The Age Of Odin

Fifty-Seven

We built a funeral pyre through the night and set it alight at sunrise.

Odin's body was laid out on a raised wooden platform, a bier, and beneath it logs and branches were stacked up and doused with engine oil.

He looked at peace, lying on his back, hands clasped on his chest. His hat was placed over his belly to hide the bullet holes. Frigga lovingly arranged his hair so as to cover his lost eye.

"He was always so self-conscious about that," she said, to anyone and no one. "He didn't like it being obvious, what he'd sacrificed in order to gain knowledge." A bitter laugh. "I can't see why, since we all knew. But vanity was among his shortcomings. The least of them, but there nonetheless."

To Thor fell the honour of igniting the pyre. There was no squabbling about this among the sons. All were aware that their father had had a favourite. It couldn't be helped. That was just how Odin had been — not always fair, not necessarily impartial — although none of them had ever for a moment doubted his love.

Thor carried a flaming torch to the pyre, and it was awful to see him weeping. So huge in stature, but stooped now, shrunken, humbled by grief, his beard silvered with tears. He touched the trembling torch to the wood, and fire leapt from the stacked lumber.

Huginn and Muninn had, until this moment, been stationed on the bier. I wouldn't have said they were actually in mourning for their master. They'd just hung about near his body, shuffling up and down beside it, as if at a loss for anything else to do. Sometimes they'd arch their wings and let out a doleful awwwrrkk! or preen each other as if for comfort.

Once the fire started, the ravens took to the air. They flew away like two black souls, disappearing into the redness of the cold, bloated new sun. I doubted we'd ever see them again. Odin had been concerned about who would feed them after he was gone, but they would fend for themselves. Without him animating them, lending them his voice and mind, they were nothing special now, just birds. Nobody else would have the same rapport with them as he did, so it was right that they go off and spend the rest of their lives doing whatever ravens normally liked to do.

The flames coiled up the logs, sparking and spitting. In no time at all they were crowding around the base of the bier. They surged onwards and upwards as though jet-blasted, roaring through the wooden latticework on which Odin lay and latching greedily on to his clothing. As his corpse began to roast, Frigga fell to her knees with a hoarse sob of anguish. Sif and Freya went to her side and caressed her shuddering shoulders. Everyone else dropped their heads, and embers and smoke rose spiralling into the sky.

Some time later, when the fire had begun to ebb, Bragi announced he was going to recite a memorial ode. Nobody groaned, as was usually the case when a Bragi poem was in the offing. A respectful hush fell.

Eyes red-rimmed, he began. The poem was short, to the point, and rather touching.

As the sun rises, another sun sets.

You shone a light. Now a darkness descends.

Odin, All-Father, in woe and regret

Your soul to High Heaven we humbly commend.

You were the sly one, the wily one, wolf.

You learned and, in learning, learned pain -

A pain that you shared with none but yourself.

Your wisdom you put to good gain.

You were the war god, the furious cry,

The patron of warrior lust,

Looking with favour on those who would die

For causes both noble and just.

Your judgement might waver, your temper might flare,

You were often aloof and apart,

But never in doubt — and beyond all compare -

Was the stoical strength of your heart.

O father, my father, All-Father, you fought

With bravery here, and you won.

And now we whose lives your self-sacrifice bought

Will continue the work you've begun.

This, as your body succumbs to cremation,

We solemnly, dutifully, fiercely maintain -

That Asgard, our home, our snow-fastened nation,

Shall never be conquered while Aesir remain.

"And Vanir!" Freya shouted.

"And us!" added one of the troops, and others agreed. "Yeah! And us!"

All at once a great massed chorus of devotion and loyalty rose up. I would have joined in, except for the fact that Odin wasn't the only one who had died defending Asgard last night and this rankled with me. Baz's body still lay out there with Fenrir, and was he getting the state funeral, the poetic oration, the pomp and circumstance, the standing ovation? Not a bit of it.

Baz wasn't Odin, of course, and his death wasn't nearly such a big deal, certainly not as far as the Aesir were concerned. Odin had been the main man, the commander in chief, the guiding light, top of the pyramid. Baz had been just another footsoldier; a pawn, not a king.

But he would still be missed, and in a way it was even worse that he'd lost his life stopping the mega-tank, because Asgard wasn't his native soil. There'd been far less at stake for him personally, meaning he'd given up more.

Backdoor'd told me how it had happened.

