Chapter 002

Hair standing on end, Managarm blinked at the smoking chips of wood scattered on the charred ground before him. The campfire that had been roaring a few yards away to his right now sputtered and choked, threatening to go out.

Kneeling on the ground, he sat back on his heels and felt the last trickles of magick drain out of his body and into the earth, grounding his spell. As far as he knew, it had been centuries since any dark magician dared to scare up such forces, though he’d never needed to rely on such tactics himself.

Not until now.

The quarter moon drifted low in the morning sky, on its way below the horizon for another day. He had been forever chasing the sun and moon, charged with seeking destruction and chaos from the moment of his creation, whether he had liked it or not.

Sweat and smoke burning his eyes, Managarm reached for thursiaz, the triangular shape of the rune still a glowing ember in the charred wood chip, but as soon as he touched it, the wood crumbled to pieces beneath his finger tips. He had the same result when trying to pick up the chip smoldering beneath angular n-shaped rune uruz, and as soon as that one had disintegrated beneath his touch, the two remaining chips — inscribed with the runes perthro and nauthiz — lost their heat altogether. The glowing symbols disappeared, the chips becoming nothing more than cold ash.

Managarm scooped the ashes together and rubbed them between his bare hands, spreading black soot over strong, ruddy palms.

Moon-dog the Magician, he chuckled to himself as he knee-walked several paces sideways to stoke the dying fire. He was careful to keep the fire small, contained and far out of sight of any park rangers who might be out patrolling at this hour. No sense in attracting unwanted attention, particularly when he was still so vulnerable.

He sat back on his bum, stretching out his hands to warm them by the fire while the cooler temperature of the ground crept up his spine. He unzipped the collar of his fleece pullover and reached up to wipe the perspiration off his brow, smearing soot across his forehead. He laughed when he realized his mistake, then rubbed both hands across his cheeks, nose and chin, darkening the rest of his face.

“Managarm, the dark god,” he whispered to no one. He wiped his damp, sooty palms on his blue jeans and stared into the fire for a long moment. “And out of darkness, is born new light.”

He’d been almost afraid to say the words, as if some ancient curse might rise up out of the soil or swoop down from the trees to smite him for his sacrilege. He had just used Odin’s own tool against him. Granted, he had no idea whether or not it had worked. This had been just a test case, after all. But if any of the old gods had caught a whiff of what he was up to — if any of them had even remotely the wherewithal to detect him, much less to be able to do anything about it — there had been no indication in the past few months that he had been preparing and practicing.

Assuming this test spell had worked, Managarm still had to figure out what to do with the one or more Berserkers he’d just summoned. They weren’t a particularly patient lot — engineered for the express purpose of making war, violent mischief and other dark mayhem — and they would come looking for their maker.

If Odin didn’t get control of them first.

A shudder ran through his body. Fucking Odin, he cursed under his breath. The old fool who hadn’t been satisfied with the spoils and dramas of his warrior peoples, who’d gone soft and even sacrificed himself for greater understanding and wisdom — and to bring written language to the Vikings. As if the bloody Vikings needed to waste their time on education. With language had come record keeping, stable commerce, peace accords and even civilized government.

That had really been too much. Even if the mighty Odin hadn’t been able to foresee where the Nordic peoples were headed, he still should have put a stop to it all, once it became clear what was happening.

Managarm hadn’t exactly enjoyed being in charge of chasing the moon — after all, it was barely more productive than a dog endlessly chasing his own tail — but at least he’d had a purpose. He’d had a place in the Nordic pantheon, no matter how low his own position. Every day had been like the Halls of Valhalla, where fallen heroes enjoyed roasted meat, obliging women and bottomless steins flowing with mead.

He cleared his throat and spat out sooty phlegm into the dirt.

The runes. Odin’s obsession with the World Tree and harnessing its wisdom to enhance his own power in the nine realms and for the betterment of the cosmos. He’d never known when to quit. Nothing was ever enough for that stubborn old aesir. That had been the beginning of the end for the gods, even though it had take centuries upon centuries to cause any real inconvenience.

But now they were all scattered to the winds. Old gods without followers, powerless, with scarcely any belief in themselves left these days.

Managarm scooped up and handful of dirt and threw it at the fire. “Fucking Odin!” he screeched at the top of his lungs. The moisture in the soil sizzled in the fire as the flames danced, threatening to go out but then leaping up again. He rested back on the heels of his hands and sighed. He stared into the fire, too tired to even think about calculating his next move.

The wind shifted, blowing smoke into his face. Managarm coughed violently and scrambled on hands and knees to the opposite side of the fire. Not even the wind had any residual respect for an old god, albeit one of the lesser ones. In the next world, the one he would create, things would be different.

A lot different.

The tree was vulnerable now, a mere sapling. Managarm would go to the dead tree, fashion a new set of runes from its ancient corpse — to replace the disposable set he’d made on wood chips from Home Depot, and which he’d just burnt up in this latest spell. He would seize the young tree, make it yield its secrets to him. It would lead him to the Fenris Wolf, the only creature in heaven, earth or elsewhere of truly and completely destroying Odin. Managarm would bind him to his will, dispatch Odin, take control of nine realms, destroy the planet and make himself a new one — with a new class of worshipping, blood-thirsty warriors, a race of passably intelligent elfkin to handle all the administrative details of running the cosmos, and maybe a couple of sea monsters and mermaids for entertainment.

But first, he needed coffee.

Managarm climbed to his feet and shook the dirt and ash from his clothes. He kicked dirt onto the fire to put it out, then stamped on the embers with his heavy work boots. The young sapling might well be in this very stand of trees, and a forest fire at this stage would be disastrous. Smokey the Bear had nothing to do with it.

He snaked his way back through the woods, careful to leave a maddeningly meandering trail for any who might attempt to track him, then hit the park’s main path and followed it back to the parking lot at the trail head. He nodded politely to a ranger who was filling a plastic brochure box attached to the 4×10-foot trail map stationed next to the trash cans and port-a-potties.

“Getting in a good hike before work?” The ranger took a sip from a steaming Starbucks cup.

Managarm sniffed at the aroma of coffee and felt his own irritability start to rise. “Something like that,” he called over his shoulder as he passed the ranger. He yanked open the rusty door of his gas-guzzling Suburban — always left unlocked, because who in their right mind would want to steal such a thing, particular when it reeked of eviscerated game — climbed in.

First stop, Starbucks. Second, to Home Depot to demand a refund on the sub-standard wood chips — they’d actually done just fine, but he was in a mood to argue and it was easy to pick fights with customer service reps. They might also buy him some time to figure out what to do with the Berserkers. Hell, he might even be able to sic one of them on the folks at the Returns desk. He needed some good entertainment.