“Can’t make the weather? Watch your speech, golden boy.” Freyr’s mouth was hard. “You will not disrespect the Vanir.”
Heimdall’s eyes narrowed with smoldering rage. “I will speak as I please, cousin.” He spoke slowly, emphasizing each syllable with exaggerated bravado. “And don’t fool yourself. Running a martial arts school with your sister doesn’t make you any match for the Æsir.”
Freyr’s dark eyes narrowed at the challenge, and his hands tightened into fists. Laika dashed in to stand between them, looking first to Heimdall and then to Freyr.
Freya stepped out of the trees. “Come stand with me, Rod.”
Rod jogged over to her. “What’s happening?”
She watched her cousin and brother square off against each other. “I’m not exactly sure.”
Heimdall smiled wryly. “What good’s a nature god in the world of technology, anyway? You can’t even call the elements anymore. It must eat away at you when it rains here, practically every day.” Heimdall chuckled. “Or do you just kid yourself and pretend you’re the one who opened up the skies? Eh, Vanir?”
Laika put her head down and backed away with a low growl.
Rod stepped instinctively behind Freya. “What’s that? Vanir?”
“It’s a long story,” Freya answered without taking her eyes off of Heimdall and Freyr. “Basically the Vanir—Freyr and myself—are nature gods, masters of magick and the elements. We used to be at war with the Æsir, Heimdall and Saga’s family. But we made peace thousands of years ago.”
“You will mend your words and watch your tongue.” Freyr dropped his hands to his sides and stalked angrily toward Heimdall.
“But you’re cousins!” Rod yelped.
“A technicality,” Freya said over her shoulder. “A permanent hostage exchange to keep the peace between the houses. Odin adopted me and my brother into his family.”
Freyr closed the distance between himself and Heimdall. “You, of all of us, will not disrespect the Yggdrasil. You will not disrespect my sister. And you will not disrespect me.” He shoved Heimdall with both hands, grunting deep in his chest with the effort.
“What are you doing?!” Freya shouted at them.
Heimdall staggered back a few paces before regaining his balance. Freyr had never struck him before, and this first attempt was pathetic. He laughed. “Stupid little Vanir. Is that the best you can do? It’s a wonder your own kind let you survive.”
Heimdall took a deep breath and bellowed an ancient war cry as he lunged at his smaller cousin but Rod charged in to intercept him, bearing the brunt of Heimdall’s attack. Rod and Heimdall tumbled awkwardly to the ground at Freyr’s feet. Rod cried out in pain, and Saga and Freya rushed forward.
Heimdall struggled to get to his feet, but Rod grabbed him—one hand gripping the shoulder of his jacket, the other buried deep in Heimdall’s hair—and pulled him back down to the ground. Heimdall flailed about, trying to free himself.
“Unhand me, mortal!” Heimdall bellowed. He couldn’t remember ever being so angry. “Someone needs to teach this undeserving nature sprite a lesson.”
Laika tore around them in a wide circle, barking loudly as Rod kneed Heimdall in the kidneys and forced him onto his back in the dirt. Rod grunted again in pain, and a vision of being scolded by Frigga for breaking her handyman pierced Heimdall’s rage.
Heimdall hesitated, and Rod managed to climb on top of him where he sat down squarely on his chest.
“Someone want to give me a hand here?” Rod panted.
Heimdall stared up at the overcast sky. He blinked the drizzling rain out of his eyes and tried to catch his breath. Laika trotted up beside him and sniffed at his face. Heimdall turned his head and pushed her away. In a fair fight, Rod would have been no match for either of the gods. Yet here Heimdall was, flat on his back, with Rod sitting on him.
“Teach the nature sprite a lesson?” Saga frowned down at Heimdall. “What kind of talk is that among kinsmen? We are no longer Æsir and Vanir!”
Heimdall’s rage was nearly spent, but then he spotted Freyr standing over him, laughing. Heimdall tried to roll first to one side, then the other, but Rod moved with him, keeping him pinned down.
“Gods out of control!” Rod shouted. “I’m telling your mother about this.”
“Rod, let me go. This isn’t your fight.” Heimdall pointed an accusatory finger at Freyr. “He started it.”
