Staked

Perun sniffs, considers, then lifts a single buttock off the bench and farts without a shred of embarrassment. It is his first comment on Weles, perhaps, but then he elaborates: “When he is snake, he is big black snake. When he is man, he is still thin like snake. Tall. Long straight black hairs and beard, with droopy mustaches. Narrow face with cheekbones standing out. Sometimes he wear hat—no, is not right word. What is thing like crown but not crown, you wear in band around head, no top?”

“Maybe a circlet?”

“Yes, circlet! This is word I need. He has circlet with ram horns on it, and sometimes he wear this. Make peoples think horns grow on his head, but is lie. Is there to make peoples think he has many powers.”

“Well, does he have many powers?”

“Yes.”

“Can’t blame him for his horny haberdashery, then.”

“What is haber-dashing? I am not knowing this word.” The rest of our ferry ride is pleasantly occupied with the rich history of haberdashers and their profession, and Perun adds “visit a London haberdasher” to his personal bucket list. But our faces set into grim lines once we hit land and lope across Rügen to the spot where Weles has hidden the white horse of Świętowit. I check with Mecklenburg to make sure Weles didn’t show up while we were gone and he says no, the only god nearby is Perun. The turf parts for us, the staircase beckons, and Perun goes first, holding his axe out in front of him as he descends, perhaps thinking the axe will trigger any traps first and give him time to avoid them. But that makes little sense to me: If Weles is an earth god, he probably has deadfalls rigged or some kind of cave-in planned. You don’t dodge cave-ins or obliterate them with lightning blasts.

“Perun? Hold on. Don’t move.”

“Okay. I am not moving.”

The walls of the staircase are earth and chalk, solid for the moment but unstable, easily collapsed. I put my palm against the wall to see if it’s “living” earth or cut rock by calling out to the elemental.

//Query: Mecklenburg? Can you sense me here?//

//Yes//

//Please cancel all earth magic on this island except my own bindings//

//Yes / Fierce Druid bindings only//

//Harmony / No earth-god magic here// I realize almost too late that the chambers themselves were probably created by magic and hastily add, //But keep shape of chambers//

//Harmony//

I give a small, pleased sigh and Perun looks up at me, a question in his expression. “I just canceled any earth magic on the island except mine,” I explain.

“You can do this?”

“Yes. Atticus did it once to Bacchus. Certain gods work their miracles through the earth all the time and the earth allows it, but the wishes of Druids always take precedence, since we’re actually bound to the earth and gods are more bound by faith.”

“So his magical traps will not be working now?”

“Correct. But if he has strictly mechanical ones, those will still be operational.”

“I am understanding. We go.”

The light wanes to almost total darkness for a stretch, but a source of light grows below as we descend, along with a strange hum. When we reach the bottom of the stairs, we hear a click in the walls and some dust falls from above, but nothing else happens.

“I think we just triggered a trap,” I say.

“And yet we still walk,” Perun replies. “Is good.”

“Yes.”

The chamber at the bottom widens and is lined with shelves filled with glass cages. We can see them because there are Ecobulbs hung from the ceiling, powered by a generator somewhere that must be the source of the humming we hear. And inside those cages are many, many rats.

“What the hell is going on? Those aren’t rigged to break on us, I hope?” I say.

“No, is not trap. Is food for next trap.”

“What?”

“Listen. You hear it ahead?” Perun points to an arched passageway at the other end of the chamber, with a single dim light illuminating it. “Under hum you hear hissing.”

“Oh. Yes, you mentioned there would be snakes.”

“Rats are food for snakes.”

“How thoughtful of Weles.”

“Fun fact: Snakes are not very tasty,” Orlaith observes. “Probably because they eat rats.”

When did you eat a snake?

“Oberon and I found one in Colorado and tried it. We thought it was icky.”

We pad down the corridor toward the sounds of hissing, which is not typically a good survival strategy. After a short distance the corridor ends abruptly at a wide pit about thirty feet square and perhaps twenty feet deep. The bottom of the pit has helpfully been illuminated so we can see that the floor is completely covered in writhing snakes. It’s much too broad to jump. There appears to be an extendable bridge mechanism on the far side, and on our side is a helpful length of chain dangling from the wall with an illustration beneath it showing a bridge over the pit.

Perun is about to pull on the chain when I stop him. “Whoa, wait. Why would Weles put a pit here and then help us to cross it?”

Perun drops his hand. “You are right. He would not do this. Is trap. We pull chain, we go into pit with many snake.”

“Exactly. And I bet it’s a mechanical trapdoor too. It won’t require magic to work.”

Perun considers the space, looks at Orlaith, then says, “Maybe I make wind and we fly across?” Orlaith is of course the trouble; Perun and I could shape-shift to winged forms and fly across with ease.

“I have a better idea,” I tell him. “Let’s make a real bridge we can depend on.” I contact Mecklenburg again and ask him to span the pit for us with an earthen bridge three feet wide. After a brief wait, it begins to form on either side of the pit, until it meets in the middle. Elementals are awesome.

Snake pit successfully navigated. Another corridor waits on the other side, bends a bit, and the throbbing of generators becomes much louder. When we reach the end of the corridor there’s a floor-to-ceiling iron gate, easily managed and unlocked, and the reason for the generators becomes obvious: We are at the edge of a large cavern and there are a ridiculous number of UV lights mounted on the ceiling, shining down on a broad pasture of lush turf. It’s the finest underground grazing land I’ve ever seen—also the only underground grazing land I’ve ever seen. All of it built to house and hide the warhorse of Świętowit, a beautiful white stallion who has spotted us and is prancing around on the far side, shaking his head in agitation and snorting.

“Wow,” I breathe. “You don’t see something like this every day.” It’s a lot of trouble for a single horse. But that wouldn’t matter to Loki: Knowing the best day to start Ragnarok would be priceless information to him. I wonder if he asks the question daily, weekly, or if he only asks when he thinks something has changed in his favor. Even if he doesn’t appear daily, those generators have to be switched out, the snakes have to be fed, and the stone stable over to one side has to be mucked out every so often. We shouldn’t linger here. Somebody has to be visiting this place regularly, and I begin thinking defensively in case they visit soon. “Perun, let’s get over there to the stable,” I say. “That horse looks pretty upset, and we need it to calm down if we’re going to get it out of here.”