Laughter made me look toward the elf triplets. They all watched me and the expression on Vrunlin’s face made me feel as if spiders were crawling up and down my spine. Even the elf I’d defaced gave me a certain surprised look of pride. I just rolled my eyes and glared at him, lifted the rock in warning.
He chuckled, turned back to his brothers and continued the argument.
“You bitch. You are so gonna die. Right now.” Branton stood, staggered a couple of steps as he held his hand over his obviously broken nose. He lurched toward three backpacks piled on top of a picnic table. A picnic table? In the middle of a massive forest of burned dead trees. I looked around to see if we were by the lake, but I didn’t make it past the giants.
Seeing the one yesterday hadn’t prepared me.
Nothing could have prepared me.
There were more than I expected. Something like thirty, I guessed, and they stood as tall and taller than a lot of the dead trees around us. Unlike the elves, every giant had white hair and they all wore ragged burlap-type clothes. Mostly loincloths. They had hands larger than beach balls and feet that looked as long as my legs. One of the females narrowed her eyes and screeched when I met her gaze; the sound made me wince and cover my ears. The shorter male next to her hit her in the face with the back of his fist to shut her up. She hauled off and knocked him on his butt.
There were so many of them, my heart dropped to my feet. I backed up, hoping to find Arun. His arm came around my waist. Then I twisted to look at him because the power coming off him was so strong, it made my skin tingle. “Your eyes are glowing again,” I whispered as I looked around and realized we were near the water. I didn’t have to ask to know it was Yellowstone Lake.
The fear that gripped me then made me cling to the arm around my waist.
“Branton,” Arun said, his voice deeper than normal. “Whoever said you’d survive a fire here lied to you.”
“Who said anything about me staying here?” His eyes narrowed on me. “You are supposed to be dead. The elves are arguing about that, though it sounds like they’ve included other subjects. Wish I could understand them because they are always bitching about something.” He shrugged. “They don’t seem to grasp their roles here, though the giants aren’t a problem at all.” He bent forward and whispered loudly. “They are all kind of dumb. Will do anything you tell them to. Watch this!” He stood up and swiped a sword off the ground. He held it high, turned it back and forth, then grinned as fire shot down the gleaming surface.
The giants began murmuring, some started chanting.
Fire streaked up and down the sword.
I wished for the elk antlers badly right then. Not that they’d do any good against that sword, but I knew this story—knew that sword was supposed to kill Freyr.
Branton laughed and lunged toward us.
Arun pulled me out of the way, did this sort of graceful turn, then kicked Branton right in his broken nose. Branton howled, dropped the sword and grabbed his face.
I winced and had to look away. His nose was no longer in the right spot on his face and blood had smeared over his cheek, forehead and up into his hair.
Arun lunged for the sword, but one of the giants jumped toward us and smacked him away. He flew over the picnic table into a tree, and I lurched after him only to get swept up in the air by a massive hand. Arun yelled, jumped onto the picnic table, grabbed up a backpack and dug through it as he ran toward the giant holding me.
I gasped, trying to breathe as I kicked out my legs and wiggled my body. The fingers around me wouldn’t budge, so I bit down as hard as I could and had to actually gnaw through the tough leathery skin until nasty metallic blood hit my tongue. Acid rushed up my throat and I gagged, but I bit harder. It didn’t faze the thing.
Me vomiting all over its hand from the blood worked. I hit the snow hard, its cold stinging my exposed arms and shoulders.
Arun reached me before the giant and pushed me behind him.
“You have a knife?” I asked, spotting the blade in his hand.
“All the backpacks have them. For fishing, hunting, whatever.”
“Why didn’t you tell me that earlier,” I mumbled, wrapping my arms around myself as my shivers grew worse. “I have a sweater and coat in that tent somewhere.” I looked around and spotted the orange material in a heap.
Right by the elves.
Arun started to unzip his coat, but Branton chose that moment to yell and run forward with his sword. Arun jumped aside, pulling me with him, and the sword barely missed us. Arun switched the knife to a reverse grip and faced his former friend. “Stop this. Stop this right now. I don’t want to hurt you.”
“Don’t you remember the stories?” Branton chuckled, the sound wet from the blood that had to be trickling down his throat. “I kill you.”
“Branton, you aren’t Surt and I’m not Freyr. We can change everything.” Arun took a step closer to him. “You can fight with us.”
“No, thanks. What we have planned for this place will be a little too hot—even for me.”
“You also die in those stories, Sutter,” I yelled. “Idiot. And all this drama is pathetic.”
A tree just to my right lit up. It flared into a raging inferno instantly and before we could move away, a tree to our left joined the fire party. I heard and felt the fire start up behind me, and when I turned to look, the sight of a rope hanging from one of the trees sent terror screaming through me.
My shaking then had nothing to do with the cold. I glanced into the sky, wondering about the time and how far away we were from sunset. If we could somehow hold Branton, the giants and the elves off until then, maybe Arun’s power would be something to stop this. Maybe the others would have time to get here.
