"What says the Hammerer?" Utgard asked.
Hel laughed. "The lord Thor is angry. His head is bound from a wound, as you can see. He roars that the Aesir vanquished Loki and the Jotuns once before, and that they will do so again. And this time, he says, they will slay Loki instead of prisoning him."
Loki leaped to his feet. A flash of rage as blinding and terrible as lightning twisted his face.
"Slay me?" he hissed. "Sons of the Aesir, my ancient people, you will rue that thought when Asgard goes down in flame and death."
"The king Odin is speaking again," Hel told Utgar. "He says they must prepare for the coming struggle. They must devise, if possible, some way to rescue Frey and Freya and the Jarl Keith from Jotunheim. And Odin says he fears Loki may be using his scientific powers to spy on them. He will make sure, he says—"
Hastily Loki reached out and touched a screw on that strange mechanism. The picture in its quartz screen and the buzz of voices ceased. I knew it must be some super-development of television, able to operate without a transmitter.
"We have seen and heard enough," Loki said moodily. "The Aesir know we will attack them, but they'll have small time to prepare. Two days hence, we march on Asgard to crush them."
"Aye, but be careful, lord," warned Utgar anxiously. "Odin, too, has great powers of ancient science. Once before, he snatched victory from us because of your too great confidence."
"Croak not your warnings to me!" Loki stormed. "I have had centuries in which to think. Nothing can save the Aesir this time. Get you both gone now, till I call you."
At the tone of his master's voice, Fenris raised his enormous head and snarled horribly. Utgar hastily retreated from Loki's blazing wrath, backing toward a door. Less urgently the princess Hel followed him. Without looking in the direction where I stood with my guards, watching this scene in fascinated horror, Loki spoke.