The Apples of Idunn

by Matt Larkin

  Ahead, the vӧlva’s front door had fallen in. Fucking wolves. Odin scrambled over the snow, then slid to a stop when he spotted Heidr lying on the ground just outside the house. Her body lay still. A varulf had torn her throat out.

  This was not supposed to happen.

  Odin dropped to his knees beside her body. Her eyes were wide, staring up at the night sky, at the mists above and the perilous moon. The vӧlva had served his father. In Odin’s earliest memories, she’d just been an apprentice, but since he was a child, she’d become a font of strength for the tribe. The source of their wisdom. The vӧlva told them when to move camp, where to hunt. And she’d been lost because of his pride. He’d brought the varulfur down on them. Heidr had tried to tell him …

  Actions have consequences.

  Such simple wisdom, and he’d refused to hear it.

  His hand trembled as he shut her eyes. “In the name of my father Borr, I promise you vengeance, vӧlva.” He rose, eyes sweeping the town for any further varulfur. There, on the edge of town, he saw one, struggling with a shieldmaiden. Odin ran toward the pair, hefting his spear as he did. “Fly true,” he said, then threw.

  The spear soared through the night, cutting away mist as it soared and impaled the wolf. Odin continued his trot to retrieve the spear, battle-fatigue beginning to take hold of his chest. The moment he grasped the weapon, his strength and rage returned. How dare these wolves attack his people and kill his vӧlva! Odin would see them rent and driven to the gates of Niflheim! He’d serve them in pieces to the minions of Hel!

  “My lord,” the shieldmaiden said.

  He nodded at her, then turned to take in the town. Whimpers and screams of pain continued to fill the night, but there were no further signs of battle. Had they slain the last of these creatures? There would be more. He would hunt down the savages.

  “Find my brothers,” he told the shieldmaiden. “Send them to me.”

  “Yes, my lord.”

  He’d hardly felt the cold during the struggle, but as his battle frenzy wore off, an icy chill ate his bare muscles. From the deep darkness, dawn would come within the hour. Best get more fires burning to keep the mist away from Eskgard. Was the mist what turned the varulfur into cannibals?

  He worked his way back toward Idunn’s house. The Vanr seemed to know something of these varulfur.

  Loki intercepted him, bloody sword in hand. The foreigner breathed heavily but showed no sign of injury. After a glance around, Loki tossed the sword aside. “Are you harmed?”

  Odin shook his head. He was not harmed—he would do the harming. He would rend these monstrous wolves in half and leave their corpses for ravens. “Can you track them?” These creatures would pay for the lives they had stolen. Heidr would have vengeance.

  Loki nodded slowly. “I can.”

  Idunn slipped out of the house now, eyes locked on Odin. “You don’t want to do that.”

  Odin spun on her. “Fucking varulfur killed our vӧlva, Idunn! I have enough to tend to without such raids, and no time for such fuckery. I will erase these beasts from the face of Midgard! I will cut out their hearts and send them screaming down to Hel!”

  They would see what happened to those who attacked the Wodanar. He needed make a point and make it fast. His oath to the ghost had settled around him like a noose, drawing ever tighter.

  He grabbed Loki. “Find out where they came from. Now.”

  His blood brother nodded, cast a quick glance at Idunn, then took off into the mist.

  “Gather the warriors!” Odin bellowed.

  Wolves would bleed for this.

  19

  “There, in the ruins,” Loki said, pointing toward the hilltop. The foreigner crouched on a rock, out of sight of the creatures.

  Tyr knelt a short distance behind the foreigner, beside Odin. His fingers tingled, crisp like a winter storm. Always like that before violence. Battle had an energy that drew Tyr the way sex drew most men. When you were born to hold a blade, you felt it. Deep in the gut.

  The crumbling wall might once have housed a stone fortress. Not all vaettir were hostile to mankind. Just most. Enough to make a man avoid such places. More often than not, you found vaettir of one kind or another haunting the fallen places once meant to guard against them.

