by Nick Harrow
A hellish wave ripped through the Behemoth and its shamans. The enormous creature howled in a desperate denial of the power that stripped the flesh from his bones in long, ragged strips. All the naked jötnar on its back were obliterated before they could cry out, their bodies blasted to shreds of bloody tissue and shards of pulverized bone.
The shock wave hammered through the other jötnar, hurling them away from Gunnar. Their bodies sailed through the air and splashed against the atrium’s walls or crashed through the windows at the front of the building. Tremors pounded the casino’s thick walls and sent deep cracks racing through its infrastructure. Concrete shattered, steel twisted, wires whipped free of their anchors and fell like dead serpents.
A flood of hamingja roared into Gunnar’s body. The unfettered energy filled him to bursting, and the Valknut blazed like a new sun in its socket. The jarl clung to consciousness. He’d killed a shitload of jötnar, but there were far more just outside, ready and willing to tear him apart. There was also the little matter of the Luxor’s atrium being structurally fucked up beyond all recognition.
He had to stay awake. He had to get out of there.
But he couldn’t. The spear held him fast to the floor.
Gunnar sagged against the weapon, eyes flickering closed.
Chapter 21
AN ANNOYING CROAK DRAGGED Gunnar back from the depths of unconsciousness. His eyes flickered open, the right one throbbing with arctic cold. “Oh, good,” the raven squawked from where it fluttered above his head. “You’re awake. You might want to find your feet before more of those bastards show up to eat your kidneys.”
Gunnar tried to stand and groaned at the pain from the spear stuck through his shoulder. “Fuck,” he grunted. There was only one way out of this mess, and it would hurt like a motherfucker.
The jarl grabbed the spear’s butt with his right hand and held on tight. Then he bent his legs and twisted to wrench the weapon’s tip out of the ground. Burning pain ripped through his flesh, but he didn’t relent until Gungnir’s head popped loose from the concrete.
“That looked painful,” the raven croaked. It dodged around a falling shard of glass from the Luxor’s failing ceiling. “Look out below!”
The black pane slammed into the concrete ten feet from Gunnar. It exploded in a shower of deadly splinters that bounced off Gunnar’s jeans and jacket. “Thanks for the warning,” the jarl grunted and started in on the really painful part of this operation.
Jötnar had entered the front of the casino. They looked around at the carnage, unsure of what had dropped the Behemoth and its shamans. When their eyes picked Gunnar out from their dead, they headed in his direction in slow, cautious groups.
“Fuck this shit,” Gunnar grumbled. The jötnar would soon realize he was a fucked-up mess and charge. He had to get himself off the spear or he was finished. With an agonized grunt, the jarl pushed another foot of the spear through his wounded shoulder. “Fucking Odin never told me I’d have to get impaled for this job.”
The raven croaked an ugly laugh at that. “He plucked out his own eye and crucified himself. That little scratch of yours probably didn’t even occur to the old man.”
“Figures.” Gunnar steeled himself and reached around with his good hand to grab the spear where it jutted from the back side of his shoulder. “Here we go.”
The last of the spear tore free of his body in a gout of blood. The pain seared Gunnar’s thoughts like a blast of lightning. Then the agony faded, and the energy he’d stolen from the dead monsters went to work stitching him back together. Within a handful of breaths, and at the cost of most of the hamingja he’d earned during the battle, he was good as new.
The jötnar who’d come into the atrium after the first battle had gathered into a nervous mob. It wouldn’t be long before their rage got the best of their fear.
The shotgun still dangled from its strap around Gunnar’s neck and shoulder, but he didn’t know how many shells were left in the drum, and the tactical vest and attached magazines had gotten lost among the dead. It was time to get the fuck into the wind.
“Tell the völva to meet me at the tram,” he commanded the raven.
“I’m not a goddamned messenger pigeon,” the bird shot back as it swooped down from the sky to beat its wings at his head.
Gunnar snatched it out of the air, his hand curled around the corvid’s neck. He’d gotten taller again, his shoulders wider. That was nice for fighting, but the bodyguard wasn’t sure he wanted to keep growing. If he lived up to Mimi’s nickname, people would have a hard time telling the good guys from the bad guys. “You’re gonna be a goddamned chicken pot pie if you don’t tell them,” he snarled at the bird. “Go.”
