She wiped her cheek with the back of her hand and took a deep breath. “Yes,” she whispered. “But don’t...don’t tell anyone.”
I grinned. “My Lady, you have my word.”
Her pale eye opened and met mine. She looked smaller, somehow, as though she were suddenly vulnerable.
“What do I do?” she asked.
I pulled her into my arms and kissed her.
I wasn’t sure what to expect, if it would feel soft like grabbing her arm or if I’d feel the hard scrape of bone against my mouth, but I couldn’t resist any longer. She looked so innocent, and so scared. I wanted to comfort her.
I wanted to taste her.
Her lips felt soft and full against mine. I moved across them gently, feeling the hiss of air as she inhaled. I smiled before kissing her again, more urgently, tilting my head to meet her. I wrapped my arm around her waist, running my hand over the rough cloth of her ridiculously ugly dress as I pressed my mouth against hers, asking for more.
She pulled back, shaking her head. “I don’t know how to kiss,” she said, her voice shaky and her breath uneven.
“You’re doing just fine.” I already missed her soft weight in my arms.
She took a deep breath and smoothed the front of her dress. Her shoulders trembled. “I should lie down,” she said, looking at the petal-strewn grass beneath her feet.
Something golden flashed in the space between us. I froze. Hel panted as she stared intently at the ground. And with each ragged exhale, something flickered across her skin, like a slow ripple of light over water. When I wrapped my fingers gently around her wrist, the pulse of light flashed again, stronger and brighter.
“Do you want to lie down?” I asked.
She shook her head. “Yes. I mean, I don’t know. I don’t...”
I stepped closer, turning my waist so I didn’t impale her with my hard-on, and leaned into her neck, running my lips softly along her skin as I reached around her back for the seam of that horrible dress. I kissed her lightly, listening to her breath catch in her throat as I unbuckled the row of clasps along her back. Her pulse raced, and golden sparks sizzled across her skin as I touched her. I wondered if she noticed them.
When the last clasp was undone, I raised my hand to her shoulder and gently slid the dress down her arms and over her waist. Then I stepped back, smiling at her.
She had a surprisingly lovely body, curvy and soft. Her breast was every bit as perfect as I’d imagined. Even her skeletal side seemed vulnerable, not terrifying. I realized I might be the first person to actually see Hel naked. The ripples of light flashed faster and brighter now, obscuring her body as they washed over her. No, maybe not obscuring. It was almost as if there was something else underneath.
Hel hesitated, her brow furrowing. The ripples of light stopped moving over her body and I realized she was holding her breath. She looked like she was about to cry.
“You okay?” I asked, wrapping my hand around her waist.
“You’re looking at me,” she whispered.
I kissed her again. This time she opened for me, leaning into me, allowing me to explore her secret, hidden places with my tongue. I fell into our kiss, pulling her chest to mine, feeling her breast swell against me as her chest rose with her frantic, panting breaths.
“I like looking at you,” I said, when we pulled apart. “You’re fascinating.”
She trembled, hiding her face against my neck, and I realized the truth of my words. Hel was fascinating; she was the single most fascinating woman I’d ever met.
“Let’s lie down,” I said.
Hel nodded and pulled back, stepping out of her dress. She didn’t meet my eyes as she lay down on the petal-strewn grass. Her naked body flashed and rippled with light. I didn’t dare ask about it.
“Will it hurt?” she asked, her eyes wide. “I’ve read that it hurts, the first time.”
I lay down next to her living side, weaving my fingers with hers. “I’m not going to hurt you.”
I brought her hand to my lips and kissed every finger, moving slowly, watching her chest rise and fall. Sometimes, as the web of light surrounding her rippled and crackled, I could see two breasts, their twin nipples tight as rosebuds.
I turned her hand over and brought my lips to her wrist, feeling her pulse race against my mouth. My lips moved slowly up her arm, kissing her as the golden light surged around me. She was gasping by the time I reached her chest, and she cried out when I closed my lips over her nipple. Her scent overwhelmed me, and I struggled with the dull throb in my groin. Oh, damn, I wanted her.