  Sometimes, varulfur in the wilds let the animal take over. They grew full savage, leaving behind their humanity. So easy for that to happen. In desperation, men turned quickly from civilization. Chaos was the natural state, and to chaos all things returned. Unless a strong hand held it at bay. A strong hand and a heavy shield … and honor. If Tyr hadn’t known better, he’d have thought this such a camp. A pack turned feral. But the Godwulfs were expanding their reach in all directions. Annar and that traitor both agreed on that.

  Vili would have wanted to attack at night, when he could shapeshift. Still had his strength in daylight, but not his full power. But if he could, so could their prey. So they’d need to strike soon.

  Odin had asked Idunn to take charge of Eskgard in his absence. Idunn, not Ve. Strange, that. Stranger still he’d left one of his brothers behind at all.

  “We have only a few hours of daylight left,” Loki said. “If you want to do this, now is the time.”

  “Can we not wait?” Vili asked.

  “The entities within them, and you, are Moon spirits. The animals are simply varying tribes of Moon spirit, manifesting in our world through possession. There are more of them, so waiting favors the varulfur.”

  Hel’s frozen tits. Loki spoke like a vӧlva. Surely it was unmanly to speak with such authority on the Otherworlds. Tyr spat, and a pair of shieldmaidens murmured concern at the exchange, but Odin silenced them with a glare.

  “We should put out the fires,” Tyr said. Hunting varulfur worked better without flame. That he could now say for certain.

  “No!” snapped Odin. “Torches up.” He looked to Tyr. “Take a small party around the back. Catch them off guard. But do not douse the torches.”

  Tyr grunted his assent. Odin made this harder. Tyr wouldn’t have taken the man for being so superstitious, especially in daylight. Well, naught for it now. The battle beckoned. The tingling had grown to a throbbing in his veins.

  He motioned the two shieldmaidens and a pair of other warriors to follow him.

  They wound their way around back. No sentries. Arrogant. Varulfur thought men couldn’t track them, or wouldn’t with the snowstorms. That arrogance would be the death of them.

  He was first through the breach in the wall. Odin’s warriors would follow any moment. He was counting on Tyr to make sure none of these varulfur slipped away into the wilds. If that happened, they could wait for nightfall. Pick off the Wodan men one by one—

  A low snarl sounded from just behind him. Tyr turned as a naked man collided shoulder first with his shield. The wood cracked under the varulf’s strength, and Tyr’s feet skidded backward, stopped only by the ruined wall. The werewolf growled and punched before Tyr could get his sword up. The blow landed on his shield, splitting it in half.

  The varulf wrung his hand for an instant as Tyr tossed his now useless protection aside. The wolf surged forward, intent to throttle him. Tyr rolled to the side and swung his sword. Blood sputtered from the werewolf’s side as the sword embedded just above his hip. Hot fluid sprayed over Tyr while the varulf screamed in pain.

  The creature caught him by his mail and flung him against the wall. Tyr collided with the next man trying to enter the breach, and the two of them tumbled, one atop another. A shieldmaiden leapt over them, rushing the varulf spear first. The creature ripped Tyr’s sword from his side. It stepped around her spear and planted that sword so deep in her skull the blade punched out the back of it.

  Roaring himself, Tyr staggered to his feet. He dropped to one side and grabbed the fallen woman’s spear. Thrust it up in a single motion. As expected, the varulf lunged at him, impaling itself on the shaft.

  The werewolf flailed there a moment. Grimacing, Tyr rose and hefte
d it upward. Then he drove the creature down to the ground and pinned it there. The varulf wiggled, spittle and blood dribbling from its mouth along with incomprehensible curses.

  So they did have a sentry. Tyr spat on the dying varulf.

  Shouts rang out from the other side of the ruin. Odin had joined the battle.

  “There!” Tyr shouted, pointing some of his men in one direction. “Guard that breach. The rest of you, hold this one.”

  He spared a glance at the dead shieldmaiden. She had given her life to protect him. He didn’t deserve it. And now, freeing his sword from her skull would mean dishonoring her corpse. That he couldn’t do. Instead, he pulled a dagger.

  “My lord?” a warrior asked.

  “Stay here.” They could handle this.

  Odin might need him.

  20

  There could be no survivors from this. Vengeance demanded blood. And Gungnir would provide. It always provided. These wolves would know the price of threatening the Wodanar.

