by Tom Holt
Table of Contents
Title Page
Copyright Page
Also by Tom Holt
Dedication
CHAPTER ONE
CHAPTER TWO
CHAPTER THREE
CHAPTER FOUR
CHAPTER FIVE
CHAPTER SIX
CHAPTER SEVEN
CHAPTER EIGHT
CHAPTER NINE
CHAPTER TEN
CHAPTER ELEVEN
CHAPTER TWELVE
CHAPTER THIRTEEN
CHAPTER FOURTEEN
CHAPTER FIFTEEN
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Copyright
This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events, locales, or persons, living or dead, is coincidental.
Copyright © 1987 by Tom Holt
Cover illustration by Bella Pagan. Cover copyright © 2012 by Hachette Book Group, Inc.
All rights reserved. In accordance with the U.S. Copyright Act of 1976, the scanning, uploading, and electronic sharing of any part of this book without the permission of the publisher is unlawful piracy and theft of the author’s intellectual property. If you would like to use material from the book (other than for review purposes), prior written permission must be obtained by contacting the publisher at [email protected]. Thank you for your support of the author’s rights.
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First US e-book edition: September 2012
ISBN: 978-0-316-23342-2
Also by Tom Holt
Expecting Someone Taller
Who’s Afraid of Beowulf?
Flying Dutch
Ye Gods!
Overtime
Here Comes the Sun
Grailblazers
Faust Among Equals
Odds and Gods
Djinn Rummy
My Hero
Paint Your Dragon
Open Sesame
Wish You Were Here
Only Human
Snow White and the Seven Samurai
Valhalla
Nothing But Blue Skies
Falling Sideways
Little People
The Portable Door
In Your Dreams
Earth, Air, Fire and Custard
You Don’t Have to be Evil to Work Here, But It Helps
Barking
The Better Mousetrap
May Contain Traces of Magic
Blonde Bombshell
Life, Liberty, and the Pursuit of Sausages
Doughnut
To My Mother
CHAPTER ONE
After a particularly unrewarding interview with his beloved, Malcolm was driving home along a dark, winding country lane when he ran over a badger. He stopped the car and got out to inspect the damage to his paintwork and (largely from curiosity) to the badger. It was, he decided, all he needed, for there was a small but noticeable dent in his wing, and he had been hoping to sell the car.
‘Damn,’ he said aloud.
‘So how do you think I feel?’ said the badger.
Malcolm turned round quite slowly. He had had a bad day, but not so bad that he could face talking badgers - talking dead badgers - with equanimity. The badger was lying on its side, absolutely still. Malcolm relaxed; he must have imagined it, or perhaps the bump had accidentally switched on the car radio. Any connection was possible between the confused chow mein of wires under his dashboard.
‘You’re not the one who’s been run over,’ said the badger, bitterly.
This time, Malcolm turned round rather more quickly. There was the black and white corpse, lying across the road like a dead zebra crossing; yet he could have sworn that human speech had come from it. Was some rustic ventriloquist, possibly a Friend of the Earth, playing tricks on him? He nerved himself to examine his victim. A dead badger, nothing more, nothing less; except that there was some sort of wire contraption wrapped round its muzzle - a homing device, perhaps, attached by a questing ecologist.
‘Did you say something?’ said Malcolm, nervously.
‘So you’re not deaf as well as blind,’ said the badger. ‘Yes, I did say something. Why don’t you pay more attention when people talk to you?’
Malcolm felt rather embarrassed. His social equipment did not include formulae for talking to people he had just mortally wounded, or badgers, let alone a combination of the two. Nevertheless, he felt it incumbent upon him to say something, and his mind hit upon the word designed for unfamiliar situations.
‘Sorry,’ he said.
‘You’re sorry,’ said the badger. ‘The hell with you.’
There was a silence, broken only by the screech of a distant owl. After a while, Malcolm came to the conclusion that the badger was dead, and that during the collision he had somehow concussed himself without noticing it. Either that, or it was a dream. He had heard about people who fell asleep at the wheel, and remembered that they usually crashed and killed themselves. That did not cheer him up particularly.
