Bjorn Grimsson's Arc

Chapter 1 of 1

Bjorn Grimsson had spent forty years pouring other men's drinks, and tonight he meant to brew one for the gods. The old book lay open on his workbench, its gold-cornered pages stiff with age. The recipe filled the last leaf. Mortals who drank it, the ink promised, had once sat at the gods' own table. Bjorn ran a thick finger down the list of steps and grinned. "Either I earn a seat up there," he muttered, "or I poison myself trying. Both beat washing mugs." He read the ingredients twice. Honey from summer's first comb. Meltwater. Juniper. He had all of it, stacked in his private chamber behind the taproom. The timber walls held the smell of pine and old barrels. On the last page, one line stopped him. The mead could not be boiled or fermented in common wood. It demanded a vessel of silver, marked with the old signs, worthy of the drink. Bjorn had no such thing. He owned kettles and kegs, nothing more. He sat heavily on his cot and stared at the manual, its promise now a wall. Then the door thumped open. A white wolf cub trotted in, fur soft as new snow, ice-bright eyes fixed on Bjorn. It carried no leash and no owner. It walked straight past him and stopped in the corner, where a tall shape stood under a dust sheet. Bjorn had bought the covered thing years ago from a drunk trader and never touched it. The cub sat and looked back at him, patient. "You want me to open it, do you?" Bjorn heaved himself up. He gripped the sheet and pulled. Silver caught the lamplight. A distiller stood there, tall as his chest, its round belly cut with strange marks. Brass fittings crowned the top like a small sun. Coiled pipes climbed its side. The old signs on its metal matched the ones drawn in the book, curve for curve. Bjorn's breath went shallow. This was the vessel the recipe demanded. It had waited in his own home the whole time. He laughed, low and rough. "Forty years I served slop, and the gods' own kettle sat under a bedsheet." He knelt and let the cub sniff his hand. It licked his knuckle once, then curled against the distiller's clawed feet as though it had chosen a post. Bjorn gathered his honey, his meltwater, his juniper. He set them beside the silver vessel and opened the manual to the first step. He had the equipment now. He had every ingredient the recipe named. Nothing stood between him and the first batch. He reached for the brass tap to test it. It would not turn. He tried both hands and threw his weight against it. The tap gave way and poured the best mead. The cub raised its head and watched.