He snorted. “That sounded awful. There she is.” He pulled into the parking lot and sure enough, Cora was standing by her car waiting for us. She waved. “Not a word,” Eirik reminded me.
I pretended to zip my mouth.
“Is it true…? Whoa,” Cora squealed. “What did you do with my best friend? You know the one who never wears makeup to school.” She touched my hair. “I’m so loving your hair like this, and your makeup is flawless.” She pressed the side of my breasts and shamelessly sized them. “God bless PUBS,” she added, using her abbreviation for push-up bras.
“What are PUBS?” Eirik asked.
She laughed and threw him a naughty grin over her shoulder. “Women’s most guarded secret.” She faced me, her smile dimming. “Is it true someone vandalized your car?”
“Yes.” I retrieved my backpack from the backseat. “They wrote Die, Witch, Die. Who told you?”
“Kicker. Argh, people can be such tools. You need to get even, Raine. Get mean. This,” she waved to indicate my makeover, “is great, but it will only work on guys.”
“What do you suggest I do?”
Cora shrugged. “I don’t know. Something that will scare the beegeebees out of everyone. Where’s your car now?”
“At home.”
“See? You didn’t drive because of them. You’re giving them too much power. And you,” she leveled Eirik with a look, “why weren’t you at swimming yesterday?”
“Ooh, you missed me?” He wiggled his eyebrows.
She threw me a quick glance, her cheeks growing pink. “No, but Doc asked about you. Where were you?”
“At Raine’s.”
Light dimmed in Cora’s eyes, and I wanted to kick Eirik. How could he be so blind? He should have realized by now Cora only attended swim practice to watch him. We walked in silence, but it was strained. Eirik appeared oblivious. Cora kept glancing at him from the corner of her eyes.
“Why didn’t you tell me you guys were hanging out?” she finally asked, hurt in her voice.
“We weren’t,” I answered quickly before Eirik could open his mouth and make things worse. “Eirik stopped by for just a few minutes, raided my fridge, and left. Actually, I was talking to Lavania, who’d stopped by for a visit, when he interrupted us. He was so rude to her.”
Eirik snorted. “That was me being polite.”
“I don’t understand why you don’t like her,” Cora said, sounding chipper. “Oh, I asked Doc if I can rejoin the team.”
“That’s great,” Eirik said. “What did he say?”
“I’m in, but I can’t compete at the upcoming meet. Kicker also rejoined, and she convinced Lexi…”
Completely lost in their little world, I gave them space and lagged behind. They looked so cute together. The sound of Torin’s Harley reached me before I entered the building, but I refused to look back. It wasn’t easy.
Inside, students stood in groups, chatting. One by one, they nudged or whispered to their friends, and a wave of silence swept across the hall. Stares followed us. I didn’t make eye contact, but the vibes were different from yesterday. Eirik and Cora noticed, slowed down, and flanked me, Cora to my left and Eirik to my right.
He paused, bowed, and waved. “Thank you. No photographs or comments. You guys are too kind. You don’t have to, but thanks.”
Cora giggled. Even I fought a smile. He was such a goofball. Once we left the hall, he disappeared toward his locker while Cora and I headed to ours. We both stopped when our lockers came into view.
Someone had scribbled in red lipstick, Witches! Burn! Burn! Burn! This time, the ugliness touched Cora.
“I’m so sorry,” I whispered.
“It’s not your fault.” She turned and glared at the students watching us. “Who is the loser behind this? Show your face, you coward.”
I gripped Cora’s hand. “Don’t. This is about me, not you.” I turned and studied the faces of the students watching us. Some looked down. Others stared back with uneasy smiles. “I’m not explaining myself to anybody. You want to burn me? Come and get me. But don’t you dare hurt someone who’s done nothing but stand by my side. That’s what friendship is about, something most of you wouldn’t understand. You mess with her,” I pointed at Cora, “and I’m coming after you with everything I’ve got.”