“Shrewd words from the high and mighty Æsir,” Freyr sneered. “Big and brawny and completely useless. Bested by your mother’s mortal manservant!”
Freya smacked the back of her brother’s head. “Enough!”
Heimdall paused to collect himself, then easily pushed Rod aside. The human rolled onto the ground with a painful grunt. But just as Heimdall was about to regain his footing, Saga and Freya tackled him and drove him back down to the dirt.
Keyed up by the loud voices and wrestling, Laika wagged her tail and jumped from side to side playfully. She barked and tried to tempt Heimdall with a play bow, then leapt forward to nip at his hair.
“Laika!” Heimdall pushed the wolf-dog back and then tried to free himself from his sister and cousin.
Freyr laughed. “You’re not even a match for the dog!”
“Enough!” Rod snarled as he climbed to his feet. “I don’t care who started what. I don’t care what you’re arguing about, or why, or how far back it goes. I am not your freaking babysitter!”
Rod slapped down Freyr’s raised fist, then stepped a few paces away and rested his hands on his knees. With a disappointed whine, Laika yawned loudly and lay down in the dirt.
Freya stood up and straightened her clothes. “It’s the Tree.”
With a resigned nod to Saga, Heimdall eased his sister off of his chest and sat up.
“I’ve never seen you behave so foolishly.” Freya looked down at Heimdall. “The Tree is still too young and too small to contain the full wisdom of the Yggdrasil. It’s spilling over, and obviously impacting us.”
“You’re saying all of this is because of some tree?” Rod held his sides and winced, and Heimdall noted the way Rod stepped gingerly back toward the group.
“Not just any tree,” Heimdall said. “I think I may have cracked a couple of your ribs. Sorry about that.”
“Well, it’s no wonder, really.”
Everyone turned and looked at Saga.
“We all hate our jobs.” Saga looked at Heimdall and shrugged. “Okay, most of us hate our jobs. We’re living in a world that prefers double-decker burritos and movies-on-demand to any kind of god, old or new.” Saga climbed to her feet and made a vain attempt at tidying her wayward curls. “With this new threat from Managarm, is it any surprise we’d lose our composure? So let’s just all take a breath, okay?”
Heimdall rested his forearms on his knees and looked at the ground, mostly to keep the others from seeing his cheeks flush red. How could he have been such an idiot? Freya and Saga were absolutely right. He spent a minute or two listening to a few frogs croaking nearby and waited for the last dregs of angry tension to drain away.
“That’s better.” Heimdall stood up. He eyed Freyr warily, then took a step forward and held his hand out to him.
Wearing a petulant frown, Freyr crossed his arms over his chest. Freya kicked him in the shin. “Do it.”
Freyr reached forward and clutched Heimdall’s forearm against his own. They shared a relieved chuckle and then embraced in a bear hug.
Heimdall pulled away from his cousin and started picking pine needles out of his hair.
Freya fought with Rod, trying to get him to move his arms away from his torso. “If you would just let me take a look? We all need to keep our wits about us, then, and not just tonight. If Managarm is using the old Tree’s magick against us . . .”
Her voice trailed off. Heimdall deliberately didn’t complete her thought for her. Instead, he cleared his throat. “Right, then. Back to work. Rod, you good?”
Rod shooed Freya away
just as a pair of ravens settled on a branch of one of the taller saplings and cawed. Heimdall smiled.
Rod grabbed Heimdall’s elbow and winced as he pointed at the birds. “What does that mean?”
“That,” Heimdall said as he stared at the birds, “means we’re on the right track.”
The ravens spread their wings and flew deeper into the stand of White Oak saplings.
Moving as quickly as they dared between the young trees, the gods—and Rod—followed the ravens as they headed farther into the stand. Heimdall kept an eye on the black birds as they flew against the ink-colored sky. Several times, the pair circled back to give the bipeds a chance to catch up with them on foot. After nearly a half-hour, the ravens swooped down and disappeared into the trees.
Heimdall rushed forward, not wanting to lose them. He dodged between the young trees, looking everywhere for the birds. He spotted the ravens up ahead, two black shapes sitting contentedly in the dark on the slender branch of a nearly six-foot-tall White Oak sapling.
