They escorted me into the press of crowding Einherjar. A swelling roar gathered as men beat empty flagons on tabletops. I heard shouts of encouragement and last-minute advice. The noise level mounted deafeningly, beating against us with near-physical force, and still we moved down endless lines of tables. When at last we gained the cavernous doorway, the maelstrom of noise died away behind us, and a mad scramble for the best vantage point came in its place.
I blinked and paused for an instant on the threshold.
"What is it?" Rangrid asked tersely.
"Uh... nothing," I muttered. Hastily, I strode forward before the Einherjar—jammed into the doorway behind us—could trample our heels. Yesterday, when we'd come in through a different door, we'd ridden up across a broad plain. Beyond this door were rocky hills, muddy valleys, and twisting, treacherous little gorges with angry white water snarling through stony riverbeds. The size of the Valhall staggered the imagination. Useful for battle training, though...
Odin waited atop a barren ridge, seated on Sleipnir. The horse bore the brunt of his temper. Sleipnir tossed his head fretfully. There was blood in the foam at his muzzle. Odin constantly jerked the bit in his mouth. It was a lousy way to treat a valuable horse. I was a little surprised Sleipnir stood for it. Even from here, I could see the war-horse's eyes rolling white.
I narrowed my own eyes. Did he mean to fight from Sleipnir? A man on foot was at a bad enough disadvantage against a man on horseback; but Sleipnir's little trick of popping in and out of reality left me with sinking apprehension in my belly.
Well, I hadn't expected a fair fight, and I knew a trick or two that might just startle a cavalryman into a fatal error.
When I heard a familiar, spine-chilling howl, I turned, badly startled. Further down the ridgeline, where the vantage was best, was Fenrir. He snarled wildly at the end of his chain. A one-handed man held grimly onto the quivering fetter. Each time the wolf lunged, Tyr's shoulder and arm strained to hold him. I wouldn't have thought Tyr would get anywhere near Fenrir again. The wolf had bitten off his other hand the day they'd chained him.
Just beyond Fenrir's slavering reach, Thor swung his short-handled maul as though it were a jackhammer. He was busy driving the boulder that pegged Fenrir's chain deep into the earth.
Tyr, struggling to hold the wolf, bellowed, "Hurry the hell up, Thor! The bloody fight's about to start."
Thor grunted sharply and finished the job. He stepped back, and nodded once. Tyr let go the chain. Fenrir's snarled cry set up a nearly subliminal resonance through the sword blade jammed into his jaws. I pressed a hand against my skull bones and shook my head against the painful sound. Tyr lunged out of Fenrir's way, then strolled closer, chatting animatedly with Thor. The red-haired god, I noted dourly, watched me narrowly and caressed his war hammer Mjollnir. Fenrir gave one final snarl, then turned his baleful green eyes on me.
He whined piteously.
I growled under my breath. Odin was one sadistic son-of-a-bitch.
I turned my gaze away, sickened. We'd stopped in a broad, shallow valley below the Fenris Wolf's vantage point. Rangrid turned to me.
"Fight well, hero," she murmured. She drew me close. Her lips were warm and trembling against mine. "Take the kiss of Rangrid Shield-Destroyer into battle." I thought for an instant she was going to cry. Then she shook her hair back, lifted her chin in the motion I'd come to recognize, and stepped back.
I stood alone in the valley.
As alone as a live human can be surrounded by more dead men than Genghis Khan had left in his wake.
The air trembled with the swelling noise from tens of thousands of throats: "O... din! O... din! O... din!"
Tyr had squatted down comfortably on his haunches up on the ridgeline. Thor was beginning to grin. Odin shook a heavy war spear above his head in a gesture of confidence. Numbing sound rolled over us, stirring the blood—his hot, mine cold.
I knew, of course, what he held. It wasn't just a spear, any more than Sleipnir was just an eight-legged horse. The weapon was called Gungnir. The dwarves had presented it to him as a gesture of obeisance.
Gungnir never missed its mark.
Never.
As Odin held Gungnir on high, the tumult gradually died away. Silence stretched taut.
"Einherjar," Odin said. He spoke without raising his voice; yet I knew that even the farthest, dimmest ranks lost in the misty distance heard him clearly, so profound was the silence.
"There has come to Valhalla a living mortal"—cripes, was that the only speech he knew?—"who has challenged your Valfather to personal combat. His courage is great."
Odin's sneer revealed what he really thought of me; but he was wary of saying it after his comeuppance in front of these men.
"Before the sun sets on our feasting, he will join you as brother. Honor to him! Honor to you all! Let battle be joined!"
A shock wave blasted through the valley, a spontaneous, inchoate deluge of noise from the Einherjar. Odin hooked his leg over Sleipnir's withers and slid easily to the ground. He was fighting on foot, thank God. With sweating fingers I dragged my sword from its sheath. Odin might call me a silver-tongued son of Loki, but I was one helluva worried one. I knew all too well what my odds of success were. Somewhere behind me, I heard some poor fool betting money on me; and abruptly felt better.
Then there was no time left to worry about anything.
Odin strode down the ridgeline, not quite loping. I considered whether to let the bastard come to me, or carry the fight to him. He had the reach of me, armed with a spear against my sword. Odin held his weapon in the classic bayonet assault position as he closed the distance. His right hand gripped the haft just above the butt, with the butt end tucked between elbow and hip. He grasped the haft farther toward the deadly iron point with the other hand, ready to jab or charge.
I watched his narrowed bloody red eye for any betraying movement that would telegraph his intent. He squinted slightly... .
And charged.
I shifted into a classic right guard, with my right side toward him, sword ready in front of me. Odin drove forward, like a freight train on full steam. The iron spear point never wavered a millimeter from true. He was driving Gungnir straight toward my center of mass. At the last possible second, with the glittering sharp tip a hairbreadth from my skin, I shifted hard left. Gungnir's point passed harmlessly behind my shoulder.
Before I had time to be shocked that Gungnir had missed, I seized the haft. I shoved the spear point down hard, driving it into the ground with Odin's own momentum. Odin stumbled. I leaped clear. A booming wave of sound rolled over us.
Odin ripped the point free and charged again.
I dropped into left guard, left side toward him.
This time when he rushed past my shoulder, I deflected the spear haft upward with the flat of my sword. I dropped the blade instantly, and grabbed Gungnir with both hands. Again using his own momentum, I shoved the spear shaft straight up and back over Odin's shoulder. Gungnir's razor-edged point windmilled in a circle. Odin was forced to let go. He howled in pain as his arm was wrenched beyond its normal range of motion.
I couldn't hear my own panting breath above the thunderous noise. The point came down hard behind Odin. The spear which could not miss, had. Twice.
And now it was mine.
He twisted blindly around, his mouth agape as I grasped the haft and swung the point around at his exposed side—