Home. The palace Loki had hacked out of Ginnungagap, the place he hated, where his army awaited his summoning.
And they were waiting. A pair of Jotunar—one large and far from beautiful and one of the more refined type, not too dissimilar to an elf in his attractiveness—appeared in the room on the other side. They stared at Loki, mouths agape, as if they had never anticipated that their waiting might not be in vain.
Dimly aware that the Jotunar around him had gathered close to keep him from collapsing, Loki began to feel his body again. He held himself erect with sheer strength of will and built a path of ice that arched up to the rift, connecting Midgard and Ginnungagap.
“My lord!” the more attractive of the giants said, walking toward him down the shimmering path. Loki recognized him: Amgerd, a Jotunn of no great distinction who, nevertheless, was quite possibly more valuable to Loki than the pathetic creatures he still had left to him in Midgard.
The other giant, whose name Loki didn’t remember, had the sense to wipe the stupid shock from his face. He bowed deeply. “I am Suttungr, my lord. We have been awaiting your summons.” He glanced over his shoulder at the ice palace, already crowded with frost giants reacting with varying degrees of surprise, calculation, and glee in anticipation of battle.
And of possession of the world they had been promised.
“Is everything prepared?” Loki asked.
“We have never ceased our vigilance,” Suttungr said. “We can move within an hour of your command.”
One hundred Jotunar had been in Loki’s original plan for the second crossing, since holding the bridge open for the first four dozen giants had been far from easy. But as he was nearly certain that this bridge was at least partly of Danny’s inadvertent creation, he intended to get as many through as possible before it vanished.
“Assemble two hundred Jotunar,” he said. “Have them assume mortal form. And do it quietly.”
Suttungr raced back over the bridge. Amgerd remained with Loki, looking around in some confusion. “My lord,” he said, “whom are we to fight? Where are our enemies?”
If Loki had not already been weary of berating his underlings, he might have lost his temper. “You will learn soon enough,” he said. “Has anything changed in Ginnungagap since I last contacted you?”
“We can see little, my lord,” the Jotunn said, “but our watchers believe that there has been conflict among the Aesir … a struggle for power that may have weakened them.”
A struggle for power. Loki felt a jolt of shock, though he was not truly shocked at all. Only a handful of his Jotunar knew the truth of his original bargain with Freya. If his watchers in Jotunheim’s Shadow-Realm had noticed any activity at all, then at least some of the Aesir must have awakened.
Now it was clear why Freya had remained away from Midgard, and why Odin’s messenger had suddenly arrived to work its own kind of pointless mischief. There was a connection. Odin had almost certainly thrown off the deep sleep Freya had imposed upon him and the other gods with her glamour and witch-magic. He had discovered her treachery. She might very well be struggling merely to survive, even if the Eitr was sufficient to preserve her from the worst of Odin’s wrath.
But Odin had himself had neither arrived in Midgard nor achieved anything of significance with a certain truant, ebon-feathered ambassador.
And that, Loki thought, meant exactly nothing. The game had ended, but nothing else had changed. Freya might no longer be a consideration, but eventually Odin or one of the others would devise proper bodies and pass through the Void to challenge him.
Fortunately, he still had Danny. Or would, when he was finished here.
Loki looked beyond the mass of apparently human bodies beginning to crowd the other end of the bridge. “Where is Fenrisulfr?” he asked.
“Quarreling,” Amgerd said, his voice low and cautious; he well knew the uneasy and contentious relationship between Loki and his eldest son.
“Naturally,” Loki said with disgust. “With Hel?”
“Hel broods over the loss of her hall and so many of her subjects. Shall I summon them?”
“Fenrir only. Now, go.”
Amgerd turned and ran up the bridge, dodging the Jotunar descending from the palace.
Keeping a close eye on the portal below the bridge, Loki waited impatiently for the Jotunar to arrive. They were a motley crew, for no two giants looked the same. They were tall and thin, or short and stout; ugly or handsome, bearded or clean-shaven; skilled in magic or only in battle. A few were even ividyur, giantesses, as ready for war as the males.
