Kevin Hearne - Hammered

Four cursing Valkyries landed and dismounted, spreading themselves to surround me, swords drawn and shields raised. One of them pointed at my naughty bits and laughed.

“Hey, you know what?” I said. “It’s damn cold out here. And those wings on your helmet look fucking stupid.”

Leif, I saw, was beset by three more of them, having ripped out the throat of the fourth. He was probably in better shape than I; both his arms still worked. As my adversaries gathered themselves to charge me, I shouted in Russian, “Perun! Help now!” and prayed to Brighid that he heard me.

The Russian thunder god could not have revealed himself earlier and allowed the Valkyries to lay a death curse on him. I wasn’t sure this would work, because Thor might have given them some sort of protection, but it was worth a try. Now that all their attention was fully engaged by a Druid and a vampire, Perun could let loose. Seven thunderbolts lanced down from the sky to slay the remaining Valkyries, and as their smoking corpses fell limply into the snow, Väinämöinen laughed again, a creepy Vincent Price job that echoed under the ceiling of clouds. He banished his seeming and revealed our entire force to the pompous Æsir asspudding floating in the sky.

We gave Thor a few seconds to absorb it all. The Valkyries were all dead, wiped out in less than a minute by three members of a strange, unforetold force that numbered two dozen. And, by virtue of being the first on the scene, he now had no help whatsoever.

“Perun, fry his goats,” I called. Two more thunderbolts cracked in the sky, and Thor howled in rage and surprise as his ruined chariot plunged down onto the Plain of Idavoll, led by the charred black carcasses of his rams.

“Last one there’s a rotten egg!” I said, and the boys were off. It was an interesting footrace. I think Leif would normally have won on a flat surface, but Gunnar in wolf form was able to bound nimbly across the snow while Leif had to fight it with every step. Väinämöinen, Perun, and Zhang Guo Lao didn’t stand a chance, though the latter did his best with some superhuman leaps that would require wire work in the movies. The frost giants just stood there and watched the tiny people go after Thor. Aside from losing two of their number at the very start, they’d been very entertained by the visit to Asgard so far.

If Thor had been smart, he would have thrown his hammer at someone else. Nobody else could avoid the tracking spell on Mjöllnir, and he’d instantly regain his confidence. But his beloved goats were dead, and even his dim bulb of a brain could figure out that, if he resurrected them, Perun would simply strike them again. For an instant I thought he was going to let his hammer fly at Gunnar, because he whirled it around impressively as a precursor to a throw, but what he did instead was throw it without letting go—he targeted some point far in the distance and let Mjöllnir drag him through the air by the handle, the same way it had borne Leif and me to his position in the sky.

“Mrrh-hugh-huuaaagh!” Hrym laughed and pointed. “He’s flying away to go get his daddy.” The frost Jötnar all joined in the laugh and began to speculate about when or if he’d come back for more and whom he’d bring with him next time.

The only one of us that could chase him at this point was Perun, who couldn’t hope to overtake Thor before he reached help. The remaining flying mounts of the Valkyries, having nothing better to do, flew back toward Asgard without their riders.

“Coward!” Leif shouted after the diminishing god in the sky. Gunnar howled.

“Hey, Leif, a little help here, maybe?” I said in a normal tone. “Shove this back into its socket?” The vampire had no trouble hearing me from fifty yards away. He turned, located me, and ran to my aid. The adrenaline was wearing off, and my body was thinking about going into shock.

“Hmm,” he said, braking abruptly in front of me and examining my arm. “You’ve broken a bone as well.”

“Right. Socket first, then set the bones, and I’ll knit from the inside.”

“Ready?”

“No, wait. I need to touch the earth before we do this. I need more juice.”

Leif efficiently cleared away a hole in the snow and I stepped into it, drawing on the earth’s power and dulling the nerves in my shoulder.

“Okay, do it,” I said. He grabbed my arm and shoved it back into its socket with an audible, crunchy pop. Then he took hold of my splintered collarbone at the first break—there were three—and held the pieces together until I could get a rudimentary binding in place. “Next,” I said, and he moved on to the next break, and then the last. “Good enough,” I said, placing Fragarach down carefully and then lying on my right side so that the maximum surface area of my tattoos could touch the earth.

Leif watched me in silence for a full minute to make sure that lying down wasn’t a prelude to performing something tactically brilliant. Then he said, “You’re just going to lie there until he comes back?”

“Hey, you’re pretty smart for a dead guy. What happened up there? I got you your shot and you blew it.”

Leif grimaced. “No denying that. I shattered his shield, but he knocked me away with a hammer blow before I could take another swing.”

“That must have given you an ouchie.”

“He crushed my ribs,” he replied, grinning. “But that Valkyrie healed me up nicely. Their blood is powerful. First full meal I’ve had in days.”

“Good. You’re going to need it.” I sighed. “Our surprises are all spent now, Leif. Nothing will be easy when Thor returns, and our best chance to get out of here unscathed is gone.” Leif nodded but said nothing.

Gunnar joined us, barked once by way of greeting, and lay down against my back. He was trying to keep me warm, and it made me smile. Though he’d never admit it, Gunnar was treating me like a surrogate pack member. I could tell he missed them. I hoped he’d make it back. He would if we left now; we all would.

“Leif.”

“Hmm?” He kept his eyes on the skies for Thor’s return.

“I need to tell you something. Complete candor.”

He looked down at me, interested. “What is it?”

“I’ve been visited by two different gods. You saw the Morrigan, and the other one was Jesus. They tend to be pretty fucking good at seeing the future.”

“Yes?”

“They both said killing Thor would be an extraordinarily bad idea.”

The vampire’s expression hardened. “So?”

“So let’s get the hell out of here and call it a victory.”

“Victory? We have won nothing!”

“Heimdall is dead, plus twelve Valkyries. That’s the blood price of your family times four. You’ve made your point and we’re all still alive. Let’s quit while we’re ahead.”

“We are not ahead. You do not keep score properly. The only death that counts is Thor’s.”

“What about my death? Or Gunnar’s, or the rest of us? Will those count? Because the odds of us dying are pretty high if we wait for Thor to come back with the rest of the Æsir.”

“Go, then, if you want, but leave me here.”

“You know I won’t do that.” Hal would never speak to me again if I left Leif behind. “We all need to go.”

Leif knelt next to me in the snow and said in low, intense tones, “A thousand years, Atticus. I have been waiting for this, needing it and wanting it, for a thousand years of sunless existence. Against that you put the ten years I have known you. Friend that you are to me, there is no argument you can make that will swerve me from my course. And I doubt seriously that you could sway any of the others with this talk of the future. If they have a fraction of the feeling I have, then the only future they care about is the one where Thor is dead. Nothing else matters.”