Because with Dave everything was about control. Control of Finn, therefore control of the Gates and success in his mission of protecting the world. He didn’t seem to give a damn about anything else.
The elevator doors dinged open. Finn limped past her and entered. She observed him as they rode up, wondering if she was being paranoid. He’d had these flashbacks since she’d met him, and it looked like no Gate had opened. Everything was okay.
Then why did she feel this lump of dread in the pit of her stomach?
Could be the lack of sleep, she decided as they walked to the car, or the lack of action. She wasn’t used to sitting behind a desk, writing reports and filling out forms. She was seeing Shades everywhere when it was only shadows cast by the sun and clouds. She went around every corner expecting danger when there were only happy people walking their dogs and chatting on their phones.
Maybe she should accept that life was improving. That Finn was safe — or would be after he’d killed this damn dragon — and that she may soon be out of work.
She thought about this. Did she mind? Finn would cook and she’d open the wine and they’d spend every evening in bed curled around each other. Sounded like heaven.
Her mother had a beach house and had offered it on occasion, though Ella had never taken her up. She should. They’d stroll on the sand and drink cocktails. She could work as a waitress. Perhaps Finn wouldn’t mind doing that again. From the little he’d told her, he’d been happy serving tables before his nightmares had called him to the big city.
He’d reached the car and stood waiting; leaning against the trunk, ash-blond hair brushing his broad shoulders. He seemed lost in thought.
As she approached, he glanced up and gave a faint smile, the kind that made her heart beat faster.
She swallowed hard. “Would you mind working at a diner again? I mean, now you control the Gates and the Veil, and everything is quiet. Well, apart from the dragon, but once this is over...”
He shrugged.
She slipped inside the car and started the engine, images forming in her mind. Finn in one of those long black aprons, working at a quiet cafe. Finn smiling over a drink. Finn in bed, naked, strawberries and some whipped cream...
Hell, a girl could dream, right?
“Ella?” Finn had taken his seat and was now staring at her, a crease between his brows.
God knew what sort of goofy expression she wore. She was probably drooling, too. An urge to laugh gripped her.
“Just thinking of the future,” she said and drove away into the sunrise.
Chapter Two
Control
“What are you doing?” Finn’s rough voice caressed her ear. His warm breath washed over Ella’s neck, making her shiver. His arms snaked around her and gripped her wrists gently. “Cooking?”
Ella stilled. “Making salad. I figured I can’t botch that up.” She laid the knife on the cutting board.
“Botch it up,” Finn whispered and nuzzled the juncture between her neck and shoulder. “Hm.”
It was a good thing she’d put down the knife. Her whole body trembled. “Did you decide to come help me?”
“Maybe.” He released her wrists and his hands settled over hers, larger, the fine scars on his knuckles gleaming.
His hard chest pressed against her back and his scent wound around her like an embrace. He pressed her hand on the handle of the knife and she took it up once more. He guided her hand over the board, as if really intent on showing her how to better cut the leaves she’d washed — and she found she’d suddenly lost interest in cooking.
“I thought you were taking a shower and I—” Her breath hitched when Finn pressed her harder into the counter, his lips warm and soft against her collarbone.
“I want to show you something.” He let go of her hands and wrapped an arm around her waist, lifting her off the floor.
She yelped and the knife clattered on the counter.
Finn laughed softly, holding her against his hip as if she weighed nothing. “Are you okay?”
“Yeah, just... What are you doing?”
“I thought the sofa would be more comfortable.” He turned in a circle, grinning widely, and lifted her higher.
Ella squealed. Jesus, like a schoolgirl. “Put me down.”
Snickering, he carried her like that, pressed to his side with her legs kicking, moving out of the kitchen and into the living room. “I like carrying you. You’re very light.”
“That’s because you don’t cook as often as I’d like you to. If you did, I’d weigh a ton.” She smacked his arm. “Quit showing off and put me down. I know how strong you are.”