All were armed with weapons shaped from the very substance of the Void, but as solid as any forged in Midgard—axes and swords, daggers and clubs and the rare bow none but another Jotunn—or the most powerful Aesir—could draw.
The bridge was beginning to grow unstable when the group was fully assembled, large portions of the ice-ramp melting away. Amgerd had still not returned with Fenrir. Suttungr stood before the rest, his club on his shoulder, his beard flowing nearly to his waist.
“What is your command, my lord Loki?” he asked.
Loki watched the bridge disappear completely, the rent in the sky vanishing as if it had never been, and turned his attention to the portal. It had begun to crack open, the aperture gradually widening as if a blowtorch had been rigorously applied to thin, cloudy plastic.
This was not Danny’s work, Loki thought. Nor was it his. Something—or someone—else was involved.
“Scatter and hide yourselves,” he said to his soldiers. The veil of heavy snow he had manifested throughout the area was beginning to thin, and Loki could not allow any unexpected observers now that dawn was soon to break.
Weak as he was, he called up a spell drawn from the very heart of his nature—the foremost of Jotunar, equal to the Aesir in every way. He knelt and placed his palm flat on the ground.
Creeping like some foul sludge, the blood still remaining on his palm began to spread, forming a thin layer of ice so transparent that it could scarcely be seen by mortal eyes. It radiated outward with increasing speed, covering the mortal bridge on which he crouched; the streets to either side; the withered grass of the nearby park; the parking lots to the west; north and south along Third Street as far as the eye could see.
Black ice. Ice so treacherous that no mortal could walk upon it, no vehicle gain purchase. By the time he was finished, most of the Jotunar had found concealment. There were few places to hide, but no one would get close enough to see them until they attacked.
“You and the others wait here,” he said to Grer and his other personal guards. “I don’t care if you must watch an hour or a week. You will inform me immediately when the aperture is wide enough for a Jotunn or mortal to pass through. Do you understand?”
“Yes, my lord.”
Dancing over the treacherous ice, Loki walked away from Lefty O’Doul Bridge and called for his chauffeur. As he climbed into the back seat, he glanced at his palm. The wound was only a faint scar now, as if it had been made many years before.
Loki knew it wasn’t really closed at all. And never would be.
27
Mist let off a string of expletives so inventive that Dainn was almost tempted to ask her where she had learned them. But under the circumstances, such a question would not be wise.
Not only because of her foul mood, but because he had been less than well during many of the long hours that he and Mist had remained with Danny, Hild, and Sleipnir on the steppes. The sickness had come on suddenly, when his wound had begun bleeding afresh and left him nearly prostrate with pain.
He had not understood the reason for the wound’s reopening when he had left the loft, and he understood it no better now. Fortunately, he had been able to hide his illness from Mist and replace Loki’s bandage with cloths he’d discovered in Hild’s cottage.
But he had found it increasingly difficult to communicate clearly with Danny. And until this moment, there had been no change in the portal what
soever.
Now its “seal” was dissolving. Danny seemed oblivious in his play with Sleipnir, though Hild had emerged from the cottage and stood behind Mist, muttering softly in Russian as the moon broke through a haze of low-lying clouds.
She, too, found a number of interesting curses with which to regale her companions. “Blin! Did the boy—”
“He had nothing to do with this,” Dainn said, getting to his feet. “Perhaps the portal was never meant to last so long.”
Or perhaps Loki has found a way to open it. He left Mist with Hild and walked toward Sleipnir, doing his best to conceal his unsteady walk. He laid his hand carefully on Sleipnir’s shoulder and touched Danny’s dangling foot.
“Danny,” he said gently.
The boy’s eyes were almost glazed, as if he had drifted into another world: seemingly unaware of his surroundings, unresponsive, gently rocking on Sleipnir’s back while the horse endured with infinite patience.
