Heroes (Eirik Book 2)

by Ednah Walters

  “I want you to tell Hayden and your cousin about me today,” I said before we entered the shop.

  “Are you sure?”

  “Yes. Keeping secrets is terrible.” My mother had lost it last night because of one.

  “You were right about how much to tell a non-magical person like your father. A little at a time is better. I can’t say the same for Hayden and Zack.”

  “What if the Norns hear about it?”

  “I don’t care.” The one thing the Norns feared the most was being exposed. They erased memories of those who’d dealt with Grimnirs and Valkyries to ensure that. I was about to blow open the door to the supernatural world.

  “Eirik?”

  I glanced down at Celestia. She didn’t just sound worried. She looked it.

  “Don’t worry about the Norns. I’ll deal with them.”

  “How? I do not want them messing with my memories.” She shuddered.

  “They won’t. I’m going to keep them so busy they won’t have time to focus on you and your family.”

  “I have a bad feeling about this. You can’t take on the Norns and remain unscathed. Even your mother couldn’t fight them, and she is one scary lady.”

  “I don’t intend to lose.” I pushed the door open and waited for her to walk ahead.

  “We’ve had this conversation before, haven’t we?”

  “Oh yes. In fact, something you said four months ago gave me an idea on how to deal with the Norns.”

  “What? I said a lot of things four months ago.”

  “I’m not telling you. You might jinx it. Besides, someone’s gotta take the blame if my plan falls through.”

  “You’d blame me?”

  “Yep. I gotta keep my record clean. If you haven’t noticed, I’m awesome at everything I do.”

  “And the dragon is the show-off?”

  She laughed as we entered the séance room. Her eyes twinkled and those adorable dimples stayed on her cheeks. The sound sent longing through me. I wanted to hear her laugh every day. Watch her eyes light up as she teased me. Capture her smile in a kiss. Damn, now I was back where I’d started, obsessing about kissing her, claiming her, showing her she was mine.

  The smile disappeared from her lips, and she went pale. I glanced over my shoulder to see what had caused her reaction. Her cousin and Hayden stood in the doorway.

  “I thought you couldn’t remember a thing from your experience, Celestia,” Zack said.

  “Dude, back off,” I warned.

  Zack rounded on me. “I know you have something to do with this. Did you tell her to lie to us?”

  Hayden took his hand. “Give them space, Zack. Can’t you see how difficult this is for her?”

  Zack grabbed the chair across from mine, sat, and watched me like I was Hel’s spawn, which I was. He had every reason to distrust me, but his attitude wasn’t going to mean jack when it came to Celestia and me. Hayden opened the fridge and removed cans of pop and iced tea. No one spoke as we settled around the table.

  Ignoring everyone else, I focused on Celestia and demolished my food, including the appetizers, which they’d declined.

  “Don’t they feed you where you come from?” Zack said.

  Zack was looking for a fight, but I wasn’t giving him one. Last time, I’d let him land a punch. That wasn’t going to happen again.

  “Let’s see,” I said. “This morning, I had a basket of pastries before leaving for my morning flight. Afterward, I had five servings of pancakes, eggs, sausages, and bacon. I have a healthy appetite. I need it for my shifts.” Celestia covered her mouth to hide a smile. “Then I was at Celestia’s where I cooked breakfast for her, your uncle, and my two guards.”

  “You cooked for my uncle?”

  “Yep. He trusts me, so better get on the bandwagon, junior. I’m here to stay.”

  From the twinkle in her eyes, she thought I was a hoot and a half, and that was all that mattered. I wondered what she’d found funny—my claim that her father trusted me or calling Zack junior? He, on the other hand, studied me like I was a bug he wanted to crush.

  “Why aren’t you fat?” Hayden asked. The girl was blunt to a point of rude. Like Trudy. The two would probably get along. “I’d be if I ate like that.”

  “I quickly burn whatever I eat.”

  “You play ball?” Zack asked. I had a feeling he wanted to challenge me just so he could trounce me.

  “No, I fight.” My eyes met Celestia’s. “Boxing, wrestling, street fighting, weapons training… you name it, I do it. I also fly.”