I closed my teeth gently around the hard bud of her nipple, and her back arched beneath me. My hand slid down, leaving the soft curve of her chest and caressing her stomach. Her breath stuttered as my hand reached her thighs. I gave Hel’s perfect breast one final kiss and watched her face as my fingers moved between her legs.
Her eyes closed. Both eyes, although I hadn’t been certain her skeletal half had an eyelid. The golden light poured over her now, pulsing in rhythm with her breathing, and her lips parted.
I caressed the curls outside her sex, waiting and watching for her reaction. Hel groaned, moving her hips into my hand, and I slipped a finger into her folds. She was slick and wet; heat poured from her, bathing my palm. My hand circled her lips, pressing gently as she panted under me, searching for the tight little bud at the apex of her sex.
She gasped when I found it, and her legs tensed around my hand. For a moment I thought that was enough, that I’d brought her to climax with one touch. But she lifted her hips again, moaning a single word.
“More.”
I grinned. The sweet tang of her sex filled the orchard, and I had to stop myself from grinding my hips into the ground, searching for my own release. Light burst from her body, flooding the orchard, spilling onto the grass, and transforming the white petals into flecks of gold. I tried to look through the light, like I’d looked through the gleam of sunlight on the water water to judge distance to the ocean bottom. It was insanely hard to focus; she panted and rippled beneath me, and every instinct in my body cried out to fill her, to take her, to satisfy her.
Then I saw, and my heart stopped.
At the same moment she cried out, her entire body stiffening beneath me. Light exploded the space between us, and she lay beneath it, naked and glorious on a bed of flower petals. Her eyes were closed, her rosebud lips parted, her full breasts heaving as she tried to catch her breath.
I had never seen a more beautiful woman.
My entire life I’d lived in Asgard, among the Æsir, who are more beautiful than mortal women. And Freyja is the most beautiful Æsir, with her golden hair, ruby lips, and generous breasts. But the woman trembling beneath my hands was more beautiful than Freyja. Her red-gold hair alone was more spectacular than Freyja’s, or Sif’s, or...
Hel’s pale blue eyes opened. Those, at least, I recognized. Her soft lips curved into a smile. My heart broke. I was lost, and I knew it. I’d do anything for that smile.
“Baldr,” she gasped. “What was—”
My face must have given me away. Hel frowned and pulled herself up, staring down at her body.
She screamed.
The pain in her voice twisted my heart, and I reached for her. She flinched, pulling away from my arm.
“Get out of here!” she yelled.
“Wait!” I grabbed her ankle, closing my hands around her pale skin.
A second later white spots exploded across my vision as my head rocked back. The sharp metallic tang of blood filled the back of my mouth. I spat, slowly realizing she’d kicked me. In the face.
“What just happened?” I said.
Hel backed up against a tree trunk, her legs pulled to her chest. Tears streamed down her round cheeks.
“Please, let me help,” I said.
She shook her head and vanished, leaving white petals swirling in her wake.
“Hel!” I screamed.
I wiped my mouth with the
back of my hand, and it came away bloody. I called her name again, over and over, begging her to come back, long after I realized it wasn’t going to happen.
CHAPTER 5
Hel’s orchard was enormous, and I got lost almost instantaneously. It didn’t help that my mind was swirling, and I couldn’t remember a thing about our walk out here, aside from the way Hel hid her face by turning to the side. Or the flower petals that stuck to her dark hair. And to her arms and legs as she lay on the ground, naked before me.
I groaned. It was half tempting to think Hel’s transformation was a dream. But when I brought my fingers to my face, I could smell the sweet tang of her glorious sex.
Not a dream, then.
The sky faded from periwinkle to sapphire to an ominous midnight blue before the light vanished entirely. I was still wandering in the dark, wondering if I was about to walk off a cliff and break whatever could still be broken when you’re dead.
After what felt like an entire lifetime, I saw the distant, orange flicker of torches. I followed the lights and found myself back at the castle. No one seemed to much care if I came or went, so I wandered into the feast hall. Someone offered me a flagon of mead, but I shook my head. If I started drinking right now, I might never stop.