‘Anyway,’ said the badger, ‘what’s your name?’
‘Malcolm,’ said Malcolm. ‘Malcolm Fisher.’
‘Say that again,’ said the badger. ‘Slowly.’
‘Mal-colm Fi-sher.’
The badger was silent for a moment. ‘Are you sure?’ it said, sounding rather puzzled.
‘Yes,’ said Malcolm. ‘Sorry.’
‘Well, Malcolm Fisher, let’s have a look at you.’
The badger twisted its head painfully round, and looked at him in silence for a while. ‘You know,’ it said at last, ‘I was expecting someone rather taller.’
‘Oh,’ said Malcolm.
‘Fair-haired, tall, muscular, athletic, without spectacles,’ went on the badger. ‘Younger, but also more mature, if you see what I mean. Someone with presence. Someone you’d notice if you walked into a room full of strangers. In fact, you’re a bit of a disappointment.’
There was no answer to that, except Sorry again, and that would be a stupid thing to say. Nevertheless, it was irritating to have one’s physical shortcomings pointed out quite so plainly twice in one evening, once by a beautiful girl and once by a dying badger. ‘So what?’ said Malcolm, uppishly.
‘All right,’ said the badger. ‘Sorry I spoke, I’m sure. Well, now you’re here, you might as well get it over with. Though I’m not sure it’s not cheating hitting me with that thing.’ And it waved a feeble paw at Malcolm’s aged Renault.
‘Get what over with?’ asked Malcolm.
‘Don’t let’s play games,’ said the badger. ‘You’ve killed me, you needn’t mess me around as well. Take the Ring and the Tarnhelm and piss off.’
‘I don’t follow,’ said Malcolm. ‘What are you talking about?’
The badger jerked violently, and spasms of pain ran through its shattered body. ‘You mean it was an accident?’ it rasped. ‘After nearly a thousand years, it’s a bloody accident. Marvellous!’ The dying animal made a faint gasping noise that might just have been the ghost of laughter.
‘Now you have lost me,’ said Malcolm.
‘I’d better hurry up, then,’ said the badger, with weary resig
nation in its voice. ‘Unless you want me dying on you, that is, before I can tell you the story. Take that wire gadget off my nose.’
Gingerly, Malcolm stretched out his fingers, fully expecting the beast to snap at them. Badgers’ jaws, he remembered, are immensely strong. But the animal lay still and patient, and he was able to pull the wire net free. At once the badger disappeared, and in its place there lay a huge, grey-haired man, at least seven feet tall, with cruel blue eyes and a long, tangled beard.
‘That’s better,’ he said. ‘I hated being a badger. Fleas.’
‘I’d better get you to a hospital,’ said Malcolm.
‘Don’t bother,’ said the giant. ‘Human medicine wouldn’t work on me anyway. My heart is in my right foot, my spine is made of chalcedony, and my intestines are soluble in aspirin. I’m a Giant, you see. In fact I am - was - the last of the Giants.’
The Giant paused, like a television personality stepping out into the street and waiting for the first stare of recognition.
‘How do you mean, Giant, exactly? You’re very tall, but . . .’
The Giant closed his eyes and moaned softly.
‘Come on,’ said Malcolm, ‘there’s a casualty department in Taunton. We can get there in forty minutes.’
The Giant ignored him. ‘Since you are totally ignorant of even basic theogony,’ he said, ‘I will explain. My name is Ingolf, and I am the last of the Frost-Giants of the Elder Age.’
‘Pleased to meet you,’ said Malcolm instinctively.
‘Are you hell as like. I am the youngest brother of Fasolt and Fafner the castle-builders. Does that ring a bell? No?’
‘No.’
‘You didn’t even see the opera?’ said Ingolf despairingly.
‘I’m afraid I’m not a great fan of opera,’ said Malcolm, ‘so it’s unlikely.’
