Panic seized her with nearly the same amount of strength as the hands that held her in place. With every jolt or wiggle that she could muster, Grámtrist's grip only tightened. Thrúd couldn't help the small cries of pain that escaped her as she struggled on two fronts: one to release herself from the traveler's clutches, and the other to free Mjolnir from the Light in time.
From the moment he snuck up on her, Thrúd had lost count. With her wits scrambled and fear rising, she diverted all effort, both mental and physical, into getting out of his grip before it was too late.
Of course, Grámtrist made that far easier said than done.
"Just let go, child," he said. "This will all be over if you just let go!"
Thrúd grunted and grit her teeth in effort, digging both heels into the ground and jerking her body left and right to loosen his grip. Several things were going on in her mind right now, but she could only find herself focusing on one in particular:
Her thirteen seconds were up.
From inside the Light, she could feel Mjolnir become overwhelmed by it. The handle began to vibrate with such force, her hands themselves were becoming a blur, almost forcing her into letting go.
"Embla is almost free now! There is no use in resisting! You can let go!"
This only motivated her to tighten her grip.
From the outside, thunder was heard rolling across the skies. Flashes of lightning were visible through the hole in the ceiling she had created on her way inside. For a moment, Thrúd only thought that she had imagined those natural occurrences, mistaking them for the blood rushing by her ears. But those thoughts were put to rest once a bolt as big as the two that were forever frozen in Midgard and Vanaheim burst through the ceiling and struck the floor.
Grámtrist flinched in surprise, giving Thrúd the window she needed. Her grip now even tighter, Thrúd dug her feet into the floor and leaned back as hard as she could, going against both Grámtrist's hold on her and the pull of the Light.
"Back . . ." she breathed out with her eyes squinted shut from the effort. "OFF!"
Another bolt of lightning struck the ground between them, jarring the traveler's grip loose and giving Thrúd enough wiggle room to shove her shoulder into his midsection, yanking Mjolnir free in the process. Charred chunks of the ceiling rained down around them from where the lightning crashed through.
Both goddess and traveler stumbled in separate directions until they both lost their footing and fell to the ground, smoke rising from both of their bodies. Thrúd landed facedown, her head ringing from having struck her forehead against the hard floor. She did her best to ignore it as she held herself up in a prone position, looking for Mjolnir.
She found it a few feet in front of her, having clattered to the floor in her haste to free herself. Crawling over toward it to close the distance between them, Thrúd gripped the handle and held it close to her face, assessing whatever damage she could find.
To the untrained eye, it appeared fine. On a cosmetic level, there were no new blemishes or marks, save for the new ones etched in by Sindri. It still glowed perpetually, but other than that, it appeared structurally sound.
But Thrúd knew better.
Throughout her adventures with the hammer, she had gotten accustomed to its presence and mannerisms. She could feel the inside of the hammer almost as well as she could feel the inside of her own clothes, and everything about it felt wrong. From its center, she could feel constant, uneven spinning, like a gyroscope with an uneven axis.
An unseen war was going on inside the hammer, and if what Sindri had said has any truth to it, then it would soon tear it apart.
So many thoughts were going through her head the longer she looked at the weapon, and each thought was accompanied with its own emotion. Each one greeted her faster than she could process and leaving her even faster still. But one thing was at the forefront of her mind that she couldn't possibly ignore:
I failed.
Off to her side, she saw Grámtrist struggle to his feet, using his sword as a crutch as he rose to his full height.
"This could have been avoided," he said as if he were chastising a child. "This anger you feel, and the sense of failure that will meet you soon."
He was right about one thing. She was angry.
"Had you given Embla to me in the mines of Svartalfheim, your journey wouldn't have had to take place. It was foolish to get your hopes up, thinking that you could save it." He rummaged through the sack hanging at his side and pulled out a large black lump. "And even more foolish to bring others into your journey."
Grámtrist lazily tossed the stiff body of Hugin over to Thrúd. He hit the floor and rolled to a stop close to her side.
Her eyes widened in alarm, but she relaxed only an increment when she saw that he was breathing, albeit uneven and labored. Hugin twisted his head to look at her, though his eyes were only partially open. Any small movement aggravated an unseen injury, but it was clear that his right wing was bent unnaturally.
Thrúd looked up at Grámtrist, his sword held at his side patiently. "You hurt Hugin? Just to lure me here?" She was surprised she could get two full sentences out as she seethed in fury.