  Celestia choked on her drink. I reached out to pat her back. The look she shot me would have stopped a lesser guy.

  “You okay, Dimples?” She nodded. Zack’s eyes narrowed with annoyance. The man really didn’t like me.

  “You fly?” Hayden asked.

  “Yes. But not on a broomstick.”

  “An airplane?” Zack asked.

  “Nah. I’m faster than a plane. I can pull maneuvers a jet pilot would envy, and I can cloak. That ability is not available to everyone.”

  Zack sneered. “You’re full of crap. Want to show me some of your fight moves?”

  “Sure. Now?”

  “Eirik!” Celestia looked at her cousin. “Let it go.”

  “I’m just asking. Looks like he hits the gym quite often, so maybe he and I…”

  I stopped listening when I noticed the discoloration on Hayden’s arm. A section of her skin had a weird texture. I adjusted my eyesight and saw the half-moon mark. It was faint and blended well with her darker skin. If I didn’t have dragon eyes, I would have completely missed it.

  Someone pushed on my knee, but I didn’t pay attention. My hand shot out and stopped Hayden from reaching for another slice of pizza. I lifted her arm to see the underside. Similar scar, less recognizable unless you knew what to look for.

  “Dude, what’s your problem?” Zack snapped. “Let her go.”

  I dropped Hayden’s arm and raised my arms. “Sorry. Your scars, where did you get them?”

  Hayden frowned and hid her arm under the table as though feeling self-conscious. “I don’t have them anymore. My mother used herbs and spells to make them disappear.”

  “What scars?” Celestia asked.

  Hayden stood. “It’s nothing.”

  “Are they half-moon scars?” Celestia asked.

  Hayden hesitated and then nodded. “I had them on my arm when I was young.” She peered at her skin and rubbed the area. “My mother did everything she could to get rid of them. I don’t know why. I just know she hated them.” Her eyes flew to Celestia. “It’s funny. They kind of look like the one you have on your—”

  “Foot,” Celestia finished, her face pale.

  “How the hell did you notice Hayden’s scar?” Zack asked. “I’ve kissed every inch—”

  Hayden covered his mouth. “You’re done eating, mister. I’m putting you on shop duty for the next thirty minutes.”

  “The shop is closed. It’s”—he glanced at his watch—“damn! My dad was expecting me an hour ago. I’ll call him and explain. He’ll understand.”

  “No, he won’t.” Hayden’s voice was firm. “Go help him. I’ll fill you in later.”

  He lowered her hand from his mouth. “You’re trying to get rid of me.”

  “Yes.” She kissed him. “Go.”

  “If I wasn’t so crazy about you, I’d be insulted.”

  “I know, but this is Witches’ business and you’re not officially in yet.”

  Zack scoffed at the idea. “You want to tell me he is a Witch?”

  “I am,” I answered before Hayden could.

  “What’s your gift, your royal highness?”

  “Zack,” Celestia cut in. “Leave him alone.”

  Cute. She still believed I had zero magic.

  “It’s okay, Dimples. I got this.” I extended my arm, engaged the right runes, and flexed my hand. The mace became alive, shifting under my skin and lifting until it separated from my
body and leaped into my hand. Zack mumbled a curse, the look on his face priceless. Hayden’s jaw was down. Celestia wore a smile that said she knew I was showing off. I kind of loved the mace and people’s reaction to it.

  “This is Gunnlögi, my battle blaze. Want to try to hold it, Zack?”

  “Eirik,” Celestia warned.

  She was right. I didn’t need to humiliate her cousin. I whipped the mace in the air, let it coil around my arm, and blended with it. Silence followed, and I went back to my pizza.

  “You deliberately allowed me to punch you, didn’t you?” Zack asked, his voice cold. His dislike of me just shot up.

  I smiled without responding, but he understood.

  “I bet anyone can get one of those where you come from,” he said.

  “No, they can’t,” Celestia said. She glared at me and smiled so lovingly at her cousin I was jealous. “Go home, Zack. Gunnlögi is his. No one can bond with it or fight with it, let alone lift it.”

