by Greg Sisco
When they were all dead or disarmed, Loki went into the extra bag they’d brought and came up with a small satchel. The contents were a substance they’d learned the composition of in their years of traveling, a secret weapon dating back to the early years of the Byzantine Empire that the Greeks called ‘sea fire,’ though the rest of the world called it Roman Fire. They’d brought a dozen satchels of the stuff and Loki poured the contents of one of them onto the deck and set to work igniting the fuel with a flint and some steel.
“What are you doing? What the fuck are you doing?” said Ragnar.
Bork glanced back to the boat for a minute, unable to contain his curiosity. A small fire had started in the boat and it was quickly becoming a large fire, spreading toward a sack Loki had thrown as close to the bow as he could get it.
And then BANG!
The whole ship was up in flames and Tyr and Odin had leapt into the water. Eilif followed shortly, but given his pain, his exhaustion, and his wounds, after he hit the water for the first time, he never came up.
Ragnar was still pinned to the boat and he was jerking his arms and legs, trying to get free. One hand slipped out from under an axe, separated mostly into two different appendages thanks to a cut that went all the way through his hand between his middle and ring fingers. The flames had overtaken him and his skin was boiling and popping as he screamed and waved his one free hand in the fire.
“It’s done,” said Bork to Loki as they stood in the last part of the dragonship not yet consumed by fire. “Make me immortal. Make me like you.”
Loki buried his axe in Bork’s chest. “You’ll live forever in Niffelheim. You’ll dine and fight and die in battle every day until Ragnarok comes. And then you’ll fight and die again. Isn’t that what you people believe?”
Loki laughed like hell as the fire lit half his face and a dying Viking cried out in pain what seemed like miles away.
“Loki,” said Bork, in shock.
Loki laughed once more. “Whatever,” he said.
Then he dove into the water and swam for shore with his Brothers.
Back on the beach they shed their Viking armor and the three of them stood naked in the night as a ship burned on the water in the distance. The fire was peaceful, even romantic from this distance, and one would never know of the violence that had taken place there.
The Black Rose. It was done with. Burned. Wilted. Conquered.
Tyr and Odin never fully communicated how uncomfortable they were made by Bork’s murder, who neither of them was convinced deserved what he got. Loki would have argued that nobody deserves anything, that chaos is all the world has to offer. Perhaps they’d all have been right.
“Did we do something good here today?” asked Tyr.
“I don’t know,” said Odin. “Do you feel good about what we’ve done?”
Tyr was silent.
Loki shrugged. “I feel pretty good, I guess.”
“They were killers and rapists. The world is a better place without them. We’ve done a service to the Earth, haven’t we?” asked Tyr.
“Sure,” said Loki.
Odin nodded. “You’re wondering whether it would be better without us.”
Nobody said anything. None of them tried to answer.
The Black Rose would always carry a certain weight for them, but they’d have trouble defining what it was in words. It may have meant that they were evil. It may have been a symbol of the other world where they lived, separate from humanity, of the relationship they had to mankind. They might have made it their insignia as a means to keep them at a distance. Part of it was perhaps the idea that killing could be just, though they’d lost sight of it somewhere along the way if that were the case.
What it came to mean above all else was that the world was cruel. It was a reminder of their denouncement of God, of their commitment to themselves. Along with the names of Norse gods that they used from that night forward, The Black Rose—which they would later tattoo over their hearts—meant they were gods, forever to walk the earth, forever to kill men, forever at a distance from humanity, existing only for themselves and for each other.
In short, it meant ‘Brothers.’
CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO
Tyr didn’t know how long he’d been tied up in the cellar. Not long. Maybe twelve hours or so. His joints weren’t too tired yet and he wasn’t starved for blood, but the chains binding his arms to the wall above his head were made of silver and they were chaffing and irritating his skin as well as making him feel nauseated.
