I Will Pay Your Price

Odin watched him turn, his dark blue cloak whirling around him like a shadow as he spun. Loki was halfway across the room before Odin called out for him, but his call was left unanswered. He’d known it would be.

He watched him go.

There was no dramatic slamming of doors. No malevolent shadow cast over the kingdom to warn of dire times to come. Yet Odin felt it in his bones as he climbed the stairs and collapsed onto his throne.

Mimir appeared at the bottom of the dais, staring off after Loki at first, then turning to look up at Odin, a wry smile on the man’s scarred and aged face. He let his black hood fall back from his head as he glided up the steps, revealing a misshapen skull with only a few straggly hairs. He reached Odin’s throne and leaned down, resting one elbow on the armrest, and peering intently at Odin’s face.

“This is not the face of a wise man. This is not the face of one who sees what is right before him,” said the shadowy being.

“No,” Odin acknowledged. “It is not.” Had he been truly wise, he would have known how to solve the problem of Loki long before now. He would have been willing to change his ways, to change his heart. He would have foreseen what his neglect would do to one so proud as Loki.

“He is made of different stuff than that which you know,” Mimir said.

“He is my grandson.”

“And he is Freya’s son. Whose twin was Freyr - the one who killed his own father to prove he was ready to rule. Who your own precious, golden son, murdered, to protect his love.” Mimir straightened, moving behind the throne and resting his gnarled, misty hands on Odin’s shoulder. “Your pristine world has its shadows, Odin. Your golden son is tarnished, and you have failed to see the darkness lurking within your very own family.”

Odin tried to turn, to face the man who spoke so boldly of what he should not, but Mimir’s fingers became claws, digging into Odin’s clothing and the skin beneath. “What do you know?” he demanded.

Mimir’s harsh laugh, like stones grating together, rose above Odin’s head. “I know what you wish to know. I see what you fail to see.”

“Then let me see!” Odin clutched the armrests, desperate for the wisdom he lacked.

Mimir crept from behind the throne. “You wish a sip from my well, do you? It is a drink you cannot give back.”

“I will pay your price,” Odin said through gritted teeth. “I know what it will be.”

Mimir opened his shadowy cloak to reveal a horn hanging from a golden rope across his shoulders. He released it, holding it with one hand while he reached out his other, palm up. Waiting.

Odin took a deep breath. Mimir had offered this bargain to him long ago, and always Odin had refused. But now he questioned all the choices of his past. Had he the wisdom to look beyond his own disappointments, he might have been able to foresee what Loki would become. He might have been able to change it.

Besides which, Odin reasoned with himself, if he were truly to be able to oversee his children as they passed through the Trial on Midgard, he ought to be able to anticipate their needs in order to offer instruction and help when possible.

Yes. Wisdom and knowledge was worth the price Mimir demanded.

“Very well,” he told Mimir - that being that guarded the Well of Urd and the secrets of the cosmos. And Odin dug his fingers into his left eye socket and withdrew his eye. He dropped it into Mimir’s palm with a wet plop. He expected Mimir’s condescending laughter - as the man surely knew all along what Odin would do - yet it did not come.

“Go to the aviary and select a battle starling, for surely your war has just begun.” Then the mysterious being was gone, vanished in a mist that lingered in his wake.

Odin stood and straightened his jacket, a momentary flash of pride making him grateful there had been no audience for Loki’s rejection and Mimir’s trade. At that moment, he questioned all that he was, all that he’d known to be true, all that he had done.

With a flick of his wrists, he drew the hood of his cloak over his head and down over his eyes. He had no desire to meet anyone in the halls of the palace before he had completed the task Mimir had given him.

He moved toward his destination with single-minded purpose, ignoring the deference of servants and the salutations of others who worked or lived within the palace walls. There would be time for greetings later. For now, the hunger for knowledge drove him. He didn’t notice the droplets of rich, red blood that scattered upon the floor in his wake. He didn’t notice, but others did, and the rumors began to spread.

Odin paused before the double glass doors, watching the birds fly and flit between the leafy branches. There were no ravens, or battle starlings as Mimir had called them, in sight, yet Odin opened the door and stepped inside anyway.