Dainn understood immediately that the boy would be of no help. A fresh stab of pain in Dainn’s palm nearly sent him to his knees. He heard Mist’s footfalls behind him and quickly concealed his hand again.
Is he all right?” she asked, nodding toward Danny.
“I doubt he will be able to help us,” Dainn said.”If we wish to escape Loki, we must ask Sleipnir if he will bear us away from this place.”
“Bear us away? You don’t mean—” Her eyes widened as she looked from Dainn to Sleipnir’s eight powerful legs.
This spider could fly.
She turned and strode across the brittle grass to rejoin her Sister. They engaged in a brief conversation, and then both returned to Dainn.
“He hasn’t flown since I brought him to Midgard,” Hild said with her usual terseness. “I don’t know if he’d be willing.”
“Can you find out?” Mist asked.
With a brief frown at Dainn, Hild cupped Sleipnir’s velvet muzzle in her hand and spoke to him softly. He stared at her without recognition.
Hild dropped her hand. “Either he isn’t listening, or he can’t hear me,” she said. “You try it, Alfr. You’re the ones who are supposed to breed the finest horses in the Nine Homeworlds … or did.”
Odin’s mount bobbed his head up and down several times and snorted forcefully, slewing his head around to stare at Dainn.
Slowly Dainn moved to place his unbloodied hand on Sleipnir’s neck. The horse hopped backward, half rearing, and snapped at Dainn’s fingers. Passive and oblivious, Danny clung to the Slipper’s back like a monkey..
“There is your answer,” Hild said.
Dainn stared at his hand, stunned by Sleipnir’s hostility. “He will bear Danny away,” he said, “but not the rest of us.”
“Then let him take the kid to safety,” Mist said, “and we’ll get ready to fight
“No!” Danny cried. Sleipnir tossed his head, snorting and squealing, but Danny slid from his back and stood as straight as the boldest warrior. “I want to stay,” he said. “With you.”
“And there’s your answer,” Mist said. “The most important thing is to protect the boy.” She met Dainn’s gaze. “We’re going to need the beast.”
“No,” Dainn said, panic seething in his chest. “If I lose control, and hurt Danny—“
“You won’t.”
Dainn touched the bulge of the pouch under his waistband. He still had the herbs, but he had no desire to trust their efficacy again. “What will you do?” he asked, already knowing the answer.
“Call on every ounce of ability I have.” She shivered. “Loki’s not going to back down this time. If he didn’t send Jormungandr or open this portal, he’ll probably be strong. It’s going to be all-out war. If I can make the ancient magic work for me, I’m going to use it.”.”
Tell her, Dainn thought. Tell her what you should have told her a dozen times before.
But Freya wasn’t here. There was still no sign that she would ever return.
And he had not forgotten Loki’s offer. “Listen to me,” he said. “Perhaps if I meet Loki before he passes through the portal—”
“And what? Give yourself up to him to save us?” She laughed. “There’s something I think you’re forgetting. No matter how much he wants you, he’s going to want his son more. And he’s not going to stop.”
And you do not understand, Dainn thought, that Loki wants us both.
“I can try,” he said.
“And I can slug you before you take one step toward the portal.”
They gazed at each other, and Dainn was lost. He understood nothing but that this Valkyrie and this child were more precious to him than all the mortal lives in Midgard combined. He would extinguish the universe to save them.
But he could not stop Mist from stopping him.
“If you find yourself beginning to lose awareness of who you are,” he said, “you must promise to resist it. Resist it with all your strength, or I may be compelled to take extreme measures to bring you back.”
“Narfi’s entrails, I don’t like it any more than you do.”
”I will do everything I can,” he said. “Mist.”
Her eyes were suspiciously bright. “What now?”
“Do not forget your promise.”
“What promise?”
“To end my life, should I become too dangerous.”
“I never made any such—”
“Must I beg?”
“No.” She turned her face away, one hand raised to silence him. “I promise.”
Hesitantly, as if she were a skittish mare that might startle at too swift a touch, he brushed her shoulder with his fingertips.
