Valkyrie

by Raythe Reign

  Liam nodded and put his hands on his hips, letting out a bitter laugh. “I figured as much. He talked about what our mother had to go through with her mother as something that had to happen.”

  “But you are assuming, like she did, that what would have happened would have been better absent his interference.” Thor’s hands gripped the edge of the bar so hard that his knuckles went white. Liam knew that Thor wanted to touch him, but was holding back all this fatherly love because he wasn’t sure it would be welcome.

  “You just called it interference, Thor. You don’t think it’s okay either. If he’d told you what he was doing and you had been here … would you have let him do it?” That last question was said softly, but it seemed to echo in the room. Thor’s gaze dropped from his for a moment and that was all the answer Liam needed. “You wouldn’t have, because you couldn’t stand to watch others and us suffer to simply get what you wanted.”

  “But perhaps that is not the honorable thing you think it is.” Thor’s face was up again, eyes intent on his. “It takes an incredible amount of strength to do what one must for the right outcome.”

  “Maybe there were other right outcomes, Thor, where things would have worked out but not with my family suffering.” Liam raked hands through his hair.

  But Thor shook his head. “While there are others who have been weaving fate longer than Loki, there is no one defter. He did what he had to do to get the right result, which is the Gash being defeated.”

  Liam considered this. Slowly, he reached and put his hands over Thor’s on the bar. “I can see how … how happy you are about Cameron and me. Are you sure that Loki didn’t do all of this just to win you back?”

  Thor released his grip on the bar and instead grasped Liam’s wrists. Liam did the same with Thor’s. “I know it is hard to trust Loki. He is named the Trickster God, after all. But I have learned over the millennia that not trusting him is a mistake. It is an act of faith for sure. But it is a good bet to make.”

  Liam thought on this. “I see what you are saying, Thor.”

  “You are displeased that we are your parents, too.” Thor’s head lowered like the bloom of the flower dying.

  “No!” Liam tightened his grip on the Thunder God. “No!”

  Thor looked up. His expression fluttered between hope and despair. “You do not need to just say that, Liam. I –”

  “From the first moment I met you, I felt … such kinship, such friendship, such caring for you,” Liam struggled to explain. “Something felt so right as if you had been by me all my life and I had just been waiting for you to show yourself.”

  Thor beamed. “I would never dream of suggesting that I am Kurt’s equal –”

  “Dad would have loved you.” Liam grinned, which had Thor looking rather wet-eyed. “You’re family and I couldn’t be happier. I really couldn’t be.”

  Thor embraced him over the bar, over the sandwiches and mead. He hugged Liam so hard that Liam could hardly breathe. He let out a strained gasp and Thor quickly released him.

  “Forgive me, Liam! My strength sometimes gets away from me!” Thor swiped away tears unreservedly. He raised his glass again and Liam did the same. “To family.”

  “To family.” They clinked glasses once more. After Liam had drunk his fill, he found himself saying, “You know that Loki and ah, Cam, had a … a sexual … well, thing together, right?”

  “Yes, of course,” Thor said with a shrug. He was not jealous at all, understanding that it was not a risk to his and Loki’s relationship.

  “Oh, that’s cool then. I was just thinking about the fact that Cam was having an incestuous relationship before he and I got together. A little odd there. Don’t know how he’ll take it.” Liam cleared his throat.

  Thor blinked. “It is rather common among the Aesir but … are you going to tell Cameron about this? Or let Loki and myself do it?”

  “I’m going to let you guys do it, but I would recommend after the battle with the Gash,” Liam said, imagining Cameron freezing Loki rather than the Gash because of it.

  “That is likely wise.” Thor nodded and poured them more mead.

  “And, when we tell Mom … I’m going to take her gun away from her before then.”

  Thor roared with laughter and opened his mouth to say something when the bar door opened and Loki and Cameron came in arm in arm.

  “It’s time!” Loki bellowed. His golden eyes alight with a fierce desire to do battle. “Let’s go destroy the Gash!”