The instant he released the raven, the creature flapped its wings and rose toward the ceiling. “You’re such an asshole,” it croaked down at him.
Gunnar headed for the exit, spear clutched in his right hand. He’d never used a weapon like this, but Gungnir was meant for him and felt more like an extension of his own body than something apart from him. The jarl was eager to try the spear in combat.
His chance came mere moments later.
He shouldered aside the exit from the atrium to the tram and ran into a pair of jötnar armed with bundles of rebar wrapped in thick bands of gorilla tape. The enterprising monsters had bent the tips of the heavy bars down at their ends, then sharpened them into nasty spikes. The crude clubs looked like the world’s deadliest umbrellas.
All three of them froze for a moment, surprised by the unexpected threats. Gunnar recovered first and drove the spear forward with an underhand, rising thrust. The sparking tip of the weapon slammed into the left jötunn’s body, punched up beneath its ribs, and exploded from its back. Arcs of electricity jumped from the spear’s head to the creature’s flesh, unleashing a torrent of steaming blood from its gaping mouth. The jarl ripped his spear free of its target, twisted at the hips, and raised it overhead to block the descending makeshift weapon held by the monster on his right.
Metal slammed into wood, and Gunnar wondered how many more blows Gungnir’s haft could weather before it shattered. The jötunn’s attack sent vibrations through both weapons, and Gunnar spun away from his foe to get a better grip on the spear.
The jötunn wasn’t so fortunate, and the barbaric club bounced out of its hands and onto the floor. It bent down and reached out for the weapon, but its fingertips fell inches short. It took a stumbling step, desperate to regain the club.
Gunnar thrust the spear at the jötunn’s exposed back, intent on impaling the creature and ending the fight. Lightning sizzled from the weapon’s tip, filling the air with the acrid stink of ozone.
But in the split second before Gungnir found its mark, the monstrous creature rolled under it. The jötunn’s thick fingers seized the club’s haft. With a roar, the blue-skinned freak rolled up to its feet and swung its weapon at Gunnar’s face.
The spear was so light and balanced in the bodyguard’s hands it seemed to move of its own accord. He whirled it like a propeller’s blade, the haft slapping aside the club before it could deliver its devastating uppercut. Gunnar shifted the angle of his weapon’s spin, and its sparking tip shot under the jötunn’s guard and sliced off the end of its leading foot.
Black blood sprayed into the air as the monster stumbled back. It struggled to regain its balance and slipped in its own blood. With a panicked shout, the monster raised its club defensively in both hands.
The jarl had already reversed the spear’s rotation, though, and its metal butt cap swept up into the jötunn’s wrist with bone-shattering force. Gunnar let the impact stop the spear’s revolution and drove the iron-capped haft into the monster’s face so hard it popped the creature’s right eye from its socket.
The jötunn’s nerve broke. It flung the club in front of it, then turned to flee.
“Big mistake.” Gunnar swung Gungnir around to slice its tip through the backs of the jötunn’s legs. His opponent screamed and slipped
in its own blood, falling flat on its face. With a victorious roar, Gunnar drove his spear into the jötunn’s back. The sizzling tip plunged straight through the creature’s heart and slammed into the floor with enough force to chip the concrete. The bodyguard stomped down on the dead asshole and tore his spear free, then leapt over the body and continued sprinting toward the tram.
He didn’t expect the people mover to be running, but he hoped the tracks were clear and that the völva got his message and could find him. When he burst out onto the loading platform, there were no more jötnar waiting, but his allies hadn’t arrived yet, either. The train car wasn’t on the rails, which was good. Gunnar shattered the plexiglass barrier that surrounded the tracks to clear their escape path. He stepped onto the steel rails, glanced along them, and saw the route ahead was clear. “Come on,” he whispered. “Let’s go.”
The Luxor’s atrium was coming apart at the seams. Black glass on its exterior walls cracked and slid down the sloped faces to slam into the ground with explosive force. Deadly sharp shards erupted around the pyramid’s base and shredded the jötnar who’d gathered around to see what had happened. Dozens of them died screaming as the avalanche continued.