The students scrambled to get as far away from me as humanly possible. Grimacing, I turned to face my locker, and my eyes met with Torin’s. The grin died from my lips. How long had he been standing there? Cora threw her arms around me.
“I love you, Lorraine Cooper,” she said in a trembling voice.
I chuckled. Her tear glands were connected to her emotions. “Love you too, Cora Jemison.”
She squeezed me hard. At the other side of the hallway, Torin watched us. I ignored him. Cora finally let me go, stepped back, and wiped her wet cheeks. We turned and studied our defaced lockers.
“I have a box of tissue for cleaning up,” she said, punching in her locker combination.
“No. Let’s show them exactly how we feel.”
“Yes, let’s.” Then she made a face and added, “How do we feel?”
“We don’t care what they think.” We put our backpacks away and collected our folders and books. After we agreed to meet during lunch, I took off toward the math floor while she headed to the English building.
“Wait up, Raine,” Eirik called from behind me. I pressed against the wall and waited for him to catch up. He made sure he placed himself between me and the students rushing past us.
“Shouldn’t you be going in the opposite direction?” I asked.
“Why?”
“A certain perky blonde would love to be escorted to her class.”
He blinked. “Cora?”
I chuckled. “Why would you think I’m talking about her?”
His cheeks grew pink. “Lucky guess.”
“Admit it. You like her.”
He snorted. “She’s snarky and gets bored with guys too easily. I wouldn’t want to be her next victim. Besides, I have a new motto. No Mortals.”
“Of course. Too bad. I think she likes you, too.” I started upstairs. After a few steps, I realized he hadn’t moved. I glanced back and grinned at his stupefied expression. “Coming?”
“You’re screwing with my head,” he said, hurrying to catch up.
I’d just planted the seed. “Nope. Thanks for the escort.”
“My class is on this floor,” he reminded me, but he wore a preoccupied expression. “How do you know?”
“How do I know what?” I said, faking ignorance.
“That she likes me.”
“I just do. Call it a woman’s intuition. Later.” I watched him walk away and grinned when a group of girls tried to attract his attention and he walked right past them without noticing. Playing Cupid was fun.
The first person I noticed when I entered the class was Torin talking to two jocks—Drew Cavanaugh and Keith Paulson. One sat on my chair, the other on my desk. They were laughing and high-fiving each other.
Torin glanced up as though he felt my presence. My chin shot up, and I tucked my hair behind my ear, my fingers grazing the titanium screws under my scalp. I started to tug my hair to hide the patch then remembered I had cleverly hidden the shorter strands when I’d curled my hair this morning.
Half of the students were already seated, but their stares didn’t bother me. I was too conscious of Torin’s. He had this weird ability to completely grab my attention, making everyone and everything else insignificant. As though his friends realized they no longer had his undivided attention, they followed his gaze and found me.
My heart pounded harder the closer I got to them. Keith said something to Torin, but he didn’t respond. Drew did. I didn’t care what they were saying. The admiration in their eyes was all I needed to see. Cora was right. Men were easy. Glam up a little bit and you had them.
“Hey. Um, you are sitting in my chair, Keith.”
“I am? Sorry.” He scr
ambled to his feet, wiped the chair as though he’d dirtied it, and stood back. “It’s Raine, right?”
“Right.” I sat and put the books and folder on my lap.
“I’ve seen you during home games,” he added. “You play in the band.”
“Yes, I do.” Drew still hadn’t moved from my desk, which gave him a very nice angle to ogle my chest. On a normal day I would have cringed. Today, I was celebrating my curves and hoped a certain Valkyrie notice them. “Can I have my desk back, Drew?”
His grin broadened. “You know my name.”
I giggled, which was something I loathed. The things I do for you, Torin St. James. “Like Keith said, I play in the band, and you guys are stars on the field.” They grinned and puffed their chests. Seriously, guys were beyond easy. I didn’t dare look at Torin yet. He hadn’t spoken, though I felt his eyes on me. “So when is the next game?”
“Friday night in Portland,” Keith said.
“Will you be there?” Drew asked.