As if thinking about them, the sound of a helicopter filled the air. Some of the giants ran toward it and one leaped into the air and grabbed, coming so close I held my breath. I knew Coral and Raven were on that thing.
The pilot managed to elude the giants and land. Kids spilled from it fast. My sisters, Vanir, Taran, Magnus, Brigg and Nanna. Grady, Hallur and Alva followed. And then, when the Valkyries Mist and Kara stepped down, the music on the lake started again. And again it didn’t sound so much like music to me, but voices. So many voices, they wound around each other, flowing into a tone that did sound like harps and wood flutes.
Everyone, including my sisters, held some sort of weapon as they stood in a line in front of the helicopter.
I was so busy watching them, the coughs that suddenly tore up and out of my throat nearly sent me to my knees. All I could think about was carbon monoxide and how Arun and I had to get away from the fire because it surrounded us on three sides now. I didn’t think he realized the fire had spread, and then I knew it for sure when a giant reached down to grab me and Arun shoved me out of the way so he could stab his knife up into the giant’s hand.
The battle began as I tumbled over backward.
Right into the fire.
The sun turns black, earth sinks in the sea,
The hot stars down from heaven are whirled;
Fierce grows the steam and the life-feeding flame,
Till fire leaps high about heaven itself.
Now Garm howls loud before Gnipahellir,
The fetters will burst, and the wolf run free;
Much do I know, and more can see
Of the fate of the gods, the mighty in fight.
—The Norse Poetic Edda
Chapter Fourteen
As I fell, I instinctively tried to grab that dangling rope, marveling over the fact I felt nothing. In my nightmares, the burn had always hurt so, so much. This was kind of like watching the movie Firestarter. I could see my hair go flying up as I fell back, could see the sparks lighting it up. Everything felt surreal, as if my heart went into slow motion a
nd the world around me ceased to have tactile function.
I guess when you’re dying, you go stupid and start thinking stupid things because just as I realized shock was keeping me from feeling it, the pain began.
And nothing in my nightmares had prepared me for the reality.
Of fire crawling onto and into everything on my body.
Of the smell of my hair burning.
Of the bone-deep, searing pain that came when the fire ate through that first layer of skin.
Just when I released the ragged scream clawing its way out of my throat, everything around me came to a stop.
It wasn’t like my rune tempus, nothing spun around—the world just halted. I lay there, whimpering because I felt nothing but pain. I was made of pain. And of ash and the death I could sense reaching for me with sharp, searing claws.
Then a woman stepped through the flames. She wore jeans and tall gray boots, her bare arms were ripped and her vest was a silver so shiny, it hurt my eyes. She had straight long blond hair that looked like a waterfall of silk as she leaned over me. “Shh,” she said softly. “I’m Hildr. Did you think I’d let a true warrior like you suffer through this death? Come with me.”
And the pain stopped.
I had to close my eyes a moment and bask in the feel of absolutely nothing. I’d always wondered why some gave up their lives when there was still something to fight for and now that I’d felt that sort of pain, I understood. Understood that sometimes, the only freedom was in letting go.
But letting go wasn’t a part of my true nature.
Which was why carbon monoxide or even the breakdown of my own body hadn’t killed me yet. Fighting was what I knew.
It was what I did best.
She held out her hand and I took it and stood, marveling that I could see right through my arm. I started to look down at my body on the ground, but she stopped me with a long-fingered hand to my cheek.
“You don’t want to do that.”
I thought of fighting her because curiosity was another thing I did best. Then I remembered what it had felt like when the fire had reached my scalp. I closed my eyes.
“I should have reached you faster.” Sorrow deepened her voice. “Plus, this will make things tricky.” She pulled me through a wall of fire and we stopped next to Arun, who stared back at my body with a look of such utter horror and such stark loss, I felt it in my gut.
I was going to ask her what she meant by tricky, but I couldn’t get past his expression. “He’s never going to forgive himself for this and it was an accident.”
“His hand to the death of a norn,” she said as she walked me past the giant Arun had stabbed in the hand. “Though, I’ve also heard another version. His hand to the death of the forsworn.”
“You know that prophecy?” I frowned. “And what do you mean forsworn?”
“The one who lies under oath to her sisters, then relinquishes her life.” She waved her hand around us. “The one who goes into battle knowing she’s to die.”
“That doesn’t make me any different than the rest of these people. All of the warriors go into battle knowing their fate.”
She nodded. “True. But unlike the others, you’ve always known it would be fire. Any one of you triplets could have died, but for some reason, the other two were saved. I don’t normally have to stop time to take a warrior with me, but I felt it was fitting with your power.” Her smile was laced with sadness as well as kindness. “As one of the einherjar, you will be able to fight with the others, though for a time, they won’t be able to see you. Would you like to go now so you don’t have to be here for this part?”
“For this part?” I blinked at her. “You mean for their reaction to my death?” I turned to find my sisters. They had been running straight for the fire, and Raven’s outstretched hand nearly touched the flames. Horror filled my belly when I looked down and saw that her foot was about to lodge into a huge rock. She’d fall. Right into that fire. “Do you have to take me right now?” I whispered. “Is there a time problem here?”
