We have reason to suspect someone is sending assassins after you. Be careful.
“No shit,” I mumbled. Then I saw the time of the text; almost half an hour ago. It probably went off while I’d been dancing. Wait, we? Who could he be talking about? Probably his old football buddies.
Taking a deep breath, I clicked on Calder’s text.
You’re getting warmer, little sister. But, you never were very good at catching me. Do try to make it in time or it will take all the fun out of it.
As I read it, I heard his snide, condescending voice in my head. The fury that had been smoldering erupted into an inferno that threatened to burn me up from the inside.
Vidar’s hand closed over mine, dousing the flames in a deluge of compassion that took my breath away. The soothing feeling intensified when my hand instinctively clutched his in return. It felt amazing, like a nice hot bath after a long day of training. Better than that. Not only could I think through the anger, but it began receding completely as if driven away by his energy.
“Who’s it from?” he asked.
When I was able to draw breath in again, I answered, “I’ll explain everything in the truck. We should get out of here, fast.”
I would catch him. My brother was in for several surprises if he thought I was the same little girl he had bullied throughout my childhood.
Vidar nodded, then looked down at my body again. “Agreed, but I’ll get your bike. You can’t be seen like that. The truck is parked in the woods just down this way a bit.”
Clinging to his hand like a lifeline, I let him lead me away from yet another gruesome homicide I was responsible for. At least this time the only bodies were those of the condemned.
Chapter Eleven
Vidar
The hum of the tires helped me think, but I wasn’t sure that was a good thing.
Assassins from two different shifter races were after my little white wolf. Even though I’d seen it with my own eyes, I could barely believe it. I didn’t want to believe it. But I had no choice. On top of that, her villain of an older brother had gone completely super villain bent on bringing varúlfur into the light, even if it meant all-out war. Ayra needed me now more than ever and I felt like she was slipping further away by the moment.
Physically she couldn’t have been farther from me and still be in the truck. She sat sideways, knees pulled up beneath her, face leaned into the breeze from the open window as she read Calder’s journal. Long locks of her straight, pale hair blew back, bringing the scent of river water and moss to me. Beneath it lay that distinct spicy scent that was hers alone. It was similar to a mixture of peppers and cloves with a touch of sweetness. While in Iceland those long years that was the one thing I had longed to smell.
Deeper beneath those scents lay that of blood. River water couldn’t wash that out. I feared it was a smell that would always follow her now. Being part wolf, I didn’t mind it. But I knew she hated it and didn’t want it, and that made it difficult. What I wouldn’t give for real powers so I could take her away from all of this like a superhero. But, I wasn’t even sure the big man in the red cape could fix this.
I focused on the rock music playing on the radio station, enjoying the sweet and sometimes harsh voice of The Pretty Reckless lead singer. The woman had some serious pipes. The song ended before I could embarrass myself by singing along. In its place came the voice of a radio announcer reading the news.
“Another wolf attack prompts a county wide hunt by authorities—” I hit the search button to find a new station. The next one it landed on was spewing yet another account of the same news. I tried again. Same results. I gave up and switched to satellite radio that had no news. The evidence that Calder was successfully sowing the seeds of fear and hatred couldn’t be denied. For now, innocent wolves were paying the price.
“Why, Calder, why?” I mumbled.
After a long while, Ayra answered. “Because he has a superiority complex. He thinks we’re better than humans, and he thinks he is the best of us. My parents doted on him far too much, insisted he was of a Gods-favored bloodline, one that was meant to rule our kind. He bought into all that crap. Then he got pissed when I was born with the mark instead of it appearing on him. Now I think he’s mad at Odin for not choosing him.”
Bumps rose along my skin as a thought occurred to me. “You don’t think he believes in that old story about a child of Fenrir killing Thor and starting Ragnarok, do you?”
“I think that’s exactly what he believes, and what he wants.”
She fell silent after that and for once, I didn’t push. I shouldn’t have dredged up all that negativity in the first place.
