Bloodsong Hel X 3 Page 26

  “If you don’t cooperate,” Thokk told her, “I can give your daughter great pain. She is a prisoner in my castle, but even at this distance I can make her scream, even kill her. I can arrange for you to hear her cries in your mind. Shall I give you a demonstration?”

  “I’ll do as you ask,” Bloodsong quickly said, “if you’ll set Guthrun free.”

  “You’ll do as Kovna asks,” Thokk laughed, “or I will make your daughter scream. She will not be freed.”

  “How do I know she’s even still alive?”

  “You don’t.” Thokk smiled.

  Bloodsong’s gaze probed Thokk’s.

  “She will cooperate,” Thokk said, turning to Kovna. “She won’t risk harming her daughter.”

  “A fatal weakness,” Kovna said with a chuckle, “though there’s nothing she could do anyway, except seek a quick death on one of my soldiers’ swords. Free her hands.”

  Bloodsong rubbed circulation back into her wrists, stalling for time, thinking furiously, seething inside.

  “Perhaps, while we’re waiting,” Thokk said, “I might amuse myself by making one of Guthrun’s eyes—”

  “All right!” Bloodsong cried. “Curse you all!” Everyone laughed at her outburst.

  Bloodsong looked down at Guthrun’s sword, kept her eyes on the blade, and began to strip, trying to ignore the gazes and remarks of Kovna’s men as more and more of her flesh was revealed, struggling to find a way to yet turn defeat into victory, finding no hope.

  Bloodsong threw the last of her clothing onto the ground and stood naked in the sunlight, fists clenched at her sides. She looked up from Guthrun’s sword, raising her chin defiantly. The warriors no longer laughed. Seeing the numerous scars her body bore reminded them that she was a seasoned warrior, a swordswoman who had survived many battles, a warrior deserving their respect. But Kovna and Thokk still smiled, relishing Bloodsong’s defeat.

  “Against the tree,” Kovna ordered Bloodsong. He kicked her clothing toward a warrior. “Burn her clothes,” he commanded. “She won’t be needing them again.”

  They won’t win, Guthrun! Bloodsong mentally vowed. We’ll beat them somehow!

  Detecting her thoughts, Thokk laughed. “She’s stalling again. Perhaps while we’re waiting I will—”

  Bloodsong cursed, strode the few steps to the tree, turned to face her captors, leaned back, and let the rough bark dig into her flesh.

  “GUTHRUN,” someone whispered. “Guthrun?”

  Guthrun stopped pacing the small windowless room. It was the first voice, other than her own, that she had heard since awakening a prisoner in the locked chamber.

  Because she had heard Thokk’s name mentioned during her capture, she assumed that she was in the Hel-Witch’s castle. Judging by the number of meals that had been slipped through a small opening in the door, and because of the distance from Norda’s cottage to the castle of Thokk, she estimated that several days had passed since her capture.

  In the chamber was a narrow bed covered in shiny red fabric, a richly carved table of dark polished wood upon which burned an oil lamp that mysteriously never went dry, and a single cushioned chair with gilt arms and legs. She still wore her thin white sleeping shift, but it was torn, smudged with dirt, stained with the blood of the two men she had killed. The marks on her wrists from being bound on the journey had nearly disappeared.

  “Guthrun?” came the whisper again.

  She slipped to the iron-banded wooden door, found it still locked, got down on her knees, and peered through the tiny food slot. Beyond the opening she could still see nothing but darkness.

  “Release me!” she demanded.

  “Guthrun?”

  The voice was not coming from beyond the door, she now realized, but from within the small chamber.

  “I am here,” Guthrun finally said, frowning, reviewing in her mind the things Norda and Huld had taught her about spirits and how to deal with them. “Who are you and what do you want?”

  “To play, Guthrun,” the voice whispered. “I want to play! Don’t you remember me? We used to play?”

  Guthrun’s breath caught. She did recognize the whispered voice, but she had not heard that voice for seven years, not since leaving her childhood home in Helheim where she had been born.

  “Inga?” she asked, chilled, remembering the childhood friend she had left in Hel’s subterranean Land of Death.

