The Age Of Odin aog-3

by James Lovegrove

  This was what I did best, what I was made for. I wasn't a good husband. I wasn't a good father. Nature hadn't designed me to hold down a McJob and be Mr Domestic and live the cosy life. It had designed me to fight and slay. I had no other function. This — wading headlong into the enemy and mowing them down — was me.

  And the blackness at the core of my being exulted. It screamed with a joy that was beyond happiness, beyond ecstasy, inexpressibly sweet and mindless. You couldn't get a high like it from any other source. Drink, drugs, unbridled sex, they paled by comparison. Poor substitutes. This was the real deal. Uncut. Raw. Mainline. Heavenly. The utter, unutterable bliss of not having to think, not having to feel, having only to recognise, react, and move on. See enemy. Kill enemy. Find next enemy. Repeat ad infinitum, or until the supply of opponents runs out.

  The sun set. The sky greyed. There was that greenish glow on the western horizon that signified the last of the light. And when it was gone, that was when Bergelmir decided his troops had had enough for the day. Once again, the retreat was sounded, and the frost giants pulled back. Any that were still scaling the castle walls leapt back down to the ground and scurried off; any that were still on top of the walls did their best to make a getaway, and many succeeded. White silhouettes, they ghosted across the snow to the dark sanctuary of the woods.

  We watched them go, knowing we hadn't won, knowing they'd be back tomorrow, but knowing too that we'd done as well as we could have hoped and better than anyone might have expected. After all, we were still holding the castle, weren't we? And as long as we had that, we had something.

  Sixty-Two

  I was keeping lookout in the ruined hollow that had been one of the castle bedrooms. Nothing was happening outside. Campfires winked in the forest, but there'd been no sign of any overt hostile activity. Bitterly cold air whistled in through the caved-in outer wall. The stars were out in their millions, each a fleck of ice. The moon was as round and hard as a cannonball.

  Freya brought me a mug of tea. She knocked on the frame of the shattered door first, before entering.

  "Didn't want to startle you," she said. "I know how easy you are to catch unawares."

  I murdered that drink. Hot, milky, delicious. "You're a godsend," I told her when the mug was drained.

  "Soldiers love their tea. If I've learned anything these past months, it's that. They can't function without it."

  "An army marches on its stomach, but only if its stomach's got a brew inside. So, what's the news? How's everyone holding up?"

  "Reasonably well. Thwaite, however…"

  "How is old Face Fungus?" I asked, although her tone of voice had already told me.

  "He didn't make it. Frigga gave him all the attention she could, but she's been run ragged, her power is stretched thin… and he just didn't have the strength."

  "Bugger. Anything else I should know about?"

  "Nothing much. I did come across two of your teammates arguing."

  "Backdoor and who?"

  "Not him. Cy and the Irishman."

  "Paddy? Arguing with Cy? What about?"

  "That I don't know. I came in at the end of it. They were in the banqueting hall. Paddy called Cy a name and walked out fuming. That was all I saw."

  "Huh. Well, they're both big boys. They can sort themselves out. It's a pressure situation. There's bound to be some friction. I'll maybe have a chat with them later, but it's probably just them getting on each other's nerves. Nothing to worry about."

  Freya sat down beside me at my vantage point, near enough that our thighs were not quite touching. She stared out into the darkness. "Quiet out there."

  "I'd say 'too quiet,' but that'd be a movie cliche. Frosties seem bedded down for the night. Doubt they'll attack before daybreak."

  "Agreed. They're re-equipping themselves. Their ice-smiths will be busy repairing weapons and casting new ones. Normally it's a week's work to shape a decent blade, but they can put together something makeshift in under an hour."

  "Let 'em. Makes no difference. Whatever they throw at us, we can handle it."

  "From anybody else I would call that bravado. From you — you really believe it, don't you?"

  "Why not? It's the only way to think. Otherwise, might as well just give up and go home."

  "Why haven't you?"

  "Why haven't I what?"

  "Gone home."

  "Don't understand the question."

