Silas didn't wake up to the sound of sirens or the smell of incense. He woke to the smell of roasting boar, stale mead, and the sound of a thousand men screaming in a drunken brawl.
His eyes snapped open. His right eye was still a sightless pit of charcoal, but his left blue eye was clear. He was lying on a slab of Uru-Stone the same metal used to forge Mjolnir. Above him, the ceiling wasn't made of wood or stone; it was a canopy of shields, millions of them, interlocked to form a dome that pulsed with the golden light of the Valhalla-Core.
"Don't try to stand," a voice purred. Loki was sitting on a nearby barrel, paring an apple with a dagger that seemed to be made of frozen shadow. "Your ribs are currently being held together by Norse stubbornness and a very expensive healing draught made of Iðunn's apples. If you move, you'll turn back into a puddle of Mythic jelly."
"Where is Elara?" Silas rasped, his voice sounding like a rock slide.
"In the gardens, debating the finer points of soul-torture with my daughter, Hel," Loki smirked. "She's quite popular here. The Vikings like a woman who can set a priest on fire."
Loki helped Silas to a balcony, and the scale of the "Old World" hit him. Unlike the sterile "White City" of Zion or the dark obsidian of Gehenna, Asgard was Biological Grandeur.
The city was built into the roots and branches of Yggdrasil, the World Tree. Massive wooden bridges spanned gaps between floating mountains. In the distance, the Bifrost glowed like a continuous neon rainbow, channeling the energy of the nine realms into the city's power grid.
"It's... alive," Silas whispered.
"It has to be," Loki said, his face turning serious. "Unlike your 'Olympus' or the 'Vatican,' we don't thrive on worship. We thrive on Conflict. Asgard is a machine that turns war into stability. But that stability is threatened by people like you."
As they walked toward the Great Throne Room, Loki explained the "Ancient Grievance."
"You carry the blood of Zeus," Loki said, gesturing to Silas's flickering golden aura. "To you, he's a legend. To my father, Odin, Zeus was the 'Golden Narcissist.' Eons ago, before the 'Great Reset,' the Greeks and the Norse fought for the soul of the Earth. Zeus wanted to rule through order, beauty, and strict hierarchy. Odin? Odin wanted a world of chaos, honor, and the freedom to die well."
They reached the doors of Hliðskjálf, the High Seat.
"Zeus eventually won the PR war," Loki continued. "He moved his people to the 'Archive of the Sky' and looked down on the rest of us as barbarians. When the 'Purge' happened, Zeus didn't lift a finger to help Asgard. He watched from his crystalline balcony as the Angels tore at our borders. Odin has a long memory, Silas. And he hates a Greek who smells like a Demon."
The doors swung open. The room was silent. At the far end sat a man who looked like an ancient mountain carved into a chair. He had one eye—a swirling vortex of blue wisdom—and a beard that looked like a frozen waterfall. On his shoulders sat two ravens, Huginn and Muninn, who hissed as Silas approached.
Odin, the All-Father.
Beside him stood Thor, leaning on his hammer, looking bored.
"The Stray of the River," Odin's voice didn't boom; it echoed in Silas's mind like a landslide. "You carry the frequency of the Thunderbolt, yet you smell of the Abyss. You have brought the Vatican's 'Icarus' hounds to my doorstep."
Silas didn't kneel. He stood his ground, the Jade Heart in his pocket pulsing against his hip. "I didn't ask to be brought here, All-Father. Your son dragged me out of the dirt."
"My son is a fool for a good fight," Odin said, his one eye narrowing. "He sees a warrior. I see a Tainted Key. You have the Void growing in your eye, Silas. If Zeus were here, he would have struck you down to preserve his 'Perfect Image.' He always was a coward when it came to the Dark."
"I'm not Zeus," Silas said firmly. "I'm the one who survived what he couldn't."
Odin stood up, and the pressure in the room became unbearable. "Zeus was my rival. We shared mead and blood. We argued over the fate of man while the stars were young. But he lacked the one thing a true King needs: The willingness to lose his eye for the truth."
Odin gestured to his own empty socket, then to Silas's charcoal eye. "You have already paid the price of the Mother. That... I respect."
"The Vatican is coming," Odin said, looking toward the Bifrost. "They have weaponized the 'Word' because the old Gods grew quiet. They think the 'Great Decree' protects them. They are wrong."
Odin looked at Thor. "Take him to the Crag of Thrudheim. If he is to survive the 'Scripture' of the Paladins, he needs more than Greek lightning. He needs the Weight of the North."
"And the girl?" Silas asked.
"She stays with Loki," Odin said, a grim smile playing on his lips. "She is a Demon of the Second Circle. She will learn how to weave 'The Lie' into her fire. If the Vatican wants a holy war, we will give them a mythic apocalypse."
Thor led Silas to a cliffside where the wind blew hard enough to strip the skin from a mortal. He tossed Silas a heavy, unrefined slab of Uru-iron.
"Zeus taught his children to throw bolts from the clouds," Thor said, gripping Mjolnir. "It's clean. It's elegant. And it's useless against a man who truly wants to kill you."
Thor swung his hammer, not at an enemy, but at Silas's chest. Silas flew backward, slamming into the rock.
"In Asgard," Thor roared over the thunder, "we don't 'throw' the storm. We are the storm! Your Mythic blood is trying to be 'Perfect.' Stop it! Let the Demon side bleed! Let the Primod side drown! Only when you are broken can you be forged!"
Silas stood up, his charcoal eye beginning to glow with a dark, tectonic heat. He didn't summon a bolt. He gripped the slab of Uru and poured his Void-Taint into the metal.
The iron turned black. The air around it turned cold.
"That's it," Thor laughed, his own eyes sparking with blue fire. "The Vatican has the Word. But we have the Iron."