Venus beckoned Pluto to the bed, who approached, with some reluctance. These are modern times, the goddess of passion told him, cheerfully. Mortal males have always been so peculiar about the childbearing process. It’s not quite the same thing for us, you do realize.
The faceless cowl rose, and there was a chill in the air that had nothing to do with temperature as Pluto slowly, woodenly sat beside Juno’s bed. Freya moved a little closer, and put one hand on Juno’s forehead, lightly. These two do not fear death, Freya told Venus, smiling faintly. But what they will not admit to, is that they fear the unknown. Change. A birth to a barren mother and a father who is death incarnate, neither of whom could ever have hoped for this, in all the long years of their existence?
Sigrun froze at those words, which echoed loudly in her own mind. Freya paused as Pluto’s hooded head turned to regard her. No more massive change has come to this realm, except the death of Jupiter himself. And of course, Freya continued, more gently, they fear how their powers might be expressed in this new creature. Did not your Zeus hurl misbegotten monsters into Tartarus, once? Monsters with, legend has it, fifty faces and a hundred arms each? Freya’s tone now held slight irony. They all knew how much legends were worth.
But every legend had a grain of truth, Sigrun knew. And it suggested to her that once, children of the gods who had not measured up had been cast back into the wild Veil, as humans themselves had left unwanted or deformed children exposed upon the rocks.
Juno turned her face aside. Zeus no longer lives. And this child will not be a monster.
Sigrun looked down, and saw that Pluto had taken one of Juno’s hands in his. He lowered his head, and did not say a word, as Juno went about the business of her first-ever birthing.
Again, it wasn’t much like human labor. No pain. No contractions. But there was still effort, and then the room filled with light as Freya caught the infant that had slipped out from between Juno’s legs. Formless, for an instant, just an inchoate ball of radiance. And then, as she handed it to Pluto . . . form followed. Limbs shaped themselves. A face. A Name, ringing out in the air around it. Aeva, Juno whispered. Eternity. A good Name. A powerful one. It is good of you to join us at last, little one. I did not know I would ever have always had you.
Sigrun’s mind reeled as she tried to grasp the fact that Aeva, born in the Veil, had already always existed. And yet, had not existed before this moment. Incipient potential existence, was the best her mortal mind could do. A form of immanence. Always there, always around them, waiting to be, but coalesced, at last.
After ensuring that the infant did indeed, have the correct number of arms, legs, fingers, toes, and mouths . . . or had at least been able to manifest herself coherently . . . Pluto and Juno presented the child to the rest of the gods of Olympus. Sigrun, lurking at the back of the august assemblage, saw the wonder in Mercury and Minerva’s eyes. Saw the hope in Vesta’s, as the virgin goddess of the hearth accepted the child, and rocked the little goddess in her arms . . . and the infant entity raised her head to look back at the ancient goddess. No more eating our own, Juno told those assembled, briskly. No more offering up the power of your worshippers to those higher than yourself, in homage and fealty. This is our new beginning.
Vesta looked up. And what about Orcus? He has not been caught yet.
That is not for lack of looking, Pluto assured her. The death-god’s voice was little more than the sigh of wind in a field of wheat at the moment, but it carried power. A power very much like Sigrun’s own. It called to her, and she actually took a step towards him, before Freya closed a hand on her arm. You are not the only one calling out for justice, Vesta. Our new allies have been attacked by him in the past two weeks, as well.
Freya’s expression tautened. Idunn fell three days ago. Jörð fell last night. Both to Orcus’ unwavering hunger. Both were defiled before he slew them, and both times, we arrived too late to defend them. And both were doing little more than healing and providing food to mortals.
