Lord of Slaughter

50

The wolfman watched as Snake in the Eye walked through the dancing shadows towards the man who had emerged from the water of the tunnel, his sword drawn. It was the big Viking, naked save for a sword belt. The moonsword! Elifr would have recognised it anywhere. He wanted to spring forward, to insist the boy killed him with it. But the big Viking was there and he had the sword. Elifr opted to sit and wait, to see what unfolded.

Snake in the Eye approached Bollason boldly.

‘Hello, Bollason!’ Snake in the Eye’s voice was like that of a man greeting a friend on a fine morning rather than a warrior meeting another in such uncertain circumstances.

Even the battle-worn Bollason gave a start when he heard the boy’s voice.

‘Snake in the Eye,’ he said.

‘That’s a poor greeting, my friend,’ said Snake in the Eye. ‘Do you not welcome your leader and your god?’

Bollason kept his eyes fixed on Snake in the Eye. ‘What are you doing here?’

‘Need gods explain their purposes to mortals? Do we, who ride shooting stars across the void of heaven and whose enemies suffer numberless griefs, require to give reasons to men?’

‘Still mad and incapable of sense,’ said Bollason. ‘Light a lamp — the light here is dim and I have work to do.’ The wolfman caught the wariness in Bollason’s voice.

‘You paid me the service of allowing me holmgang,’ said Snake in the Eye. ‘I shall repay you by lighting your lamp. That’s how gods work.’

He took a bronze lamp from Bollason’s small bag, shook, rubbed the moisture from the oil-soaked cloth and quickly kindled a flame.

‘I have work to do here,’ said Bollason.

‘Don’t let me stop you,’ said Snake in the Eye.

‘Put down your sword,’ said Bollason. ‘We are friends here.’

‘We are,’ said Snake in the Eye. He sheathed his weapon.

Bollason gave a couple of tugs on the rope. Then he began to pull hard.

‘I think I saw you by some waters before,’ said Snake in the Eye.

Bollason said nothing, just kept pulling.

‘I know your name. This is not your well. You have a well, though — it’s near here, or is it the same well? Are all wells the same well? Is that your secret?’ said Snake in the Eye.

Bollason carried on pulling.

‘I took your head. When I gave my eye for wisdom, I took your head. You advise me and speak truths in my ear. I took your head when I gave my eye!’

‘You have two eyes now, boy,’ said Bollason.

‘I’m not a boy!’

Snake in the Eye snatched up Bollason’s sword and struck at the side of his head. The warrior had anticipated the blow and ducked, the sword sparking into the wall. Bollason dropped the rope and dived at Snake in the Eye, driving him to the floor of the tunnel.

‘Who are you? Who are you, old man?’ the scholar Loys cried out from down in the pool.

Snake in the Eye gave a great sigh as all the wind went out of him, and Bollason froze, lying unmoving on top of him.

‘There they are, all the pretty candles,’ said Snake in the Eye.

Bollason was quite still. Snake in the Eye wriggled from beneath him.

‘You don’t look right with a head on your shoulders, old Mimir, my friend,’ he said.

He stood and took out his own sword. Then he hacked off Bollason’s head. He gave the neck five or six good blows but still the head was not severed. The boy snorted in frustration.

‘If you were a better corpse, your head would come off more easily,’ he said. ‘Your head’s meant to be off. It doesn’t look right any other way.’

He walked to the rope that emerged from the water and looked at it as if he didn’t quite know what it was. Then he began tugging on it, singing out in a high voice,

‘Oh I am the fisherman,

And fish are what I catch.

Big ones, little ones, fat ones, thin ones,

In fish I have no match!’

Four or five pulls and a woman came almost lifeless from the water, her hands bound to the rope. It was all Elifr could do to keep silent. It was her — the one who had tormented his dreams, the one he had vowed never to meet because he knew he had loved her too strongly and that their love was cursed by the gods. His head pounded, his vision blurred. He wanted her so much but he couldn’t go to her. That way death came into his kingdom and the cycle of misery began again.

