As it was, the wine must have gone to my head, because I gave them the works – told Frey he’d been an idiot to give up his runesword for a girl; told Sif she was getting fat; told Njörd he smelt of fish. I told Thor that his mistress Jarnsaxa was pregnant and expecting twins. I told Frigg that Odin had been playing away again. I may also have said something to Týr about the way he lost his arm, and I’m pretty sure I called Heimdall a ‘pimped-up gobshite’. But it was probably a mistake to tell Skadi that her father had squawked like a chicken as he fell ready-roasted into the flames, and then to ask the Enchantress if Golden Boy was still as dead.

That brought silence to the room. Maybe I had gone too far. Thor picked up his hammer and levelled it at Yours Truly.

‘Don’t,’ said Odin softly.

‘I’d be doing the Worlds a favour,’ said Thor.

‘Go ahead,’ I said. ‘Bring it on. I’m unarmed and outnumbered. That ought to be odds enough for you. Or should I really be blind, as well?’

The others looked uncomfortable as they remembered Hoder.

‘Well,’ I said, turning to go. ‘Much as I hate to leave, folks, it really has been a very dull party, and I have places I need to be.’

And so I walked out of Aegir’s hall, and as soon as my headache had lifted – which was sometime later that morning – I took hawk guise and made for the hills. Call me over-cautious, but Your Humble Narrator was starting to feel that he had out-stayed his welcome.

Lesson 8 Judgement

LESSON 8

Judgement

Run first, talk later.

Lokabrenna

TURNS OUT my instincts were right again. By the time the hangovers lifted and the sweet light of understanding had dawned, Yours Truly had been unanimously condemned by everyone in Asgard, not just of Balder’s death, but of every crime imaginable.

Once more, everyone remembered something I’d done to offend them – with the exception of Sigyn, of course, who could never believe anything bad of me, and Idun, who could never really believe anything bad of anyone.

The rest of them made up for that, however. Skadi was particularly venomous, demanding my blood on the instant, and Heimdall was all too happy to remind them that he had never trusted me, and that if they’d listened to him in the first place, I would never have been allowed to gain a foothold in Asgard.

Finally, sensing weakness, he dared confront the Old Man.

‘What are you going to do?’ he said. ‘Loki has declared war on all of us. Are you going to wait until he marches on Asgard with all of Chaos at his heels, or will you finally admit that you were wrong to take him in?’