“I really hope you’re showing us the Tree, and not leading us on a wild chase through the woods,” Heimdall whispered as the others jogged up behind him. The ravens crouched low on the branch and eyed Heimdall, then made a soft clucking sound deep in their throats.
They were urging him forward.
“Huginn and Muninn?” Heimdall whispered as he took a few tentative steps toward them.
The ravens bobbed on the branch and cawed softly.
Heimdall’s face broke into a huge smile, and he looked over his shoulder at his kin. “Odin’s ravens!” He pointed at the birds and laughed. “Something of the Old Magick still remains.”
“Huginn and Muninn.” Freya shook her head in disbelief.
Out of breath, Rod stepped up beside Heimdall. He was still clutching his sides. “Are those really Odin’s ravens?”
Eyes shining bright in the dark, Heimdall shrugged. “Who knows? Those two took off long ago, shortly after we arrived in the Pacific Northwest. But these friends may just have led us the rest of the way to the Tree.”
Rod let out what started as a satisfied sigh but ended in a whimper of pain. He stood awkwardly, leaning to one side with both hands pressed against his ribs.
“Rod, we need to get you to a doctor,” Heimdall said.
“Later.” Rod nodded toward the ravens, who started calling more fervently. “The Yggdrasil first.”
Heimdall smiled. Maybe Frigga hadn’t done so badly in hiring this mortal. “You’re a good man.”
Heimdall felt the tingling rush of adrenaline in his chest as he moved toward the sapling. The ravens grew more excited and squawked louder with every step he took. He soon felt Freya walking by his side. “I think . . .”
“Yes,” she agreed in a hoarse whisper.
When they got close enough to touch the young White Oak, Heimdall and Freya both laid their hands carefully on the slender trunk. After a few seconds, Freya fell to her knees and started to cry.
Heimdall heard Rod swear behind him. “You mean, this one isn’t it, either?”
“No.” Heimdall felt tears trickle down his cheeks. He caressed the bark beneath his hands and bowed his head. “This is the Yggdrasil.”
Now nearly eye-level with the ravens, Heimdall looked at the birds and nodded. “Thank you,” he whispered.
The ravens croaked and flitted up to a higher branch.
Freya pressed her palms against the roots, her face beaming as she cooed an ancient lullaby. Saga and Freyr stood behind her and wrapped their arms around each other.
Heimdall sighed. “Too young to fend for itself. Too old to be moved.”
Freya abruptly stopped singing and looked up at him, wide-eyed.
“Don’t worry. We’re not going to try to uproot it.” Heimdall looked around at the other trees. Of course, the one they’d been searching for would be pretty much dead center in the stand—giving the Yggdrasil something of a buffer and making it more difficult to locate.
“But this is logging land.” Heimdall pulled out his phone and headset. “The Tree couldn’t have picked a worse spot to hide from the timber industry.”
Freyr whistled. “So even if we head off Managarm . . .”
“We still might have chainsaws to contend with.” Saga pulled out her own phone and started dialing.
“Yeah, Frank. I’ve got something.” Heimdall listened to the voice on the other end of the call and winced. He checked his watch. 3:02 a.m. “Hey, sorry, I didn’t realize it was so early.”
Freya started humming to the Tree again.
He stepped away from the Tree and studied the star patterns in an open patch of sky. Just two more days to go. “Yeah, I couldn’t sleep, so I headed out with Laika.”
At the sound of her name, the wolf-dog trotted over and offered Heimdall one end of the stick she’d picked up somewhere. Heimdall grabbed it, and Laika’s jaws tightened. She growled and wagged her tail, trying to rip the stick away from him. Heimdall let go, and Laika danced around him, taunting him with her prize.
“Listen, I’ve found another campsite.” He heard Freyr behind him protest the lie, but Heimdall held up his hand for silence. “Yeah. No equipment or anything. Just some marks and trails, and some charred earth.”
Heimdall knew that would push some buttons, and he grimaced as his supervisor let fly a string of expletives. “Right. A couple different places around that new growth of Oregon White Oaks. Might be more than a single individual. I’ll text you the coordinates . . . Yeah. Gotcha.”
Heimdall turned back toward the Yggdrasil as he disconnected the call. Laika dropped into a play bow in front of him and growled.
