Addictive Rimeshade (17 page)

Chapter 18

Eastward sat the crone in the iron wood,

and there brought forth Fenrir's offspring.

Of these shall be one worse than all,

the moon s devourer in a demon s guise.

Fill'd shall he be with the fated's lives,

the gods abode with the red blood shall stain.

Then shall the summer sun be darken'd,

all weather turn to storm.

~ Edda

Gunn:

I'm too late, the siege is underway, Ewan against Leug, the two blurring and morphing, Ewan's sword shooting rainbows across the sky to compete with the aurora borealis.

Now I must wait my turn. I'm honor bound to step in if Ewan falls to the sword, but if he does fall I could be chief, I could love Deliah in his stead... my conscience wages between honor and desire.

Perching on a jagged outcrop of ice in Eagle form, I watch the men below, amazed by the power of the one we call Logi.

*

Macala:

As shadows we flit inside the cave, wisping in and out of sight, no more than an extension of the world of darkness.

Leaving Arghin to stand guard, I slink deeper into the channels of hel, breathing in the comfort of this place. I thought it would be harsh and ingrained with suffering, but it's just so … peaceful.

Touching the glazed rock, melted and recolded, remolded, tempered, reformed, a living testament to the changes a spirit goes through on the journey of purification, cleared of karma, I find a shadow stretching for my attention.

It wishes to commune, so I lean in, closing my eyes and extending my own harii mist. Breaking contact wrath envelops my reason, my purpose. Leug and Em have had intercourse!

No!

Damn you Leug! Forever and ever!

Knowing where the conflict plays out, I go running for the melee, ready to brawl that bastard to death, once and fucking for all.

*

Lara:

My heart tugs and tugs, breaking the sublime drift between the bands of evanescent light, losing the touch of tranquility and homecoming, the love infused into me carrying me on the curl of a beam, leaving me reeled closer to the ground, calling my name.

Looking down, disoriented when I do, I wonder if I'm looking up to look down, or if I'm looking the other way, or if I'm really seeing.

Disbelief wipes the jubilation out of my mind and spirit when I spy Leug in a rumble, rolling and clashing, one second a wolf, the next a shaft of light, the next a column of ice, throwing icicle needles, then he's a flea, then a siren screeching like a banshee, then a child throwing a grenade; a viper, a rock, an ox, a three headed dog, a one eyed slug, all gargantuan in size, changing and changing and changing.

Ewan's shaking hands reach for a battle-ax, at least I assume that's Ewan.

He's fighting for me. I will go down and tell him not to, I belong to no one, I simply exist to free the wind and birth light. I love Leug, and in that, all knowledge is safe.

Coalescing, undulating, I ripple through the moonbeams, rolling between the men, standing as they charge, a bellow pulling my focus to the entrance where a tall man with a glowing eye glares at me, his glower penetrating the gloom with the brilliance of a shaft of truth, his sword spinning over and over and over like a drunk snowflake, and before I can react I realize it's aiming for me. Screaming, holding my hands up, roars on either side of me as the warriors charge, metal ices through my chest, solidifying me completely, crushing me to the ground, impaling me to mother earth, the ice inside me splintering and cracking in an almighty rift, the fire bursting out, the lava spewing, burning my skin, the shriek I hear the saddest wind to ever blow.

*

Leug:

My greatest fear materializes, Lara appearing between Ewan and myself, both of us already full throttle, unable to halt in time before smashing her between us, a scream from the ether warning me, instinct forcing me to look up, the winter's sword flying through the sky, straight for her. Becoming air, I bend and twist and strain to stop the trajectory, but it's too swift, the sound of her spirit sliced and shattered too soon.

Falling over her, trying to staunch the loss, the rupture, the carnage, the anguish, a woman's keen of grief splits the lights, the sky instantly pitch dark when the aurora cease their celebration.

I love you so much, and now I'm losing you, the way I lost Skadi.

Anguish rises up from the cluster of my source, in my sacral shield, the bellow of grief beyond my control, the sorrow splitting me into a million billion particles of dust.

As ash I cover my love, my heart, my rebirth, my hope, my essence, layering over her in a blanket of extinguished pyre, the volcano bursting forth from Hel's mountain, the ice barrier dropping, the shelf splitting, avalanches rushing down the steep incline, rock and ice and lava rushing to my feet, blowing us away.

I made her me, and I made her vulnerable.

They win.

They murdered not me, but the one who was me, the one I gave everything to. I existed through and in her, now we're both destroyed. Just left to drift on as shattered thoughts, carrying away on the winter wind. The only way to end me was to end her.  And that they have. Today is the day.

*

Gunn:

I watch Ewan stagger and fall to his knees, bloodied and brutalized. Macala rushes out to the steaming liquid rock glowing fire into the sky, lifting Ewan out of danger, literally carrying my chief to the entrance of hel, Deliah running at him, hitting him, biting, kicking, flaying, screaming obscenities that would shame a criminal.

Emma turns into an owl, flying once over the lovers petrified as rock, blowing away with every gust the way a spire of ash once did after napalm burned down its sin.

Landing in front of Ewan, she becomes mist, blasting Macala with light, screaming at him for being judgmental and murdering Lucifer, of ruining all hope the world ever had at being free from tyranny, then standing as herself, staring her harii eye into Ewan's, their words too soft to discern.

I should do something, but don't have the courage to show myself now. I am drawn to her calm in carnage. I could use a woman like that in my life.

The chief staggers and stumbles, crawling back to the hardened and dead form of the god Leug and the female Lara.

A sword sticks out of the stone, mocking a long ago legend. Macala's sword. Without it he cannot be chief, and he cannot enter Asgard. He fucked himself in the process. It's just considering he just slew Búri's daughter. There is no afterlife for a warrior who murders the perfect out of wounded pride.

