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truly
with him!
Jumbled carelessly in the bottom of the bucket were at least a dozen golden
horseshoes, full-sized and unbroken.
For a wild moment Hal was tempted to grab the container by its rope handle
and
run for the open gate and the descending trail. But any such mad try would of
course be hopeless. Even if his dash to get away went unmarked by any of
Wodan's
creatures, Baldur would certainly yell after him, maybe even jump on his back
and tackle him, for committing such a staggering blasphemy as stealing from
the
great god.
A second look into the pail convinced Hal that these were the worn shoes,
pried
from the horses' hooves and casually tossed into a bucket, ready to be melted
down, then, with some addition of new gold to replace what had been worn
away,
reworked into new ones. Now he estimated there were more than a dozen, as
many
as fifteen. Why they should be here, yards away from the forge and out of the
farriers' reach, was not immediately obvious. But a lot of things in the
world
were awkward and illogical.
Blind greed, surprisingly strong now that it had a real chance, urged Hal to
snatch up and carry away the whole bucket, heavy as it was. But the instinct
for
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self-preservation insisted that he not try that. Half a dozen shoes would be
plenty, or at least he was willing to bet they would, and he thought he had
room
for that many in his pouch.
As fast as his hands could move, Hal began stuffing twisted little curves of
gold into his pouch; they were heavy, but there seemed little danger of his
falling into deep water, so he would be all right.
There was a strange little noise, a kind of choking, and he looked up to see
Baldur staring at him. The youth was almost stunned. "What are you doing?" he
quavered, in evident horror.
"Providing for my future, lad." Hal kept his voice to a hoarse whisper. "For
yours, too, if you like. Let's get on with it!"
"But you cannot steal from Wodan!" Baldur was almost hissing with outrage. "I
should have known, because all along you have talked of gold, gold, nothing
but
gold! I should have suspected but still I thought "
"I'm only taking a few "
"You cannot!"
Hal drew himself up and tried to speak in a paternal voice. "My son, a great
god, a glorious deity like your Father of Battles will never miss a few small
metallic crumbs." But he had to heed the look on Baldur's face, inflexible
already and getting worse, practically ready to commit murder.
Right now they could certainly not afford a serious argument, much less a
brawl.
Hal pulled most of the gold from his pouch carefully retaining his original
fragmentary find and dumped the rest quietly on the ground beside the bucket,
thinking the clanging metal would make less noise that way. Even as he
sacrificed his treasure he was marking the spot mentally, intending to come
back
later for what he had already begun to think of as his own property.
Horror and rage were fading from Baldur's face, and he quickly regained some
of
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the happiness that had been his only moments earlier, when he was embracing
Gold
Mane. In the ecstasy of his excitement he seemed to forget and forgive Hal's
attempted crime.
The fact of an exotic stable awoke old memories. "Let me tell you a story
about
Hercules sometime," Hal whispered to his companion, trying to distract him
from
his outrage, meanwhile chuckling to himself.
But the youth was in no mood for distraction now, and seized him by the arm.
"Hal, do we dare, after all, to do this?"
Hal stared at him. Maybe it was finally dawning on Baldur that Wodan might
consider the taking of one of his Horses as great a crime as the pilfering of
discarded shoes.
Drawing a deep breath, Hal became heartily encouraging. If it was truly
possible
for men to ride these creatures, they would provide an excellent means of
getting away. "Of course we dare. We are going to borrow not steal, you
understand a couple of these excellent animals. You will help me find one I
can
ride. Then they will carry us to a safe spot at some convenient distance.
When
we are there, you and I will discuss what our next step ought to be."
"Right now?"
Hal mastered an impulse to club the young fool down. "Yes, right now! What
did
you think? Before someone comes nosing around and discovers us. When d'you
think
we'll have a better chance?"
Hal's sporting blood was up. It seemed that Baldur, though now his will was
wavering, had not been entirely crazy after all. In situations fraught with
danger there were times and Hal thought he had learned to recognize them when
the least dangerous thing to do was to move fast and straight ahead.
Experience had given Hal a great respect for the powers that god-Faces
bestowed
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on men and women; but it had also completely freed him of the commonly held
notion that gods, especially the truly great ones, could see everywhere and
find
out everything.
The lord of this ruined fortress might still be formidable but on the other
hand
there were certain indications suggesting he might not. Certainly the place
had
been allowed to go to rack and ruin. It would have come as no surprise to Hal
to
learn that whoever wore the Face of Wodan now had not visited this scene of
embarrassing deterioration for a long time. It was easy to believe that he
might
never come back. It even seemed quite possible that the most recent avatar
was
dead, and no one else had yet picked up the Face. Hal had never laid eyes on
a
naked Face, few people had, but he had no trouble imagining the Face of Wodan
lying somewhere, lacking all power and purpose in itself, until, as would
inevitably happen, another human being should pick it up and put it on.
If Wodan was truly dead, and the gnomes knew it, they were successfully
keeping
the secret. And if the Valkyries knew it too . . . ? The implications were
too
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