Hugin cocked his head at the prisoner Sigurd. They had no reason to hold Sigurd now, but one might say that he was in protective custody. The dragons had all threatened to eat him on sight. Hugin poked his beak at him. "I thought Odin had sent you to fetch Brynhild?"
"I did," said Sigurd morosely. "I passed through the ring of fire on the mountaintop and woke the black-skinned Brynhild from her enchanted sleep."
"You did what?" said Lamont, scattering jelly beans.
"Bitar and Smitar will take you to this flame-walled place. They'll have to stay high up to keep off the fire, but I should be able to lower you safely," said Liz.
It was a measure of Lamont's state of mind that he did not even question the strength of Liz's homemade mountaineering equipment. Jerry thought the link and plate arrangement very frail.
"Getting you out without a winch is going to be a bit trickier, but if you get a bit of height . . ."
"I'll work it out," said Lamont. "Let's go."
So off they went, as the equipment for the attack on Asgard was loaded into Naglfar.
"Thor," said Marie.
"Thor?" said Brynhild.
"Thor?" said Sigfrida.
Marie wished like hell that they wouldn't repeat everything she said. But the blond bimbos from Asgard weren't exactly original thinkers.
"Yes. Thor. He's a better bet than some so-called hero. He needs people in that place of his. And he's a decent enough man. Or god, I suppose."
"Well, yes. Except when he's drinking," said Brynhild.
"He's given it up," said Marie, crossing her fingers behind her back. "So that's where we need to go." It also happened to be where her man and children were, but she didn't see any reason to get into that with the Valkyries. "Now we just need some way to put out a piece of the fire."
"The fire is magical," said Sigfrida. "It cannot be extinguished."
"But we could call our horses and go over the top," said Gudrun. "If you are sure Thor would have a place for us?"
"Honey, trust me on this. Thor will have a place for you because I will throw him out of there on his fat ass otherwise," said Marie. The Valkyries gawked at her.
"Call these horses of yours," she commanded. "Time's a-wasting and I haven't got much."
She adjusted her sword and then bent over and picked up a thorn. She wouldn't mind giving it back to the son of a bitch. She had a good idea of a great place to push it up, too.
Hel's troops had been crossing the pontoon bridge for three days now, and more were still coming. But Loki was not going to wait. He knew that he could not.
He walked beside the great wolf, and behind him followed the legions of the dead, the files of frost giants, and the huge mountain giants.
Thor's new chariot rumbled beside them as they moved across the thin snow of the Vrigid plain. As the walls of Asgard came in sight, the chunky boy beside Thor picked up a huge horn, with a silver chased mouthpiece. That Emmitt could play the trumpet—without much expertise, true—was something of a bonus.
Emmitt put the horn to lips and blew.
Emmitt blew his heart and soul into that horn, fully expecting a noise like a sick fart.
What came out the other end was the roaring of many trumpets, so loud he nearly dropped it. There was no way he could finger any notes, but somehow he was playing the "Battle Hymn of the Republic." And behind them the dead began to beat their shields like some vast heartbeat, loud and strong.
Thor raised his hammer and thunder spoke. It rolled across the plain, and echoed off the white walls. Loki and the great wolf stalked ever closer to Frey and Freyja, assembled with the Vanir on the plain.
Now the wolves howled and the great dog Garm gave tongue.
Ever closer.
No order to charge was given.
In the distance they could see the lines of fire, of Surt's minions pouring out of Myrkvid.
"If they're not all watching now . . . they never will be."
A flight of Valkyries turned above the battlefield.
"Let there be fire and smoke," said Loki.
And there was.
"Look," Jerry had said, pointing at the map that Liz had created with Thor, Thrúd, Sigyn and Loki. "This." He pointed to the river that ran through Asgard.
"It disappears around here. The bit where the fenlands are."
"Ah. The Gjalar. Yes, it disappears into the ground there."
"It comes out here," said Jörmungand pointing with her tongue. "To the north of the Vrigid plain. It is how I got into Asgard to drink with Thor. But it is no use to anyone but me. It is at least a league long and there is no air in most of it." She brightened. "I could go in and cause a distraction, if you like. The boys say I'm very distracting."
"Vain, more-like," said Fenrir.
Jerry tugged his goatee. Sigyn told brother and sister to hush. "The distraction," said Jerry, "will be on the Vrigid plain. Loki, I know you would like to conduct your battle with Odin in person, but the truth is, the Vanir will need you. They will need Frey's sword, and they will need Hel's host, to defeat Surt and the sons of Muspell. Otherwise fire will consume Asgard, Midgard and even Jötunheim. I am right, aren't I? You are the trickster, but also Logi, the fire-god, both the friend and foe of mankind. You can warm, or destroy. Your nature is mercurial, just like fire itself. Fire always has a place in every pantheon, just as the trickster does. I just hadn't thought it through."