*

Deliah:

I refuse to believe it unless I see it with my own eyes. Emma sounds like a raving lunatic, and I'm so hollow with grief that I'm having a fucking hard time breathing right now. Holding it together with this last shred of hope, I drop to my knees, tears streaming down my cheeks, crying for Lara, my angel, the only friend I've ever had. My sister, who was my sister before we knew we were bloodkin. I love you!

I'd do anything, anything! I will stand before the gods and hand Ewan over myself, I will end all wars singlehandedly to get her back.

Anything!

Just please, please, oh god please....!

*

Hel:

Sitting with Carmen, we share a secretive smile. None of them knew. They couldn't know that only love separates the wheat from the chaff. They had to go through this, all of them, to understand that Odin is a dead god who only lives on in memory. He has no power, he never did. He used the power of his own creation, never wielding it himself because when he sold his spirit for insight, he lost the part of himself that was god.

He's an empty vessel, he's a myth, but they haven't been to Asgard to witness it. This is their theatre and they must complete the play, to free themselves from the script.

Managarm, the most powerful wolf, comes out to sit with us, the wolf who waits to finish the story should any of them deviate from resolution.

At the women's demand, Ewan who just three minutes ago sought Leug's demise, takes his Odin harp to the ash pile, sitting next to it, using Odin's original power to call them back, healing them, rebuilding blood and bone, vein and mind, man to woman, god to mankind.

Emma will make a great leader, a replacement for me when I choose to rest, as she knew Ewan could heal them and make his wrongs right. He's not too proud after all. He loves his handfast enough to bring back his enemy to save her sister, and Macala's actions have ruined his hopes with Emma.

Hel needs a mistress who is free of handfasting, there's no room for jealousy in its halls.

A lone eagle watches from the sky, and I leave Carmen, becoming wind to call him down. He wishes to love a lady of Skadi kind. Her name is Emma, she is the weather, and she needs a warrior to warm her bed, just not to bind her in marriage.

I think Gunn the brave will be perfect. He is persecuted and suffering. He will require the healing only Hiflheimr can offer.

To them I'll give my crown, my underworld, I will let them stay here safe and cherished.

Emma, no one asked who was your mother. No human could give birth to you child, it was me. I am your family, which means tonight you saved your grandfather. The light bearer. The one mankind rejected even when his truth could set them free.

*

Lara:

Opening my eyes, feeling a heat so severe it ruins me, a cold kiss kills the burn, his tears running into my eyes, his love rushing through me like fresh blood sent to starving muscles.

Ewan sings softly, the skald of magic, the swansong having broken his ego, the war behind us as Liah runs to me, embracing us all, the four of us hugging and squeezing.

He took a rose wilted and shriveled in 'death', preserved in fragile suspension, giving her new roots, allowing her to flourish and bloom when all others presumed she was beyond revival.

I'm home. My family, my Leug, my Lucifer, my sister, and the man who saved our lives after helping to kill us, Ewan, the no longer berserk.

I must write this down.

I will call it the Gemini Journal, for Liah, for me. For all of you staring down the barrel of eternity.

Closing my eyes, I lean into his chest, his heart beating mine, my home wrapped around me, his light all that pulses through my mind.

~ The End ~

Afterward

The Moon and the Sun are brother and sister; they are the children of Mundilfori, who, on account of their beauty, called his son Mani, and his
daughter
Sol;

for which presumption the gods in their anger took brother and sister and placed them in heaven, and appointed Sol to drive the horses that draw the chariot of the sun, which the gods had formed, to give light to the world, of the sparks from Muspellheim.

~Voluspa

Glossary

Ásatrú – faith in the Æsir

Æsir – the gods

ás-kunnigr – god's kin

ás-móðr – divine wrath

áss - god

Banka – knock, pound, beat

Berserkr – proper spelling for berserker.

Böðvar - battle

Buachaille Eite Mòr - is ten miles outside of Glencoe.

Búri: The father of all the Norse gods (all of them). He is the first (He is Odin's father).

Eagle clan - live in the Blackmount Forest in the Argyle highlands.

Élivágar – ice waves that existed as rivers in the Ginnungagap, before the world manifested.

Eoghan (Ewan) – noble / born of the yew tree

Fenrir – Loki's son, the wolf

Friðr - father

Galdr - Old Norse word meaning to sing a charm / incantation

Ginnungagap – the primordial void,
signifying a magical (and creative) power-filled space (existing before universe 'began'.)

Gjöll – the word means resounding. It is one of eleven rivers to flow from 'heaven to hell'. Originating in Hiflheim and flowing closest to the gate of the underworld, it is freezing, so cold it's said to flow with knives that cut through you.. It is also the name of the rock Fenrir was tethered to.

Gunn – from the Norse-Viking word for "warrior" (gunnr meaning war)

Hamask – change form / shapeshift

Hvergelmir -  a bubbling boiling spring originating in Niflheim, the source of all waters and rivers which spread from it like antler's horns.

Hlaðguðr – her name translates as Swan White (the original snow white). A Valkyrie.

Jörmungandr – the world snake, Logi's son

Læraðr – the golden apple trees of Asgard outside the halls of Valhalla, the orchard of the deathless acre.

Loki – his real Norse name is Leug, also known as Logi.

Múspellsheimr / Muspelheim – the realm of fire, home to the fire giants. The opposite – and balance – to Niflheim.

Níðhöggr – the venomous dragon snake

Seidr –  divine sorcery, sometimes anglicized as the word seith.

Sváss - beloved

Ulfhednar (
Úlfhéðnar)
– Norse berserker

Utangarth - outside the enclosure - not of your immediate tribe

Vargynja – she wolf

Vigr – able to fight