"Stuck his neck out too far," he'd said. "We were placing the charges on the cab of that thing, and I told him to be careful, keep low. I told him. But he just didn't listen. Leaned out. Got just inside the arc of fire from one of the turrets. Got ripped apart."

I looked over at him now. Last night, spattered freshly with Baz's blood, he'd seemed shellshocked by the experience. Said he couldn't remember much after Baz bought it. He'd set the fuses, scrambled off Fenrir, run for the trees, all on autopilot, numb.

He looked okay this morning, however. Everybody around him was chanting and cheering, reaffirming their commitment to the cause. It was a collective declaration of defiance, a way of coming to terms with the momentous blow we'd received, and Backdoor was giving it as much welly as anyone.

And that just did it for me. Something inside went snap.

I didn't believe Backdoor's account of events. I didn't believe a word that came out of that muttonchopped gob of his. Not any more.

It wasn't the time or place to have this thing out, but I couldn't wait a moment longer.

I stormed over to him, butting people aside.

"You!"

He blinked at me. "Gid?"

"You — you self-satisfied little turd. I've had it up to here with you."

Around us the crowd started to go quiet. Fire-bright gazes turned.

"What is this?" Backdoor said. Captain fucking Innocent. "What's the matter?"

"What's the —!? I'll tell you what the matter bloody is, sunshine. You. You're the fucking matter."

"Gid, I've no idea what's got into you, but — "

I lunged closer to him. Our noses were almost brushing. "I wasn't sure it was you, at first. Utgard. Chopsticks. I reckoned it could all just have been a terrible accident. I thought I'd give you the benefit of the doubt. No proof, no witnesses. Maybe Chops did just discharge his weapon by mistake. But then, with Baz… I should've known better. I shouldn't have left you alone with him in a combat situation, but I wanted you off my back. The engine room job was too important to have you come along and wreck it for us somehow."

"Gid, please, why don't you calm down?"

"Calm down!"

"This is an emotional time. For all of us. You're tired, you're not thinking clearly. I'm not even sure what you're getting at."

"You!" I bellowed. "You, is what I'm getting at."

Now nobody else was talking. The only sound, other than Backdoor's and my voices, was the snap-crackle-pop of the pyre.

"You," I went on, "have been fucking with us all along. You got Chops killed and the rest of us nearly as well. You also got Baz killed. I don't know how you did it, but my bet would be you shoved him in the way of those guns."

"Shoved him… Why the hell would I do that?"

"Because you're here to sabotage us. You've been sent by Loki. You're his inside man."

"Loki?" And he laughed. The nerve of him. Fucking traitor. Laughing in my face. "I've got nothing to do with Loki. Never had. Never even seen him, except on telly when he's, you know, her. This is absurd, Gid. I can't believe I'm hearing any of this."

"Believe it, you tosser. You even admitted you fancy Mrs Keener."

"So what? Who doesn't? Okay, yes, I did fancy her, but not after I found out who she really is. If that's your basis for all this shit you're accusing me of doing, it's pretty flimsy, I've got to say."

"Also, when I first met you, you described yourself as sneaky."

"Well, I am. It was hardly a confession."

"Blatant. Rubbing our noses in it."

Backdoor laughed again, this time for the benefit of our audience: Are you hearing this unmitigated bollocks? "You know what? You're insane. That's what you are. Going around saying I've murdered my own teammates. Insane. That IED that put a hole in your head, it's done a complete number on you." He reached out and tapped my skull where the titanium plate was. "Inside here, it's all clowns and monkeys."

He shouldn't have done that.

"You shouldn't have done that," I told him.

"You shouldn't be calling me a traitor," he replied.

I swung for him. But Backdoor knew me well enough by now. Knew what I was like. The punch was predictable and he saw it coming and got up a forearm block. I craned back my head, planning to nut him on the bridge of his nose. Something nudged against my groin, and I froze.

"Ah-ah-ah," Backdoor said, shaking his head and grinning.

I didn't need to look down. He had a gun to my balls.

"Bastard," I hissed.

"What part of 'sneaky' do you not understand? You could take me in a fair fight, Gid, no question. Cream me. So why would I be so stupid as to let this be a fair fight?"

"Put it away. Let's deal with this like men."

"Isn't that what we're doing? Just as different kinds of men. You your way, me mine."

