Gram. Balmung.” Sigrun shrugged. “Nægling means to nail. Nagelring means jeweled nails, as in those in the hilt of the sword. Gram can mean either grain or war. Balmung . . . just another name for Gram. Legend says Odin stabbed it into an oak tree, and declared that whoever had the strength to pull it forth, might keep it. Sigurd kept it, though it shattered in his last battle, and was reforged for his son, Siegfried. And when it was reforged, it could cut an anvil in half.” Sigrun paused, as they were standing in the practice area in the atrium of her house. “On reflection, it does sound a little like Caliburn.” She gave Minori a look. “What’s the story of your hedge-clipping sword?”
Minori tilted her head to the side, smiling. “Susanoo, the god of the sea, fought an eight-headed dragon. On getting the dragon drunk with sake, it was an easy mark, and he cut off all its heads with his own sword, and, on cutting off its eight tails, he found the sword . . . inside the fourth tail.” She paused, watching Sigrun’s eyebrows rise. “He gave it to Amaterasu to apologize for having killed one of her servants and ruined her rice fields.”
“So the magical sword was inside the dragon’s tail.” Sigrun nodded, her lips twitching faintly. “Possibly left there by the last hero stupid enough to fight a dragon, I take it?”
“History does not record,” Minori replied, her chin elevated, but she could hear Amaterasu laughing in her mind.
“So, why did you bring it over?” Sigrun took a seat on the edge of a planter, looking up at Minori calmly.
Minori shrugged, and slipped the changeable blade back into its sheath. “I doubt I’m meant to wield it, but just carrying it from Nippon has made me remember how much I loved kendo, until I had to give it up.” She sighed. “I would like to start practicing with you again, Sigrun. I have missed it.”
“You had to give it up because of the arthritis.” Sigrun studied Minori, and a flash of . . . something . . . passed over her features. Minori hadn’t concealed Amaterasu’s presence within her from the others. She hadn’t informed her mother, but she had told Masako. And it was impossible to hide the effect the goddess was having on her body. Oh, no change in eye or hair color, other than the removal of the gray. Amaterasu was trying to be discreet in her fallback position, even as the main portion of the goddess continued to fight in Nippon. But losing ten years overnight had hardly been subtle. The shifts of expression on Sigrun’s face seemed a complex mix of anger, pain, and finally, resignation. “Of course, Minori. I’m sure it will be good for you to clean the rust off.” Sigrun’s eyes dropped to the blade. “And if someone is needed to carry that sword, I cannot imagine a better wielder than you.” She held out her hand, and her spear had appeared there, as it always did. Minori had never quite figured out how it did so. A blood-binding should have caused it to traverse a linear path through unblocked areas to Sigrun’s hand, nothing more. She’s pulling it through the Veil, Amaterasu supplied, quietly. Though perhaps she does not realize it.
That had been about six months ago, and Minori was just beginning to feel competent with a wooden sword once more. She remembered her reflexes as being faster, and had to compensate to be smooth, instead of quick. Sigrun kept her spear’s head covered, bated, for every practice session, and always pressed Minori just to the limit of her abilities, and no further. Never overwhelming with superiority. Just always one step better, showing Minori different tactics to take. Just as in the old days, Minori thought today, shaking her head as she’d picked herself up from the mats spread out in the back yard, under the cherry and apple trees. “Sig-chan?”
Sigrun stepped back to a ready position. “Yes?”
“You’ve seen this ‘kraken’ creature on the news, have you not?”
Sigrun blinked, and nodded. “We should do something about it,” Minori blurted. “It’s destroying shipping lanes. Fishing boats. This is . . . what we do. What we have always done. We go solve problems.”
“Yes, and the last several times we went to solve problems, we made them worse.” Sigrun raised her pale eyebrows, and leaned on her spear now.
“I refuse to believe that.” Minori clamped her teeth down for a moment. “I think that you and I could make a difference out there. And I am . . . very tired of not making a difference.”
Sigrun sat down under the sapling apple tree. Minori knew that Sigrun picked all of the apples and gave them to the Matrugena children. Baked them into pies and cakes and let the children eat them all. “You’ve made a difference, Min,” Sigrun said, quietly. “If not for you, we wouldn’t have known about Tawantinsuyu until after the Sapa Inca and Supay finished draining all the other gods. You were in Fennmark. You kept Kanmi sane. You’re rescuing your people and making sure they have homes and jobs. But now, you want to get back into the fight?”
Minori nodded, silently.
“You’re as bad as he is.” Sigrun nodded towards the house. “I caught him oiling and cleaning Caliburn last night. It’s the news that does it. He wants to go help the flooding communities, or go fight beside the jotun and his own people on the Wall. He wants to be young again.” She sighed. “So, what is the plan for you and I killing a creature so tall that its feet apparently touch the seafloor while its head and chest are out of the water? I ask, because I am entirely out of surface-to-air missiles.” She paused. “Also, there is the small matter of . . . jurisdiction.”
“It’s in international waters,” Minori replied, quickly. “No one holds sway over the sea, besides sea gods. You shouldn’t get in trouble. And I didn’t think it would be just the two of us.” Minori shook her head. “I was thinking you should ask Nith for some assistance.”
Sigrun’s eyes widened. “I am sure he would be happy to do so, but I am uncertain that the kraken will die without several submarines and destroyers, all firing at the creature at once.”
“Hellene mythology says that Perseus turned it to stone with the head of
Medusa.” Minori realized that she was parroting Reginleif, but forged onwards, anyway. “Nith’s breath can freeze almost anything. It’s a creature of the water, specifically of the Mediterranean. Chances are, it doesn’t have the antifreeze compounds in its blood common to creatures of the Arctic and Antarctic. On top of which, it’s standing and swimming in salt water. Electricity should be quite useful against it.” Minori pursed her lips. “And I may have one or two tricks of my own to use.”
Sigrun sighed. “I know that the Roman fleets based out of Tyre and Shiqmona are out looking for it, when they’re not trying to protect the shipping lanes. Both from it, and from an unfortunate amount of piracy coming out of North Africa at the moment.” The cities of African Carthage were in ruins. Few people had jobs, other than recovery, relief, and construction workers. The result was a huge number of people taking to the seas to attack ships that happened to be carrying supplies. That some of these were relief ships didn’t matter to the pirates. The person who had the food, water, and ley-taps, was the person who had power.
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