The Sleeping Army (5 page)

There was a flash of movement, and Alfi had returned.

‘Njord's palace, and Freyja's, and Sif's … none of them exist any more,' said Alfi, panting. ‘It's all just rubble and ruins.'

‘Where is everyone?' said Freya.

They ignored her.

‘Master! Master!' shouted Roskva. ‘Master! Are you here?'

There was a rusty upturned chariot, half-buried in the dirt, choked with weeds. A twisted rope of silver tarnished black lay beside it.

Roskva prodded her brother.

‘That's our Master's!' she hissed.

‘No,' said Alfi. ‘It can't be …' He picked up the silver reins and scraped at the tarnish, revealing traces of the interwoven pattern. Then he nodded.

‘Roskva, what are we going to do? Do you think we're too late?'

Roskva twisted her hands. Freya noticed how old and wrinkled and calloused they were. More like the hands of an old woman than a girl. Her nails were bitten.

‘Could the Gods be –
dead
?' Alfi whispered the last word as if terrified he would be overheard.

Roskva laughed. ‘The Gods are immortal.'

‘Something's happened,' said Alfi.

‘We've seen no burial mounds,' said Roskva.

‘Maybe there was a fire … maybe the Gods have gone somewhere else …'

‘But that doesn't explain … all this,' said Roskva.
‘This is so much worse … How much time has passed since we were here?'

Alfi shrugged. ‘How can I answer that?'

‘I know things were bad, but …' Roskva trailed off.

‘If no one's here then I'll be going home,' said Freya. She felt angry and frightened.

‘You're going nowhere, hornblower,' said Roskva.

‘Since when are you my boss?' said Freya.

Roskva waved her hands as if she were brushing off an ant.

‘You know nothing, little girl!' hissed Roskva. ‘You are part of something much bigger than you can imagine.'

Little girl? Freya opened her mouth to protest.

‘We'll argue about this later,' said Roskva. ‘Let's go to the Well. If any of the Immortals are still here, that's where they'll be.'

‘The Gods hold court at the Well of Urd under Yggdrasil every day to pass judgement,' Alfi told Freya as they walked through the weeds towards the tallest, widest, most enormous tree she'd ever seen or imagined. Dead ivy coiled round its withered trunk. The towering tree hurtled into the heavens higher than she could see, wider than a street of houses, wider than Buckingham Palace. Its leafless branches fanned out across the sky.

‘Roskva and I came here every day with our Master. He lived so far away in Asgard we had to wade across many rivers to get here. But we did it. The Master was always moving, always travelling, always fighting and bellowing. It was hard to keep up with him.'

They walked to the sacred Well of Fate beneath one of the roots of the world tree. Reverently, Freya brushed her hand along the rough bark of the great ash, which loomed above the holy place of the Gods. Her fingers tingled as she felt the tree's faint pulse.

Freya stood in the middle of a circle of intricately carved, ivory-white stones, their seats worn smooth. Tracery lines of runes were etched along the bottom. Moss and grasses grew around them. At the centre was a large pool with glinting blue-black water, nestling under the root of the giant ash tree. A single shaft of sunlight lit up the well.

There was a hushed silence. Freya felt the power of the place.

‘That's where the great god Frey sat,' said Alfi, pointing to the stone seat still decorated with the outline of a giant boar. ‘And that's the All-Father's High Seat. His wife Frigg sat beside him. Baldr the Fair and Heimdall over there. And the beautiful goddess Freyja, Frey's sister, across from Woden and
his wife. Our Master Thor and his wife Sif sat here. Roskva and I stood behind him in case he needed us.'

Freya walked to the pool and knelt down to peer into the inky depths. She picked up a small stone and was about to drop it in when Roskva gasped and stopped her.

‘That's a sacred well,' she said. ‘The Well of Fate. You don't just throw things in it.'

‘Oh,' said Freya. She stepped back as if the well had caught fire. ‘I just wanted to see how deep it was.'

‘She didn't mean any harm,' said Alfi. ‘Remember when all this was new to you too, Roskva.'

Roskva scowled. Freya thought for a wild moment how nice it would be to dump Roskva down the well.

Roskva scooped up a handful of water and sprinkled it on the bark of the giant tree. Yggdrasil shuddered and jolted, and a burst of dark green leaves appeared on the lower branches.

‘Well? What do we do now?' said Freya.