"Like I said," Grámtrist continued, "it was foolish to involve him in the first place."
The raven tried to squawk and speak to her, but Thrúd shook her head. "Just relax, Hugin," she insisted, rising to her knees and gathering the bird in her arms. "I'll . . . I'll- er, shit, what can I do?" She muttered to herself, but it was unfortunately loud enough for Grámtrist to hear.
"You can give the hammer to me and end this chase. The bird will live, I made sure of that much." He added as if it were a genuine act of kindness that Thrúd should be thankful for.
More thunder cracked outside the temple. For a moment, Thrúd nearly forgot that she was holding the body of her partner in crime. He let out a chirp of protest as her grip tightened in outrage. With a quick apology, Thrúd set him back down, careful not to agitate his injuries anymore than they already are.
Thrúd rose all the way to her feet and picked up the hammer. She could still sense the unsteadiness inside of it, but ignored it. Instead, she pointed it right at the traveler, lightning crackling and flashing off of it for added effect.
"If Mjolnir is truly not long for this world," she bit out, "then I'm going to make sure that its last act is caving in your miserable fucking skull."
"If you're not giving up the hammer," he raised his sword and gripped the handle with both hands, "then you're not long for this world either."
A louder crack of thunder rolled across the realm.
Thrúd peeked behind her, looking down at Hugin. The raven struggled, but managed to rise to his feet, shaking his head to fend off the weariness and fatigue.
"You gonna be ok?" Thrúd asked him.
"Odin put me and Munin through worse whenever he had a bad day. But having god-like healing abilities does come in handy at times like these," he admitted.
Thrúd snorted. "I bet. Get somewhere safe, alright?"
Hugin shook his head, ignoring her command. "I helped you find that hammer," he reminded her. "Someone's gotta make sure you won't get it destroyed."
Before she could ask how he planned on doing so without getting himself caught in the crossfire, Hugin flapped his one good wing and hopped toward her. Suddenly, a black stream of magic wove its way around her body before settling around her shoulder.
Just like how he did with the All-Father, Hugin fit himself on her body in the form of swirling black tattoos, crisscrossing and melding with her preexisting ones that adorned her arm.
"Huh," Thrúd breathed out, appreciating her new addition. "You gonna be ok there?"
"So long as you don't get yourself killed, we'll both be fine," his voice echoed in her head like normal. "Now kick his ass already."
Thrúd twirled the still uneven hammer in her grip. "Gladly."
As the two of them spoke, Grámtrist performed his usual pre-battle ritual. He paced slowly back and forth, eyes scanning his environment and the threat that his opponent possessed. Due to Mjolnir's compromised structural integrity and Thrúd's mind in a whirlwind of panic and fury, he deemed the threat minimal. He only paced a few times before drawing his sword and squatting into a battle-ready stance.
What he couldn't tell was that Thrúd had assessed the situation herself. If Grámtrist was pleased that they were all gathered around the Light, then the logical thing to do is to get them as far away from it as she could get them.
Grámtrist lunged.
Thrúd swung the hammer in an uppercut motion and let go, letting it crash into the Traveler's midsection and carry him out of the temple by creating a new hole in the wall of the temple. A sense of Déjà vu washed over Thrúd, thinking back to how Odin did the exact same thing to her at Ragnarok.
Snapping her fingers, Thrúd zipped forward until she was outside, gripping the handle and riding its momentum across the sky. Grámtrist grunted in effort and discomfort, clutching the hammer with his free hand to try and redirect it away from him.
Around them, dark clouds had gathered. Lightning cracked and flashed around them. Thrúd wasn't sure how much of it was the realm's natural weather cycle, or if it was her own godly abilities altering it. Either way, she could use this.
As the two of them flew over the Alfheim desert, Thrúd climbed into a standing position on his abdomen. She summoned the hammer into her hand and threw it directly into his gut, sending him plummeting to the sandy terrain below. She could both feel the hammer's impact in her bones and see the cloud of dust below her.
She snapped her fingers again and Mjolnir sailed back up to her hand. She flipped it upside down and held the face of it in both hands, allowing both her and the hammer's combined weight pull her down to where Grámtrist landed, lightning crackling and sizzling around her as she plummeted down like an electric comet.