  When she spoke Inga’s name, a ghostly image wreathed in pulsing purple light materialized only a few paces from her.

  Inga looked as she had seven years before, a young child with long blond hair framing a corpse’s face, sunken eyes staring. “Guthrun!” Inga cried. “How I’ve missed you! I can’t stay long. Mother Hel misses you too. Why did you leave? Won’t you come back to us? Come home? All of your friends miss you so!”

  Guthrun started to speak, shook her head, and did not.

  “Guthrun?” Inga said, her ghostly form reaching out as if to be embraced. “You look different, Guthrun. You’ve grown older. Don’t you want to play with me anymore?” the child asked, her voice catching. “Don’t you like me anymore?”

  Tears welled up in Guthrun’s eyes. Again she had to stop herself from speaking, knowing that to do so might give the spirit more power.

  “Come home to us,” Inga begged, starting to weep. “Please? I have to go now since you won’t talk with me. But please do as Thokk asks. Mother Hel wants you to do that. So do I and all your friends. I will come back, if I can—” The voice faded along with the ghostly image.

  Guthrun choked back tears, raised her fists. “It won’t work, Thokk! You won’t trick me! You won’t win, whatever your game!”

  There was no response.

  A long time later, another meal was delivered. Guthrun at first vowed not to eat it, still upset by the vision of her childhood friend, but then, reminding herself that she needed to keep up her strength in case there was a chance to escape, she began eating the cold, tasteless food, food similar to what she and her mother had eaten while together in Helheim.

  Helheim, Guthrun thought with a shudder, remembering the countless gray-skinned corpses with whom she had shared her first six years of life. After her mother had destroyed the Hel-traitor Nidhug and returned the War Skull of Hel to the Goddess, Hel had released Guthrun to walk the Earth with her mother. But Guthrun still woke some nights, thinking that she was back in Hel’s icy world, momentarily forgetting that the night’s darkness would pass at dawn, that the chill air would warm with the rising of the golden Sun.

  What if I’m back there now? Guthrun suddenly thought. What if I wasn’t taken to Thokk’s castle but back to Helheim? What if Inga’s visit was real, was not a trick? What if Inga’s mentioning Thokk was a trick to make me think I am still upon the Earth’s surface? Could Inga even have visited me if I were not within Hel’s realm?

  Guthrun began pacing the small chamber again, fighting to control a rising panic.

  * * *

  Far below the chamber where Guthrun was held prisoner, Huld still hung naked in her chains, each breath becoming more and more of a struggle because of her strained position. She had lost all feeling in her hands. Her shoulders burned with pain, and her cramping legs refused to raise her to give her shoulders relief. She was growing steadily weaker from pain, exhaustion, and the lack of food and water.

  I could die here, she suddenly thought. Freya’s Teats! No! I’m not going to die!

  The stiff hairs of a rat brushed against her foot again. Huld gathered her strength, shouted with rage.

  A faint purple glow began to pulse before her. Slowly it grew brighter. Within the glow a form materialized, gigantic, half again Huld’s height, its face that of a grinning skull, tattered flesh clinging to its skeleton’s body. It glided forward toward her.

  I am your death, spoke a toneless voice in her head, and your life. I
am your lover. Through me you shall know the ecstasies of the grave, the passions of the Dead.

  Huld fought her chains as the horror came nearer. “In Freya’s name,” she cried, “begone, thing of Hel!”

  The towering vision of Death did not respond, kept coming, reached her. Skeletal hands gently stroked her long blond hair, caressed her face.

  Huld strained against her chains, threw herself from side to side the scant distance the chains allowed.

  The monster’s fleshless hands moved elsewhere, stroking and kneading and teasing her like a lover.

  “No!” she screamed, outraged. “In Freya’s name, I command you to stop!” She sobbed.

  Suddenly the skeletal hands withdrew. The death’s-head of the monster turned to one side. Another glow was growing there, yellow-gold light, pulsing softly.

  The skeletal thing hissed like a serpent.

  “Freya!” Huld cried. “Aid me!”

  A corpse stood within the yellow glow, blackened, charred, unrecognizable except for the eyes, the eyes of Norda Greycloak, filled with hatred and pain.