Sigrun lifted her head. She hesitated to speak, but at Freya’s gesture, did so, in spite of her nerves. It is my thought that Orcus has become what humans would call a serial killer. He pursues those whom he considers weak. Consider his choice of victims. Idunn, or youth. Jörð, a gentle earth goddess. Nantosuelta, a death-and-fertility goddess of the Gauls. Gentle death, they called her. Hestia, another gentle goddess. Thrud, a flower-goddess. Of all his victims, only two were male, and both were at Jupiter’s behest. Tepeyollotl, god of mountains and quakes, and Tlaltecuhtli, another fertility god. He has very carefully selected those who cannot fight back effectively, except when directly ordered otherwise. A snatch of Zhi’s old words came back to her, as the efreet had commented that without danger, there was no growth, no satisfaction in the hunt or the battle. Zhi would turn up his nose at Orcus, greater power or not. Orcus didn’t challenge himself by fighting equals. And of course, Zhi didn’t turn on his allies. Sigrun returned her thoughts to the present, hastily. And added to what might be considered solely human drives, there is the very real fact that he absorbs the power of those he kills. Though he has yet to target anyone whose power could . . . genuinely increase his own. Sigrun looked down. Most of his targets since Jupiter’s death had been creatures antithetical to his own nature. Givers of life, nurturing figures of fertility and light. He couldn’t be absorbing much of them at all.
Justice will be done, Pluto promised, quietly, in that whisper-soft voice, which still had the finality of a leaden clang. He turned, and Sigrun did her best not to look under the cowl, fearing a little what she might see. He will be caught, and I will kill him, if no other manages the task.
I will bait him, Mercury volunteered.
Venus laughed, a lovely, mocking trill. He will expect treachery from you.
Sigrun raised a finger. Was I not one of his original targets? she offered, quietly.
Freya’s head snapped towards her. No.
My power is very similar to Orcus’ own. And other than that, I fit his—forgive the mortal terminology—victim profile. A feminine aspect. A lesser power.
Ah, but you have been bait in the trap, before. When you sought to lure Ītzpāpālōtl out of hiding, Pluto said, sitting down on his throne as Juno accepted their child back from Vesta. I have something different in mind this time. A hunt. Under the cowl, Sigrun could just see the somber lips of the judge who never smiled, start to curve. I would like to borrow the services of Fenris, Freya. If he is amenable. Your wolf has not yet had luck in tracking Orcus, but I might have other resources that he has been lacking. Such as Artemis. Since Cernunnos’ and Forseti’s deaths, you and the Gauls have been lacking in gods of the hunt.
I will speak to him about this, Freya said, and lowered her head infinitesimally to the new rulers of the Roman gods. And, catching the way Sigrun’s gaze remained on her, relented a little. We will revisit the issue of Stormborn playing the part of bait in our little drama, if there is need.
They departed, Freya drawing Sigrun through the Veil back to Valhalla, where Nith was waiting for their return. I had thought I might need to lay siege to Olympus, the dragon said, and there was no humor in his voice as his head came up off the flagstone floor. He was similarly displeased to hear that Sigrun might be bait again, and growled, making the walls shake, though Sigrun rested a hand on his neck to calm him. There are others who match his profile.
Saraid fits, but I would not put her in danger, Sigrun agreed. Lassair, but I think it quite possible that she would . . . she looked away, and then finished, be snuffed inside of a minute. Lassair is powerful within her own realm. But she had no chance against Venus, except to be an excellent distraction.
I do not like this any more than I liked it when you allowed yourself to be bait for Obsidian Butterfly, Nith warned, pacing alongside her as they followed Freya deeper into the endless halls. His talons unsheathed themselves, and tore into the rocks as he walked, a clear indication of his agitation. Let Sif take the risk, if it is necessar
y.
Sif would be a good choice. But Thor would never forgive any of us if she came to harm.
Nith snarled, but subsided. Finally, he asked, Will you tell Steelsoul about this?
Sigrun considered it. Her life in the Judea house seemed impossibly remote most days now. An artifact of a different time. No, she replied, after a moment. But I will visit.
