Mickey Zucker Reichert - By Chaos Cursed (2 page)

Still, Larson had never found a means to detect the presence of a gentle probe. Through it, Vidarr could communicate and read the elf-man’s superficial thoughts.
I’ll read his mood without him ever knowing I was there. If he’s relaxed, I’ll say my hellos. So long as I don’t play with his thoughts, he shouldn’t mind.
With that idea, Vidarr thrust a probe for Larson’s mind.

Vidarr’s search met nothing. Shocked, he withdrew and tried again. Once again, he met only darkness.

Vidarr slid to the grass, sitting cross-legged, his fingers to his temples. Never before had it cost energy or effort to explore Larson’s mind. Vidarr lowered his head, putting his full concentration into the task. Again, his mental probe met no resistance.
Dead? He’s dead?
Surprise and concern sharpened his focus. Gradually, words, images, and the snarl of looping thought pathways took shape, black against near-black, like the outline of sun glazed through thunder-heads, viewed as much from his knowledge of its necessary presence as reality.
Not dead
, Vidarr realized, gaining little solace from the realization.
But nearly so. How?
For now, the reason did not matter. Vidarr rooted through the darkness for a single spark of life.

For some time, the search frustrated Vidarr. Apparently, Al Larson still lived, otherwise he would have no memories at all, not even the vague, smeared images obscured by the hovering fog of death. Vidarr drew fully into Larson’s mind, forcing himself to evaluate the quality of each shadow, following a subtle and scattered trail that was more “less dark” than light. Gradually, he discovered a single, cold pinpoint of light, rapidly fading.

A thought struck through Vidarr.
If he dies before I get out of here, we’re both dead.
Gently, he fanned the glow. It sputtered, frayed like ancient string. For an instant, Vidarr thought he had blown it out. Fear gripped him as the spark sputtered, then grew ever so slightly. He felt a survival instinct shift, erratic as a rusted hinge, then cringe back into hiding from pain.

You bastard! Since when has pain ever stopped you from doing anything?
He kicked the wire-thin pathway that housed the instinct. Agony sparked through Larson’s mind, but this time the survival instinct hovered, uncertain, tenuous.

Vidarr held his breath.

In Larson’s head, a hand clamped onto Vidarr’s shoulder.

Shock wrenched a gasp from Vidarr, the strength of the emotion splashing insight through Larson’s mind. Heart pounding, Vidarr snapped back to Asgard. He could feel the other presence flash out with him.

After the crushing darkness of Larson’s mind, the hovering fire of Asgard’s sun blinded Vidarr. He whirled, slashing an arm up instinctively. His forearm crashed against a wrist, breaking the grip, and he found himself facing Freyr.

Freyr stood with arms crossed in judgment, and his pale eyes shone like the sun that was his charge. “What are you doing?”

Vidarr rarely used words. Over time, he had become adept at communication only by radiating his primary emotions. Now, as surprised waned, he stared dispassionately at Freyr.

“Allerum.” Freyr used the name Larson had won through an inadvertent spell of stuttering during his original introduction to his friends. “You were healing Allerum.”

That being self-evident, Vidarr mimicked Freyr’s outraged stance without a reply.

“You can’t do that.” Freyr made a brisk gesture with his arm that set his clothes shimmering colorfully.

Still, Vidarr waited, not bothering to contradict an obvious fallacy. Freyr’s commanding manner was starting to annoy the Silent God, but he kept the first stirrings of irritation from his disclosure and his manner.

Apparently recognizing the ludicrousness of his own claim, Freyr amended. “Well, of course, I suppose you can heal Allerum, but you shouldn’t. Vidarr, it would be bad.”

Vidarr cocked his brows, demanding explanation. If not for Al Larson’s courage and his willingness to fight against Loki, Vidarr knew he would still be trapped within a lightless, soundless void. Loki would still live to lead the hordes of Hel and giants against the gods and men. Without Vidarr to slay the Fenris Wolf, the beast would have survived to aid its loathsome father, Loki. Instead of the prophesied Ragnarok that would have ended with a few gods and men still intact, Loki and his followers would have torn the worlds asunder with a limitless Chaos of slaughter. Wives killing husbands. Fathers raping daughters.

The images wound through Vidarr’s mind, bringing a chill that the sun-filled Asgard meadow could not touch.
Averted, all averted, thanks to Allerum. I owe him my life as do all the gods. And he paid a price we should never have asked of anyone.
Vidarr cringed, recalling how moments before the sword stroke that took Loki’s life, the Evil One had reminded Larson that destroying him would prevent Ragnarok. Without the war, the Norse gods would reign through eternity, never replaced by the Christian religion Larson embraced. Larson, his family, his friends, and his world would never exist.