The fact that a silver chain even existed in Loki’s house was disgusting. They had a few silver weapons with which they beat one another’s brains out for sport some nights, but nobody ever would have chosen to fight with chain alone. Silver chain served one purpose and that was to bind a vampire in place. Somewhere along the line, their trust in one another had fallen to such a level that Loki felt the need to keep it around. And sure enough, it was now being put to use.
For a few hours Tyr had stopped breathing and tried to listen, hoping Eva wasn’t suffering at the hands of Loki. Under other circumstances his primary concern being tied up for so long would have been boredom, but today he had to hope his girl wasn’t being murdered elsewhere in the house.
He heard nothing. All of the walls were thick and well insulated and even if she was screaming at the top of her lungs he’d probably never notice. He tried calling out for Loki and Thor and even Eva, but nobody answered. It wasn’t long before he surrendered to the futility and stood waiting to be set free whenever the others got around to it.
After somewhere between six hours and three days, there were footsteps outside the door and when it swung open Loki entered the room. They were both silent for some time, as brothers are after one of them burns the other’s house down and ties him up for an extended period of time.
“How you feeling, buddy?” Loki asked finally.
Tyr stared into Loki’s eyes and said nothing.
“Well, I’ve got some bad news for you. Eva died last night.”
An electric current ran through Tyr, tightening his body from the inside. His jaw clenched and all of his muscles seemed to flex. His eyes shut as tight as they could and his body held like this for a moment before everything started to loosen and he was left with only the trauma in his mind.
“One more week, Loki. That was all she ever wanted, all I ever wanted. You couldn’t even give her that, give us that? One week?”
“This wasn’t my decision, Tyr. It was hers, if anything. She just let go.”
“Fuck you!” The cry came from Tyr’s mouth without conscious decision. He was acting now on some overwhelmed instinct with which he wasn’t entirely familiar. “You’re lying. She was alive when I left the house with her. She wasn’t the picture of health but she had a week left in her easy. If she’s dead, you killed her.”
Loki pulled up a chair and took a seat in front of his Brother. “Okay Tyr, you want to know the truth? The truth is you killed her. You’ve been killing her all her life. First her parents, then her innocence, and now you’ve broken her with your lies.”
“What are you talking about? What did you do to her?”
“All I did was open her eyes. I freed her from the bonds you tied, told her all the things you wouldn’t. I told her about the people you’ve killed, the things you’ve done, and… her parents. I think that one was the deal-breaker.”
“I don’t believe you.”
“I made her understand what you can’t—that humans and vampires are incompatible for obvious reasons. In our world she’s prey, and in her world we’re predators. As soon as she grasped that, she had nothing else to live for and her little heart gave up beating.”
Tyr jerked at the chains but it only hurt his hands. He was stuck here until somebody unlocked him. “I’m gonna kill you, Loki. Our whole lives you’ve taken anything you wanted and I’ve gotten scraps. I’m not playing your game anymore.”
“You’ll get over it. You always
get over it. In a few days she’ll be a piece of your past and we’ll move on. You’ll thank me for it later. We’ll laugh about it. I’m already laughing about it.”
“Take these chains off so I can cut your fucking head off.”
Loki sighed. “You make a persuasive argument, but I’ll pass. I understand how you feel and I’ve got it all sorted out. We’ll give her a big New Year’s Eve funeral pyre in the spirit of new beginnings and sentimental bullshit. So cool off. I’ll let you down when you get a grip, when you can be reasonable.”
He patted Tyr’s cheek with pity and left the room as Tyr shouted and cursed after him.
It couldn’t have been more than a few hours Tyr spent struggling with the chains, fighting his inner self for control, and howling for Loki before the door to the basement opened again. But it wasn’t Loki who entered this time. It was Thor.
Thor had spent all day in a hotel room churning over whether it was time to go. He’d gotten on the phone and nearly booked a flight for tonight, but it was short notice and no tickets were available. He settled instead for a red eye flight the following night, and he took the delay as a sign. When the sun went down, he headed for the house and as soon as Loki left for the club, he came in and found Tyr.
