The Goddess Embraced (The Saga of Edda-Earth Book 3)

by Deborah Davitt

  The other gods froze for a second. UnNaming was forbidden, even amongst themselves. Trennus Matrugena had been the last to use it in the world, that they knew of, at any rate, and it had made many spirits and gods uneasy with him for years, although he’d only used the ritual once, and with good cause. It was true death, or at least, being sent to the Aether, cast out from every universe that mattered. The mortal! Morrigan cried. Who is he? Where is he?

  Toutatis managed to give her the flash of information that he’d gleaned in the attack—a mortal in his own temple, killing other humans to empower his spell . . . and weaving his own life into the working. As Morrigan dove towards the temple below, however, she was caught as the two other, smaller mad godlings moved in on her. They had been hanging back, raising ghul and shredding smaller buildings. Avoiding the direct confrontation that the largest godling had sought with the gods. Now, however, they moved in and tangled her in their tendrils, and Toutatis saw Odin’s eye flick from him, to the Morrigan, and back again. Hold! Odin shouted to the war-goddess. Baldur! Freyr! Heimdall! To me!

  The crafter-god began to feel . . . stretched. The mad godling was devouring his essence at the same time that his essence was being unmade. Stop! Toutatis thought, and reached out for the clouds, catching just enough power to send lighting down at his own temple . . . but sensed innocent lives in there, and hesitated. The agony intensified. I have done nothing to harm you! I have spent my entire existence teaching humans to build! I helped the Gauls shape clay and wood, then bronze and iron, and now steel and silicon and aluminum. Stop! Stop now!

  Odin and Taranis tried to haul the mad godling off of Toutatis, and the crafter god could see the strain in the face of his oldest ally. He, Taranis, and Esus had once ruled as a triumvirate, and they’d accepted the sacrifices of evil-doers. Murderers, rapists, and thieves had all been slain by their priests to empower the gods. They’d given up that power when Rome came. Their war-god, Esus, had chafed at their capitulation and had sunk himself so deeply in the Veil that no one had seen him since. Toutatis and Taranis had thus known each other for twenty-five hundred years in this world. Toutatis could read the expression behind the blue woad mask Taranis wore—fear. Mortal fear, for him. I won’t let this happen, Taranis said, desperately, and tore at the mad godling with all his strength, while two others still held Morrigan in their toils.

  The main godling, already weakened, was still as massive an example of the type as any Toutatis had yet seen. Odin had speculated that it might be one of the original fifteen, engorged by the deaths of the Qin gods. The death-god of Valhalla hadn’t been able to absorb all of its essence, and it had been repairing itself with Toutatis’ power. Taranis, my friend, no—

  Those were the last words Toutatis spoke. The mad godling, destabilized too far, sundered, and the shockwave took Toutatis over the edge, fracturing his core, while below, in his own temple, a human summoner, bleeding from eyes, mouth, nose, and ears, dropped to his knees, rasping out the final words that UnNamed a god.

  The skyscrapers of Nimes were largely faced in glass. And while they were all designed with earthquakes in mind, they had suffered from far too many seismic events in the past two decades . . . and they were not designed with hurricane-force winds in mind, either. The shockwave tore the glass and poured-stone facades away, leaving the flayed corpses of the buildings gaping like eyeless, fleshless skulls. The earth shook as the two other godlings, holding the Morrigan in place, were caught by the energy, destabilized, and exploded in turn. The Morrigan screamed in pain and grief, her avatar’s flesh being torn away. Odin and Taranis’ forms both destabilized, and for a long moment, neither of them could control their power.

  The mountain that dominated the eastern horizon of the city, once called by the Mohave tribe Avii Kwatiinyam, was covered in snow. Only twenty-eight miles from the heart of the city, the snow danced on the peaks, and began to collapse in great avalanches, while the massive fault line that had formed the entire transverse range around it began to convulse as Veil energy entered the ley-lines, triggering massive seismic events. Earthquake after earthquake spasmed through the unsettled ground as tectonic plates buckled and ground on one another.

  The Morrigan screamed in an agony that had nothing to do with physical pain. Her ravens appeared around her in cloud of dark wings and claws, looking for something to attack. Any creature that tried to touch her at this moment, even to heal her, might have been flensed to the bone. Like Pluto’s worms, the ravens were not physical creatures, but a manifestation of her raw will. Every aspect of the war-goddess was enraged, and as her face flicked from Macha to Nemain to Badb, tears streaked down her ruined faces, cutting trails through the blood-spatters and the blue woad paint.

  Baldur, Heimdall, and Freyr appeared in the sky, too late, and Freyr went to Odin, lending his leader some of his own power to try to stabilize his form. Heimdall went to Taranis to do the same, and Baldur sighed and did his best to heal the Morrigan without touching her at all. Be easy, he told her, gently. Be easy.

  No. Never again. He was the kindest and best of us, wanting nothing to do with war, only with building. And they tore his Name from him! He is no more, and never can be again!