He let her slide down until she knelt on the sofa. “You do?”
Huh, good question. She’d seen him punch and splinter a door, and the ease with which he lifted her... “So how much can you lift exactly when—”
“Sh.” He knelt on the floor and took her hands, smoothed his thumbs over her palms. His uptilted eyes shone, slivers of blue above his sharp cheekbones.
He had no stubble on his cheeks; Boreals, as it turned out, grew no beards. His lips looked so soft. She leaned forward. God, when had she become so addicted to him?
Finn bent his head, not giving her a chance to kiss him, his fingers clenching around hers.
Not playing fair. She opened her mouth to protest, tried to free her hands to touch him.
Finn’s breathing changed, speeding. The air between them began to glow. It was a seed of light at first, tendrils growing in all directions like the rays of a miniature sun.
“What the hell...” She couldn’t think clearly. “You’re opening a Gate?”
He could? He’d do it right then and there, in the bright morning, in their living-room?
Was it time to start screaming yet?
“Not a Gate.” Finn’s voice came strained and his lids fluttered. His fingers threatened to crush the bones of her hand. “I can part the threads... of the Veil.”
Christ. “But... the Shades?”
“They can’t cross.” Sweat beaded on his brow. “Look.”
The seed of light expanded to a bubble hovering over their clasped hands. Its core was lustrous grey. Forms shifted inside, faces, silhouettes. A winged creature flew upward and the bubble bulged but didn’t break, even as Ella’s breath caught in fear. The creature smashed against the surface, like a moth on a lamp, and fell back.
Electric discharges stung Ella’s skin, making her flinch, but Finn’s hands held her fast. Flashes burst around them, one striking the bulb overhead, breaking it.
Holy shit.
The light began to shrink. Finn’s breathing filled the room, harsh and shallow, as the bubble imploded and vanished, plunging them in darkness.
In the silence that followed, Ella blinked and blinked, clearing the blinding afterimages.
That had been... amazing. Frightening. Beautiful.
Finn sat back on his heels, releasing her hands.
“You’re stronger,” she whispered, flexing her fingers to get some feeling back.
He flashed her a faint smile. “I’m a fast learner,” he rasped.
“What does it mean? How different is this to opening a Gate?”
“It’s the first step,” Finn said.
The implications sank in slowly. The first step to opening Gates. Jeez, she had yet to realize she sat in her living room with the mythical John Grey.
“Wow,” Ella muttered. She tried to ignore the icy fingers of fear wrapping around her spine. She was thrilled and pleased and proud of him, dammit. “Thanks for showing it to me.”
A light flush touched Finn’s cheeks. He touched two fingers to his chest.
She lifted her hands to his face, caressing his smooth jaw. “Finn...” If what he said was true, if he’d be able to control the opening of Gates soon, then...
As if reading her thoughts, Finn bent forward, his smile vanishing. “Don’t tell anyone,” he whispered, looking straight into her eyes. “Don’t tell Dav
e.”
***
Ella leaned back on the sofa, trying to focus on her book. Finn’s head was resting in her lap, his long body laid out on the cushions, his hair soft under her fingers. He was dozing, his face open, expression unguarded and relaxed, his lips parted.
It made her think of the boy-Finn she’d witnessed in his early memories, the one who played with toy animals and invited her to join in.
Finn sighed in his sleep, turning into her touch. She stroked the fine golden strands back from his forehead. His shoulders nestled against her thigh, warm and padded with muscle. A grey-tipped ear poked out of the bright hair, delicately pointed.
Finn made a soft sound in the back of his throat and turned his face toward her, his eyes moving rapidly behind the lids. He shivered.
Was he cold? She glanced at a red throw-over she’d placed on the armchair. She hated to wake him up. He’d fallen asleep almost as soon as he’d lain down, a magazine about the Vikings Mike had lent him slipping from his fingers and hitting the floor. That hadn’t woken him.
