The Shores of Vanaheim (The Ragnarok Era Book 3)

by Matt Larkin

  Obviously, Odin knew of Njord—who didn’t? The famous king of the gods and master of the wind and sea. And probably Odin’s ultimate opponent on Vanaheim.

  They paused before a giant window looking out over an apple orchard. Unlike the golden apples of Yggdrasil, these were bright red, looking truly luscious. Gefjon pointed at them. “Those fields are owned by Sunna, my own lady. I suspect Idunn didn’t seek shelter with her, though she is an Aetheling, because of the rumors Bragi had an extended affair with her.”

  Since every Vanr he’d ever met treated bedding someone of little more importance than sharing a toast with the person, Odin had to call Bragi’s reaction petty and hypocritical. The god of poetry wanted to have his own affairs and yet deny them to his wife. Most men were like that, he supposed. Still, no wonder the two of them were estranged.

  “How is it,” Odin asked when they resumed their walk, “that no First One is king here? If the Vanir measure rank by generation, and even a few First Ones remain, I would think those would become your leaders.”

  Sometimes men betray their greatest lords …

  What was Audr saying now?

  “There were three in the past, before Njord,” Gefjon said. “The last of them, Mundilfari, chose to step down. They say he saw something in the well that changed him forever. And after that, he took to wandering the world, maybe even worlds beyond this one. Ever searching, though no one can say what for. I wouldn’t repeat those rumors in front of Lady Sunna, though.”

  “Oh?” What well did she speak of? Something that revealed visions? That might prove useful—anything to help clarify the madness unfurling from the Sight. The shadows that played in his dreams showed glorious battles, yes, and death. Death beyond measure, as the world burned.

  Gefjon smiled. “Mundilfari was Sunna’s father. He hasn’t been seen on these shores in the better part of a thousand years. Some pains never truly heal.”

  Odin gritted his teeth. No. Gefjon was right about that. You never got over losing those you loved. Not if you lived for centuries, for millennia. The Vanir were living proof of it.

  As they headed back into the great hall, Odin fell short. Idunn stood there, face drawn as she conversed with another woman. An uncanny resemblance lay between them. The other woman’s skin was darker and richer even than Idunn’s, her long hair black as night. This had to be Idunn’s mother.

  Gefjon at once bowed. “Lady Eostre. You honor my hall with your presence.”

  Eostre was short, slim, and girlish looking. She might have passed for Idunn’s sister, if not for eyes holding impossible depth. She nodded at Gefjon, then turned to Odin. If she was waiting for him to bow, she might as well wait for the snows of Hel to melt. Instead, he nodded at her.

  “Lady Eostre.”

  “Lord Odin.” The Vanr’s voice lacked inflection or even emotion, but somehow carried weight enough. She turned to her daughter. “I will walk with this Ás in the gardens. We are not to be disturbed.”

  A test then. Odin struggled to keep his emotions from betraying him. Idunn had hoped he might reason with her mother. Odin would have preferred to match wits with the woman after a good night’s sleep and a hearty breakfast. It seemed their hopes would now hang on his words, whether he fancied himself ready or not. He waved an open hand toward the door, accepting Eostre’s invitation.

  She led him out into the fields, and he walked beside her, fearing to speak first. The goddess had a presence, a serenity that demanded respect and silence. Without a word, she led him on past terraces and flowerbeds boasting plants and colors he had imagined only in dreams. By his reckoning, they must have walked nigh to half an hour, probably beyond even Gefjon’s domain.

  Finally, she spoke. “Did you know,” she said, pointing at the sun as it dipped low on the horizon, “that my mother named me after the dawn? My father worshipped the sun. After my mother lost him, she called me Eostre, I think hoping I would somehow lead her back to him. I’m not sure that ever worked.” Eostre turned back to him. “You probably never really saw the sun, not the real sun, until you landed on these shores.”

  Indeed. He had never considered it, but seeing the sun from Vanaheim, without the veil of mist and cloud, seeing real light, had left him speechless. “You are insightful, my lady.”