I wasn’t too crazy about football, but they didn’t need to know that. I gave them a playful smile. “Will you guys win?”
They both nodded.
“Then I might consider it.”
“Guys,” Torin cut in and pointed at the door. “Go.”
The two jocks protested, but something in Torin’s eyes had them moving. Still, they kept whispering and glancing back and almost bumped into two girls in the doorway.
“Idiots,” Torin mumbled, but I pretended not to hear him. I could feel his eyes on me. After a few minutes, I had to know, so I turned.
“What?” I asked with feigned annoyance.
Something flashed in his eyes, but he didn’t speak.
“Uh, you do know it’s considered rude to stare,” I added, starting to feel hot.
He shrugged. “So?”
“So, do you mind?”
His eyebrows shot up. “I’m trying to figure you out, Raine Copper. Do you always go around threatening the entire school to protect your friend?”
I pretended to think about it. “At least once before the first bell.”
He laughed, and Lavania, who’d been talking to some guys, turned and looked at us with narrowed eyes. I pretended not to notice. Instead, I stared into Torin’s blue eyes and pretended our relationship wasn’t over, that he wasn’t a jerk, my silly heart pounding hard like the hooves of a racing horse.
“Whoever wrote on your locker will not stop just because you refused to clean it.”
I shrugged. “Why should we clean them? We didn’t put them there.”
“They don’t bother you?”
Big time. “No. Everyone deserves to be notorious once in their lifetime. This is my moment.”
He snorted. “Liar.”
I hated that he could read me so well. “Not. You can’t force people to act the way you want them to, so why bother?”
He stopped smiling, and I’d bet he assumed I was talking about him. Poor guy. He had no idea he was the exception to the rule. I planned to force him to see things my way.
7. FIRST LESSONS
Nervous energy twisted my stomach into a knot as I made my way to my first lesson that evening. What if Torin was right and I didn’t need to become a Valkyrie to stop the Norns from coming after me? I hated that he’d planted the seed of doubt in my head. Training was the right thing to do. I had to get the Norns off my back, find out why Eirik was in danger, and help him. Then there was Torin. I refused to give up on him no matter what he’d said.
Lavania, dressed in a caftan-like white dress, opened the door with a broad smile. “Come in. This is exciting, isn’t it?”
Yeah, like a visit to the dentist.
“What did the doctor say?” she asked.
For a moment I drew a blank. Then I remembered I’d told her about my appointment with my doctor. “He sent me to see a physical therapist, but my head’s healed.”
I glanced around curiously. Except for the night he’d thrown a party, Torin hadn’t tried to furnish the living room. One brown leather sofa and a coffee table had been it. The night of party, he’d gone all out. Large TV screen like you see at clubs, audio system with sick output, and couches galore. Now, the room was done conservatively in white and grays with framed nature pictures on the wall. An attention-grabbing aquarium took up an entire wall. Myriad fake coral in the tank added splashes of color to the stark room. The house was quiet, the music I’d heard earlier turned off.
“Where is everyone?” I asked.
“Torin is at football practice, and Andris and Ingrid are reaping.”
“How does that work? I mean they’re at school most of the time and people are dying.”
She chuckled. “They do their share of reaping, and there are thousands of Valkyries around the world. Don’t forget healthy people die at a much lower rate than those dying of illness or old age. Hel’s reapers tend to be busier than our Valkyries. Come on.”
She lifted the hem of her dress and kicked off her sandals. Instead of sitting on a chair, she curled up on the plush white rug and pointed at the other end of the table. “Sit, please.”
I toed off my shoes, left my socks on, slipped my cell phone into my back pocket, and joined her. On the table was a pitcher of water and two glasses. There were no books, no writing materials, nothing. The coils in my stomach tightened a bit. I gave Lavania a tiny smile.
“You’re nervous,” she said.
“A little.”
Lavania frowned. “Why?”
I couldn’t tell her the truth. That Torin had tried to talk me out of training and it was messing with my head.
She reached for my hand and sandwiched it with hers. “It’s okay to be scared. This is a big moment.”