  “It didn’t look heavy,” Zack protested.

  “Let him try, Dimples. Please.”

  “Stop it.” The look that accompanied those words said Celestia was close to pulling a Witch move on me. No one could lift the mace except me. It was made of a special metal and forged in the ambers of a dying star by Dwarves. “Don’t encourage him. If that weapon hurts him, I will hurt you.”

  “It moves on its own?” Zack asked.

  Celestia sighed. “No, it doesn’t. Just go home, Zack.”

  Her cousin studied the tattoo, then me. “Next time, right?”

  “Sorry. She’s the boss, and she says no.”

  He picked up his drink and left the room with Hayden. Celestia played with her bottle of iced tea, her eyes distant. I wanted to know what she was thinking.

  “Sorry about teasing your cousin.”

  “Zack knows he shouldn’t mess with magic or magical objects. Unfortunately, he can’t resist a challenge. Do you think Hayden is one of the orphans? That would mean she’s an Immortal.”

  “Ask her.” It wasn’t my place to tell her the truth about her best friend. There had to be a reason Tammy had tried to get rid of the scars. Had she found a way to sever the blood bond using spells? I rather liked the idea of Celestia falling in love with me and our love destroying the bond.

  Hayden entered the room. “I hate keeping secrets from Zack, so I promised to tell him everything tonight.” She threw me a weird look. “I hope that’s not going to be a problem.”

  “Not with me.”

  “So you can’t keep secrets from Zack, but you can from me?” Celestia asked.

  Hayden cringed as though Celestia had slapped her. “What are you talking about?”

  “Are you an Immortal?” Hayden stared at her, a stricken expression on her face. “Don’t answer that. It’s written all over your face.”

  Hayden sat. “Celestia, we all have secrets we keep from each other for reasons only known to us. Mine started way before I met you, and it wasn’t mine alone. It was also my mother’s. Keeping it was the only thing that kept us alive. It still is.”

  “I’m not judging you,” Celestia said. “I just wish we didn’t have to keep secrets from each other. I’ve wanted to tell you about my time in Hel so many times.”

  Hayden reached for her hands. “And I’ve wanted to tell you I was an Immortal too, but I couldn’t. Mom warned me to never ever tell anyone what we were or what we’d gone through all these years.” She glanced at me before adding, “So you astral projected to Hel?”

  “Yes. Eirik is really Hel’s son and his so-called ‘guards’ are soul reapers. Oh, your mom… she wasn’t alone when she left, Hayden,” Celestia said. “Noises woke me up, and I went to look. She and some guy in an expensive suit were talking in whispers. Then the lights went out and they were gone. I think he was an Immortal, too.”

  Panic flashed across Hayden’s face. “Why didn’t you tell me?”

  “I wasn’t sure whether I should say something or not. I mean, I was keeping secrets from you, too.”

  Hayden jumped up and started for the door. I stopped her before she could open it. “Whoa, slow down. Where are you going?”

  “I need to make a call.”

  “To who?”

  “Mom’s friends. Other parents. As far back as I can remember, as soon as one of the Suits appeared, we warned the other parents and took off. Mom said they were looking for kids like me.”

  Other parents? “What do you mean kids like you?” She looked away, but not before I saw her expression. Years of running from these men in suits and protecting herself had made her wary of people asking too many questions. “I’m not one of the Suits, Hayden.”

  “I know.”

  “Then sit down and talk to us before we decide what to do next.” I waited until she sat before grabbing a seat. “What did you mean by kids like you?”

  “Kids with gifts, the scar, and these.” Runes covered her face and arms. Like most of mine, they started black and then glowed. She had my mother’s rune on her forehead, confirming what I’d suspected. She was one of the orphans, and her protector was my mother.

  “What do you mean by these?” Celestia asked.

  “She has runes.”

  “I have runes on my body,” Hayden said at the same time. “Other than kids like me and their parents, I’d never met another person with runes, until I saw Eirik and the guy with purple eyes.” Her eyes locked with Celestia’s. “I was born with the gift to control minds and make people do what I want.”

