Brandr gave Lassair a long look. “N-not stupid,” he finally managed. “N-not her n-name . . . any m-more . . . than Asha is yours.”
No. You are not stupid. Lassair appeared to sigh. Cloudwalker, I could give you much joy, I think, but you would never accept it from me. You do not desire anything that comes to you easily, without struggle or a fight.
He went still. He knew his Name. Thor had called him by it, often, while trying to knit his body back together after Hel’s attack. He hadn’t realized that his Name was that obvious to others.
Lassair went on now, gently, And while there are women within this building with whose spirits you resonate, there is no one here with whom you resonate as clearly as with Shadowweaver. Of course, she is either watching us from the safety of an illusion so complete that I cannot penetrate it, or she has already left the building. No doubt, when next you meet, she will apologize for the emergency that called her away, and ask you how the evening went. Lassair settled her perfect face against her hand, as Brandr’s blood pressure spiked once more. I cannot see into her heart, you understand. She is bound to another, most firmly. But there is still resonance. The curious thing is, she has a worse void in her life than I have in mine, but she does not seek to fill it. A faint shrug. I believe that she accepts the emptiness of her own existence as her punishment. She knows she can never make amends, so she toils endlessly, without hope, because that is what your people do.
“We—what?” Brandr stared at Lassair, now almost completely at sea.
Lassair grimaced. You say there is no hope, no future, and yet, you must endure and go on. It is very . . . Valhallan, and I do not claim to understand it. But after watching Stormborn endure such misery for nigh on forty years, I am as tired of her suffering as she is. And I will not see others inflicted with the self-same wound. Go and bargain with Lorelei, Cloudwalker. Bind and be bound. She actually flicked her fingers at him, shooing him away. Go on.
Brandr stood, tossing the menu aside, and gave Lassair one more wary look. Then turned and stumped out of the taverna. He had no idea how he was supposed to find Lorelei if the siren didn’t want to be found. But her apartment sounded like a good first option.
As Brandr left, Lassair turned and smiled at her children at the table with her. See? That wasn’t so hard. Now, getting my phoenix-self back . . . that’s proving to be a bit more difficult.
And with that, she stood, and walked out, herself, clearly enjoying the fact that every eye in the room was on her.
The younger people, on their side of the table, just stared and shook their heads for a moment. None of them had heard Lassair’s end of the conversation, but they’d definitely noticed when Brandr’s temper had spiked. And then the bear-warrior had left, without a word. “I have no idea what that was all about,” Solinus assessed. “And I probably don’t want to know.” He glanced at Masako, who’d already pulled up a ward around their end of the table, so that they could talk about sensitive matters, like Zaya’s work in the Magi Archives, and Masako’s own research. “So, what else has been going on?”
Rig had spent the past several months deep in what was left of Chaldea. “Found an Immortal lab,” he said, tersely. “My squad put it out of commission.” He rubbed at his face. “There are hundreds of towns and cities there that are just . . . empty. I’m sorry, Zee, I know it’s your home, but it’s unnerving walking through cities that are deserted, other than ghul and maybe random djinn. Some of the ghul have been dead so long, there’s little left but the skeletons, and you can see the energy bands holding them together in place of ligaments and tendons, through the mummified skin.” He paused as Zaya shuddered. “Sorry. The Persians are re-colonizing the edges, moving people from overpopulated eastern cities to take over the ruined ones to the west, and . . . well, either killing the ghul or repurposing them.”
“What was your objective, just recon?’ Solinus asked. Rig shrugged, and didn’t answer. “Ah. One of those. Forget I asked.” He rubbed at his face. “Truth be told, I wish I were off with you. I’ve spent the last six months on Ikaros. Everyone in the JDF calls it that fucking island. Everyone knows which one we mean.”