I nodded. “Can I be honest?”
“Always.” She let go of my hand, leaned back against the couch behind her, and wrapped her arms around one bent knee.
“What if I’m not supposed to be a Valkyrie?”
She frowned. “Who’s making you doubt your destiny? Your mom? Your dad?”
“No.” I poured water in a glass and guzzled some of it. “I’m just concerned. What if it’s not my destiny?”
She smiled. “Maybe it is, maybe it’s not. That’s for you to decide. Being chosen to become such a powerful being can be overwhelming, and it’s normal to have doubts. Back in Valhalla, we often discuss our first encounter.” She paused to pour water into a glass and took a sip. “It didn’t matter what our trainers called themselves—high priestess, shaman, medicine woman, diviner, spirit-medium, oracle, sibyl, or more ethnic terms like machi, sangoma, eem, babaylan, and mae de santo—learning who we would become, the power we would wield was scary. Do you know why all Valkyries were women for millennia before men joined us?”
“Men went to war, so the gods needed women to collect their souls and lead them to Valhalla and Falkvang. You only started recruiting men when women became warriors.”
Lavania laughed. “Which one of my boys told you that?”
My boys? “Torin.”
She chuckled. “I’m afraid that’s my fault. I had to tell them something when I chose them.”
“When you chose… You trained Torin?”
She smiled. “Yes and countless other girls and boys after him, including Andris.”
“You were the angel in the field during the crusade?”
Her smile disappeared. “When did you and Torin discuss how I turned him?”
Warmth spread to my cheeks. “I, uh, overheard him talking to Andris and Ingrid about their first encounters,” I lied and hoped my face wasn’t as red as it felt.
Lavania smiled, a far away look entering her eyes. “For weeks I watched him fight, interact with the wounded, his fellow warriors, his brother. He had an essence I couldn’t ignore, and I had to have him. It wasn’t easy telling him, or others after him, that he was spiritual and more in tune with nature and the cosmos than any young man I’d ever met. Women have always been more spiritual than men, more a
ccepting of their gifts, and that’s why most Valkyries were women for a long time. Occasionally, we get lucky and find a man.”
“Andris is spiritual?”
She chuckled. “Don’t underestimate my youngest. He might be impulsive, but he feels things a lot deeper. He just covers it with smirks and shenanigans. If I’d had more time, I would have guided him more. He definitely needed it. Most of the mistakes he’s made could have been avoided. Torin, on the other hand, always does the right thing.” A thoughtful expression crossed her face. “Sometimes I wish he didn’t.”
Even though he’d refused to make me immortal, he had tried to fight his feelings for me and failed. So he’d bent a few rules. Sometimes I wished he was more like Andris. No, that wasn’t true. I loved that he’d bent the rules just for me.
Lavania was still talking. It was surreal hearing her talk about Torin and Andris as a mother would when she looked around our age. How could she have an affair with Torin if he was like a son to her?
She smiled and sipped her water. “In my day, one started out as a healer, learning herbology and divination. When the high priestess saw that you had talent, she chose you to be her protégé. After more private training, you became a priestess and finally a high priestess like her. Only a select few were chosen to become Immortal. It was a higher calling, an honor.”
“When does one become a Valkyrie?”
“Once you can convince a soul to leave with you.”
I blinked. “What?”
“You think you just stand there and they get up and join you? People don’t like being dead, especially young, healthy ones. They will insist they have unfinished business, beg for more time, try to bargain with you. When that fails, they get angry and run. Where do you think ghosts come from? Silly souls who don’t want to leave with Valkyries. It is a lot easier to reap the sick and the elderly than people in their prime.”
“What about children?”
“Their souls are recycled, taken to a special hall run by Norns. It’s their job to find new bodies for them, which is why they’re always visiting hospitals. Ask Torin about it. Of all my children, he’s the only one with the patience to reap children. I tried it once and hated it. They reminded me too much of my brothers and sisters and how I felt leaving them.”
Immortals (Runes book 2) Page 9