The Journal of Vincent Du Maurier Trilogy (Books 1, 2, 3) (65 page)

Veor, the Viking

Dawn stretched her
rosy fingertips across the sky and painted it pink, the color of beginning,
birth, and renewal. I had seen an incalculable number of sunrises in my years,
but that one marked me. The world—my world—was about to change, and
I witnessed its transformation in the sparkle of an early ray of light.

I went up on deck to
scan the horizon when Captain Jem announced our arrival. He had been a recluse
most of the trip, but was not forgotten. I had no doubt about the fate of the
drunkard. He would make a fine bishop to slide across my chessboard once the
time was right.

The northern tract was
transformed completely from its early layout in the first few decades of the
second millennium. We passed an island that had once belonged to a territory,
still standing but covered in ice caps. Even its firs and pines were glazed
with ice. Man had abandoned the frozen isle long ago. After the ruptures and
the floods, the new world gave up housing nations, and became a quilt of arable
land. The remaining population, small as it was, no longer fought over terrain
but gathered in enclaves and settlements with vast wastelands in-between. From
what I could tell, territory was not claimed but easily acquired.

The facility bordered
the shore, not far from the marine base set up on the coast, built on a destroyed
petrol plant, a new Ilium set upon an old. No one cared the abandoned land was
deemed uninhabitable due to petroleum leaks and unusable soil since the entire
facility was subterranean, an underground hideout for dastardly deeds.

My introduction to it
came from Veor, who sat alongside me on the platform at the top of the radio
tower, as we surveyed the shore.

“It will be
difficult,” he said, as he pointed to the cutout of land in the distance. “The
trek between here and there is covered in snow.”

I smiled inwardly. If
you wonder at my fear of the nuisance ahead of me, I had none.

“My people speak of a
legend about a Norse god, a great god who will return
after Ragnarök
,”
he said. “Today we are living the days of
Ragnarök. Floods, destruction of land, people, all mean
a war is coming.”

“What kind of war?”

“Völva
prophesies
the apocalypse, which sates itself on the lifeblood of fated men, and paints
red the powers’ homes with crimson gore. The sun’s beams become ink in the
summers that follow treacherous weather.”

“In your legend, does the Norse god save the world
from this?”

“There will only be rebirth after an eternal
winter,” he said. “One man, one woman shall remake the earth with the guidance
of those who return from the dead. Baldr, the gleaming Norse god, will be the
greatest of them.”

“What does this god
do if he does not salvage the wreckage?”

“Our gods cannot save
man from the war he brings upon himself,” he said. “They may guide him if he
goes astray, though. With Baldr, it is not about what he does, but about what
he represents.”

We sat in silence for
a time, as I imagined the yarn he could spin. I had acquired an encyclopedia of
mythology over the years and knew most everything. Time and again each story
proved the same, with similar elements. Only the nuances and names differed. Veor
lived as though his Viking days were not a thousand years behind him, and I
wondered how he had existed day to day in the vampire’s modern world, thriving
on a dwindling human population.

“Baldr, son of Odin,
and his mother Frigg dreamed of his death. They believed it was prophecy and
she decided to do what she could to protect her son, making everything in the
realm swear an oath to keep Baldr from harm. But there was one who was too
young to swear—mistletoe—who became Baldr’s downfall.”

He paused, perhaps
for effect or to recall the story exactly as it was told to him.

“Loki is the father
of Hel, who receives a portion of the dead where she reigns in a place named
for her. Loki is known to stir the pot, and I believe his desire to feed
portions to his daughter is what makes him a rabble rouser. Loki took mistletoe
and made an arrow, sending it into Baldr, who had easily shirked every other dart
sent his way. But worse still is that before Loki directed the arrow at Baldr,
he placed it in the hands of
Höðr,
Baldr’s blind brother, who did not know he held
the point that would slay his kin. Baldr died then, and
Höðr followed soon
after.”

“Why would the gods
throw spears and arrows at Baldr if Frigg had begged the oath,” I said.

“To test the strength
of a god is to live,” he said. “Baldr became a target because he was made
invincible, or at least able to resist all harm.”

“Except for the mistletoe,”
I said.

“Yes,” Veor said with
a smile. “We all have one Achilles’s heel, don’t we?”

As I sat in the plum
light of dawn, I wondered if I could be defeated. I had overcome every weakness,
and was equivalent to a god.

“Baldr is special
because he was so loved,” Veor said. “Others would die for him—with him.”

I sensed Veor’s
telling me the story for my sake, as though I were Baldr.

“Like in all
funerals,” he said, “Baldr’s body was placed on a great Viking ship,
Hringhorni,
and set afire to burn as it drifted out to sea, catching the wave that would
direct its course to the underworld. But as Baldr lay on his pyre, Odin
whispered a secret in his ear—this secret remains untold and is known as the
famous riddle Odin would ask those he visited in disguise: ‘What did I whisper
in Baldr’s ear?’”

“Baldr’s return
brings the answer to the riddle, then?” I asked.

Veor smiled and said,
“It is the one thing we have waited for. My people, the Vikings are gone, but
our hearts, our souls live on in our kin. Muriel will be saved by the answer to
Odin’s riddle, and only Baldr can bring it.”

I hid my disdain for
his superstition, though I cannot say why it made me uncomfortable. Veor’s way
of speaking about his history and his legendary future with Muriel made me
uneasy.

“Do you know how Frigg
bargained for Baldr’s release from the underworld?”

I shrugged.