‘About bloody time,' hissed a voice beside her.

‘What took you so long?' rasped another.

Freya jumped. She looked around, but saw nothing. Roskva tensed.

‘We've been waiting centuries for you,' moaned a peevish voice behind her.

The shadows fluttered. Freya saw ghosts rise from the earth and the rocks and shuffle towards her, tottering creatures of twilight and dew, more like walking air than living beings. Freya could hear bones creaking, like rusty wheels trying to turn again. She smelled mould and damp, as if the lid of an old trunk filled with moth-eaten rags had suddenly been lifted.

Roskva gasped. She clutched Alfi's arm. Snot growled.

Alfi nudged her. ‘That's Heimdall,' he murmured, pointing to a wizened spectre babbling to himself as he rocked back and forth. ‘Oh Thor, that's the guardian of the Gods. Roskva. Look at him. He's worse than Grandpa was …'

The wispy, flickering shadows gathered in the stone circle under Yggdrasil's withered root. The dying Gods were assembling to hold their court.

A crippled, shrivelled wraith hunched on the highest stone seat. His single eye glittered faintly beneath a few threads hanging down from what was once a wide-brimmed hat. Fragments of a blue mantle clung to the bones jutting out from his emaciated body.

Snot fell to the ground.

‘Bow!' hissed Roskva, flinging herself down. Alfi
did the same. Freya copied. She tried to stop her hands shaking.

‘Who is that old guy?' she whispered.

‘The All-Father,' murmured Alfi. ‘Hide your eyes.' Freya obeyed. Her heart was pounding.

It was impossible. How could this doddery, broken-backed wreck be Woden the Much-Wise, Father of Magic, Giver of Victory, Lord of Poetry? Freya glimpsed the stone seat beneath his transparent skin. The capricious, scary, vengeful God, the one Clare bowed down to so anxiously, was a crumpled husk. Two dead ravens, skeletons with a few feathers sticking out from their sides, perched on his shoulders.

‘Stand up!' croaked the one-eyed ghost. ‘Our time is brief.'

The four stood in the middle of the stone circle, surrounded by the trembling Gods. Freya felt faint with horror and pity. The immortal Gods were old and dying. How was this possible?

‘Where is the hero we've been waiting for?' rasped Woden. ‘Where is the battle-brave warrior who blew Heimdall's horn and woke my sleeping army? Where is the mortal hero the seeress foretold? Let him step forward and reveal himself.'

He can't mean me, thought Freya. She looked
down at her scuffed black shoes and her Baldr's Fane of England school uniform with its crumpled blue-pleated skirt. There was still a ketchup stain from lunch on her ratty yellow sweatshirt. He can't mean me.

Freya looked around. Snot scratched his bum. Alfi cleared his throat. Roskva gave her a push.

‘Who blew the horn and cracked open the earth? Step forward!' hissed Woden. His withered eye flashed for a moment.

‘I did,' whispered Freya.

The assembled Gods hissed and muttered. The Goddess Sif choked. Heimdall rocked to and fro, drooling.

‘But it was a mistake,' said Freya. ‘I didn't mean to … I didn't know, I …'

‘Your name,' said Woden. When he spoke, there was an edge to his voice that frightened her.

‘Freya,' she said.

‘An unworthy namesake,' hissed a bald Goddess with shaking, liver-coloured hands. Her transparent skin was a mass of wrinkles. A glittering gold necklace weighed down her scrawny, turkey-gobbler neck. ‘You're so ugly. What were your parents thinking? I am insulted.'

You're one to talk, you old crone, thought Freya. And she'd always been so proud to share the name of such a beautiful, wise Immortal.

Woden fixed the Goddess Freyja with his dark, baleful eye. She tossed her wobbly head as if she still had flaxen curls to toss. Her necklace rattled.

‘Your parents' names?' said Woden.

‘Bob … uh … Robert Gislason,' said Freya. ‘My mother is Clare Raven.'

‘You and your family are unknown to me,' said Woden. He sat for a long moment in silence. ‘There was a time when no creature on earth escaped my notice.'

‘I am Frey,' quavered a stooping God with tightly stretched, blackened skin. He looked like rags fluttering on a stick. ‘Are you a thrall?'

‘A thrall?'

‘A slave,' said Frey.

‘No!' said Freya.

‘A farmer then?' asked the God of crops and sunshine and peace and plenty.