  Odin paused, giving Tyr time to get into position, then pulled his golden hair back into a ponytail, keeping it from his eyes. Other warriors flexed their muscles, or twitched weapons.

  “They’ll smell us,” Loki whispered. “But with luck, they sleep and may not notice until we’ve descended upon them.”

  With a start, Odin realized Loki carried no weapon. “Where’s your sword?”

  “That wasn’t mine.”

  All right … “And now?”

  “The varulfur will have weapons. If need be, I shall borrow one.”

  Odin snorted. His new brother was as mentally deprived as his others. Loki would fit right in. “It’s time.”

  As one, his warriors rose and charged up the hill, not letting out their typical war cries until they’d passed through a breach in the wall. Then shouts rang through the chambers, scattering an unkindness of ravens that had perched atop the ruins.

  A pile of sleeping men and women leapt to their feet. They’d all been naked, sleeping on and under furs, one atop another. Like wolves. Odin slashed open one varulf’s throat, then impaled another. A lop of Vili’s axe beheaded a woman who went for a sword. Odin’s warriors fell upon the unarmed wolf pack with ferocity. Well-deserved vengeance for last night’s raid.

  More shouts and war cries sounded from across the ruins. Tyr’s forces must have found another congregation of the pack. Odin stalked through the snow-misted halls, cutting down stragglers. A large man—well over six feet tall—charged at him, snarling like a beast. Odin set Gungnir for the charge and thrust it up at the last moment. The spear shot clean through the varulf’s chest. The werewolf looked down at the shaft, as if stunned. Odin kicked him and withdrew the spear, then continued on.

  A tunnel had been carved into the hillside, creating a cellar. After pausing to light a torch, he continued forward.

  A body slammed into him from the side. Gungnir skittered away as Odin fell. The impact knocked all wind from his lungs. His vision blurred for one instant, then a man sat straddling him, hand on his throat. He grasped at the man’s arm, but the werewolf’s strength was Otherworldly. Odin couldn’t breathe. Lungs were burning. He flailed weakly, trying to dislodge his assailant. The beast snarled, saliva dripping onto Odin’s face. The foul spittle stung his eyes.

  Someone slammed into Odin’s assailant, knocking him aside. Tyr tackled the wolf, and the pair tumbled several times. Odin gasped, trying to get air through his bruised throat. When at last he rolled onto his side, he saw Tyr now atop the werewolf, raining blows down on the man with a dagger. As Odin rose, the werewolf got a grip on Tyr’s wrists and flung him aside.

  The varulf turned over, growled, and leapt for Tyr. Odin stumbled toward Gungnir. The instant his fingers closed around the shaft, he felt strength return to his limbs. The dragon’s power filled him, and his breath came easier. A simple slash of the blade opened the varulf’s back. The creature wailed, and Tyr kicked it off him. The warrior rose, then stomped his foot down on the werewolf’s skull.

  “How fare you?” His voice sounded raspy in his own ears. It would probably take days for the damage to his throat to heal. Maybe Heidr could have given him a draught to help—if his pride hadn’t killed her.

  “Damned sight better than you,” Tyr said.

  Odin grunted.

  A child’s wail caught his ear from the next room.

  Odin exchanged glances with Tyr, then they made for the back room of the underground chamber. The place stank of uncooked meat and spoilt milk. Animal skins were spread over the floor in a kind of primitive rug. In the shadows of the room, a naked woman twisted, blocking his view of something. She snarled at him but made no move to charge.

  She was one of them. One of the animals that had slaughtered his people, killed Heidr. A bitch for the slaughter. Was it the dragon’s rage or his own? It did not matter. Blood for blood, and he’d made an oath.

  He stalked closer, ready for her to move. She growled at him. Then he charged forward and thrust Gungnir through her chest. “Your menfolk await you in the realm of Hel.”

  As she fell, he spied a straw-filled cart beyond. Inside lay two babes, probably twins. One male and one female. Odin hesitated. Varulfur children. His oath … Odin never broke an oath. These were werewolf children. He raised Gungnir.