Ella brushed her hand over his brow, trailed it down his cheek, and forced her attention back to the book she held. It was a treatise by a last century ethnographer, a study of a ballad he’d recorded in a backwater village in Norway.
She wasn’t quite sure what she was looking for. She hoped when she found it, the information would jump right off the page shouting “me, me!”
Heh, right. She flipped the page, shaking her head, reading on.
‘Silence, sons of earth,’ said the Seeress. ‘For I shall speak of the nine worlds hanging from Yggdrasill, the mighty ash tree, and of the Ljosaelfar, the shining ones. The Light Elves came from caverns under the hills where they opened gates, and conversed with the sons of the earth, mingled and learned our ways. Pale they are, as if carved of ice, for their world is cold and lying under eternal snow. Through the gates came creatures from their world, f+frildia, insects white as milk, and frekar, wolves covered in iridescent feathers. But above all, with them came terrible weapons and their mighty steeds, the drekar, dragons of ice and fire.’
Mighty steeds. Ella wondered if the wet-nurse who’d supposedly told the tale to the ethnographer had used such terms. Unlikely. Made Ella wonder how much of the tale really came from the informant and how many were the scholar’s additions and corrections.
The tale went on, recounting how the Boreals, the royal line of the Light Elves, planned to invade and take over the world of men. Ruthless they were, and desperate, driven out of their world by glaciers and endless storms. Midgard was warm and green; the men gullible and their weapons primitive. But something happened the Boreals hadn’t foreseen.
The Boreals’ enemies, the Dokkaelfar or Dark Elves, took advantage of this moment of confusion to defeat them. The Dark Elves grasped control of the Veil and the Gates, closing them and posting Duergar, Guardians, in every world.
While the Shades kept falling through the Veil, the Dark Elves observed and controlled the Gates. The Light Elves became a distant memory, a fitting punishment for what they’d set out to do, whilst the power of the Dark Elves grew. For they who control the Gates, control everything.
Ella paused, staring at the words. Dave had presented his function as someone in charge of keeping the Gates closed and protecting mankind from the Ljosaelfar, the Light Elves. This phrasing, this account... It plainly said the Dark Elves, and by extension the Guardians, didn’t care for mankind’s welfare. They wanted something. But what?
She chewed on her lip. Relax. The last was probably a comment added by the scholar. Besides, it was just an opinion, with nothing to back it up. From Finn’s few talkative moments, she’d gathered that despite the enmity between Light and Dark elves, Finn didn’t blame the latter. Rather, he blamed his own people for their aggressive conquistador strategies.
Finn twitched and tensed, his breathing quickening. Ella petted his brow and rested her hand on his hair, fingertips burrowing in the warm silk. She needed to find out more about the Dark Elves and the Guardians. Their motives, their power, their goals.
Because Dave was his usual self; friendly and gruff, as if nothing was going on. Like a snake lying in the tall grass, waiting.
What for?
Whatever it was, it couldn’t be good. Fool me once...
The account then returned to the genealogies of human kings and queens and their bloody feuds and cross-breeding. Ella groaned. It read like a cheap soap opera.
Why hadn’t the Light Elves expected to be defeated by the Dark Elves? Up until that moment, it sounded as thought the Light Elves had the upper hand, as if they made it their habit to invade worlds and conquer. As if they didn’t think anyone was strong enough to get in their way. And then... Boom. In one stroke, the Dark Elves step on the scene, stop their pallid cousins, drag them screaming and kicking back to Aelfheim, slam the Gates closed...
And post Guardians. Only in her world? No, most probably in others, too, if they had access to them. Just how many worlds were known to the Aelfar? She thought she’d seen mention of nine worlds, but she clearly remembered reading elsewhere that countless worlds hung on Yggdrasill — so which was it?
She leafed through the book, a smell of mold and old paper wafting up. There was another ballad, a version of Volluspa, the first poem of the epic Edda.