‘Now I know you too,’ said Snake in the Eye. ‘Lady, we have met before. Well, it’s time for us to meet again.’

He pulled her onto the dry ground. The woman was face down, vomiting water, sucking in air in great rasps. Snake in the Eye turned her onto her back and hitched up her skirts. Then he undid his trousers and stepped out of them.

‘I think this,’ he said, ‘will prove once and for all I really am a man. And all my friends, my silver, shining friends, here to see me in my glory.’

He paused for a second.

‘This candle I see is not yours. Why do I not see you, woman? Two candles. Perhaps I should snuff them and see what corpses I find planted in this rich earth.’

The rope started coiling back through the water.

‘But wait,’ said Snake in the Eye. ‘It seems I may have other fish to catch!’

The wolfman gave a shiver. He knew who the boy was, knew who killed without touching, knew who carried Mimir’s head for wisdom and had given his eye at the well. Odin, the dead god. Come to the earth to die, as the prophecy had foreseen. He’d been so near to being free of his destiny in the emperor’s tent.

Every instinct told him to attack but, though Elifr had lived as an animal, he was not an animal. The woman was there. If he allowed himself to be killed by the god, what would happen to her? She would be saved in eternal time, perhaps killed in this incarnation. But seeing her alive, so vulnerable, he feared for her and his resolve left him. He needed to defend her. But how, against a god? A ritual was impossible now in the waters, he needed more time.

Again the howl, fear given sound. There must have been another entrance, and the wolf was in. The god’s story was unfolding.

Elifr knew he didn’t have long. The wolf’s destiny was to kill him, the last stage in a magical conversion that would empower him to kill the god. He had to get the woman away. He mouthed her names as he’d known her before. Adisla, Aelis. What was she called this time? It didn’t matter. It was up to him to save her. How? Hide and then ask the well’s guidance when he had the chance.

Snake in the Eye was pulling at the rope, singing all the time.

‘O lady, rage at the ocean,

The storm-torn fields of grey.

But the ocean, it is heedless

Of anything you might say.

Your tears sit like diamonds

Upon your cheeks so pale and fair,

And the spray it sits and sparkles

A rainbow in your hair.

Your son is son of a father,

Dead and lost to the sea,

So lady, rage at the ocean

Then turn your eyes to me.’

With one final tug a shape emerged from the water that sealed the passage, a flash of white. A head.

A man stood up with a great cough. He bore a large wound on his cheek. The wolfman saw he was nearly as afflicted as the woman who lay half-naked and gasping on the floor, but he was a warrior and instantly mastered himself.

‘Ragnar, my fine killer!’ shouted Snake in the Eye. ‘I have spared your life once, but even for the service you did me you cannot expect such indulgen-’

There was the sound of steel on leather, a heavy exhalation and Snake in the Eye sat down. Mauger’s sword had gone straight through him. The boy grasped at the hilt as if he was afraid it would be taken from him.

‘I’ve had enough of your talk,’ said Mauger. ‘Speak to that.’

He bent to the lady and pulled down her skirts, checking to see if she was breathing.

‘You know the penalty for this offence,’ he said to Snake in the Eye.

The warrior picked up Bollason’s strange curved sword, which lay on the floor next to the dead man’s head. He weighed it in his hand for a second, and the wolfman knew he was about to cut off the youth’s head. Snake in the Eye sat glassy-eyed, gazing up at the man like a child listening to a story.

‘Ahh!’ A shout from behind Elifr. The wolfman glanced left from his hiding place. The scholar. The white-haired warrior forgot about the dying boy and ran down the passage towards the sound.

Again the howl — no echo, just forcing its way through the dead air of the caverns, flat and toneless. Was the boy the god? He had to die at the teeth of the wolf, yet the warrior had put a sword clean through him. The wolfman needed to get away from the woman. The wolf was coming for her, and if Elifr fled then he wouldn’t die as part of the magical transformation that would bring the wolf god to earth.

But he couldn’t leave her stricken on the cave floor.