The ground grew closer and Grámtrist was in sight. He managed to roll out of the way before she could slam into him, but the resulting collision still propelled him backwards several feet.
As soon as the new could of dust settled, Thrúd found herself dead center inside a crater on one knee, panting from the exhausted effort. The sand around her was charred black, but around her yet in the enlarged blast zone were crystalized spires of sand varying between eight to twelve feet tall, all of them glowing an eerie orange-ish yellow as they cooled off from the extreme heat of the lightning. Before long, they all turned black.
Grámtrist shook away his disorientation and rose to his feet, sand falling out of several spots of his armor. With a stumble, he regained his balance and reached into his sack to fish out a whetstone. He scraped it across his blade and swung immediately, sending a red arc of magic her way. Thrúd jumped to avoid the oncoming attack, then ducked to avoid another. Most of the magic that missed her crashed into the glassy spires, making them topple over and shatter instantly.
With each swing of his sword, Grámtrist immediately scraped the whetstone across and sent another wave her way in a rhythmic pattern, each one going in a different direction, but all of them aiming at her. She ducked, bobbed and weaved her way past each magical attack, slowly making her way closer to the Traveler until she was close enough to interrupt his swing with her shield and follow up with another strike from Mjolnir.
He stumbled backward, giving her more time to strike at the now weakened chunk of armor covering his midsection. Before she could land another blow, he caught wrist with his hand and twisted his body around, using her momentum against her and flinging her across the blackened sands. Thrúd let out a grunt of pain as she crashed into one of the spires before skidding along the sandy ground to a stop.
Once she got her bearings back, Thrúd looked up to see Grámtrist holding that same blue sphere in his palm, preparing to cast the same healing spell he did in Muspelheim. The orb glowed bright blue and similarly colored magic spiraled around him.
"Oh no you don't!" Thrúd shouted over the whirlwind of magic and thunder.
Rearing back, she threw Mjolnir at the hovering orb with pinpoint accuracy. It shattered on impact and sent out a concussive shockwave that made him stumble again.
Thrúd ran forward as fast as she could as she snapped her fingers to call Mjolnir back. It struck the back of his helmeted skull as it flew into her awaiting palm, bringing him unintentionally close enough for her to bash her shield against him. Her eyes widened in surprise and joy as she saw cracks beginning to form along his breastplate from the stress of her attacks.
Her distracted gaze cost her as Grámtrist swung his sword in a wide arc, forcing the goddess to dodge underneath. Before she could set herself up for another strike, Grámtrist was already swinging again, and again and again after that.
The two of them danced like this for a while. Every so often, his sword cut through the fragile spires like they were made of butter, shattering to pieces as they fell. A lumberjack in a field of miniature trees.
As he swung, he shouted, "Why does your family insist on interfering in my life? Is it not simpler to yield the hammer?"
"Wouldn't it be easier to admit that you're fucking crazy?" Thrúd shot back as she evaded his attacks. "That there's no one inside Mjolnir and I would definitely know if there was?!" She hoped that the uncertainty she felt as she said that last part wasn't present in her voice. "Besides, my dad-"
"Was a drunken oaf who took everything from me!" Another swing, another spire shattered. "His negligence is the reason Embla resides in that hammer. And if you cannot see that she rests inside, then you're just as big a fool as he was!"
Thrúd was surprised that his words weren't burrowing under her skin like they would have a few days ago. Rather, she focused on another aspect.
Grámtrist was getting sloppy. Every other time they met he was calm, collected. He had started this crusade to free somebody and needed absolute focus and determination to do so. But now that he was so close to his presumed goal, his emotions were running high. He couldn't control them, and it is now affecting his skills in battle.
Thrúd blocked his next swing with her shield and slammed Mjolnir onto his wrist. He let out a pained howl and dropped the massive sword. Kicking it away, Thrúd grabbed onto his armor with one hand and began to pummel his weakened midsection with the hammer. Sparks flew on each hit and the stress cracks grew more prominent.
She struck the hammer against him one more time and took a small amount of satisfaction in her work as she heard him cry out in pain again. Looking up, she expected to see his eyes contorted in pain, but was surprised to find that they were filled with rage instead: not an expression one would wear after just screaming in pain.
The screaming continued. Thrúd realized the texture of it didn't carry the same tinny quality as his voice did coming out of his helmet. It then occurred to her that the voice wasn't coming from anywhere. Like Hugin's voice, it sounded as if it were inside her own head.
