by Matt Larkin
The woman pulled off gloves and tossed them aside, then placed her shockingly warm hands on Odin’s cheeks. She stood nearly as tall as he did. She leaned in closer, so close he could feel her breath on his face. Still, her eyes were naught but shadows. “Let it go,” she whispered. “The mortal world has much to offer.”
“Who are you?”
“Gudrun.” She pressed a goblet into his hands. “Drink, my lord. Find yourself.”
A draught of mead to relax away the Sight? Odin would gladly take it. He downed the liquid fast, gasping as it burned his throat.
Gudrun pulled him to her and pressed her lips against his, ignoring his half-hearted protests. She was soft, unhardened by the bitter chill. Odin started to pull away. However he and Frigg had parted, Odin was a married man. He should … She wrapped her arms around his shoulders and drew him closer. All thought fled his mind as Gudrun massaged his lips. He shut his eyes, lost in the sensation.
Gudrun shoved him. Odin stumbled backward, falling onto the plush bed. The world shot back into focus as he opened his eyes. After so long gazing at shadows, the colors seemed almost too vibrant, and he blinked at the sight. Gudrun was dressed in an embroidered blue dress and a cloak lined with thick fur. Long blonde hair flowed over her shoulders, escaping past a large golden headband wrought with intricate patterns. And around her neck hung an amulet of gold that seemed to shimmer with its own faint light.
“Yes,” she said. “The Singasteinn. I know what she wants of you. But I can give you so much more. I can break the curse that vaettr placed on your soul. I can give you everything.”
Odin tried to speak, but a lump formed in his throat. Dimly, he realized he had dropped Gungnir when she kissed him.
Gudrun released the clasp on her cloak and it fell away. With two fingers she pulled at the laces of her bodice, exposing her breasts. Her nipples stood erect in the chill air, bright pink against her pale skin.
“I’m a married man,” Odin stammered.
“Married to a vӧlva? You hold yourself tied to a woman whose powers are as a child’s compared to mine, and you dare to imagine she might give you a shadow of what I can offer?” Gudrun’s voice dropped, becoming huskier, almost hypnotic. It seemed to echo in his mind until he could hear naught else. “She cannot satisfy your lusts as I can. You hunger for flesh, for knowledge, for power … I offer all the secrets of the universe.” The Niflung princess straddled him on the bed, forcing him backward.
Odin’s arms trembled. This was wrong. Part of him insisted it was, but that part could barely be heard over the all-consuming volume of her voice. She issued commands with the authority of a true queen. A fire built in his loins, ready to devour him alive unless he sated it.
“Take what you want,” Gudrun whispered in his ear. “Take it all. Forever.”
Odin grabbed her shoulders so tightly she cried out, and he rolled atop the princess. Some other thought had been in his mind. Something on the tip of his tongue—he couldn’t remember. The fire kept building until he roared like a beast. He snatched two sides of her bodice and ripped the dress in half.
The gods had made her for him. And he could not deny them.
38
Castle Niflung lay on the fringes of Midgard, wedged on an island separating the Morimarusa from the Gandvik Sea. This island, Samsey, had become their hidden sanctum, where the greater part of the Niflungar had slept away the ages. Gudrun’s grandparents had built it some eight hundred years ago, after the Niflungar were driven out of the mainland by the now-fallen kingdom of the Lofdar. It had long since served as the last refuge of the greatest descendants of Halfdan the Old. If Gudrun’s parents—Gjuki and Grimhild—had not lived through these events themselves, they must have at least firsthand accounts of it from their parents. And that meant they themselves had survived for many centuries.
They had used the Art to sustain their mortal forms long beyond the time allotted to mankind, using secret knowledge denied to her, at least thus far. At just past twenty-five winters, she had aged about as much as she cared to. Grimhild could have passed for her—slightly—older sister. The queen’s most treasured spells were housed in a grimoire said to be written by the hand of Hel herself—there was none greater. Hel, Queen of Niflheim and Mistress of the Art. And through those spells, Grimhild had somehow maintained her youth down through the centuries.