  “There’s no need for flattery, Odin. I need to know the real you. I am faced with a dilemma. My son-in-law comes to me—with a broken nose, no less—claiming my daughter has brought a mortal lover to these shores.”

  Mortal? So Idunn had not revealed that Odin and others among the Aesir had eaten the apples. Because Idunn was meant to be their guardian, and to admit she had stolen some away, given them to outsiders … Hel only knew what kind of punishment Njord might dream up for that.

  When he made no immediate answer, Eostre continued. “It’s nothing to be ashamed of. Nor is it the first time one of my people has returned from the outside with a lover. Sometimes they stay here for years, sometimes their whole lives. Mortal lives are short by our reckoning, and as long as their numbers remain few, no one seems to care overmuch. A human here or there offers little risk. But Idunn, well she was never the kind to bring her lovers home. So what changed?”

  Odin cleared his throat. If he spoke wrongly he might well find himself banished—or worse, imprisoned. Eostre offered no outward hostility, but he was not fool enough to miss how thin the ice beneath his feet had grown. Idunn, an Aetheling, had a position of great authority and respect as guardian of the apples of immortality. With that position must come some extra caution on her mother’s part.

  “Lady Eostre …” The best lies were all true. To be the king his people needed, he would have to convince all or most of the Vanir to his way of thinking. Or at least to frame every situation such that truth might be concealed in clever words. “Idunn and I are not lovers.” He pointed off in to the distance, toward where Andalus lay. “My wife and children are out there, waiting for me. I admit, I have betrayed her, but not with Idunn. I love my family, and I’ve sworn to do better by them.”

  “Then why have you come?”

  Everything hinged upon his choice here. He had to hope the half truth would be enough to get him in the door, to win enough sympathy to prevent the imminent war. Or, if war was inevitable, if it was truly his urd, he at least needed time to learn the strengths and numbers of these people. “I come speaking for the Aesir.”

  “All of them?” The surprise in her voice was among the first emotion he had heard from her.

  “Yes, all. I was appointed their king because of a common threat. And now I come to you, to Vanaheim, as an ambassador seeking aid against that threat.”

  She paused, looking him right in the eye. As if daring him to offer any cause she might care for in the least. Though she stood far shorter than he did, her gaze left him feeling small before her.

  “The Niflungar have returned, Lady Eostre. Their sorceress queen raises armies of draugar and plots with trolls to overthrow the Aesir and all kingdoms of men.” That truth would have to suffice. “We know in ages past, the Niflungar were enemies of Vanaheim. Now, those who spent centuries worshipping you have come begging your aid in a broken world. A battle for all of Midgard has begun. Do not abandon the Aesir out in the cold.”

  Eostre’s eyes had narrowed at mention of the Niflungar, and she began to chew her lip, once again seeming young. An illusion disguising a five-thousand-year-old goddess, of course. For the first time, Odin wondered what gifts an apple had given the dawn goddess. “The Niflungar were defeated long ago, but perhaps it was always urd they would return. Still, you are not like to find help here, King of the Aesir. The Vanir withdrew from Midgard. The problems born of Halfdan the Old’s mistakes are not ours to solve. That, at least, is what Njord will tell you, should he deign to see you at all.”

  So even the Vanir believed in urd guiding their steps, shaping their lives. The thought did not comfort Odin.

  “Idunn told me as much, about Njord. But I did not come here to
see your king. I came to seek help from people like you, my lady. The Niflungar are sorcerers, steeped in the Art and thus armed with weapons the Aesir cannot understand. The Lofdar are gone, dwindled to shattered peoples. But the Vanir, you understand the Art, you know how to stand against the Niflungar.”

  The path Eostre led him on had taken a steep turn, rising along the curve of a hill and forming a circuitous route deeper into the island. Odin wanted to ask where she was taking him, but he dare not distract her from his entreaty. Instead, they walked in silence for a time, until the sound of rushing waters reached him, drawing nearer as they pressed on. High overhead, a waterfall cascaded down the mountains, cut through the hills in rapids, and then poured out into another fall. An ivy-covered stone bridge arched over those rapids, high above them. This path would eventually lead there, but first it passed into another hall. This one, a many-tiered tower seven stories tall. Overgrowth wrapped the spire as well, save for a balcony at the apex, open to the east—to the rising sun. This must be Eostre’s tower.

