Ragnarok: I Bring the Fire Part VI (Loki Vowed Asgard Would Burn)

by C. Gockel

  He expects a sharp retort—Lewis and Bohdi did save Steve from paralysis after all. Instead Bohdi says, “Yeah.”

  A cold wind buffets Steve’s back. He has a feeling like the earth just shifted beneath his feet, but he knows there has been no quake.

  Lewis comes out of the tunnel and says, “This is it, I’m sure of it.”

  Swinging his M4 around, Steve says, “I’ll take point. Down the hatch.”

  x x x x

  Bohdi’s heart is beating fast as he stands on the dark staircase just outside Gullveig’s chamber. He shouldn’t get his hopes up, he knows that, but the mirror is so close and the potential to finally know his true origins is overwhelming. He feels a force as strong as gravity or lust drawing him toward the chamber, but Steve insisted on having the SEAL team make sure the secret chamber was all clear.

  At his side, Claire says, “Can we go in yet?” Bohdi wants to suggest they just ignore Steve’s orders, but that would piss Steve off and maybe terrify him since Claire is involved. So he hangs back with his friend’s kid, Amy, and Gerðr. Fenrir was too big to come down, but she’s taken guard up top.

  “We’re ready,” Larson says. Lights flicker on in the chamber.

  Bohdi bolts in, briefly blinded by the light. As his eyes adjust, he sees long desks loaded with books and scrolls. There is also an easel, but it’s empty and Redman is standing above something on the floor beside it. “Captain, I think I found the mirror,” he says.

  Bohdi hurries over, but Steve is there first. Steve sits down on his heels beside the mirror and frowns. “It’s broken,” he murmurs.

  “No,” Bohdi says, falling to his knees beside Steve. A dark, flat object lays on the floor before them. It’s glass covered in dirt, he realizes.

  He feels Amy’s hand on his shoulder. “Does it still have magic?” says Amy.

  Sigyn sits down on the other side of Steve. Touching the glass, she murmurs. “Yes.”

  Steve gently picks up the largest shard. Amy and Bohdi peer over his shoulder. The glass is dusty, and there are all three of them, faces indistinct behind the grime. Steve cleans the mirror with his mitten. “Hoenir,” Steve whispers. The three of them disappear and for a moment they’re staring at mist. Someone swears, and Claire gasps. Amy’s hand has somehow snuck its way into Bohdi’s, and she squeezes. The mist does not go away. “The Creator,” Steve says quickly. The mist disappears, and the mirror shifts in Steve’s hand, but all that it shows is their reflections again.

  “Its magic is fading fast,” Sigyn says. Bohdi holds out a hand to the mirror, and it’s strange, but he can feel the magic leaving. It reminds him of goofing off at a playground with a girl, sliding down the longest slide and hearing static jumping to his hair and clothes, prickling beneath his skin. As he’d stood upon the rubber ground the feeling had dissipated. That’s sort of what it feels like now. He knows he should save any last visions for the team, but his brain lurches forward. “My family,” he says, the words pouring out of his mouth before he can stop them. There is a swirl of mist again. Bohdi’s jaw sags, but then he’s just staring at his, Amy’s, Claire’s, and Steve’s reflections, with Redman, Berry, Nari, Valli, and Sigyn peering over their shoulders. Bohdi sighs.

  “I’m sorry,” Amy whispers.

  “Close enough, I guess,” he says, trying to make a joke.

  Amy squeezes his hand, which he expects. Steve pats his shoulder, which he also expects. But as Steve moves away, Redman puts a hand on his shoulder, and so does Berry. “Of course, we are,” says Berry. In the periphery of his vision he sees Valli nod, and he has to turn away or he might well up. And then he realizes Nari isn’t in the cavern … he blinks over to where Redman is picking up another shard. Redman whispers something, and his eyes get wide. “I see—just me.” His shoulders slump.

  “There’s not enough magic left in the shards,” Sigyn says.

  Bohdi takes a breath. Seeing Nari was probably just a trick of the light. The team falls silent. Bohdi swallows; he isn’t the only one who is lost—they all are. For a moment there is no sound but their boots on the stone floor. Then, scowling, Larson lifts his canteen to his lips. “Damn,” he says, “it’s still frozen.” He tips it upside down and a pea-sized chunk of slush slides onto his hand. He glares at it.

  “I can thaw your water for you,” Sigyn offers. “We are beyond the trees’ reach.”

  Jaw getting tight, Larson says, “No.” To Gerðr he says, “Explain to me again how magic unfreezes ice.”

