by Elin Peer
“Are you still scared of the big man?” Charlotte asked with sympathy in her voice.
“No, and neither should you be,” I said with a small smile. “Only the nice Nmen can come into the Motherlands, so you have nothing to worry about.”
“I wish we could call Magni up. I want to see what he looks like,” Tristan said and gave Finn a hopeful smile.
“He’s probably fighting some rebels on the East Coast, but I’m happy to try calling him,” Finn replied.
“Really?” Tristan exclaimed with excitement.
Finn angled his head and looked at me. “It’s up to Athena, it’s her house and her rules.”
With the children looking at me, I drew on my ambition to be forgiving to my adversary, and said, “It’s fine with me.”
Finn lifted his wrist. “All right, let’s see if Magni can spare a minute to chat with us.”
It only took two rings for Magni to answer. “Finn, my friend, did you get out of the claws of the witch?”
“Nah, not yet, I’m still in her kitchen and guess what she’s up to now?”
“What?”
“She lured the local children to her house, and she’s fattening them up with hot chocolate and cake. The poor schmucks have no idea that they’re in danger of ending up in one of her delicious pot pies.”
Charlotte’s head swung to me.
Shaking my head with resignation, I muttered to her, “You’re not in danger.”
“Hang on, Magni, I’m just going to pull you up on a hologram, and connect the group chat so you can see everyone,” Finn instructed.
The large man appeared in the air and turned his head to look around.
“Oh, hey, Athena,” he said and raised a hand to wave at me. It hit me how different he looked. He was still intimidating, and it didn’t help that he was wearing a tank top of sorts that did nothing to hide his bulging muscles or the tattoo on his neck. He didn’t frown, and that made his face look very different from the angry time bomb of a man whom I remembered.
“Magni, I want you to meet Hans and the children from one of the local family units.”
“Hey there,” Magni said and raised his hand again.
Reva, Samuel, and Tristan greeted him politely, but Charlotte was hiding her head behind Tristan’s shoulder.
“Remember, I told you about a boy who looked just like me as a teen?” Finn said and continued. “Tristan, stand up and let Magni see you, will you?”
Tristan signaled for me to take Charlotte and I picked her up in my arms, whispering that she was safe.
“Shit, the boy really does look like you, Finn. He even has your ugly ears,” Magni exclaimed.
Raised to be polite, Tristan let the insult slide and spoke up. “Hi, Magni. Finn has told me a lot of amazing things about you.” Tristan’s teenage voice broke a little.
“Oh yeah?” Magni lifted his chin. “You shouldn’t believe a word he says, unless he told you that I’m the biggest badass, because that part is true.”
Finn laughed. “I told him that you have sticks for arms, and that I taught you everything you know about fighting.”
“Sticks for arms, huh?” Magni flexed his large biceps and the children gaped. “Damn, you do look like Finn. Don’t tell me that your jaw does that creepy cracking sound when you yawn too?” Magni said to Tristan.
“It does,” Reva piped up and it made Tristan and Finn look at each other with renewed curiosity.
“Is it true that you are the best fighter in the world?” Samuel was brave enough to ask Magni from his chair.
“Could be.” Magni shrugged. “But with all you Momsies being damn pacifists there’s not a lot of competition, is there?”
“I’ve been training in martial arts since I was seven,” Tristan said, his eyes shining with excitement. “I wish I could learn from someone like you.”
“You’ve got Finn,” Magni said. “Didn’t you believe him when he said that he taught me everything I know?”
“He didn’t really say that,” Tristan pointed out. “He said you were tall as a grown man when you were twelve, and that even adults were afraid of you.”
“Finn has a bad memory. I was a sweet kid with cute dimples like yourself.”
Finn grinned and raised an eyebrow. “If you were, no one ever saw those dimples. ’Cause you were always scowling, my friend.”
“Hey, Tristan,” Magni said. “We have a school up here for Motlander kids and you should come. I train the children whenever I can and you would learn more types of fighting than just martial arts.”
“I would love that, but my mom wouldn’t let me.”
“Your mom? How old are you?” Magni asked.
“I just turned fifteen,” Tristan said and stood a bit straighter.
“Aren’t you a little old to be controlled by a woman then? A real man doesn’t ask for a female’s permission to do anything.”
“Maybe we should say goodbye to Magni now,” I interjected, with a reprimanding glance at Finn.
“See, Tristan.” Magni pointed in my direction. “There’s another example for you. Women are fucking controlling, but we Nmen are the last free men and we don’t allow females to boss us around.”
“Okay, well, maybe I could talk to my mom about it,” Tristan said.
“The trick is to not ask. Just inform her that you’ve been invited by the best fucking warrior in the world to come train with him, and that you’re going.”
This time, I stepped forward. “Magni, you will stop manipulating the boy at once. And you’ll mind your language when you’re in my house and in front of impressionable children.”
Magni pinned me with his eyes and crossed his arms. “Or what? Are you going to cast a curse on me too?”
“She’s going to send you outside,” Finn tone was dry as sand. “Every time I use the F word, Athena kicks me out of her house.”
