by Per Holbo
***
Tjalfe´s mother hovered across the plains with Roeskva hanging in her hair like an extension of her pony tail. She held a pitchfork in one hand and a pot in the other, which she used to wave at Tjalfe. She had a wry smile on her lips and her eyes seemed distant, almost as if she wasn´t really present, but was instead controlled by a strange and undefined force. At first Tjalfe believed it was a mere optic illusion that made her look as if she was flying freely a few feet above the ground, but as he observed more closely, he had to realize that her feet did in fact not touch the ground.
Roeskva was giggling and cheering as she toppled around herself hanging in her mother´s hair. For every time they moved across an elevated area on the grass field, Roeskva rammed into the ground and toppled even faster. Tjalfe kept expected her to cry out loud in agony, but for some strange reason she didn´t. Instead she was absolutely thrilled and her laughs reached new heights for each blow to the ground.
Tjalfe looked down and was terrified to discover that he was completely naked. Even though his mother and sister were the only ones present apart from himself, he wasn´t at all comfortable to be naked in the presence of women. He wanted to grab his cape, but it was nowhere to be seen. Desperately he looked around for something, anything, to cover himself. Even the tiniest cloth would be better than nothing. Apparently nothing was all there was. The hunting bag with the looking glass and the knife his father gave him last winter had also disappeared.
Some 10-15 feet away Sif was staring in his direction, but she didn´t look like she had noticed him standing there the way he was born. In an attempt to hide, he crawled under a nearby bush and started pulling the branches to cover himself, but as soon as he touched them, the bush suddenly came to life. Spreading out its branches and leaves it left him completely visible to everyone passing by. And everyone did pass by - or at least that was how he felt. The whole village had suddenly decided to parade by this particular bush to stare at the naked boy in it. Most of the elderly women just passed by with a condescending smile while looking somewhere else than in his eyes, but the old men starred at him viciously grunting and complaining. “Blasphemer!” “Disrespectful Boy” and similar invectives were the order of the day and the humiliation was almost too much to bear.
Through the leaves he could see Roeskva as she came closer and closer while calling his name out loud.
“Tjalfe?”
Tjalfe looked around to find his mother, but she was nowhere to be seen.
“Tjalfe?” Roeskva repeated his name in a worrisome voice. She approached the bush crouching to crawl under it and put a hand on his naked shoulder.
“Tjalfe? Tjalfe! Wake up, Tjalfe, please!”
Tjalfe slowly opened his eyes and looked around with a confused expression. He was fully dressed and the hunting bag lay on the ground right beside him. Roeskva looked him in the eyes with concern and he sat up straight. Phew.. He sighed with relief as he realized it had only been a dream. But how long had he been sleeping? He wasn´t sure, but tried figuring it out by looking at the sun, which was hanging a hand or so over the tree tops in the direction of the city of Hobro. He had had to have been unconscious for several hours, then.
“Are you alright, Tjalfe,” Roeskva wanted to know. Sweet Roeskva. Always concerned with his well being, she was.
“Yeah,” he said in a distant voice, “Yeah, I´m.. I´m okay.” He tried to ease her concern with a smile and it seemed to work. She looked more relaxed and lowered her shoulders.
“Mum is worried about you,” she said, “she asked me to look for you and tell you to come home right away.” Tjalfe got to his feet and brushed off the dirt of his clothes.
“In a minute or so, sweetie,” he answered and grabbed the hunting bag, “I have to check out something first.”
She looked concerned again.
“Please, Tjalfe,” she objected with her eyes skewing toward the ruined fortress, “She did say right away, you know. She is going to get mad. Tjalfe!”
He stopped and turned around looking in her eyes. She looked both angry and excited at the same time. As if she had already sensed there was some kind of adventure ahead, but couldn´t shake of the prospect of having to deal with her mother afterwards. Tjalfe put his hand on her shoulder ensuring her that there was no danger in what he was about to do and that the fortress was completely deserted.
“I won´t be long, Roeskva,” he said. He paused for a bit, and then continued: “you can come with me if you want.” That triggered her. All grumpiness and potential anger disappeared from her face. She sent him a gigantic smile that pushed aside all worries. Tjalfe hadn´t told her to come with him just for her sake, though. After all, it would be much better if she went along instead of going home revealing everything to their parents. Not that he believed she would deliberately tell them. In fact, he was certain she wouldn´t. But if she looked the least grumpy or even worried coming home, their mother would guess immediately that he had refused to come home with Roeskva. This way he could avoid the conflict with their mother, because they couldn´t know if Roeskva had found him or not. So, he suggested she should join him. And he knew it would work. Every single day since the Aseir arrived at the Fyrkat fortress and welcomed Tjalfe to visit them, Roeskva had begged and pleaded with him to bring her along. He had always refused her, because he knew his parents wouldn´t approve. It was bad enough that he visited the gods, a fact his parents weren´t too happy about in the first place. He suspected they only let him do it, because deep down they awed the gods and since the Aseir extended their hospitality to Tjalfe, who were Egil and Groa, a simple hunter and his wife, to go against the will of the gods? So, even though Tjalfe´s visits called for some unwanted attention from the village people in general and the elders in particular, his parents probably felt they had no other choice but to let him go for his daily visits at the fortress. But there was a huge difference between that and allowing Roeskva to go with him. She was, after all, no more than 10 summers old - and even a girl!
