The place was two hundred feet wide and six hundred feet long! Ninety feet above us were the great beams that supported the enormous gabled roof. Narrow, slit-like windows admitted too little light to dispel the shadows, but I could see that the walls were hung with brilliant tapestries. The stone floor held massive tables and benches.
In the center was a great sunken hearth, where a few dying brands still smoldered. Facing this, on a raised stone dais against the south wall, sat Odin, king of the Aesir. He was wrapped in a blue-gray mantle, and wore a gleaming eagle-helmet. Thor led our little group across the shadowy hall and raised his hammer in salute.
'Hail, king and father! The Jotuns dared to attack the lady Freya. Frey and I killed the
Freya stepped forward, her slim figure martial in her gleaming white mail, her beautiful white face wrathful.
'Thor is stupid as ever, lord Odin! Anyone can see this man is an outlander from beyond Niffleheim.'
'Let the man speak for himself,' Odin said in a heavy, rolling voice.
The king of the Aesir seemed to be a powerful, vigorous man of about fifty years of age. His short beard was gray. His left eye was missing, destroyed by the accident or battle that had also left a white scar on his face. But he radiated such deep, stern power and wisdom that I felt like a child before him.
'You say you came from beyond Niffleheim?' he asked.
'Yes, lord Odin,' I answered unsteadily. 'I was traveling over that icy waste in my flying ship. A storm caught me and flung me far north, toward this strange land which I could not even see until I was hurled into it.'
'So the outland peoples have been learning science?' Odin asked thoughtfully. 'It must be so, if they can build flying craft.'
'Yes, and I am one of the scientists of my people,' I said. 'Yet I cannot understand this strange land. It cannot be seen from outside. It is warm compared with the polar cold outside, and it seems flooded with some mysterious force.'
'If you cannot understand these things,' Odin rumbled, 'then the science of your outland peoples cannot be deep as our ancient one.'
I was more stunned than ever. The Aesir seemed utterly without modern scientific tools, weapons and instruments, yet their ruler was calmly deprecating the science of the modern world.
'I cannot understand you, lord Odin!' I burst out. 'Asgard, all the Aesir, and the Jotuns have been deemed but legend for many centuries. Yet in this hidden land I find you have the names of the old gods, and have called your city Asgard. Most of all, I do not understand why you speak of the science of my race as though you knew a much deeper science. I have seen no evidences of scientific knowledge in this land at all!'
'Outlander, who call yourself Jarl Keith,' Odin replied, 'we Aesir are men, not gods. But we have lived for many centuries in Asgard, and many legends may have risen about us in the outer world.'
'You've lived here for
'Not immortal. We can be killed by war, accident or starvation. But we do not grow old, and neither do we sicken or die of disease. We do possess an ancient science, deeper and different than your outland science.
'But because it once brought us disaster, we prefer not to encourage research in it, nor use it in our everyday lives. We Aesir were the first civilized race of Earth. For we grew to civilization in the place where life itself first evolved — beneath the crust of Earth.'
'Inside Earth?' I exclaimed unbelievingly. 'Why, not one of our biologists would agree!'
'Yet it is so,' said Odin broodingly. 'There are great spaces beneath the crust of the planet, mighty hollows formed by its unequal cooling. It was in one of those spaces beneath this northern part of the globe that life first began. For in those hollows are great masses of imbedded radioactive elements.
'Their radiation, powerfully drenching certain compounds of carbon, hydrogen, phosphorus, sulfur and other elements, which erosion carried down into the subterranean spaces, transformed those unstable compounds into new, complex chemical compounds. They never could have formed on the surface. Those organic compounds finally formed into cells capable of assimilation and reproduction.
'A rapid evolution of those first subterranean living cells into more complex creatures took place. It was rapid because the penetrating radiation in that subterranean space affected the genes of all living things and caused a proliferation of mutants, a constant flood of new forms. Thus, the first living things, the first plants and insects and animals, were born beneath Earth's crust.
'From there, they spread out onto Earth's surface, and soon multiplied vastly. But evolution was more rapid in the subterranean spaces. For the gene-affecting radiation was more powerful there than on the surface. Thus more mutants evolved there. So it was in the subterranean spaces that the first mammals and the first men evolved. Many of those men found their way out to the surface.
'They spread over Earth as wandering, half-animal savages who slowly developed through the ages. But the human beings who remained in the sheltered subterranean world developed far more swiftly. Those people had become intelligent when the men of the surface were still brutes. Those people in the underworld developed a great civilization and deep knowledge of science. They were my people, the Aesir.
'Generations of us lived and died in the great, hollow underground world we called Muspelheim. But then our scientific progress brought catastrophe. One of our scientists, ignoring my warnings, believed that he could enable us to live indefinitely without aging or sickening.
'His theory was that by accelerating the natural disintegration of the radioactive substances in our subterranean world, they would emit a terrific flood of radiation. It would destroy all disease bacteria and deliver us from sickness. It also would constantly renew the cells in our bodies by stimulating their unceasing regeneration.'
Odin paused, and a shudder seemed to run through all the Aesir in that great hall, Valhalla.
'Against my orders, he carried out the experiment that brought catastrophe to Muspelheim. The process got beyond his control. All the radioactive matter in our subterranean world blazed up. We Aesir fled up from our underworld to the surface. We found that the mainland yonder, which we called Midgard, was populated by two of the barbarous races of the upper Earth.
'One of those races, whom we called the Jotuns because of their great stature, were quite numerous. A people of savage, brutal warriors, lacking all learning, they dwelt in the dark city Jotunheim, which lies on the southern shore of the mainland Midgard. The other race we called the Alfings, for they were stunted men who dwelt mostly in the small caves under Midgard, through fear of the Jotuns.
'The Jotuns at first pretended friendliness toward us, and learned our language. We had taken this island of Asgard for our home, and had built our castles here, and connected it to the mainland by the bridge Bifrost, whose beams the Alfings forged for us. Then the Jotuns suddenly unmasked their hatred and attacked us here in Asgard.
'Almost they overcame us, for to surprise was added treachery. But by calling upon our scientific powers, we repelled the Jotuns. Aghast at the dreadful forces our science loosed upon them, they gladly ceased attacking us. Yet they have always hated us, and we have lived in a hostile armed truce with them for twenty centuries.
'Yes, for two thousand years have I and most of my people lived here in Asgard. The terrific blaze of radioactive fire which our rash scientist kindled in Muspelheim far below drenches all this land with penetrating radiation. Even as he had hoped, it kills all disease bacteria and rejuvenates our tissues. We do not sicken or age, and can live indefinitely, unless killed in war or accident. But because the radiation has a strong sterilizing effect, our number has never increased.
'The Jotuns and Alfings, who dwell in the mainland Midgard, are also kept unaging by the radiation. And it refracts all light around this land. It also causes the northern lights that stream from this place into the skies. Here in Asgard we have lived thus for all these centuries. Though we chiefs of the Aesir retain the deep scientific knowledge we developed long ago in Muspelheim, we have chosen not to delve deeper.
'It was such delving that brought disaster to our subterranean home. We want no more such disasters! We are content to live here in simple fashion, without depending too utterly on science. We know from bitter experience that science can be perverted to catastrophic results by reckless and unscrupulous men.'
His heavy voice ceased. I stood staring at him, my mind dizzy. Incredible as it seemed, his story was scientifically sound. It explained nearly all the enigmas I had met in this mystery land.