In her bed, the Ás man stirred, rolling over before collapsing on his stomach like a sea lion on a rock. Gudrun smirked to herself. The love potion had worked more than well enough to enthrall him. His will was weak enough she might have even drawn him to her bed without need of alchemical assistance, but her father had insisted she leave naught to chance. Insisted, most like, through Grimhild’s orders. Though her father was the king of all the Niflungar, Grimhild was Hel’s high priestess and claimed to hear the voice of the goddess in her dreams. Anyone who questioned that claim seemed to disappear, probably into the Pit, Grimhild’s nigh-bottomless dungeon beneath the castle.
The queen’s unnatural longevity must derive from feasting on the souls of her victims, much as a vaettr fed upon its host or even upon other entities from beyond the Mortal Realm. The secret to that would lie in the grimoire, but Gudrun had never been able to lay a hand on the tome. It never went far from the queen and, as far as Gudrun knew, not even her father was allowed to touch it. Only the queen’s vile servants could—the Bone Guard, Grimhild’s former enemies in life, damned to eternal servitude in death and acting as a reminder of the fate of any who dared stand against the queen.
As now, when Grimhild had taken the Bone Guard and ridden for Sviarland, intent to secure her puppets there. Grimhild had sworn not to repeat the mistakes of her predecessors to the throne—as if it were her bloodline and not Father’s directly descended from Naefil. But so long had the vicious queen ruled the Niflungar, perhaps even Father had become one of her innumerable puppets. The queen had built an army of pawns spread across the face of Midgard, moving only a few pieces at a time, ever waiting for an endgame that would ensure that, when the Niflungar returned, no one would be able to stand against them.
Their waking had come slowly at first, but now they moved for greater surety. And the Vanir did naught. They no longer watched Midgard, nor cared for the fates of man.
Maybe that was why her father had tasked her to seduce and train Odin. To create another pawn, a would-be king among one of the numerous barbarian peoples left in Midgard. Not that the task was odious. He was handsome and an apt lover. Moreover, his body surged with vital energy that coursed into Gudrun every time he climaxed. She felt stronger, vibrant, her own life force fortified by Odin’s. Given enough of such power, she might even one day challenge the queen.
All things in time.
Wool cloak slung tight around her shoulders, Gudrun slipped from her room. Father would be in his study. Such intuitions were inherent blessings of the Sight. Oh, she was not given much for prescient dreams or visions of the past, as some blessed with the Sight were. But instincts, intuitions, those she excelled at. That and communing with spirits. Ghosts flittered at the edge of her vision even now, though she ignored them. To acknowledge their existence was to invite their ire or pleas, and Gudrun had time for neither.
Instead, she stalked the halls, making her way down to her father’s study in the basements deep under the castle—though not half so deep as the Pit. A circle of candles lit the room. All servants of Hel disdained fire, but not even the royal Niflungar could read in the dark. As always, countless musty tomes and scrolls cluttered the shelves ringing the chamber, and a bowl of water sat on the table.
Not for drinking. Water had numerous other uses—it was liminal, fluid both literally and spiritually, and thus served as an excellent medium for focusing the Art. Her father didn’t look at the bowl now, though. He watched her, head cocked to the side as he listened to whatever secrets the raven on his shoulder whispered in his ear. The ravens proved more effective spies than the spirits Gudrun or even Grimhi
ld had to use for gathering information. Less costly now, though Father had hinted he had once paid a great price for such servants.
All sorcery came with a price. You drew power from the Otherworlds, and the Otherworld took back from you tenfold. The mere thought wakened spirits writhing beneath her skin, clamoring at the back of her mind, always eager to take from her. They would take her body, mind, and soul, given the chance. Such was the fate of all sorcerers who lived long enough.
“Your mother will return within the moon.”
Gudrun leaned over the table, demanding her father meet her gaze. “The Ás is somewhat more than human, is he not?”
Father looked to his raven as if the damned bird would answer the question, then finally raised an eyebrow at Gudrun. The one thing he had always demanded from his daughter was intelligence. Unlike Grimhild, who demanded everything, oft as not, more than could be borne.