The door to the narrow hallway was closed. I pushed it open anyway. The hall was dark and silent. I walked slowly, listening to the desolate echo of my footsteps, until I came to the room where I first met Hel.
No one was there.
My shoulders trembled. The torch in my hands shivered, its flame casting wild, desperate shadows along the walls. Of course she wouldn’t be here.
“Baldr?” a quiet voice asked softly from behind me.
I pulled myself together and turned. “That’s me.”
It was Eriksen, watching me with a very strange expression. “Are you looking for something, my Lord?”
It was all I could do not to laugh. Oh, me? I’m just looking for the most beautiful woman in the Nine Realms. You know, the one who’s half dead with maggots in her chest?
“No, nothing. I just seem to have forgotten how to get to my quarters.”
I could tell from the thin press of his lips that Eriksen didn’t buy a word of it. “If you’ll please follow me,” he said.
I did as I was told.
A sharp knock on my door jolted me out of my daze just after sunrise. I pressed my palms against my eyes before pulling myself out of the chair. I hadn’t been sleeping, exactly, but I didn’t feel entirely awake either. I’d spent the whole night hunched in that armchair, or pacing the room, trying to untangle the complicated mess of obligations and longing my afterlife had become.
“Come in,” I called.
The door opened. A thin, severe looking woman I didn’t recognize stood in the hallway. “Hel requests your presence,” she said.
“Really?” My heart leapt. “Now?”
The woman sniffed, looking me over with a frown. “As soon as you’re presentable.”
I glanced down at my wrinkled clothes. There were grass stains on my knees from the orchard, and I’d shoved my sleeves up about a thousand times last night as I paced the floor.
“Right.” I tried to give her a charming smile. “And where would I find a suitable outfit?”
“I suggest the wardrobe,” she said, pulling the door closed behind her.
I opened the enormous wardrobe and groaned. It was packed with supremely uncomfortable clothes. I finally settled on heavy golden robes, stiff black pants, and a white tunic that had been bleached until it felt like wood against my skin. I tried to open the laces at the top of the tunic, in the desperate hopes a hint of chest might help me make whatever case I was going to make, but I couldn’t get the shirt to cooperate. In the end I just ran my fingers through my hair and decided to hope for the best.
The woman stood outside my door, pointedly tapping her toe. “Ready, then?” she asked, making it sound as if she’d been waiting for days.
“Of course,” I said, with a forced smile.
We walked for a long time, passing rooms I didn’t recognize at all. Apparently this palace had a ballroom. And what looked like an indoor garden. My heart sank the further we walked. I’d only spent three days with Hel. I knew nothing of her palace, and next to nothing about her.
My guide cleared her throat. “Through those doors,” she announced.
I swallowed. Before me were the biggest set of doors I’d ever seen. They were ebony, and set with dark, sparkling gems which gleamed in the flickering torchlight. I took a deep breath and stepped forward.
The doors swung open as I approached, revealing a cavernous throne room. It wasn’t exactly crowded, but there were more people inside than I’d ever seen in the palace. And they were all watching me. I tried to smile as I raised my eyes to the dais at the end of the room.
Hel sat on her throne. It was huge, and black, and it looked supremely uncomfortable. Her robes cascaded off her shoulders, rolling down the steps of the dais behind her. At least the robes on her human half did; her skeletal half was draped in dark, rotting tatters, as usual. The flickering orange torchlight played off her exposed bones, making her look especially formidable.
Ah. Just in case I thought we were getting close, then.
I walked slowly, keeping my eyes on Hel. Her face was a blank mask, betraying nothing. When I was about five steps from her throne, she raised her left hand, flashing bones and decaying tendons. I stopped and swallowed. Hard.
“Eriksen. Please read the terms of my agreement with Baldr, son of Óðinn,” Hel said. Her cold voice reverberated through the room.
Eriksen stepped forward and cleared his throat as he unrolled an enormous scroll. He looked especially pale, and I wondered how often Hel actually used this room.
