“How does that make any sense at all?” Alf questioned. “This machine is running now, and she’s really very dead.”

  “I don’t know entirely, but think about the reports. She wasn’t piloting the machine all the time, but she was needed for specific things, like battles. There was clearly some sort of distinction, but I’m not sure what, or why.”

  “I think…” I cautiously began, “I think it was for new orders.” The others looked at me.

  “What do you mean?” Tove asked.

  “I think they needed her in the chair whenever they had to give the Colossus new orders, or change existing ones.” They all considered this, so I kept going. “They needed her during battles, because you have to make lots of quick adjustments, your priorities and circumstances will change unpredictably, things like that. If you’re just walking from A to B, you can just give one instruction and then leave it to do that.”

  “I’m not sure I understand that either though,” Alf said. “How can you just ‘tell’ a machine to do something?” None of us had a good answer to that.

  “Magic?” Tove guessed.

  “I suppose it would have to be,” he agreed, “but what sort of magic would make a huge metal construct like this behave as if it was a person?”

  “Well think about Eirny,” she replied. “She was basically a metal person, right?”

  “Tove, it was a reindeer.”

  “Still counts.”

  “How?!”

  “Because she had a sou-” Tove stopped dead, paling rapidly, and now it was my (and Nalfis’) turn to feel deeply confused. I had no idea who or what this Eirny was, and I didn’t get a chance to ask before Alf spoke. “Oh fuck,” he said. “Oh really fuck.”

  “Yeah… really really fuck,” Tove agreed.

  “I guess I’ll ask this time,” I said. “What on Midgard are you talking about?” Tove got a deeply pained look on her face as she explained.

  “There’s this friend of ours,” she gestured between herself and Alf, “who built a metal reindeer that he could give all these orders and instructions to, and which he would use to help him in battles. He was really proud of it, since it was pretty much unique and a really impressive piece of magic.” She paused, grimaced, and continued. “To cut a really long story short, it turned out the reason it worked so well was that it was basically… alive. It had a soul in it. Specifically, the soul of his infant daughter, which he had accidentally and unknowingly moved from the girl into the reindeer.” I was aghast.

  “How-” Tove held up a hand to cut me off.

  “I’m not going to go into it massively. I will say it wasn’t his fault, he didn’t know about it, and Loki was involved.” (Loki? Who are these people?) “He’s off trying to figure out how to undo it right now. But that’s not really my point…”

  I could see her point. I’m sure you can see it as well. “That’s ridiculous,” Nalfis said. “No soul short of a God’s could provide anything near this level of power.”

  “Astrid said it herself Nalfis,” Alf replied. “She told the commander directly: the souls spoke to her.”

  “No…” he whispered. “You’d need hundreds, surely.”

  “Thousands, I’d imagine, for something this size.”

  “That’s barbaric!”

  “That’s war.”

  “So let me get this straight,” I interjected. “Our current understanding is that this thing is a colossal, ancient Gnomish war machine, powered by thousands of captive souls, piloted by a girl who was a tortured experimental test subject, and which is now endlessly acting on the last orders it received before the final Battle of Denofell?” People nodded as I gave my thoughts, before frowning at the last point.

  “What was that about its last orders?” Tove asked.

  “Well, if we agree like earlier that you need the pilot to make any changes in what the Colossus is doing,” I shrugged, “then doesn’t it follow that it must still be doing whatever it was last ordered to do?”

  “Though that of course raises the question of what those orders were,” Alf pointed out. I scanned over the reports again.

  “Assuming we exclude the battle itself,” I said as I flicked through the pages, “then the last direct orders it had was to ‘patrol the outskirts of Denofell.’”

  “Which it has now been doing for about 900 years,” Nalfis said. “That’s quite the commitment.” I didn’t have anything to say to that.

  We all sort of lapsed into silence as we tried to work out the implications of our discovery. This was a piece of artifice that was miles beyond what we could do today, but it had been born out of such cruelty and desperation that I was glad it had been forgotten. It came at the cost of so many lives, and had taken so many more as well – both inside it and out. It wouldn’t have surprised me if this whole machine was its own sort of ghost. I asked as much.

