Day of the Giants

by Lester Del Rey

  He doused them into the tank and out again, rumbling what was probably meant for a laugh, then seized Loki and treated him the same. They came out surprisingly clean, and almost instantly dry.

  “How’d you reach us?” Leif asked.

  Lee grinned. “We were already following Sudri’s story when Vidarr came up with a big tale about giants from Muspellheim. Everybody went off there, but I persuaded Thor that there was a lot better reason to trust the dwarf.”

  They went out into the courtyard then, where Thor’s two goats were waiting, each slightly larger than a Holstein bull. Thor climbed to the front of the vehicle to which they were hitched, looked back to see all were accounted for, and yelled. They were off at full speed, with Hoof-Tosser trotting along at their side. Loki and Lee stood beside Thor, looking forward, and Leif and Fulla were alone at the rear. But he was too tired to do more thank hold her close quietly, and she seemed content to fit his mood. It was over an hour later when Thor’s bellow rang out, and they began crossing through Bifrost, to pelt over the sward toward the judgment tree.

  Thor’s yell sounded again, and the gods scattered to let him through. Leif grabbed the reins of Hoof-Tosser and vaulted into the saddle, unfinished business bringing new strength to his body. He stared through the crowd, noticing that Odin and several others were missing, but his eyes searched for Vali and Vidarr.

  Then he spotted them, off at the side, between Odin’s seat and a small pile of grenades that Odin was keeping for his personal testing. Their faces were incredulous, but hardening into sudden decision as they turned toward the grenades. Leif reached for the gun, to find it twisted in his pocket.

  Thor shouted, and the hammer cut the air with a scream that left a wake of steam behind it, lifting Vidarr from his feet and literally splashing him against the tree. But Vali had reached the grenades and scooped one up before Leif’s gun was fully out, or Thor’s hammer could return.

  Vali was confident now, his rat-face smirking. “Safe conduct, Thor, on your honor, or the lovely Fulla and the apples will be supping with Balder! You’ve won now, but…”

  The gun in Leif’s hand spoke sharply, and Vali’s face blanched as the grenade fell from the pierced right hand. Thor’s hammer came up, but Leif was remembering Andvari and his promise, as well as the danger to Fulla. “Mine, Thor!”

  Thor nodded. “Yours, Leif Svensen!”

  Hoof-Tosser was already in the air, overtaking the running Vali. Leif brought the horse down, kicked as carefully as he could at the treacherous god’s head, and was off, gathering the thin figure up and lifting it in front of him, just ahead of the saddle. Fortunately, the blow had only stunned Vali briefly. His eyes were opening as Hoof-Tosser began lifting up into Bifrost at Leif’s shout.

  Hoof-Tosser screamed, but this time it was more in protest than to break the veil through the bridge. Leif ordered again, and the horse seemed hunch himself.

  Then all hell was tearing at Leif’s mind, and even the horse seemed to feel the same. Vali screamed and began to struggle, to cease in a paralysis of fright and horror in the ripples of dark color that began to die down. Leif closed his eyes, but the hell still poured over him. He held back his vocal chords, savagely fighting to keep them from ordering Hoof-Tosser back, and summoned the last desperate effort of his will. Hoof-Tosser was making a sound no horse should make, bnut he was still moving ahead. There was apparently little gravity here as Leif lifted Vali over his head and tossed the former god forward and into the thick of his new surroundings.

  Then Leif found he could no longer speak to order Hoof-Tosser back; but the horse had had enough, and suddenly reversed of his own will.

  Niflheim’s cold fingers released reluctantly, but Leif’s eyes were frozen shut, and his mind teetered and gibbered at him, even when the voices of the gods were around him again. He felt hands reaching for him but he was already passing out.

  Fulla was cradling him, and there was the taste of apple and something bitter and strange on his tongue when his mind began creeping back. His brain had mercifully refused to remember anything clearly; somewhere, there would always be a section of scarred memory from the few minutes, but its very horror had burned all connections to his consciousness. He grinned feebly at Fulla and looked up to see Odin on the seat, finishing some remark to Frigg. The eyes of Odin’s wife were frozen lightning as they stayed fixed on Leif.

