M. Lachlan: Lord of Slaughter

The man cleared a few rocks away and scratched something in the sand. A rune like an angular r. To Loys it seemed to sparkle with water, to shift like the rain on a hillside.

‘What does it mean?’

‘You don’t know, so that means you are safe. Stay where you are.’

‘And you?’

The woman stood almost next to the rune, gazing down into it.

‘I…’

Her body twitched and shook and she stepped forward to stand beside the god. Her head lolled to the side, her shoulders sagged and her feet went onto tiptoe as if she was being hanged with an invisible rope. The old man stood and extended his spear at arm’s length, prodding the woman in the back.

She spoke, her voice strangled: ‘There is still time. The giants will die and we will come here. There is still time. No! No! The god speaks through me; it is not me.’ The woman had her hands at her neck, as if to pull something away.

‘Time for what?’ asked Loys.

‘For life and for death.’ Her voice had gone down an octave. It was now that of an old man — deep, full of spite.

‘What life, what death?’

‘Her life, your death.’

‘My wife is gone.’

‘I am King Death. She is not gone unless I will it.’

‘Then do not will it.’

‘You have done me great harm.’

‘I sought only death.’

‘Do not pay to bring her from the well!’ It was the woman’s usual voice again, terribly hoarse and strangled.

‘What is the price?’

‘Die on the teeth of the wolf before he is free,’ the god spoke through her again. ‘He last ate when the world was young. We will retie him while he feeds on you.’ The woman twisted and fought with whatever encircled her neck.

‘Why not throw the woman to the wolf?’ said Loys. ‘She is a sorceress and has brought this thing on herself.’

‘She is part divine.’ The woman spoke, but Loys knew it was the twisted figure of the spear god who commanded her voice. ‘It is dishonourable to kill her in this place.’

‘Not me?’

‘You are a man and an intruder here. Yours is the necessary sacrifice. Yours is the death I require to work my magic.’

‘If I don’t do it then you will die.’

‘If that is what honour requires. We could have killed the wolf instead of binding him, but honour said no. We raised him and cannot stain the fields of Asgard with the blood of a guest. Better to die than be dishonoured. You come here bearing fire, as the prophecy foresaw; you have tried to free the wolf, as the prophecy foresaw. You are my enemy and I demand your death.’

The wolf lunged towards Loys but its jaws snapped short of him. It was still held by the threads binding its back legs.

‘I want more,’ said Loys.

‘What more?’

‘She must not be alone. Make sure she gets back to her father. All I believed in has been shaken today, and it grieves me to bargain with demons, but give her a protector; let her live and prosper.’

‘I will.’

‘Do you swear it?’

‘It is my oath.’

‘No! No!’ the woman screamed. Now she was flung to the ground by the invisible force. She crawled towards the snarling wolf, out of the reach of the god’s magic.

The wolf’s paws tore at its back legs in a frenzy, its voice like the scrape of a ship grounding. Loys realised the beast could not claw the final strands free. It snapped and twisted, writhing in frustration and agony.

‘Your oath?’

The god said nothing, just held out his hand. Loys was sure he was going to die so feared nothing. He stepped towards the god and put his hand in his.

It was as if he had taken a blow to the stomach, the feeling someone dozing in front of a fire gets as they suddenly snap back into consciousness from the edge of sleep. Images went flashing through Loys’ mind — a vast sky of stars, a high tree, a man hung upon it pierced by a spear, his eye a raw wound. Loys felt a weight to the air — air more like water, as if he had to struggle through it to move. Cold water, dark water, black water. He saw what the god had suffered, his thirst, his agony, but he saw more. He saw heroes who carried the god’s symbols, the raven or the triple knot, cast down and stabbed, he saw them crying out to the god for help, but women or ravens, or something between ravens and women, swept down on them, carrying them away. He knew they were the god’s servants and he knew the god’s names. Odin and Bolverkr — the evil-worker. Ginnarr — the deceiver. Grimnir — the masked one. Skollvaldr — ruler of treachery. He could not trust the oath.

He let go of the god’s hand. Back down the slope the weird horseman still battled the giants, but two huge bodies lay dead and the others were giving ground.

He took his little lamp and walked towards the wolf, where the god could not send his mind.

We are three. A voice spoke in Beatrice’s mind.

The wound in her side hurt badly. She tried to get up, to help Loys but her injury was too severe. She wept in frustration and pain.

The tattooed savage, Azemar’s double, stood chanting in the pool, holding someone beneath the water, the wolf-thing tore at Mauger’s flesh and the boy splashed in the water calling out, ‘Why here’s the answer; there are runes aplenty here.’

You are the only. The existing. The now. A voice in her head. Her own? No, a girl’s. A name came to her. Elai, and another name too. Skuld.

‘What was?’ Beatrice didn’t know where the words came from but she knew she spoke them.

I release it.

‘What will be?’ said Beatrice.

I do not fear it. This is the well, the well of wyrd. The well where destinies are spun. For some life, for others death.

‘Is that skein spun?’

You are spinning it.

‘Where is Loys?’

He will die for you. Long ago the magic was set, burning in the back of the minds of strange sisters in dark places like this, burning in your mind — this is how you will escape the god. Put your blood into the waters to see. It is your blood that lets you see.

Beatrice clasped to the wound in her side. Her hands were soaked with blood. She knew what to do. She dipped her right hand into the stream.

What have you given? She couldn’t tell who asked the question. It was almost as if she asked it of herself.

‘I have given my lover and my blood,’ she said.

Then see.

Beatrice saw the black hillside: she saw the battle between Bollason’s Vikings and the giants and the two gods, she saw Snake in the Eye dodging and ducking the swipes of the great hammer; she saw her sister Uthr, she with the burned face, lying fallen on the ground and Loys staring up at the great bulk of the snarling wolf, who tore and snapped at his bonds.

She understood it all — how the god had brushed her sister aside. The woman with the burned face was the past. But other women might prove more difficult for him to beat. The gods had had Beatrice in their grip, had cursed and doomed her, but no more. Here she was her own mistress. She did not think of the past, so many lives spent in agony. She did not think of the future — so many more lives to be tortured and denied. She thought of that instant and her love for Loys.

‘I would go to him.’

What would you give? It was her own voice in her head now but she knew it was the well speaking to her.

‘My life.’

More is required.

‘What more?’

Snake in the Eye, who had been splashing in the waters as if searching for a lost coin, suddenly looked up. ‘I can go to the wall,’ he said, ‘and what little flame is this? A baby! These waters seem to want it snuffed, for sure!’

‘No!’ said Beatrice. The blood on her hands streamed out from her fingers through the water of the well, threads of crimson spinning towards Snake in the Eye to ensnare him. The boy fell back into the water, at the same time reaching forward his hand as if to snuff out a candle. A great spasm shot through her belly. A warm flow spread over her legs and she doubled up.