I tensed. "I'll — "

He jabbed the pistol firmly into my crown jewels, and I tried not to wince. "You'll do nothing, unless you'd like to be singing soprano for the rest of your life. Just stand still and give me what I want, which is an apology and a retraction. You don't go around calling somebody a traitor unless you have evidence. You don't have any, only a couple of half-baked theories. You've just false-accused me and you need to take it back."

"Not going to happen. I know what I know. And being the guy who's threatening to blow my balls off is hardly helping your case, is it? Sign of guilt, to my mind."

"I'm defending my reputation," Backdoor said. "Surely if I just let you beat me up, wouldn't that be more suspicious? Whereas this" — he ground the gun harder still into my nethers — "is me publicly and robustly telling you I deny everything and you can go fuck yourself."

"And this," said Freya in his ear, "is me telling you to put the gun away or you'll be the one singing soprano."

She'd crept up behind him silent as a panther, and her hunting knife was between his legs. Backdoor didn't realise it at first, until she nodded her head downward and he followed her gaze to find the blade poking out from under his crotch.

"You wouldn't," he breathed.

"Try me."

Backdoor went up on tiptoes, and the knife rose with him, blade keeping light contact with the zipper of his trousers. He searched Freya's face, and something there told him she wasn't fooling around. He hesitated. Then I felt the pressure of gun against genitalia ease. He raised the pistol with his finger outside the trigger guard, showing Freya he meant no harm.

"I'd never really have done it," he said. "I was only bluffing."

"That makes one of us," she replied. She withdrew the knife.

"But the fact remains, I'm not what Gid says I am. He's lying."

"For what it's worth, I agree. Not about the lying, but I think he's mistaken. You're not acting like someone with something to hide. Your declarations of innocence have the ring of truth."

"There," Backdoor said to me, and to everyone else. "One of the Vanir believes me. I reckon that's enough to clear my name." Smug triumph was written all over his face, which made me yearn even more to plant a fist in it.

I probably would have, but Freya saw what was brewing and held up a hand to me like a policeman stopping traffic. "Gid. Back down. You've embarrassed yourself enough as it is. No need to add idiocy to the list of offences."

"But — "

"It is the All-Father's funeral," she said tightly. "You shame his memory with these boneheaded melodramatics of yours."

"But Backdoor — "

"— deserves the apology he's asked for. Give it to him now." She leaned close and whispered so that only I could hear: "One pair of balls is much the same as another to me. I don't value yours that highly."

She wasn't joking. The knife was still in her hand.

"Backdoor," I said. "Sorry." I didn't mean it.

He shrugged. "Bygones." He didn't mean it either.

"I jumped to conclusions." I still think you got Chops and Baz killed.

"Easily done. We're under stress." You fucking wankstain.

He moved off. I'd be watching him closer than ever from now on. He knew that. I'd make sure, too, that I never turned my back on him. And he'd damn well better make sure he never turned his back on me.

Slowly the crowd started to disperse. The pyre was a heap of blackened, twisted wood, licked here and there by pale flame. What was left of Odin lay amongst it, indistinguishable.

I turned to Freya, who was sheathing her knife.

"Okay, maybe I could have timed that better," I began, "but…"

"Don't expect forgiveness," she said, head averted from me. "I'm not that kind of deity."

"I've never assumed you are. Still, you stood up for me just now. That's something."

"No. I helped you out only so as to end an impasse and defuse an awkward situation. Don't read anything more into it than that."

"You saved my bacon — by threatening to cut off his."

"Humour won't redeem you," she said, stony-faced. "Especially when it's as inappropriate as yours always is. Do you not appreciate the seriousness of our predicament? Odin is dead. We've lost our leader. And Loki will have plenty more surprises up his sleeve."

"More Thunderbirds-type machines like the tank?"

"Oh, undoubtedly. And without Odin to marshal us, exhort us, maintain morale and focus when the going gets tough — "

She was interrupted by a cry.

Someone nearby had just collapsed. Heimdall. Grief-stricken, it seemed, just as Frigga had been. He rolled on the ground and his hands were pawing at the sides of his head. It looked like he was tearing his hair out.

Then I realised. Not grief. Agony.

"My ears!" he gasped. "My… they… aaaarrrghh!!"

I frowned at Freya. Her expression was as perplexed as mine.

"I can't hear a sausage," I said.

"It's coming!" Heimdall yelled. Blood oozed between his fingers. "It's… I can't bear it! Help me! Help! It's coming! Screaming. So low… So loud…"

And then he fainted.