Chapter 4: The Weight of the Axe
The tentative peace forged in the quiet sanctity of the godswood was as fragile as a winter rose. The shared moment of understanding between Thor and Jon Snow had been a fleeting spark in the oppressive gloom of the thunder god's existence, but it had not been enough to dispel the storm clouds gathering within him. The days that followed settled into a tense and uncomfortable rhythm, the routine of Winterfell now irrevocably altered by the presence of its divine, drunken lodger. The whispers that had once followed Thor now became more frequent, more pointed, tinged with a growing fear that bordered on resentment. He was no longer just a curiosity; he was a burden, a walking portent of chaos whose very presence seemed to warp the stoic reality of the North.
His lessons with Arya continued, much to Catelyn's silent fury and Eddard's conflicted resignation. They were clandestine affairs, stolen moments in forgotten corners of the castle, away from the prying eyes of Septa Mordane and the rigid discipline of Ser Rodrik. Thor, often nursing a hangover that would have felled a lesser man, would watch as Arya practiced the brutal, efficient forms he had taught her. His instruction was sparse, punctuated by grunts of approval or gruff corrections. He was not teaching her the elegant dance of a Water Dancer, but the savage pragmatism of a survivor.
"No, little wolf," he'd grumbled one afternoon, as she narrowly dodged a swing from a padded stick he wielded with one hand. "You think too much. You think, you die. Feel it. Feel the rhythm of the fight. The song of the steel."
"What if they're bigger than me?" she panted, her small face flushed with exertion.
"Everyone is bigger than you," he stated bluntly. "That is your strength. You are a wasp, not a bear. You sting, you move. You get in close, where their size is a weakness, not a strength." He gestured with the stick towards her chest. "The heart, the throat, the eyes. These are the great equalizers. A king dies just as easily as a commoner if you put a blade through his eye."
The casual brutality of his words would have horrified any other listener, but Arya absorbed them with a grim fascination. She was learning a truth that no one else in Winterfell would ever teach her: the world was not a song, and the only thing that stood between life and death was a willingness to be more ruthless than your enemy.
Jon Snow often watched these sessions from a distance, his silent direwolf, Ghost, a constant, watchful presence at his side. He never joined in, but there was a quiet intensity in his gaze, a hunger for the knowledge that Thor was imparting. He and Thor had spoken little since their encounter in the godswood, but a silent accord had been struck between them. They were two exiles, two broken things, who recognized the shards of their own loneliness in the other.
One evening, as Thor sat by the forge, watching the blacksmith, Mikken, work the glowing steel, Jon approached him. He did not speak, but simply sat down on a nearby anvil, his presence a quiet invitation. For a long time, the only sounds were the crackle of the coals, the hiss of hot metal in the quenching tub, and the rhythmic clang of Mikken's hammer.
"You miss it, don't you?" Jon said finally, his voice low.
Thor grunted, his gaze fixed on the dancing flames. "Miss what? The adulation of the masses? The endless feasts? The constant threat of annihilation?"
"The fight," Jon said, his grey eyes preternaturally perceptive. "The purpose."
Thor fell silent, the boy's words striking a nerve that was still raw and exposed. He had been a warrior for over a thousand years. It was not just what he did; it was who he was. To be without a war, without a cause, was to be adrift in a sea of meaninglessness. "Purpose is a cruel mistress, boy," he said, his voice a low rumble. "It gives you a reason to live, and then it takes everything from you."
He thought of the Avengers, of the family he had found and then lost. He thought of the desperate, hopeless fight against Thanos, of the weight of failure that was heavier than any mountain. "I had a purpose once," he said, his voice thick with a grief that was still as fresh as an open wound. "I was a protector. A shield for the weak. And I failed. The universe… the universe is a graveyard because of me."
He had never spoken these words aloud to anyone. He had buried them deep within himself, drowned them in an ocean of ale. But here, in the dim light of the forge, with this quiet, soulful boy as his confessor, the words came spilling out, a torrent of guilt and self-loathing.
Jon listened without interruption, his expression unreadable. He could not possibly comprehend the scale of Thor's failure, the cosmic consequences of his defeat. But he understood loss. He understood the pain of being an outsider, the ache of a wound that would not heal.
"My mother," Jon said, his voice barely a whisper. "I don't know who she was. My father… Lord Stark… he is a good man, an honorable man. But he will not speak of her. It is a… a failure on his part. A wound that he cannot, or will not, heal." He looked at Thor, his eyes filled with a shared, unspoken sorrow. "We are all broken, I think. We just find different ways to live with the pieces."
