91 — ASGARD, KINGDOM OF THE NORTH
Asgard was a lost realm and perhaps abandoned by time and men. Isolated in the extreme northern Europe, it was not visited by anyone, as its routes were not described on the main maps and even its inhabitants rarely or almost never left the region to venture into neighboring countries. Just as the Sanctuary was protected from men by the Cosmos of Athena, so was Asgard, so that knowledge of its location was restricted to the oldest Civilizations. Figured as a fictional kingdom in the main Norse stories, its neighboring descendants had no idea that the place actually existed.
From a large population for such an abandoned place, Asgard was divided between those who lived inside and outside the castle, a fortified complex on top of the highest mountain. Misery, however, was an epidemic that spread to either side of the castle, for years ago the terrible weather of Asgard had claimed victims not only among newborns and older men, but also swept through crops or even the few animal farms.
And it was in a crowded tavern in the lower part of the Kingdom that a girl on a table shouted cries for peace.
"You need to hear me out!" she was desperately trying to get the attention of the commons.
But those who gathered there fled the scorching cold of Asgard in the fireplace and the flaming torches above their heads, as well as fleeing hunger in cheap bread and alcohol that cut them off from reality. It was a difficult audience and she found herself, in fact, hit on the head by a devoured apple. But she didn't shut up.
"We can't stand still. This path ahead of Asgard is one of tragedy. We need to stand up and make Valhalla hear our voices! We'll be damned if it goes on like this."
"We are already lost!" said one in the back.
"Get out of here, princess, go back to the palace!" said another.
"You won't tell us what to do!" a third joined.
"What is bad now, will get even worse! Don't you see it!?" she was trying, when she was hit again by something that opened a wound on her temple.
The tavern burst into laughter at the girl, but then when some palace guards opened the door, the place went completely silent. The guards entered letting the cold invade that place; among them was a young man who stood out for his simple robes, but much cleaner than anyone else there. No one dared to say any other insults as he walked calmly to the table where the girl was trying to talk to all those people.
"I'm not coming down, Hagen, forget it." she said.
"Please, Princess Freia." he tried. "You know it doesn't give me any pleasure to have to do this."
"Did my sister send you?"
"You know that. Please come with us." he said, reaching for her.
Freia then got down from the table, resigned, without giving Hagen a hand; she simply jumped in front of the boy and fixed her hair before walking out the tavern door alone. Hagen went after her while they were escorted by that palace guard, but the boy intervened and asked them to stay and make the rounds in that region, as they didn't need the escort.
"Princess Freia, please listen to me." tried Hagen. "You need to stop doing these things. Turning the people against your sister in that way."
"I don't want to turn the people against her, but they need to know the truth. This cannot go on, Hagen."
"Your sister is getting more and more impatient with you."
"She is more and more impatient with anyone who challenges her. And she wasn't like that."
"It's different now. You know it. And causing riots like you've been doing, you're going to make people even more confused."
"One is not forbidden to get on a table and say what one thinks." she said.
The boy did not respond to her and chose to remain silent in the face of her revolt. Hagen was one of the most esteemed guards at Valhalla Palace and, in fact, had known Princess Freia as well as her sister, the Governess of Asgard, since they were all very young. And that was why Hagen's chest was heavy, for he had such a great admiration and affection for them, so that it was painful to put himself between them like that. But that was his job.
As for Freia, she also chose not to bury her friend with her revolts, as it was not as if she had not tried in vain for the last few weeks to talk or convince her sister's advisers that the path they were taking was wrong. She was often taken for crazy, ungrateful and even envious of the power acquired by her beloved sister. And not for a second did they consider what she said.
They crossed the main street to the walkway and climbed silently to Valhalla Palace.
The most important Palace in Asgard was also the largest and most opulent of that fortified castle that stood on top of a very high hill in the region, as if from it they could see the entire Asgardian population. All of dark stones, well carved and polished, the footsteps inside that cold and dismal palace echoed through the walls. There were quite a few different halls and chambers, but Freia knew the way to the main aisle where her sister usually received the entourages that came to beg her for anything.
