He struck at me with his sword, but I had the advantage of surprise. I ran in with an upward thrust of my blade, slid past his defense, ripped between the laces of his brynja. He collapsed, the alarm bubbling through the blood that filled his throat.
I began running toward the vague shape of my rocket plane, which loomed out of the mist. But suddenly I remembered that the port window had been smashed when I had first landed on the sandy beach below Midgard's frowning cliffs. Flying in the cold, thin air of the Arctic, I might lose consciousness and crash into the sea. In any case, my hands would be too numb to handle the firing wheel.
"Hold the ship against attack!" I shouted to Frey, handing him the guard's sword.
As I rushed into the cabin, I glimpsed him standing with the sword in hand, but he was swaying drunkenly. I knew he could not hold off an attack for long, and I dragged on the flying togs I had discarded before climbing to Midgard plateau. The instant I strapped the oxygen tank to my shoulders, I heard Freya's terrified scream.
"Jarl Keith, Frey is swooning, and Jotuns are coming!" I snatched a super-automatic from the supply compartment and dashed outside. The Moon slipped from behind the clouds, shining full on the Jotuns who were rushing up to attack. Horned helmet on his head, sword in hand and the golden mustache writhing above his savage lips, Loki was leading two fierce Jotun soldiers. But Freya was struggling with Frey's almost inert weight. The blade had slipped from his nerveless grasp.
"Get him into the rear of the ship and close the door!" I shouted to the woman.
The Jotun archer drew back the string of his bow to strike me down with a heavy arrow. I picked him off with a single snipe-shot. The pikeman raised his javelin, dropped it as a slug blasted away his skull. Before I could wheel on Loki and end the menace to the Aesir, Freya called to me in despair.
"Jarl Keith, I cannot get him into the ship! He has swooned."
I triggered a shot at Loki, saw him duck swiftly out of the bullet's path. Then I had no more time to fight. I hurled the gun and caught him on the right shoulder. The sword spun from his grip as he staggered back.
Frantically I ran to the cabin door and dragged Frey inside. When I pointed quickly, Freya opened the door of the freight hold while I carried him in and laid him down on the floor. I wrapped him in blankets and told Freya to do the same. It would be warmer and more easy to breathe than in the cabin, for the ship was electrically warmed and synthetically oxygenated. But the smashed window of the cabin would leak its own air and warmth, and chill and thin the air of the hold, despite the tightness of the door I closed on them as I sprang back into the pilot room.