See what I mean? Love makes us weak. That runesword was beyond price. A triumph of runes and glamours, it rivalled Odin’s spear in strength and even Thor’s hammer in accuracy. It was a true indication of how badly Love had got him that Frey hardly even glanced at me when I told him Gymir wanted it.

‘Just as long as no one blames me,’ I said. ‘You know what people are like.’

Frey waved an impatient hand. ‘What am I, a child?’ he said. ‘I make my own decisions. Now go and take the sword with you, and don’t come back without Gerda.’

Well, what else was I to do? The man had spoken. The promise was made. No one could doubt I’d done my best to talk Frey out of this impulsive decision, as disastrous to the rest of the gods as it would prove to Frey himself. That sword was life insurance to them, and when the End of the Worlds came around, as I never doubted it would, Frey and the others would soon find out that there’s only so much you can do with a lute. Still, that was for later. For now, all I had to do was simply deliver the sword and win Frey’s girl.

Win her? That implies fair play. I, of course, was planning to cheat. There’s more than one way of skinning a cat, strangling a snake or winning a girl, and even Gerda, obstinate as she was, would be no match for my persuasive tongue.

Having failed to win her with flattery, poetry or jewellery, I moved onto some basic threats; dire warnings of worse to come; painted a bleak but convincing picture of Gerda, alone and abandoned by all, shunned for her rejection of Frey, growing old and cursing herself for missing the opportunity. I reminded her that Death was long and that worms would dance in her cooling flesh, while all her peers would laugh at her for going to the grave a virgin.

Then I spoke of the prejudice that had blinded her to Frey’s charm. I spoke of tribes divided by war; of the romance of love at first sight; of the fact that of all the girls in all the caves in all the mountains of the Middle Worlds, it was she who had caught his eye. Surely that meant something to her?

When it became clear that it didn’t, I followed up with a desperate and colourful depiction of Frey’s magnificent hall in Asgard, with its formal gardens, its topiary, its ballroom and its ornamental fountains.

‘Really?’ said Gerda. ‘A topiary?’

Funny how even the most determined of women can be swayed by the prospect of nicely clipped hedges.