  “You’re correct,” Eostre said, pausing at a bridge the led between hills and rose to her tower. “I do know of the Art, though to say anyone understands it is to misinterpret its study. You call it a weapon, but it is both less and more than that, and we spend lifetimes trying to grasp those distinctions.”

  Petty, would-be gods who glimpse a teardrop … and call it the ocean …

  Odin resisted the urge to argue with the wraith. Such things rarely provided any useful result. He needed to focus on Eostre. “At Sessrumnir.” That was what Idunn had called their school of witchcraft.

  Eostre quirked an eyebrow. Had Odin said too much? At last, the goddess set out across the bridge. “Maybe that is the best place for you to seek answers. Those with questions always seem to linger there, and its keeper, Freyja, is better suited to answer your questions than I. For tonight, you will shelter in my hall. In the morning, I will take you to Sessrumnir and introduce you to Freyja.”

  Vӧlvur called Freyja their patron, the goddess of seid. Of course, common men and women knew her more as the goddess of love and sex. Odin followed Eostre. She had not turned on him, nor informed Njord of his presence. He could not have hoped for much better an outcome.

  “What of Idunn?”

  “A servant will go and fetch her.”

  Eostre led him into her tower and up the first flight of stairs to a landing, in the middle of which lay a fountain the size of a small house, carved in the likeness of a dragon, one spewing water.

  Odin’s eyes glazed over and he swayed. It was … not unlike those dreams he’d had as a child. Could he have foreseen this decades ago? And if so, if every choice had lead him here, did that not confirm he was bound by urd, trapped in a weave greater than himself? His throat was dry and his eyes stung.

  Enormous glass windows let in so much light it hardly seemed like being inside a building. Beside the fountain Bragi sat, rising stiffly when Odin entered.

  “What is this currish miscreant still doing on the sacred islands?” The god of poetry’s words wheezed through his broken nose, grating on Odin’s ears.

  “Lord Odin is my guest for the evening,” Eostre said.

  Bragi stiffened, glaring at Odin before turning a meeker gaze on the lady. “Lady Eostre, surely you cannot believe his protests of innocence. I found them lying together unclad. The basest child could not help but glean what had gone between them.”

  “Do you call me a child, Bragi?”

  The poet sauntered forward, clearly more at ease with this game of words than Odin was ever like to be. “I would never mistake your youthful visage for one lacking in any manner of fortuitous experience.” Odin was starting to hate this god. “But, were I left to believe this mortal has somehow forced or duped you, I would have no choice but to take the case to the highest authority—all in the best interest of my family, of course.”

  Eostre snorted. “If King Njord were to hear of this, know that not only Idunn, but I as well, will be displeased with you, son-in-law.”

  The poet god shrugged. “Then I, of course, must defer to you. Mother. I could never act to displease you.” After a moment’s hesitation, he bowed and left.

  “Hope the nose feels better soon,” Odin shouted after him. He decided it was best if he left the “trollfucker” bit unspoken at the end.

  Eostre turned to him. “That was unwise.”

  Odin shrugged. “He thinks I slept with his wife. Then I broke his nose. I doubt a little taunt will be what turns him against me.”

  “Do not forget yourself, Lord Odin. You are a guest among the Vanir, and here, your rank among the Aesir means naught. It is but a common courtesy that we even address you as a lord. You are safe in my hall. Do not think yourself beyond Bragi’s reach elsewhere in Vanaheim.”

  It had never crossed his mind. Nor, in truth, did he think Bragi was like to prove his biggest threat on these shores.

  18

  “This man, Tyr,” Volsung said, “he bears a fell blade and fights like a man gone fey.”

  Gudrun frowned, staring out into the mist from the grove where they had camped for the night. If Volsung only knew. Tyr had not only taken a Vanr apple, but bore the runeblade Gramr. Since Grimhild seemed to have increased his bloodlust, the Ás had become all the more dangerous. Sooner or later, he’d destroy himself, but the present seemed to turn against the Hunalanders. And she had been careful not to let him even learn of Tyr’s battle against Guthorm. Her brother ought to have wiped the Ás from Midgard, and instead had returned maimed, barely able to speak with his half-severed jaw.