  The Alfadur looked older and more beaten than usual, but he was holding the hell of the treachery of two sons to himself, and Leif was surprised to see no anger in the god’s eye. Odin watched Leif rise and nodded wearily. “I have removed the burn of Niflheim, Son of Sven, in small gratitude for saving me the need of meting out such justice as one of those I called son might merit. Henceforth, by virtue of all that has happened on this day, be known as Leif Odinsson!”

  There were incredulous sounds from the other gods, and Frigg screamed, her hands contracting to claws as she turned to Odin. Leif shook his head and looked to Loki for explanation.

  Loki’s expression was both puzzled and more sardonic than usual. “That makes you an official god, Leif, adopted by Odin himself. But don’t get any ideas—Odin probably did it to spite Frigg for siding with Vidarr and Vali so long. And there are catches to it—it doesn’t mean you are any freer. You’re bound now to win Ragnarok more than ever, or you’ll join Vali as a traitor. And it usually takes several thousand years before you begin to develop whatever powers you may grow beyond that which you already have, so you’re still a god in name only!”

  Put that way, it was easier to believe. Leif liked Thor’s honor better than this empty one. But Odin had finally quieted Frigg and was speaking again.

  “And lest Loki make you think this is a mockery, though it is the only honor we have to give, all former oaths apply. Should we win Ragnarok, the boon of which I swore is still yours to ask. With that, and your place as my son, you can gain powers beyond most others.”

  He shook his head slowly, stepping down from his head and approached Leif. The arm the god laid on Leif’s shoulder was a tired one, and Leif felt a stirring of sympathy that deepened as Odin went on in a low voice. “But to the son who replaces two unnatural ones, I admit victory seems most unlikely. The giants now know of our new powers, and the Gaping Wolf already seems to course beside the dog Garm, while my eyes saw the hordes of Surtr assembling in Muspellheim. We have won back a weapon worth ten thousand einherjar, since the sword of Freyr must be with us at the final battle. But without Vidarr, who shall kill the Wolf when I have been swallowed? Thor, Leif! I grow weary. Lend me your strength as I go to Mimir’s well to read what shall come of the future now.”

  Leif Svensen shook his head slowly, conscious of the ever-amazing surprises of this paradoxical world. He looked at the icy, venomous face of Frigg, and back to the god who’d given one eye to learn only that he must rule with the certainty of eventual defeat—and to whom being swallowed was a lesser evil among the dire things to come. Suddenly Leif has enough of it.

  “Father Odin,” he asked, “as Leif Odinsson, do I have a voice in council?”

  Odin nodded gravely. “Even as Thor.”

  Leif’s eyes swept over the crowd. Heimdallr was busy polishing a part of his golden armor; Freyr was fingering his newly restored sword with open delight; Fulla’s face was beaming, and Lee had his hands clasped together over his head in a vote of triumph; even Thor seemed to be looking on with a brotherly acceptance. Then Leif turned to Frigg again, and all the life seemed to go out of the company, leaving it in his mind as a picture of open and obvious hopelessness.

  “Then I demand to be heard,” Leif said.

  The Alfadur shrugged and stepped back to his seat. “Speak then, Leif.”

  Leif felt like a fool a the attention focused on him; well, he’d never enjoyed making speeches, though he’d made enough at farmer’s meetings. Loki could have made a better one, but Leif could at least tell them what he thought.

  “My ancestors had a lousy religion once,�
�� he began abruptly. “It was the gloomiest, most futile one ever created. For every major god, they had something evil to kill him—and the better the god, the worse his fate. To make it neater, they had those gods knowing what was to happen. But that was all right—those ancestors of mine were only rude barbarians. They could have a serpent to kill Thor, Surtr to kill Freyr, Garm to kill Tyr, the Wolf against Odin, and a general burning of the universe by Surtr after evil had won.

  “But then I was brought here to find that they got those notions from you—after you’d had thousands of years to live and learn better! You’re still swallowing the same hogwash today—even when you have already seen half of the predictions turn out to be a pack of has-been lies. You still think that the Norns—who couldn’t even predict the sleep—are infallible. They were right about so-and-so, weren’t they? The idea that you made it come true by believing every word they put out never entered your heads.