  She nestled in close to me. We were definitely touching now, her body firm and tight against mine. Knowing Freya, this was purely pragmatic. Compensating for the freezing temperatures, shared physical warmth, all that. And yet, it wasn't. It was more.

  "This isn't your fight," she said. "You're a soldier of fortune. You're here only because money is involved. But still, you're going to see this through to the end. You're happy to."

  "Loki has to be stopped."

  "Is that all?"

  "Isn't it enough? Nobody on Midgard seems able to stand up to him, but we can."

  "Can we? We've taken such dreadful losses."

  "Still here, though, aren't we? Still standing."

  "I'm just saying I wouldn't blame you if you wanted to quit."

  "I wouldn't forgive myself if I did."

  "Asgard isn't your world."

  "It isn't yours either, lady from Vanaheim."

  "True, but I have a blood connection to it. The Aesir are family."

  "And I feel like I have a connection to it too. I liked Odin a lot. I even liked Thor, the great big buffoon. And…"

  I almost said something about her. About liking her. More than liking. Her being the strongest of my connections to Asgard. But that might have spooked her. Worse, she might have just laughed scornfully, and I simply didn't want to take that chance. I wasn't scared of much but I was scared of Freya rejecting me. Better that she and I have this exclusively sexual thing going, keep it at that level. I could gamble on making it more than that, but I might well wind up broke if I did.

  "And," I said, "I'm a bloke who finishes what he sets out to do. I don't leave a job half done. Especially this sort of job. It's just who I am, Freya. I've come to realise that. I'm not cut out for much except combat. It's my thing, what I'm built for. Which is pretty sad, when you come to think of it — that I'm not really a well-rounded person, that I'll never be content as a civilian, that fighting is all I have. But as Detective Harry Callahan famously once said, 'A man's gotta know his limitations,' and I now know mine.

  "For a while, after I got dropped from the army, something was missing. Not the piece of my head that I left in Afghanistan. Something deeper, essential. A purpose. I lost that and had nothing to replace it with. Coming here was about getting a second chance, but turns out it was also about reconnecting with who I am — who I'm supposed to be."

  She didn't comment, didn't tell me to stop droning on and shut up, so I carried on.

  "I fight. I kill. I'm a man of war. I'm not particularly proud of it, but I'm not ashamed of it either. Plenty of soldiers hate war. Most, I'd say. It scars them, fucks them up for life. But they fight anyway, because they're brave and because it's expected of them. And I'm no less fucked up than anyone. You should see some of the nightmares I have. Wouldn't wish them on my worst enemy. But my one advantage is that I know that, come what may, I have an aptitude for soldiering. I know I do it well, better than anything else. That — what's the word? — mitigates things for me. Makes it easier to put up with the rest of the shit that comes with the profession. Life hasn't given me a better alternative, so grin and bear it, eh?"

  Her head snugged into the contours of my neck. Her shoulder pressed against my pectoral. Her hair smelled faintly, deliciously, of pine forests and ozone.

  "And I'm not scared," I said. "Even if we lose to Loki — which we won't — I can accept it. I won't mind dying if it means I've done my bit trying to foil his plans. Bullying bastards like him can't be allowed to go unchecked. They have to be challenged, faced down, given a damn good slap if tha
t's what's required. And above all else I know that this is the upside of me being such a full-on battlefield hardcase. I can use it in the name of what's right. Cloud, silver lining. I've been gifted with the ability to kick arses and the good sense to know which are the arses needing to be kicked. And that's… Freya?"

  My only answer was a soft snore.

  I smiled to myself. A Vanir goddess needed her beauty sleep as much as the next person.

  I did something then that I never thought I'd do with Freya. Tenderly, I kissed the top of her head. She stirred, mumbled what might have been a complaint, then settled down again.

  The wind hissed.

  The castle slumbered.

  It was a good night.

  The best.

  Sixty-Three

  Screams broke the dawn hush.

  I snapped awake and was on my feet in a moment. Freya was up too, and already at the room's empty socket of a window. She was staring out towards Yggdrasil, where the commotion was coming from. Low grey cloud carpeted the sky, hazing the World Tree's uppermost branches. There'd be snow soon, lots of it.