Tyr went limp. He wasn’t ready for Thor. Since hearing the news, his mind had been so stuck on Eva and what Loki had said or done to her that he’d never even stopped to consider Thor’s involvement.
“Hiya Tyr,” said Thor placidly.
“What did you two do? Why? What did she do?”
“Tyr, I’ve been unfair to you.”
“What was your hand in it? Did you participate? Or just watch and smile while Loki did his thing? Maybe a high-five and a drink afterward?”
Thor paused. “I’ve been out of the house, Tyr. I spent all of last night looking for Heimdall. I don’t even know what you’re talking about.”
“Loki told me Eva’s dead. Is it true?”
Thor looked over his shoulder at nothing in particular. He’d figured as much. Her odds of making it through the night alone with Loki hadn’t been good. At this point killing Eva felt cold even by Loki’s standards, but that didn’t mean it couldn’t happen.
“I don’t know,” said Thor with all the sensitivity he could muster.
“Why didn’t you stop him? Why didn’t you back me up on this? It only would have been a few more days.”
“We’ve all been hearing that for a long time from you, buddy. Every night it’s a night away. I came back here tonight to be merciful, not to be guilted. Frankly I think you and Loki are a couple of children these days and you’ve each got your thumb in one of the family dog’s eyes waiting to see who gets bit first. I don’t want anything to do with either one of you. But I sided with Loki last night when I should have stayed neutral and I came back to rectify that.”
“You can’t rectify it. It’s done.”
“Enough. I didn’t come back to help you or to take your side, I only came back because I owed you a level playing field between you and Loki. I’m going to rattle off a few facts. Number one, you’ve been my Brother a hundred years. Number two, so has Loki. You two taught me everything I know and it’s not my place to change either one of you even if I think you’re both full of shit at the moment. But you’ve got a rose on your chest the same as me and you probably wouldn’t be tied up there if it wasn’t for me. I don’t feel good about that. So I’m going to cut you down, not because it’s the smart thing to do or the right thing to do, but because it’s the only thing to do. And after I cut you down, that’s it. As far as I’m concerned, from that moment on, I don’t owe you or Loki a thing. After that, we’re all back on our own paths and mine goes wherever I want it to.”
With that, Thor cut Tyr down. Tyr stood and looked at Thor with the kind of vacant gaze you give a bagel you don’t want. He wanted to be angry, to take his rage out on someone, to place the blame. But Thor was right. He didn’t owe Tyr a damn thing. They weren’t enemies. They were Brothers again, or at the very least they were two people in a lousy world and nothing more.
Tyr headed into the house to find Eva, and Thor followed.
Eva was a pale human corpse lying on a bed in the bourgeois prison with stiff fingers and shut eyes. There was no blood, no scars on her throat, no sign of a fight. From the look of it, Loki had been entirely honest. She’d given up on Tyr and cashed in her chips. No more pain nor joy. No arguing nor laughing. No intravenous injections, no television, no black licorice, no scratching of itches. No tanning.
That was the human curse. They walked by day or by night, free to love and be loved, the world at their disposal, but they died when they were still babies. Tyr would live for millennia and understand existence better than any human being ever could, but his only companionship would be his Brothers and if he ever saw another sunrise it would be on his deathbed. Pros and cons. Curses and blessings. The ways of the worlds.
He stroked her cheek in the way that made her smile up at him when she had a pulse. When she had brain function and oxygen supply, emotions and thoughts. When she was a living thing instead of an inanimate object. She lay there and did nothing, as dead women do.
“I used to think I was God, Eva,” he said. “I’m sorry I couldn’t save you.”
“You know, I never wanted this,” said Thor. He was standing in the doorway behind Tyr.
“I know.”
“I mean, I wanted you to drain her, but I never would have deliberately brought it to this.”
“No. Only Loki would go that far.”
“You’re not gonna kill him, are you?”
“Not sure yet.”