‘I don’t believe it. Well, let’s not go into all that now. I’ll be dead in about three minutes. When you get home, look up the Ring Cycle in your Boy’s Book of Knowledge. My story starts with the last act of Götterdämmerung. The funeral pyre. Siegfried lying in state. On his belt, the Tarnhelm. On his finger, the Mbelung’s Ring.’ Ingolf paused. ‘Sorry, am I boring you?’
‘No,’ Malcolm said. ‘Go on, please.’
‘Hagen snatches the Ring from Siegfried’s hand as Brunnhilde plunges into the heart of the fire. At once, the Rhine bursts its banks - I’d been warning them about that embankment for years, but would they listen? - and the Rhinedaughters drag Hagen down into the depths of the river and drown him. For no readily apparent reason, Valhalla catches fire. Tableau. The End. Except,’ and Ingolf chuckled hoarsely through his tattered lungs, ‘the stupid tarts dropped the ring while they were drowning Hagen, and guess who was only a few feet away, clinging to a fallen tree, as I recall. Me. Ingolf. Ingolf the Neglected, Ingolf the Patient, Ingolf, Heir to the Ring! So I grabbed it, pulled the Tarnhelm from the ashes of the pyre, and escaped in the confusion. To here, in fact, the Vale of Taunton Deane. Last place God made, but never mind.’
‘Fascinating,’ said Malcolm after a while. ‘That doesn’t explain why you were a badger just now, and why you aren’t one any longer.’
‘Doesn’t it?’ Ingolf groaned again. ‘The Tarnhelm, you ignorant child, is a magic cap made by Mime, the greatest craftsman in history. Whoever wears it can take any shape or form he chooses, animate or inanimate, man, bird or beast, rock, tree or flower. Or he can be invisible, or transport himself instantaneously from one end of the earth to the other, just by thinking. And this idiot here thought, Who would come looking for a badger? So I turned myself into one and came to this godforsaken spot to hide.’
‘Why?’
‘Because it’s godforsaken, and I’d had about as much of the Gods as I could take. They were after me, you see. In fact, they probably still are. Also the Volsungs. And the Rhinemaidens. And Alberich. The whole bloody lot of them. It hasn’t been easy, I can tell you. Luckily, they’re all so unbelievably stupid. They’ve spent the last thousand odd years searching high and low for a ninety-foot dragon with teeth like standing stones and an enormous tail. Just because my brother Fafner - a pleasant enough chap in his way, but scarcely imaginative - disguised himself as a dragon when he had the perishing thing. I could have told him that a ninety-foot dragon was scarcely inconspicuous, even in the Dawn of the World, but why should I help him? Anyway, I very sensibly became a badger and outsmarted them all.’
‘Hang on,’ said Malcolm, ‘I’m a bit confused. Why did you have to hide?’
‘Because,’ said Ingolf, ‘they wanted the Ring.’
‘So why didn’t you give it to them - whoever they were - and save yourself all the bother?’
‘Whoever owns the ring is the master of the world,’ said Ingolf, gravely.
‘Oh,’ said Malcolm. ‘So you’re . . .’
‘And a fat lot of good it’s done me, you might very well say. Who did you think ruled the world, anyway, the United bloody Nations?’
‘I hadn’t given it much thought, to be honest with you. But if you’re the ruler of the world . . .’
‘I know what you’re thinking. If I’m master of the world, why should I have to hide in a copse in Somerset disguised as a badger?’
‘More or less,’ said Malcolm.
‘Uneasy lies the head that wears a crown,’ said the Giant sagely. ‘Looking back, of course, I sometimes wonder whether it was all worth it. But you will learn by my mistakes. ’
Malcolm furrowed his brow. ‘You mean you’re leaving them all to me?’ he asked. ‘The Ring and the - what did you say it was called?’
‘Tarnhelm. It means helmet of darkness, though why they describe it as a helmet when it’s just a little scrap of wire I couldn’t tell you. Anyway, take them with my blessing, for what that’s worth.’
Ingolf paused to catch his breath.
‘To gain inexhaustible wealth,’ he continued, ‘just breathe on the Ring and rub it gently on your forehead. Go on, try it.’