“What are his secrets?”
“Are you not equipped to pry such things loose from him?”
Gudrun scowled at him. Obviously she could get the man to tell her all he knew. “I doubt the Ás has any inclination of Grimhild’s purpose for him.” The queen wanted Gudrun to make him a pawn, because in her mind, Gudrun was her pawn. All pieces in the grand game she played. A tafl board on a scope encompassing all Midgard. Maybe even beyond.
“Your mother has her instructions from Hel herself—there is none greater.”
“There is none greater.” Why would Hel want Odin?
Her father stroked the raven’s head and leaned back in his chair. “A Vanr came to him. Brought him a gift.”
A Vanr. From time to time, a few of those self-proclaimed gods still wandered the world, but most had not left Vanaheim in a thousand years. Any gift they brought would be laced with double-edged purpose, and … in Hel’s name … Odin’s vital energy. Every time he climaxed inside her it was like standing under a waterfall. Because he was infused with the energy of life. “An apple of Yggdrasil?”
Given such power, no wonder Gudrun felt so invigorated. And had Grimhild been here, no doubt the queen would have seduced Odin herself. Perhaps she still intended to. That thought left an unexpected sourness in Gudrun’s stomach. She was not going to share the man with anyone, much less the queen. If Grimhild thought to claim this pawn for herself, she was in for a shock. Gudrun had lost so much because of the woman.
She was not going to surrender Odin.
He was hers.
39
Odin shot awake, gasping for air as though he’d been drowning. The winds were chilly against his bare skin. A glance around told him the previous night had been no dream. Gudrun lay sprawled naked across the bed, a glorious goddess. Splinters of the dresser littered the floor. They had smashed it when … Gods, how many times had he taken this woman? The bed, the wall, against the window …
Her voice seemed to coil inside his mind, as though demanding he come and ravish her sleeping form once again, and already his body began to rise to the challenge. Only a slight hesitation held him back. Wasn’t there some other woman in his life? He tried to picture another face, but none came to mind.
Some force pulled him closer to Gudrun, her scent growing heady with the nearness, until he could not stop himself. And why should he? She giggled and jerked awake as he buried his face between her breasts. He felt his kisses grow so fevered he thought he would faint, then flung her legs apart so he could enter her. Any sense of time fled him.
When next he looked out the window, the sun had set again. He stared out over the mist and the icy castle beneath him. In the moonlight it felt even more removed from the world of men.
An uneasiness settled over him, like something he was forgetting tingling the edge of his mind.
“This place is steeped in sorcery,” he said when Gudrun put a hand on his shoulder. “Like something time forgot.”
“Not entirely inaccurate,” she said. “What do you know of sorcery? Of the worlds beyond Midgard?”
Not enough, that he could say for certain. When he turned to her she was fully dressed, as was he, though he didn’t remember dressing. A fog seemed to have settled over his mind. Hunger, perhaps.
“I could use something to eat,” he mumbled.
Gudrun pressed a goblet into his hands. Odin drank the burning liquid once again, then sank back onto the bed. At the edge of his vision, those shadows had drawn up again, trying to creep into the room through cracks in reality.
“There are ghosts in here.”
“Shades are everywhere, Odin.” She held out a hand and pulled him back to his feet.
He was so tired. He wanted only to feast, to fuck, to sleep. What had he been doing before this that had left him so exhausted? The thought seemed to flit through his fingers.
Instead he followed her out among the halls. Other Niflungar greeted him by name, nodded at them. He knew them, he realized. He’d spoken to some over the night meal, met others out in the courtyard. He knew them, but most of their names escaped his grasp.
The little one, no more than ten winters, that was Gudrun’s brother Gunnar. Always running about with a sword, training, testing himself. Hadn’t he asked to spar with Odin once? Yes, yes. But Odin had refused him.
“Gunnar wants to become a master, like his big brother,” Gudrun said idly.
“Big brother?”
