Staked

Some jeers and epithets got hurled in our direction at that, but Brighid ignored them.

“Send an envoy—unarmed—to negotiate in good faith. I will guarantee safe conduct for both sides. Your army will remain here until I hear a reply. They will be released to return to Asgard once that envoy appears. That is all.”

Hugin and Munin squawked and spiraled into the clouds, ascending up the root of Yggdrasil to return to Odin.

Brighid surveyed the army for potential threats, saw that they remained akimbo in the snow and supremely cheesed at us, and nodded in satisfaction before turning to check on me.

“How fare you, Druid?”

“Leg is pretty messed up, but I’ll be able to limp out of here eventually. Working on it. Is Fjalar truly dead, or can we save him?”

She took in the charred remains of those she had set aflame; I could smell the cooked flesh and saw smoke rising from the corpses, but I had hope that perhaps he was merely unconscious. Brighid evaluated the bodies for a few seconds and shook her head. “Fire is unforgiving, and I did not hold back.”

“Oh.” I was sorry for that and wished Fjalar would have been more reasonable. Silence fell between us, except for the uncomfortable shifting of bodies in the army and the dark curses muttered at us from various quarters.

“Shall we go visit the Svartálfs while we wait?” I said. “Sitting here in front of the army is getting awkward fast.”

“Very well.”

We flew back to the dark doors of Svartálfheim and called out that we had good news: The army had been halted and an envoy would arrive soon for talks.

“No one else need die today,” Brighid said. “We can talk in peace of a more lasting accord.” With her permission, I stood behind her right shoulder, kept my weight on my left leg, and surreptitiously leaned on her back for support. Soon the doors opened and the leaders of the Svartálfar reemerged. This time, they deigned to favor Brighid with a shallow bow, and she in turn did the same and removed her helmet. If I stopped leaning on Brighid to remove mine, I would fall over, so I kept my helmet on.

It was poetry after that. Brighid was much better at slinging words around than I was, and before long we had a pavilion set up outside with tables and chairs and hot drinks and nobody killing anybody else. I got to sit, Brighid melted some snow away so that I could put my bare foot down on the earth and draw some strained energy from Gaia to aid my healing, and then she employed that honey-throated voice of hers to convince Turid and Krókr that fighting against the hordes of Hel would be better for the Svartálfar in the long run than sitting it out—the logic being that it was quite possibly going to be the end of the world, and you didn’t want that one to go the wrong way. She actually made them smile and laugh a couple of times, until the envoy from Asgard showed up an hour later.

It was not who we expected. Not that we expected anyone in particular, just that we did not expect that particular envoy. It was a man dressed entirely in gray with a beard like a cliff wall and a patch over one eye, with two ravens riding along on his shoulder: Odin himself. Everyone tried to be cool, but it’s difficult not to sit up a bit straighter when Odin joins your party. Sort of like if you’re relaxing with your friends and Neil deGrasse Tyson walks up, you suddenly want to talk about science: His arrival changes the subject. Two dark elves flanked him and one carried Gungnir, Odin’s spear.

“I come in peace,” Odin said right away, his head tilting toward the guard for a moment. “I gave up my weapon willingly.”

Introductions were made all around. When attention fell on me, Odin’s remaining eye narrowed but he said nothing. That was enough to communicate his displeasure with me, however.

“Excellent,” Brighid said. “Before we begin, can we all agree that saving the world would be better than allowing Loki to torch Midgard and all the nine realms to bring Gaia under his and Hel’s control?”

Everyone nodded or grunted assent, and Brighid beamed. “Good. That’s a strong foundation to build upon. The fact that the leaders are here and we don’t need to use go-betweens is also good. Let’s proceed.”

Hours of grievances and apologies followed, together with arguments and concessions and more than two trips into the trees to relieve bladders filled by hot spiced cocoa. I only mention those trips because they were perilous journeys for me, which I hopped at first and then gingerly limped through. At no point did we enter the doors of Svartálfheim.

Near the end I must have dozed off, lulled by the drone of carefully controlled voices, because Brighid had to shout me awake. “Siodhachan!”

“Eh? Wuzzah?”

“We are finished. I need your help unbinding the army.”

“Oh, yeah? Hey, yeah! I hope they’re not frozen to death. What did I miss?”

“Say your farewells and I will tell you on the way.”

Odin accompanied us back to the army, and Brighid filled me in. The new accord between Asgard and Svartálfheim included trade agreements, remunerations for past trespasses, new diplomatic channels—and also a promise that no dark elves would accept a contract that would harm Granuaile, Owen, or me.

“Wow,” I said, “that’s impressive.”

“And they will fight with us in Ragnarok,” Odin added, “which is all I wanted anyway. This exercise served its purpose.”

I nearly snarled but managed to merely grunt in response. Fjalar’s death, all those other dwarfs set on fire, was an exercise? Including the crafting of that armor and those axes? That was a long and risky game to play, believing that you could maneuver someone into becoming your ally by threatening to exterminate them first.

It wouldn’t have happened if Brighid and I had not become involved—which then made me wonder if she had been in collusion all along. Perhaps the Morrigan too. I would not put such scheming past any of them, even though it meant using Fjalar horribly and resulted in many other deaths besides. Would Fjalar still want to fight as one of the Einherjar, knowing that he’d been manipulated so? Would the Svartálfar wish to maintain their new alliance if they knew Odin had somehow tricked them into it?

It was all speculation, but I didn’t ask for confirmation from either of them. Brighid was my ride home.

CHAPTER 13

Traveling to Cape Arkona is not as quick as much of my travel, since there are no bound trees on the island. I have to shift to the German mainland and take a ferry out to Rügen. But because Orlaith has been so patient and such a good hound, we stop at a sausage haus and order a sampling of their trade—bratwurst, knackwurst, and weisswurst.

Orlaith is happy to be petted by a couple of older women on the ferry and obligingly growls at a young man who wishes to use her as an excuse to flirt with me. My weapon, Scáthmhaide, can be mistaken for a fancy walking stick so that to some eyes I look like a hiker instead of a martial artist.

“Ach! Control your dog!” he says to me in accented English.

“My hound is quite controlled. You will notice that she growled instead of bit you. That means you should go away now.”

He starts to berate me in German, an ugly sneer on his face. I don’t need to listen, so I ask Orlaith to bark and lunge at him but not bite. He jumps back and leaves us alone after that, though he curses us from what he thinks is a safe distance. I smile and wave him goodbye. The older women return and pet Orlaith some more.