by Exile
The gaol was easy to find by the empty stocks at the edge of the wide street. She tethered her raven mare, mounted the few steps to the front door, knocked, and entered. A skinny youth snored behind a wide counter, head back, mouth open, scuffed boots propped beside the remnants of supper.
Kelda cleared her throat. The youth snorted awake, his chair nearly upending as his boots swung to the floor.
“I’ve come to pay a reward,” she told him, reaching into the pocket of her new breeches – bought from a farmer when she took her midday meal and altered to fit by his pretty daughter while Kelda ate – to draw out a parchment square. She unfolded it on the counter, smoothing its creases flat to reveal Sigunna’s sketched portrait and the pile of coins depicted at the bottom.
The youth stifled a yawn, nodding. “Armsmith caught her, sent his boy to let us know. She went straight to his place like the messenger said she would. Had to kick out Drunk Rasmus to empty the cell. Never needed more’n one cell before. Not since I can remember.”
Kelda’s sack of coins landed on the counter with a solid clunk. “Was anyone hurt?”
The young man shook his head. “Smithy got the instructions and herbs. She’s been asleep since. Her horse is stabled out back. Or wait – is it her horse? She a horse thief?”
Kelda, recalling Sigunna galloping toward sunrise that morning with Kelda’s mare fleeing before her like a demon at the point of Odin’s bright gods-blade, shook her head. “No. Nothing like that.”
The boy hefted the bag of coins. He pulled the drawstring, snorting when he saw unstamped gold rather than dull pewter. He looked up, doubt in his face. “We don’t have to hang her, do we? Nobody’s ever had to do more’n spend a couple days in the stocks. Don’t know we’d want part of any hanging. Not around here.”
Kelda considered. Death in this realm would simply send Sigunna’s Hel-forged spirit back among Yggdrasil’s great spreading boughs, to be reborn somewhere out on the infinite cosmic tafl board Odin’s whim made of the Nine Realms. She closed her eyes, smelled again the sweet scent of Sigunna’s hair, tasted the honey of her skin. She thought of the dozens of minor realms through which the endless gods-game had carried them, the other bodies they’d pressed together, the countless nights they’d lain close, breathing the air of countless worlds.
She opened her eyes. “No,” she said. “Several days in the stocks should be fine, though be careful once she wakes. She’s a difficult woman to control.”
She untied two smaller coin bags from her belt and tossed them beside the first. “This should buy decent food and drink for her and her mount. Before I go, I’d like…” she glanced away. “I’d like to see her.”
Without comment, the boy stood. He lifted a lantern from one peg on the wall behind him, a huge iron ring with a lone key from another. Kelda followed him down a short corridor to a single door with simple open grillwork at its centre. Beyond, stripes of lanternglow fell across the back and shoulders of the figure on the cell’s single cot. Spilling onto the floor in thick ropes, Sigunna’s hair seemed to drink the lantern’s feeble rays.
Kelda untied a last sack of coin from her belt. “This one’s for you,” she told the boy. “I’ll only be a moment.”
In any number of towns in any number of realms on any number of worlds between Yggdrasil’s branches, she would’ve met with suspicion. But no misgiving flickered in this young man’s eyes. Tyrfingrby had long been under the protection of one of the most powerful objects in the Nine, and so the boy took the coin and handed Kelda the lantern and the hammered iron ring with its single key. Kelda read his expression as clearly as if she read his mortal thoughts: He thinks simply of the balcony women he can please with that gold, of the skald song he can buy with it, and perhaps of a pair of new boots with scarlet heels.
When the boy had gone Kelda set down the lantern and opened the door, not overly concerned about waking Sigunna; she’d sent enough sleep spice to knock her current body insensate for a full local day, and tomorrow Hela’s demon agent would wake in the village stocks. While Sigunna wore that mortal sheath she could no more overcome its frailties than could Kelda. Neither could violate the natural laws of this realm. Only the blades and the gods could do that.
Later – after Kelda returned Odin’s property to Asgaard, after she won his gods-game for him and was rewarded with her freedom – she’d seek Sigunna out. There’d be nothing to keep them apart then, no gods’ whims sending them beyond the Nine Realms to battle and outwit and deceive each other in the name of Odin, of Hela. Once Odin won his wager with Loki’s daughter, cosmic tafl-pieces Kelda and Sigunna could live side by side as equals, as companions. As friends.