It was a huge hall where the ceiling was lost in darkness, while columns bordered a red carpet to a huge floor fire where a hot purple flame burned. Behind the flames and on the other side of the great fire, the guests of the Palace could see the high throne beyond the wide steps where the Governess of Asgard stood. Two huge stone crows sat beside a beautiful white throne where Princess Freia's sister sat. Her name was Hilda.
Kneeling on the other side of the fire were two men who rose immediately to their feet at the arrival of Hagen and Princess Freia.
"I don't care for what you are about to say." the young princess strated over them all. "I will not stop saying what's on my mind."
"The sister of the representation of Odin cannot mingle herself with the commons on top of a table screaming madness." said her sister on the other side.
"I'm talking about the truth. If the truth needs to be shouted, then it shall be heard from the seas if needed." she replied. "If you've forgotten our mission, I haven't."
"I have said a hundreds times that I follow Odin's will!" shouted Hilda. "I will lead our people into the sun! I was blessed by him."
"And he blessed you with that awful ring, I assume." scoffed Freia, and beside her one of the men stood up, degraded.
"That's Odin's Ring! Careful on your words, Miss Freia."
"That ring is cursed, Siegfried. You all know!" said Freia. "But here in front of her you pretend that everything is all right."
"Enough!" cried Hilda. "The mission we have is clear and it was given to us by Odin! I will not allow anyone to stand in my way. Not even my sister."
"You will be the undoing of Asgard." tried to speak Freia.
"Hagen, get my sister out of here!" asked Hilda finally, rising from her throne.
She was absolutely wonderful; she wore a black Valkyrie Armor, which left her long dress exposed, and she had an ebony spear in her hands, her pale hair was behind her back, and a Gold Ring in her left hand.
"Take her to Eir's chamber so Andreas can make sure my sister hasn't gone mad."
"I'm not crazy, Hilda!" she accused, raising her finger. "You're the one who stopped being who you once were."
Hagen approached Freia with a torn chest, but she did not allow him to lead her, as she stomped against the Palace stone alone and left for her own chambers, against her sister's order to go see the Palace healer.
"Princess Freia." called Hagen behind her.
"Forget it, Hagen. I won't go to the healer, for there is nothing to be healed. You are all being deceived by her. How can it be possible that you don't see the change that has taken place in my sister? You, of all people, Hagen, know that she's not like that. That Ring is driving her completely out of her mind."
The boy then held Freia by the wrist so that she would not go further away; and then he regretted it, letting her go. Hagen just wanted her to see that he suffered from being in this terrible situation; he wanted perhaps to apologize, but he cared as much about Freia as about his duty to Odin's side.
"I've trained my entire life to protect you both." he said. "And now I've been honored as a God Warrior to ensure nothing happens to any of you."
"For we didn't even need the God Warriors." said Freia.
"Why do you doubt your sister so much?"
"She's different now. You know that, Hagen. She was kind and caring, but now we've lost count of how many people were thrown into a closed dungeon for disagreeing with her."
"To disagree with Hilda is to disagree with Odin."
"That Ring was not a gift from Odin." said Freia in a lower tone, for even she knew how sacrilegious it was to doubt Odin's intentions.
"The Ring is a heavy burden that one else could wield, but Hilda. And no-one else could have given to Miss Hilda, for this is Odin's Golden Ring. The Ring of the Nibelungs. Only Odin, our Father, could have honored it to Miss Hilda. How can you question that, Princess Freia?"
"No, no. Something is wrong." she denied with conviction, but not quite knowing how to bend Hagen and his God Warrior conviction.
Freia was adamant that something was wrong, but between them a servant crossed one of the corridors, so she continued on to her chambers with Hagen at her heels.
The tense meeting between the sisters, however, was not alien to the Great Hall, so Hilda's advisers were also aware of that crisis at the Palace and the sluggish moods among the poorest in the region who didn't even seem to have any energy to buy one fight, whichever side it was, for they were devoured by misery and poverty.
On the balcony of Valhalla, in front of millenary mountains covered with the coldest ice on Earth, the warrior Siegfried confides his concerns to a handsome boy of high family, who called himself Sid. They spoke softly, as gossip runs through the halls, but a third voice joined them, calling their attention.
