Chapter Three: Kill the Beast

Okay, so here’s the thing about Hel. When I look back at my childhood on Mala-Mundial, I can think of six or seven big memories. The biggest things to happen to me that made me who I am. At least half of those involve Hel. In fact, one of my biggest memories happened only a short time before the herd was attacked and Old Jack killed. It was the execution of Valgardt Warg, Hel’s father. My father brought me to the execution, which was held at the Cyclops Cemetery. Dad wanted me to see first-hand the repercussions of breaking La Regla Primera. This moment, Valgardt’s execution, is what was running through my head when I watched Cerbie attacking sabers.

“Kill a beast, get the feast,” Dad said when he explained it to me. That was one of those sayings that were so distinctly Mala-Mundial. Like “Nothing Decays in the Land of the Dead” and “Needs Must When the Devil Drives.”

Que mala. Nobody on any of the other planets has to worry about the consequences of killing an animal that might be trying to kill you or your livelihood.

“Kill a beast, get the feast,” the High Marshal said. “La Regla Primera.” He was known as The Gorgon for obvious reasons to anyone who met him face to face. There were many wild stories about how his face got cratered in, but I know the truth about it, and if you listen long enough, I may tell you. But not yet. This isn’t really about him right now. It’s about Valgardt Warg, whose arms were chained to the tusks of a mammoth skull. See, mammoth skulls have only one orbit for the eyes, so they look like cyclops skulls. So the mammoth graveyard, which was where many moths who weren’t slaughtered went to die, was known locally as the Cyclops Cemetery.

There must have been a hundred people there, but it seemed like more at the time. Like a couple thousand more. Many were ranchers who were often stuck between protecting their stock and La Regla Primera. But even more were Nords and everybody related to the Nords cause Valgardt was a known supporter.

The Cyclops Cemetery was a crater that only had ridges on part of its sides, so it looked like a giant horseshoe. We stood on a crater’s ridge that formed a semi-circle around the mammoth bones. Dad and I stood on one end of the semi-circle. The Gorgon stood on the far side. Next to him was Valgardt’s daughter, Hel, and the notorious crime lord known as The Frost Giant. He was the leader of the Nords, and there was good reason for his nickname. The man stood at least a head above everyone else on the crater. He was twice as broad and had a long, thick beard that covered his chest and belly. And he was known for being just as violent as an old Viking monster.

Now, for the observant, you will have noticed that the High Marshal and upholder of the law stood right next to the king of the underworld. It was said that they had a truce, the Gorgon and the Frost Giant, because of the funeral, but most people (myself included) always thought the Gorgon and the Frost Giant were closer connected than they made out to believe. The Gorgon had to get paid somehow, and Mala-Mundial wasn’t exactly a tax-collecting mecca.

In front of everybody, the Gorgon said, “Long ago, the first rule of Mala-Mundial was to not kill the wildlife. Rangers watched over the sanctuary to ensure the safety and vitality of the animals. Then the ranchers came in and the laws were ignored. But I am here to tell you that the rangers are back, and law will return to the Far Colony. The punishment for killing any wildlife is death. Valgardt Warg, you have been brought here to this mammoth graveyard to bring justice to the life of the saber-toothed tiger that you took.”

I remember the graveyard was lit up by our lanterns and flashlights. If I wasn’t viewing an execution, I would’ve probably really liked what I was seeing: LED reds, blues, yellows, and whites outlined the giant bones of the dead mammoths.

The Gorgon blew a whistle nobody could hear.

“Take care of my daughter,” Valgardt begged the Frost Giant. His words trembled in the cold air.

The crime lord nodded and placed his hand on Hel’s shoulder. Hel was my age, and maybe half the size of the Frost Giant. “Make sure she’s raised right, in the way of our people.”

To his daughter, you might think he told her how much he loved her or to make him proud. But this was Mala-Mundial. Valgardt Warg said to Hel Warg, “Hel, I’ve been set up. I ain’t innocent by an astronomical unit, but I didn’t do this. Some thief or liar set me up. Find out who, and avenge me. Remember what I taught you: cold as the ice, hard as the rock, bitter as the wind. Remorseless as the Mala-Mundial. I didn’t raise you to be a soft-footed farmer’s wife. Earn it. If you can’t earn it, take it. If you can’t take it, destroy it.”

He would have said more, but something growled from the shadows of the mammoth’s graveyard.

Valgardt slowly turned his gaze on the shadows. He searched for an answer, I think. Maybe in his last moments of life, he wanted to find a reason for his existence or a way to rationalize his death. I would like to think he found it, but the look of absolute terror on his face made me think otherwise.

Valgardt tried reciting an old Viking poem about death. But this was not the Middle Kingdom. It was an ice dwarf on the far edge of the galaxy. Life here was cold and brutal.

For ten-foot long, eight-foot tall monsters, sabers were stealthy as ninjas. This one snuck into the graveyard while we were all watching Valgardt tell us his last words. The saber stayed hidden among the bones.

I tried to find the saber in the shadows, and I think Valgardt did, too, because his eyes darted from one shadow to the next. Then the giant saber hit him from the side where he wasn’t looking. Valgardt’s body rocked back and forth like a piñata tethered to the tusks of the mammoth skull. He screamed in pain.

Hel did not look away, though tears were running down her face. This would be one of the defining moments in her short life.

The saber stood a few feet from its prey, licked the blood from its lips, and studied Valgardt Warg with those horrible eyes. Valgardt tried kicking the saber with his free legs. It was the only way he could defend himself. The saber ducked away from Valgardt’s kicks, then slapped him across the chest, cutting deep gouges in his skin. Blood spilled from his sliced meat.

Then the saber sung its long teeth into his body. The saber pulled back, popping the condemned man from his sockets, leaving his arms to dangle from their chains. Gross, I know.

Valgardt stopped screaming. He was determined to survive this. He was like so many residents of the Mala-Mundial in that way. We were survivors way down in our bones. It’s all we knew. We lived in a world that would bury you in snow one day, shoot you in the back the next, and eat you alive on the third day. Valgardt wasn’t just trying to be poetic when he said cold as the ice, hard as the rock, bitter as the wind. Remorseless as the Mala-Mundial. He was eating a full serving of that remorselessness while we all stood and gaped.

Well, most of us, anyway. I’m going to let you in on a secret. I don’t like the sight of blood. I was a good kid. I mean it. So as the saber took care of Valgardt’s arms, I watched the crowd. Many people raised their arms in salute of his bravery. It was a four-fingered salute, with the ring finger lowered and the others spread apart. Do you think Valgardt noticed? I don’t think so either.

That’s when my dad caught me not watching. His thick fingers wrapped around my neck and guided my eyes back to the kill. He didn’t say anything, though. There was a discordant silence to the event that gave it a kind of hellish reverence.

Valgardt wiggled and edged his body along the ice like a sea lion with no flippers. He got maybe eight feet before the saber stopped chewing on one of his arms and turned its attention to poor Valgardt. There was a lot of tough in Valgardt’s heart, but now there was a lot of saber, too. The tiger dragged Valgardt’s armless body back into the recesses of a giant mammoth skull, where it consumed the rest of him.

Kill the beast, get the feast.

Next Chapter: Chapter Four:  Bitter as the Wind