CHAPTER 174: FIMBULVETR COMES

The bells of St. Peter’s tolled as the curia gathered, their iron song heavy as storm clouds.

The air in the Lateran Palace was thick with incense and argument, voices rising and falling in Latin like clashing swords.

Pope John XIX sat beneath the canopy of his throne, the weight of the Fisherman’s Ring heavy upon his trembling hand.

Messengers had come in waves, each bearing tidings darker than the last, until the old pontiff felt himself drowning in a sea of calamity.

"Gold and silver, gone!" cried Cardinal Benedict, his face flushed red. "A king’s ransom poured into the hands of pagans, and still they mock us! Still they slaughter Christ’s anointed!"

Another cardinal, pale with rage, held aloft the letter from Nidaros.

"Cnut blood-eagled in the square of London, his entrails offered to devils while our emissaries were bound and made to watch! Svein calls it sacrilege, and swears Denmark and Norway to our cause if we condemn Duncan."

"Condemn?" spat Cardinal Leo.

"The Scot was there! He marched with the wolf! And now he claims England as his own, while Cnut’s son yet lives? It is usurpation, blasphemy, and deceit. Rome must excommunicate him!"

Others shouted back at once, voices colliding like thunder.

"If we damn Duncan, we drive Scotland into rebellion against the Church!"

"If we support him, we betray Denmark, and lose Norway’s fleets!"

"What of the Empire? What of Conrad?"

At that name the chamber stilled. All eyes turned to the papal throne.

The Pope lowered his head, his voice hoarse but clear.

"Conrad is patient, but not blind. He sees Denmark weakened, torn between Svein and Scotland, and already he sharpens his blade. He waits for our word to move."

The cardinals muttered, some crossing themselves, others gnawing their lips.

Conrad’s ambition was no secret, the Empire ever hungered for the North Sea’s coasts, and now Denmark stood exposed.

John’s fingers trembled on the arms of his throne.

His chest felt tight, as though the incense smoke itself had settled into his lungs.

Cnut dead, Duncan crowned, Svein in fury, Conrad circling, and Rome’s silver squandered on the very pagans who mocked its altars, the litany of disasters spun in his mind like a wheel of torment.

He tried to rise, his hand lifting weakly, but the room swam before him.

Voices blurred into a storm, cardinals shouting, bishops arguing, their words crashing into one another until they were only noise.

The wolf has stolen our gold... butchered our king... Christendom tearing at its own throat...

The Pope’s breath quickened. His heart thundered like a war drum, then stuttered.

His vision narrowed, faces swimming into shadow. He clutched at his chest, a strangled cry escaping his lips.

"Holy Father!" one cardinal gasped, rushing forward.

But already John XIX was slipping from his throne, the Fisherman’s Ring glinting in the firelight as he collapsed to the marble floor.

Panic erupted in the chamber.

Some fell to their knees in prayer, others shouted for physicians, their voices echoing off the vaulted ceiling.

Yet the old man’s eyes had already gone glassy, his chest still.

The Vicar of Christ lay dead, struck down not by blade or poison, but by the weight of fear, fury, and despair.

And somewhere far to the north, the sea carried its wolf back to his den, while the heart of Christendom beat no more.

---

"Bring water! Bring a priest!" someone shouted, though half the room was already on their knees.

Two bishops rushed forward, pressing trembling fingers to the papal throat, then drawing back with ashen faces.

"He breathes no more..." one whispered. "The Holy Father is gone."

A cardinal seized the old man by the shoulders, shaking him gently at first, then harder."Sanctitas! Holy Father!" His voice cracked with panic.

Another bishop splashed holy water across the pontiff’s brow, muttering hurried prayers, while yet another fell to his knees beside him, reciting the rites in a voice that broke with terror: In manus tuas, Domine, commendo spiritum meum.

But John XIX’s eyes were glass, his lips slack. No hand of heaven stirred him.

The chamber erupted. Some wept, clutching their crucifixes. Others shouted at one another, voices cracking like whips.

"He died unshriven!" one cried. "God have mercy on his soul!"

"No, the words were spoken, the rites begun, they are enough!" another argued.

"Enough? Enough, when Christendom itself is aflame?"

One by one, heads turned from the body to the gilded throne that now stood empty.

"Succession," Cardinal Benedict muttered, his face pale but eyes hard. "We must call the conclave. Before word spreads beyond these walls."

"Conclave?" a bishop spat. "The Holy Father lies dead at our feet, and you think of politics?"

"Politics?" Benedict snapped.

"Look to the north! England in chaos, Norway in arms, Denmark unguarded, the Empire circling like a hawk, and the wolf feasting on it all! Without a Pope, who speaks for Christendom? Who commands unity? Do you want Conrad to seize Denmark while Rome still wrings its hands in mourning?"