  Tyr’s hand on his shoulder yanked him away. “My lord!”

  Odin jerked. He damned himself for letting Tyr creep up on him.

  “They are monsters!” Odin shouted.

  These were varulfur. They were of the same tribe he’d sworn vengeance against for Heidr. If he failed to uphold his vow to its fullest extent, her spirit might well crawl out of Niflheim to haunt him for it. And yet, these children had done naught. They would have, of course. They would have grown up to be savage animals who raided the Ás tribes. Even then, that was not so different from what the Aesir did to each other, or to any foreign peoples they came across. The gods respected only strength. And some varulfur did serve in tribes, as berserkir did.

  “They are infants,” Tyr said.

  Yes. The adults in the tribe had raided his village or condoned the raid. But the babes were innocent. Yet to spare them was to break his vow to Heidr.

  Odin’s mind swirled at the sight of the two werewolves. His throat had grown so dry. He had no desire to murder these babes. And it would be murder. He could not condemn them for what they would have done, had they grown up savage.

  “I would not expect … sympathy from you.”

  Tyr folded his arms. “Because I was raised savage? I have more sympathy. Men can change. Your father gave me that chance.”

  His father. Yes, gods. Father had always tried to see the best in people. He had believed mankind was slowly dying out. That chaos was engulfing Midgard, and only if humanity banded together could they forestall the end.

  “Father trusted you.” Odin let Gungnir fall from his grasp. The moment it left his hand, weariness wrapped its claws around his chest. His muscles ached from the battle, a fatigue he’d not even been aware of finally taking hold, even as the anger clutching his heart began to abate. The spear is the strength of the tribe, his father had once said. But it is anger—a power to be unleashed or held in check, as the need arises.

  Tyr nodded, face solemn, slight hint of approval in his eyes. The thegn had gone on about the Athra and the Godwulfs just last night. The Godwulfs—a tribe ruled by varulfur. Did that prompt Tyr’s request to spare these babes? Either way, the thegn had the right of it. Father would want him to check his anger.

  Odin reached into the cart. “Forgive me.” Heidr forgive him. He would not become a murderer of children. He handed one babe to Tyr and cradled the other in his own arms. “We’ll take them with us.” The Wodanar had a few berserkir, but no living varulfur. Maybe these twins would change that in future generations.

  Right now, he had to find a way to save his brother. But still, he had sworn an oath to Idunn, an oath spoken on Gungnir and Father’s name alike, and one he cou
ld never break. An oath to become king of the Aesir. “Tyr … You served as champion to my father.” Odin pulled off his arm ring—coiling dragons wrought in a twisting of silver and iron. He stared at it a moment before offering it to Tyr. “Serve as my champion now.”

  The thegn shifted the babe in his arm before taking the arm ring with reverence. He placed it on his wrist where Father’s ring had once sat, and nodded solemnly.

  Odin clapped him on the shoulder. “Good. I ask you not to judge me harshly. I do what I can be worthy of Father’s legacy, but I am bound by more than one oath now, torn in many directions. I have sworn to Idunn to become king, but first I must tend to another oath.”

  “What could be more important than the fate of all the Ás tribes?”

  The fate of his family, of course. Odin shook his head. “Work with Idunn and do as you think best to draw the other tribes to our side. With word or blade, prepare the way and hold together what Father tried to build.”

  With a sigh, Tyr nodded. “If we are to return to the town before nightfall, we must leave now.”

  Indeed. Odin had someone he needed to see.

  21

  The sun had nearly set when they returned to the town, the werewolf girl cradled in his arms. She’d wailed all day with a hunger Tyr had no way to sate. Here, at least, he could find a wet nurse to care for the babes.

  Though it was early for the night meal, Odin ordered the tables set in his feast hall. Much like his father, he kept his intentions guarded closely—too closely for Tyr’s liking. Odin had asked for his trust, yes. And Tyr wanted to give it to him. He so wanted Odin to be worthy of it. But the man had refused to explain himself. Or explain what he intended, while asking Tyr to make him a king.

  Worse still was that Odin didn’t seem to want the fucking throne. He wanted something from Idunn, but Tyr couldn’t say what. That didn’t sit well.