  “Do you think this place would count as a ghost?” That certainly got a few considering looks from them.

  “How d’you mean?” Nalfis replied.

  “Anguish, suffering, dying with unfinished business, restless and semi-alive centuries after it ‘died’,” I ran through the list, checking them off one after another. “It just feels like it has all the ghost-y ingredients.”

  “It’s certainly an interesting proposition. Alf, care to weigh in?” The Dwarf in question found a nearby chair, and leant back in it, pondering. Given that it was too small, made of solid metal, and bolted to the floor, he didn’t actually lean very far, but he certainly tried. I think it’s an old man thing. “Ghosts are… tricky,” he settled on, choosing the word with some care. “It really depends on what you mean when you say ‘ghost’, which is where it gets weird. Technically, there are a lot of different things that fall in that group.”

  A case of literary theft: this tale is not rightfully on Amazon; if you see it, report the violation.

  “Like what?” Tove asked.

  “Well, the classic ‘ghost’ that Indy seems to be thinking about – an incorporeal spirit fixed to a place and unable to pass on until its worldly matters are resolved,” he looked at me for confirmation, and I gave a nod, “are properly called ‘Geists’. They’re the soul of whoever that person was in life, so they keep all the personality and memory and that nonsense, left behind or stuck down here on Midgard for whatever reason relating to ‘unfinished business’ you care to invent.”

  “I have a question.” Nalfis interjected. “If they’re just ‘people but incorporeal’, then why are they always aggressive and vengeful and angry and violent and insane?”

  “Two reasons,” Alf replied. “One, a lot of ‘unfinished business’ important enough to affect you on a spiritual level is going to be deeply distressing regardless of your usual temperment. Two, most of them have been stuck on their own for a few centuries. You try that and then see how your mental state is.”

  “Fair enough.”

  “What about Beowulf? Tove said. “He seemed alright.” (Wait a fucking moment, I thought, what the HEL do you mean by “Beowulf seemed alright”?)

  “True,” Alf conceded, “but I’d argue he’s probably a special case. I think we’d agree that this place isn’t that, though. Bit too solid. Speaking of solid ghosts, you’ve got the Einharjar – the resurrected warrior-spirits who’ll come pouring forth out of Valhalla and Fólkvangr when Ragnarók comes, fighting on the side of the ?sir and the Vanir against the dishonoured dead and all the rest. You know how it goes.” He waved a hand as if Ragnarók was just a minor detail.

  He opened his mouth to continue, before frowning slightly, shaking his head, and starting a different point. “Much as I hate to give credit to an annoying sprog such as yourself,” he said to me, “you have accidentally raised quite a good point.” He paused. “Well. Quite a worrying point really, but what’s the difference?”

  “Excuse me, how do you know it was accidental?” I challenged (it totally was), only for him to call me on my bluff immediately.

  “Because,” he muttered, “if you had the thought I’d just had, you’d be a lot more concerned right now.”

  “Oh yeah? What thought would that be then?” His eyes flicked back over the room, fixing on the empty chair that had once been the pilot’s seat, and looking uncharacteristically serious. He answered in a far-off tone, like he wasn’t thinking about us at all. “She wasn’t lying down,” he murmured.

  “‘Scuse me?” His eyes refocused and he coughed once before he continued.

  “The other type of ghost is called a Draugr,” he explained, “and they are a bit unpleasant. They are reanimated corpses, possessed and empowered by the spirit of the deceased and generally driven by bloodthirst, envy, greed, things like that. They tend to be guarding something, and they take particular offence to trespassers and would-be thieves. Of special concern in our own case is how one normally identifies a Draugr.” He trailed off, waiting for the obvious question. Nalfis fulfilled the role, allowing the dramatic reveal.

  “And what might that be, Alf?” he asked with a sarcastic flourish.

  “Well my dear boy, it would be that the corpse in question is not lying down, but sitting down.”