But there were more coming, and Gunnar heard the pounding feet of enemies storming through the atrium. He braced himself for the attack.
The exit doors flew open. Three more jötnar exploded onto the loading platform, eyes wild, crude weapons clutched in their hands. These seemed far more bestial than the Behemoth. An unearthly lust for violence drove the monsters into battle and burned in their eyes like hellfire. Those three were a problem, but the dozens more behind them were the real danger. If they reached the tram’s tracks, Gunnar and the völva would never outrun them.
The jarl’s bond with the spear showed him the answer. He sneered at his enemies and hefted the weapon over his shoulder. He felt hamingja swarm out of him and into the blade. Its tip glowed like a flash of lightning frozen in flight.
Gunnar hurled the relic and unleashed its power with a shout. “Stormur!”
A lightning storm burst to life around Gungnir. Bolts the size of telephone poles blasted the jötnar off their feet. Arcs of power bound the trio together, boiling their eyes in their sockets and burning their tongues to ash. The spear continued past the front rank of jötnar and over the crowd behind them. Electricity blasted through the horde, casting their bodies before it like leaves ahead of a hurricane.
At the end of its arc, Gungnir returned to the jarl’s hand with its tip steaming and dripping sparks. He was surprised that the attack hadn’t harvested any hamingja. He’d worry about why not later.
The spear’s onslaught had weakened the atrium even further. The platform shook beneath Gunnar’s feet, and the concrete floor cracked and rumbled. Chunks of the walkways overlooking the open area broke free and plummeted to the ground, pulverizing more of the jötnar on impact. It wouldn’t be long now until the whole place came crashing down.
“Nice job,” the raven crowed as it burst through an entrance on the platform’s far end, the völva hot on its heels. “Don’t get too carried away with that. Every power has a cost.”
“One I’m willing to pay,” Gunnar said. He pointed his spear at the rail line. “Follow that. Hurry.”
He wanted to sweep the völva into his arms and smother them with kisses. His blood still boiled from the battle, but the sight of the women had changed his desire for violence into something more pleasurable. He promised himself to act on that soon and followed them through the shattered doors and onto the tracks. The group marched up the incline and toward the Excalibur. The line rose twenty feet into the air. From that height, Gunnar could see up and down the Strip.
He did not care for the view.
Packs of jötnar rushed down the streets and sidewalks, loping like wolves on the hunt. They navigated the crush of cars that clogged the road with ease, their bloodthirsty howls goading one another to move faster. The Behemoth must have called every jötunn in the city to join in the fun.
Gunnar’s only hope of survival was to hide somewhere safe, as soon as possible.
But what worried the bodyguard was the growing shadow that hung a few hundred feet above the Strip. The insectoid vehicle moved much faster than the jötnar, and its whirling rotor made it far nimbler. As the chopper drew closer, Gunnar recognized it as a Black Hawk.
He doubted the jötnar could fly a helicopter. It had to be an Army or National Guard unit. Gunnar hoped they had enough sense to stay out of the city. He wasn’t sure if the Valhalla Virus was still hanging around in the air, but the last thing anyone needed was a bunch of soldiers getting infected and going on a rampage with the big guns.
“Can you run?” he asked the völva.
“Not for long,” Bridget said with a weak smile. “That little trick took a lot out of us. Not even all the hamingja you fed into Mimi and Ray could replace what they lost.”
The platinum-blond völva looked like she was running on empty. Her eyes were sunken and hollow, her shoulders slumped. Gunnar cursed silently. He should have known Bridget wouldn’t take the hamingja he’d harvested from the jötnar. She’d explained it could interfere with her abilities, though the jarl didn’t really understand everything Bridget had told him.
“Okay,” he said, “then you’re getting a ride.”
He scooped Bridget off her feet and slung her over his left shoulder to keep his spear hand free. Then he took off at a dead run to cross the distance to their destination.
Mimi and Ray kept up with Gunnar’s pace. The group descended along the rail to the tram’s last station at the Excalibur.