“Thus agreed,” he began, “between Baldr Óðinnsen, late of the realm of Asgard, and Hel Lokisdóttir, ruler of the realm of Niflhel. Baldr, son of Óðinn, commits to providing the Lady Hel with some manner of information previously unknown to the Lady, in exchange for which he shall be granted a boon.” Eriksen shifted uncomfortably on his feet.
“Thank you,” said Hel. She turned her ice-blue eyes to me without the slightest flicker of emotion. “Baldr, son of Óðinn, you have fulfilled your task.”
There was a slight gasp from the crowd. I ignored it
“I shall now return you to Asgard,” Hel said. She raised her left hand again, and a cold wind billowed from behind the throne, lifting my hair and pressing the stiff fabric of my shirt against my chest.
“No,” I said. I had to raise my voice to be heard above the hiss of the wind.
Hel’s hand trembled and the wind vanished. “Excuse me?”
“Eriksen, could you read that again?” I asked.
Eriksen raised both eyebrows, looking so uncomfortable it almost hurt to watch. He glanced at Hel. She gave him the barest nod. He picked up the parchment again, holding it like a shield before his chest.
“Thus agreed,” he began.
“Just summarize it for me. Please.”
The tall, thin man wavered, and for a minute I worried he was about to pass out. Then he coughed slightly and straightened the parchment. “The agreement states Baldr will provide Hel with new information, in exchange for a boon.”
The hall fell silent. Hel raised an eyebrow at me.
“Thank you,” I said, grateful my voice managed to carry a measure of confidence I didn’t exactly feel. “The agreement said a boon. Not a return to Asgard.”
The corner of Hel’s mouth twitched. “What are you saying?”
I took a deep breath. “My Lady Hel. I wish to be your consort.”
Someone in the crowd dropped something metallic, and the crash reverberated through the entire throne room. Hel’s eyes flashed.
“You mock me before my own subjects?” she demanded.
I spread my arms wide and dropped to one knee. “I do not.”
The slightest flicker of light danced across Hel’s s
houlders and rippled down her body. “You’re out of your mind, Óðinnsen.”
“My Lady. You are the most fascinating woman in the Nine Realms. I wish to be with you. That is my boon. Send me from your castle, if you must, but I will not return to Asgard. As long as you are here, I’ll remain in Niflhel.”
There was a scattered murmur behind me. Hel’s lips parted for an instant, then clamped shut.
“And what of your duties, Baldr the Beautiful? The role you play among the Æsir?”
I shook my head. This was what kept me up all night, and there was nothing to do now but tell the truth. “My Lady, I’ve spent a lifetime serving the Æsir. I mend conflicts, I let each side vent their frustrations to me instead of each other. I’ve done Óðinn’s bidding, going wherever he thought a pretty face would help him advance his agenda.”
I paused, reaching for the words. “It’s not a role I chose, my Lady. Now that death has freed me of those obligations, I find I’m reluctant to return.”
Hel shifted on her throne, showing me only the naked bones of her left side. “And your wife? Nanna Nepsdóttir?”
“I suppose I loved her,” I said. “I tried to be a good husband, at least. But now, if I returned to Asgard, I would have to tell her I desire another.”
That did it. The crowd behind me all started talking at once, and another ripple of light flashed across Hel’s body.
“Stop!” Hel rose to her feet, and the voices died in an instant. “Leave us. All of you.”
She stood, impassive and foreboding, as the room emptied. I got a few sympathetic glances from the crowd, although most of them gawked at me openly. I tried to smile, to look relaxed and confident, although I felt none of those things.
Finally the massive doors slammed behind us, and we were alone in the vast, echoing room. Hel looked down at me from her imposing throne.
“What the fuck are you playing at?” she said, shoving her massive skirts behind her as she descended the steps.
She looked majestic in her dark robes, with her eyes burning against her pale skin. My cock twitched inside the stiff, heavy pants and I bit my tongue, just enough to tamp down my arousal. I really shouldn’t have been turned on at this point, but after yesterday, I couldn’t help it.
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