I glanced up and around, too. I remembered glass walls shattering light into rainbow fragments. The freed colors had bounced from crystal paving stones and alabaster walls, dancing through awnings and pennants of purely-hued silk.
Now, a restless breeze soughed through stray saplings and the emerald grass in the process of reclaiming the ruins.
I sighed. “Home.”
“I caught that much, yeah.” Impatience danced beneath Claire’s attempt at gentleness. I abruptly realized she’d been holding her curiosity in check for a couple of hours now.
I smiled faintly and returned to walking. The apothecary gardens would have been further left, maybe. I angled that direction as I talked.
“Alfheim. The world of the light elves.”
Both Claire’s eyebrows lifted. “Light elves? Is that where your magic comes from? Because there are like, lights and colors and poof.”
A laugh startled me, bubbling up in my throat before I knew it was there.
“And poof”?
“Yes. Our magic involves the manipulation of light.” Around me, the memory of glass walls and silk streamers persisted. “But we were more than just that. More than just our magic.”
“Yeah?” Claire trailed me toward where the apothecary gardens had maybe been. “Tell me about it.”
Tell me a story. That was another memory that struck too close. I pushed it away and waited for Claire to catch up to me before beginning.
“The Alfar valued creativity. Sensitivity. Empathy. We lived to be kind to each other. And to the dwellers of other worlds, if their paths crossed ours. So many in the other worlds consider compassion a weakness—you have to be tough to survive, they believe. You have to look out for yourself, to the exclusion of all others. But my people considered compassion a good thing. A strength, not a potential weakness.”
Claire nodded. Then her brow furrowed. “Wait. What?”
“What?”
“‘Other worlds.’ Like, more than one. What?”
I tried to come up with the briefest possible explanation. “Have you read any Norse mythology? Odin, Asgard, gods and legends?”
Claire blinked. “What, like the guys in the movies?”
I stifled an exasperated groan. “Only vaguely.”
“The guy who plays Thor—so hot.”
“The real one is less so,” I muttered.
And looked up to find Claire staring wide-eyed at me. “You’re telling me he’s real? They’re real?”
“Asgard is real, yes. So is Alfheim.” I spread my arms, and Claire looked around like she was seeing it all over again for the first time. “Your world is known as Midgard. There are nine worlds altogether.”
“Wow.” She mouthed the word as much as spoke it aloud. “And your guys knew all about the other worlds?”
“Midgard is the only world that really doesn’t. And even there, mortals used to know. The gods of Asgard—the Aesir—lost touch with Midgard, and Midgard eventually forgot they existed.”
Claire pondered it all in silence for a few heartbeats. “And your Alfar and the Asgard gods—they hung out together and stuff, too?”
I snorted a laugh. “Not exactly. The Alfar are makers of the ways, so Asgard had to deal with us.”
I caught Claire’s blank expression and backtracked.
“The ways—lights and colors and poof. The bridges between the worlds.”
“Oh.” Again Claire mouthed the word more than spoke it aloud. “So you worked for the gods?”
My smile became forced. “They believed so, I think. In truth, the Alfar considered the use of our ways to be a duty of service to all the worlds. Not just the gods.”
I caught the bitterness in my tone, but not before it had already leaked into my words. Claire tipped her head.
I shrugged. “The ways of Asgard could be brutal. We served them, but we considered ourselves above their pettiness.”
Until their pettiness sucked me in, anyhow.
Claire walked in silence for a few steps. I waited for her to ask more questions. After a second, she gave her head a little shake, as if trying to clear it.
“So Asgard was the gods. And your people made the bridges that let them travel around from world to world. And the gods could be kind of naughty, but your people were all perfectly nice.”
“Not exactly how I’d have put it. But I guess.” I didn’t bother to correct Claire’s past tense in reference to Asgard.
“Yeah. No offense, but that sounds a little boring.”
I paused in my search and narrowed my eyes at Claire.
She lifted her hands in self-defense. “No offense.”
I laughed a little in spite of myself and then shrugged. “When I was younger, I’d have agreed with you, probably. My brother Willow—he was insufferably perfect.”
“And you weren’t?” Claire gave me an arched-brow looking-over that stopped me in my tracks.
“What is that supposed to mean?”
Claire quirked a grin. “Nothing. Nothing at all. So what did you do about this annoyingly perfect brother?”
“I… nothing much, really.” I shrugged. “Papa nipped it in the bud before it could get out of hand. He was big on offering object lessons in empathy and compassion.”
And I couldn’t think of Willow now without thinking how his ashes were among those baked into the glass slump left behind by the fire.
“Huh.” The sound was more an exhalation from Claire than an actual word. “Your dad sounds like a good guy.”
Claire kicked one foot idly through the grass as she spoke. I resisted the urge to tell her to be careful, that she might crush the plants for which we searched. But that sounded so much like something Willow might have said to me that the words died in my throat.
“What was your father like?” Mostly I just wanted to stop thinking about my own past. But something wistful had lurked behind Claire’s words too, I thought.
“My dad?” Claire didn’t say anything more for a long moment. “He had a lot of troubles. Not really a bad person, he just… couldn’t ever stay out of trouble. Out of prison.”
