The Sleeping Army

by Francesca Simon

  Woden whispered to Roskva. His claw-like hand gripped her arm. She winced, and nodded. Then he whispered to Alfi. Alfi nodded, and his lips moved, memorising the rune. To Snot he did the same. Snot looked uneasy.

  ‘I’ll never remember that!’ he burst out.

  ‘Write it down,’ said Freya.

  ‘Write?’ said Snot. ‘No one can write.’

  Woden sighed. ‘I grow weary,’ he whispered. ‘Let me teach you your rune, then I must sleep.’

  Freya went up to him. He smelled of cold ash and mildew. Reluctantly, she bent closer. Woden whispered in her ear: ‘To make a corpse talk, you say: AERKRIUFLT AERKRIUFLT KRIURITHON … umm, KRIURTHON … or is it THKIRTHU?’ Woden broke off and looked away in the distance. ‘Well, I’m sure you won’t need that one. Corpses can only tell you so much and their news is usually out of date.’

  Freya thought she’d prefer a rune to keep a corpse safely in its mound.

  Woden trembled as he gazed at her. ‘I must give you something … you must have a gift from me … lend her your falcon skin,’ Woden ordered his wife.

  The shrivelled Goddess scowled. Then Frigg reached into her girdle and took out a glowing heap of feathers.

  ‘You’d better bring it back,’ she hissed.

  ‘This will turn you into a falcon. With it you can fly anywhere in the nine worlds,’ said Woden.

  Freya looked at the translucent falcon skin. Fly? Not if she could help it. She was scared of heights. Gingerly, Freya gathered up the feathery skin. It shrank in her hand to a single feather. She shook it out, and it became again a plumed falcon skin. Freya smiled a tiny smile and tucked the feather in her skirt pocket.

  ‘What a shame you don’t have Sleipnir. No horse can keep up with him.’

  ‘But we do,’ said Roskva. ‘He’s grazing by Bifrost.’

  Woden shook his head.

  ‘My memory,’ he muttered. ‘My memory. The fates are kind. I wondered where he’d got to …

  ‘You have Sleipnir. Good. He can gallop across any land or up or down any mountain, no matter how steep. No gleaming river or torrential stream can stop him.

  ‘Now swear a ring-oath that you will complete your task, whatever fate may throw in your path,’ said Woden.

  The God held out his wasted hand. Freya watched as Snot, Alfi, and Roskva placed their hands on top of his ring. Then slowly, reluctantly, she added hers to the pile.

  ‘Swear by the rivers that run through the Underworld,’ said Woden. ‘Terrible fate-bonds attach to the oath-tearer.’ His one eye seared her.

  Freya felt icy chills as Woden intoned the fateful words. ‘Wretched is the pledge criminal.’

  ‘Wretched is the pledge criminal,’ they repeated.

  ‘May Woden hallow this pledge.’

  ‘May Woden hallow this pledge.’

  ‘May Thor hallow these runes.’

  ‘May Thor hallow these runes.’

  ‘So help me Frey and Njord and the all-powerful Gods.’

  ‘So help me Frey and Njord and the all-powerful Gods,’ they swore.

  ‘Will the fates favour us?’ asked Roskva.

  ‘The seeress said nothing of the future, and it is hidden from me,’ said Woden. ‘You – berserk. Protect them as you would me.’

  Snot grunted and bit his shield. He glared at them.

  ‘Always stick together,’ whispered Woden. ‘You will be stronger that way. Go now. Go swiftly.’

  Then the grieving Gods drifted off and faded into the shadows. The stone circle was empty. The only sound was a faint rustling of Yggdrasil’s sparse leaves above them.

  Freya was alone with Roskva, Alfi, and Snot. She looked around desperately. Maybe she could make a run for the bridge and … and what? Throw herself over the side?

  They stood together for a moment, in silence.

  ‘Right … well …’ said Alfi. ‘I guess we’d—’

  ‘Let’s go,’ said Roskva. ‘Jotunheim is a long, long way from here.’

  ‘Noooooo!’ wailed Freya. ‘I can’t do this!’

  Snot picked her up and slung her over his back as if she were a sack of wool. She kicked and wailed and wept as they hurried on their way.

  4 The River Irving

  ‘Put me down!’ shrieked Freya. She pounded Snot’s gnarled back and beat his chest with her feet.

  Snot ignored her.

  Freya felt her streaming nose squash into her face as it bang-bang-banged against Snot’s back as he stomped across the withered meadows outside Asgard’s great wall, trailed by Roskva and Alfi. The stench from his matted bear-shirt and cloak was horrible.

