by C. Gockel
“Do you hear that? That’s Sam and your dad shouting for me to hurry up. We’re taking Sam to his first official day of flight training. Your dad could hardly Recharge last night, he was so excited. I better go.
“Just remember three things: You are loved. Protect your humanity. And your team is your family so protect them like you would Sam. Oh and one last thing: Aaden’s fighting a lot of demons right now. The kind you and I can’t see. He’s very much like your dad was when I first met him: he will require... patience.
“Okay, I’m coming! I have to go, but remember: You. Are. Loved.”
The mixture reverts back to its original liquid form and leaps back into the vial. I turn away from Randy and look out the window.
“I’m sorry, Pry. Maybe it was a bad idea to listen to the recording after all,” Randy says.
“No, it wasn’t. I just didn’t think I’d hear Sam’s voice in the background. It threw me.”
He comes over and gently rubs my back. I try to smile back but don’t quite make it.
“I wish you could have heard your dad too.”
“Actually I do hear my dad,” I reply.
“What do you mean?”
“I hear him in my head saying, “Pryor, even angels need reminding.”
“I don’t get it.”
“Whenever they were on missions, my dad made sure that if at all possible the team got a chance to have fun and blow off some steam. He’d say even angels need to be reminded of the grace of Omnis. And you know what? I know just how to do that. Let’s go!”
Before Randy and I take off, I text the team and tell them the plan. Everyone responds and agrees to come along. Well, everyone but Aaden. Our plans aren’t “team business” so I guess he won’t be coming.
We arrive in Paradise Plitvice Lake, near Southeast Europe. Here, Omnis placed the most beautiful waterfall in the human world. Over a dozen rivers converge and cascade down throughout the picturesque terrain. The clear turquoise waters, lush planet life, and vast mountain range always leave me in awe.
“This is incredible,” Randy says as he looks around.
“Yeah, Sam and I used to vacation here with my parents,” I reply.
“Death takes vacations?”
“So do Time and Fate. Just never at the same time. My mom gets the summer months because it coincides with our school vacations.”
Bex, East, and Swoop fly past us and head for the highest peak they can find. They quickly strip down to their swimwear and get ready.
“What are they doing?” Randy asks.
“Another reason to come here is because the mountains are just high enough for the team to Soul Dive.”
“What’s that? I wanna do it too,” he says.
“No Randy, you don’t,” Key warns.
“How do you know, Key? I might have an adventurous side. A dangerous side,” he says, trying way too hard to impress her.
“Randy, Soul Diving is a game where two angels leap off the tallest mountaintop at the same time without using their wings. Whoever opens up their wings first, loses. It’s what the humans would call a game of chicken,” I explain.
“Oh, that doesn’t sound too bad,” he lies.
“Really?” Key asks.
“Well, what happens if one of them doesn’t pull up in time?” he says.
“There are Ports at the base of all the mountains. They take you straight to Difi,” I reply.
“What’s Difi?” he asks.
“Hell.”
“Oh...” he says quietly.
Key and I exchange a look of bemusement. Key comes over to him in her bathing suit and takes his arm in hers.
“I know if you had wings, you’d Soul Dive and not even think twice about it. But since you don’t, I thought we’d hit the waterfall in the lower terrain while Bex and the others are diving. What do you say?” Key asks kindly.
I think Randy lost his power of speech in that moment. All he could do was nod and give her a goofy grin. He then rushes and takes his shirt off, leaving only his Star Wars shorts. The two of them jump into the water and cry out excitedly as they splash around and swim. A few mountains over, I watch as the rest of the team Soul Dive and carry on like happy maniacs.
I strip my clothes off and reveal the bathing suit underneath, but I don’t go in the water. I sit on top of one of the cliffs and look out at my team. Well, most of my team. Aaden isn’t here.
Aaden isn’t here...
