Someone had obviously given my battered wardrobe as much attention as they'd given me. My boots stood on the floor beside me, cleaned and polished, and the remnants of my pants hung on a nearby chair. While badly stained, they were patched and repaired with some sort of heavy grey cloth. My tattered shirt was missing. It had been replaced by a coarse peasant-type shirt of nondescript grey. Socks and underwear lay on top of this, laundered somehow. The rest of my gear was piled beside the chair, and from here it looked like nothing had been disturbed.
Easing carefully out of bed, I found that someone had also thoughtfully provided a chamber pot. I grinned. They might not be accustomed to living guests; but someone had remembered. I relieved myself gratefully; then slowly dressed. I was hungry again, and wondered if I could wrangle another meal before having to meet the mistress of the hall. A soft knock sounded at the door and I hastily zipped my fly.
"Uh, yeah, come on in; I don't think it's locked."
The door opened and Baldr stuck his head in. He grinned when he saw me.
"Good, you're up and about." He came in, leaving the door ajar, and nodded in satisfaction. "Much better. I hope you're feeling better as well as looking it?"
"Much, thanks. When's supper?"
He chuckled. "You really must have been half-starved."
"I was." I thrust my hands into my pockets, and regarded him seriously. "Do you have any idea how long it took me to get here?"
He shook his head. "No; I couldn't even guess. None of us can quite believe you managed it at all. Hel is most anxious to meet you."
"Huh. I'll bet she is."
She had to figure Odin was behind this. I just hoped I could convince her I wasn't a threat, to her, at least. Unpleasant as it sounded, she and I were mostly on the same side—against Odin. I hoped Baldr hadn't guessed the truth of that.
"Let me get my knife, and I'll be ready to go."
I strapped Gary's knife to my calf and felt a hum of approval go through my leg. Good—I wanted the Biter's backup in case things got unpleasant.
Baldr led the way through immense corridors, past closed and barred doors, until we came to a wooden door decorated with silver filigree. I didn't even try to make sense of the ghastly scenes depicted in that metalwork.
Baldr knocked, and a woman's voice, low and gravelly, answered, "Enter."
Baldr pushed open the heavy door and motioned for me to proceed. I stepped through, glad when Baldr followed. The room was lit by even ghastlier carvings than the main entrance hall. I carefully averted my gaze, not wanting to spoil her first impression of me by throwing up on her carpet. There were indeed carpets on the floor, knotted in intricate patterns from what looked like plaits of human hair.
The walls were hung with tapestries—also woven from hair—and with heavy furs of animals I didn't recognize. Strange carvings of bone and ivory stood on smaller tables and shelves, and one massive piece of furniture seemed to be a wardrobe for clothing. Briefly I wondered what Death wore. Another ghostly fire blazed in a fireplace which must've required regular harvesting of giant sequoias. A heavy table stood beside it, laid with one place setting.
The central fixture of the room, however, was a bed on a raised platform. Silver skulls—human ones—topped stout posts at all four corners. Hangings of shimmering cloth obscured the occupant I could just barely see. Death reclined at her ease.
"So, you are the man who dares enter my kingdom before his time."
Her Bette Davis voice didn't sound angry; just intrigued.
"Come closer. I would look at you."
Baldr nodded toward the bed, so I moved across the carpets and approached the shimmery hangings, not without considerable trepidation. Unlike Baldr, Hel was very much alive. Her voice came again, chill as the wind and sleet outside.
"My home appears to distress you. What would you have me dwell in? A shining, fairy-tale palace full of warmth and light? Once those things were mine; but those who banished me made certain such were taken from me forever. Instead I wield a terrible power, and do not miss such trivialities."
She moved behind the hangings, nothing more than a shadow and a voice.
"My table is set with Hunger and Famine. I repose at my leisure in the Sickbed you mortals dread. My draperies—do you not admire them, the way they shimmer and lure you? They are Glimmering Misfortune, shining with elusive promise until you are ensnared. Come closer, mortal—or have you already come too near and tangled yourself forever?"
The hangings billowed out. For an instant, I was engulfed in a smothering cold stench, like a slaughterhouse. I lunged backward, and found the Biter in my hand. The stench vanished, and I was free.
"Very good," she purred.
The draperies subsided. A slim white hand pulled them aside. A fetid smell of sickness assaulted my nostrils and sent me back still another step. The goddess rose gracefully and let the hangings drop back into place. I tried not to stare. Then sternly repressed an idiotic urge to grin. I seriously doubted she would appreciate being laughed at.
But... honestly... !
She was half black, half white. The colors split right down the center, from head to foot. And—God help me—she looked as if she'd stepped right out of the hammiest Star Trek episode ever filmed. Her dark right side was the deep ebony of southernmost Chad, with long, black hair intricately braided and knotted in an arrangement that fell to her waist. Her left side was fairer than Baldr, with masses of silvery-blond hair braided just as intricately as the right side. Where the two colors met at the crown of her head the braids were interwoven, forming a banded pattern that reminded me unpleasantly of snakeskin.
The gossamer thin veil she wore left absolutely nothing to the imagination, and was held in place only by a snarling wolf's-head brooch at one shoulder.
Her gaze caught mine, and all trace of amusement drained away, leaving me clutching the Biter with a sweaty hand. Her eyes were crimson. They glowed hot like coals. When she smiled, her teeth were sharp, white fangs. She was beautiful, in a terrifying, compelling fashion. I understood, deep in my gut, why men throughout the ages had been repelled by—yet fatally attracted to—the angel of death. I found myself wanting to embrace her, to stretch out on her pallid bed and let her come to me... .
The Biter flared in my grasp. A flash of brilliant green light reflected the anger that flashed abruptly through my whole being. Hel was playing games, and I was cast in the role of toy. I blinked sudden sweat from my eyes.
Hel smiled, and gestured as if to say, "You can't blame me for trying." I discovered that I was shaking.
Her voice was a sultry purr, like a self-satisfied cat, and her eyes glinted briefly.
"Enough amusement, for now. I can see that you are a strong hero, so there is little to gain by deception. Come, sit at my table."
"Unh-uh." I stayed right where I was.
"Baldr," she said, a trifle wearily.
"It's all right to sit down," he said from the shadows. "Just don't accept anything from her table and you'll be fine."
She gave Baldr a pained glance; then gestured us to chairs. We sat; she joined us. I kept my grip on Gary's knife, and it kept its grip on my arm. Hel lifted a goblet and drank deeply; then set it down and contemplated me again. Her expression was impossible to interpret, shadowed here and highlit there by the eerie glow of an orange sculpture suspended above her table. I glanced at it only long enough to determine that the carving showed something utterly unspeakable being done to a pregnant woman, then hastily averted my gaze.