Freyr’s voice became fatherly. Apparently partially guessing Vidarr’s concern, he rationalized. “I know you think you owe something to Allerum, but you don’t. Men are pawns, meant to serve us. The opportunity to do so is all the reward they deserve.”

“I used to believe that,” said Vidarr quietly, his voice a mellow tenor.

Caught off-guard by Vidarr’s switch to speech, Freyr stared.

“Before I spent so much time in Allerum’s head.”

Freyr recovered with a snort. “You can’t judge all men by Allerum. He was addled by a war without glory, and he’s a product of his time and place. His god chooses to fade into the background, leaving men to make their own decisions and mistakes. I passed over hundreds of loudmouthed, disrespectful future Americans before I discovered Allerum.”

Vidarr did not bother to argue. Natural mind barriers prevented the gods from reading the thoughts and intentions of mortals, so neither side of the discussion could be corroborated by fact. Vidarr extrapolated from the only model he could access: Al Larson. And, having learned how sincerely humans voiced their lies, he had to guess that most of the gods’ pawns hid their grudging acceptance of the position behind an artificial enthusiasm. Vidarr let impatience sift through his facade, making it clear he considered Larson’s life more important than a discussion on human motivation.

Accepting the cue, Freyr came to the heart of his explanation. “You are familiar with the Balance.” It was a statement, not a question.

Vidarr nodded. The Balance between Law and Chaos was eternal, since long before the gods entered the nine worlds. The natural forces seemed to keep themselves in line without need for a guardian. Minor inequalities had no effect upon the worlds and their inhabitants. The deaths of strong proponents of one side were always naturally compensated by equal deaths for the opposite cause.

“Then,” Freyr continued, “you must also know the effect Allerum has had on that Balance.”

Vidarr lowered his head, feeling responsible. Freed from his imprisonment, joy had made him careless. He had left Loki’s corpse where it had collapsed near Hvergelmir’s waterfall, never guessing Larson would hurl the body into the cascade that destroyed all things. Annihilated, body and soul, Loki’s harbored Chaos disappeared, leaving a gap no one could fill.
Chaos.
Vidarr shook his head.
The stuff of life.
It seemed odd that the very substance defining existence also poisoned it, so that corruption naturally accompanied power. The world’s only mortal sorcerers, the Dragonrank, drew their powers from tapping their own internal chaos known as life force. Therefore, those who served Chaos were always more powerful than their counterparts, and there were always larger numbers of Law abiding souls in the world to compensate.

“Allerum destroyed Loki,” Freyr explained, anyway. “Then he raised Silme from the dead, balancing her resurrection with an equally powerful servant of Chaos....”

Vidarr nodded smugly, but this perfect example of Larson’s concern for the Balance was crushed by Freyr’s next description.

“... whom Allerum later killed, thereby skewing the Balance dangerously further in the direction of Law.” Freyr sat in the grass, hugging his knees to his chest. Thin, white-blond hair tumbled about his shoulders. “Then there was that Geirmagnus’ rod quest....”

“That’s not fair!” Vidarr interrupted. “It wasn’t Allerum’s idea. In fact, he fought against it so hard I had to lie and cheat to make him finish it. My father forced me to send Allerum on that quest. He couldn’t bear the thought of his most beautiful and gracious son rotting in Hel for eternity....”

Freyr raised his hand to stop Vidarr’s uncharacteristic flow of words. “I never said it was Allerum’s idea, only that no one else could have succeeded. As it was, Allerum, Taziar, and the Kensei resurrected Baldur.” Freyr added quickly, “Don’t misunderstand. I’m as glad to have Baldur back as anyone. But the rift in the Balance would have been enough to destroy the world. If not for the dragon.”

Vidarr nodded. He had seen the beast through Larson’s eyes, a towering manifestation of raw Chaos energy imprisoned by the first leader of the Dragonrank sorcerers at a time when the Balance had tipped dangerously in the other direction. Again, he saw the house-sized creature bank and glide on its leathery wings, maneuverable as a falcon. He knew Larson’s fear as teeth long and sharp as daggers gashed his arm, and Vidarr also knew the tearing depth of grief when Kensei Gaelinar goaded the beast through a coil of razor wire, sacrificing his own life in the process. Dragons were conglomerates of unmastered Chaos-force; slaying it dispersed rather than destroyed its power. Here, Vidarr believed, was how the Balance had been put right.