She did, too. Adam was seventy now, and her trips to Judea allowed her to ensure that his old age was a healthy one. She assisted him in and out of the shower, ignoring his grumbling that he didn’t need help. She believed his words somewhat less than she had believed Juno’s protests. And when he asked her how her day had gone, she blinked, and told him about the birth she’d attended. Adam blinked as he slowly combed his hair. “I . . . might not be an expert on Roman gods. But Juno doesn’t appear to be particularly grieving for Jupiter’s death.” He sounded rattled. As if his words carried more weight, even to him, than they should.
“Do you think that Poppaea grieved for Livorus?” Sigrun asked, frowning as she looked down. The tile was slippery when damp, but rugs were a trip hazard, and if he fell now, he was liable to break something. After a moment’s consideration, she roughened the texture of the tile a little, making the footing better. She couldn’t do more for his bones than she already had. “A loveless political marriage. Just a business arrangement. It is what Rome was founded on, after all.”
Adam frowned, and put down his comb. Rubbed irritably at the white whiskers on his leathery face, and picked up his razor. “And again, forgive me, but aren’t they siblings? Isn’t that incest?”
Sigrun blinked. The fact that the thought hadn’t occurred to her made her a little uneasy, but then again . . . . “They’re spirits, Adam,” she said, shrugging. “They don’t particularly have to worry about inbreeding and recessive traits like receding chins. And Jupiter, her theoretical brother, was her first husband, after all.” She paused. “And what better way, really, to convey to those around them a sense of new beginnings, of unions, of joint authority?” She shrugged. “I don’t know if they got that from humans, or if humans got it from spirits, but the symbolic weight is important.” The mother and the father. The king and the queen. It’s embedded in every human mind. Down at the brainstem level, or written in our genetic code. Civilizations pattern themselves after the family unit . . . whatever the family unit looks like, in that civilization, anyway. As above . . . so below. Huh. I should mention that to Trennus . . . .
The lights overhead flickered, and Sigrun glanced up. “Has that been happening often?”
“We’ve had rolling blackouts to help distribute the load,” Adam confirmed, tossing his razor aside. “There have been attacks on the nuclear plants. Persian rockets, mostly. Erida put up a smaller version of the city-wide shield around them. It would be bad if the plants exploded.” He turned to leave the bathroom. His shoulders slumped more than they had, once. Muscle loss, and calcium replaced by tiredness in the bones.
Sigrun froze, in mild horror. “I did not know about that,” she admitted.
Adam turned and gave her a long look. “No,” he told her. “No, you didn’t.”
Sigrun swallowed, I don’t want to fight right now. I came here to make sure that you were doing all right. That you had food in the pantry—and don’t think I don’t notice that you’re giving away all the things that I replicate for you. I don’t want to have this fight right now. The fight about how I’m neglecting you and this home and your country. Please . . . just let it pass.
To her surprise, he let it go.
Chapter 16: Ragnarok, Part II
Ovid once called time the devourer of all things. Heraclitus tells us that the river we step into today, is not the same river as it was yesterday. For not only is it not the same river, but we are not the same person as we were, the day before. Poets and philosophers. Once in a while, they uncover a nugget of truth. And then they cling to it. We all do. These are comfortable truths, aren’t there? Immutable, like the laws of physics. The laws of physics are what we teach here, because no human can break them. Oh, we can use them in our magic. But we can’t break them.
But gods? Gods break the rules all the time. I told you a few weeks ago that turning a human into a frog isn’t impossible, so long as you don’t mind it being a dead and super-massive amphibian. Or the hassle of changing the frog back into a human and performing cardiopulmonary resuscitation. And I told you then, that a god could manage this feat, without issue. They have infinite time to survey the possibilities, they have considerable power at their disposal, and they pay only casual heed to the laws of our physical universe.