After a while Roeskva had come to terms with the fact that she would never meet Tjalfe´s new friends face to face. So, at this new prospect of visiting the fortress, she shone brighter than the sun. Deserted as it may be, going inside Fyrkat was still quite the adventure and she looked very much forward to it.
“But...” Tjalfe said in a firm voice, “you have to promise me you won´t tell anyone about it!” She nodded eagerly.
“Not to anyone - especially not mum and dad, okay?” Roeskva couldn´t stand still, but moved her feet and legs like mad.
“I won´t, Tjalfe, I promise!” She said excitedly. Oh, was she looking forward to seeing that fortress on the inside!
Tjalfe swung the hunting bag over his shoulder, took her hand and then they proceeded across the grass toward the fortress.
Coming closer, Tjalfe had to stop for a moment to let the sight of Fyrkat´s destructive state sink in. He was chocked.
“Whoa,” he said distantly and felt Roeskva squeezing his hand so tight it hurt, “the palisades have almost been destroyed.”
Roeskva looked at her brother while still clinging to his hand.
“Pali- what?”
“The Palisades,” he answered without looking at her, “The raft wall around the fortress. They are supposed to protect the fortress against enemies.” He pointed at the top edge of the Palisades and continued:
“You put guards up there and then you can spot the enemy coming from far away. It gives you the advantage of being on higher ground.” She showed her understanding by nodding and they entered the gate, which was wide open and hanging askew at its hinges. The inside of the fortress appeared to them as they entered through the gate. What a dreadful sight! Everything in there was destroyed. The many houses the Aseir had used as living quarters when they weren´t aboard their air vessels were obliterated and the small cars that could move by themselves without being pulled by oxen or horses had turned into charcoal. Some sheds were still burning and the grass bene
ath the two children was light brown like after a dry summer. Only the big stone in the middle of the fortress seemed untouched by whatever had happened in there.
That particular stone had always had an alluring effect on Tjalfe ever since he entered the fortress for the first time. The symbols on the stone had to be touched in a certain order and then the stone and the circle glowed more and more till the gods were embraced by something that resembled the steam Tjalfe had seen coming from his mother´s stewing pot over the fire. Finally the gods would disintegrate like melting snow. Tjalfe had never really understood how it worked, but contrary to the beliefs of the elders, he knew it wasn´t magic. It was ‘science,’ a word Thor used on several occasions. In the village they believed magic to be something reserved for people with the gift, but according to Thor, ‘science’ was obtainable by anyone who wanted to learn, although the extent to which someone could harness the power depended on their ability to learn. The elders had never responded positively to this notion and Tjalfe was quite sure the only reason they didn´t exile him from the community was the fact that he seemed to be favored by the gods.
Tjalfe looked down to find the circle, but for some reason it wasn´t visible. The stone didn´t have the usual glow either, so he gathered all his courage to get closer and examine the place. He was quite disappointed. There was nothing special about that stone. It was merely... a stone... nothing more...
His face changed expression as he noticed something on the ground right beside the stone and crouched to get a closer look. There it was, calling out to him - or so he felt. It was a kind of tube made of a material similar to glass like the balls he used for his looking glass. Only it was of a much finer quality and the color was a bit different. He had seen that kind of tube before and knew the gods used them for a whole variety of things. Thor had told him never to touch them. They were only to be used by the Aseir. Tjalfe felt the temptation grow inside of him. He strongly wanted to grab the tube and try to fix the transport stone and he was wondering if this situation wasn´t special enough to be the exception from the rule. Maybe the gods would forgive him for it, if he picked it up? Just to have a look at it, of course. He struggled with himself for a while. Finally he gave in to the temptation and picked up the tube.
“Tjalfe! No!” Roeskva yelled loudly, but it was already too late. The tube began glowing in his hand and while Roeskva horrified stood by observing without being able to do anything about it, Tjalfe felt the excitement grow inside of him. Imagine standing there with a piece of Aseir technology in his hands? He turned the tube examining it from every angle. The glowing light inside of the tube moved back and forth in yellow and red colors. First slowly from one end to the other. From that end and back again. Back. Forth. Back. Forth. Back... Forth... Back and Forth. Back and Forth. Back, forth, back, forth, back, forth, back, forth. Faster and faster it moved and for every switch in direction of the movement the light glowed a bit brighter. After a while the light grew outside the tube embracing his hand and moving further out to cover his arm. At this point he was scared and threw the tube on the ground. But it was already too late. The glowing bubble continued to grow further and further out from its origin inside the tube. Roeskva grabbed his hand and pulled it. He following her willingly and they both stepped back a few steps.
The bubble of light grew and grew and reached over the top of the stone and - if it happened within a few seconds or if it was minutes, even hours, wasn´t at all clear to any of them, because they had both lost every sense of time they might have had - with a sudden change the bubble seemed to burst in an explosion of light, heat and fire... Tjalfe felt his body being blown backwards and he only just managed to grab Roeskva with both of his hands and holding her in a firm grip, before a mighty force pulled them violently backwards, away from the stone...
***