  "What's going on?"

  "Deserters."

  "What! No fucking way."

  "Look."

  Over by Yggdrasil, frost giants were milling about in a cluster, very busy. There were men among them. Uniformed. Ours. They were the ones screaming. Protesting. Pleading.

  "Shit," I breathed. "How can you be sure they're deserters? Couldn't the frosties have just captured them?"

  "Without a firefight? Without any of us hearing gunshots? I don't think so. And why else would anyone have left the castle, if not to desert?"

  She was right, damn her. I gauged the range from us to the World Tree. Too far. The frost giants were armoured. Our rifles were no good. We couldn't help. All we could do was watch as a couple of the frost giants picked up the first of the men by his arms and raised him high. Then in a series of quick, brutally decisive movements they pinned him to Yggdrasil's trunk, skewering ice daggers through his wrists and calves. He howled and roared in hopeless torment. The other men were dealt with in the same way, until all of them, eleven in total, were impaled on the tree.

  Their grisly task completed, the frost giants disappeared back into the forest. One of them turned towards the castle before he left. Even at a distance I recognised the posture, the air of pompous authority. Bergelmir.

  "They came to us in the night," he called out, in no doubt that there was an audience to be addressed. "They came without weapons, seeking peace and the freedom to return to Midgard unmolested. They said they'd had enough of fighting. They were sick and tired of it. With Odin gone, they said, their cause was lost. Battling on would be futile. The odds against them were hopeless." He gestured at the squirming, crucified men. "This is our response. We jotuns do not let our enemies go unpunished. Nor do we know the meaning of mercy."

  Then he was gone, while the men fixed to the World Tree screamed on.

  "He mocks us," Freya snarled. "He mocks the All-Father's time of trial."

  "Let's get out there. Get them down."

  "No. We can't risk it. Bergelmir will be waiting for us to do just that. Those men aren't only an object lesson, they're bait. Besides, it will take us several minutes to organise a rescue party and reach them. Shock and blood loss will have already done for them by then."

  "So we just leave them hanging there, is that it?"

  "There is another way." She raised her Lee-Enfield. "Jotuns may not understand mercy, but I do."

  "No."

  "Yes, Gid. You know this is the right course of action. The only course of action."

  "Freya, don't."

  "I'm not asking your permission. If you're squeamish, look away."

  But I didn't.

  Eleven rifle reports. Eleven shots straight through the heart. Eleven suspended bodies twitching, falling silent and still.

  It wasn't until an hour later that I discovered that Paddy was one of the eleven. Their ringleader, in fact. Cy told me over breakfast, after I'd asked where our tame Irishman was.

  Absolute gut punch. Left me gaping.

  "Paddy?" I said. "But…"

  "You didn't realise?"

  Numbly I shook my head. "I couldn't make out any of their faces. Haven't checked since. Paddy? You're sure?"

  Cy nodded.

  "Fuck. Fuck the fucking fucker."

  "I know. I can't believe it either."

  "But he was, you know, one of us. One of the gang. He was probably the last person I'd have expected to wimp out on us. Wait. Didn't you and him have a bit of a barney last night?"

  "Yeah. Who told you?"

  "Little dicky bird. What was it about? You piss him off somehow?"

  "No. Well, yeah, a little. But it wasn't like that. That wasn't why he went out. He came to me, and he was well fed up. Said some stuff about nobody being in charge any more, this was turning into a slaughter, the frosties would just keep coming at us 'til they'd polished us all off. Asked me if I'd join him in a walkout. I told him not to be so defeatist. It got heated. I may've even called him a coward. Paddy got the hump and flounced off. That was it. I honestly didn't think he was going to go through with it. I thought it was just talk, him letting off some steam."

  "He thought he could negotiate with the frosties? Persuade them to let him through their lines?"

  "Apparently."

  "For such a smart man, he was a stupid arse, then, wasn't he?"

  "Smart was Paddy's problem, if you ask me. Overthinking things. Trusting the frosties would listen to reason. Assuming they'd act honourably under the circumstances. Those are mistakes a smart person makes."