  ‘I said put me down!’ screamed Freya. She tried not to breathe in his stink.

  ‘Is this how you want your saga to end?’ said Snot fiercely. ‘Crying and mewling? After the sword, or sickness, or old age ends your life, only reputation lives on.’

  ‘I don’t care about my saga!’ said Freya. She started weeping again. ‘I want to go home.’

  ‘Well, you can’t and neither can we, so ACCEPT YOUR FATE,’ screamed Roskva. She muttered under her breath to Alfi.

  Freya stopped crying.

  Accept her fate? She was under sentence of death. Wolves? Trolls? Giants? If they didn’t kill her, other monsters would. And if by luck she escaped them, the wilderness would snare her and she’d drown in a river or tumble off a mountain. And even if fate decreed that she survive, what was the chance of finding Idunn and bringing her back to Asgard before nine nights ran out? Nil.

  Strangely enough, Freya felt calmer spelling this out. No one knows their fate, she thought, wiping her eyes. If I only have nine more days to live then I’d better make the best of them.

  ‘I can walk, you know,’ she said. ‘Put me down.’

  ‘Then stop whimpering,’ barked Snot, dumping her on the gravelly ground. Freya sat up, rubbing her arm where she’d landed.

  Outside the ghostly ruined citadel of the Gods, the afternoon sun lit up the vast plains. There was no sound except the roar of a tumultuous river. When had she last slept? She couldn’t remember.

  ‘Are all girls like you now?’ said Roskva, looking down at her with distaste. ‘You’re very soft. Where’s your spirit of adventure?’

  My spirit of adventure is trying a new vegetable, thought Freya. She didn’t dare say it out loud.

  ‘Don’t give up hope, Freya,’ said Alfi. He smiled at her and helped her to her feet. ‘I’ve done this sort of thing before.’

  ‘Yeah, with Thor behind you all the way,’ said Roskva.

  ‘We’ll be back with Idunn before you know it,’ said Alfi.

  Freya stared at him.

  ‘How can you be so cheerful?’ said Freya, scowling.

  ‘A man should be happy until his dying day,’ said Alfi, shifting restlessly from foot to foot. ‘My grandpa used to say it’s always better to live than lie dead.’

  Yeah right, thought Freya. Good for your grandpa. She gnawed on her frayed sleeve.

  Roskva whistled. Freya heard pounding hooves, and Sleipnir galloped over, snorting, his eight legs churning the stony ground.

  ‘Hurry up!’ said Snot, striding towards the gleaming river. ‘We want to get as far as we can before nightfall.’

  ‘Snot! You’re going the wrong way,’ shouted Alfi. ‘Jotunheim is north-east. We need to head for the mountains past the River Irving.’

  Snot stalked over to Alfi. He towered over him.

  ‘Are you as brave as me?’ he bellowed. His crooked brows bristled.

  ‘Far from it,’ said Alfi, cowering.

  Snot kicked Alfi’s feet from under him. Alfi fell over.

  ‘Just remember that and we’ll get on fine,’ said Snot. ‘Don’t you tell me which way to go. I’m leading this quest.’

  ‘Says who?’ said Roskva.

  ‘Says me,’ said Snot. ‘I am Woden’s chosen warrior.’

  ‘We’ve all been chosen,’ said Roskva.

  ‘Actually, I think Freya is leader,’ mumbled Alfi.
‘She blew Heimdall’s horn.’

  ‘What?’ said Snot. He looked like he was about to attack Alfi again.

  ‘She’s our leader?’ said Roskva. Her eyes flashed.

  I’m leader? thought Freya. If she thought it would do any good she would have howled. No one had ever asked her to lead anything. I’m a follower, thought Freya. I’m Betty the brunette, the leader’s best friend. Not—

  ‘I should be leader,’ said Roskva. ‘I’m the smartest.’

  Snot glared at them. ‘I take orders from no one but Woden. And certainly not from children.’

  ‘For the last time we are not children!’ screamed Roskva.

  Freya looked at the furious faces around her. Sleipnir snorted and stamped the ground, eager to go. We haven’t even set off and already we’re fighting, she thought.

  ‘So go on, Freya, tell us, what makes you so special?’ said Roskva. ‘You wear no rings or gold arm bracelets so you must be poor and without protectors. You’re small. You’re very plain. You can’t even walk on Bifrost without vomiting. And yet the Gods have chosen you and Alfi thinks you should lead us. Are you a seeress?’