Loki nodded. "And Sigyn is the hearth-goddess. She who shapes fire into something to warm and nurture."
"I should have guessed that earlier," said Jerry. "Frey is a fertility god. The maker of green things, which is why he and he alone is effective against Surt, because Surt is fire uncontained."
Loki nodded. "Surt is fire the destroyer. That is his power. Frey can stand against him, but not without huge hurt. The others are powerless."
"But you can deal with Surt. Njörd said as much."
Loki nodded.
"And just who can deal with Odin?"
Loki shrugged. "Me. Or Fenrir." He looked at the great wolf and said, apologetically, "Fenrir fully grown, that is."
"And Jörmungand? If I recall correctly she was supposed to be Thor's adversary, not his drinking buddy. Norse myth was always very balanced. This against that."
"Possibly Jörmungand. Thor would prevail against Odin," said Loki.
"If Odin didn't out-think me," said Thor.
"To keep it simple, I want a feint—a noisy feint—on the battlefield. And then I want you, Loki, to attack and deal with Surt. Do you think the Vanir will honor their bargain?"
Loki nodded. "The Vanir are old enemies of Surt and the sons of Muspell. When Odin allied with them, he lost much of the support and loyalty of the Vanir. Odin has let his vanity about his power as chief of the Æsir go to his head." He smiled wryly. "It always did. So: we deal with Surt. And Odin attacks us in the rear."
Jerry shook his head. "He'll have his own problems. What if the wall is breached?"
Loki raised his eyebrow. "If that were possible, the giants would have attacked and destroyed Asgard these ages past."
"But if it were possible?"
"He'd have to hold the breach, of course. Odin is as cunning as a snake. He'd assume we'd made the breach to charge through."
"That's what I thought," said Jerry. "I talked to Lamont about this, and it is basically his idea. I'm going to let him explain."
Lamont stood up. "Water weighs. It's heavy stuff. The fenland down there," he pointed, "is the lowest land in Asgard. It's a pretty narrow valley, and the river is a mighty big one since it drains all of Asgard. We estimate one hundred thousand gallons a second. If we were able to stop it flowing through its underground channel, even for an hour or two, it will build up against that wall."
Loki laughed. "The wall is magically proof against the frost and mountain giants—as well as just being high and large. But it is not proof against water. I like it. The softest will bring down the hardest." He looked at Thor. "And maybe we can even organize a bit of extra rain."
"I suppose so," said Thor. "Though it feels wrong to bring down Asgard's wall. Anyway, how would you block the river?"
"With a cork," said Lamont.
"By magic," said Jerry, more cooperatively. "We tried it out on a stream. But we'll have to get there first, and we'll have to hope it works as fast and well as we think it will."
"And how will you get there?" asked Loki skeptically. "Even with Freyja's falcon-cloak, out-flying the arrows of Ull's archers is not likely. You could go by night, but my informants tell me that great fires burn on the walls."
"Thanks to our traitors, they will be looking for an attack from above—but not from below."
Loki shook his head. "Tunneling is not an option, and there are no cave-paths that go under the walls."
"The river does. And Jörmungand swims it."
"There is a difference between her swimming it and you swimming it," said Thor. "Just a little, of course," he said, looking warily at Liz. It was funny how she had that effect on people.
"We've built a craft, what we would call a submarine, which, with a little magic, will carry us and our paraphernalia underwater. We can take several people, and Jörmungand can tow it. And we've used the principals of Ran's net to make a magical net that can hold anything. Even Loki."
Loki looked startled and then laughed again. "I was too smart for my own good."
"More than once," said Sigyn.
That had been a week ago. And then, on the morning they were due to leave, had come the news of Sigurd having woken Marie the day before. Jerry had unhesitatingly modified his plans, but he felt the absence of Lamont in the enclosed space of the "submarine" very keenly.
Still, it was his project. He would have to go through with it, even on his own.
The dragons flew in tandem high over the ring of flames. The enclosed area was about two acres in extent. The dragons might be able to set down, but the convection from the fire-wall made it difficult. Even fifty meters up, the dragons were struggling not to rise. Liz checked the homemade harness and the link and plate belay device she'd organized for belaying Lamont down. Really, the sensible thing would have been for her to rappel in, but it was his wife.
He wasn't showing any of the normal signs of nerves a person ought to before this sort of thing. Just barely concealed impatience. The rope was the best she'd been able to find, hawser-laid, made of sort of some fiber—probably flax—and not too even in diameter. Not exactly a perlon braided rope, but they'd practiced on the cliff top and it didn't jam up in the belay plate, even if it did twist terribly.
"Okay," said Liz. "Take a hold on the rope and go. When you're down, untie the link. We can't keep position. We'll have to drop a rope in for you two. You've got the spare harness?"
Lamont nodded and, giving her a thumbs up, walked off the side of the dragon.