When my eyes started to get blurry I followed the signs to a campground not far off the road. The place appeared deserted without even a camp host. Under the cover of darkness I pulled into the most remote spot I could find that was choked with trees. Pine boughs brushed the truck as I nosed it in so no one could see the dented hood.
Ayra set the leather bound journal in her lap and looked over at me from beneath furrowed brows. “A pay campground. Do you think that’s wise?” she asked.
I thrust my head in the direction of the nearby stone building that housed pay showers. “Thought you might like an actual shower.” I sniffed at my arm. “I know I certainly need one.”
She looked down at her hands. “Yes, thank you.” Her flat, hollow tone almost sent shivers through me, and not the kind her voice normal gave me.
She opened the door and jumped out of the truck before I could say anything. I grabbed my sleeping bag and backpack from the back and followed her. We set up camp in a silence so tense it was hard to breathe. Or maybe that was just the fear crushing my chest. Each moment of silence I felt her pulling further and further away. Her battle fury had receded completely, but this was almost as bad in its own way. While I built a fire in the campground provided l-shaped steel fire pit, she set her tiny tent up. The zippered front faced the fire, not the truck where I would be sleeping.
The only thing I could hear or smell within miles of us were squirrels, owls, and a badger. The lack of people helped me breathe a little easier. But only minutely so.
As Ayra unfurled her sleeping bag and stepped inside her tent I looked down at my hands. They were clean from an earlier visit at a river, but I could still see the blood, smell it, feel it.
“I killed a man today,” I said, more to myself than to her. After the words left my mouth I realized how stupid it was to be saying that to her, of all people. She had killed three now, and would have to kill many more.
This horrible feeling of guilt and shame was one she’d already felt, and would feel who knew how many times more. Or was it? I didn’t know if everyone who’d killed someone felt this way.
Ayra strode over and took my hands in hers. Her intense gaze made me regret ever learning to talk. I was such an idiot. This had to be so much worse for her. “I know it smells and feels like that berserkr’s blood is on your hands, but it isn’t,” she said gently.
I stared at her, dumbfounded and speechless—a rare thing for me, the speechlessness, not the dumbfounded part.
She went on. “It’s on my hands. His death is my fault, not yours. If I hadn’t become the reaper, you wouldn’t have had to do that. If you hadn’t been with me…” She dropped my hands and looked away. Her energy heated up, became something well on its way to volatile.
I stood up, stepped around her, and blocked her path before she could walk away. “Don’t think that way. I shouldn’t have said that, it was stupid, thoughtless. You’ve already been through far worse.”
She crossed her arms beneath her perky breasts. “You are many things, but never stupid or thoughtless. And what you had to do was just as bad as what I have to do. That’s the problem,” she said.
Moisture shone in her pretty blue eyes, making them look like jewels. I hated that this hurt her. I put my fingers over hers where they rested on her arm. She tightened her grip on herself so I could
n’t slip my hand into hers.
“No, it isn’t a problem. It’s just…you know me, I like to talk everything to death. That’s all it is, just me being me.”
The way she wouldn’t look at me made it hard to breathe. I took her by the shoulders. “I’ll do it again if I have to. I don’t regret protecting you.”
Finally, she met my gaze, but the sorrow and determination in her eyes almost made me wish she hadn’t. “But you do regret killing, as you should. You need to stay you, and being anywhere near me almost guarantees that won’t happen. This is why I haven’t chosen you. This is why I can’t choose you.”
She stepped back out of my grasp and I was too stunned to stop her. “Being with me will ruin your life. And you’ll get nothing out of it,” she whispered.
“No,” I said with such vehemence that she turned back to me, eyes wide. I had to swallow the lump in my throat before I could finish. “My life would be ruined without you in it.”