  Celestia grinned. “I knew it.”

  “But the other things I do, like suddenly having something you’d forgotten in another class or in your locker, I often use runes for speed and invisibility, create a portal, and get them.”

  “Like my glasses and wallet,” Celestia whispered.

  Hayden glanced at me. “Mr. Dupree wouldn’t let her leave the class and rescue a guy in the bayou, so I opened a portal to her bedroom, grabbed her glasses from her dresser, and made it back to the classroom without anyone realizing it. I did the same thing when she forgot the tickets for the fair in her wallet at home.”

  “You claimed you’d picked it up before we left the house,” Celestia said, speaking slowly as though remembering little details. “Oh man, so many times I’d forgotten my books and you suddenly had them, or I’d found myself at home after I tranced. I always called you my guardian angel, and you were. Sort of.” She frowned.

  “I’m sorry I couldn’t tell you,” Hayden said softly.

  Celestia dismissed her words with a wave. “Don’t be. Like I said, I have no right to get hurt or angry with you for keeping your secrets. I’ve kept some from you, too. So how old are you?”

  “Anywhere between seventeen and eighteen.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “I was adopted and Mom was very honest with me about it. The adoption agency had no birth certificates, so based on my size, Mom figured I was about two years old. They asked her to choose a birthday.”

  Celestia glanced at me. I knew what she was thinking.

  “Same thing happened to me,” I said, and Hayden’s eyes swung my way. “I’ve celebrated my birthday in March for as far back as I can remember, until last year when I found out that my actual birthday is in November.”

  Hayden frowned. “You are an orphan, too?”

  “No, but I was taken from my parents when I was a kid and given to an Immortal couple to raise. I learned who my parents were six months ago.”

  “Were you on the run all the time too?” Her voice was barely above a whisper.

  “No. I was lucky to have a former Valkyrie guarding me. I think she stopped the Suits from finding me.” Raine’s mother was the only one who could have protected me.

  Celestia jumped to her feet, disappeared inside the store, and came back with her cloak.

  Hayden’s eyes went to the cloak. “What’s that?”

  “A cloak with runes. If I connect with this”—she showed Hayden the
gold and emerald clasp—“I can see the things in your world. Can I see your runes?”

  Hayden engaged several runes, and Celestia studied them. “She has the goddess’ runes on her forehead, Eirik.”

  “What do you mean? What goddess?” Hayden asked.

  “You want to tell her?” Celestia glanced at me, excitement making her eyes luminous. I shook my head because I could see she was dying to do the talking. She scooted to the edge of her chair. “Okay. The rune on your forehead belongs to Goddess Hel, Eirik’s mother, which means your real parents are either from Helheim or consider her their protector. Show her yours, Eirik.” I engaged my runes. “See? He has her rune too, but the one on his forehead is Odin’s.”

  “My mother didn’t see the need to rune me when I was a baby because she never thought there was a reason to do it. I was her son. I think the Norns did it instead and since they were in cahoots with my father, they made Odin my protector. Odin is my grandfather.”

  Hayden watched me with wide eyes. “So you’re some kind of a god?”

  Celestia chuckled. “Yes. His mother’s people call him the Rising Star and his father is Baldur. Everything you were told about the gods is true, Hayden. And being there is surreal. So you and your mother knew I had runes on my car all these months?”

  Hayden nodded, but she looked confused. “Yes, and on your house and the store. We knew someone was protecting you.”

  “Eirik was.” Celestia gave me a wide smile filled with gratitude. I didn’t want her gratitude. I wanted her to be mine. “Did you also guess I was lying about not remembering my experience in Hel?” she added.

  Hayden made a face. “No. I believed you’d really forgotten because I’ve met Mortals I knew when I was young, and they couldn’t remember me. Erased memories is how we stay safe from Suits. I’m not sure who does it. I just know when we run, people are made to forget knowing us. When I saw him and the guy with purple eyes—”

  “Rhys,” Celestia said.

  “When I saw him and Rhys in your hospital room, I was scared. I thought the Suits had found us again and were interested in you. But when I described them to Mom, she said they were not the same people.”