  Below, the temple of Toutatis had been the first structure to crumble. It had been ancient, however, and had survived dozens of earthquakes in the past four or five hundred years. Dust rose from its fallen stone walls, as it did from thousands of other collapsed buildings. To the south, an enormous force of ghul wavered, cut off from their mad godling parents. Some collapsed. And the rest swarmed in over the broken piles of rubble, catching survivors to eat. Our people . . . Taranis managed to say, as Heimdall gave the Gallic god some of his own power. We must aid them . . . .

  Our people turned on us! The Morrigan’s three-fold scream rent the air.

  A handful of men, Taranis corrected, his voice pained. We must help the survivors.

  Heimdall shook his head. Go to Valhalla. All three of you. You are in no condition to help anyone. We will . . . do what we can for the city. We will begin the evacuation, and move the survivors north, to Burgundoi.

  We cannot leave this city! The Morrigan’s voice was fierce. This was our last stronghold on this continent. Nine million people in the city and its lands! We must rebuild . . . . She covered her face and a tearing sound came from her. How do you rebuild, when the one who built and created is no more?

  There was a quiet moment as snow began to fall from the sky above. The battle, Odin said, wearily, is lost. What remains is to recover our wounded, fall back, and survive long enough to fight again.

  None of them needed to say it. Toutatis had died here, a true death that had erased him from existence. Three mad gods had fallen, but millions of humans were dead, and . . . yes . . . their deaths and the death of Toutatis had likely warped and harmed the humans who survived the shockwave and the earthquakes. Odin, Morrigan, and Taranis were wounded. Fall back, Taranis told the Morrigan, his voice gentle.

  He was a crafter! He was a builder! The centuries had gentled him, but we need such as he was. Else there will never be more than war.

  I know. We will either learn to build, or we will find someone who can fill the void he leaves behind. We must.

  This should never have been. I did not remember this happening. All these broken futures leave us with, are ruins and ashes. She turned away, and she, Odin, and Taranis retreated to Valhalla. Leaving Baldur, Heimdall, and Freyr to try to pick up the shattered pieces of millions of lives.

  Chapter 17: Ragnarok, Part III

  A man who sluggishly awaits his fate is almost a coward, just as he is immoderately given to wine who drains the jar dry and sucks up even the dregs.

  —Seneca, Moral Epistles, 109 AC.

  The keenest sorrow is to recognize ourselves as the sole cause of all our adversities.

  –Sophocles, Oedipus Rex

  Every life is a tragedy told in three acts. And everyone is the author of their own fall.

  —
Sigrun Caetia, Iunius 2, 1993 AC.

  ___________________

  Iunius 14-Caesarius 6, 1999 AC

  Pluto rarely left the ground in battle. He was a chthonic deity, and drew strength from contact with the earth itself. The mad godlings, however, never touched the earth if they could avoid it; they tended to hover in the air over their targets, even when feeding on ruptured ley-lines. And they had several currently coming right for the city of Athar, which had a population of five hundred thousand people. A small city, in the grand scheme of things, but lives were lives. And added to that, were the fifty thousand Roman legionnaires who were huddled in and around their vehicles in the heart of that city. Fifty thousand legionnaires that were needed on the front lines, not buried under rubble. Move to the edge of the city! Pluto commanded, demanifesting to travel through the Veil, himself. Draw them as far from human habitation as possible!

  He’d already called for assistance. He knew that Juno was bogged down in Caesaria Aquilonis. They’d agreed to leave one major god at all times in Olympus, and that was Venus’ duty at the moment. That left the Hellene gods, like Poseidon, who had just reached the port city’s shores, and Dionysus, who’d just appeared overhead. Sif and Loki were both present. Combined, they might be enough to turn the tide. We’re losing too many gods, Pluto knew. If only Jupiter had listened, instead of becoming like Cronus, a devourer of all he saw.

  Stormborn had been badly injured by Artemis, and Niðhoggr had been damaged by Orcus. The goddess’ death had not liberated enough energy to heal anyone except Orcus, who had devoured most of her . . . and who was now pinned by Fenris, as the others moved to meet the godlings.

  The battle began in earnest east of the city, in a range of mountains covered in the ubiquitous cedar trees that the Carthaginians loved so much. The evergreens bowed under the snow, and a farming village that stood here was empty, without a single chimney giving forth smoke.

  Pluto hadn’t expected so many of the damnable godlings. There was a single large one, whose tendrils took up half the sky, three of the medium-sized creatures, each taking up about a third of the visible heavens with interlacing tendrils, and about a half-dozen smaller ones. There wasn’t anywhere he could stand where there weren’t tendrils of energy, writhing from one godling or another.

  Sif had one of the medium-sized creatures pinned to the east. Dionysus and Poseidon were each fighting one of the other medium-sized godlings to the south. Loki and Sigrun locked the largest one in place using magic, but Stormborn listed to the side on Niðhoggr’s back, clearly injured. Pluto leaped onto the tiled roof of a stone cottage beneath them, and reached out, tearing at the mad one with entropy, and pulling it into himself.

  The air hummed with energy as the smaller ones crept in, seeing their larger fellows pinned, trying to siphon off the larger godlings’ power . . . or to snipe at the gods, as they fought. Pluto sliced through a probing tendril that tried to wiggle its way under his hood, only to have it replaced by two more, questing from behind. Too many, he said distantly. slapping them away, too, seeing black lines of energy snake, unerringly, for Stormborn and Loki.