"They're all wondering if Princess Freia will control herself."
The bright eyes of the two confidants immediately turned towards the third interlocutor, who was none other than one of the advisors of Hilda, the Governess of Asgard. One of his eyes covered by the red fringe that fell over his face, the slender body and a rare jewel earring in one ear was unnecessary ostentation in a time of such misery.
"What have you been hearing in the halls, Alberich?" asked the huge warrior.
"Your tone might suggest that I'm prone to listening behind doors, Siegfried."
"Isn't that what you do?" he asked again.
"What I do or don't is my thing to care with Miss Hilda. The safety of Asgard, however, is your doing, Siegfried. And Princess Freia stirring up the populace could cause Valhalla unnecessary trouble."
"Then let me take care of it."
"The way you did tonight?" asked Alberich. "It's for all of our best interests that she behaves."
"And she will." said Siegfried. "Otherwise, I'll put her prison myself."
"Siegfried!" warned Sid, who had been silent by his side until then. "It's Miss Hilda's sister you're talking about."
"Hilda is no one's sister anymore." said Siegfried gravely without taking his eyes off Alberich. "She is Odin on Earth."
There were evidently the sparks of a rivalry perhaps ancient between those two, which echoed through those dismal and abandoned corridors of Valhalla. Sid, among them, sought to pacify the situation, perhaps taking the conversation to a side where everyone was in agreement.
"'Do you think there will be war, Siegfried?" the short-cropped boy asked his colleague.
"Alberich knows better than anyone that we need to defend ourselves." he said still citing his rival there.
"We still need one God Warrior for Odin's army to be complete." observed the other.
Siegfried showed immense dissatisfaction by looking at the village beyond the walls of Valhalla and leaning on the balcony.
"It is unbelievable and unacceptable that there is no warrior capable of taking this post. A disgrace to Asgard."
"There is one." Alberich recalled immediately awakening a deep anger in Siegfried that had to be contained by Sid not to punch the ironic smile that drew on that face.
The boy with the smirk left the place, leaving Sid there with the immense difficulty of keeping the warrior Siegfried under control, while he simply walked off into the bowels of Valhalla Palace.
The mood among the denizens of Asgard was far from cordial, as it had been in time immemorial; misery had transformed them into a distrustful and individualistic people, as well as a very fragile one. The dissent in power had split dynasties and ancient heritages in Valhalla, for in reality the only exercise of power for the aristocrats of Asgard was precisely to rule that one and cursed people.
The climate of Asgard was so inhospitable that the sun appeared only a few times a year and night and day blended together in the hours that never seemed to pass, for even the count of time seemed to have abandoned that place, as if Kronos had really forgotten about swallowing that kingdom.
For another night; or day, who could say? Freia was standing on another table, in another tavern, but always repeating the same words.
"Asgard is a Kingdom of Peace." she spoke. "With a terrible and painful mission, but also important and divine one. We cannot march to the Sun! We cannot abandon this Land."
"And must we be miserable forever?"
"It's Odin's ordeal!" she tried, but was hit by a stale bread.
"To hell with Odin! My son hasn't eaten in two days. Where was Odin when I saw my father die inside the house? I'm with Hilda!"
"I'm sorry, Bjorn, but the War will kill us all." she said.
Her voice found no echo among those, for the suffering of those people was enormous and perhaps the War would even be a less terrible death for them, because at least they would have the ghost feeling of hope. But that night, one of the few old men of Asgard was there hooded, muffled from the cold and his voice interrupted the tavern that laughed, because at least the commons and bohemians respected the voice of those who had lived so long.
"Her words are true." said his hoarse voice. "It is a matter of honor and pride that the men and women of Asgard endure our hard fate. It is more honorable to starve to death supporting Odin's divine mission than to battle foreigners for the greed of men."
"Or women." said a mocking drunk from the back of the tavern, reminding everyone that they would follow Hilda to War, or would side with Princess Freia against her.