Ikaros had been settled as long ago as three thousand years before Caesar, probably by the Dilmun civilization. The islanders had worshipped Shamash, the sun-god of the Babylonians and Akkadians, and there was archaeological evidence of human sacrifices to the sun and moon gods. After Alexander the Great had passed through, it had become a Hellene outpost, and it retained its Hellene name to the present; no one knew what the original inhabitants had called it.
It was still a Hellene possession, and thus, a part of the Roman Empire; the continental land closest by was actually the territory of nomadic tribesmen who occupied the southern half of the Arabian peninsula. The tribes worshipped herding spirits, as well as djinn, efreeti, and lilitu, and the old, dead Babylonian gods in the hopes of their return. These tribes normally came to the coast during the summer, to let their herds graze and drink in the wet regions near the sea.
And yet, anyone who came to the coast was subject to Persian attacks, or ran the risk of having their young men seized and forced into the Persian army, with the added bonus of potentially having their young women seized and forced in other ways. The tribes were caught in a bad situation. If they came to the lusher regions, they were in danger. If they did not, they faced starvation. And they were in danger anyway, thanks to the mad gods.
Solinus knew about this, because a few groups of survivors had asked for asylum on Ikaros. He described it all as best he could, saying, “We’re the toe-hold. If Persian comes south, Ikaros is where they’ll land. They’ll try to hold the island, then hit the coast from there . . . and then come up from the south.” He exhaled. “Ikaros is hot and humid, but lush. Which makes it all the more surreal as ornithopters fly overhead, scouting our defenses and occasionally bombing targets. You get so you can hear the whoosh of their wings long before you can see them, and then you hear the fighters scrambling to chase them.” He shook his head. “We sweat, steam, and live on raw nerves. I sleep in a helmet and flak jacket in a barracks where the walls are stacked to the windows with sandbags.” He shook his head again. “Well, when I sleep. I’ve had some pretty damned odd dreams.”
“I usually don’t dream in the field,” Rig supplied. “Usually, fighting ghul and djinn and finding laboratories where people are lobotomized and turned into Immortals is enough to stun my subconscious into silence.” He frowned. “Though I’ll admit to a few strange ones the past few months.”
“Do they beat riding a damned red dragon into a fight?” Solinus asked, and Maccis dropped his fork. “All right, lindworm, I guess. I have no idea where my brain came up with that one from. I’m a ground-pounder. Sure, I did my parachute training with the rest of my unit, and when they told me that if my backup chute failed, I’d die, I laughed at them . . . .” he paused, his eyebrows crinkling at the look on Rig’s face. “What?”
“Blue lindworm,” Rig replied, tersely, stealing the smile from Solinus’ face. “Carrying the sword my father gave me. Yes, I know, it makes no sense. I’m infiltration, and yes, I had the same drop training as you did. Every time I wake up, I feel like I’m in the wrong place. Doing the wrong thing.”
Solinus swallowed. Rig always had been behind him, on a blue steed, in these dreams. “Yes. I . . . shit. I’ve had that same feeling on waking up.” The table had gone silent, and he glanced at Maccis, who’d stopped eating. “You were always along in these dreams, too. Don’t suppose you’ve had the same ones?” Only faint humor there.
Maccis swallowed. “Black lindworm. Heolstor. Going after Immortals’ facilities with both of you. And apparently, my subconscious is really egotistical, because we were getting a reputation as the—”
“Knights of the air,” Rig finished, looking down at his plate. “Shit. We’re all dreaming this?”
“Just you,” Inghean said, sharply. “I haven’t had any haunted dreams.”
They all traded disquieted glances, and Zaya asked Maccis, “So . . . no second thoughts about running with the pack now?”
He scrubbed at his face. “Second and third thoughts, yes. But what I said before still stands, Zee. I might wake up feeling like I’m in the wrong place, but . . . I don’t have to do what the dreams tell me. And I wouldn’t let something like that dictate my actions, anyway.”