That’s one of the most frightening things about beings at a certain level of power. The universe has rules for a reason. Gravity helps things organize themselves. Time allows organization to happen. Matter and energy act in certain ways, and they cannot be created or destroyed. Except when gods get into the mix. What if gods started actively disobeying the rules of this universe? Couldn’t they destroy it?
We’re told that we have to trust that they won’t. Why? Because if we ask that question, they might destroy us. Really, that’s not a basis for trust.
—Kanmi Eshmunazar, Lecture recording. Thaumaturgy 101, University of Jerusalem, 1978 AC.
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Maius 15, 1999 AC
Romana Via X was an arrow-straight east-west line through southern Novo Gaul. The Imperial Highway passed through areas that were usually burning deserts, but at the moment, the temperature hovered in the fifties. No rain, though. No water. And the highway was packed with refugees. The fortunate ones, the ones with ley-powered motorcars, and who’d managed to scrounge up tires, had the luxury of not having to walk. Drust Corraidhin had traded twenty solidi—a substantial amount of coin, even before the hard times—for decent leather backpacks, water skins, and worn-in boots for himself and Sadb when the bus they’d boarded to leave the ruins of Divodurum, had broken down eight hundred miles from their old home. Some of the others from the bus had, foolishly, in Drust’s opinion, paid twice as much to local townsfolk for a skinny old horse. A horse needed food. A horse needed water. They can eat the horse when the old nag falls over, can’t they now?
They walked through the days, in the gray light of a sun that rarely pierced the clouds, and held no warmth. They tried to stick with the same group of people, those who’d been on the Divodurum bus with them, and hadn’t ridden off ahead on a costly old horse. They’d all met in the refugee camp they’d lived in for six months after the destruction of their city. Known quantities were safer. But stragglers who’d fallen behind other groups were occasionally absorbed into their group for a day or two, until they fell behind again. On a good day, Drust could look ahead, and see nothing but a slow-moving line of people, all heading west. At night, they’d make camp, and stand watch. Drust and Sadb kept their guns close at hand, at all times.
No word from their son Fearchar in months. Drust had long since come to the dull conclusion that his only child was dead. That he and Sadb were alive was a cosmic accident; every other house on their block had been leveled. Their own home had partially collapsed during Damara’s death, but they’d been in their downstairs bathroom, a relatively sheltered spot, and had managed to push their way out, before the house had fallen in entirely.
He was aware that Sadb wept every night before falling asleep, silent, listless tears, but he was past weeping. No son, no home, no future, and, as far as he could tell, damned few gods left, either. What’s the point in going on? he sometimes wondered . . . and then looked over at his middle-aged wife, who had yet to complain about her blistered feet or aching legs, though she had to feel both as acutely as he did. Then he’d wrap an arm around her. And keep moving.
Tonight, another group of travelers joined them at their campsite. This put everyone on edge. The last time another group had tried to cozy up to the Divodurum group, they’d tried to rob them of their few belongings. The result had been a dozen
bodies on the edge of the highway in the morning, rolled into the drainage ditch. They’d found a few other shallow graves like that in the past month. No wonder the townsfolk along the highway are so edgy and so apt to try to take you for all you’re worth, Drust thought . . . and kept his gun’s barrel pointed down, for the moment, as negotiations between their former bus driver and the leader of the newcomers edged around towards the sharing of supplies. When the newcomers broke out wax paper bags of jerky—salty, but real meat—everyone relaxed a bit. And the Divodurum group offered canned peaches and beans in exchange. Though everyone on both sides ate carefully, and waited to see if anything had been spiked with sedatives.
Just in case.
“We’re only heading as far west as Alba Aesculus. Then we’re going to cut north, towards the Mitsi'adazi forest, up around the Yellow Rock River,” one of the newcomers said. “It’s untouched wilderness. There’s bison. Bears. We can live off the land up there, and no one’s going to bother us. Shit, there’s even all the geysers. We’ve got a couple of people who can rig a geothermal generator, if they can scrounge the parts up.”
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