She sat on the edge of the cot and reached to smooth back a tendril of Sigunna’s satin hair, tuck it behind the curve of her ear. She leaned close, warmth from the sleeping woman’s mortal body heating her leg even through the stiff new leather of her breeches. She breathed the honey scent of her opponent’s skin, and the faint cloying odour of the soporific she’d sent ahead to drug Sigunna rather than risking battle and death in this realm before gaining Odin’s blade and being forced to start over again out between the branches.
She pressed her lips to Sigunna’s sleeping mouth, then stood, then left, destined to play out the petty games of distant gods.
Sigunna had been an early riser in every mortal form she took; it surprised her to wake to the emerald glare of full day. Her tongue was raw, her throat parched. Her wrists and neck hurt as though sawed by the serrated edge of the gods-blade she sought.
She tried to turn her head, swearing as bonfires blazed inside her skull. She willed her eyes to open, to focus on the dusty red braids of the small figure staring up at her.
“The armsmith’s son,” she croaked.
The boy nodded. He lifted a hammered cup smelling only of metal and water to her lips. She drank, the water tasting of iron, but cool and clean. Strength flowed back into her muscles. Her vision cleared. The fog receded from her mind and she saw why she couldn’t move.
A fleeting, bitter rage filled her. Then she began to laugh, which turned to a cough in her parched throat. The boy poured her more water from the waterskin at his waist.
Sigunna drank until her head felt clearer, less pounding. It would be a long time before her pride recovered, though she couldn’t blame anyone but herself for that. Herself, and perhaps that cursed valkyrja. This had Kelda all over it like dog scent on a post. Odin’s creature could be sly when she set her mind to it.
“Smith’s child, do you know where they keep the key for these stocks?” she asked.
The boy looked over his shoulder at the busy street. People strolled past, arm in arm. Vendors sang the virtues of their wares, women called from balconies. Nobody showed much interest in the warrior in the stocks. A day in stocks was common punishment for unruly drunkenness; it wasn’t unusual to see an unconscious outlander mercenary carried into the gaol one day and appear, befuzzled and blurry-eyed, in the stocks the next. Peaceful Tyrfingrby was no great place for a warrior to earn coin, but it was a fine town for spending it.
The boy met her gaze. “Only one key for all locks at gaol. My da forged it. Keeps copy at smithy.” He fished in his pocket and pulled out the small blue carving of the eight-legged beast.
“Boy,” said Sigunna in the same tone she’d used with skittish mounts on a dozen worlds, “…boy, could you fetch me your father’s copy of the key? You’ll be helping a warrior with her life’s purpose, a purpose directed by the gods themselves.”
The boy slid the carving back into his pocket. He looked into her eyes again, and nodded.
Kelda and her mount ambled into the courtyard of Tyrfingr Hall as the greenish sun passed its zenith. Small flowers spilled from cracks in ancient stone walls. Lambs and puppies cavorted on wide lawns beyond the open portcullis as laundry lightly flapped on long lines strung between battlements. Skald song and laughter tinkled on breezes redolent with the scents of peace.
The angry
clatter of hooves behind her and the enraged cry cut through the air like a knife through soft cheese.
“Kelllldaaaa! You and your fat donkey! Stop!”
Kelda slid to the ground as Sigunna reigned sharply beside her. The dark-haired woman launched at the pale-haired one, sending them both sprawling on the ground.
Sigunna straddled Kelda and pummelled her with tight-closed fists. “You spawn of feeble gods!” she screamed. “Freyja’s golden turds! I should’ve split that smug valkyrja face of yours this morning and sent you hurtling back out between the Nine where you belong!”
Men and women glanced idly at the couple sprawled in the courtyard, tittered behind open hands, and turned away. Tyrfingr Hall was accustomed to lovers’ quarrels; such were among the realm’s most popular pastimes.
Kelda rolled from Sigunna’s fists, confident the blade in Tyrfingr Hall was Odin’s and not that forged by the cursed off-spring of Loki. Hel’s creature could try to kill her first, but Kelda need only be close enough for the bright blade to leap to her hand, recognizing her as Valhalla’s servant. She would then sheath Odin’s blade in her mortal heart and win by the rules of the game, as set by the gods.