Thor nodded. “I’m leaving. Tomorrow night. I wasn’t gonna tell you, but… well… I am. Thought maybe I’d look you guys up in a few years and see if you settled things. Between you and her, Loki and the club, I figured somebody was gonna get us killed before long. Long as she’s out of the picture, you want to hop on a plane with me? Ditch Loki and start our own thing like you offered a while back?”
Tyr shook his head softly. He knew the right answer was yes. If he went with Thor, there was the opportunity to go back to the comfortable life they’d always lived, sans the discomfort brought on by Loki. And even if Loki came looking for them in a few years or a few decades, which he almost certainly would, they’d have some time to enjoy themselves before it happened.
But Tyr felt no satisfaction in accepting that, in deserting Loki with his tail covering his balls and accepting Loki’s murder of the little girl Tyr had saved thirteen years ago. She was the peace offering. Tyr and Loki were Brothers again by Loki’s acceptance of Tyr’s decision to love this girl, and with her dead at Loki’s hand, Loki had broken the bond. That problem wasn’t resolved by running, and it wasn’t even resolved with confrontation or revenge. There was only one way to resolve it.
He wasn’t willing to play things by Loki’s rules anymore, to let him off the hook again. He wasn’t leaving without closure. When Eva was six years old and Tyr spared her life and stuck Loki to the wall and abandoned them for a decade, he thought he’d made his point. It seemed he’d been too subtle. He could rectify subtlety.
He stood up from the bed and headed for his quarters, the little bedroom in the corner used mostly for sex and murder.
“I think you should probably go,” he said. “I’m getting ready to do something stupid.” He turned the dial on the safe next to his bed.
“Tyr, you’re not saying what I’m hearing, are you?”
“If you want to maintain that precious neutral stance, to let me and Loki settle this ourselves, and if you’re not willing to face the possibility of seeing one of your Brothers dead tonight, you’re going to want to leave now.” He opened the safe and took his sword in hand. “And if there’s a shred of possibility in your mind that Ofeigr or the Chosen might be out there watching us, you’ll want to sever all ties with me.”
Tyr turned back to Eva’s room and marched, holding the sword at his si
de with the blade facing the corner of the hall.
“Tyr, this is a rash decision. Stop for a minute. Talk to me. She won’t come back the same. She won’t remember. The girl you knew is gone. Think about this.”
“I’m sick of thinking,” said Tyr without breaking stride.
“Tyr!” Tyr stopped in the doorway of Eva’s room and turned to face Thor. “You’re gonna get yourself killed, man.”
“Do you know the Norse legend of Tyr and Fenrir? The wolf who the gods wanted to shackle? He broke every rope they tried on him, so they went to the Dwarves and had a magic rope built, one that could restrain anything. And Fenrir said he’d only let them shackle him if one of the gods would put a hand in his mouth as a show of trust.”
“Right. And Tyr said he’d do it. So what?”
“Exactly. And they bound the wolf and he bit off Tyr’s hand. Now does that sound like a guy who thinks things through, or a guy who gets shit done?”
“Tyr, you’re losing it.”
“I’m the god of war. Of justice and heroic glory. I’m going to head Loki off at the Chupacabra and rain down holy Hell on that place. I’m gonna send a fucking message and he’ll hear it loud as he’s ever heard anything when he sees Eva by my side.”
Thor shook his head. “I can see I’m not going to convince you, so I’m going to say goodbye. Sounds like I won’t be seeing you around again, but maybe I’ll catch a glimpse of your head on a pike somewhere.”
“Stranger things have happened.”
Thor hugged Tyr for what he hoped wouldn’t be the last time. “So long, Tyr. It’s been a ride.”
“Take care. If you start your own Brotherhood, look for guys more like you and less like Loki and me.”
Thor laughed. “Shit. Like you gotta tell me.” He started down the stairs and then stopped. “Don’t get killed, Tyr. It’d be a real shame if this is the last we speak.”
“That it would, Thor.”
Five minutes later Thor was out of the house and Tyr was standing over Eva’s body with his sword in his hand.