Blinking in surprise, she looked down at Mjolnir, still pressed against Grámtrist's armor. The cries of anguish timed themselves with the flickering of the hammer's ethereal light coming from its markings. "What?" She asked underneath her breath.
Another distraction that cost her. Grámtrist lifted her by her throat and slammed her on the ground, dragging her across the coarse and rough sand before lifting her to her feet and wrenching Mjolnir from her grasp. The hammer fell to the ground and she was tossed away, her back hitting another spire.
As she slid to the ground, she looked up in time to see Grámtrist picking up his sword and scraping the whetstone along it. He raised the glowing red blade so the tip was hovering over the hammer's head.
On instinct, Thrúd snapped her fingers hastily. Rather than flying into her awaiting palm, Mjolnir threw itself into Thrúd's body. With an audible oof, the force of the collision destroyed the spire she was leaning against and she skidded to a halt in the sand several yards away.
Thrúd let out a series of coughs as she pushed the hammer off of her body. She only just looked up in time to see Grámtrist- the magic infused in his sword still unused- swing and release it in low, wide arc. Thrúd rolled to put herself between the hammer and the oncoming magic, unfurling her shield as she did so.
The shield took the brunt of the impact, making her fall backwards. Her hands scrambled at her sides in a frantic search for Mjolnir. She immediately gripped the handle once she found it.
"Your balance is wanting." Grámtrist observed.
"And you're a dickhead." Thrúd also observed.
The screaming she heard almost all but forgotten by the two hits she took, Thrúd diverted her attention to Grámtrist's hand, which was reaching inside his sack to retrieve another whetstone.
Despite having already accepted the grim reality that Mjolnir likely won't survive this encounter- whether it be from a swing of Grámtrist's enchanted blade or from the overwhelming power of the Light of Alfheim tearing it apart from the inside- Thrúd did know at least one thing for certain:
Those whetstones needed to go.
She restrained herself from throwing Mjolnir at it as Grámtrist fetched it from his bag, remembering Sindri's tale of the other dwarves and their failed attempts of destroying them. A different idea formed in her head. If she couldn't destroy them, she could at least have them lost once again.
The wind had picked up. Sand began flying in all directions. Thrúd wasn't sure how much of it was due to the natural weather cycle of the realm or her godly influence. Either way, it was good enough to use to her advantage.
Thrúd tossed Mjolnir as hard as she could overhead, just like how she had back in Vanaheim. It sailed clear over Grámtrist and into the night sky, illuminated by the streaks of lightning that smothered it. With a snap of her fingers, Thrúd zipped forward and grabbed underneath the Traveler's breastplate as she passed.
Just as she hoped, the strength of the hammer was able to lift them both effortlessly from the ground, sending them flying into the air. The force of the sudden liftoff wrenched the whetstone free from his grip, sending it falling below, buried underneath the sands.
In just a few moments, Thrúd's outstretched hand gripped the handle of Mjolnir. In her other hand, Grámtrist wiggled and grunted uncomfortably, trying to pry himself loose from her grip. Lightning flashed all around them, thunder accompanying it only a few seconds after each strike.
Their momentum now carrying them forward, Thrúd positioned herself so she was straddling his body and in an easy enough spot to reach and try to extract the contents of his bag. He tried to stop her with his flailing arms, but Thrúd managed to swat them away, gripping at three whetstones and sending them hurtling to the ground, disappearing in the growing sandstorm.
"No!" He cried out, watching them vanish below them.
Reaching out, he managed to grab an armful of her hair and yanked backwards. With a yelp of pain, Thrúd found herself thrown to the side and plummeting to the sandy ground. Before she was able to aim Mjolnir and alter her course, a large tower appeared from out of the darkness far too quickly than she was able to avoid.
The tower appeared to be attached to a prison of some sort; walls rose high around the surrounding perimeter and multiple cages made a maze inside. That was all she was able to see before crashing through the roof of the tower.
With a grunt, Thrúd's grip on the handle was jarred and the two of them fell down the hollow interior. Zigzagging from wall to wall all the way down was a spiderweb-like system of chains that she collided with, flipping her over and spinning her all about on the way down. Hanging from the chains were the remains of Elves. Whether they were light or dark Elves, Thrúd wasn't able to tell. They have been hanging here for so long that their bodies had decomposed beyond recognition. All that remained of them were fragile husks of brittle bones and crispy wings that shattered as she rattled their chains as she fell.