I allow myself to go back to the night we kissed for what I hope will be the last time. I can feel his hand on the side of my face as if it’s happening right now. His soft lips felt like summer breezing through my wings. And when I parted his lips with mine, it sent a rush of pleasure to parts of my soul I didn’t know existed until that very moment.
It’s not just the kiss I miss; it’s him. I know it makes me a complete loser for missing a guy who doesn’t give a damn about me, but I do. I miss the way his eyes glaze over when The Face is talking. I miss the intensity in his voice and the confidence of his walk.
Most of all, I miss the way he says my name. It always sends a tingle whirling through me and makes me feel like I’ve had a double shot of Coy. And no matter how many times I’ve witnessed it, it still amazes me how he can be so aggressive in battle and yet so gentle in his touch.
“Moping is not allowed today!” Randy says behind me.
I look just in time to see him and Key coming for me. They pick me up and scold me for staying out of the water.
“I don’t want to swim, I’m fine here,” I promise.
“Well, too bad,” Randy says.
He signals to Key and the two of them conspire and hurl me off the cliff. I scream in delight all the way down. When I hit the water, I gasp at how cold it is and they all laugh at me. Soon East and the others join us in the water. It’s the most fun I’ve had in awhile.
Things go from entertaining to outright hilarious when the force of the waterfall knocks Randy’s shorts off. He’s horrified but still laughing as he tries to find his shorts in the water. Swoop and Key make inappropriate and silly comments. The guys join in and I’m laughing so hard my sides hurt.
Finally Randy emerges from the water with his shorts in hand. He says it’s not funny as he puts his shorts back on, but we catch him laughing at himself yet again. We point out the stray flower petals, leaves, and seaweed that have latched on to his body.
“Did I get it all?” he asks as he turns his back to us.
“Yeah, man, you’re fine,” Bex says.
“You still have one behind your thigh,” I call out from a few yards away.
“Pryor is just messing with you,” Swoop laughs.
“Oh really?” Randy says as he playfully leaps towards me and sends me flying backwards into the water.
We have a “splash” war for a few moments then head out of the water. I then swear to Randy I wasn’t messing with him. He doesn’t believe me so I make him turn around so I can take it off for him. I bend down and swipe the small stray debris from the back of Randy’s thigh.
“Damn, it’s stuck,” I tell him.
“Oh no, is it some kind of jellyfish? Is it sucking my blood or something?” Randy says, starting to panic.
I get all the way down to the ground so I can take a closer look.
“Pryor, c’mon, tell me! Is it a jellyfish?”
“No,” I reply.
“Then what the hell is it, Pry?”
“It’s a rose; a blue rose.”
~FIN~
Book Name, Series Name Book 2, is available at your favorite retailer.
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The Noru 2: The Last Akon is available now at your favorite retailer.
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ELSKER
Elsker Saga Book 1
S.T. Bende
Kristia Tostenson prefers Earl Grey to Grey G
oose and book clubs to nightclubs. But when she transfers from her one-stoplight Oregon town to Cardiff University in Wales, she falls in love with Ull Myhr. Her new boyfriend isn’t exactly what she was expecting. His cashmere sweaters and old world charm mask a warrior who's spent an eternity fighting for his very existence. Ull is an honest-to-goodness Norse god — an immortal assassin fated to die at Ragnarok, the battle destined to destroy Asgard and Earth. On top of being marked for death, Asgardian law prohibits Ull from tying his fate to a mortal. No matter what she feels for Ull, Kristia knows she's the one thing he can never have.
With Ragnarok on the horizon and a lunatic haunting her dreams, Kristia has to find a way to convince Ull that breaking the rules is the only way to survive; that defying the order he's sworn to uphold is their only chance to be together. And when someone starts asking the wrong questions, Kristia realizes the crazy visions she's had all her life might be the key to saving their realms... even if they end up costing her her life.