She nodded. “We only have another minute or so.”
“Can you instead move my sister back before she falls into that fire?”
“If you’d like.”
Like there was a choice. “I would.”
She walked to Raven, lifted her and carried her back to the others, then did the same with Coral. Her smile still sad, Hildr turned back to me. I didn’t have time to swallow the knowledge that I was truly dead because everything went back to normal and the battle began.
The cry of thousands of birds filled the air. Raven, who had to be completely turned around because she’d been moved, fell to the ground, scrambled to her feet and ran toward the fire, Coral on her heels. This time, they stopped before they reached it and the raw, broken scream that tore out of Raven’s throat sent me to my ghost knees.
“Please stop looking in there,” I whispered. “Please look away.”
Raven turned to Coral and grabbed her purse. “There has to be something in here!” she yelled.
But Coral knew it was too late. Tears streamed down her face as she pulled her purse from Raven’s hands, dropped it to the ground and wrapped her arms around our eldest sister. Raven clutched handfuls of Coral’s coat as she sobbed into Coral’s hair.
Branton started to laugh and I spun toward the noise in time to see Arun turn, rage changing his face into a stranger’s as he ran forward, leaped into the air and slammed his knife into Branton’s chest as he came down. I couldn’t see if it was a killing blow from my angle. Branton fell back with a scream and Arun followed, his arm raised again.
Two giants rushed in to pry them apart, but Brigg and Nanna ran forward, weapons out.
The sound of snowmobiles joined the fight as Tyrone and the others arrived.
Hildr stepped next to me, turned my face toward hers. “There is a reason you three girls tracked down these particular boys. Do you understand that?”
I nodded, but said, “No.”
She tightened her fingers on my face until I winced. “There is a reason you went to Freyr.”
I shook my head, not understanding how her fingers could hurt my ghost face, not understanding why she was talking about Arun’s god. I tried to pull my face from her hand, but she increased her grip. “With his gift of healing, there could be a way if we just wait until his peak of power. It’s possible I can help.”
I shook my head. “He heals plants, Hildr.”
Magnus ran past us and didn’t even pause even though he nearly ran into me. He carried Arun’s sword, tossing it to him as he got close.
Hildr let go of me.
“The others can’t see you? But they can see Kara and Mist just fine.” I looked around for them and found Mist had joined the battle while Kara ran toward it. She turned and smiled at Hildr, then stabbed a long sword into the thigh of the first giant she reached.
“Only the others of my kind can see me right now because I’m willing it. We only need to hold out for a small time.”
“For what?” I stretched my neck, trying to see Arun. He was wielding his blood-covered sword like a madman, swinging and hacking, and I started to run toward him when he barely missed having his head knocked off by a giant. “He’s being reckless. That’s not like him.”
“His heart is broken.”
I swung toward her, my eyebrows going high. “His heart?”
“How could you not know the boy cared for you?” She frowned, then nodded to where he now stood on the carcass of a giant as he continued to fight. Arun suddenly yelled and jumped, and the elf in his path didn’t see what hit him.
I flinched. “You didn’t answer me—said we only had to hold out a short time. For what?”
“The gloaming.”
The time when magic was at its peak. I nod
ded and opened my mouth to ask more questions, but the sky pulled my attention as clouds poured over one another and swallowed most of the light. Brigg ran past me, yelling, and his light filled his area of battle just in time for me to see Taran take a running leap off the back of a crouching giant. He went high into the air and brought his hammer around in a swing that would have taken off a human’s head. The hammer smashed into the temple of a giant and blood splattered him as he grabbed on to another giant’s long hair and brought his hammer up under her chin. His fierce expression as he rode that giant to the ground and looked toward Coral made me hold my breath. A bolt of lightning struck the earth near Taran as he stopped and watched my sister momentarily.
I cried out a warning he couldn’t hear when a giant reached for him, but he swung his hammer up and around and took off the male’s finger. Thunder rumbled through the atmosphere as his eyes glowed.
“I can’t believe I have to just stand here and watch. I want to help.” I looked at Hildr, frowned. “I don’t understand. Where are the dead warriors who are supposed to help?”
“The einherjar will come.” She gave me one of those enigmatic smiles I’d read about in books—the kind that I’d always found really annoying.
I glared at her. “Didn’t you just say that I’m now one of the einherjar?”
“You are. Watch.” She pointed.
I didn’t look away at first because that sadness had come back to her expression. I was dead—I knew it. And if she’d pulled me off the battlefield then I would be able to come back.
But as what?
Raven’s sudden scream yanked my attention back to the fighting, and I breathed a quick sigh of relief when I saw she was okay. She and Coral had been frantically putting together spell bags as both of them cried. Raven would have absolutely no idea what she was doing. But now she stood, her hands over her mouth. I followed her gaze, and this time I couldn’t stop running forward as I spotted Arun flying back through the air into a tree. He hit hard and slid down, but he didn’t stay down long. He crawled forward, shaking his head, and when he seemed to have it together, he stood and ran toward...I ran around a giant to see Arun was fighting elves. Along with Tyrone, Magnus and Mist.
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