She reached out and gripped a chain. The chain was yanked from one side of the wall, and she swung into the other side with bone-jarring force, still managing to hang on.
Finally having a moment to collect her thoughts, Thrúd spun around and looked for where Mjolnir had landed.
The hammer had gotten itself tangled in a nest of dangling chains, rocking back and forth ten feet above her as if a light breeze were blowing against it.
Huffing in determination and rebuilding her strength, Thrúd planted her feet against the wall and scaled it like a rock climber. Once she was high enough up to reach another chain, she leapt and gripped it, the small disturbance she created on the links were enough to send another Elf carcass to the bottom. "Sorry!" She called down to it.
Swinging back and forth, she flipped herself atop the chain as if she were now walking along a tightrope, waving her arms back and forth to regain her balance. Thrúd leapt again, gripping another chain overhead, getting closer to the hammer.
The wall beneath her feet shattered. A wave of blue energy crashed through one side and destroyed the other. Her balance officially lost, Thrúd fell and gripped the chain again, holding on for dear life as the tower rattled around her.
"Come out, Thorsdottir!" Grámtrist's voice echoed from outside. A few moments later, another wave of magic tore through the tower, making it shake even more. "You can't keep Embla from me any longer!"
Thrúd's body swung back and forth in vain attempts to steady herself. She let one hand go and reached upward, snapping her fingers to call Mjolnir to her.
Mjolnir wanted to obey, but the chains held it back as if they were holding a wild animal. In her head, whimpering noises were heard. The voice sounded similar to the scream she had heard before. "Who's there?" Thrúd hopelessly called out.
Instead of a verbal response, one more wave of magic ripped the tower in two. Thrúd felt herself pitch to the side as her half of the structure began to plummet sideways.
With another snap of her fingers, Mjolnir tore the chains from the wall and zipped to her awaiting palm. Still unceremoniously draped in chains like they were weeds, Mjolnir carried Thrúd out of the collapsing building and onto the desert floor. Grámtrist stood some fifty feet away from where she landed, sword spent of its magic in one hand but a whetstone in the other.
Thrúd rolled her eyes. "What, two falls from hundreds of feet in the air isn't enough to take you out?" She asked, more annoyed than afraid at this point.
"Falls from great heights are nothing compared to the thought of Embla spending an eternity inside that cold stone of a weapon you use."
As if on cue, Mjolnir rumbled in her hand, the markings glowing even brighter as it did. The Light was still tearing it apart inside. With each pulse of light, there was a whimpering sound to accompany it. Thrúd paid it no mind, dismissing it as the stone beginning to groan as it was forced apart. She began untangling the chains from it, but stopped as an idea formed.
"Don't worry, it doesn't have too much longer, thanks to you!"
Grámtrist swiped the stone across his blade. It glowed its blue aura. "And now I'm going to make sure of it."
With no other word of warning, he swung wide, releasing the familiar arc of magic. Thrúd jumped over it with ease, adjusting her grip so that she was no longer holding onto the hammer's handle, but rather the chains that now decorated it. As soon as she landed, Thrúd launched Mjolnir at him like a fishing line and grinned when she saw it anchor itself around his bulky body.
Thrúd summoned lightning around her body and watched as it traveled along each link, making its way over to the now-trapped Traveler on the other end. To her satisfaction, he began to squirm and grunt as the electricity wandered through his body, illuminating his skeleton from underneath his armor.
His hands slowly made their way to the hammer and chains that wrapped around him in an effort to unravel them, but Thrúd tightened her grip on the chain and launched him as high as the chains would allow before yanking down on them hard, bringing him back down to the sand with a bone-crunching thud.
She repeated this two more times, each time leaving a scorched mark on the sand beneath him. With another pull, she swung him overhead in a large arc, slamming him face first into the sand.
Putting as much tension on the chains as possible, Thrúd dug her feet into the sand and twisted her hips as hard as she could. Gritting her teeth, she let out a strained yell of effort as she spun him in a wide circle, electricity still incapacitating him. He slammed into boulders and rock formations with each pass, shattering them to pieces. Thrúd spun him faster, not even growing the least bit dizzy as she did.