  Streams of fire shot forth from Norda’s hands, striking the skeletal monster. The death-horror was hurled away from Huld, struck a crumbling stone wall, and burst into golden flames. It writhed silently on the floor a moment, became ashes, and was gone.

  “Norda?” Huld whispered as the charred corpse within the yellow glow came nearer.

  Charred hands touched the manacles on Huld’s spread ankles. The locks sprang open. Huld pulled her legs together beneath her, moaning at the pain of moving the long-immobilized muscles. Norda’s blackened hands touched the manacles around Huld’s wrists and freed them too.

  Huld tried to stay on her feet, could not, went to her knees on the floor, sobbing with pain.

  You must save Guthrun, Norda’s voice spoke within her mind. The young Witch looked up into the eyes of her teacher.

  “What has happened, Norda? Who did this to you?”

  Thokk has imprisoned Guthrun in the castle above. She intends to awaken the dark powers we sensed in the child. You must not let that happen. I have done all I can do, transported myself here, found and freed you. I have loved you like a daughter, Huld.

  The charred corpse suddenly screamed, fell to the floor, burst into flames, writhed spasmodically, and became ashes. The yellow glow faded. Total darkness returned.

  “Norda!” Huld cried, struggled to stand, but found the pain still too great. She slumped sideways, then onto her back, lay panting with pain, tried to move again, could not, and began to weep.

  “Freya give you peace, Norda,” Huld prayed, “and me strength. Thokk will know my revenge!”

  She fought to retain consciousness, again tried to stand, was overcome by exhaustion, and sprawled unconscious upon the cold stone floor.

  “YOU DESTROYED the throne I intended to usurp when you destroyed Nidhug, and his castle, and his kingdom.” Kovna stood before Bloodsong. “Instead of being a king, I have been reduced to leading a band of roaming warriors. I’ve wanted revenge upon you these seven years, and now I have it!”

  Bloodsong hung against the tree, tied there by splintery ropes that circled her waist, held her arms stretched high above her head, and kept her ankles pulled painfully back and up above the ground on each side of the gnarled trunk. The pain was constant and growing steadily worse. Sweat bathed her body, making her bare skin glisten in the sunlight. But for Kovna she forced a laugh. “You should thank me, Kovna. You’re still alive, which you wouldn’t have been if you’d tried to destroy Nidhug.”

  “If a mere woman could do it, I—”

  “I didn’t do it alone! I had the aid of the Goddess Hel, and the help of a Freya-Witch, as well as—”

  “The Freya-Witch, Huld,” Thokk interrupted, “who is also a prisoner in my castle, no doubt wishing that she were dead by now.”

  Bloodsong looked at Thokk.

  “And you, Thokk?” Bloodsong asked, her voice tight with pain. “Do you want revenge for some imagined wrong, too? Is that why you have taken my daughter and helped to destroy my village?”

  “Nothing so petty,” Thokk answered, then smiled at Kovna’s reaction. “I serve Hel, as you once did. I have motives someone like Kovna could never understand. I want power, yes. But not just for myself. You returned the War Skull to Hel so that She again wields substantial power, power that now extends somewhat beyond the borders of Helheim. But with my help, She and I will soon extend the reach of Her power farther. Much farther. Many who worship and serve Her have flocked to my castle, and soon now—” Her voice trailed away. She walked to stand next to the smaller of the two graves near the tree.

  “Isn’t there a detail you’ve forgotten, Kovna?” Thokk asked. “Didn’t Nidhug tie the corpse of Bloodsong’s son to her body as if nursing, to mock her? Shouldn’t you dig up what remains of the child and—”

  “Let my son’s bones rest!” Bloodsong commanded.

  Thokk’s laughter rang out.

  “Perhaps you are right,” Kovna said, relishing the notion.

  “No,” said Thokk, stopping him. “They would find nothing within the child’s grave. I removed the body myself—”

  “No!” Bloodsong cried.

  “Yes! Thirteen years ago,” Thokk continued. She smiled at Bloodsong. “After you died.”

  “You’re lying!” Bloodsong shouted, straining against the ropes.

  “She died?” Kovna asked. “We all thought she had somehow escaped.”