The Prophecy of Ragnarok
With the death of Balder, the powers of darkness will burst from their tethers. Jotunheim shall crack open; a terrible frost shall suffocate all things good. The great beast will attack, the wicked ship sail, and the light of Asgard will dim evermore. Fire shall consume the earth and Darkness shall swallow the sky. No one, God or Mortal, can survive the travesty of Ragnarok.
—Prophecy of The Norns
Chapter 1
I moved faster than a salmon down a chute in bear season. It was my only option. If the giant wolf biting at my heels didn’t kill me, then the tree-trunk of a snake twining between my feet was going to finish the job. I pumped my legs harder, exerting every modicum of strength I had left, and in the process, I stepped on the snake’s head. It hissed, a guttural reverberation bouncing around the darkness. I pushed harder. My chest burned, but I’d managed to put a little space between my attackers and me. The wolf growled angrily, but I didn’t look back. I couldn’t spare the movement.
Since it was pitch black, I couldn’t see what I was running towards, and I certainly didn’t see the fissures beginning to form in the dirt beneath my Nikes. My size six sneaker slid into one and I could hear the crack of my ankle breaking before I hit the damp earth. The chasm was getting bigger and soon my whole leg slipped through. My fingernails clung to the soil as it separated from itself, and I felt the chill creep over the ground as the terrible frost settled like a blanket onto everything it could reach. I started to shake – it would be death by freezing, then. But I knew chilled human wouldn’t be the worst thing the wolf and snake had eaten that day.
“Earth to Kristia! Hello? Are you even listening?” I rubbed my eyes and focused on the frowning face of my best friend since kindergarten. A sprightly brunette, Ardis was everything I wasn’t – adventurous, perky, self-confident. And at the moment, highly irritated.
“Sorry.” I shook off the remnants of last night’s bad dream. Ardis Behrman didn’t often grace our hometown of Nehalem, Oregon. Three hundred residents and a solitary stoplight didn’t hold much excitement for a girl studying acting at NYU. I treasured any conversation we had that didn’t require text or Skype.
“Vision?” She cocked her head.
“Hardly. Just tired. Nightmare last night.”
“The weird one about the animals hunting you down?” Ardis wrinkled her nose.
“That’s the one.” My favorite grandmother’s dark stories from the North were never far from my subconscious. I never understood how any woman in her right mind could lovingly recount the end of the mythological Norse world to an eight-year-old girl. Mormor always had a wicked sense of humor, so I liked to think her intentions were good. Or maybe she suffered from a touch of the crazy. The fact that, at eighteen, I still had vivid nightmares about Ragnarok; well, that spoke more about my own sensitivities than anything else. They were just stories.
“That dream’s just creepy, Kristia.”
“Tell me about it.”
“So.” Ardis rested her hands on the table. The metallic blue sparkles on her nails caught the light of the coffee shop where we’d had countless heart-to-hearts. “What’s new in Nehalem?”
I stopped just short of rolling my eyes. “Good one Ardis.” Nothing changed around here but the weather, and even that was freakishly consistent.
“And the University of the Pacific Northwest?”
“You mean High School, Part Deux?”
“C’mon, it can’t be that bad.”
“You do realize you’re the only member of our graduating class who doesn’t go there, right? The only one who isn’t going to end up married to someone they’ve known since kindergarten. And spend eternity working in the boring log mill or tourist traps.” It would be the latter for me. My parents’ antique shop was popular with the summer crowd and I was expected to begin fulltime work when I graduated. Not exactly the stuff of dreams.
“If you’re that bored, don’t just sit around waiting for something to happen to you – go out and grab it.”
“It’s not that easy,” I mumbled. Ardis was one of those people to whom good things came naturally. She didn’t understand that life didn’t just fall into place for the rest of us.
I glanced up as our waitress set two steaming mugs on our table with a little too much force. I raised my eyebrows. “Is everything all right today, Susan?” My voice strained with the effort of false nicety. In our twelve years of school together, Susan had always treated me like a social pariah. Clearly nothing had changed since graduation. I may not have been well bred, but I was well raised. I pasted on my best fake smile, though after enduring a lifetime of whispers and stares I had a very low tolerance for rudeness. It was my absolute pet peeve.