Finally, she let go of the chain, sending him flying into the growing sandstorm. His entire visage would've entirely vanished inside it were it not for the electricity in him still sparking; a lantern in a storm. Thrúd still wasn't sure how much of this storm was a natural event in the realm as opposed to it reacting to her fury.
Thrúd snapped her fingers and zipped over to his flying form again, grabbing onto Mjolnir and enjoying the ride once again. His body slammed into another rock formation, sending the two of them tumbling off course and crashing into the sand.
Grámtrist wriggled his way free of his lasso and took up his sword, cursing at Thrúd as he swung down on her. Rolling to the side, Thrúd dodged the blade as it plunged into the sand. He tried again, Thrúd rolled again.
Thrúd kept rolling until the chains wrapped their way around her body as if it were another layer to her battle armor, freeing Mjolnir of their weight.
She avoided his next swing by throwing Mjolnir to her side and snapping her fingers. Not even waiting for him to strike again, Thrúd tossed it to her side again and zipped over to it. Repeating this process repeatedly, Thrúd and Mjolnir became a whirlwind of light and electricity. Snap! Zip! Snap! Zip! Over and over again, she snapped her fingers and tossed the hammer as soon as she felt it in her hand with more speed than even she thought she was capable of.
As the Traveler struggled to rise to his feet, arcs of lightning zapped him, hindering his progress. Finally, he rose to his feet, finding himself in the center of a gaudy lightshow. Grámtrist did his best to reach into his bag but found it to be an endeavor equal to trying to walk upstream of raging rapids. Finally, his fingers closed around another whetstone. He scraped it along his blade before discarding it off to the side like a candy wrapper.
Magic of his own swirled around him as he raised his sword overhead, aiming the tip at the sandy ground under his feet. Thrúd kept up her assault. With each blast of lightning he took, she could see his armor beginning to crack and loosen, smoke rising thicker and thicker from his body after each strike.
Just a little longer . . .
An arc of lightning removed a bracer from his arm. Another took off a chunk of his shin guard. Enduring the pain, Grámtrist completed his spell and plunged the tip of his sword into the ground, sending a shockwave out in all directions.
Her rhythm now interrupted, Thrúd was launched away several yards before sliding a stop on her side, groaning in discomfort as she rolled onto her back. She squeezed her hand, making sure that she still had a hold of Mjolnir.
To her relief, she was. But to her horror, Mjolnir was peppered with several gashes and marks, electricity sparking and zapping out of them.
She blinked several times, hoping that her eyes were playing tricks on her due to the disorientation from the blast. But the damage remained. Mjolnir was on its last legs.
Thrúd took several steadying breaths to calm her nerves before planting both hands into the sand to push herself upright. Now standing at full height, Thrúd squared up to Grámtrist, who was digging his blade out of the sand.
Only one thought was going through her head: let's make sure this bastard dies with Mjolnir if he wants it destroyed that badly.
"No!"
Thrúd shook her head. "Don't bother trying to hold me back, Hugin. I'm finishing this."
As Grámtrist made another lunge forward, Thrúd couldn't hear the raven say, "Uh, that wasn't me."
Just as Thrúd thought, Grámtrist could sense how close the hammer was to annihilation. He lunged forward with the tip of his sword aimed directly at the hammer. Thrúd sidestepped and unraveled the chains that were adorning her body, wrapping it around his wrist.
Avoiding another swing of his sword, Thrúd rolled between his legs, letting the chains wrap around him as she went. Without letting the Traveler land another blow on her, Thrúd avoided his attacks until his arms were constricted against his body. With a yank of the chains, Thrúd brought the giant to his knees.
She leapt at him from behind, wrapping her arm around his neck to hold him in place while holding Mjolnir in front of his face. "You want this thing broken so badly? Fine." Her arm crackled with lightning, traveling up until it reached the hammer. It pulsed light in rapid and unpredictable intervals. She could feel what was left of it coming apart as she pushed more power into it. "Let's see what happens when the power in this thing gets unleashed on us at point blank range," she all but growled in his ear.
Even Thrúd couldn't believe what she was saying. Everything she had fought and worked for was about to explode but all she could think of was getting rid of her stalker once and for all. Amidst the chaos within her mind, she did have just enough wherewithal to compose one lone thought:
Sorry, dad.
