The Makers and the Made

None could tell whether years had passed since that day or merely a handful of hours. The forgotten god wandered as a soundless shadow across the scorched and mangled land, torn apart by tempests and roaring storms. Before his eyes continents sank and vanished into the deep; seas boiled; the very ground burned beneath his feet — while far above, the branches of the Great Ash sagged and dripped molten light, seared by the infernal heat as it struggled to shelter what little could still be saved. There was no way to mark how long this calamity endured — only that one day, having long since lost count of time, the god noticed the crimson sky beginning to cool, its murderous red slowly fading. Storms and quakes still wracked the remains of the world, yet from the abyss rose newborn islands, fresh archipelagos: the first hints of future homesteads, villages, and, should fortune be kind, cities rebuilt by those who survived. The world, knowing neither rest nor laziness, sensing even the faintest lull, hurried to mend the broken and revive the lost. Everywhere he saw scars of the battles now gone silent: the colossal corpse of Jörmungandr, hurled upon the land from the ocean’s depths and slain by Thor himself… The remnants of his world — decaying, dissolving under the relentless force of life that refused to perish. Satisfied that civilization — though mutilated and robbed of much and many — had nonetheless endured, the god turned toward the place from which he had once come. There the sky remained smothered beneath a thick, tar-black shroud of ash that would not clear even in a hundred years. Eternal cold ruled here now, and snow — gray and filthy with soot — fell in an unbroken wall. For reasons he did not question, his feet carried him through lands he had once known, now reduced to lifeless ruins of a great city, bared like a snarling skeleton flaunting its dried-out innards. Passing the devastation, he moved on — to the modest stone plateau where, not so long ago, he had said his last farewell to a friend. Against all logic, the spot remained untouched by quakes or ruin. Even the snow seemed cleaner here. At the very center of the plateau — buried beneath drifts he cleared with hands and feet — he found a single thawed patch of earth. And in it… a single seed. The final gift of the Great Tree — untouched by snow, which seemed unwilling to smother it. Smiling to himself, the god picked up the seed and made his way to the place where, he felt, it could take root. All this time he had avoided that cursed valley — the place of the last battle of the gods… and their grave. A monstrous, charred wound in the flesh of an already tortured world. Here, in the heart of all creation — where no mortal had ever set foot — lay a cemetery holding the best and worst of the old world. Finding a small patch of earth untainted by blood or scorched by undying fire, the god dug a shallow hollow with his bare hands. Into it he placed the entrusted seed of new life, and, lowering himself beside it, began to wait. Time passed. The sprout at his feet grew into a sapling, then into a mighty young tree lifting its crown above tender new growth — a growth that, given time, would become a grove, then a forest. The god, still seated at its roots and long past caring about time, planned to witness it all. And so he would have — had the mischievous plant not begun dropping leaves on his head. And twigs. And — to his utter bewilderment — acorns and chestnut burrs. This was exceedingly strange. One day, after receiving a particularly hefty nut squarely on the crown, the dozing god groaned, cracked his neck, and glared upward in silent reproach. The impudent thing had grown into something beyond imagining: It bore acorns and juicy fruit of every imaginable hue, and cones besides. One half of its canopy shed golden leaves like a tree settling in for winter; the other half blazed with spring green and ripe, ready-to-fall fruit. The god snorted, fascinated despite himself. “Would you look at that,” he croaked — his voice rough and raven-harsh from long silence. “Seems even the Great Tree grew bored of being an ash.” He could have sworn the tree rustled its entire crown in agreement — and promptly dropped another acorn square on his head. It split with a sharp crack, scattering its halves at his feet. “What do you want from me, you spiteful stump?!” he roared, leaping to his feet — and immediately collapsing again, his legs too atrophied from sitting to remember how to walk. Swearing like a tavern brawler, he wrestled himself upright and slumped against the rough bark. “Think I’ve lingered too long, do you?” The approving whisper of leaves was answer enough. Taking a pair of unsteady steps toward the edge of the now-vast grove, he paused and glanced back. “Well then… since you’ve pushed me to my feet, you’d best show the way.”

***

He walked on, guided by a faint, half-forgotten longing — the desire to find a purpose again, a purpose lost with the passing of his age. The road unfurled before him of its own accord, perhaps by chance, though far more likely at the prompting of some unseen will, leading him toward a place unknown yet suddenly, inexplicably important. He knew he was on the right path by the old stone, which had come to life again in his palm. It quivered and warmed whenever he strayed from the way the Ash — no longer an ash at all — was pressing him to follow. Gradually the landscape, once tangled with sparse trees and unending mists, softened into the pastoral sweep of green meadows he vaguely recognized. The illusion of peace, however, was shattered by the sky — blackened crimson, swollen like an infected wound — and the heavy, malignant sun hanging above burned fields whose grass had first withered, then been charred into a grey, ashen carpet stretching beyond sight. From somewhere far off the wind carried cries and weeping — sounds that promised nothing good. Wrinkling his nose at the choking scent of smoke, the god sighed and descended the hill, intending to reach the afflicted village as quickly as possible. After some time, climbing another rise and having met not a single living soul, he finally saw the settlement clearly: once two dozen neat timber houses, now only blackened ruins; a splintered palisade, collapsed upon itself, having failed utterly in its purpose. Across the hewn logs — defenders turned to fuel — lay the carcass of a gigantic wolf, blocking the way into the village. Circling the beast, the god saw gaping wounds torn across its belly and a rended jaw, the tongue hanging limp to one side. And yet, impossibly, the creature still lived — drawing breath with a ragged, bubbling sound as blood-foamed air seeped from its mouth onto the earth. Obeying an intuition he did not question, the god approached the wolf’s head and looked into its single remaining eye, searching for something other than the madness he had once seen there. To his astonishment, there was no hatred — only quiet sorrow, and the weary resignation of a creature that understood its fate. He knew then that the beast was doomed. All he could do was catch the faint spark — the freed, unclouded fragment of his son’s mind — and close his fingers gently around it as the creature, risen against the world, finally exhaled its last. Clutching the trembling shard of another’s soul, the god walked deeper into the ruins, past homes still smoldering with strange blue fire, until he reached one such hut. Even intact, it would have been a pitiful sight; now it was nothing but a heap of charred logs. At its center lay the scorched body of a boy of perhaps seven years, his clothing hanging in burnt tatters. Pushing aside the debris, the god knelt and searched for even the faintest glimmer of life in the frail frame. The child’s soul had fled — but not yet passed fully beyond, not yet crossed whatever boundary served as the heavens of this remade world… “I hope you want to live badly enough,” the god murmured, “because I have exactly what you need.” Opening his other hand, he pressed his palm to the boy’s forehead and let the shard of the wolf’s soul slip free. Smiling to himself at the irony, he gently lifted the child’s head and looked into his face. Within a minute the boy’s eyelids quivered, and he opened eyes still clouded by retreating death, trying to make out the figure leaning over him. “Your name will be Skugga den Varga</strong>, little one,” the stranger announced with a faint smile, lifting the weightless body into his arms. “And… you? What is your name?” The boy’s voice was like the whisper of dry grass — thin, wavering, barely there. “Me?” The stranger pondered the question for a long beat. “I haven’t been called anything in a very long time. So… you may give me a name yourself, if you wish.” Having made this odd suggestion, the man rose and began making his way toward the broken edge of the village. “Ready for a journey?” he asked, casting an inquisitive glance at his small new charge. “We’ve a great deal of work ahead of us.”