But the expression of outrage on Freyr’s face cued Vidarr to the fact that there was knowledge he did not yet have. Freyr cleared his throat. “You have no idea how Allerum came to be as near to death as he is. Do you?”

Vidarr shook his head, hoping the gesture made it clear it did not matter. Regardless of the cause, he owed Larson his loyalty.
Don’t I?
Doubt seeped silently into his awareness. Feeling weak, he sat beside Freyr.

The lord of elves plucked at grass spears, avoiding Vidarr’s stare. “Raw Chaos can’t be destroyed, only disbanded. To destroy it, you must destroy its host.”

Vidarr waited, aware Freyr had started with the obvious in order to make a more serious point.

“Chaos-force is nonintelligent, geared only toward survival and the Balance. It knows only that it must find a strong host, one capable of surviving its transfer and its demands for cruelty, mayhem, and disorder. Once freed from dragon form, that raw Chaos-energy raged across the Kattegat to a farm town called Wilsberg. There, it struck with a storm that slaughtered every citizen
except its new master.
”

Freyr’s words stunned Vidarr into an awed silence.
All of that Chaos into one man?
The thought was madness. Until now, he had assumed the Chaos would disseminate, that every man, woman, and child in Midgard would become a trace more evil.
No one could have survived the transfer of so much Chaos energy.

“A Dragonrank sorcerer named Bolverkr.” Freyr answered the unspoken question. “He came from the earliest days of the Dragonrank when the mages drew reams of raw Chaos to themselves rather than using life energy, ignorant of the cost to the Balance.” Freyr paused, leaving time for the words to sink in, waiting to see whether Vidarr would make the obvious connection without further hints.

Vidarr remained stunned.

Freyr met and held Vidarr’s gaze. “Chaos hunted out the strongest possible master on the nine worlds.”

Suddenly, understanding radiated from Vidarr.
It went to Bolverkr, not me or Freyr or Odin.
The natural conclusion was too enormous to contemplate.
This Bolverkr apparently wields more power than any single god.
He shuddered at the observation.

Freyr concurred. “Frightening, isn’t it?”

Vidarr nodded.

Freyr rose, brushing pollen and grass spears from his leggings. “Bolverkr knows Allerum and Taziar loosed the Chaos that destroyed the town and the people he loved, his pregnant wife and his fortress, and turned him into a puppet of Chaos, contaminated beyond redemption. He’s sworn to be avenged, but he isn’t stupid, either. He knows Allerum and Taziar have already defeated the Chaos-force that is his power, and now they have the Dragonmages, Silme and Astryd, as partners in love and war. He’s playing it careful and well. Allerum’s current condition demonstrates Bolverkr’s skill.” Again, Freyr held Vidarr’s pale gaze. “And now I think you understand why you can’t rouse Allerum.”

Vidarr beetled his brows, missing the connection.

Seeing Vidarr’s confusion, Freyr explained. “Allerum is an anachronism and Silme, by all rights, should still be dead. Taziar and Astryd are small enough in power that their deaths would not severely affect the balance. But, should Bolverkr die, wielding as much Chaos-force as he does, the Balance would overturn. The world might be destroyed, all men, elves, and gods with it. Or, perhaps, his death would need to be matched with equal amounts of supporters of Law. All the mortal followers of Law might not prove enough. Gods would die, Vidarr. Perhaps you and I? Odin? Thor and Baldur? For the sake of the world, Allerum and his companions must lose this feud. You’ll have to undo anything you’ve done and
let Allerum die.
”

Vidarr bit his lip, pained by Freyr’s words. He understood the necessity. The Balance and the lives of gods had to take precedence over one soldier, no matter how much good he had done for Vidarr. The idea of leaving Allerum to his own devices seemed difficult enough.
But what’s done is done. To snuff the slight spark I encouraged would be murder.

Freyr tried to soften his command. “You have to remember, Allerum was as good as dead when I plucked him from the battlefield. We gave him life, if only for a few extra months. If not for me, he’d be a bloody corpse lying in an empty riverbed in Vietnam.”

Vidarr said nothing.

Freyr sighed. He clasped Vidarr’s shoulder comfortingly. “Do what you have to do.” Without further encouragement, Freyr started back across the meadow, his boots crushing foliage in huge patches, his eight foot frame still visible against the sun long after he passed beyond hearing distance of Vidarr.