Ingolf eased the plain gold ring off his finger and passed it to Malcolm, who accepted it rather as one might accept some delicacy made from the unspeakable parts of a rare amphibian at an embassy function. He did as Ingolf told him, and at once found himself knee-deep in gold. Gold cups, gold plates, gold brooches, pins, bracelets, anklets, pectorals, cruets and sauce-boats.
‘Convinced?’ said Ingolf. ‘Or do you want a metallurgist’s report?’
‘I believe you,’ said Malcolm, who was indeed firmly convinced that he was dreaming, and vowed never to eat Stilton cheese late at night again.
‘Leave them,’ said Ingolf. ‘Plenty more where that came from. The Nibelungs make them in the bottomless caverns of Nibelheim, the Kingdom of the Mists. They’ll be glad of the warehouse space.’
‘And the Tarnhelm - that works too, does it?’
Ingolf finally seemed to lose patience. ‘Of course it bloody works,’ he shouted. ‘Put it on and turn yourself into a human being.’
‘Sorry,’ said Malcolm. ‘It’s all been rather a shock.’
‘Finally,’ said Ingolf, ‘cut my arm and lick some of the blood.’
‘I’d rather not,’ said Malcolm, firmly.
‘If you do, you’ll be able to understand the language of the birds.’
‘I don’t particularly want to be able to understand the language of the birds,’ said Malcolm.
‘You’ll understand the language of the birds and like it, my lad,’ said Ingolf severely. ‘Now do as you are told. Use the pin on one of those brooches there.’
The blood tasted foul and was burning hot. For a second, Malcolm’s brain clouded over; then, faintly in the distance, he heard the owl hoot again, and realised to his astonishment that he could understand what it was saying. Not that it was saying anything of any interest, of course.
‘Oh,’ said Malcolm. ‘Oh, well, thank you.’
‘Now then,’ said the Giant. ‘I am about to go on my last journey. Pile up that gold around my head. I mus
t take it with me to pay the ferryman.’
‘I thought it was just a coin on the eyes or something.’
‘Inflation. Also, I’ll take up rather a lot of room on the boat.’ He scowled. ‘Get on with it, will you?’ he said. ‘Or do you want a receipt?’
Malcolm did as he was told. After all, it wasn’t as if it was real gold. Was it?
‘Listen,’ said Ingolf, ‘listen carefully. I am dying now. When I am dead, my body will turn back into the living rock from which Lord Ymir moulded the race of the Frost-Giants when the world was young. Nothing will grow here for a thousand years, and horses will throw their riders when they pass the spot. Pity, really, it’s a main road. Oh, well. Every year, on the anniversary of my death, fresh blood will well up out of the earth and the night air will be filled with uncanny cries. That is the Weird of the Ring-Bearer when his life is done. Be very careful, Malcolm Fisher. There is a curse on the Nibelung’s Ring - the curse of Alberich, which brings all who wear it to a tragic and untimely death. Yet it is fated that when the Middle Age of the world is drawing to a close, a foolish, godlike boy who does not understand the nature of the Ring will break the power of Alberich’s curse and thereby redeem the world. Then the Last Age of the world will begin, the Gods will go down for ever, and all things shall be well.’ Ingolf ’s eyes were closing, his breath was faint, his words scarcely audible. But suddenly he started, and propped himself up on one elbow.
‘Hold on a minute,’ he gasped. ‘A foolish, godlike boy who does not understand . . . who does not understand . . .’ He sank down again, his strength exhausted. ‘Still,’ he said, ‘I was expecting someone rather taller.’
He shuddered for the last time, and was as still as stone. The wind, which had been gathering during his last speech, started to scream, lashing the trees into a frenzy. The Giant was dead; already his shape was unrecognisable as his body turned back into grey stone, right in the middle of the Minehead to Bridgwater trunk road. All around him, Malcolm could hear a confused babble of voices, human and animal, living and dead, and, like the counterpoint to a vast fugue, the low, rumbling voices of the trees and the rocks. The entire earth was repeating the astonishing news: Ingolf was dead, the world had a new master.