Eric Flint - Pyramid Power

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 Jormy?" 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 Thrud. Thrud 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: Jormungand'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 Jormungand 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."

Thrud 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 Thrud.

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.