The hall inside the wall of flames was large, Lamont realized, as Liz lowered him jerkily toward it. He managed to avoid getting impaled on the sharp end of the gable. And then he was down, fingers clumsy with haste, trying to untie, yelling for Marie.
He was met with silence.
He pushed hastily in through the half open doors. It was just one big room with nothing but row upon row of empty biers.
He went back outside and set about the tricky task of getting up onto the roof, waving to Liz and the dragons. On the third try he managed to grab the rope without falling off the roof. Liz took up the slack and the dragon-lift hauled him off his feet.
Then, with horror, Lamont realized the hole in their plan. A dragon wasn't a helicopter or a fixed platform. It was a biological balloon full of biogas and hydrogen, and his extra weight brought Bitar lower. As the dragon turned to regain height, Lamont swung perilously close to the twelve-foot-high flames, like a pendulum. Just as he though he was going to be crisped, he jerked higher, and passed just above the flames. He dropped again, suddenly enough to make him scream. But his fall was arrested a few feet above the ground, and then he was lowered down. He hit the ground running. The dragons circled in and landed a safe distance from the flame-wall. Lamont was limping over when Liz bailed and ran to see if he was all right.
"She's not there!" he panted.
Liz was actually relieved. She'd been half convinced that Lamont's Marie must be dead in that building when he came out alone. "Are you all right?"
"Other than nearly being cremated, fine. My hair was pretty frizzy anyway," said Lamont with a touch of his familiar dry humor. But his pressing concern did not leave him for long. "But where is Marie? There must have been hundreds of them in there. Now they've all gone."
Liz looked at the fire-wall. "Somehow they must have got over the fire. Funny-face did it on a horse, so it is possible. Let's look for tracks."
They did, but the only tracks they could find were those of a single horse, presumably that of Sigurd. And it was a steep little mountain-hill, too, with not many places a horse could walk without leaving a trail.
"It's as if they grew wings," said Liz. "Do these Valkyrie have wings under their mailshirts?"
Lamont pursed his lips. "I've seen a picture of two Valkyrie 'choosing the slain' in a book somewhere. I think they had winged horses." He sighed. "And tracks in the air are few and far between."
"Well, where would you have gone if you managed to get out here?" asked Liz. Lamont was too distraught for clear thinking. "Back to where you left us, I would think. So let's go back to the dragons and mount up. We're on our way to Asgard."
"There is a war happening there," he said despondently.
They'd reached the dragons by then. "Can we go to look for Jörmy?" asked Bitar in a mournful tone. "I worry about her."
Smitar sniffed. "Me too."
Having persuaded Sigfrida that allowing Marie to sit behind her would really be a better way to fly than hanging her over the saddlebow like a corpse, Marie was now wondering if she'd made a mistake. At least lying over the saddle she'd feel it was okay to be sick. And maybe because horses were really not designed to fly, the motion could even make a corpse queasy. But they were free and, hopefully, she was heading back to her children and her husband.
The horse was complaining. Understanding the tongues of all the animals was not always pleasant or very useful.
When they got closer to white walls of Asgard, she realized that finding her family might not be that simple. There was a huge army on the plains. The snowy landscape was black with men, and even from here she could hear the noise. The walls of Asgard were prickled with spear-points.
"What's happening?" she asked Sigfrida.
"Ragnarok. We are too late, I think. The end has come."
"Ragnarok?"
"The great and final war. Where do we go now?"
"Thor's place, I think." Where else could they go?
The current tugged at the "submarine," flinging it and the occupants around. Jerry knew the first submarine to ever make an attack on another ship—the Turtle—had been little more than a converted hogshead. Knowing that and being in one were two completely different things. It was bad enough to be suddenly thinking of issues such as pressure and how long the air would last, without landing on top of Thrúd. Thrúd dressed for war, to boot—which meant spiky armor.
Jerry suddenly realized he was outnumbered by women in this craft and they appeared to be keeping their calm better than he was. Sigyn had yet to say a word. They bumped against the walls and Jerry wondered if the timbers of the barrel would hold. After what seemed like an eternity, Jerry felt the wood scrape on gravel. And then a blessed sound: Jörmungand's sibilant voice. "Do you want me to tear it open?"
"Please."
A minute later they were out, blinking, standing on the beach next to the maw into which the river Gjalar poured. Jerry realized he'd misinterpreted Sigyn's silence. She was crying.
"What's wrong, Sigi? Are you hurt?" asked Jörmungand anxiously. Sigyn might be the serpent-dragon's stepmother but the stepchildren were genuinely fond of her.
"I wonder if I haven't been stupid," said Sigyn. "I have sent Loki off to war on his own, and I am parted from him for the first time in hundreds of years, for my revenge." She took a deep breath. "I suppose it is too late to just let it all go."