“Same here,” Solinus said, but he gave Rig a thoughtful glance. “Except now, I’ll be paying a little more attention to the details. Though gods know, I have more than enough to keep me occupied in the waking world.” He sighed, and returned to the subject of Ikaros. “I really want the order to move out. I want my people occupied, so they stop manufacturing trouble for themselves. Boredom is a bad enemy to fight.” He exhaled. “Discipline’s an issue. Half my men see the daughters of the herders, and just can’t seem to keep it in their trousers. The nomads have a very strict honor system, and they don’t like marrying or fraternizing outside the tribe, even if it’s willing.” He stared into his cup. “There was an enlisted man caught raping a girl. I had him flogged outside the nomads’ camp, so everyone could see that I was taking it seriously. Seventy lashes, bare back. Offered the girl a chance to hold the lash, too.” Solinus felt his face go tight. “I told my men that if there was a second infraction, I’d damned well crucify the man who did it.” He sighed. “And even the ones who aren’t violent or dishonorable . . . I keep telling them to go to the local brothel and get it out of their system. It’s less risky. Young men like to brag when they’re courting. Operational details tend to slip out that way.” He grimaced.
Rig leaned back in his chair, obviously grateful to turn his mind away from the topic of their odd, shared dreams. “It’s not limited to young people. I mean, I could invent a plausible espionage scenario for an older man, like that magus that Zee and Maccis mentioned,” he said. “Masako said he’s married, but he’s hanging about in a place like Psyche’s Wings? People who have to go out and find new and exciting playmates tend to be showoffs. Easy for spies to get a handle on people like them. Money, an addiction, sex? A spy is in.”
Zaya looked distressed. “I wish I’d never mentioned it,” she mumbled. “I don’t think he’s a bad man!”
Inghean patted the younger woman’s arm. “We’re not saying he is,” she said, comfortingly. “Rig’s just saying that he’s an example of someone who’d look like a good target for a spy. He’s involved in high-level projects. He’s not a central figure, so he’s not subject to a lot of scrutiny, the way Erida is, and he apparently likes to frequent places with bad reputations.” She shrugged.
Rig held up his hands. “I’m not impugning him. I don’t even know him. It was just an example.”
Solinus kept his words silent, and slipped them into Masako’s mind. Do me a favor. This man works with you, and the more Rig talks, the more paranoid I feel. Talk to Tasalus. He’s in counter-intelligence. He can look into it.
Masako glanced back at him, and nodded. The band of tension around Solinus’ chest eased. It was probably nothing, in the end. But a little reassurance didn’t hurt.
“Anyway,” Sol said out loud, “Three more months there, and then I’m being rotated out. Maybe back to working with Rig’s people.” He shifted in his seat.
“They can’t keep you out in the field for the rest of our lives,” Masako said.
Solinus grimaced. “A lot depends on whether or not I’m even going to be in the JDF and the Legion in three months, Saki,” he told her, trusting in her warding to prevent eavesdroppers from hearing his words, and wrapped an arm around her. “Politics. I think the world would be better off without it.”
Lorelei had taken to the sky to make her way back to her apartment. Frittigil had directed her to leave the shelter over a year ago, stating that Lorelei’s stipend from her office, and the small salary she received as a consultant for the Lindworms meant that she could afford a place of her own. And nevermind that Lorelei had been donating her earnings back to the shelter.
She barely gave a glance to her surroundings; she’d always been able to see in the dark like a cat. Nothing was out of place, not that she had any belongings of any real note. She was under the impression that all of her pictures and books in her house in Germania had been seized and transported, probably to Valhalla, back in 1970 or so, for storage and study. And as a refugee, even a leader among them, she had really nothing to her name. The one-room apartment had no bed. She’d stacked a couple of mattresses in the corner, and tossed a blanket over them; that served as a nest. She owned a single place setting, which rested on the counter that extended from the kitchen area, and which served as her table and desk. There was a stool by the counter, rescued from someone’s rubbish pile; she’d fixed it herself. No far-viewer; she’d never been fond of the newfangled devices, and she could read the newspapers at the refugee center, for free. She’d decided against a radio or a photogram; she loved music, but if she sang along with it these days, she could do some fairly serious damage before she realized what she was doing. Aside from which, it seemed . . . inappropriate . . . to have such a thing. It was a luxury.