Claire shrugged.
“Did you see him much?”
“No. He got out a few years ago. But by then things were…” Again, Claire shrugged. “He wanted to be better. I know he did. He wanted to be a better father.”
Father issues. The Joel situation suddenly made more sense to me.
“Yeah.” I straightened from peering at the ground and turned to look at Claire. “I’m sure you’re right. People are good at heart. They always want to do the right thing. Sometimes it’s just difficult.”
Did I even believe that myself anymore?
I opened my mouth to add a disclaimer, that compassion shouldn’t make you a doormat. Because the last thing I wanted Claire to believe was that I thought she should go back to Joel.
Claire caught my eye. A pained expression flitted across her face, and she looked away.
“So.” Claire swung her foot through another clump of grass. “You’re an elf?”
I sighed in exasperation. “That is what you took away from my story?”
Claire stepped forward, leaving a mat of trampled grass in her wake. The grin she flashed at me was pure mischief. I caught myself liking her, heavy eyeliner and all. Had we still been co-working at Cox Lake Resort, that would have alarmed me.
Then Claire took another step. And from the shadows beneath a lump of melted glass, exposed by the crushed grass blades, delicate white blossoms glowed, fragile as hope.
27
* * *
Six years past and worlds away
Heimdal’s grip on my hand was tight enough to be nearly painful. In an attempt to match his stride, I broke into a trot. My heart thudded faster than my footsteps, but that had mostly to do with the storm cloud expression hanging over Heimdal’s face. I had never seen him like this. Not even when I’d helped Loki escape his execution.
“Tell me what’s going on.” I’d as
ked already—twice. This time I left off the “please” and put all my effort into making it a command instead of a question.
“We can’t stop to talk.”
Same reply. Heimdal’s jaw clenched, but his pace never slowed.
Night stars spun over our heads, flickering past bare branches of the trees we ran beneath. A cold as brooding as Heimdal’s face whipped my skirts. We were far past the center of the city’s protective enclosure, surely approaching its outskirts.
Running. We are running, both of us. Why?
Heimdal led, but not toward any location I was familiar with. Not toward my bridge stone. Just, so far as I could tell, away. Just… away.
As abruptly as he’d burst into my house and dragged me from my bed, Heimdal stopped and wheeled around.
I pulled up short beside him. He took both my hands into his and stared into my eyes.
My heart thudded more quickly than it already had been. I was so wound up and confused that I couldn’t tell if that was due to the intensity of his gaze or from fear.
Heimdal’s fingers tightened around mine, hard enough that this time, it did hurt.
I inhaled sharply.
Fear.
“Open the way from Asgard.”
Truly frightened now by the urgency in Heimdal’s voice and eyes, I started to shake my head.
“I don’t understand—”
“We must go. Now.”
That stopped me cold, all other questions frozen on my tongue. “Go?”
“Now. From right here. I know you can.” Heimdal leaned closer, until his forehead all but touched mine. His face filled my vision. “Please. Please just do as I ask.”
“Where?” I asked. Why?
Heimdal didn’t hesitate. Whatever his reasons, he’d determined our destination before dragging me off into the woods.
Why had he dragged me into the woods? If we were going someplace, we could have left from the bridge stone clearing. From my house, even.
“The bridge stone in Midgard. The same one where you sent Loki.”
Heimdal didn’t let go of me. Both his hands stayed locked around mine, fingers strong around my wrists.
I fell still, trying to read Heimdal’s face. When I opened my mouth to ask more questions, he cut me off.
“Take us both,” he said. “Do it now.”
He wanted me to trust him. Look at all the things that had gone wrong when I hadn’t.
I steadied myself, drew in the light, and opened a way. Colors alternately brightened and dimmed around us, midnight blue and deepest green and ruby. Faster and faster, they sparked, until with a final brilliant flash, Asgard dissolved around us.
In its place, another darkness resolved. I could feel the difference between the worlds before I could see them. Midgard held a different weight than Asgard. More solid. Less cold and more humid. As my eyes acclimated, I glimpsed streaks of the aurora through branches woven overhead. Clouds skimmed in front of the colors, darkening them. Lightning lanced across the horizon. A heartbeat later, thunder rumbled.
“They call this city Grand Forks.” Heimdal still held my hands. Still held his face close to me. But tension reverberated through his voice. “The stone is in a park along the river.”
He hesitated. Gripped my fingers more tightly in his for a brief moment. Then he straightened, pulling his hands from mine and turning to face half away from me.
“If you walk that direction, you’ll leave the park. There’s a shelter. You can find…” He trailed off, as if his voice had failed him. “People will help you.”
Fresh alarm tingled up my spine. “People will… What are you talking about?”
Heimdal’s jaw worked again. At this rate, his teeth would be ground down to nothing.
This time, I reached for Heimdal. Taking his closest hand into both mine, I turned him toward me. I peered up into his face until finally he looked at me. Anguish rippled across the stony set of his expression.
“No one can follow us from Asgard. Not with me here.” I squeezed his hand. “Tell me what is going on.”
“Frigg has seen something.”
I frowned. Frigg with her fey ways was able to see a great many things. Sometimes the future. But not often.