A hellish roar rose from the block behind them, and they turned back, frozen in place by the spectacular implosion of the Luxor. Its structure, weakened by the battle, had given up the ghost. The top crumpled inward, followed by gigantic sections of the outer walls. Plumes of concrete dust shot into the sky like a mushroom cloud, spreading its dark shroud above the Strip.
“This way,” Gunnar urged the völva. They raced down a broad hallway from the tram station to an elevated pedestrian bridge that carried them across the Tropicana to New York-New York. The extra time in the open was dangerous, but Gunnar hoped it would pay off. He knew a place they could hide, one which the jötnar were unlikely to search.
If he reached it in time.
Running through the deserted casino was an eerie experience. Something had torn many of the machines from the floor and had slammed a few through the green felt of the table games. Millions of dollars in chips crunched under their feet, now as worthless as the clay they were made from. The Hershey’s store had been ransacked. Its racks and shelves stood empty of clothes and candy. Coyote Ugly certainly lived up to its name once the jötnar had finished with it.
Finally, Gunnar found the stairway he needed and rushed up to the casino’s second floor. He followed the fake boardwalk around the elevated walkway, coming at last to a replica of a Coney Island boardwalk.
“Is that a roller coaster?” Ray asked.
Gunnar couldn’t help but chuckle at her excitement. “I promise we’ll take a ride another day.”
Ray looked behind Gunnar and swatted his ass. “Good, you didn’t cross your fingers.”
“I’m no cheat,” the bodyguard said with a wink. “Now, let’s get ourselves somewhere safe.”
He led the völva to a prize counter beside an arcade. To Gunnar’s surprise, the case had survived the looting. Cheap plastic junk that cost hundreds of tickets won from skeeball machines or crane games hung from plastic racks or lay atop shelves. Gunnar felt a pang of loss when he glanced at those items, as if they were a time capsule from a world hundreds of years in the past rather than garbage from a few days ago. Even as he watched, they changed, transforming into polished clay bead bracelets and shards of colored stone. The cabinets changed, too, sleek chrome and glass giving way to rough-hewn planks and twisted lengths of black iron.
The changes were coming faster now. He
wondered how long it would take the whole Strip to vanish beneath the primordial Viking chic.
“Where are you taking us?” Mimi asked.
They’d gone behind the prize counter to a storeroom. Gunnar examined the ceiling. The old acoustic tiles had changed to dinged-up wooden slats, but the trap door was right where he’d last seen it while bodyguarding a paranoid dealer who’d hidden out here to escape an angry client. That had been one of his worst, lowest paying jobs when he’d started out in the business, but now he was glad he’d taken it. He grabbed the iron ring set into its face and pulled the door down to reveal a dark space above. “Secret room,” he said. “Supposed to be for storage, but the guys who worked here put a couple of old mattresses up there and used it as a crash pad.”
The rickety wooden ladder that led up to the space above the ceiling unfolded with a loud screech, and Gunnar froze. He strained his ears for any sign their pursuers heard them, certain the jötnar would storm in and kill them all. After what felt like an eternity of silence, nothing happened. With a sigh of relief, Gunnar stepped onto the extended ladder’s lowest rung and lifted his head into the dark space. There were no lights, but the Valknut pierced through the darkness. There was no one and nothing hiding up there. “Right this way, ladies,” Gunnar gestured toward the ladder. “I’m right behind you.”
When they were all safely off the casino floor, Gunnar dragged the ladder up behind them, extinguishing the last of the ambient light that had made its way into their hiding space.
“Ouch, shit,” Mimi whispered angrily. “Brained myself on the ceiling. Can we get a light in here?”
“Turn on your witchy headlights,” Gunnar teased.
“Doesn’t work that way,” Mimi grunted.
“Fine, one second.” Gunnar eased past the women. The room was wide and long, but there was little clearance. Even on his knees, Gunnar’s back brushed the cobweb-strewn ceiling, which was just the floor above them.
Someone had placed sheets of plywood across the rafters, which made it easier to cross the space to the corner where a pair of mattresses and a small stash waited. Gunnar dug through the meager supplies there until he found what he was looking for. The dealer had been terrified of the dark and had demanded they keep an LED lamp running at all hours. The bodyguard had rounded up one of the hand-cranked jobs so he wouldn’t have to worry about batteries.