![Hammered]()
Hammered
» No, of course not. I am merely pleased to meet you and exchange knowledge of our worlds. We have much to teach each other before you earn a name in the harvest of the blue whales. What can I teach you? What would you know? «
We had long since spoken into deep night, with naught but a fire lighting the waters of the fjörd. Flickers of lightning played about the billowing skirts of clouds, and these flashes occasionally lit up the shore. The great creature’s snout lifted up toward the low ceiling in the sky after a particularly bright display.
I chuckled. » There are many explanations for those. One god or another is usually credited for them. «
» The god of the Norse is named Thor. He rides a chariot pulled by two goats—horned animals with four legs—and wears a large belt that doubles his strength. «
» Where? « I turned to look over my shoulder and saw a bright ball of lightning writhing in the sky. It centered round the head of a hammer, beneath which was a raised hand and a scowling visage wreathed in blond hair. The edges of a chariot and the horns of two goats were starkly highlighted. Nothing else could be discerned, other than that the thunder god was quickly approaching, intent on the two of us.
Fearful of his intentions, I frantically began to wave. » No! « I cried. » Wait! «
But Thor threw forward his arm, and the coiled lightning arced down to strike the magnificent creature in the eye. She screamed and reared up in pain, then plunged herself into the fjörd, more lightning bolts following her and burning holes into her scaled hide wherever it showed above the surface.
I dropped my kantele and proceeded to jump and gesticulate and call him the brain-dead spawn of a lack-witted shepherd, but to no avail. He kept hammering the poor beast wherever he could as she desperately tried to make it out of the shallow fjörd to the open sea. I ran to my hut and retrieved a spear from my small cache of weapons. This I quickly enchanted for true flight and hurled at the nearest one of Thor’s goats. It spitted him cleanly and the chariot lurched violently to the side, spilling the thunder god into the sea.
This managed to secure his attention.
She who had sung to me was given a reprieve from the lightning, and I took up my kantele again to speak to her.
» Dive deeply and never rise again, « I told her. » I am so sorry. « Nothing coherent came in reply, just a sense of agony and bewildered betrayal. I berated myself for not concealing us with a seeming, and for not acting more decisively to halt Thor before he could unloose the destruction of the skies upon her. Here was a terrible price to pay for our mutual curiosity. But she was still alive. Perhaps she would live if I prevented the thunder god from attacking further.
He thrashed to the surface, collecting more lightning to his hammer held high above the waves. I targeted him with my voice and sang a song to calm his rage. His remaining goat strained to land the chariot on shore, dragging both his dead companion and the chariot behind him.
I could not see the leviathan anymore, but apparently Thor had some sense of her location, for he struck out with clear intent at a certain swell in the ocean near the entrance to the fjörd, heedless of my song and immune to its spell.
A flare of pain lashed out from the sea and seized my mind, and I staggered backward. Then there was nothing, simply nothing.
After that I needed to sing a song to calm my own rage. The flood of it nearly loosed itself upon him, with no dam to stop it save my will; yet I knew that Thor could stand against that tide if anyone could, and furthermore I knew that I was woefully unprepared to fight him at that time. I had no defense against lightning. Instead, I did what I should have done earlier and cast a seeming over my presence to hide myself from his eyes. As Thor pulled himself through the water with powerful strokes toward the shore, I cast another seeming on my small hut and yet one more on my voice, so that when I spoke next Thor would not know from whence it came.
The thunder god emerged from the sea looking every bit as angry as I felt. He took the hammer from his belt, where he’d secured it during his swim, and shook it threateningly in my general direction.
» Coward! Show yourself! You who slew my
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