None of that mattered now. Because now Sæmundur understood the truth of the matter: he hadn’t learned a single worthwhile thing. He was just as weak, just as limited, as he had been before. The leaps he had made were microscopic, leaving him just as distant from the true, boundless potential of galdur. An untamable force that could make everything from nothing. Sure, he had grown competent enough at making cheap parlour tricks, which was all that the mortal tradition of galdur amounted to in the end. Small tricks and fleeting illusions. To understand time and the cosmos, to reshape these elements according to your will, to firmly grasp the reins of reality itself and stand outside the causal stream – that was the true, raw might of galdur. That was enlightenment. Divinity.
And the Stone Giant was the key.
He had also realised that all his new-found power stemmed completely from Kölski. When the demon was bound into shadow he found himself much weaker than before. Manifesting the demon had taken some toll on him he did not quite yet comprehend. He had paid a price that remained elusive to him, lost an intangible part of himself that was more than mere shadow. Even binding the demon into shadow was pushing his limitations. Binding Kölski required a constant reinforcement of galdur, or else everything could be undone in mere moments. It took every ounce of focus he could muster to keep the galdur reinforced. When he had been cornered by the Crown, he had been effectively powerless facing them. Kölski had done all the work.
He was the problem. His human body and his human mind. That was the nature of the chains of life, the constraints holding him back. But to simply discard his corporeal form would only turn him into fodder for transmundane possession. No, he would have to find a way forward. He had to find a way to transform himself into something different – something more. Something beyond humanity.
He had to take certain steps before he could seek out the Stone Giant. He had an idea of what he had to do. But first he needed some answers.
After Garún kicked him out, Sæmundur had headed towards the edge of the Forgotten Downtown, to the limits where the mind couldn’t clearly interpret what lay ahead and led you time and time again back into the same street. He kept an eye out in case anyone was shadowing him and made sure to take a long-winded detour towards the shack where the portal was. Everything seemed fine. It was slightly easier to keep Kölski bound into shadow when it was dark and he was alone. The presence of light and other people placed a significantly greater strain on him. Still, he found himself completely exhausted just being by himself. He didn’t quite understand the fundamental, arcane nature of this galdur, as with so much else that Kölski had taught him. Claiming power alone wasn’t enough. He had to claim true understanding as well. He was certain that if he only pushed a bit further, he would attain that state he craved above anything else: true power, and a higher understanding of the capabilities of galdur.
Miracles were within his grasp. All he needed was to make a small sacrifice. And he had so much still to give.
He stepped into Reykjavík in the temple cemetery of Landakotshof. He collapsed into the tall grass, lying there like one of the moss-grown gravestones, camouflaged with the collapsed obelisks half sunken into the earth. He stared up into the grey sky. It was cold and the grass had turned yellow.
He wanted to disappear, to petrify and become forgotten like an illegible gravestone. Let his face slowly erode, like all these faded runes and inscriptions. It would be so much easier to give up. To let go.
Landakotshof was an old wooden temple, built on ancient stone foundations that predated the building itself by centuries. It was roughly round in shape, its domed roof low. Four great sculptures of the landvættir were placed around the building, each facing the cardinal point they were associated with. The sculptures were great monoliths decorated with countless vættir and ancient beings long forgotten, with the landvættur itself at the top, lording it over the lesser beings. The Great Eagle was made from skrumnisiron, crass and uninviting, its enormous talons gnarled and sharp. The Wyrm was cast in thaumaturgical meteoric iron, the seiðmagn lending its scales an unnatural sheen, making it seem as fluid as liquid water. The Stone Giant was made from seemingly naturally formed lava rocks and obsidian. The Bull was carved into a single basalt column in sharp, brutally clear lines, an uncompromising force of destruction.
Technically it was illegal to hold any other faith than that of the royal church, which preached of the royal family’s divine power and their godly right to rule, granted by the king’s ancestral connection to the divine and the ancestors themselves, made manifest through the Machine of the Almighty. Still the Crown had let the temple stand, out of respect for the land and the old ways. The old faith could not be practised officially, but it was possible to worship in secret. On certain days of the year