  Illa’zhi is capable of devouring one of the smaller ones, Sigrun offered, faintly. I will call to him. And Mladena, my russalka ally. She might be capable of such.

  Three hundred miles to the south, Illa’zhi was raging through a Persian assault force that had made a rapid strike at the Judean nuclear plants. Erida and Prometheus were evacuating the engineers and technicians inside the reactor, the core of which had been struck by missile fire. I cannot come to you! the efreet said, harried. There is something else here that requires devouring, unless you wish to have radioactive fallout spread across the entire peninsula.

  Valhalla! Pluto called through space and time. More assistance is required!

  The only asset we do not have in the field is Njord, and he holds our gates, as Venus holds your own. That was Tyr’s voice, terse and hard. Odin is wounded, and Toutatis dies!

  The russalka appeared at Sigrun’s call, instead, and shrieked a little, but managed to catch one of the smallest godlings, and locked it in combat. Death-spirit, ice and water, Pluto thought. It was a start. He was exerting himself considerably, trying to absorb the mad one without a shockwave, without the release of any extraneous energies. Difficult, but not impossible, especially with two other death-gods present, in Sigrun and Niðhoggr. Just . . . hold . . . steady . . . .

  Dionysus, however, was hardly a war-god. His gifts were wine and divine madness, song and revelry. His grip on his mad godling slipped, and the tendrils roiled free, plunging deeply into the Hellene god. No! Poseidon roared, and tried to reach the younger god . . . which meant that his godling ripped free of his hold, too.

  Dionysus fought, and Poseidon closed, trying to tear the tendrils away that were probing into his avatar’s flesh, and leeching at the energy of his core. Escape to the Veil! Poseidon commanded.

  I cannot. It . . . holds me here . . . .

  Poseidon’s godling, now free, leaped inwards, not for the god who’d held it captive, but plunging towards the center of the scrum. Directly for the weakening largest godling at the middle of the melee. It wants to feed on the main godling, Sigrun called, as Nith pivoted them away.

  Let them! Loki called. Let them fight for us, while we attend to Dionysus!

  The smaller godling collided with the larger one, and to Veil senses, it looked like two stars fusing together, yet fighting for dominance. The air smelled ionized, and stinging tendrils were everywhere, like water infested by a million electrified jellyfish. Pluto grimaced and released his hold on the larger godling, just as Loki and Stormborn did the same. Nith swung around, and that pair swept to the east to try to aid Mladena, who was locked in battle with one of the smaller godlings. Sigrun’s power raced ahead of her, locking the godling in place for the Raccian spirit to begin feeding on its essence, while Pluto and Loki spun to try to help Dionysus and Poseidon.

  Pluto slashed a blade of entropy through the tendrils feeding on the Hellene god, and Loki sent the creature flying back a thousand feet with a focused blast of raw magic. Dionysus managed to right himself, and looked down at the golden blood oozing from his chest and belly. You’re all right? Poseidon asked. It might have been the first time in centuries that one Olympian had actually expressed concern for another. Pluto considered that perhaps the best sign other than the birth of Aeva, that failing to defend Jupiter adequately might have been a good decision.

  I will live, it would seem, Dionysus said, managing a smile.

  Through the by-play, Loki had been weaving a net of power around the mad godling whose attack they’d disrupted, and was already beginning to de-spin it. Hurry, the trickster god told them, his voice strained. This will not hold for long without assistance—

  And behind them, clearly visible in Veil-sight, the smaller godling killed the larger, weakened one. The larger one exploded like a star gone nova, the shockwave blasting out over the deserted village. Pluto opened himself to the energy, and could sense Sigrun and Niðhoggr attempting to do the same, but it wasn’t quite enough. He’d already absorbed large portions of Artemis, Orcus, and the main mad godling already today. He was reaching his saturation point. The mad ones around them, however, absorbed the rest of the essence, growing stronger . . . and Dionysus, already weakened, destabilized, his core sheared in half by the energy wave. His power liberated itself, pouring out over the earth and hit Pluto directly, but it wasn’t a power he was well-equipped to absorb. Dionysus had been life, fertility, and revelry. Positive energies, not death and destruction. His death cut through Pluto, and flensed some of the flesh off his bones. Worms rained to the ground, and writhed feebly in the snow, trying to reach up and rejoin his body.

  Poseidon curled in on himself, in obvious pain, and the mad ones drank deeply of Dionysus’ power, too. The type of power did not seem to disturb the mad ones. They only knew hunger.

  Stormborn keened in pain, as the power flooded her. Too much! s
he called. Too much, I have to turn it around, I have to use it on something—

  There is a target well at hand! Niðhoggr snarled in response, and Stormborn required no more urging to turn what she’d taken from Dionysus against the godling she and the others battled. It died at her hand, and her russalka ally did her best to contain it.

  This left them with five small godlings, and two medium-sized ones . . . all of which had just fed deeply. They were empowered and dangerous, but might, conversely, fissure if they overfed now. Which was a danger of another type. Pluto, in as much pain as the rest, called, Fenris!