Thrúd shrugged. "You know my grandfather. Odin would never have left it alone, because he never would have believed you could."
"True. Come, then, master magician. Loki believes you will bring down the wall, although he does not believe we'll catch Odin."
"He doesn't?" asked Thrúd.
Sigyn shook her head. "He would never have left us to come alone if he did. He is far too clever at protecting those he loves. That was why he and Thor made no objection to us coming with Jerry. They believe that behind the wall of Asgard we will be in the safest possible position. The war out there will be bitter."
Jerry blinked. It had seemed that Loki was easily persuaded to let them come along, now that he thought about it.
"Uncle Fox!" said Thrúd.
Sigyn nodded. "Yes, dear. He's like that. It is an aspect of caring, I suppose. I'll bet he told Jörmungand to take care of us. Probably to take us somewhere safe."
"Hurry up, Jerry," said Thrúd. "Draw those runes and let's go and prove my father and uncle wrong."
Jerry clambered around the cave-mouth, making the symbol for ice, the symbol for sea—drawn in salt, because salty ice is much colder—and, of course, Ansuz, nine times.
Why did they have such a fixation on nine?
He then got out his funnel-shaped piece of paraphernalia, already suitably inscribed with runes, and took the stopper-piece of ice from the insulated bag. The problem, as Lamont had seen it, was that ice floated. It had to be a very rough edged hole for it to jam well enough to stay there.
It was apparent that Jörmungand had her own ideas too. As Jerry finished his chant, and dropped the ice-plug, she swung her tail at the rocky bluff, and tumbled a thirty-ton lump of rock into the churning water.
Ice formed around the rim of the hole, and then Jörmungand's rock tumbled into the hole so hard that the ground shook. Ice grew around it.
"Run," said Thrúd, sensibly grabbing Jerry's arm and hauling him back from the edge of the river.
As it was he got his boots wet. But millions of gallons of water were already starting to back up.
"Time to go Odin hunting," said Jerry.
Frey rode forward in his chariot, drawn by his golden-bristled boars. Thor looked down on him, rather disdainfully, from the Æsir-SUV.
Frey swallowed. "Some wheels, Öku-Thor."
It was a fair comment. The wheels were large, to cope with stones, and they had spokes—weighing less than a quarter of what Thor's old solid wheels had weighed—and they had metal rims. They had leaf-springs too, and independent axles. "And with me driving it does no gallons per mile, now that I've stopped drinking. My artificer says that's better than any vehicle in America."
"Where is America?" asked Frey.
"Don't know. A place they drink a lot, but make great chariots."
"And the dog with the nodding head on the back of the chariot?"
Thor threw out his palms. "It's one of the magical mysteries, like the go-faster stripes and the sides of the wheel being painted white. But Garm says that he likes to travel by chariot. Loki asked me to give you your sword back."
He handed the weapon over. "Now, do we attack Surt?"
Frey nodded. "I never really believed it, when Ratatosk brought us word. But my father trusts him."
Loki came trotting out of the smoke. "Frey, I want you to take the east flank. Öku-Thor will take the west. And I am going to meet them in the middle. That's where they'll least expect me. And brace yourselves. We're going to be fighting in the rain."
"Rain?"
"Our Thor is a thunder-god. He can do rain if he wants to. He's drawing it now from the west. It would be better from the north, but it's too cold up there."
Loki turned to Emmitt. "Give Frey the slow count to thirty and sound the advance."
"I don't know how to play that," said Emmitt uncertainly.
Loki grinned. "The horn does. And you're a better player than Gold-teeth."
Frey turned his boar-drawn chariot. Thor looked at the mess on the thin snow. "He needs better emission control on that thing."
Among the Vanir, horns sounded. And then Emmitt raised Gjallarhorn and blew.
Even the smoke seemed to shiver.
Öku-Thor urged Tanngnjóst and Tanngrisnir into a trot and then into a gallop. Emmitt saw how he drew his hammer and gripped it in one metal-gauntleted hand while he handled the chariot with the other. All of a sudden, he didn't look at all like a fat recovering alcoholic. He looked like . . .
Well. Thor. The Thor. He was really pretty scary.
Lightning cracked and the thunder roared and echoed. Ahead, like a huge red wall, were the fire giants out of Muspellheim. Their swords flamed.
And hissed and spluttered a lot, as the rain suddenly came in from behind them.
"Hold tight and keep blowing!" bellowed Thor.
Emmitt would remember the next half an hour vividly for the rest of his life. Partly he would remember it as total confusion, and thunder, and blowing the great horn, but mostly for the vivid little snatches of Thor, radiating lightning, and smashing giant heads like watermelons. There were a lot of giant heads, but without their fire they were fairly feeble swordsmen.
Still, there seemed an endless supply of them. And even through the rain Emmitt caught glimpses of occasional fires. Something was still burning.
Burning hot.