“She begged and
begged and begged until Hel finally promised his release on the condition that
every single thing, dead and alive, weep for Baldr’s death. Already his pyre
did not burn alone, for Thor had kicked Litr the dwarf into the fire with him,
and his wife Nanna threw herself into the flames too, and even his horse was tossed
in with all its trimmings and frills. But as hard as Frigg tried, she could not
get everyone to weep for him. One giantess,
Þökk, refused him her tears. Some say it was
Loki in disguise, but I think it is far worse. Loki swayed the giantess to his
side instead, manipulating her.”

“Manipulation is a far greater talent than
imitation,” I said.

“I agree.” Veor leaned over the ledge and looked
down at the sea.
“So now we are in
Ragnarök, and Baldr will
rise again with Höðr and the sons of Thor to wrestle the new world into
submission, tilling and plowing her field until it is safe for man again.”

“Will you be there
with them?” I asked.

“I already am,” he
said, raising a single fist to the sky. “And so I am with you, too.”

“Are you on my side?”

“Of course,” he said.
“But Muriel’s safety is most important to me.”

I flashed him a
subtle fang, though I cannot say if it was intended. His mention of my donor had
done the trick. “How did you discover she was inside the facility?”

Veor smiled and I recalled
how much he reminded me of Alessandra Tarlati. Though a brief spark in the
night, she would not fade too soon from my memory.

“I have fed on her
family for years,” he said. “My last succor was from her father, and Patty Lem,
his mother, and Cyrus Lem before that.”

“She tells me you got
her out?”

He gave me a hard
stare. “She saved me.”

“How?”

“Once the colonel was
gone, I had no other.”

“Would it be so bad
to feed on blood that is not yours?”

“Yes.”

“What is it about the
blood of your kin that makes you long for it so?” I had never asked that of any
kinblood I had encountered, and though I could have guessed the answer I wanted
to hear his.

“It dulls the
burden,” he said, surprising me.

“What burden?”

“The burden to feed
on blood,” he said. “I may be a vampire, but first and foremost I am Viking. We
are bound to family for all succor, our kin is our life source, and for that I
can’t resist my own. The desire is inherent.”

“Who is your maker?”

The little bit of
color that livened his porcelain face drained with my question. But fear had
not wracked him, just remembrance.

“I don’t recall my
maker,” he said. “But I remember the day my fate changed.”

I encouraged him to
share his story.

“We were on a raid, a
Christian settlement on the island of Iona. We took the ancient monastery of
St. Columba, and stowed its relics on our ships. But after the slaughter, we
stayed on shore, our vessels moored just off the coast. We fêted and feasted on
the flesh of those we slayed, too tired to hunt. Man’s meat is less satisfying
than a goat’s, but we filled our bellies and fell asleep before the long haul
home.

“Some time before the
others woke, I came to, unsettled and aroused. Loki tempted me, or I simply longed
to walk the darkened isle with my gut filled with its people. I rose and
followed my bliss, hiking up to a cliff where I found a single light burning
deep inside a cavern. I entered it, of course, with my ax drawn. As I crept
toward the light, I saw her shape, the lone survivor sleeping on her side like
a child in a womb.

“I mistook her for a
wood maiden at first, her shape barely the size of a woman’s. Her slowed
breathing, her warmth called to me and I fell down beside her, tucking myself
about her little frame. She woke and turned her small body toward me, pulling
me in with her dainty fingers and hands. Her eyes were soft, and she whispered lustful
things to me. It was not long before I gave in, and made her a part of me.

“I took her home with
me, cleaving to her after that single bewitching night we spent in her cavern
beside a low fire. She lived with me for many years before her kin came for
her. I can’t say how her father found her, though he was surely a god in
disguise. He stole into our homestead in the middle of our slumber and took
back what was his.”

Veor held out his
hands, palms facing upward. “He left me with a severed heart and a taste for
blood,” he said. “Parting gifts for the hospitality I showed his daughter.”

“Did you feed on your
people once awakened to blood?”

He looked away,
defeated. “I took off, ashamed at the desires that rocked my core. The day
burned my skin, and the night brought on new pains, hunger and loneliness. I
kept to the solitary path for many winters before I discovered my own bloodline
was the only I could stomach.”

He scratched the side
of his jaw as though itching a beard.

“What will you do
when Muriel is gone?” I asked.

“I suppose I’ll have
to be flexible.” He forced a smile.

“Tell me about the
facility,” I said. “Why were you there?”

“Colonel Heath told
me it’s where I could find his daughter.”

“How did he die?”

“I lost him to the plague,”
he said. “Once he turned, I had to find Muriel.”

“How did you gain
access to her?”

“I met Youlan inside
and she told me where to find her. Once she booked passage on Cixi’s ship, she
told me to come with her and bring the girl.”

Peter had told me
Youlan could not speak, but she was cunning and capable of convincing anyone of
anything she pleased.

“Did she tell you
about the letters?”

“How do you
know—oh, Muriel told you.”

I shook my head,
assuring him I had made the discovery on my own.

“That was Youlan’s
doing,” he said. “Our payment for Muriel’s escape.”

“Did you ever meet
Laszlo Arros?”

He looked down at the
water, and I could not read him when he said, “It’s him, isn’t it?”

“Who?”

“The one who’s come
to end it all.”

“So you have met him.”

He turned to look at
me, and the pain behind his eyes ran deep. “No,” he said. “But if he is who
Youlan says he is, Baldr will rise up and save one man and one woman.”

“Why just one man and
one woman? Why not all of civilization?”

“One man and one
woman is civilization.”

I could not sense the
depth of his words at the time, his suggestion that the human population was doomed
unless two remain. Despite the plague, and the predatory creatures aiming to
change their fellow man into counterparts, one man and one woman could begin
civilization anew.