  “Or take Frigg. Once, in trying to show off how well she could protect her mama’s boy, Balder, she got him killed. So now she sits here, staring at the sun and hating every man, doing nothing to help anyone but herself. But she gets away with it because she told you she knows all the future—though she can’t tell it to you. That’s the line little kids tell when they haven’t studied their lessons: ‘I know but I won’t tell!’ The truth is, she couldn’t even tell you how Thor will avoid death from the Serpent’s venom!”

  Odin was looking at his wife now with a speculative doubt in his eye, and there was iron firmness in his voice. “Speak, Frigg!”

  She snarled at Leif. “No one can tell that, since Thor dies by the venom. Tradition and my foreknowledge say it!”

  “And both are liars,” Leif told her flatly. “The dwarfs have made a plastic sheet that even hydrofluoric acid can’t touch. In an inner suit of that, Thor can swim in the venom and laugh at you—as he will live through it. And what of all that bunk about Vali and Vidarr living beyond the Ragnarok to found a new world? Am I greater than your whole world, that I can upset your fixed future?”

  Some of the gods muttered at that, but Leif went on, noticing it only out of a corner of his mind. “When I was brought here, I may have been a coward, as I was accused. But I wouldn’t have sat around a witches’ cauldron with a bunch of old women, being scared to death by fairy tales. I’m one of you now, and it’s my future, by your own choice. So—do you really want to win this war? Because you can.”

  Odin had been saying something to Frigg, and the god waited until she stepped down with blanched face and unbelieving eyes and began moving woodenly off. Then he turned back to Leif. “How?”

  “Forget your traditions—stop waiting for the giants to bring the war to you. Use the courage all of you have individually, and take the weapons I have made against the giants, before they can organize. Wipe out their leaders while their traditions keep them helpless!”

  Thor’s bellow seconded it; it was a minor miracle that he should have been first to agree to breaking tradition, and for a moment, Leif dared to hope. Loki and Freyr joined. Odin nodded slowly. “I say this is a weighty thing, Leif, too great for one along to decide. Those who would join in Leif’s plan, stand to my right. Those who would await the Gjarrar-Horn, choose my left.”

  Leif stared incredulously. Beside him, to the right of the throne, stepped Loki, Freyr, Fulla, Thor and Ullr. But the rest—even Heimdallr—stuck to tradition and moved to the left with the others.

  They were to wait like sitting ducks for the giants to choose the time and make the attack.

  Chapter XV

  Leif shrugged, letting the hot spirit that had prompted the appeal die out, and went back to stand before Odin’s seat. “All right, the, I suppose Thor and I might as well help you to Mimir’s well. It’s as good as anything else we can do.”

  Odin smiled faintly and shook his head, motioning Leif back. “My son, traditions here are things beyond reason. Yours, too, from what I have seen—though you count them as logic and ours as things to be put aside. For that logic of yours, and the thoughts you have given me, I like you—as I’ve liked Loki in spite of all the traditions against him. Well, the others have won, but my mind still spins. Let Mimir’s well go. I have enough for thought already. The giants are warned now, and will strike too soon. Fulla needs you more than I—go to your bride and the work that is needed.”

  He turned and moved away, leaving Leif blinking, while Loki chuckled in the background. Fulla was moving slowly toward the buildings, her eyes to the ground, as Leif caught up with her. She refused to meet his eyes.

  “Well?” he asked at last.

  “The Alfadur had no business…Perhaps I said things while you were burned from Niflheim, but…Maybe I even said I needed you.” She shook off his hand as he caught her arm. “But Leif, I know your heart isn’t with Asgard. I know you mean to use Odin’s boon to return to your Earth. And since you have eaten of the apples for only a short time, and are hardly bound to your godhood, you can return, though it may be hard at first. I thought there was still a little time until then—until the Ragnarok; we have waited so long that it seems sometimes it can never come. I should have known that the Time is near, and that your words were only to soothe me while the giants had us.”