‘No,' said Freya.

‘Surely not a noble?'

‘No,' said Freya. How her granddad the baker would have loved that question.

‘There is nothing else,' said Frey.

The Gods and Goddesses jittered and stuttered.

‘Not a slave? Then who does the work?'

‘We all do,' said Freya.

‘We've been dying too long,' whispered Sif, a heap of shrivelled, transparent skin, her wispy white hairs barely covering her bald skull. ‘We'll have a lot to learn …'

‘A lot to put right,' quavered Woden's wife, Frigg. Her toothless mouth sagged.

‘Can I go home now?' said Freya.

‘Hold your tongue,' ordered Woden. Freya shrank back.

‘What was I saying?' muttered Woden. He was silent for a long moment, mumbling to himself. ‘Oh yes,' he rasped. ‘Where are the others? Where are my sword-bright warriors? Where are the ones versed in the arts of old magic? Where is the sleeping army who will save us?'

Freya looked around. Alfi, Roskva, and Snot did the same. She half-expected to see all the chess pieces gathering, the knights, the kings, the queens, the pawns, all changed back into living people, but there were only the empty plains of Asgard and the wrecked, racked Gods shaking before her.

‘It's just … us, Lord,' said Roskva. ‘We're the only ones who woke when she blew the horn.'

The assembled Gods murmured.

‘
This
is our sleeping army! Four? Just …
four
? These … mortals! These … these – children!' spat a toothless God.

‘I'm no child,' said Snot. The gnarled skin on his thick neck tensed. ‘I'm not a babysitter either. I was one of Woden's berserks.'

‘Alfi and I can take care of ourselves,' said Roskva.

I can't, Freya wanted to whimper.

‘The charm is weakening,' whispered Woden. ‘The whole army should have woken … There should be over a hundred warriors here … My powers are fading.'

The assembled Gods sighed. The Goddess Freyja began to weep. Tears of gold fell from the cataract-covered eyes and plinked on the dirt. Someone Freya presumed was the Goddess's husband leaned over to wipe her eyes, but she pushed him away.

‘We are nothing more now than breath in the trees, the rustling of leaves, the foam on the waves. We who used to make and destroy, reduced to rustling,' moaned Sif.

‘I HATE rustling,' hissed the Goddess Freyja. Her palsied hands shook.

‘Wait … for … me!' gasped a voice.

‘Master?' breathed Alfi. His eyes filled with tears as he bowed to the frail, dripping-wet man with a hint of a red beard still visible on his gaunt jaw. He paused to regain his breath at every painful step.

Freya stared. This was Thor? The mighty Thor, the killer of giants? The God who could devour an ox and eight salmon at one sitting, who heaved boulders and shattered cliffs? The God of thunder and stormy skies?

Roskva looked shocked. ‘Master.' Almost unwillingly she smiled. ‘Still wading through all those rivers to get here, I see.'

‘Ah, Roskva. Thialfi.' A tiny smile flittered across the skull-like face. ‘You've returned to save us. At last.'

‘As if we had any—' began Roskva.

‘Of course we have,' interrupted Alfi, kicking her.

Roskva kicked him back.

‘Ow,' said Alfi. ‘That hurt.'

‘Good,' said Roskva.

‘Good to see you, my boy, good to see you both,' gasped Thor. ‘'Course I can't see you, too blind now, but I heard your voices. You are still young. That's good. That's very good. Speak again.'

‘Master,' said Alfi, brushing tears away from his eyes, ‘where's your hammer?'

‘Hammer?' muttered Thor. ‘What hammer?'

Roskva gasped. ‘Your hammer, Mjollnir. The one you use to smash giants. The one only you can lift. Mjollnir.'

‘Ah!' said Thor. ‘I knew I'd forgotten something. Mjollnir … yes, now where did I put it?' He looked around as if the hammer would appear before him.

Snot grunted and said nothing.

‘Tell me one thing,' rasped Woden. ‘Are we still worshipped and feared? My ravens who brought me news of the world of men are long dead.'

Freya gulped. What should she say? Dare she tell him about the half-empty fanes attended mainly by old ladies or students praying for extra wisdom during exams? Oh and of course by families trying to get their children into the local Fane of England school who turned up every Sunday for a few years till priests like her mum wrote a letter to the headteacher testifying to their attendance and then … poof! Never seen again until they wanted a fane wedding or a baby-naming?