Thor’s goats raced across the clouds. Hilda held onto the carriage and let them carry her over the battlefield. They didn’t listen to her commands as they had listened to those of Thor, but she trusted that they would take her ahead, and stop, eventually.
She peered down through the clouds. Valhalla was close. The flames flickered on the tall iron weapons that marked its outer walls. The goats were taking her home—maybe even to the Alfather. Hilda gulped, imagining how angry Odin would be, if he had heard Fenrir’s howl. He would have heard, and he would know what it meant too.
Part of Valhalla’s walls were missing, torn from the ground. Giants were fighting, their fingers clasped around axe hilts as wide as ancient tree-trunks. Hilda peered through the crowd. Something white caught her attention. Too large to be her snow fox—her fylgja had long disappeared, anyway—but it was fur.
A white bear was fighting. Few animals had taken any part in the battle: there were wolves and there were monsters, but this was the first bear Hilda had seen. The bear roared and slashed, its white fur smeared with blood. A giant swept right through the white bear’s head, as if it wasn’t there. A living fylgja, in a battlefield upon which all the warriors were dead. There were no other fylgjur fighting on Ragnarok’s plains except, maybe, those of the gods, but here a white bear was fighting. Hilda’s heart sped up at the sight and thought of it. In life, she had seen many fylgjur, but only one white bear.
Einer.
He was alive. Einer was alive. Hilda grabbed the reins in both hands and tried to force the goats down towards him. To see him. To get close to him.
One of the goats bleated. Neither of them moved even slightly from their course.
The white bear wrestled a gold shield off a warrior and cast it away with a roar lost in the clamour of the battlefield. Einer was fighting for the giants, not for the gods and Valhalla. He had to have his reasons, and despite everything that had happened, Hilda trusted Einer, and his reasons, no matter what they were.
Despite what seat she had gained for herself in Valhalla, she too had once been swayed by Loki’s words. She too knew that Ragnarok was so much more than the death of the gods.
Thor’s goats took her down, through the clouds. Closer to the ground, but not towards Einer. His white bear disappeared in the tangle of giants and gods and warriors.
Hilda kept her eyes on the part of the battle where he had been. As they passed by, she looked back, staring intently at where she had seen his fylgja. She hoped to catch a glimpse of white fur. Or maybe, a streak of his straw-coloured hair.
Einer. He was alive. But not for long.
The cart wobbled, drawing Hilda’s gaze ahead, away from where Einer and his bear had been.
It had to be him. No one else would be alive and fighting on Ragnarok’s battlefield. No one else would bring a raging white bear fylgja into battle.
In front of her a thick group of fighters were crowded together. Giants stood in a ring, slapping the same patch of ground. In the middle, amongst hundreds of warriors and giants and beasts, stood the Alfather. His silver hair was hidden by a golden helmet, and he did not move like an old man.
Hilda leaned over the side of the cart to better see him. His chainmail shone, and his spear thrust and swept and was thrown with such precision and speed, that all Hilda could see of it was a blood-red blur.
Thor’s goats were taking Hilda to the Alfather. Of all the places on this vast battlefield. Hilda shielded her thoughts with runes. Odin would kill her in rage when he found out that Fenrir was still alive. Unless he already knew.
Although her thoughts were masked, her worries were confirmed immediately. The Alfather thrust his spear through a giant’s head, parried blows with jewelled arms of chainmail, and looked up. Through the swinging arms of giants, and straight at Hilda.
He yelled something. His words were lost to the clatter of war, but Hilda didn’t need to hear them. The Alfather was roaring her name, and he did not look happy.
Hilda would rather have gone straight in search of Fenrir than dart down there, though her thigh ached at the thought of facing the big wolf again. She would rather have faced even Thor’s rage than that of the Alfather. Yet the goats proceeded unforgivingly, straight towards bloodied Odin.
The battle was so loud she could hardly hear anything at all. The noises rang in Hilda’s chest. Her heart throbbed with it.
The cart flew close to giants and their rage. She felt like a fly buzzing around them; nothing but an annoyance. A giant caught her gaze, and Hilda hefted her axe, and picked up the shield. The giant was swinging one of Valhalla’s huge axes. The axe-head was much larger than Thor’s entire cart. He swung the axe at her. Hilda ducked and heard the vast iron head crash through the side of the cart. The goats bleated and kept going. Down, and down. They hopped from a low-hanging cloud onto the giant’s shoulder. He swung around, whirling his axe with him, and narrowly missed them. The goats kept going, jumping onto another giant’s arm and then a wolf’s back.