Her mouth dropped open and she stared at me for a long moment, struggling for the words it seemed. “V… I…”
I held a hand up and she fell silent. “My energy, my power, banishes the rage that threatens to consume you before and after reaping. Don’t think I haven’t felt that. I can help you, I do help you. But that isn’t the only reason I stick around. I need you…in my life too. And I don’t mean the reaper. I mean my storm-loving, comic book reading, crazy mad skills dancer best friend.” I clamped my jaw shut before I could say too much, before it could all pour out, before I couldn’t take back what she may not want to hear.
Her surprise-filled eyes widened.
I wanted to tell her that my vow of celibacy ended the moment she chose a verndari, but I was forbidden to do so. The order was very strict about allowing the uppskera to choose with a mind clear of desire or mating instinct. The choice had to be about what was best for the uppskera, not the woman. And, as much as I wanted to disagree, I couldn’t. Even if she did choose me, we could never mate because of Elí. But I was okay with that if it meant I got to remain at her side.
I waved a hand. “Enough heavy stuff for tonight. Neither of us needs that right now. You go take a shower and I’ll get something cooking on the fire,” I said with false cheer.
The sweet smile she gave me held more sadness than joy. She nodded, grabbed her bag, and headed for the showers. An ache started to develop deep in my chest as I watched the way her little cutoffs hugged her ass when she walked off. It took a colossal amount of effort to force myself to look away. Even looking away I could still see her, as if her silhouette was burned into my retinas. That tiny, perfect package of white-blond hair and big blue eyes was my kryptonite.
I had to find a way to control my feelings for her and make this work. This wasn’t about me and what I needed. While getting food from the truck I tried not to look at my hands, to see the blood I imagined was still there, to smell it. Yes I had a killed a man. That left me feeling horrible and hollow inside, like a part of me had died with him. It didn’t matter that he had been an assassin. But Ayra didn’t need to hear how bad I felt. I had a choice. I could walk away from all of this. She never could.
By the time she returned I had two steaks browning on the grill I had put over the fire. She sat down on the log beside me close enough that our legs touched. Years of monk training was all that allowed me to keep my heart rate normal. Trying to think when she was this close, well that was another matter altogether.
After a while she emitted a sound somewhere between a growl and a sigh. “The Shifter Council discussed me without inviting me to speak. I can’t let that go.”
“I agree.”
She turned wide eyes to me. “You do?”
“Of course. That surprises you?”
She shrugged. “Well, yeah. You’ve always been kind of a peacekeeper, and confronting the Shifter Council is going to create a bit of havoc.”
“More than a bit. It’s going to create a lot of havoc. But it needs to be done. Gotham wouldn’t meet to discuss the caped crusader without inviting him. Oh wait, I think that did happen in Volume…” I trailed off as I tried to recall the number. “It doesn’t matter. What matters is that the assassination attempts stop. And I think confronting the Shifter Council is the only way to do that.”
“All right, verndari, so how do we do it?” she asked with a smile.
Could that possibly mean she was actually considering me for her verndari? The look on her face made me think she was. The weight of the nine worlds started to lift from my shoulders. An idea began to take form. “We convince them to meet again, then we make sure you’re in attendance.”
“How? Even if we get them to meet, they do it virtually since they’re all over the world. They could just shut me out, deny me access.”
I forced my gaze away from her long legs and back to the fire. “I know a hacker that can make sure that doesn’t happen. If we can force them to meet, he can guarantee they don’t shut you out.”
“There’s a catch, I can hear it in your voice.”
She was too sharp for my own good. “There are a few catches,” I admitted.
Sitting up straight, she studied me. I struggled to find the words and couldn’t.
“Don’t make me tickle it out of you like I did when we were kids.”
The thought of her hands all over me, fingers digging into me, body straddling me, it was too much. I shut my eyes tight. Measured breaths kept my body from reacting, but just barely. She grabbed hold of my side and wiggled her fingers against my muscles. Eyes flying open wide, I gasped and squirmed. Beautiful lips smiling and open in a laugh captivated me. Her other hand grabbed my other side and tickled me without mercy. Heat filled me as I laughed and squirmed, powerless to escape, and not wanting to anyway.