“Guthorm. He’s away with … our mother. Not one of Father’s heirs, so he avoids Castle Niflung most times. Come.” She led him further down halls that blurred before, obscuring thought and time as in a dream. All of life had become a dream. “You have awakened to the Sight, Odin, and with it, you see and feel things others cannot. You see past the Veil into the other side, the shadow of this world where ghosts and spirits dwell when they watch us. We call this shadow the Penumbra. Beyond it lies the Spirit Realm, where the Otherworlds orbit us.”
“So I … I’ll always see these shadows now?”
“You’ll always know they are there. The Sight has other uses—those strong in it can pierce the veil of time, forward, backward, gazing upon the strands and fetters of urd. Your vӧlvur, the strongest of them, possess the barest hint of such a blessing. Any sorcerer likewise must gain at least some level of Sight, for sorcery is the power of the Otherworlds.”
“So seid.”
She paused. “A name for harnessing the energy suffusing your body and the world around you. Through force of will and expenditure of that life energy, you can change the world around you by calling upon spirits. That is the essence of sorcery.”
Gudrun led Odin farther into the castle, to a wall that folded in upon itself at her approach, revealing an opening. It led to a long hall, and he followed her down it, eyes latched onto her arse. Would anyone dare speak against them if he took his lover right here in this secret passage?
No.
None would dare challenge Odin. Lord of the Aesir. Prince of the Niflungar.
He grabbed both of her arse cheeks and pushed her against the wall.
She chuckled as he lifted the back of her dress. “I have something to show you.”
“Show me,” he demanded.
Instead, she spun around in his arms and pushed him backward. “Say you love me.”
“I … I … love you.”
At that she kissed him, then pulled away far too soon. “Midgard is but one of many worlds, Odin. A small, weak world compared to those beyond. Tell me of Niflheim.”
They’d had this conversation before, hadn’t they? The words came to his mouth as if by rote, and he knew them. “The World of Mist, of cold. The world of the dead, ruled by Queen Hel. There is none greater. From Niflheim comes the power of sorcery, the power to unmake the realms of man.”
“Yes.” She smiled. At that she grabbed his hand and pulled him forward until they paused before an iron-banded door. Inside, a man shrieked in pain. The sound ran through Odin like a wash of icy water, the mist in his mind clearing a moment. And then Gudrun’s lips were on his again, her breath mingl
ing with his, returning the peace.
“How many Otherworlds, Odin?” she asked, a breathless pant against his cheek.
“Nine worlds in the Spirit Realm. Nine worlds as there are Nine Spheres of Creation …” He was forgetting something important. There was something he was meant to do. “Nine worlds that are not places but …”
“But more like states of consciousness,” she prompted.
“Consciousnesses, shaping reality. Shaping our world, every world. The Otherworlds and the …”
“The Penumbra. Some call it the Astral Realm.” She pursed her lips. “Hmmm.” She then opened the door, revealing a scene of horror beyond.
An obsidian altar marked with strange runes rested at the head of the room. Gjuki, the Raven Lord, stood before it, ravens on each shoulder. But it was the naked man strung above the altar who held Odin’s eyes. Blood dribbled down numerous cuts along his abdomen, the blood stains all but invisible on the black stone beneath.
“What is this?”
“Sorcery,” she said. “Sorcery is the most dramatic form of the Art. Sorcery calls forth the power of spirits, enjoining them or bending them to our will. And what greater spirit could there be than almighty Hel?”
“There is none greater,” Odin said.
“Yes. So now is your chance to practice it. Kill him—offer his soul and body to Hel and complete the ritual.”
Odin’s stomach lurched at the thought. Even as his hand drifted toward the victim.
Bile scorched his throat. Something was wrong. Who was this man? He shook himself. Sorcery called up power from vaettir out of Niflheim. It ate away at body and soul, by its nature and by its cost. Why would he want to harm this innocent man? No, no this was wrong. Odin opened his mouth, trying to find words to explain to his love she had taken a wrong course.
Gjuki slapped the altar. “He is not ready.”