Immediately the Tavern erupted into intense discussions about the right way forward; for the first time Princess Freia felt that her words had resonated somewhere. Perhaps luckily for her, it had echoed through the ancient experience of one of the most elders of Asgard, for perhaps only the weight of history could support what undoubtedly seemed like madness coming out of hre mouth.
But again the palace guards stormed the Tavern, silencing the commotion, but this time the guard escorted another man than the divided Hagen. Now Princess Freia would have to deal with the wonderful Siegfried, the most feared and respected warrior in all of Asgard. He walked past the silent tables and immediately took Freia by the arms and placed her on the floor, much to the Princess's protests.
"Don't touch me!" she protested.
"You will come with us to the barracks, Freia." said Siegfried expressionlessly.
"To the barracks? What are you talking about, Siegfried?"
"Princess Freia, you are imprisoned in the name of Odin." the warrior announced so that everyone there could hear.
And they were all absolutely astonished at the sight of such an absurd event unfolding among them as that on a busy night in a tavern that was normally almost as dead as the dying day outside.
"Imprisoned?" she asked in surprise.
"You will be confined with those who disrupt the night's rest in the taverns of the realm."
"For violating public order?" scoffed the Princess.
"Precisely." he said and then looked at one of the palace guards. "Take her."
The guard, very moved and disconcerted to handcuff the Princess, almost apologized with his eyes, but Princess Freia didn't give him any hard time and accepted the handcuffs willingly without taking her eyes off of Siegfried. And under the prying eyes of the bohemians of that night, Princess Freia was escorted from there to the nearest barracks, where there were common cells in which the few agitators were usually left overnight.
Princess Freia entered the very simple brigade escorted by Siegfried; an almost completely abandoned barracks, where only one other person was thrown into the only cell in the place and two or three guards kept the night watch. The two were very surprised to see that Siegfried, the greatest warrior of Asgard was among them in a prison as simple as that one bringing a prisoner who was perhaps even more famous in the region: Princess Freia.
"Open the cell." asked Siegfried stoically.
"Si… Yes, sir." said a stupid man, dropping his key ring on the floor.
The cell was unlocked and Princess Freia entered alone, drawing the eyes of the other prisoner of the night towards her. She looked at Siegfried and let him unlock the cuffs on her wrist.
"You could be half the warrior your brother is." she said next to him.
Siegfried swallowed hard and locked her in that cell for the night.
Asgard's cells recounted, perhaps, to their heyday, but like everything else, frozen in time; the weedy stones, the leaks, the rusty locks, the high ceiling, for the round cell was in a tower with openings high above the heads of its prisoners, through which freezing rain soaked the place on inclement days.
In another cell and in another time, the door opened with a great clang and Hilda's counselor walked into that dismal place where the prisoner was imprisoned by the hands in precious shackles, but attached to the opposite walls and very high, so that he seemed to be hanging by open arms.
That prisoner was Hyoga, the Cygnus Saint.
ABOUT THE CHAPTER: And here we go: Asgard. I love the Asgard arc from the original series, but I also really like the second movie (against Durval) and I love Soul of Gold. Asgard is, without a doubt, a very interesting place to explore within the Saint Seiya universe and it always generates good stories. First, I thought it was very important to completely change the tone of the previous arc (adventure, fantasy, humor and discovery), to present something unique for this arc. I love how the Asgard soundtrack is sad and melancholy and I wanted to reflect that sadness in the suffering of the people, not just the commons, but the dramas of each of the characters. I chose Freia to be this dissonant voice exactly as she is in the second film (alongside Frei), but mainly in the series. I just wanted to give her a little more liveliness and revolt, giving her a little bit of Lyfia's personality from Soul of Gold. It never made much sense for the Old Master to know the Ring of Nibelungs, but the people of Asgard didn't, so I built a narrative around that. Freia getting arrested is totally Soul of Gold. =) The rivalry between the God Warriors comes from the original series. I'm always looking to take ideas from the series and repackage them here. And let's go to Asgard.
NEXT CHAPTER: THE IMPRISONED PRINCESS
Princess Freia is arrested again, but ends up finding a curious prisoner in her cell, who could be a beacon of hope for her land tragedies.