Caught in the throes of my ridiculous ticklishness, I fell over the log onto the pine needle-covered ground. Like I had imagined—and feared—she followed me over it and straddled me. The moment her legs landed on either side of mine I forgot how to breathe. My ticklishness overrode my self-control, leaving me helpless against her. I had to stop her.
Guilt and jealousy over Elí stabbed me in the heart. The words of my oath rang in my head. The warning of the priest of the Order replayed like a bad dream. If a potential verndari was discovered to have had sex with the uppskera before her choosing, he would be banished from the order. Banishment didn’t just mean shunning. It meant being hunted down like a dog and slaughtered.
I grabbed her hands and pulled her down to my chest in an attempt to move her pelvis away from mine. Her hard nipples poked into my chest. It wasn’t cold out tonight, and even if it had been, we were varúlfur, we had a resistance to cold. That meant she was aroused. Now that I thought about it, concentrated a bit, I could smell her desire, feel it in her power. It filled not only her power, but her intense eyes as well, eyes that hovered only inches above me. Her body relaxed against me. Our groins touched. A pale pink tongue darted out to lick her lips. Gods how I wanted to do the same.
Odin help me. This was a bad idea, the worst. Her eyes started to slide closed as her face descended to mine. Unable to find the will to resist, I closed my eyes as well. Her breath touched my lips, entered my mouth as I parted it. Then she was suddenly gone. Her slight weight disappeared from atop me. Eyes snapping open, I sat up. She stood on the opposite side of the fire, chest heaving with deep breaths, fists opening and closing.
“I shouldn’t have done that,” she said in a breathy voice.
The verndari blood in me wanted to help her in any way I could, while the alpha in me wanted to take her, lay claim to her. She was so willing, it was hard to resist. But that willingness was just the aftereffects of the reaping. Wasn’t it? She was engaged to another man.
I forced myself to respond. “It’s okay. The reaping does that to you, I understand.”
I wanted to be all things to her. I wanted to steal her back from Elí. But I couldn’t bring myself to say that. And I had taken an oath. Hiding
behind the oath wasn’t very superhero-like of me, but it was the foundation of all my training. And it was a death sentence not to.
Hands covering her face, she shook her head. Anger spiked within her power, prickling out from her to dance over me. “Gods, even I don’t understand. I thought I knew what I was, and how I was going to deal with that. Now, all I know is I could never do that to you, V. I know how much your oaths and honor mean to you.”
“They don’t mean as much to me as you do,” I said, keeping my voice soft to try and hide the vulnerability in it.
She took a few steps around the fire toward me. The gentle look she gave me hurt more than a punch to the balls would have. I knew rejection when I saw it. “You mean the uppskera.”
“No. I mean you.” The words came quick and easy, without a thought.
She squeezed her eyes shut tight for a moment. Her power went cold, as if a wall had gone up between it and me. “I will not destroy something that is such a huge part of you by making you break your vow. You are still my friend.” She bowed under the weight of more left unsaid.
Rather than argue like my heart wanted me to, I listened to my head and gave her a smile instead. “Even after my radio silence the last four years?”
She bent and pulled something out of the bag beside the small cooler. Brows rising, she slapped a spatula into my hand. “Always. But I may have to reconsider if you overcook those steaks any more than you already have.”
“Oh, damn!”
I plopped down onto the log and gave the neglected steaks my full attention. The tangy, sweet scent of steak sauce filled the air as I poured it onto the meat in an attempt to return some moisture to it.
She grabbed a pop from the cooler and sat down beside me causal as could be as if we hadn’t just been about to kiss. Fire blazed to life along my skin.
“So what are these catches to your plan?”
The words doused my desire completely. “My friend who can help us is a computer genius with his own renewable energy company,” I began.
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