To her disappointment but not at all surprised either, he offered no resistance. Grámtrist was at peace with the idea of his life coming to an end in the name of destroying the hammer. Now that the moment was here, "Finally," was the only thing he could find himself able to say.
Mjolnir, on the other hand, had something else to say.
"Don't kill him!"
Thrúd gasped in shock. She ceased the stream of lightning and the light of the hammer dwindled down to its usual glow. Then, she threw the hammer away from her as if she had realized she were holding a venomous creature.
Mjolnir landed in the sand with a dull thud ten yards away, sand already piling against it from the storm's winds.
Thrúd released her chokehold on Grámtrist and stumbled backward, landing on her behind with her jaw slack. Without anyone there to hold them tight, the chains imprisoning Grámtrist slid off of him and coiled on the ground. He slowly rose to his feet, his arms giving zero indication that they'd be swinging a sword at her anytime soon.
After all, there was no point in battle since he was just proven right.
"I- I . . ." Thrúd panted. "I heard a voice."
Grámtrist faced her. "Embla," he provided. "I myself haven't heard her voice since the night I lost her." For a moment, he was lost in time, the sound of his lover's voice erupting from the hammer in its weakened state stirring up memories and sensations he hadn't felt in eons.
"She's really in there . . ." Thrúd breathed out to no one in particular.
Her comment was followed up with an intelligent, "Uh huh," from Hugin.
"Now you see," Grámtrist started. "You see that there is no other way." He lifted his sword and slung it atop his shoulder, the motion diverting Thrúd's eyes to him. She noticed the full extent of the damage he took from her attacks:
His once-gleaming armor was now spotted with soot and charred marks. Several chunks of metal plating were either missing or hanging limply against his body. His breastplate was almost entirely stripped away, exposing a layer of chainmail underneath and a tunic with ancient designs under that still.
"She is in pain," he turned to look at the hammer. Thrúd could tell he was correct. From here, she could hear the uncomfortable grunts and groans coming from the hammer. Embla. Her 'body' was being torn apart from the inside. "She hurts," he continued. "And I can relieve her of this. Please. Yield the hammer to me."
Seeing that Thrúd's resolve had been all but siphoned out of her, his own urge to battle had dwindled as well. Gone was the crazed and spastic warrior from a few moments ago. In his place was the frustratingly calm Traveler she had bumped into in Svartalfheim several days ago.
Thrúd made no effort in rising to her feet.
Taking this as her giving him her blessing, Grámtrist turned back to the hammer and retrieved a black whetstone from his sack, scraping it along his blade.
As he walked over to the damaged weapon, Thrúd still was attempting to catch her breath from what she had just learned;
Her father's legendary weapon has been housing an innocent soul for several lifetimes and he had no idea.
She didn't notice that her ears were ringing, preventing the panicked squawks of Hugin from reaching her.
Looking down, she found that Hugin had removed himself from her shoulder without her noticing and was bouncing on his feet in desperate bids to gain her attention.
"Uh . . . wha?" She was able to blurt out.
"I said go get the hammer!"
At this, Thrúd let out a breath. The adrenaline had run its course through her system and hopeless depression and defeat took its place. "Why? Haven't I kept her away from him long enough?" She asked bitterly. "You heard the voice. She's there. She's been there the whole time. And, you know," she thought for a moment, watching as Grámtrist grew closer to the hammer, "I guess Mjolnir isn't the only way to keep dad's legacy alive. I mean, maybe I could learn to build a statue or some dumb shit like that."
"Stop deluding yourself and listen!" Hugin snapped. "Grámtrist is going to kill her!"
Thrúd's eyebrows scrunched in confusion. "What are you talking about? Why would he do that? He's trying to free her, bird brain."
"Yes," the raven conceded. "But that's not what's going to happen!" He flapped his wings as if this would help accentuate the severity of the situation. "This is exactly what happened to Odin!"
"Well yeah, but he-" Any thought she had in her head stopped short, crashing into a brick wall and scattering itself within her headspace.
Lúnda's words from their conversation at Týr's temple rang in her ears. Particularly, the part with 'Sindri bringing the smackdown on Odin's orb.'
Her eyes went wide as saucers.
"If he swings that sword . . ." Hugin trailed off, allowing Thrúd to fill in the blanks herself.
