Larson drew a sharp, terrified breath. He shied from the dead man and blundered into a tight pack of walking corpses. Their contact chilled him to the marrow; they seemed to drain the warmth of his very life essence. Their flesh gave like overripe fruit. Shocked and off-balance, Larson clawed through them and fell to one knee. The dead closed around him, staring silently, scowling or leering in murderous agony.
Larson screamed. Memory crowded in on him. But this time, his thoughts lacked the horrifying reality of his flashbacks. He knew who and where he was. Yet he surrendered to the saner world of images to escape the living death his mind could not accept. The dark stillness of Hel became the steamy murk of Vietnam, the muffled swish of Gaelinar's robe a slash of breeze through bamboo jungle. Al Larson stood in a silence of unmatched intensity, the one which can only exist after the mind-shattering explosion of a hidden mine. Blood stained the slender leaves in an arc. In its center, Private John Lewis lay, his face sallow and speckled with gore. His recognizable features ended below his abdomen; his pelvis and legs trailed like tattered streamers. The air hung heavy with the reek of ruptured bowel.
Now Larson flinched, the picture still vivid within him. He remembered how he stood in shocked sorrow. No matter how much death he witnessed, watching the slaughter of another friend never seemed to become easier. But, Lewis' eyes remained open, soulful and seeing. By all anatomical possibility, his hand could no longer function; nevertheless it seized Larson's ankle. Lewis'
voice emerged, weak yet frighteningly alive. "I'm hurt bad, huh?"
Larson recalled how his stomach lurched and he dared not speak for fear he might scream or cry, run or puke. He managed a short nod.
"Al." Lewis' fingers tightened spasmodically on Larson's shin then fell away. "I'm going home, right? They're gonna ship me back."
Larson felt the horrified gazes of the entire patrol at his back and wished someone would say something… anything. They had all helped injured companions before, but this was different. For all his movement and speech, Lewis was dead. Nothing any doctor could do would change that fact, and the only one who seemed unable to comprehend it was Lewis' own broken, bloodless body.
Larson remembered how he had gathered a courage he'd never believed he had. He knelt at his friend's side, caught the cold, blood-slicked hand, and met glazing brown eyes. "Yeah, buddy." Larson kept his face composed. "You're going home."
Lewis' eyes swept closed. His mouth twitched into a smile which remained until his last drop of life seeped into the jungle floor.
Now, surrounded by corpses in Hel's dank hall, Larson tapped the gentle strength of his memory. The dead studied him with fearless curiosity. Yet they did not reach to touch him nor open their mouths to speak. Unlike the phantoms of the movies, these ghosts appeared to have no designs against the living. Rather it seemed as if they sought to recapture some memory of the upper worlds and the individual existences they once took for granted.
Gaelinar wove through a gap in the crowd. His almond-hued skin and Oriental features seemed oddly out of place amidst the blackly-rotted flesh and wraith's pallor of Hel's dead. The agile movements which belied his advancing age and the brilliant gold of his clothing made him appear a caricature. With an impatient wave of his arm, he summoned Larson to him.
Larson came gladly, noting as he did that the dead separated to open a lane and allow his passage. They had not tried to harm him, he realized. Rather, he had stumbled into them. As warmth filtered back into his being with the painful slowness of thawing frostbite, he harbored no wish to make physical contact with these corpses again.
Gaelinar turned a disapproving glare on Larson. He spoke in a grating whisper. "I told you not to speak to them."
"Speak?" Larson was incredulous. "I didn't speak, I screamed. And it wasn't on purpose."
Gaelinar whirled and strode deeper into the hallway. "Someday, hero, you must learn self-control."
Control! Larson trailed Gaelinar, not bothering to voice his annoyance. In the past two weeks, I died, was hunted, had my thoughts violated by wizards and warring gods, fell in love with a woman then killed her, assassinated a god, and destroyed the only world I used to know. There was no longer any doubt in Larson's mind. When God… He amended. When gods created Gaelinar, they ran out of fear, so they substituted extra intolerance. He snorted, sending the animated cadavers scuttling from his path.
Farther down the hallway, Hel's citadel opened into a huge, unfurnished room. A chandelier hung crookedly from the ceiling. Thick mist obscured the metal work so it appeared like a handful of intertwined snakes frozen for eternity. Half of the eight candles had burned out; the others danced in the breeze from the doorway, shedding scarcely enough light to delineate the granite blocks which composed the ceiling. In the entry way, first Gaelinar, then Larson, came upon a throne pushed against one wall, its jeweled magnificence dwarfed by the sad-faced man perched upon it. There was no mold or decay upon this visage. It seemed ageless and timeless, and splendor fairly radiated from it. Beside him sat a woman every bit as well-kept, but her beauty paled in comparison, though she seemed to bear at least as heavy a burden as her companion.
Larson paused, thinking these might be the gods they had come to see. But Gaelinar shook his head and led Larson a little farther into the chamber. The corpses remained huddled and attentive in the portal, but not one crossed into the partially illuminated room. The Kensei stopped and pointed into the cross corridor. "That's her."
Larson squinted as a figure approached through the mist. "Hel?"
Gaelinar nodded. "Queen of the realm she was named for. Choose your words with care, hero."
Larson watched as Hel crept toward them, advancing so slowly, he was uncertain if she moved at all. "Me? I'm going to talk to her?"
"Who else?"
Larson frowned, thinking the answer too obvious for him to bother replying. Nervously, he traced the gold and silver designs on the hilt of the sword he had claimed from Loki's corpse. He gathered breath to protest, but his words were never spoken. In the eon it took Hel to come before them, he realized what Gaelinar had pieced together long ago. I killed Silme. I won't be able to live with myself unless my own efforts either win her back or lose her forever. Throughout the trip from Midgard to Hel, grief, guilt, and disbelief had haunted Larson too hard for him to consider the persuasions he might use to charm the goddess who owned Silme's soul.
Hel came before her guests while Larson still brooded. Her face was crinkled and jowly, frozen into an eternal grimace of gloom. She was naked. Above the waist, she looked as normal as any living woman, small breasted, her skin pink and supple as an infant's. But her thighs and legs appeared green-black with decay. Her expression never changed as her eyes flickered over Larson and Gaelinar. She spoke so sluggishly, her words emerged shorter than the pauses between them. "Dead… or alive. Neither… of you… belongs… here."
Larson glanced sideways at Gaelinar, seeking some clue to the correct formalities when addressing the queen of the underworld. But Gaelinar remained still, his gaze fixed on Hel, his face impassive. Still uncertain, Larson considered bowing or kneeling, and settled on a simple nod of acknowledgement. "Your majesty, we've come to ask a favor."
Hel shifted her weight, meeting Larson's request with a strained and overlong silence. Then, she replied with the maddening tedium of a dripping faucet. "I… make… no bargains… with… the living. Even… dead… elves… do not… belong…"
Larson found not completing the goddess' sentences an effort in restraint.
"… here," Hel finished. "Go away." Her stolid features did not betray a hint of the emotion her words implied.