  Volsung spat. “Today he slew two berserkir. How would you have us reach the ships to burn them while such a man guards them?”

  Now she ground her teeth. Tyr needed to die, and soon, but that was hardly her chief concern. Though she dare not say it, Gudrun had begun to think burning the ships came secondary to allowing Guthorm to capture Loge. The fire priest had helped the Lofdar bring down the Niflungar already. Gudrun did not want to see her rise to power as the new queen thwarted by the man, and, in this, he might prove a greater threat than even Odin.

  With Irpa’s insight, Gudrun had succeeded in raising a draug of her own—an Ás warrior chosen at random. She might send the creature against Tyr, but the warrior had already come close to slaying Guthorm. Perhaps, though, she might solve two problems at once: impeding Tyr’s efforts to hunt the Hunalanders and drawing out Loge at the same time.

  Finally, she sighed. “I am not to be disturbed this night, not under any circumstance.”

  Volsung worked his jaw before grunting and turning away. The man had just enough wisdom not to ask about that which he would not wish to know.

  Guthorm had been kind enough to secure her an Ás prisoner—a shieldmaiden drawn away from her troop. The woman hung from an ash tree by her ankles, bound and gagged, but struggling, clearly unable to take her gaze off the rotting flesh of Gudrun’s brother.

  Blood drizzled from shallow cuts on the victim’s arms, blood with which Gudrun had painted glyphs on nearby rocks and trees in a summoning circle. Beyond the Veil, vaettir had already begun to gather, watching, drawn no doubt by the eldritch symbols. Gudrun could see them with the Sight, as could Guthorm of course, but the Ás shieldmaiden would have seen naught. Which was worse? The sense of gathering doom which one could not see, or to look upon the foul faces of the dead?

  In truth, it did not matter. The shieldmaiden would see what awaited her, as life began to flee her body.

  Gudrun blew out a long breath and wiped sweat from her forehead with the back of her hand. Evoking several snow maidens was risky, especially weak as she had grown—and deprived of any protective talisman—but Snegurka alone would not serve her needs. With a last look around to ensure no mortals drew nigh, she began to chant in the spirit tongue, the foreign syllables tasting odd and seeming to reverberate in her skull, even after so many years of castings.

  At her words, Snegurka and Irpa both stirred in the
back of her mind, pushing, pressing against her will, perhaps even against one another, each seeking control of a mortal vessel.

  Drawing a dagger from her belt, Gudrun approached the shieldmaiden, never ceasing her evocation. The victim thrashed, eyes wider than ever. Gudrun slid the blade along her throat, allowing blood to rush out in a waterfall over the woman’s head. The convulsions lasted but a moment more.

  The mist thickened.

  It whispered to her, answering her summons, as snow maidens drifted in on the vapors, approaching from all sides. Three of the them came, moaning and wailing, invisible to those without the Sight or drawing nigh to death. The Mist spirits were born of death, drawn to it, as if keen to drink the suffering of the damned. Sometimes, they even appeared to those fated to soon pass from the Mortal Realm, privy to some uncanny insight that revealed such things.

  One drifted closer than the others, hair, eyes, and clothes all white and translucent, like moonlight reflected on a frozen lake.

  They pressed their wills against her, seeking any ingress into her body.

  Gudrun slumped to her knees and clenched her fists, ground her teeth and stared defiance at the Mist spirit. Pressure beat against her temples and welled in her chest, the weight of an avalanche crushing her from all sides. Instinctively, she reached for the Singasteinn, but it was not there. No talisman, no protection. Just her.

  Hot liquid began to dribble down her nose, running over her lips. She could not let up, could not give in.

  And then, all at once, the pressure eased, and the Mist spirits converged on the now-dead shieldmaiden. Gudrun did not look as they began feasting off the woman’s soul, accepting the sacrifice.

  She wanted to stand but feared to topple over. One did not show weakness in front of vaettir.