  CHAPTER THIRTY-THREE: FIRE AND ICE

  The ranch did not look the same as it had a decade before. When Reggie had taken Cameron here it had been owned by a couple that had lived out of state and had mostly been abandoned. They had no idea that Reggie had been using it as his killing ground. After all was revealed, the couple had stopped paying taxes on the property and it had fallen to the state. No one had tried to buy the tax debt and the state had no desire to do anything with it. So ten years of dust and wind and scalding heat had made the place a ruin.

  The barn that Reggie had parked inside had its roof mostly collapsed. One of the doors hung off of rust pitted hinges. The other was done on the dusty ground, the wood faded to a uniform gray, splintered and rotting. The yawning opening showed the inside to be a tangle of corrugated roof and broken stalls. Rusted and mangled farm equipment littered the floor from where a shelving unit had collapsed. The equipment reminded Cameron of dead things somehow. His shoulder blades twitched and he dragged his gaze away from it.

  Liam laid a comforting hand on his lower back and that had Cameron jerking upright, but he immediately calmed and drew closer to his older brother’s larger form. His heart rate immediately lowered and calmness flowed over him.

  Liam was looking at a spot on the ground about fifteen yards away. There was nothing to mark the spot. There was nothing to differentiate it from any other area of the yard. But it was the place where Liam had died. Cameron’s shoulder blades twitched again and he gripped Liam’s nearest arm. His older brother looked down at him then. Liam tried to give him a comforting smile, but there was this haunted look in his eyes that he couldn’t quite conceal.

  “Where is it?” Cameron asked as he turned to the rest of the group.

  Everyone had let Cameron and Liam go first onto the property. It wasn’t that they wanted the two brothers to face danger first. That was not a consideration actually. Though the Gash did not have a true physical form in this realm, it needed darkness to have power so it was not going to be out on the sun-scorched lawn. They wanted Cameron and Liam to have a moment to themselves, but Cameron didn’t want to stay here any longer than necessary.

  Thor and Loki were standing a few feet behind them, with the rest of the Valkyries flanking them. Lihua stepped forward and pointing unerring to the ramshackle ranch home.

  “They’re in the basement,” she said without any hesitation.

  “They?” Liam asked with a raised eyebrow.

  “The children,” Loki said and his mouth flattened. “From the hospital.”

  “I’d forgotten about them,” Cameron said and acid bubbled in his stomach.

  “We can handle them again, Liam,” Thor said with a gentle, yet firm tone. “Just like we did before with the lightning.” His hand went to the shaft of Mjolnir.

  Cameron’s jaw tightened. The Gash would hide behind children. But it wouldn’t stop them from acting. They had to end this.

  “Everyone prepare,” Elda said and she drew a longsword from its sheath that was slung over her back. She was no longer wearing human clothes. She had on silver armor from head to foot and her wings fluttered in the dead, dry breeze.

  Nafari gracefully lifted his hands up into the air and his biker leathers seemed to peel away and fluttered down to the ground, only to disappear. He had on an armored breastplate with scale mail arms and plates for his calves and thighs. The metal boots had overlapping scales on them. He had two silver axes.

  Lihua crossed her arms over her chest and b
owed her head. Scale mail rolled over her from head to foot. A chainmail tunic with tails hung between her legs and almost brushed the ground. She had a bow and set of arrows as well as twin silver daggers in mail sheaths around her waist.

  Thor had changed out of his human clothing and back into his royal armor with the red cape that fluttered behind him like a living thing. Loki had still been in simple jeans and a t-shirt, but now, for the first time, he changed. Black armor as dark as night wrapped around his muscular form. Wolves and skulls were carved into the armor and it appeared that they moved if you looked at them too long. He had a simple staff with a golden crystal at the one end that was the same color as his unnatural eyes.

  Cameron turned to Liam then. He both wanted and didn’t want to see his older brother’s Valkyrie form, because it made him remember losing Liam for those years. But he turned his head to watch. Liam met his gaze and drew a finger down Cameron’s cheek. Then he stepped back and spread his arms wide. His wings appeared first, these glorious white and silver wings, that stretched out eight feet on either side. They blocked the sun for a moment and Cameron could only see the outline of his older brother’s form. Then the wings lowered and Liam stepped forward.