“And?” I said, carefully, watching Heimdal’s face.
“The Betrayer will bring vengeance to the gates of Asgard.” Heimdal’s words were stilted, as though he quoted what Frigg had been said. “He will… He will use the Bridge to return to Asgard. Then he will kill the Watcher, and begin the war to end all the worlds.”
I stopped moving. Maybe I stopped breathing. The words rang through me, and I tried to make sense of them.
No. I made perfect sense of them. I just didn’t want to.
“The Betrayer. Loki. He will…” I felt the blood drain from my face. I looked around, suddenly afraid.
Loki was in Midgard.
We are in Midgard.
“We shouldn’t be here. What were you thinking?” I clutched harder at Heimdal, preparing to return us. “Loki could get to us here.”
“No!” Heimdal barked the order so sternly that I stopped what I was doing and stared at him. “You can’t do that. You can’t be in Asgard.”
A new thrill of alarm wound through me. Heimdal’s gaze shifted away from me.
“What aren’t you telling me?”
“Odin believes… He thinks you will allow Loki entry to Asgard. So that Loki can destroy us all—all the gods. All the worlds.”
Shock stilled my voice.
I’d wept over Loki. Even after he’d caused Baldur’s death, I’d insisted on pardoning him. I’d helped him escape certain death and sent him here to Midgard.
Odin had good reason to fear what I might do. I looked into Heimdal’s eyes and imagined I saw the same doubt in him.
Indignation swept through me. Compassion was one thing. Deliberately setting into motion the deaths of others—of the very end of the world?
“I wouldn’t do that.” I’d meant to snap the words at Heimdal. They came out a whisper.
“I know.” But Heimdal still wouldn’t meet my gaze. And a crack of something I couldn’t quite read ran through his voice.
He extricated his hand from mine and stepped back. His expression became that of the Watcher, Asgard’s guardian. Not of Heimdal, the man who might love me. I was abruptly reminded of things I’d managed to forget.
“The Aesir will always come first.”
But Loki lied. And Heimdal always told the truth.
“Walk the direction I told you.” Heimdal’s voice no longer cracked. It commanded. His face betrayed no emotion. “I’ll take care of the rest.”
“Heimdal?” I felt small, suddenly. And very, very alone.
His expression softened. He stepped toward me again, lifting both hands.
“Trust me,” he whispered. And then, “I’m sorry.”
With one hand, he touched my face.
In the other, he held something. I caught a glimpse of it, a faceted stone small enough to fit the palm of his hand. It should have caught the light, glinting like a prism. Instead, a darkness even greater than the night’s hung around it, an aura of non-light.
Heimdal lifted the crystal and pressed it against my temple.
Light flashed around me, faster and then too-fast. Colors bled like melting pigments, draining away from my vision. I grew weightless with loss and then too heavy. Pain crashed through my head.
My knees buckled. The last thing I saw was Heimdal’s face, his eyes filled with the colors he’d drained from me.
The next time I woke, I was inside. Bright lights and Midgard’s alien architecture surrounded me.
I was alone. Heimdal was gone.
So was my magic.
28
* * *
Present day
“Don’t move.” I reached for Claire, wrapped my fingers around one wrist, and guided her away from the white blossoms she’d uncovered.
Claire stumbled forward
with reluctance. “You just told me not to move. Now you’re moving me.”
I flashed a smile and an eyeroll at her. “You just found what we’ve been looking for.”
I bent and reached into the shadows. As I tugged the whole plant free from the soft earth, a new thought finally occurred to me.
I had the plant. I had no way whatsoever to turn it into a form that would be useful to Claire. Preparing a tincture required water, a pan, a heat source…
Shit.
Water, we could find. The well at the city’s center, maybe. Although whether the drawing system still worked, I had my doubts. There had been a lake on the farther side of the city. That would be another long hike, of course.
“Iris?”
“Hang on. I just need to figure out—”
“I’m not feeling so great.”
This time, I heard the slurring in Claire’s words. I whirled around.
Claire lowered herself to her knees. She pressed both hands flat against her chest, just by her collarbone. Her breathing came in fast pants, the movement of her diaphragm exaggerated.
My own breathing quickened.
Choking? No—I could hear the rasp of her breath.
Don’t be stupid.
Hyperventilating. I knelt beside Claire and put my hands over hers. Her panting edged toward becoming a wheeze.
“You need to calm down.” What did people do in this situation? “Try to breathe more slowly.”
Paper bag. Something about a paper bag. Which, like all the things I needed to make a tincture, I was not going to find around here. I cupped my hands and held them to Claire’s mouth.
Claire flinched back.
“This will help. It’s OK.” I had no idea if I was lying.
But Claire stopped fighting me. Her breath warmed my hands with short puffs of air.
Gradually, her exhalations slowed. I kept my hands there anyhow, until finally she lifted one shaky hand and pushed mine away.
Claire settled back, breathing more evenly. Her eyes moved as she sought out my face. A faint smile curved her too-red lips. “Better now. Thanks.”
Bridge Burned: A Norse Myths & Legends Fantasy Romance (Bridge of the Gods Book 1) Page 17