Norse Mythology(29)

The main hall went back a long way. “There could be beasts or monsters back there,” said Thor. “Let’s set up by the entrance.”

They did just that. It was as Loki had described—a huge building, one huge hall, with a long room off to one side. They made a fire by the entrance and slept there for an hour or so, until they were woken by a noise.

“What’s that?” said Thialfi.

“An earthquake?” said Thor. The ground was trembling. Something roared. It might have been a volcano, or an avalanche of great rocks, or a hundred furious bears.

“I don’t think so,” said Loki. “Let’s move into the side room. Just to be safe.”

Loki and Thialfi slept in the side room, and the tumbling-roaring noise continued until daybreak. Thor stationed himself at the door to the house all night, holding his hammer. He had been getting more irritable as the night wore on, and wanted only to explore and to attack whatever was rumbling and shaking the earth. As soon as the sky began to lighten, Thor walked into the forest without waking his companions, looking for the source of the sound.

There were, he realized as he got closer, different sounds, which occurred in sequence. First a rumbling roar, followed by a humming, and then a softer sort of whistling noise, piercing enough to make Thor’s head ache and his teeth hurt each time he heard it.

Thor reached the top of a hill and looked at the world beneath him.

Stretched out in the valley below was the biggest person Thor had ever seen. His hair and beard were blacker than charcoal; his skin was as white as a snow field. The giant’s eyes were closed, and he was regularly snoring: that was the rumble-hum and whistle that Thor had been listening to. Every time the giant snored the ground shook. That was the shaking they had felt in the night. The giant was so big that by comparison Thor might have been a beetle or an ant.

Thor reached down to his belt of strength, Megingjord, and pulled it tight, doubling his strength to make sure that he was strong enough to battle even the hugest of giants.

As Thor watched, the giant opened his eyes: they were a piercing icy blue. The giant did not seem immediately threatening, though.

“Hello,” called Thor.

“Good morning!” called the black-haired giant, in a voice like an avalanche. “They call me Skrymir. It means ‘big fellow.’ They are sarcastic, my lot, calling a runty little chap like me Big Fellow, but there you are. Now, where’s my glove? I had two, you know, last night, but I dropped one.” He held up his hands: his right hand had a huge mittenlike leather glove on it. The other was bare. “Oh! There it is.”

He reached down to the far side of the hill Thor had climbed, and he picked up something that was obviously another mitten. “Odd. Something’s in it,” he said, and gave it a shake. Thor recognized their home of the previous night just as Thialfi and Loki came tumbling out of the mouth of the glove and landed in the snow beneath.

Skrymir put his left mitten on and looked happily at his mittened hands. “We can travel together,” he said. “If you’re willing.”

Thor looked at Loki and Loki looked at Thor and both of them looked at young Thialfi, who shrugged. “I can keep up,” he said, confident of his speed.

“Very well,” shouted Thor.

They ate breakfast with the giant: he pulled whole cows and sheep from his provision bag and crunched them down; the three companions ate more sparingly. After the meal, Skrymir said, “Here. I’ll carry your provisions inside my bag. Less for you to carry, and we will all eat together when we camp tonight.” He put their food in his bag, did up the laces, and strode off toward the east.

Thor and Loki ran after the giant with the untiring pace of gods. Thialfi ran as fast as any man has ever run, but even he found it hard to keep up as the hours went by, and sometimes it seemed that the giant was just another mountain in the distance, his head lost in the clouds.

They caught up with Skrymir as evening fell. He had found a camp for them beneath a huge old oak tree and had made himself comfortable nearby, his head resting on a great boulder. “I’m not hungry,” he told them. “Don’t you worry about me. I’m going to get an early night. Your provisions are in my bag, up against the tree. Goodnight.”

He began to snore. As the familiar rumble-hum and whistle shook the trees, Thialfi climbed the giant’s provision bag. He called down to Thor and Loki, “I cannot undo the laces. They are too tough for me. They might as well be made out of iron.”

“I can bend iron,” said Thor, and he leapt to the top of the provision bag and began to tug on the laces.

“Well?” asked Loki.

Thor grunted and hauled, hauled and grunted. Then he shrugged. “I don’t think we’ll be having dinner tonight,” he said. “Not unless this damnable giant undoes the laces on his bag for us.”

He looked at the giant. He looked at Mjollnir, his hammer. Then he clambered down the bag, and he made his way onto the top of Skrymir’s sleeping head. He raised the hammer and slammed it down on Skrymir’s forehead.

Skrymir opened one eye sleepily. “I think a leaf just fell on my head and woke me up,” he said. “Have you all finished eating? Are you ready for bed? Don’t blame you if you are. Long day.” And he rolled over, closed his eyes, and began to snore once again.

Loki and Thialfi managed to fall asleep despite the noise, but Thor could not sleep. He was angry, he was hungry, and he did not trust this giant, out in the eastern wilderness. At midnight he was still hungry, and he had had enough of the snoring. He clambered up onto the giant’s head once more. He positioned himself between the giant’s eyebrows.