  His armor was similar to Thor’s. His arms were bare other than silver gauntlets that came to points on the backs of his hands. His breastplate was molded to show a howling wolf with lightning raining down on top of it. His legs were sheathed in silver scale mail and flared boots with plates. A white cape flowed down from his shoulder. Finally, at his waist was a hammer with a long handle. His older brother touched the top of the hammer in surprise and his gaze rose to Thor’s face.

  Thor saw it, too, and he was grinning so wide his face likely hurt. His eyes were filled with happy tears that he quickly swiped away.

  “Liam,” the Thunder God said and just beamed.

  Liam just nodded as if he were overcome with emotion, too. Cameron’s gaze snapped to Loki. Clearly, everyone was in the know but him. But Loki only half shook his head to say, “not now. Later.”

  “It’s your turn, Cam,” Liam said and looked eagerly at him as if expecting a show.

  “I don’t have an outfit,” Cameron laughed uncomfortably and gestured down towards his ripped jeans and a lemon yellow t-shirt. “What you see is what you get.”

  “You do,” Loki said. “Close your eyes and reach for your power. It will come.”

  “We’re not a group of super heroes, you know?” Cameron knew he was stalling as he feared he wouldn’t have a costume like the others.

  “No, we aren’t. We’re much better than that.” Loki grinned. “You and Liam are demi-gods and Thor and I are full gods. The Valkyrie are supernatural beings. So you see much better.”

  “Right. I’m a demigod. Awesome,” Cameron repeated and felt now even more under pressure to perform.

  This is stupid! He told himself. We need to go kick the Gash’s ass. It doesn’t matter what I’m wearing. Just got to get my powers to work.

  Cameron closed his eyes and concentrated on fire and ice.

  The world will end in fire and ice, he found himself thinking. He knew it was a bastardized quote from something, but it seemed to help him concentrate.

  There was a faint gasp from one of the Valkyries. He knew he had been successful from that gasp. When he opened his eyelids, he brought his arms up to look at them. His right one was glowing red with deeper swirls of fiery orange and yellow etched in his flesh. The left one was glowing blue with icy darker blue swirls.

  But there was more than that.

  His jeans and holey t-shirt had changed now, too. Like Loki he was wearing black armor. His arms were completely bare like Liam’s. Instead of wolves and skulls like Loki had, etched into his armor in silver were flames wrapped around blooms of ice. There was also a dagger at his waist. He slowly pulled it out. The blade was black as if made of obsidian, but it seemed to move like liquid.

  Cameron lifted the dagger towards Loki. “What - what is this?”

  Loki did not move towards it to look at it. “A gift.”

  “From who? For what? What does it do?” Cameron felt a sense of repulsion and yet fascination with it.

  “From Hel,” Loki said with a shrug. At first, Cameron thought he meant “Hell” but then he realized Loki meant the Aesir Hel, who was supposed to be Loki’s daughter. “As to what it does … it will be something useful and dangerous.”

  He caught Elda tightening her hold on her sword and knew that she was afraid of Hel and whatever she had given Cameron. Nafari leaned forward to see the dagger more clearly. He stared at it a moment and shook his head. He was disturbed as well. Lihua had one hand against the center of her chest curled into a fist. Her dark eyes were shadowed.

  “It will serve you well,” Lihua said quietly and Cameron wondered what she saw.

  “But why would she give me anything at all?” Cameron pressed.

  “Because of who your parents are,” Thor said quietly. “Now, we need to go.”

  Cameron stood for a moment longer with the dagger lifted towards Loki, but he finally lowered his hand and sheathed the dagger. His hand missed the feel of it. He noticed that the hand he had held it in - the right - the swirls of red-gold had turned black like a crust of magma. His magic roiled more powerfully within him. The blackness faded slowly. Liam put a hand on his shoulder.

  “Are you all right?” his older brother asked.

  Cameron nodded. “I’m good to go. Let’s do this.”