  "Yeah, we're well past the honourable stage with them. It's just about winning or losing now. Living or dying." I sighed. "Paddy… you big Irish twat."

  "Suppose we should be grateful he only managed to get ten men to go with him," Cy said. "Could've been worse. Could've been more."

  "Is that the general mood? Could there have been more?"

  "Honestly, bruv?"

  "Go on," I said, knowing I wouldn't like what he had to say.

  "Yeah. There's a lot of unhappy fellas here, Gid. Lot of people wondering if it's worth it any more, if we in't on a hiding to nothing. Odin's gone. So's Thor. We're down by our two biggest players, and no disrespect to Vidar, Vali and Tyr but they're none of 'em in the same league. Strong all right, but they don't fill the hole. Don't carry the same weight. And there's however many frosties out there, not to mention Loki. Fuck knows what he's still got in the pipeline, but it's bound to be something big and nasty if what we've seen so far is anything to go by. There's men here who reckon Pads and the others had the right idea."

  "Yeah, and look how far it got them."

  "Which only makes it worse, dunnit? Now everyone's feeling even more trapped. Rats in a cage and that. No way out."

  "How come this is news to me?" I said. "You've have thought I'd have picked up on it, wouldn't you?"

  "Mate, no offence, but you're not exactly 'man of the people' these days. You're not in touch with the vibe. You hobnob with the Aesir, you give orders — whether you realise it or not, you've become officer class. So naturally no one's going to tell you the truth to your face now."

  "Apart from you."

  "Apart from me. And then there's laying into Backdoor like you did, tearing a strip off him at Odin's funeral…"

  "Officer class again?"

  "Well, that and you came across as a bit, sort of, I dunno…"

  "Be gentle."

  "Nuts."

  "How nuts?"

  "Nutty as squirrel shit."

  I sat back and peered around the banqueting hall. People were hunched over their food, eating mechanically, subdued. Nobody looked like they'd slept much. Hollow eyes, taut faces. A few of them caught my gaze and glanced away immediately. Resentment I could have coped with, but they were just blanking me, as if there was a barrier between us and nothing to say that would penetrate it, nothing they
could express in words.

  It was time to take matters in hand.

  I stood up.

  "What're you doing, man?" Cy asked.

  "Grabbing the initiative," I said, and strode to the top table, where the handful of remaining gods sat.

  I rapped the table with a spoon until the already near-silent hall was completely quiet.

  "Listen up, everyone," I said. "Going to keep this short. Short and as sweet as possible. Last night some men did a very foolish thing. One of them was somebody I considered a pal. If I'd had any inkling what he was about to do, I'd have talked him out of it. Failing that, I'd have beaten some sense into him. I realise what many of you are thinking. 'We're screwed. There's no point carrying on. We're all going to wind up dead. If the frost giants don't get us, Loki will. Might as well give up.' I'll tell you what. Not only is that bollocks, but if you allow yourselves to think that way, then we are screwed. Yes, we've had setbacks, and yes, I'll admit that the enemy do seem to have the upper hand. But I know something they don't and probably even you yourselves don't, and it's this. When the blue team has something worth defending and the red team doesn't, the blue team wins, hands down. Every time. Doesn't matter how many of them there are, how well supplied or not, how well armed or not, they always win. And we have something worth defending."

  "Yeah?" shouted someone. "Such as what? A fucked old castle?"

  There was a ripple of bleak laughter.

  "Nine worlds," I said. "Not one. Not two. Not even three. Nine of them. And Loki will stomp all over the lot of them in his stiletto heels unless we stop him. You know what earth's been like since Mrs Keener got elected. Tearing itself apart, conflict on top of conflict, and her lording over it all, looking all kitten-cute and butter-wouldn't-melt. Imagine that times by nine. That is why we've plonked ourselves down here in this 'fucked old castle.' That is why we're going to keep holding it come hell or high water. Just to wipe the grin off her — Loki's — smug fucking face. So let's do this. Let's get out there and fight like we mean it. Let's Ragnarok and roll!"