With all the grace of a startled deer, Thrúd did her best to scramble up to her feet, but only succeeded in twisting herself around to a prone position while kicking sand up in every direction. Hugin jumped up and assumed his tattoo form on her shoulder once again. She didn't even bother calling out to the Traveler. Rather, Thrúd snapped her fingers to summon the damaged hammer.
Mjolnir slid between Grámtrist's feet and darted into her hand. Grámtrist twisted around as fast as he could, his helmet tilted to the side in visible confusion. Though Thrúd couldn't see inside his visor, she imagined that the expression on his face was a mix of betrayal and anger, neither of which promised a peaceful conclusion to their meeting.
Thrúd held Mjolnir in one hand, holding it away from Grámtrist while extending her other arm between them in a placating gesture. "Grámtrist, wait," she pleaded.
The Traveler shook his head in disbelief. "You still wish to wield the hammer. Despite knowing that Embla suffers inside." His voice was shaking, as if he were struggling to contain his outrage.
"It's not like that," Thrúd tried to reassure him, keeping her voice as level as possible. "Your plan, it's not going to work."
"I once thought it impossible," he hefted up his sword with both hands, "but your cruelty surpasses the All-Father himself."
Thrúd tried to ignore the comment. "Listen, there's not much time left. I, uh, I know a blacksmith! He can help, but we need to get there as fast-"
"LIAR!"
He swung his blade, sending the black arc at her. At the last second, Thrúd unfurled her shield. She stumbled back a few unsteady steps from the impact, but Mjolnir was still protected.
Peeking over the shield, Thrúd only had enough time to gasp and fall backward as Grámtrist leapt through the air and plunged his sword into the sand where she had been standing.
Finding an opening, Thrúd kicked her foot out and knocked Grámtrist off balance. Thrúd rose to her feet and resisted the instinctual urge to swing the hammer, remembering the damaged state that it's in.
"Grámtrist! Listen to me!" Thrúd pleaded as Grámtrist removed the sword from the sand. "You can't go through with this!"
"Nothing you can say will change my mind! Embla will be freed!" He swung wide. Thrúd parried it with her shield.
"No, seriously! I believe you now! I know that Embla is inside. But you're going to kill her if you destroy the hammer!"
"LIES!" His sword slammed into the sand in an overhead arc. Thrúd dodged well before it struck the ground. His emotions had returned in full force, making his attacks easy to read, but no less dangerous. "More empty words from an Asgardian!"
"I'm not lying! This is exactly what happened to Odin! His soul was destroyed when-"
"What happened to the All-Father was long overdue justice," Grámtrist snarled. "We were promised voyage to the light! I will not deny her peace!"
Countless arguments escaped Thrúd's lips in hopeless gambits to get the distraught Traveler to see reason. Not at all surprising to her, he elected to ignore them, choosing instead to go through with his mission, the ending of which was right in his grasp. As they argued, Thrúd avoided attack after attack, still holding back from striking with Mjolnir for fear of making the damage even worse.
Embla offered no help in the matter. Her cries of discomfort and pain could be plainly heard by both of them, flooding their hearts with pity for the woman.
With one other step to avoid his sword, Thrúd's foot slipped on the uneven sandy surface. Before she could so much as stumble, Grámtrist closed the distance between them and grabbed a handful of her long hair, hoisting her feet off the ground.
Yelping in pain, she kicked and thrashed, one hand still gripping Mjolnir and the other clutching her assailant's wrist, trying to wrench herself free.
Panic flooded her core. Not knowing what else to do, Thrúd reared her arm back, attempting to throw the hammer as far away as she could from him in a last-ditch effort to protect the helpless woman. Grámtrist used his free hand to catch her wrist, preventing her from tossing the weapon away.
Squeezing her wrist hard and yanking it upward, Thrúd let out another pained howl, dropping Mjolnir to the ground. Wrist throbbing and scalp screaming in agony, she couldn't concentrate hard enough to so much as snap her fingers.
Grámtrist positioned himself next to the hammer, lying on its side in the sand. He raised his sword, glinting with unspent black magic during their scuffle, and pointed the tip of it at Mjolnir.
Thrúd swung like a pendulum, kicking her feet at Grámtrist's side to no avail.
"STOP!" She cried out hoarsely. "You're going to kill her! Think about this!"
His helmet slowly turned to look at her. "I've been doing nothing but think of this moment for several lifetimes. Now, her suffering will end."
"NO!"
His sword plunged into the side of the hammer, then everything went white.