I held Susan’s glare with my own pleasant look until she scurried back to the kitchen, obviously uncomfortable. Well, I was used to that.
“Sorry, what were you saying? You don’t think it’s easy to change your life? You only think that because you’ve never tried.” Ardis sipped impatiently at her latte, the unofficial beverage of our rain-drenched town. “Look, Kristia, you’re my best friend and I think you rock. But is sitting around Nehalem for the rest of your life really going to make you happy? Really?” Score one, Behrman.
The minute she said it I was transported from the rainy-small-town coffee shop to a dreary house on the edge of Nehalem.
Rain fell outside the thin windows, and the air was damp with the faint scent of mildew. A cleaning caddy sat at my feet – judging from the smell of the bleach, I must have just scrubbed the toilets – and I sorted laundry while the television droned in the background. When the boredom consumed me, I crossed to a coffee table where I idly fingered my one indulgence in an otherwise uneventful life: my subscription to Travel Magazine. The cover boasted an Irish castle sitting in a brilliant green field of clovers.
My heart tugged – in my vision I was thirty years old, and I’d never even been on an airplane. I forced myself back to the coffee shop, where Ardis was watching me closely.
“What did you see?”
“Absolutely nothing.” I shook my head. I was resolute. My life was not going to turn out that way. It was one vision that could never come true. I drew a breath. I was eighteen years old. Time to choose the path I wanted my life to take. There was a whole world out there – what was keeping me from living in it? From living, period? “I have three years of college left. I’m not spending it here. Not anymore.”
“Awesome,” Ardis nodded her approval. “So what are you gonna do?”
“I’m…” I was at a loss. I hadn’t thought that far ahead. “Well…” Then it came to me. “Got it! UPN has study abroad. The deadline isn’t for another two weeks. I’ll spend sophomore year somewhere totally different – somewhere people don’t know anything about me.”
“Bravo.” Ardis clapped loudly, to Susan’s chagrin. She glared at us from behind the counter. “So where do you want to go?”
I had to think. Now that I’d made the deci
sion to leave the country, where should I go? I thought about the book on my nightstand – a Jane Austen classic. Those ladies seemed to be enjoying themselves, in their own angsty way. They certainly had a good time romping through the English Countryside. There was my answer. Once I’d made up my mind, I pictured something altogether different.
I was on a big, fancy jet, flying towards Europe. A flight attendant handed me a coke with a lemon wedge, and I stared out the window at the endless, green meadows passing beneath. The businessman to my left read the Wall Street Journal, and the one across the aisle buried his nose in the London Times.
Oh, criminy. What had I gotten into now?
“So where are you going?” Like always, Ardis glossed right over my little mind trip. Bless her heart.
“England. No, Wales.” A few miles closer to home might make it seem a little less scary. I dropped my head in my hands. Darned hallucinations. I hadn’t had one in months, and I’d just had two in as many minutes. It was with no small amount of pleasure that I took the visions back.
The three hundred townsfolk of Nehalem whispered about my “handicap” when they thought I wasn’t listening – actually, it was a mental problem. It was generally accepted that I was two trees short of a forest. Thanks to some glitch in my brain, I saw random flashes of the future against my will. I’d been in two minor car accidents, failed four midterm exams, and had to avoid competitive sports entirely, all because I saw stuff at lousy times. This wouldn’t have been so much of a disability if I could have seen the winning lotto numbers, or even just the location of the radar-cops who hid along the 101. But to date, my premonitions had yielded zero useful tidbits. I saw the mundane, ranging from my mom doing a load of laundry to Ardis painting her toes fire-engine red. I was the world’s most useless psychic.
“Wales it is then.” Ardis nodded her head firmly. “Now we just have to make sure you actually get on that plane.”