The hall filled with fearful mutters. Some nodded grimly, others recoiled in horror at the haste.

Another cardinal slammed his fist on the table.

"Then we must move swiftly. A successor must be chosen, tonight if need be. If the world sees Rome without shepherd or voice, the wolves will not only laugh at us... they will devour us."

The body of John XIX still lay cooling on the marble, incense swirling like fog above him, but already the princes of the Church turned their minds from death to crowns.

And somewhere far to the north, the sea carried its wolf back to his den, while in Rome, the throne of Peter sat empty, and Christendom trembled on the edge of ruin.

---

The sea groaned beneath him.

Vetrúlfr stood alone on the deck of a ship he did not recognize, its timbers black with age, its sail torn to rags.

All around him, the waters heaved, mountains of foam rising and crashing, a storm with no horizon.

And from beneath the prow, she rose.

The woman of salt and shadow, her hair dark as sunken seaweed, her skin glimmering with the pale sheen of scales.

Her eyes, green as the deep, fixed upon him with the patience of eternity.

She leaned against the prow like a lover at the threshold, one hand beckoning him down into the black waters below.

"Come," her lips whispered though no sound touched the air. "The sea waits for you. You are already mine."

Vetrúlfr’s jaw clenched. His fists tightened on the slick wood of the railing.

The ship pitched, the storm howled, the waves clawed at his ankles, yet still he shook his head.

"Not today," he growled.

Her smile deepened, a crescent moon of promise.

Again she beckoned. Again he answered, teeth bared against the gale:

"Not today."

She tilted her head, her hair drifting like kelp in the surge.

Then her lips moved once more, the words cutting sharper than any wave:

"But what of our child? Your daughter... the sea. She beckons to you."

Vetrúlfr’s breath caught. A memory flickered, the night in Greenland when his soul was returned from the depths, and he became draugr no more.

The night swallowed in haze he could not recall.

A second vision, on Vinland’s shores, when he saw her a second time.

And now her voice, twisting like a knife: our child.

"Lies," he snarled, though his heart pounded with doubt. "Not today."

Then the sea fell silent.

Vetrúlfr turned, and saw the storm gather over land, not fjord or forest, but the great city of Rome.

Its seven hills were drowned in shadow, its streets filled with voices crying in terror.

Over the Lateran, ravens circled in black clouds, their wings blotting out the sun.

"The Holy Father is no more!" the voices screamed.

In the heavens above, thunder split the sky.

He lifted his gaze, and there upon the storm’s throne loomed the red-bearded god.

More storm than flesh Thor raised Mjǫllnir, and the hammer fell.

Lightning speared the Lateran Palace as the corpse of the Pope was borne forth.

Fire consumed marble and roof-beam alike, until nothing but ash and carrion crows remained.

Then came the cold.

A breath of frost rolled outward from the ruin, seeping across fields and mountains, down rivers and valleys.

It reached even the prow of Vetrúlfr’s ship, crusting the boards with ice, freezing his breath in his chest.

The woman beneath the prow laughed soundlessly, her eyes bright with triumph as the waters stiffened into black glass.

Her hair floated around her like a shroud of kelp, her lips curling into a smile that was half-mother, half-lover, and wholly cruel.

"If you had only chosen me," her voice seemed to echo from the depths though no sound crossed the gale, "you would have been spared the cold of winter. Beneath the sea there is no frost, no hunger, no death. Only eternity. Together. You and I, bound as the tides."

Her laughter rose, mocking, sweet as poison. "But still you cling to your rafts of wood, to your feasts and fleeting wars. What are they to the deep? What are they to me?"

The storm froze around him, her promise ringing like a curse: together beneath the sea, you will be mine for eternity.

The cold sank into his bones, his heart faltered, and in the last moment before the darkness swallowed him whole, Vetrúlfr’s lips shaped a single word:

"Fimbulvetr."

He awoke with a jolt, drenched in sweat despite the furs, the word still burning on his tongue.

His breath came ragged, clouding the dim rafters above.

For a moment he lay there, trembling, until the warmth of Ullrsfjǫrðr seeped back into him.

The hypocaust flues groaned below, pushing waves of heat through stone and floor, the old Roman craft long lost to the south but still kept here.

Soon his skin burned, his limbs flush with life once more.

And yet, the memory of that chill clung to him, deeper than flesh, lodged in marrow and soul.

Never in his hall, not in the height of winter, had he ever known cold like that.

Not in Iceland, not even in Greenland’s icebound wastes.

He sat up slowly, staring into the shadows that curled across the chamber. Was it a dream? A vision? Or the gods mocking him with glimpses of what was to come?

The word still lingered, bitter on his tongue, like frost that no fire could thaw.

Fimbulvetr.