Magni shook his head. “I swear, five days in the Motherlands and you’ve already grown soft. You’d better hurry back here, or you’ll start saying please, and shit like that.”
“Have a nice day, Magni. I’m afraid we have to say goodbye now,” I said and wished I hadn’t allowed the children to meet him. Their parents would be horrified when they learned about the improper communication that had been used between Finn and Magni. Insults and cuss words were unacceptable in an enlightened society like ours.
“I hope to see you soon, Tristan,” Magni said, “and just for kicks we’ll do a paternity test on you when you get here, because I seriously think they messed up on the fertility clinic and used Finn’s sperm to create you.”
The way Tristan’s face lit up made my skin tingle with a foreboding that this conversation would be life-altering for the boy. He had been fascinated with the Northlands even before Finn showed up at his school, and now he wanted to be an Nman himself.
CHAPTER 21
Last Night Together
Finn
The atmosphere between me and Athena had been tense all day. Her words from last night, that she had opened her heart to me, had freaked me out. Like a warrior raising his shield for protection, I had reminded her not to fall in love with me, and refused to examine my own feelings for her.
I did have feelings for her. It was getting harder to crack jokes and make it seem like I didn’t care.
“Do you think there’s a chance that Tristan could be your biological son?” she asked me as we went to bed that last night.
“No, I’ve never donated sperm, so it’s not possible,” I replied and got comfortable on the bed next to her. “It would’ve been amazing though, you know, to have a son.”
“How would Tristan’s life have been different if he had grown up in the Northlands?” Athena asked, with a hand between the pillow and her chin.
“You’ve spent nine days with me, which makes you something close to an expert on Nmen, doesn’t it? I think you know the answer to that question by now.”
“Can I ask you something different then?” she breathed.
&n
bsp; “Yeah.”
Athena swallowed before she asked the question. “Why do you idolize Magni so much?”
“I don’t idolize him. He’s just my best friend, that’s all.”
“But how can you be friends with someone who kidnaps women?” She narrowed her eyes. “I’ll bet he has even killed people.”
“First of all, Magni doesn’t go around kidnapping women in general. He only did it to you. Secondly, his job is to secure peace and stability in the Northlands. Of course he has killed people. If he hadn’t, they would have killed him and his family.”
A small triangle formed between her eyebrows when she frowned. “You’re friends with a murderer.”
“Don’t call him that. Magni is a warrior, Athena. And a damn fine one too.”
“But human lives are precious.”
“I’m sorry to tell you this, but some humans are scumbags who only bring misery and pain to others.”
Athena spoke in a low whisper. “But Finn, how can Magni live with himself without feeling remorse for the lives he has taken? And how can you not hold it against him?”
I looked down, knowing that I could never make her understand, unless I opened her eyes.
“You think everyone is kind and good.” I sighed. “There’s an innocence and pureness to you that I envy and resent at the same time. The thing is, Athena, you have no idea what really goes on in the world. What good people are capable of when it’s a matter of survival.”
Athena lay quiet, and just listened to me.
“You talk about being open-minded but at the same time you’re judgmental.”
She protested. “How can you say that? I haven’t judged you, have I?”
“Yes, you have, and you don’t even know the worst of what I’ve done.”
Her eyes widened.
“If you want to judge Magni for killing, then you’ll have to judge me too.”
Athena blinked and her nostrils widened in a big inhalation of air. “I don’t believe you.”
“It’s true.”
“No, I’m sensing kindness in you. If you were a murderer, I would feel it,” she exclaimed and kept blinking those green eyes of hers in confusion.
It was tempting to let her believe that, but with another deep sigh, I admitted my secret to her.
“When I was fifteen years old, I killed one of my mentors.”
She breathed in shock. “No.”
“Yes.”
“Was it an accident?”
I had propped myself up on my elbow and shook my head. “No, it wasn’t an accident. I hated him and I had fantasized about killing him for years.”
Her hand flew to her mouth, and then Athena pulled back a short distance. I didn’t blame her.
“The truth is that I kicked him to death,” I said. “His name was Johnson, and he was the meanest son of a…” I stopped myself. “For years he tortured me and the other students, and it didn’t stop until Magni came along.”
“Did Magni go to the same school as you?”
I nodded. “He had only been at the school for about three months when it happened.” My eyes locked with Athena’s and I saw tears forming in her eyes. “Magni and I weren’t friends, but he was the only person brave enough to stand up to Mentor Johnson. Probably because, Magni being the son of our ruler, Johnson never gave him a hard time like he did with the rest of us.
“What did Magni do to make the torture stop?” Athena asked.
“One night, Johnson was torturing me again, and Magni kicked the door in and started beating him up.”
Athena wrinkled her forehead, messing up the beautiful design of her tattoos. “Isn’t Magni younger than you? How could he beat up a teacher when he was just a child?”
I played with the bedsheets, trying to explain. “Magni wasn’t a normal kid, Athena. First of all, he was huge for his age. Secondly, he had been taught by his father since he was four years old – Marcus Aurelius was a superior fighter himself, and from what I know, he pushed Magni and Khan beyond belief to make them both phenomenal fighters.”