The cart wobbled, and Hilda was thrown off. She bumped into a fighter’s back, and then fell onto a stinking corpse. Quickly, she grabbed a warrior’s arm, and hauled herself to her feet. Her golden shield was no great help here. Most of the warriors had arrived from Helheim.
Hilda could hardly stand, but she had to fight. It was that or immediate death. Hilda hacked her axe through a warrior of Helheim as he turned towards her to assess if she was foe or friend.
The Alfather was a few rows further ahead.
At least the crowd was so thick that she didn’t have to balance on her own feet. She plunged ahead, slicing every neck and arm in her way. Blood splashed up on her face until she could hardly see, but she kept swinging her axe and launching herself forwards, at the Alfather.
At last, a fighter fell in front of her, and Hilda saw straight to her god. She tumbled out of the thick crowd, into the Alfather’s reach. His famed spear swished over her head. He was standing on a mounting pile of corpses.
Giants and rotting warriors were confused by Hilda’s arrival. They didn’t seem to know if she was worth the effort to kill, since even the Alfather was yelling at her. He seemed in more distress at Hilda’s arrival than before. His voice cut through the chaos. ‘You told me Fenrir was dead!’
‘And he was! I will just have to kill him again,’ Hilda said. She tried to hobble away to find Thor’s carriage, but her path was blocked. Besides, the goats had to have flown away by now; staying in this crowd, they would die.
The Alfather fought off attackers over Hilda’s head. A wolf kept trying to launch at him from the left, but his spear swished through the dark so quickly that it never got a chance. Its snout and paws were red with blood from trying.
Hilda bent down and crawled closer to the Alfather. Ravens and crows circled above him, keeping him safe, and attacking giants and warriors from above. Odin’s valkyries.
‘I will kill the wolf,’ she assured him. Odin had enough to do, what with the hundreds of warriors and giants trying to take the honour from Fenrir.
‘When he comes,’ the Alfather grunted. He didn’t sound in the least breathless, despite how he was darting around. ‘You will strike the final blow.’
Hilda watched the Alfather whirl, and readied herself to rise out of his reach. She saw the right moment and stood up, her legs groaning. She parried blows out of habit. She had trained well in life. The blows of the corpse warriors hit hard, but Hilda pushed back, and gave the Alfather a smaller part of the crowd to focus on. The valkyries helped from above, dropping stones and conjuring runes.
Hilda smiled, for that was her advantage, too. She conjured ice and made warriors fall. She conjured luck and struck. She conjured defence and chaos.
As she fought, she searched through the dark, bloodied crowd. Warriors were tired, beasts heaved for breath, but giants still roared. They were restless, and they were angry. So was the Alfather. He held them all back. The crowd began to leave a larger distance to him. They were all done, and ready to die, or at the very least rest. All but the Alfather.
Hilda stared back the way she had come, flying in Thor’s carriage, and caught sight of the bear again. The white fur almost shone in the firelight. Many fires had been put out, leaving few demons still alive and little light to see, yet in the dim glow, the bear’s white-furred ears were even easier to spot. It was moving closer. He was approaching, heading straight for the Alfather. Straight for Hilda.
‘A white bear?’ the Alfather yelled to her, over battle-cries and howls and roars.
She had forgotten to shield her thoughts from Odin. At once, she took to the runes, and called upon them to hide her thoughts.
‘A fylgja. There’s a living warrior out there,’ she told the Alfather, for she had to tell him something, and something that was true.
The white bear cut through the crowd. Warriors fell before him, and giants gave way. And then Hilda saw him. Not the bear, but him. He had changed, after so long. His helmet hid most of his face, but she could see his mouth and his cheeks, and it was him.
‘Einer,’ the Alfather muttered, loud enough for Hilda to hear. He, too, knew him.
Hilda put an additional effort into her runes to shield her mind. Not to give anything away. In case Einer needed her. For he had clearly been fighting with the giants, against Valhalla’s warriors, and if he reached the Alfather… He would die.
No one survived Odin’s famed spear.