  “You didn’t know?” Thokk walked to the bound woman. “She was a Hel-warrior when she destroyed Nidhug.”

  “Yes. But she was not, is not, like those dead things who aided us during the battle.”

  “There are varieties of Hel-warriors, Kovna. Some, like Bloodsong, are granted a return to living flesh when they die Hel-praying, as she did. Others, like those who aided us, are animations of dead flesh. They are Death Riders. To touch even their weapons in battle is to die.”

  “You are lying, Hel-Witch, to taunt me,” Bloodsong insisted, “lying about my son.”

  “A mother’s anguish.” Thokk laughed, gently stroked Bloodsong’s long black hair.

  Bloodsong tried to jerk her head away, but her bondage prevented it.

  “I can tell from your thoughts that you know that after your death Nidhug returned and made a Death Slave of your husband’s corpse. He would have done the same to your body, but you were gone. I can also tell that you have wondered why he did not also make a Death Slave of the corpse of your son. Now you know why. When Hel’s spirit-winds transported your corpse and your unborn child to Helheim, your son’s corpse was transported, at my intervention, to me.”

  Bloodsong felt the chill of truth pour through her. “Monster! What have you done with my son?”

  Thokk smiled sweetly at Bloodsong and kept stroking her hair. Thokk laughed. “I wish to comfort you.” She stroked Bloodsong’s shoulder. “He is quite well, in my castle.”

  “He’s well?”

  New laughter came, but then for an instant the beauty of her face became the obscene mask of a demoness. She calmed herself, reached out, and began stroking Bloodsong’s hair again. “How I’ve longed to tell you about him. He’s a handsome, well-grown young man. I have healed him, you see. Helped him to grow.”

  “Thorbjorn is alive? He can’t be. I asked for his resurrection to be part of the bargain before I died Hel-praying, but Hel herself said that it wasn’t possible, that he’d been dead too long.”

  “Lokith is his name now. And no, he’s not actually alive. Not yet. But soon, when I introduce his sister to him, and when her first woman’s blood flows, he will taste of that sweet crimson draft and arise!”

  “No!” Bloodsong screamed, throwing herself against her ropes. “You will not make a Hel-monster out of my son!”

  “Monster?” Thokk a
sked, pretending shock.

  “Don’t let her do it, Kovna! Surely even you cannot condone such a thing! Do something to stop her! Torture and kill me, but don’t let her—”

  Kovna’s laughter stopped her. “I never thought you would ask for my help! Truly, my revenge is complete!”

  Bloodsong spit in his face. His fist came around and cracked into her jaw. She sagged, unconscious.

  “Curse you!” Thokk cried. “Leave me alone with her. Or do you wish to risk Hel’s wrath and my own?” Embers of purple fire flickered deep within the Hel-Witch’s eyes.

  Kovna stood his ground a moment longer, then he cursed and ordered his men to follow him as he strode away down the hill. At the bottom he stationed warriors to keep watch.

  Thokk controlled her anger, concentrated her will, traced Runes in the air, spoke a word of power.

  Bloodsong’s eyes slowly opened.

  “Warrior,” Thokk said with a smile, “you may yet see your son and daughter again. The choice is yours.”

  Bloodsong’s vision cleared. She looked for Kovna.

  “This is just between the two of us and the Goddess Hel,” Thokk assured her. “I have sent Kovna away.”

  Bloodsong stared into the Hel-Witch’s eyes. “Say what you will. I can’t stop you.”

  “Nor should you want to stop me. I have agreed to let Kovna have his revenge upon you, and I will keep my word. Your fate means little to me but much to my reluctant ally. I suppose, however, that you have many unpleasant days ahead of you, slowly dying here, of starvation and exposure, your bare flesh at the mercy of insects, birds, and other hungry—”

  “I look forward to their company.”

  “Of course you do! You have experienced it before. And at the end, when you know that death is near, there will again be whispers within your mind, the voice of Hel, though louder this time, now that She again has the power of the War Skull at Her command. Die Hel-praying when Hel bids it, Bloodsong. Become a Hel-warrior again, and in time you shall see Guthrun and Lokith once more.”