DIRE : TIME (The Dire Saga Book 3)

by Andrew Seiple

  “Mm.” Dottie’s words came back to me. “Bound by blood, perhaps?” I reached into my pocket, pulled out the bloody handkerchief.

  Loge’s eyes narrowed, and he licked his lips. But then they fell back to their previous careless expression, and he laughed. “What a clean handkerchief.”

  I stared at it. Every bit of it was soaked in blood. My hand was sticky with old gore now, and I knew I’d be washing my pocket later. “Is it?”

  “Oh yes, I think so.” He slid his coat open, pulled his shirt down, revealing a pectoral that Martin would have killed to own. And Martin was ripped.

  But right over his chest on his left side, there was a bloody symbol. Somewhat like a mix between an eye and a cage of lines. It glowed an evil red.

  “I’ve got a bit of dirt on my chest,” Loge said, eyes trying to catch my gaze and failing. Annoyed, he harrumphed, and clicked his fingers, and I guiltily jerked my eyes to his face. Right, right, business time now.

  “The gunfire’s stopped.” Bryson whispered.

  “Dirt on your chest.” I nodded to Loge. “Yep, she sees it.”

  “Think you could take that handkerchief and wipe it clean?”

  Ah. He’d found a loophole.

  Bryson grabbed my arm, leaned in close. “That’s over his heart. It’s a binding rune, I’ll wager. Atlantean, probably.”

  “Likely to kill us if we do it?” I muttered back.

  “No, but it’ll free him. And then there’s no telling what he’ll do to us.”

  Loge spread his hands, pointed to his chest with a hurt look and a ‘who me’ pout. I studied him, looked at the rune again. Then met Bryson’s eyes.

  “We’ve come a long way. Will you trust her?”

  “It’s not you I’m worried about trusting.”

  A cry of pain from down the hallway. Henri’s voice. Bryson flinched like he’d been the one hurt.

  “You don’t have the luxury of options.” I leaned in closer. “Look at it this way. In the future she’ll be the one trusting you.”

  Emotions played across his face... amazement, anger, annoyance, and finally acceptance. He shot another look at the doorway, and gripped his cane, pulling a blade free. “Do it, then. I’ve got two feet of Atlantean steel here if he tries anything.”

  Someday I really had to ask him about his adventures. He’d gotten the neatest toys out of them. But not now. Stories later, horrible ideas with unreliable Norse deities now.

  Without pausing I leaned into the circle and mopped the handkerchief around the symbol, smearing gore across Loge’s chest.

  The warmth, the closeness in the room seemed to ease, and the shadows seeped back into the corners. Loge grinned. “That’ll do. Oh, play along.”

  “With what?”

  Loge pushed me out of the circle, and I stepped back to avoid falling. He looked at the ground, and used his heel to scoop the powder back into a rough shape around himself. Then there was a flicker, and an impossible motion my eyes failed to track, and he was the old stony god again, squatting in the circle and looking miserable.

  No time to muse on it, as jackboots clicked on the corridor just outside.

  A breath, two, then the room flooded with a greenish light. I cursed, and moved to put Loge between myself and the doorway. Bullets cracked out, and I hit the ground, bringing the sonic rifle to bear—

  —and hesitating, as I saw the misshapen form in the doorway, one that resolved into Henri, bloodied and battered, a muscular, furry arm held fast around his neck. A furred face glared over his shoulder, and another furry arm poked out around Henri, leveling a smoking Luger my way.

  The werewolf had a monocle. I snorted, and my own fell from my eye, to clatter upon the ground. “Hello Mitternacht.”

  “Doctor,” he growled in German. “And Herr Bryson, as well. Ach, I knew I should have come straight home.”

  Bryson raised his sword-cane, but paused as Mitternacht shoved his gun against Henri’s temple. “Come now, none of that. Surrender and you will be well-treated.”

  “As well treated as the Jews in those cells.” Heat stirred through me again, and I spat on the ground, standing up to glare at him over Loge’s shoulder. “You monstrous filth. Worthless wretch!”