  We all whipped our heads around to the chair, and then to the corpse of Astrid which had been laid down nearby. “I hardly think she herself is one,” Alf continued. “Otherwise we’d have been attacked the moment we set foot in here and no mistake. Besides,” he looked at me and Nalfis, “didn’t you point out that she had… ‘merged’ with this?” He gestured all around us. “I expect that you’re right after all, Indy, though it pains me to say it.” He gave a wry grin. “This whole place may very well be a ghost.”

  It was a weird concept, but it made a certain kind of sense. I didn’t know it would be the evil kind of ghost though, which was annoying. It was as I started pondering what else this might mean that we all heard something truly horrible.

  “Are you all quite finished?” came the snooty, nasal voice of Eoin, who I’d quite happily forgotten existed. He hauled himself up through the hatch in the floor, and stood facing us with his hands on his hips, and a sneer on his face. “I’d hate to interrupt whatever it is that has been going on up here, but need I remind you all-”

  “There’s a dead girl here.” I cut him off, my voice cold and even.

  “Is that so?” he asked. “Well I hardly see how that matters now, so why don’t you all stop playing around, and we continue with our stated goal of leaving this place?”

  “Don’t you fucking dare speak like that,” Tove snarled. “You have no idea what you are talking about.”

  “Frankly, I don’t want to know either. Sticking your noses into affairs which don’t concern you at all is what landed all of you here in the first place. Pointless, idiotic, self-indulgent behaviour of the exact sort that got your oafish friend killed.” Tove sucked in a short breath through her teeth, Nalfis winced, and even Alf’s expression sharpened beyond its usual apathy. I didn’t know who he was talking about, but it was a low blow regardless. “Finish your affairs here immediately,” he continued, “and then come back down so we can finally leave this contraption.” With that, he climbed back down the ladder and out of sight, leaving a pretty angry silence behind him.

  “I hate him,” Tove hissed. “I hate him and the second I have the opportunity I will kill him.”

  “I’m almost scared to ask, but how do you not have the opportunity?” I asked. “I mean, I haven’t seen you guys fight or anything, but is he really that much of a threat if he’s introducing you guys as his guards?”

  “He is stronger than he may first appear,” Nalfis said, “but yes, I expect that between the three of us we could likely dispatch him without too much difficulty (might not be just 3 if he’s going to keep being a bitch). The issue is more one of… leverage. Our involvement with him is a probationary one, and there would be consequences if we breached the agreed-upon terms. He makes regular reports to his superiors by magical means, and if those reports should fail to arrive, our lives may become inordinately tricky.” I looked at him somewhat blankly, at which point Alf sighed heavily.

  “Look,” he said, “I’ll clarify. We committed a crime against the King of Elvenden.” He pre-empted the obvious next question. “Treason. Specifics aren’t important (you sure?). We got sentenced to death, but a ‘kind ally’,” he stressed through clenched teeth, “begged clemency for us. We were told that if we carried out a mission for the crown, specifically to help them kill the Khan of the Centaurs, our sentences would be commuted. Eoin is their agent and our overseer. We back out, act out, or fuck up then the deal’s off and Elvenden is out for our blood. So maybe you can see why we’re a bit stuck.” Yep, I could definitely see that. It did raise an uncomfortable thought however.

  “Wait, so am I on the hook as well if I run off?”

  “I doubt it,” Tove answered, “more likely he’s making you stay around to ensure ‘secrecy’.”

  “But will he have reported about me to whoever he’s reporting to in Elvenden?”

  “Oh. Almost certainly, yeah.” Fantastic. “He probably took the time we were up here to tell them about this whole situation.” My day was just getting better and better. “But speaking of our time up here, it’s quite limited now and I’d like to have some resolution.” We all looked at her.

  “Resolution how?” Nalfis asked. Tove’s response was to walk over to the front, standing between Astrid’s body and her chair.

  “It’s a simple plan,” she said in a way that didn’t fill me with confidence. “Only 2 steps.” My confidence was still lacking. “Step 1: we burn Astrid’s body.” Good start. “Step 2: we shut down the Colossus.” Bad end. Or, I guess it was a good end, but it didn’t really sound like a simple one.

  Sammy xx