Elifr ran to her. From up the passage, towards the well, he heard the warrior bellowing, screaming for Loys to show himself. The scholar had hidden in the dark. The woman was breathing. He held her to him to warm her with his body heat.

He wept as he did so.

‘I’ve tried to stay away,’ he said, ‘but the fates are weaving for us and they bind us too closely. Come on, wake up. You must run from him.’

Snake in the Eye still sat, impaled on Mauger’s sword, clutching the hilt. He kicked Elifr’s leg to get his attention.

‘Now no one can doubt me, for I have a mighty wound,’ he said. ‘I ask you, sorcerer, could you live with a wound like this? I tell you, you could not.’

Elifr picked the woman up, saying nothing. He had no idea where to go or what to do. His original plan seemed best — go to the waters, perform a ritual and see if the well would talk to him — but he needed to get the woman somewhere dry and warm. There was no such place here. He headed towards the well.

‘There are many candles here for snuffing,’ shouted Snake in the Eye. Again the howl. ‘I cannot go to the wall if he is here — he’ll see me. Let me stand. Let no one doubt me — let me stand!’

Elifr pulled the woman down the little stream. Only then did he see what was happening at the well. Loys clung to one side, cowering from the warrior. The warrior was not in the pool; he crouched at the entrance, looking around him in wonder.

‘Who’s here?’ said Mauger. ‘Who is speaking to me?’ Bollason’s sword was in his hand.

Elifr heard the voice in his head, a woman whispering, singing and muttering. He is here, he is here. The voice was very clear.

‘Show yourself, woman. Ghosts won’t protect you, scholar.’

The woman in the wolfman’s arms began to stir. She opened her eyes.

‘Set me down,’ she said. ‘Can you hear her?’

‘I can hear her. Who is she?’

Beatrice was shivering and he was reluctant to put her down, but she wriggled out of his arms onto the floor.

‘She is the voice of the waters. She is my sister. I must go to her. Get away from me, Azemar — this place is death to you.’ She crawled towards the pool.

‘I am not Azemar.’

Her eyes scanned the cavern as if trying to make sense of what she saw.

‘Where is Loys? Where is my Loys?’

‘Here, Beatrice. Run. Flee this place.’ Loys stayed back in the water, fearful of Mauger. Beatrice cried out and slid down to the pool’s edge, oblivious to the warrior beside her, the cruel sword in his hand.

‘Who are you and and who is this old fellow?’ she said. ‘I do not like his looks. He has a noose at his neck.’ Beatrice’s eyes were wide, staring into nothing. ‘Why am I pursued by foul wonders? What is this thing writhing and howling in my breast?’

‘Beatrice! Beatrice!’ shouted Loys, but she showed no sign of hearing him.

His shout seemed to wake the warrior from his stupor and he jumped into the water. Loys tried to scramble up towards where Styliane lay but he was too cold and too scared.

The warrior stood in the pool, the water up to his chest. ‘Who is it? Who is calling me? You, child?’ He pointed his sword directly in front of him, staring into space.

Someone scrambled down the stream towards the well. It was the vala.

She came to Elifr and hugged him. He felt her warmth.

‘Mother,’ said Elifr. ‘So the fate is inescapable.’

‘Yes,’ said the vala, ‘as we foresaw. This is the price of wisdom, Elifr. It is no great thing.’

‘I feared this day above all others.’

‘The skein is spun,’ she said. ‘There is nothing to stand in your way. Better to suffer now for an instant than to face torture in eternal time. This is the appointed place.’

‘I had thought to offer myself to the waters.’

Again the howl shook the cavern.

‘He is here for you. Your certain death unless you act on what was revealed. My name is Uthr. I am a Norn and a spinner of fates, the waters whisper it. I need to go across the bridge of light.’

Tears came into the wolfman’s eyes, his face long in the glow of the rocks. ‘Then go.’

They waded out to the furthest part of the well, forty paces in under the low roof.

The howl was close now.

The wolfman held her and kissed her. Then he pushed her beneath the water.