The pony had halted, its muzzle almost touching Shea’s coat. The man on the animal’s back straightened suddenly so that Shea could see he was very tall indeed, a perfect giant. But before he had time to note anything more he felt himself caught and held with an almost physical force by that single eye. A stab of intense, burning cold seemed to run through him, inside his head, as though his brain had been pierced by an icicle. He felt rather than heard a voice which demanded, «Are you trying to stop me, niggeling?»
For his life, Shea could not have moved anything but his lips. «N—no,» he stammered. «That is, I just wondered if you could tell me how I could get somewhere where it’s warm —»
The single eye held him unblinkingly for a few seconds. Shea felt that it was examining his inmost thoughts. Then the man slumped a trifle so that the brim of his hat shut out the glare and the deep voice was muffled. «I shall be tonight at the house of the bonder Sverre, which is the Crossroads of the World. You may follow.» The wind whipped a fold of his blue cloak, and as it did so there came, apparently from within the cloak itself, a little swirl of leaves. One clung for a moment to the front of Shea’s coat. He caught it with numbed fingers, and saw it was an ash leaf, fresh and tender with the bright green of spring — in the midst of this howling wilderness, where only arctic scrub oak grew!
Shea let the pony pass and fell in behind, head down, collar up, hands deep in pockets, squinting against the snowflakes. He was too frozen to think clearly, but he tried. The logical formulas had certainly thrown him into another world. But he hardly needed the word of Old Whiskers that it was not Ireland. Something must have gone haywire in his calculations. Could he go back and recheck them? No — he had not the slightest idea at present what might have been on those six sheets of paper. He would have to make the best of his situation.
But what world had he tumbled into? A cold, bleak one, inhabited by small, shaggy ponies and grim old blue-eyed men with remarkable eyes. It might be the world of Scandinavian mythology. Shea knew very little about such a world, except that its No. 1 guy was someone named Odinn, or Woden, or Wotan, and there was another god named Thor who threw a sledge hammer at people he disliked.
Shea’s scientific training made him doubt whether he would actually find these gods operating as gods, with more-than-human powers; or, for that matter, whether he would see any fabulous monsters. Still, that stab of cold through his head and that handful of ash leaves needed explaining. Of course, the pain in his head might be an indication of incipient pneumonia, and Old Whiskers might make a habit of carrying ash leaves in his pockets. But still — The big black birds were keeping up with them. They didn’t seem afraid, nor did they seem to mind the ghastly weather.
It was getting darker, though in this landscape of damp blotting paper Shea could not tell whether the sun had set. The wind pushed at him violently, forcing him to lean into it; the mud on the path was freezing, but not quite gelid. it had collected in yellow gobs on his boots. He could have sworn the boots weighed thirty pounds apiece, and they had taken in water around the seams, adding clammy socks to his discomfort. A clicking sound, like a long roll of castanets, made him wonder until he realized it was caused by his own teeth.
He seemed to have been walking for days, though he knew it could hardly be a matter of hours. Reluctantly he took one hand from his pocket and gazed at his wrist watch. It read 9.36; certainly wrong. When he held the watch to a numbed ear he discovered it had stopped. Neither shaking nor winding could make it start.
He thought of asking his companion the time, but realized that the rider would have no more accurate idea than himself. He thought of asking how much farther they had to go. But he would have to make himself heard over the wind, and the old boy’s manner did not encourage questions.
They plodded on. The snow was coming thickly through the murky twilight. Shea could barely make out the figure before him. The path had become the same neutral grey as everything else. The weather was turning colder. The snowflakes were dry and hard, stinging and bouncing where they struck. Now and then an extra puff of wind would snatch a cloud of them from the moor, whirling it into Shea’s face. He would shut his eyes to the impact, and when he opened them find he had blundered off the path and have to scurry after his guide.
Light. He pulled the pack around in front of him and fumbled in it till he felt the icy touch of the flashlight’s metal. He pulled it out from under the other articles and pressed the switch button. Nothing happened, nor would shaking, slapping, or repeated snappings of the switch produce any result.
In a few minutes it would be too dark for him to follow the man on the pony by sight alone. Whether the old boy liked it
or not. Shea would have to ask the privilege of holding a corner of his cloak as a guide.
It was just as he reached this determination that something in the gait of the pony conveyed a sense of arrival. A moment more and the little animal was trotting, with Shea stumbling and skidding along the fresh snow behind as he strove to keep pace. The pack weighed tons, and he found himself gasping for breath as though he were running up a forty-five-degree angle instead of on an almost level path.
Then there was a darker patch in the dark-grey universe. Shea’s companion halted the pony and slid off. A rough-hewn timber door loomed through the storm, and the old man banged against it with his fist. it opened, flinging a flood of yellow light out across the snow. The old man stepped into the gap, his cloak vividly blue in the fresh illumination.
Shea, left behind, croaked a feeble «Hey!» just managing to get his foot in the gap of the closing door. It opened full out and a man in a baggy homespun tunic peered out at him, his face rimmed with drooping whiskers. «Well?»
«May I c-c-come in?»
«Umph,» said the man. «Come on, come on. Don’t stand there letting the cold in!»
THREE
Shea stood in a kind of entryhall, soaking in the delicious warmth. The vestibule was perhaps six feet deep. At its far end a curtain of skins had been parted to permit the passage of the old man who preceded him. The bonder Sverre — Shea supposed this would be his host — pulled them still wider. «Lord, use this as your own house, now and forever,» he murmured with the perfunctory hurry of a man repeating a formula like «Pleased to meet you.»
The explorer of universes ducked under the skins and into a long hall panelled in dark wood. At one end a fire blazed, apparently in the centre of the floor, though bricked round to knee height. Around it were a number of benches and tables. Shea caught a glimpse of walls hung with weapons — a huge sword, nearly as tall as he was, half a dozen small spears or javelins, their delicate steel points catching ruddy high lights from the torches in brackets; a kite-shaped shield with metal overlay in an intricate pattern —
No more than a glimpse. Sverre had taken him by the arm and conducted him through another door, shouting; «Aud! Hallgerda! This stranger’s half frozen. Get the steam room ready. Now, stranger, you come with me.»
Down a passage to a smaller room, where the whiskered man ordered him: «Get off those wet clothes. Strange garments you have. I’ve never seen so many buttons and clasps in all my days. If you’re one of the Sons of Muspellheim, I’ll give you guesting for the night. But I warn you for tomorrow there be men not far from here who would liefer meet you with a sword than a handclasp.» He eyed Shea narrowly a moment. «Be you of Muspellheim?»
Shea fenced: «What makes you think that?»