But Sigunna could make trouble for Kelda. The two were perfectly matched in battle – the gods demanded an even playing field for themselves, if not for their servants – but if the power-thrum in Kelda’s blood turned out to be the call of Hela’s blade, and Hel’s demon got close enough…
A terrible weight descended on the valkyrja. A notion of herself wandering Yggdrasil’s branches for another hundred mortal lifetimes, another thousand. No peace, forever.
She leapt to her feet and sprinted past the wide open doors. The great hall was a long low room, full of well-worn feasting tables strung with garlands of fresh flowers. Rich tap-estries covered stone walls. Fresh rushes covered the floor. The hall smelled of roasted nuts and baking bread.
At the main table was a chair, slightly raised, heavily carved and covered in beaten gold, with cushions of red. And over the jarl’s great stone hearth were mounted two blades, one bright, one dark.
Kelda stumbled, fell to her knees. “Both blades in one place… Bright Odin, Leader of Souls, save me.” Was it possible the Raven God had heard her secret entreaties to his name? It was as if he had looked into her immortal spirit, read her valkyrja heart and granted his servant’s wish: that she and Sigunna both achieve the purposes for which they’d been fashioned, both win this cursed gods-game. Live ever after, in victory, in peace. Together.
A dark streak flew past. Kelda heaved to her feet and lunged to grasp Sigunna as she sped by, but her fingers only grazed the hem of the other woman’s tunic.
“Sigunna, wait! We’ll do it together, forge a draw! Sigunna!”
Lurching across the hall, toppling benches and banging tables, Kelda raced Hel’s demon to the blades. But as always when it came to Sigunna, she was too late, too late.
Sigunna reached for the dark blade’s hilt and her blood made it sing. Responding to power from the Halls of Hel, the blade leapt from its mounting. Iron hooks which had held it for a mortal century disintegrated into rust, crumbling away in a shower of red powder.
Dark power surged visibly through Sigunna as she poised the blade above her breast. Without thinking, Kelda reached for the bluestone pommel of the bright weapon. It jumped into her hand like a magnetized ingot. Fire coursed the rivers of her mortal body’s veins at its touch, burning so bright she thought she’d crisp to ash.
Kelda prepared her own thrust, intending to split her mortal heart and bathe Odin’s sword with her eternal spirit as she’d been made to do. But her hand froze, arms shaking, her plunge stilled by an invisible gods-tight grip reaching from across the Nine. Her mouth opened. A voice not hers boomed from her lips to echo like dry rolling thunder across the stones of the hall. “Banished Children of Loki! ”
Sigunna’s eyes turned the blue-black shade of Hela’s necrotic flesh. A hiss escaped her clenched lips: “Greetings from Hel, Bright Odin. . . ”
The kernel of Kelda locked inside her mortal sheath understood, then. There would be no peace. Not for her, not for Sigunna. Never for them. A tafl piece would never be more than a toy, and the Nine Realms was just the enormous gaming board of the gods, as it always had been, always would be.
Kelda’s arm rose against her will. In the instant before she struck, Kelda tried to etch in her mind every detail of the woman in front of her. Her mortal body had scarcely an eye-blink’s moment before Odin tugged the strings of his puppet, swinging her arm to obliterate Hel’s servant forever.
But Sigunna’s arm rose to meet the blow. When the weapons clashed, Yggdrasil’s branches shuddered and groaned. The ground trembled. The stones of the hall buckled and heaved.
The flash of rupturing suns exploded in Kelda’s arm. Blind, she felt Odin’s presence ebb from her limbs. “Sigunna!” she cried as the hall collapsed, and the world flickered out like a doused tallow candle.
Laughing, Chun Hua dropped to the grass and rolled down the hill, her small round child-body coming to rest against the base of a cherry tree. Near her cheek lay a slender cherry branch, no more than a long stick. Grasping it, she rolled to her feet. The stick had a pleasing thickness in her chubby little fist. A whack to the tree’s trunk provided a satisfying shower of pinkish petals.
Chun Hua peered closely at her new toy, studying a burl in the wood. The dark knot had a pleasing blueness, whorled into the bark’s natural white and brown and green.