  He laughed. “They serve their purpose. More than they’ve ever had in their miserable Jew lives. And so shall Tesla. In two days, magic and science shall combine in manners never before dreamed of, and the Thousand Year Reich shall become reality!” He sighed. “It’s going to be a long, sleepless day, preparing all of them. Which is why I’d like you to die or surrender now, please, so I can get a few hours rest before I have to get to work.”

  Okay. Had to give him points for his monologue style, but my anger over the unrepentant atrocities down the hall made it moot. “And what of us, then?”

  “Prison, until the war is over. Guest quarters, practically. We have all we need. You are immaterial to our success, here.” I didn’t know it was possible for a wolflike muzzle to sneer, but he managed. “Come now. The fact that you’re here means that you’ve come all this way in some futile attempt to undo my power, and what have you managed? What hope do you have of fighting on here? With the father of Fenris at my beck and call I can easily tear all of you to pieces without any significant trouble.”

  “Yes, about that,” Loge said.

  And oh, was the look on his face worth it, as Mitternacht’s eyes practically popped out of their sockets in shock.

  “Two questions. Firstly, how well do you think you’ll fare without my son’s powers?”

  A shadow passed over the room and Mitternacht shrieked, twisted, and dropped Henri. Bryson surged forward, but the Nazi sorcerer whipped his Luger down at Henri’s form and held up his free hand, warning him off.

  Loge continued without missing a beat. “And secondly, how well do you think that weapon will fire without bullets?” He lifted a hand, and small brass objects flashed in the unnatural light as metal chimed on the ground.

  Mitternacht went pale, and as he looked to his Luger, Bryson was on him.

  “Alive, Bryson!” I yelled, and he grunted in acknowledgment or perhaps that was Mitternacht as Bryson’s knee drove into his solar plexus. I really couldn’t tell.

  I tried to get some pleasure out of watching Mitternacht squeal and roll on the ground while Bryson took his cane to him, but it was over too quickly.

  Something rolled across the ground and tapped across my boot. I looked down to see a coin on its edge, brass-colored and very old. More coins were scattered across the circle.

  I looked to Mitternacht. He was on the ground with Bryson on his back, and Bryson’s cane across his throat, choking him out. The Luger was a good ten feet away.

  I leaned on my sonic rifle. “That gun’s still full of bullets, isn’t it?”

  Loge was back in his romance-cover form, turning the full-force of that vulpine grin upon me. “I never said I took them, did I? Just wondered how well it would work without them.”

  I snorted, and his grin widened.... as the green light went out, plunging the chamber into darkness.

  “Generally that means the sorcerer who called them up is unconscious.” Bryson said.

  “Give him another twenty seconds to make sure.” I advised.

  “Will do.”

  Loge chuckled. “Allow me.” And then torches flashed to life from every wall, torches that weren’t there a minute ago. He stood outside the circle, arms folded, looking down on Mitternacht’s limp form. “Oh Hulbert, I told you this wouldn’t end well.”

  “Hulbert?” I grinned.

  “His real name. Part of it, anyway. May I have yours?”

  “Doctor...” Bryson shook his head at me.

  “No. Call her Doctor if you must.”

  He studied me, eyes sliding up and down, and I flushed. Damnation, he was attractive. But mid-survey, he dropped the sultry act and stared, non-plussed.

  “What?”

  Loge looked nervous. “You don’t happen to have a
cow’s tail, do you? Or an empty spot in your back when viewed from behind?”

  “That’s... oddly specific. No to both questions.”

  “All right. Strange. Well, none of my business, I’m sure.” The sultry look was back. “Just yet, anyway.”

  “Okay.” I moved over to Bryson, took charge of Mitternacht, while he fussed over Henri. “Do you need a first-aid kit?”

  “It’s nothing the Gamanu won’t fix, thankfully.” He sighed, and uncorked a vial, slipped it between Henri’s lips. “I’m down to two doses. Damnation, this trip’s been hell on my supplies. Bloody fruit only blooms—”

  “Once every ten years. She knows.”

  “We’ll have to talk about that at some point.”

  “Perhaps.” He looked at me with irritation, that faded as Henri gasped for air. “I suppose your way worked out. Not the route I would have taken.”