“Are you insane?” Freyr stormed toward him, but stopped at a safe distance. Heimdall could tell his cousin was trying hard not to re-ignite their previous altercation. “You’re calling in the Forest Service? To the site of the Yggdrasil?”
“Give me some credit, will you?” Heimdall punched a series of numbers into his phone. “I’m not giving them the exact location. But I am setting it up so there will be patrols in the general vicinity.”
Freyr paused and looked at the Tree. “Okay.”
“So anyone looking for the Tree, like Managarm, will have a harder time getting to it,” Freya sang her words to the melody she’d been humming.
Heimdall hit SEND on his phone and slipped it back into his pocket. “And now, as far as my job is concerned, I’ve got an official assignment to hang around here and keep watch. Protecting the Yggdrasil and getting paid for it.”
Freyr smirked. “Frigga will like that.”
Saga snapped her phone shut. “Okay, so, first off, Odin says good work on finding the Tree. Second, we need to get back to Portland.”
Heimdall frowned at her. “Excuse me?”
Saga shoved her phone into her jacket pocket. “Sorry. I need to get back to Portland, pronto. Odin’s orders. Wants me to check the bookstore records to see if maybe Managarm or anyone else has been coming in looking for books on Norse magick. It’s a long shot but . . . You going to drive me, or do I need to spontaneously sprout wings?”
The ravens shifted on their feet on the upper branch of the young Yggdrasil and cawed unpleasantly. Saga looked up at them. “No offense.”
Freya patted Heimdall’s ankle. “I will remain with the Tree until you return.”
Heimdall nodded. “I’ll leave Laika with you.”
Tail high in the air, the wolf-dog danced beside him, barking through clenched jaws while still brandishing her stick. Heimdall feinted a lunge toward her and she sprang away with a playful yip. Freya reached out to grab at Laika, but the wolf-dog dodged out of her way. Laika tossed the stick into the air, then leapt up and caught it. Landing with clumsy puppy grace, she pinned the stick to the ground with one foot and growled as she gnawed at it.
Heimdall laughed. “For entertainment.”
Saga tugged on his elbow. Heimdall started the long walk back to the car, with Freyr and Saga assisting the injured Rod
. While Laika bounded in haphazard circles around her, Freya closed her eyes and resumed her singing.
11
Thor squirmed in the back seat of Bragi’s Subaru Forester, trying to get comfortable as he dozed. Squeezed between dented metal and shabby upholstery for six hours while Frigga shot down every single one of his elaborate and exceptionally clever conspiracy theories was not his idea of a good time. Thankfully, Frigga had dozed off somewhere around Pendleton as they headed to the Northeastern corner of Oregon.
Sleeping fitfully, Thor dreamt Odin had convinced Bragi to trade in his battered Subaru for a diesel-powered truck, but then he’d been jarred awake to find himself looking out the same moss-covered windows.
“Rugged chic my left kneecap,” Thor grumbled low enough for no one to hear, then fell back asleep.
He next awoke to the smell of coffee and a bag of pastries landing on his chest. The sudden proximity of food cleared his head, but he sat up too fast and smacked his crown against the car’s ceiling.
“Oof!” Thor rubbed the top of his head then pounded the ceiling above, leaving a sizable dent. “Stupid horseless machinery.” He made several thundering, retching noises that sounded like he might be trying to dislodge one of his own lungs—what qualified for Thor as clearing his throat in the morning—then sniffed at the contents of the paper bag. He frowned. “No jelly?”
“No.” Bragi paused at a stoplight to hand a cup of coffee back to him from the driver’s seat. “I’m afraid you’ll have to make do with two cream-filled, three cake doughnuts, a half-dozen bear claws, and some others.”
Thor pulled out a custard-filled pastry. What was the point of a road trip without jelly doughnuts? He eyed the pastry warily and bit off two-thirds of it in a single bite. Custard oozed out the sides of his mouth and glopped onto his jeans. He chewed, muttering curses to the effect of Eastern Oregonians being wretched creatures trapped in the dark ages of confectionery and something about the baker’s questionable relationship with a pig, then took a massive gulp of the piping hot coffee which burnt about two layers of skin off the roof of his mouth. Thor grunted and shoved the rest of the pastry into his mouth.
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