“But you said that it was you who killed the teacher.”
“Yes. Magni pulled him off me and knocked him to the ground, but after that, I was the one who went berserk and kicked his head in.”
Athena grimaced.
“I know it sounds horrible, but if you knew the amount of abuse I took from that man, you wouldn’t feel sorry for him,” I defended myself and sighed. “Students suffered and even died because of him.”
“Oh, no, that’s horrible.” Athena reached out for me and I looked down at her hand on top of mine. “How could a man like that be allowed to work with children?”
I shrugged. “Beats me. But I’ll never forget what Magni did for me that day. He could have looked the other way like everyone else did. After all, he didn’t suffer the abuse himself, and like I said, he and I weren’t friends at the time.”
Athena stroked my hand, listening with her full attention.
“It wasn’t just that he burst through the door and pulled the monster off me, but he also took the blame for Johnson’s murder.”
“Why?” she whispered.
“Because if he hadn’t, I wouldn’t be alive today. Even in the Northlands, beating a man to death is no joke.”
“But he was torturing you – couldn’t you have claimed your right to defend yourself?”
“Maybe, but it would’ve been my word against a dead man’s, and chances are that the other mentors would have wanted to set an example to make sure no other students got the same idea.”
Drying away a tear, Athena whispered, “I’m sorry. I’m horrified that this happened to you. You and Magni were only children back then. I can’t even imagine. For a man like that to be allowed close to children, it’s so wrong!”
“The only good thing that came out of it was a heightened awareness on abuse in schools. Magni told everything to his father and Marcus took the opportunity to announce his son’s heroism in public, and underline his revulsion for all pedophiles. After that, new laws to protect students were put in place.” My lips pursed upward. “The law was even named after Magni, which he didn’t like at all.”
Athena’s voice cracked a little. “You said your mentor was a pedophile; does that mean he molested you?”
I looked away, hating this part of the story the most. “There were other boys who were raped by him. I was lucky that Magni saved me from that part. Throughout the years, the man would touch me in ways that made me feel dirty. His main thing was sadism though. He was very creative when it came to finding ways of humiliating his victims. A true mastermind at inflicting physical and mental pain.” I scratched my neck and heaved my chest in a deep sigh. “I shouldn’t have told you all this.”
“No, I’m happy you did,” Athena swallowed hard and dried another of her tears away.
“I just wanted you to see that some people are evil and unworthy of living. Maybe now you understand why I’m defensive of Magni.”
Athena took my words in but didn’t respond.
“You can’t tell anyone though,” I pointed out. “My name was kept out of it back then, and I don’t want anyone to know about it, ever!”
Athena angled her head. “But it wasn’t your fault that he abused you.”
“I know, but it’s not something I like to think about, or talk about for that matter.”
“What about you and Magni? Do you at least talk about it with him?”
I pulled at my earlobe and gave a long deep exhale. “Magni isn’t much of a talker and to be honest, we’ve never spoken about that night.”
“Why not?”
“I told you, it’s not how we roll.”
Athena lifted her hand and caressed my face while looking deeply into my eyes. “Have you forgiven yourself?” she asked with deep empathy.
“Of course,” I replied but the truth was that even though I didn’t regret killing Johnson, I had nightmares about the way it happened. The blood-rush that had
made me into a senseless monster, out of control, was the reason I never participated in fights, unless it was training and with friends.
“Can I hug you?” Athena asked and moved closer to me.
I was a bit stiff at first, not liking the idea of her pitying me. But Athena’s warm hug was like getting under the warm shower on a freezing day, and it made me wrap my arms around her too.
We sat like that for a while, until she spoke the same foreign words that she had used the two previous nights to lift her curse.
“Thank you,” I whispered, and kept close to her when she rolled down on her back, with her arms still holding on to me.
As we were completely snuggled up in each other, I had my forehead resting in the crook of her neck. Closing my eyes, I breathed in her wonderful smell of homemade cake and flowers, while Athena stroked her fingers up and down my upper arm.
I cleared my throat. “Do you think I’m free now?”
“I’m not sure, but talking about our past can be liberating and help put all ghosts to rest,” she said.
“No, I didn’t mean free from my past, I meant from your curse. Do you think I’ll be able to find satisfaction with a woman now?” I asked.
Athena’s hand stopped stroking me for a few seconds. “I can’t be sure,” she whispered, her hand trailing up my arm, shoulder, and neck, until she weaved her fingers into my long hair and turned to look at me. “I guess you’ll have to test it with someone.”
We were nose to nose and my heart was beating like a war drum calling me to action. Was there an offer in those words?
I didn’t want to make assumptions and ask, because the closeness I had with Athena at that moment was worth more to me than an orgasm. It was like that woman from the painting on the wall in Johnson’s office had come to life. The way she caressed me, held me close, and comforted me reminded me of the times I had imagined the woman being my mother.
Thinking about yesterday when Athena had moaned my name, and kissed me with sexual hunger, reminded me of the times I’d imagine the woman as my lover.
I smiled a little, when I thought about Athena and me battling for control just like I imagined siblings would do.