It was an account of the battle between the Vanir and the Aesir, the gods and demi-gods of the Nordic pantheon. The Vanir allied themselves to the Joettnar, a sort of frost demons or giants, and were sure of their victory — until the Aesir got themselves another magical ally and defeated them. When all was done, the Aesir imprisoned both Vanir and Joettnar in their respective worlds, behind powerful spells, ensuring they wouldn’t try to invade Asgard or Aelfheim ever again.
Aelfheim? Ella frowned at the page. What did this have to do with the Aelfar? Nothing, surely, unless the allies the Aesir had found were elves.
Motherfucker. Had the Dark Elves fought on the side of the Aesir? Why would they? And the bazillion-dollar question was — what was on the Dark elves’ devious little minds?
A strangled moan from Finn broke through her musings. He shook under her hand, and she realized she’d been tugging hard on his hair.
She lifted her hand. Her skin prickled, as if the air around them was charged with electricity. “Finn?”
He tensed, his back arching. “Asmodr,” he gasped out. His hands curled into fists and an image hit her like a bullet between the eyes.
A blinding form, humanoid, the face dark but the rest sparkling as if made of broken mirror shards — and there was pain, bowing her spine, splitting her head, until she couldn’t breathe. The light intensified, searing into her retinas.
The book fell from her hand, hitting the floor, the thud reverberating. Breaking the sensations, the images.
Ella drew a shuddering breath and blinked. Finn stared up at her, his eyes wide, his body vibrating with tension. “Ella.”
“I’m here.”
He went boneless against her, a long breath leaving his lungs.
“What was that thing?”
Finn stiffened again. “What thing?”
“That creature in your dream. What the hell’s Asmodr?”
His face turned ash-grey. He twisted and pushed to his feet, stumbling, barely avoiding the table. He stepped backward.
She stood, her heart hammering. She hadn’t shared dreams with Finn for more than a month now, and this strange creature... “It’s a memory, isn’t it?”
He took another step back.
Her phone rang, knocking the breath out of her. Shit. Her heart still racing, gaze locked on Finn who had turned and was crossing the room, she hunted for the phone between the sofa cushions. “Ella Benson.”
“Ella.” Dave hummed faintly. “Grab your partner and head to the Madison building. A sighting on the roof. Could be our dragon.”
Real fucked-up timing. “On our way.” Ella disconnected the call.
Finn stood by the door
, looking back at her. His eyes were unreadable. “Dragon?”
“Could be.” She lifted a hand in what she hoped was a calming gesture. “Please, Finn. This Asmodr. The name means something to you. In your dream... In your memory. What happened?”
He closed his eyes and shook his head.
A burn began behind her eyes. “I thought you didn’t have to hide from me.”
Finn pressed his lips together, a muscle leaping in his jaw. Then he turned and left the room.
Obviously she was wrong.
***
Damned dragons and their preference for high places.
No witnesses present. The chubby night guard had led them to the roof of the building, explaining someone had called, reporting something huge flying over and settling on the top.
He’d left them there and returned inside, where it was warm and cozy and where the view of the city could be enjoyed from behind thick glass, not over the parapet with the freezing wind whipping at you and the vertigo.
Not afraid of heights. Not afraid of heights. Not—
“Ella.” Finn was standing ten feet away, way too close to the fucking edge.
“Do you see something?” Her feet refused to carry her over there. They liked the center of the roof and its safety, thank you very much.
Finn shook his head, bright hair flying.
“Come here.” Away from the void. In her mind’s eye, she saw him falling from the white cliff at Aelfheim, falling, falling. Crashing.
She scrunched her eyes shut to break the image. “Whoever the hell reported they saw something in the middle of night should be shot in the head.”
Finn lifted a brow but walked away from the edge, thank god, stuffing his hands into the pockets of his jacket. He’d deigned wear one tonight, as he should. The cold bit to the bone.
Boreal and John Grey Season 2 Page 2