  He managed to pull her to him finally. “The words were what I felt in my heart, you precious little fool,” he told her gravely. “You were the one who fought against me—and I was coming for you when the giant stole you. As for going back—if I can, I’ll still want you with me—if you can give up all this to be just a simple farmer’s wife. You’d have to pretend to be just a woman—not a goddess, of course.”

  “It wouldn’t be pretense. My powers would face there, and I would be only a woman. Odin, his true sons, and Loki are the only ones who can move freely without loss between the worlds.”

  “Oh.” His hands began to drop from her shoulders.

  She pressed them back. “Do you think that matters to me? Have I ever used any powers, other than when I revived you and the twining occurred? I’d go with you if I turned into a giantess! But it would never do. I’ve eaten the apples too long, and without them I’d grow old on Earth and die as a hideous hag. And you’d still be in your prime.”

  “We could take our share of the apples and keep them in the deep freeze…”

  “A few apples last all Asgard a thousand of your years, Leif…There are never more than a few. But on Earth, all of them would be less than enough for one of us for a single decade! If we could take even one…”

  She threw off the mood and drew his head down to her. “But we still have a few weeks before Ragnarok, Leif.”

  He looked down at her, comparing her to the girls he’d known, and even the dreams he’d had when he was very young and naïve. He could see the smirks on the faces of Gefjun and the other goddesses, and he knew he should refuse for her sake. Instead, he smiled at her. “A few weeks can be a long time, my beloved.”

  It made her happy, apparently, as he had meant. But he knew that they would be short weeks—weeks driven and harried away from them by the rush to be ready for Ragnarok. The gods were hopelessly out-numbered, the einherjar almost useless. The giants would have all the advantage of knowing the time, and the Aesir would probably be defeated in advance by their own sense of inevitable defeat. There would be little time for love in desperate days of trying to find ways to cancel out all the factors.

  If the miracle of victory for the gods occurred, Leif had practically an eternity of life in a tradition-bound world where there was nothing to do but turn Earth into a vassal peasant world, subject to the whims of the gods. If they lost, Leif wouldn’t have much knowledge of it, but the giants would wrack and race Earth with fire and destruction.

  It was just a question of time before one of the two alternatives must be thrown at him. He wondered idly how much time and then dismissed the thoughts to clasp Fulla tighter.

  Then one morning a month later, when Leif and Fulla were together, something that sou
nded like all the klaxons invented went wailing and keening through the air. Fulla paled, terror running into her eyes. “Heimdallr blows the Gjallar-Horn! The giants are at Vigridr!”

  Leif considered the fact that Ragnarok had begun. Now, as Leif Svensen, his duty was in the shops, to wait for the results. But as Leif Odinsson, his place was to the fore-oh. He began buckling on his armor, with Fulla’s help. Finished, he blinked as she came out with a suit of mail, motioning for him to help her into it.

  She met his eyes firmly. “I’m fighting. Do you think I care what happens if you don’t come back to me, Leif?”

  He knew he should protest, according to Earth traditions, but he felt no desire to do so. If she wanted to be in the battle, that was right for her. He helped her quietly, and went out through the workshop entrance, where the worried dwarfs tried to yell encouragement after him. The work there was done, as best I could be. Leif moved toward the stables, seeing no other god near them, still trying to realize the day of doom had struck. But the fear he expected refused to come. He was only conscious of a vague relief that the waiting was over.

  Lee caught up to him, swung around for a better look, and grinned. “You’ve got it, son. All of it. I always knew you’d make a better hero than I do, and by Ymir, I was right. You’ll be around after this is over—nothing can kill a man when he’s got as much of it as you do.”

  “I’m not scared, if that’s what you mean, Lee. But I’m still not one of your fighting men. I’m not looking forward to this for the thrill of it, or laughing about it.”

  “No—no, of course not.” Lee frowned in thought. “You don’t have to, I guess. You can go in cold and deadly and serious, like Thor or Tyr. Look, my godly twin, d’you know what would happen if Loki or I quit pretending it was all just a joke or a thrill? We’d funk out! We don’t dare take it seriously. It has to be a game to us. Damn it, if I don’t get off this soap box, I will funk out! Wish me luck!”