“I am sorry for the many times I have deceived you,” he said. “But I was never anything but your friend.” He bowed his head. “It has been my honor to serve you, Lady Mist, and to fight by your side, even if I have frequently…” He smiled, ever so slightly. “Even if I have as often complicated your mission as assisted in it.”
“Shut up,” she said, smearing the tears across her face with her fist. “Just shut up. We’re not dead yet.”
He looked away, leaving her to gather herself. After a time he heard her take another deep breath and knew the crisis was over.
“Hild,” she said, “stay with Sleipnir and Danny. We’ll do our best not to let Loki get anywhere near you. You’re the last line of defense. Get them away if it starts to look bad.”
Hild nodded, put her hand on Sleipnir’s nose, and led the horse and Danny toward the cottage. As they were disappearing behind it, Danny looked up, his face alight as if he had seen a shower of meteors illuminate the endless sky.
Dainn followed his gaze. He saw nothing, but he felt it: a weight above their heads, a storm about to break in a cloudless heaven.
He had never actually seen a bridge from the Void, and he well knew that there were only a handful of beings capable of opening a passage to and from Ginnungagap.
But no bridge should appear in this place, so far from the city where all the others were said to converge. I am mistaken, he thought. As in so much else.
“Wake up,” Mist said, barely touching his shoulder. “I’m going to need all your senses in working order.”
Lying beside Mist just on the other side of a low hill facing the portal, Dainn caught the pungent smell of Jotunar riding on the chill breeze of a Russian dawn. Sunset had fallen over San Francisco, and the aperture had grown so wide that he knew it couldn’t be much more than a few moments before the enemy broke through.
He glanced up. The storm he had felt overhead had neither dissipated nor expanded. He nudged Mist, lay. The silence was absolute; not even the small nocturnal creatures who still braved the cold of winter dared stir.
They, Dainn thought, were the wise ones.The first Jotunn to enter the portal changed from an average, bearded man to an eight-foot-tall giant just as he stepped over the threshold, swinging his ax at Mist’s head as she ran to meet him. Kettlingr’s blade struck the ax like hammer striking anvil, and Dainn loosed
the beast.
At first it refused to respond. As other Jotunar poured through the widening gap—carrying flails and axes and impossibly heavy swords, knives and clubs and every other tool of murder and destruction—a blast of bitter, ice-laden wind entered with them, freezing everything in its path and sealing Mist’s and Dainn’s feet to the ground. An ividja, a Jotunn woman, slipped under Mist’s guard and struck her in the belly with her club.
Nothing more was required to fully awaken the beast than Dainn’s sudden rage. His feet were no longer those of an elf, his vision no longer Alfar, his mind no longer completely rational. He slapped at the giantess with a massive paw, knocking her aside like so much chaff. One by one he ripped at the Jotunar who attempted to pass through, only half aware of Mist working free of the ice and blasting the giants with all the Galdr at her command.
Then the storm overhead broke, and something floated down from the sky: a figure, gold-limned, in elf’s wool and leather—a woman the beast did not recognize but knew as he knew his own ravaged soul. She wore an Alfar body, borrowed or stolen, and when she alighted on the earth she looked straight at Dainn.
Instinctively he turned toward her, lowered his head between his shoulders and started in her direction. Mist’s hand clamped on his heavily furred arm.
“Dainn!” she shouted. “I can’t do this alone!”
He swung back toward her, struggling to find the means of speech. Now he must warn her, but no words would come.
Mist glanced over her shoulder, and a look of perplexity crossed her face. Blinding brilliance exploded in inside Dainn’s broad skull, and then she was fighting again in a way elf-Dainn recognized all too well: her face taking on a strange, ethereal glow, her magic sweeping up rocks from the soil to batter her enemies, flinging needles of ice back into their faces, blinding them with shafts of morning sunlight that transformed into spears of flame, setting them alight.
She was truly a goddess now, and she wielded the ancient, elemental magic as easily as she might toss a handful of dust into the air. But the female elf was striding toward her, and she had a terrible power of her own.
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