  “Yes, I’m curious about that.” Loge said, squatting down next to us. “Why did you just up and free me?”

  “Multiple reasons.”

  “I’ve got time to listen.”

  Well, after Mitternacht had spent all that time monologuing, I did want to beat my own drum a bit. Villainous sympathy and all.

  “Well, we had limited time to bargain a good deal. You’re a trickster god, so any deal we stood a chance of cutting in such a limited time would have ways to bite us in the rump after all was said and done. And since you’re a trickster god, you’d feel obliged to do so.”

  He nodded. “True. How else are you going to improve?”

  “How noble of you.” He grinned at my words as I continued. “Also, we didn’t exactly know what we needed for the situation. From what a friend of mine told me, baiting a magician in his lair is a hard task at best. No telling what he’d have ready to use against us. And again, if we went for a hard bargain, you’d give us exactly that and no more, or in a way which fulfilled the letter of the deal and bite us in the rump before it was done.”

  “Again with the backside biting. Do you enjoy that?” He raised his eyebrows, and leered. I pushed down a spike of libido. Took a few seconds of remembering his true form, to get my hormones to recede. I coughed, then continued.

  “Furthermore... well, the man had wronged you. One thing she knows, and knows well, is that you would bear your captor no love. And that you were sick of being bound. By asking nothing of you, and holding you to nothing more, you had one target to take vengeance upon. And anything you did to him would be to our benefit.”

  “You were gambling.” Bryson ground out, helping Henri to his feet. Henri’s eyes were riveted to Loge, who ignored them both to stare at me.

  “Gambling in a sense.” I rose, offered a hand to help Loge up. He chuckled but took it, and kept hold of it as he stood. “But it worked out in the end.”

  “Hm. Would you like to worship me?” Loge asked. His gloved hand was warm in mine.

  “Sorry. She doesn’t kneel.” I pulled my hand free. “You are the most reasonable deity she’s ever met, for what it’s worth. But it’s the principle of the thing, you understand.”

  “Fair enough.” He looked down at Mitternacht, and shook his head. “I really should kill him. That would be what my brothers would insist I do, to avenge this slight.”

  “Seems a bit merciful. Be more fun, she thinks, to leave him alive to see his plan come crashing down.”

  Loge wasn’t smiling as he looked over his shoulder to me. “Now you’re trying to manipulate me. Careful.”

  I nodded. “Worth a shot. We do need to talk to him about the details of his plan. There’s a lot riding on it.”

  Loge considered. “Well, my brothers are idiots at the best of times. Mostly. I suppose my time would be better spent freeing the few others Hulbert’s kin have captured.”

  “About that... One of our friends got turned into a werewolf. Could you turn him back, please?”

  “A gift for a gift. Certainly.” He closed his eyes, opened them again. “Done.”

  “You don’t need us to tell you which friend?” Bryson asked.

  “I’ve convinced my son to withdraw from everyone he was obliged to inhabit. Fenris will trouble your friend no more, whichever one he was.” He kicked the Luger to one side. “Well, have fun then. Off I go.”

  “See you.” I turned my attention back to Mitternacht, started dragging him back to one of the larger stalagmites. “Hey Bryson, got any rope on you?”

  “I saw some upstairs. Keep an eye on him please, Henri.”

  Bryson hurried out, and Loge slowed, stopped three steps from the door. He looked back. “You aren’t going to ask me for my help?”

  “No, not really. You said you have places to go and things to do. That’s fine, you’ve already helped enough.” My first assessment of this entity hadn’t changed, for all that he looked entirely too attractive right now. Loge was dangerous.

  “You really don’t think you need me helping you at all?”

  Careful, now. “She didn’t say that. She doesn’t know what she’s up against.”

  “Hm. Interesting.”

  “What?”

  “You said she. Like you’re going to face it alone.”

  “Slip of the tongue.”

  “Perhaps. But you... you’re a regular valkyrie. You’d take on this entire group if you had to by yourself, and go down fighting in a heartbeat if there was even the slightest chance of winning. I’ve met your kind before, mortal. Though not as often as I’d like.” He leaned against the doorway, watching me with unblinking eyes.