The comparison was absurd, the small, personal tragedy of a bastard boy set against the backdrop of a universe half-depopulated. And yet, in that moment, Thor did not feel the absurdity. He felt a strange sense of kinship, a shared humanity that transcended the vast, immeasurable gulf between them. He was a god, and this was a boy. But they were both sons who had lost their way, haunted by the ghosts of their past.
This fragile peace, however, was about to be shattered. The catalyst was not some grand, dramatic event, but something small, something domestic. It was a hunting trip. Lord Stark, in an attempt to provide some entertainment for his restless household and to stock the larder for the lean months to come, had declared a hunt in the Wolfswood. It was a grand affair, with lords and household knights, huntsmen and hounds.
Thor, of course, had been invited, an invitation he had accepted with a boisterous enthusiasm that was fueled more by the promise of wine-filled skins than by any real interest in chasing deer. He had lumbered along with the hunting party, Stormbreaker slung over his shoulder, a bizarre and intimidating figure amongst the fur-clad Northmen. He had little skill in the art of tracking, his heavy footfalls scaring off any game long before the hunters could get near, and he had spent most of the day drinking and telling loud, rambling stories of his past glories to anyone who would listen.
The trouble started on the way back to Winterfell. A sudden, freak storm had blown in from the north, a furious squall of wind and freezing rain that turned the forest paths into a treacherous quagmire. A large, dead tree, weakened by the wind, came crashing down across the path, blocking their way and spooking the horses. One of the wagons, laden with the day's kill, overturned, its axle broken, its contents spilling into the mud.
The men, cold, wet, and weary, struggled to clear the path, their efforts hampered by the failing light and the driving rain. It was a scene of frustrating, mundane chaos.
Thor, who had been watching the proceedings with a detached, drunken amusement, decided to intervene. "Stand aside!" he boomed, his voice cutting through the howl of the wind. He strode forward, pushing his way through the struggling men, and hefted Stormbreaker in his hands. "Allow me to demonstrate the proper way to clear a path."
With a roar that was more animal than human, he swung the mighty axe. But he was drunk, his coordination impaired, his aim unsteady. Instead of cleanly cleaving the fallen tree, the axe head struck a large, granite boulder that was half-buried in the mud beside it.
The result was spectacular, and terrifying. There was a deafening crack, like the sky itself was being torn asunder. A brilliant, blinding flash of blue-white light erupted from the point of impact, and a shockwave of pure, raw energy blasted outwards. The fallen tree was not cut, but obliterated, vaporized into a cloud of splinters and dust. The granite boulder shattered into a thousand pieces, and the men closest to the blast were thrown from their feet, their ears ringing, their eyes seared by the flash. The horses screamed and reared, their eyes wide with terror, and several broke free, galloping madly into the dark, rain-swept woods.
For a moment, there was a stunned, ringing silence, broken only by the whimpering of the injured men and the terrified neighing of the remaining horses. And in the center of it all stood Thor, swaying slightly, Stormbreaker humming in his hands, its runic symbols glowing with a malevolent blue light. He looked down at the axe, a flicker of surprise, and something akin to fear, in his own eyes. He had not intended that. He had not meant to unleash such a raw, untamed power.
It was the final straw. Catelyn Stark, who had been riding in a covered litter and had witnessed the whole terrifying event, had seen enough. Her fear, which had been a low, simmering anxiety, now boiled over into a cold, hard fury. This was not just a drunken oaf; this was a monster, a creature of uncontrollable, destructive power who had endangered her men, her sons.
That night, after the last of the scattered horses had been rounded up and the injured men tended to, she confronted her husband in their private solar. Her face was pale, her eyes blazing with a righteous anger.
"He has to go, Ned," she said, her voice low and trembling with a rage that was all the more potent for its restraint. "Tonight. I will not have that… that thing under my roof for another night. I will not have my children exposed to that kind of danger."
Ned, who had also witnessed the display, was deeply troubled. He had seen the raw, untamed power of the axe, the fear in Thor's own eyes. The man was a danger, not just to others, but to himself. "Catelyn, where would he go?" he asked, his voice weary. "We cannot simply cast him out into the wilderness."
"He is not our concern!" she retorted, her voice rising. "He is a monster, a demon! Did you not see what he did? He could have killed them all! He could have killed Robb! He could have killed Bran!" Her voice broke on the last word, her fear for her children overriding all other concerns.