Chun Hua spun on one slipper to slash the air, laughing. “I’m a great warrior!” she shouted at the tree. “And this is my mighty sword!”
“Really? Master Jin says you’re an embarrassment to the village.” Bai, also only six but a full head taller than her classmate, sat on the ground practising calligraphy in the dirt with a branch of black willow.
“I’m not a bebarrassment!” Chun Hua yelled.
Bai shrugged. Holding her sleeve from the dirt, she carefully etched characters in the earth with her branch: foolish.
Chun Hua recognized the word Master Jin made her wear on a scroll around her neck, punishment for laughing in class or dipping Bai’s looping black braids in ink. Roaring, she lunged at the other girl, cherry stick whirling. With a feral smile Bai leapt to her feet, black stylus raised to block the blow.
When cherry branch met willow, a clash rang out. Nearly inaudible to the ears of the small warriors, the sound resonated deep in the earth beneath them, vibrating through the nine branches of Yggdrasil and out into the infinite spaces of the thousand thousand worlds between.
AFTERWORD: THE CASUAL MAGIC OF PLAY
DEREK NEWMAN-STILLES
As adults, we tend to look back on our childhoods with a sense of loss (though this loss is not always a mourning of a childhood passed, but can be a reminder of a childhood that was perpetually marked by losses), a displacement from the magical collection of worlds we were able to inhabit. As adults, we pretend that we now only have one world to inhabit, one that we invest with as much mundanity as possible, but we still hold those realms of play within us, and sometimes those moments of nostalgia captured in a treasured object become portals to those worlds that we pretend are lost to us, that we are too mature for. Our toys and objects of play can propel us into those spaces where we had the potential to create our own worlds with ease, inventing new realms and vistas of imagination.
We invest objects with our memories, imbue them with the magic of those multiple adventures we have shared with them. Our toys have the capacity to operate like keys, opening new worlds of possibility, unlocking areas of the mindscape that can alter our reality, allow us to explore new potentials, new ways of looking at the world. In play, we learn and grow, and our toys are passengers on those journeys as well as signposts to new areas of adventure and exploration.
Yet, not all adults are invested with the idea of nostalgia. Not all of us look back on our history with a sense of loss and joy. For some, adulthood is an
escape from lives of control, from abuses of power and person. For those who have experienced abuse, nostalgia can be a complicated phenomenon, tinged with pain.
Playground of Lost Toys captures our nuanced relationship to play: fantasies of escape, ideas of childishness, creative potentials, pain, loss, and the power of play to change our circumstances. The tales within these pages are snapshots of moments of creative potential, imagination transformed into paper and ink but still holding all of the dream-like magic of overlapping lost worlds. These tales push boundaries, unwilling to be limited to simple tropes or singular interpretations. These authors PLAY with their toys, letting them signify loss, memory, escape, the haunting power of the past returned, moments overlooked in the moment that later become all-encompassing in their importance, things lost and things gained as we grow up.
Our toys can be our first and best friends, changing as we change. They are perpetually part of the notion of BECOMING, changeable objects that mirror youth in their ability to be imbued with potential and yet fluid, able to alter themselves. Toys can be mirrors where we can see ourselves anew as they change to mirror our thoughts, feelings, desires, anxieties, obsessions. They reflect who we are at a particular moment, and yet they also take on qualities for us as we change. We see new things in our toys as we age.
Our toys can be time-travel objects, propelling us back in our memories to the moments we played with them, reminding us of the different person we were when we played. Perhaps this is why the theme of lost toys works so well as a speculative fiction theme. Speculative fiction is a literature of possibilities, of questions, of changeability, never settling on one interpretation of “reality” but pushing us beyond the mundane to see nuances of a multifaceted world. Playground of Lost Toys invites us to spin the dice to open up new worlds, to play revolutionary chess against conquering aliens, explore the fear that parents have of the casual magic of their children, enter into a conversation with a modern day Merlin, look into the multi-faceted faces of a doll and its power to alter the world, take a ride on a toy train into old age, play games with an Artificial Intelligence that views humans as toys, be rescued from ghosts by a doll, be rescued from a space prison by a transforming train, or discover that a book of nursery rhymes can be a grimoire of spells with the power to change our world. These tales explore the possibilities of play to make social changes, to alter the way we think about and interact with the world. They explore the simple magic of play.