Linda Evans: Sleipnir

I admired Gary's heroic attitude; but it was going to get him killed, and then where would he be? Pact with Odin notwithstanding, sometimes Vernon had carried this Viking stuff a little too far. You did a whole lot more damage to the enemy if you shot twenty or so with a sniper than if you took out half a dozen in a suicide dash—and you generally didn't lose the sniper, either. Patton had had the right of it as far as I was concerned—make the other poor, dumb son-of-a-bitch die for his country.

"You know, Gary," I said as we headed for the railway station, "I figured out why there aren't any more Berserkers. They killed themselves off before they could reproduce. What was it Niven and Pournelle said? `Evolution in action'?"

He gave me an enigmatic look from under his eyebrows. "Never thought of it quite that way," he said quietly. "Maybe that's why Grandma asked me to quit Special Forces." His voice trailed off quietly and I winced; I hadn't meant to rake up bad memories. He'd once admitted—somewhat shamefacedly—that he couldn't say no to anything his grandmother asked, because he was all the old lady had left to live for.

Our train ride was short, and soon we were back at the little village near the missile site, headed into the surrounding forest. Within minutes, streets and houses were out of sight. It was hard to believe, sometimes, that you couldn't get farther than a couple of kilometers from civilization anywhere in Germany. The forests were so dark and forbidding, you could almost convince yourself you were living a thousand years in the past—then a group of school kids would come trooping by, waving and shouting and playing radios or something... .

"Uh, Gary?" I was careful to keep my voice low-pitched. That wasn't reverence for the forest; just ingrained caution and leftover paranoia. One couldn't always count on hedgehogs. I hadn't told Gary any details about my oath, and hadn't planned to—but the towering silence of the trees left me looking over my shoulder for... something. I didn't know quite what. Abruptly I wanted to share my thoughts.

"Yeah?" He glanced back.

"Anything strike you as, well, strange about that hedgehog the other night?"

Gary turned to look at me over his shoulder. "Like what?"

"Like why it didn't just roll up into a ball under the pine tree? It was close enough to me, it must've heard my heart beating, never mind smelled me, and you know how shy they are about people."

"You weren't moving, Randy."

"No, but..."

Gary glanced back again, one brow cocked quizzically.

"Okay, I'd barely taken that oath when out he strolls, maybe saving our collective bacon."

He stopped walking. "So you wonder if Odin heard you?"

I grimaced, falling silent again, and Gary nodded silently, as if to himself. We kept walking. It was stupid, and I was probably just as superstitious as Brunowski—who at least was honest enough to admit it—but I couldn't help wondering, at least a little. Kind of nifty to think of a genuine god answering my oath... but then again, maybe not. What might a god consider a "marker"? And what would a god do if he called it in and I couldn't pay?

Well-l-l, either way it couldn't hurt to just cover my bets—which was, after all, the reason I was out here, and not sleeping late. At least Gary hadn't laughed at me.

A few minutes later he found the spot we'd been looking for, an enormous oak tree that looked old and twisted enough to have seen the Germanic tribes sweep the Romans before them on their drive south. Well, maybe not that old—but it might have been old enough actually to have had sacrifices made to Odin in it. How long did an oak tree live?

Gooseflesh crawled along my back. I shook myself mentally and hastily removed the bayonet from its wrappings and steel sheath. I shucked off my heavy jacket and handed it to Gary, and shivered in the cold air as I rolled up my sleeve. Holding out my arm, I firmly took hold of the bayonet's grip and drew the edge of the blade lightly along the inside of my forearm.

I suppressed a gasp as the cold steel opened my skin. As blood dripped down my wrist and fingers to puddle on the frozen ground, I said, "May it please the one-eyed god, the Valfather who sits in Hlidskjalf, where he sees and understands all: this offering of a new-blooded steel blade is given in fulfillment of my own oath given in promise of blood."

I'd memorized the words in German, having looked up some of them to be sure. After I finished speaking them, I knelt at the base of the tree and drove the blade up to its grip into the hard ground. I rose then, and found Gary standing behind me. Weak winter sunlight turned his sandy hair to gold, while I shivered in shadows under the gnarled old tree. His eyes had a faraway look. I wondered what he was thinking. Or dreaming...

I wasn't sure why, but the moment reminded me of Hohenfels, when we'd been out one damp and shivery late autumn day, on a week-long field problem. Gary and I had been ordered to secure an observation post on one of the hills, so we dug in—and discovered it wasn't a hill at all. Under the moss and leaves and gnarled tree roots there were crumbled blocks of stone.

"Holy Mother of Odin," Gary had whispered into the silence. "It's a burial mound, RB."

"I didn't think they were found this far south."

"They aren't."

I don't know why we whispered; but we did.

The sun was so low and the mist so thick we nearly missed the hole broken into one side. Right outside that hole, almost as though someone had planted it there when those stones were still raw from the cut earth, stood the blackened skeleton of a huge oak tree. A stray breeze opened a rent in the mist and the dying sun bathed the mound in light the color of blood; a cold, bitter draft eddied from the hole.

"Jesus, what's that smell?"

Gary hadn't heard. He took three steps toward the gaping hole and stopped. Only the luminous dial on his watch, flashing in the gloom, reminded me this was the twentieth century.

"They used to perform sacrifices on trees like that," Gary murmured. "They'd take a warrior and strangle him and spear him in the heart while he choked to death. Then they'd hang him in an oak tree for Odin, who would send a valkyrie, or maybe his stallion, Sleipnir, to fetch the sacrifice to Valhalla."

Gary stared at the tree; then gazed off into the mist, where disturbing shapes loomed indistinctly and tricked the eyes. "You can almost see Sleipnir coming—"

"Shut up, will you?" I spoke louder than I'd intended. Gary started and swung to face me; then grinned. "Sorry. It gets to you sometimes, you know?"

I knew. But we had to sleep on the cursed mound.

For a moment he looked as sheepish as I felt; then we grabbed our shovels, and got busy with the army's observation post.

I'd forgotten all about that day; until now. Gary looked really eerie, with that golden light touching his face, and a stark shadow from the naked oak branch over my head cutting across him. I shivered without quite knowing why, and wondered if burying that knife had been such a good idea after all. Blood still dripped down my arm, warm and sticky.

"Gary, you got that lousy bandage?"

He blinked a couple of times; then walked over and bent to look. "Good cut, Randy. Not too deep. Yeah, it's right here." He pulled out the gauze and wrapped my arm securely, stemming the flow. I wiped my bloodstained fingers on an extra cloth I'd brought along and rolled my sleeve down and buttoned the cuff; then put my coat back on, feeling a little foolish.

Now that the ceremony was over and I'd fulfilled my half of the bargain, I found I couldn't get away from that tree fast enough, and led the way until we were out of sight of it. I slowed down, then, hands thrust deep in my pockets, and worked at ignoring the slight burning in my left arm. Gary walked beside me, uncharacteristically silent.