"He is a lost soul, Cat," Ned said, his voice soft. "He is in pain."
"I do not care about his pain!" she cried, her composure finally shattering. "I care about the safety of my family! I care about the sanctity of my home! He has brought nothing but fear and chaos since he arrived. The servants are terrified, the men are on edge, and my children… Arya worships him like a god, and Bran looks at him with stars in his eyes. He is poisoning them, Ned! He is poisoning our home!"
She took a deep breath, her hands clenched into fists at her sides. "I have tolerated his presence because you asked it of me. I have held my tongue while he drank himself into a stupor at my table and corrupted my daughter with his savage ways. But I will tolerate it no longer. He leaves Winterfell. Or I will."
It was an ultimatum, the likes of which she had never given him before in all their years of marriage. Ned looked at his wife, at the fierce, unyielding love for her family that burned in her eyes, and he knew that she meant it. He was caught between his duty as a host, his compassion for a broken man, and his love for his wife and family.
He found Thor in the Great Hall, sitting alone by the dying embers of the fire, a flagon of ale in his hand. Stormbreaker lay on the floor beside him, its glow faded, its power dormant once more. The thunder god looked smaller somehow, diminished, the boisterous energy of the afternoon replaced by a heavy, brooding silence.
"We need to talk," Ned said, his voice grim.
Thor did not look up. "Let me guess," he slurred, his voice thick with self-loathing. "The lady of the house wants the monster out of her castle."
"She is afraid," Ned said, choosing his words carefully. "And after what happened today, I cannot say that I blame her."
Thor let out a hollow, mirthless laugh. "Afraid? She should be. I'm afraid of myself." He looked down at his hands, at the hands that had once wielded Mjolnir with such precision and grace, the hands that had saved worlds. Now, they could barely control the immense, destructive power of the weapon that had replaced it. Stormbreaker was not Mjolnir. It did not have the enchantments, the safeguards that Odin had placed upon its predecessor. It was a king's weapon, a weapon of raw, untamed power, and he… he was no longer a king.
"I didn't mean for that to happen," he said, his voice barely a whisper. "I just… I wanted to help."
"I know," Ned said, his voice softening. He sat down opposite Thor, the long table stretching between them like a vast, empty chasm. "But you are a danger, Thor. You are a storm that has blown into our lives, and we are not strong enough to withstand you."
He leaned forward, his grey eyes, the color of a winter sky, locking with Thor's. "I cannot ask you to leave. It is not my way. But I am asking you… what is it you want? What is your purpose here?"
The question, the same one Jon had asked him, hung in the air between them. Thor had no answer. He had been adrift for so long, his only purpose to drink himself into oblivion, to numb the pain that was his constant companion. He had come to this world by accident, a cosmic castaway washed up on a foreign shore.
"I want…" he began, and then stopped. What did he want? He wanted his family back. He wanted his home back. He wanted to be the man he once was. He wanted the universe to make sense again. He wanted the impossible.
He looked at Ned Stark, at this honorable, weary man who had shown him nothing but kindness, and for the first time, he felt a flicker of something other than self-pity. He felt a sense of… responsibility. He had brought his storm to this man's door, and it was not right that they should suffer for it.
"There is a power in this axe," Thor said, his voice low and serious, all traces of drunkenness gone. "A power to travel between worlds. The Bifrost. It is how I came here."
Ned's eyes widened slightly. The Rainbow Bridge. The stuff of myth.
"But it is… unpredictable," Thor continued. "Especially now. I am not… myself. To use it is a risk. I could end up anywhere. Or nowhere." He took a deep breath, the decision forming in his mind, as heavy and as final as a gravestone. "But I will not endanger your family any longer. Tomorrow, at dawn, I will try. I will leave your world."
The words were a promise, and a death sentence. To cast himself out into the chaotic, swirling vortex of the Bifrost in his current state was a gamble he was unlikely to win. But it was a choice. A purpose. A way to atone for the trouble he had caused. It was a warrior's end. And for the first time in a very long time, Thor felt a flicker of the god he had once been. He had a duty to perform, a sacrifice to make. And he would face it, not as a king, not as a hero, but as a man who was trying, in his own broken way, to do the right thing. The weight of the axe was not just in its Uru metal, but in the choices of the one who wielded it. And Thor, finally, was ready to bear that weight again.