The only other furnishings in the apartment were a pair of battered electrical lamps, and a bookshelf made from bricks and plywood. Lorelei turned on one of the lights, checked the wind-up clock on the shelf, which ticked steadily at her, and picked up one of the books. Written in antique Hellene, Electra was part of the bloody history of Agamemnon and his family. Electra helps her brother to murder their own mother, so as to avenge her father, who in turn had murdered her sister. They’re told by Castor and Pollux, their mother’s deified brothers, that their crime of matricide was horrific . . . but that they could be purged of it. And so they flee the Furies until they find a temple of Athena, where they bathe in pig’s blood for purification. Their tattered family is reunited, and the gods forgive them, because the family is whole once more, and they have suffered enough. Lorelei stared down at the words.
But what none of the ancient writers ever ask, is how Electra and Orestes could live with themselves afterwards. Their crimes were already committed. Their father murdered their mother’s first husband, married Clytemnestra at sword-point, and presumably begot all his children by rape. He murdered their sister, Iphigenia, as a sacrifice to the gods so that he could hasten his way to Troy. He returned, ten years later, and Clytemnestra killed him, with the aid of her lover. Apollo and Zeus demanded that Orestes avenge the death of his father by killing his mother, and he and Electra obeyed, only to be punished for doing . . . precisely what they were told to do. She sighed. They at least had the comfort of having followed orders, before being unjustly punished for obedience. And the ancients at least recognized that at some point in the whole cycle of revenge and blood, someone must forgive, or the cycle will just perpetuate itself.
They gave it to the gods to forgive, and in Electra’s case, they finally chose to stop the punishment. But again . . . she and her brother had already committed the crime. Reginleif stared at one of her gray walls, barely enlivened by the yellow light from her lamp. Even if the gods themselves forgive you, and tell you that you’re now wiped clean, how do you live with the memory of what you’ve done? Can you tell me that, Sophocles? Can you tell me that, Euripedes?
The metal door of her tiny apartment suddenly reverberated with a thunderous series of clangs, as if someone outside were intent on beating it down. Lorelei blinked and turned off the light, softly, reflexively muffling the sound with a hint of seiðr. Then she padded to the door and peered out through the peephole, her eyebrows rising. Brandr, on her doorstep, looked furious. This wasn’t something she’d expected. If all had gone according to plan, he should have been well-occupied for the rest of the evening.
Reginleif debated not answering. Of course, if she hid now, she might as well keep hiding for the next calendar year. Time would not sweeten whatever had soured his disposition. And she couldn’t afford the repairs to her door if he did ki
ck it in.
She slid the bolt back and opened the door, just as Brandr raised his fist to begin pounding once more. “My neighbors will not thank you for the noise,” she told him in Gothic, her mind working rapidly. “Some of them have undoubtedly already gone for their weapons, thinking that there is another gang incursion—”
Her words cut off in surprise as Brandr picked her up by the elbows, and walked her backwards into the apartment, kicking the door closed behind him. She recognized all the signs of rage, being locked down by training and will. She spread her fingers widely in front of herself, and remained still, constructing an illusion of herself in her mind. Perfectly replicating herself, so that she could turn her actual body invisible, and duck out of the way, once he let go of her arms. “What’s wrong?” she asked as he released her, and turned to stalk around the fifteen-foot by fifteen-foot cube of living space, staring at everything. She’d never allowed anyone past the door before.
“L-l—” His lips pulled back from his teeth in frustration.
“Lorelei?” A head-shake. “Lassair?”
A nod of assent. “She vexed you, somehow? I have been told that she can be a little flighty at times, but she has a warm, kind nature.” Lorelei frowned. And she’s passion incarnate. How did she not succeed with him? Ah. She didn’t try. Perhaps she didn’t find him pleasing.
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