  ‘No,’ said Freya. At least she didn’t think she was.

  ‘Then what’s so special about you?’ Roskva repeated.

  Freya tried to focus.

  ‘Nothing,’ said Freya.

  What talents did she have? Did she even have any? She’d been in her school’s ‘Good as Gold’ book twice in a row. She held the school record for the most pancakes eaten in ten minutes. And she could … and she had … Somehow Freya didn’t think being good as gold or able to stuff her face with pancakes was going to help her much now. How depressing to be twelve years old and good at nothing.

  ‘What are you good at?’ asked Freya.

  ‘I’m the fastest runner in Midgard,’ said Alfi. ‘Well, I was. I imagine I still am. I’m certainly the oldest.’ He grinned.

  ‘I’m almost as fast as you,’ said Roskva hotly. ‘And let’s face it. I’m a lot smarter.’

  ‘A quick tongue often talks itself into trouble,’ said Alfi.

  ‘And out of it,’ said Roskva.

  Freya felt as if she were watching a ping-pong match between brother and sister.

  ‘We must go NOW,’ bellowed Snot. His fists clenched. ‘We have to travel as far as possible before dark.’

  Freya saw the others looking at her expectantly.

  ‘I don’t want to be leader,’ said Freya, trembling. ‘I don’t know my way around … I don’t know anything, really … But … but … can I just ask … has anyone ever been where we’re going? To the land of the giants? Jot – Jot—’

  ‘Jotunheim,’ said Roskva. ‘Alfi and I have been many times with our Master. It’s north-east from here. The River Irving marks the boundary. Ever been to Jotunheim, Snot?’

  Snot looked down at her and bit his shield. He said nothing.

  ‘Thought so,’ said Roskva.

  Snot’s hand tightened on his sword.

  ‘You’re lucky that Woden ordered me to protect you,’ he snarled.

  ‘Then I think Alfi and Roskva should guide us there,’ said Freya. ‘We can argue about who is leader later. Does anyone have a better plan?’

  ‘That’s settled then,’ said Roskva, without waiting for anyone to answer. She grabbed hold of Sleipnir’s golden bridle. ‘Four can ride at once,’ she said. ‘If we squeeze.’

  Freya held back. Horses terrified her.

  She stared up at Sleipnir. The gleaming grey horse towered over her. He was longer and wider than any horse she’d ever seen.

  ‘I’ve never ridden before,’ said Freya.

  ‘High time you did,’ said Roskva, clambering on.

  Snot heaved her unceremoniously on to Sleipnir behind Roskva. Freya scrabbled about and tried to swing her legs over his broad back without slipping over the other side. The ground looked very far away. Snot hesitated, then climbed on behind Freya, muttering and growling. Alfi sprang on last, vaulting easily over Sleipnir’s tail.

  ‘AAEEEEEEE!’ screamed Freya, as Sleipnir galloped off. ‘Help,’ she squealed. ‘I’m going to fall!’

  She clung frantically to Roskva and squeezed her eyes shut as Sleipnir jumped the flinty river as if it were a puddle and scrambled up the opposite bank.

  ‘Careful, you’ll pull me off!’ shouted Roskva as Freya clutched her waist, terrified, rocking and jolting on top of the speeding horse.

  Soon the plains and parched meadows of Asgard were behind them. Freya sat squished between Roskva and Snot, her eyes squeezed shut every time Sleipnir leapt over a river or a lake, her knees gripping his smooth sides as tightly as she could as they vaulted through the air, landing with a horrendous bump that made Freya’s stomach lurch. Far, far away, she could see mountains black with forest, lost in grey clouds.

  For hour after hour they crossed river valleys and hillsides, wooded below, rocky higher up. Waterfalls tumbled down sheer, pink-grey cliffs, flowing over boulders into frothy pools. Freya dared to open her eyes for a time and glimpsed tiny blue flowers growing between the rocks littering the overgrown path. Sleipnir crushed them underfoot.

  Freya was concentrating so hard on not falling off she barely looked where they were going. It was difficult to talk, they were travelling so fast. Roskva’s long hair, tied back in a knot at her neck, kept whacking Freya’s face.

  ‘What’s that?’ shouted Freya. She pointed to a huge, monstrous-shaped stone, squatting by the steep, winding path between the hills they were crossing. The arms were outstretched, like a bulbous Valkyrie of the North.