  “She’s got no idea what a valkyrie is, but thank you.” I finished dragging Mitternacht over to the stalagmite, and arranged his arms behind it. Henri sidled up next to me, moving carefully around Loge, and leaned in with a question.

  “Who is she, again?”

  “What?”

  “Her.” He nodded at Loge, who beamed a happy smile.

  “You see a woman?” I asked.

  “One of the most beautiful I have ever seen.”

  Ah. Well, that explained my sudden hormones. He was using a trick to look desirable to us. “Now who’s being manipulative?” I frowned at Loge.

  “I’d say I was sorry, but honestly I’d rather say you’re welcome.”

  I rolled my eyes. “Anyway, yes, she would face it alone if she had to. Rather not. Thankfully she’s got friends to help.”

  One less, now that Dottie was gone. The cost we’d paid to get here... I leaned on the stalagmite, and sighed.

  Loge’s footsteps echoed through the cave, and he leaned on the other stalagmite. “I am told I am a very frustrating friend.”

  “You too?” Martin made no secret of that, whenever we argued. Still, it had always worked out so far.

  He tilted his head, considered, and shrugged. “I think I shall wait and see how this goes. If nothing else, you’ll be amusing to watch.”

  “Oh, well, that’s fine then.” Not like we had much choice in the matter. Tell him to back off, and he might take offense.

  “No promises one way or another, of course.” Seriously, that grin belonged on a fox.

  “Wouldn’t ask’em.”

  Bryson returned with rope, and we bound Mitternacht hand and foot to the stalagmite. Some smelling salts from Bryson’s first aid kit had him groaning and stirring, and after a quick round of glances and wordless debate among the lot of us, Loge squatted down in front of him, putting his face about half a foot from Mitternacht’s.

  “Good morning Hulbert,” Loge chirped, as Mitternacht’s bruised eyes rolled open.

  He’d seemed a proper boasting, sneering villain back when he’d confronted us at the church. None of that was in evidence now. He was just a slightly overweight middle-aged man, bruised and battered from Bryson’s brutal beating.

  “We have questions,” I said, taking a seat on the cavern floor. “You have answers. Give them to us, and you have a chance of surviving this.” Not technically a lie. There’s always a chance of survival, no matter how bad t
he situation. And none of my teammates had expressed an interest in killing him, so technically I didn’t know my answer was incorrect.

  Mitternacht’s eyes were devoid of hope, as he stared into Loge’s. “I... I... ja, what do you want to know?”

  Loge pulled back, and I took his place. “Why do the Thulites want Tesla?” Bryson grunted next to me, approving. The man was the entire point of his mission.

  “He s-shall serve as, as one of the donors for the transference,” Mitternacht stuttered.

  “Transference?” That didn’t sound good.

  “Herr von Katzen has built a machine, that will allow minds to be transferred between subjects. Can you imagine it?” Mitternacht’s eyes gleamed, even in the rough torchlight. “Immortality, here and now, at the pull of a lever!”

  “At a cost.” Bryson said. “What’s that cost?”

  “Little enough. The brains are switched. But that’s where we come in.”

  “When you say we, you speak of the Society of Thule.” Henri said.

  “Yes! Magic is necessary for the second part of the process. When we transfer Tesla’s mind, what do we gain? Nothing, the man still hates us. We could bind him, but binding dulls the intellect. Hinders the brain.”

  Loge cleared his throat.

  “In any but a god, I mean,” Mitternacht hastily amended. “So instead, once Tesla’s mind is in its new home, we bind his prodigious genius to its new body, then send the mind back. When the original brain is returned, Tesla’s quality of genius remains! With enough binding skill, any quality can be transferred.”

  That sounded like nonsense to me. I glanced over to Bryson. “Could that work?”

  Bryson looked worried. “From what I know, it sounds possible. But even if it’s not, the process might harm Nikola.”

  “In which case we’ve lost nothing, and crippled an enemy of our Fatherland.” Mitternacht smiled until Bryson glared at him and raised his cane. I caught his arm as the sorcerer shook with fear.

  “One of the donors.” I said, remembering. “Who are the other donors?”

  “The Jews outside.” He nodded back toward the door. “And der Schwarze Ritter.”