  The seven of them headed towards the house. It was far more intact than the barn though, under other circumstances, he would never have risked going in there. He was sure that the wooden floors were rotten and they would be risking broken legs. Well, like he would be. Demi-god or no, he had no idea how to float over the ground like the others did. The roof still looked solid. The glass though for the front picture window was broken though. Blackened curtains, ragged from the wind and sand that had blown through over the years, fluttered at them.

  Cameron thought he saw a child’s hand pulling back the gauzy, ruined window and looking out at him. Ghostly, children’s laughter rang up when Cameron’s head jerked up and his hand went to the dagger’s hilt.

  “You’re not hallucinating, Cameron,” Nafari murmured in his ear as they approached the door.

  “They’re taunting us,” Elda said with a frown.

  Liam was first at the door. He had taken out the hammer. Thor was on the other side of the door. Mjolnir was out as well. Liam turned the door handle and tried to push the door open. The handle turned, so it was not locked, but the door did not budge.

  “Is something blocking it?” Nafari asked and he moved to put his shoulder against the door.

  “The frame is broken,” Liam said.

  Thor gestured for them to move back and made a simple, almost slow swing of Mjolnir. The moment the hammer lightly touched the center of the door, the door shattered into a million splinters.

  “There,” Thor said with a smile and gestured for people to go inside.

  “That’s a handy skill,” Liam grinned back, but the grin quickly died as they all looking into the yawning opening into the house.

  “The Gash is hiding in the basement where there is no light,” Lihua said as they all hesitated outside, scanning the interior for enemies.

  “Liam and I will go first. Only we can cure the children,” Thor said, taking the leadership position easily.

  Loki gave Cameron a half smile, completely expecting this. Cameron didn’t mind. Thor seemed to know what he was doing. Mjolnir made him feel rather secure. Cameron watched the two that could have been brothers or father and son glide into the dilapidated house. Cameron and Loki followed after with Nafari, Elda and Lihua bringing up the rear.

  The house had a large overhanging roof which kept a lot of the sunlight from coming inside, to maximize the coolness of the shade the roof gave. It was slightly cooler inside, but the air was stale and had a coppery scent.

  Like b
lood.

  Cameron took shallow breaths. He felt the air was bad, as if breathing it in was poisoning himself with every breath. There was a central hallway going straight through the house with doors leading off to the right and left. The rooms were shadowed and the broken furniture covered with rotting sheets made them look like they were filled with people pretending to be ghosts.

  Liam and Thor were about five feet ahead of him and Loki when Cameron caught a flicker of movement out of the corner of his eye in a room to his right. From the shapes of the covered furniture it appeared to be a sitting room. There was an elongated rectangle that was likely a couch. A long coffee table sat in front of it, two of the legs broken so it was sitting topsy-turvy. There were two single chairs. One had a high back and there was a bulge as if someone was actually sitting in the chair beneath the gray sheet. The movement had come from there. It was as if a person had poked a finger out against the front of the sheet and running it up and down.

  He opened his mouth to say something, but before he could Liam was talking.

  “We’ve found the basement door. It’s jammed,” Liam’s voice sounded muffled as if it were far away.

  Loki moved forward towards his older brother and Thor, but Cameron took one simple step into the sitting room. Just one step. He knew it was a mistake the moment he had done it. He knew it before he heard Loki shout out a warning that was cut off in mid-yell.

  There was a sucking sensation and Cameron was pulled into the room. The door slammed shut behind him. Cameron swung around to open it. But it wouldn’t budge. He wasn’t exactly frightened, because he’d seen the short work that Thor had made of the front door. The Thunder God would open it in a second. But that second past, a minute passed, two minutes passed and he didn’t hear anyone even shouting for him on the other side of the wooden door let alone the thunderous roar of Mjolnir.

  But he did hear the soft shift of of the sheets as if they were being pulled off the furniture. He whipped around to face the rest of the room. He took a step back and he hit the wall. He could go no further away. The sheets were not off the furniture. Instead, just like the one high-backed chair that was also still covered, the couch now showed what looked like three people were sitting under the sheet. There was yet another head-shape under the other single chair. Cameron swallowed.