  Roskva shrugged. ‘Petrified troll,’ she said. ‘They get sun on them – bam! They turn to stone. Our Master tricked one once – Alviss.’

  ‘Good times,’ shouted Alfi.

  Freya shook her head. Poor Alfi. What a dreadful life he’d led, if tricking trolls was his idea of fun.

  The wind whistled through the valley as shadows started to drift across their path. The snowy peaks of the giants’ icy lands loomed in the distance behind small hills rolling off into the horizon. Freya heard the clamour of a fast-flowing river and caught the glint of silvery water through the scented pine trees.

  ‘That’s the boundary,’ said Roskva.

  Freya didn’t need to ask which one.

  ‘We need a place to camp,’ said Snot, scrambling to be first off Sleipnir. These were the first words he’d spoken since they’d set off. ‘We’ll stay on the Asgard side of the river. It’s too dangerous to travel at night. We’ll cross into Jotunheim at dawn.’

  It was a plan. Freya liked plans, and to-do lists, and re-doing homework in neat and someone in charge telling her what to do. That way she knew where she was. Unfortunately, where she was wasn’t anything she could have planned for.

  Freya slid the long way down from Sleipnir and watched the giant horse trot through the tangled trees to the river to gulp great mouthfuls of water. Her legs wobbled and muscles she never knew she had felt battered and bruised. All she wanted to do was to stretch out somewhere, anywhere, and sleep. A strange thought, as camping was her idea of Hel.

  Alfi found a little green gully which provided some shelter from the wind. Snot nodded. ‘That’ll do,’ he said. Alfi flung himself to the ground, amidst coarse clumps of rough grass, breathing hard. Roskva bustled about, tending to Sleipnir, the stallion glowing in the forest’s olive light.

  Freya felt helpless. She was useless at games, useless at climbing. She was clumsy. She hated PE. Get a good education, Mum and Dad were always telling her. But she would have been better off just being physically fit and never picking up a book, she thought bitterly as she skidded on the mossy stones littering the slimy river bank to get some water to drink. Maybe there was a good reason why museums were always putting up signs saying ‘Don’t touch’.

  It was eerily quiet. Freya hated nature, so cold, so wet, so uncomfortable, so malevolent. She always felt nervous off concrete. Her whole body ached. I’m hungry, she thought. Do t
hese people eat?

  Freya stood on the banks of the wide, sparkling river separating Asgard from Jotunheim. She thought for a moment to dip her feet in, but the boiling current changed her mind. Scooping up the clear, icy water in her cupped hands, Freya drank, shuddering at the cold.

  She glimpsed the far-away, jagged mountains, and grim gulches and gulleys, lit by the dying rays of the sun. The flat-peaked mountains looked like a giant had taken a gigantic saw and lopped off their tops. A giant probably did take a gigantic saw and lop off their tops, thought Freya.

  Roskva pointed.

  ‘Jotunheim,’ she said. ‘It gets much worse further in.’

  ‘Worse?’ said Freya.

  ‘Jotunheim is a biting land of gales and rock and ice,’ said Roskva. ‘And that’s the good bit. Where Thjazi lives … it’s so cold the air aches.’

  Great, thought Freya. Just great. Can’t wait to freeze to death before I’m eaten alive.

  ‘I’ll find food before it gets too dark,’ said Snot. ‘You—’ he pointed to Alfi. ‘Keep your hand on your sword. And no one goes to pee alone.’

  Freya watched Snot slip down to the river bank and disappear around a bend.

  ‘He smells,’ she said.

  ‘No he doesn’t,’ said Roskva, gathering up twigs and pieces of kindling lying thick amidst the dead bracken and mossy undergrowth. ‘On the other hand, you smell …’

  ‘Me?’

  ‘You. Sort of … sickly-sweet. Ugh.’ Roskva wrinkled her nose.

  ‘That’s deodorant,’ said Freya.

  ‘What?’

  ‘Stops you smelling,’ said Freya.

  Roskva looked at her. ‘Why don’t you just take a bath?’

  ‘I do that too,’ said Freya hotly.

  ‘I haven’t had a bath in … a long time,’ said Roskva. ‘We had our own bathhouse at home, with a stone floor, and little benches … Tyrsday was bath day …’ She shook her head and bent over her kindling.

  Freya watched Roskva and Alfi prepare a fire. Roskva struck a light with a piece of flint strung on her belt. The tiny spark flickered, then the kindling caught.

  ‘Why did Thor take you from your parents?’ asked Freya, as the tiny flames spluttered into life.