  Gerðr starts speaking in her own language. “After harnessing magic, you have to imagine the water at its most basic level, at the level of atoms and molecules.”

  “Imagine the structure of water?” Larson asks, in Jotunn. Bohdi tilts his head. He has only ever seen Larson speak Jotunn to Gerðr.

  Leaning close, Amy whispers, “I think understanding her is Larson’s talent.”

  Before Bohdi can digest that, Gerðr screams, Sigyn gasps, and Valli hoots. Bohdi looks at Larson’s hand. Where the pea-sized ball of ice was there is now a small puddle of water.

  Tilting his head, Larson says in Jotunn, “It could have just melted with my body heat …” But then, before Bohdi’s eyes, the tiny puddle turns to ice.

  Grinning, Larson sets it at the top of one finger. It looks like a malformed contact lens. He speaks in English. “Well, I guess I won’t be forming ice bridges anytime soon. Still, kind of cool.” He snorts. “No pun intended.”

  “It is your talent?” Sigyn says, but she sounds uncertain.

  “No,” Larson says, “I just focused on that feeling, and then I imagined water at the molecular level.”

  Gerðr holds her hands to her mouth. “No,” she says. “That cannot be it. For Claire, to be gifted in magic, yes, maybe. And Steven, since he and Claire are related, and abilities run in families, yes, but more …”

  “It takes years of study to make ice,” Sigyn protests. “You should not be able to do it.”

  Bohdi takes out his canteen. He still feels a little wrung out after briefly getting his hopes up. But if he could work magic, that would be something. It might even lead him to the smiling man and woman on his phone. He shakes the canteen; it’s still slush. He knows what water looks like at the molecular level. Unscrewing the cap, he imagines water molecules in his mind, or at least the textbook 3D-rendered versions: two little hydrogens bound by an oxygen in between at an angle, connected by loose hydrogen bonds to other molecules. Nothing happens.

  “You have to feel the magic first,” Larson says. He shakes his head. “I can’t believe I just said that.”

  Bohdi frowns. He feels magic when he needs to kill someone. He doesn’t want to feel that.

  “Hey, I did it!” shouts Steve, holding aloft a tiny icy contact lens of his own.

  “Steve,” Amy says, “How?”

  Steve narrows his eyes at Amy. “I have taken basic chem, you know.”

  Rolling her eyes, Amy huffs. “No, I mean, how did you put yourself in the ‘zone’ to do magic?”

  Steve’s eyes rove over the room and stop on Bohdi. Shoulders falling, Steve looks down at the melting ice on his finger tip. “I use mindfulness, it’s a meditation thing. I’ll teach everyone how to do it.” His is uncharacteristically quiet, probably because admitting to meditation is a step away from admitting he has PTSD—and admitting he almost broke a woman’s arm. Bohdi wishes he could go over and punch him on the shoulder to snap him out of it, but he’s playing the good Marine, and good Marines don’t punch their officers.

  Amy nods. “That’s how Hoenir and Odin taught Loki to harness magic at first.” She winces. “Of course, with Loki, sometimes all it took was getting excited.”

  Bohdi looks down at his canteen. Magic without the desire to kill someone … he rolls on his feet and looks around the room.

  “Can I try to make a snowball?” asks Claire, holding out a hand for Steve’s canteen.

  “I think I can put myself in the ‘zone’ another way,” says Redman. He tak
es out his canteen, shakes all the slush onto his hand, begins shaping a little statue out of the ice—and it abruptly changes to water and slides through his fingers. “It worked!” He laughs aloud, and jumps. “Wow.” Bending over, he puts his finger in the tiny puddle—tracing a pattern with his finger. Where his finger touched, a trail of frost follows.

  Bohdi shakes his canteen and hears the icy sound of slush instead of water. He stares down at the green plastic bottle. Steve’s explained mindfulness to him before. It’s just about accepting the here and now. He focuses on the weight of the canteen in his hand, the gentle currents of air in the room, the feel of his parka on his shoulders. At the same time he tries to imagine the water molecules in the rigid crystalline structure of ice loosening ...

  “It’s hot in here,” Amy says, walking over to Claire. Bohdi tries to ignore her, but she swings off her parka and peels off the first under-layer, so that all she is wearing is only the tight black poly-undershirt. Completely opaque, it hides everything and nothing. He still hasn’t seen what hides beneath, but last night he had rolled her body on top of his in the tiny bed they’d shared, and he’d felt how soft she is. The molecules of water he’s envisioning break apart in his mind. Heat races through his fingers. “Whoa!” shout Redman and Berry.

  Dropping his canteen, Bohdi stares in amazement as a cloud of steam billows from the container to the ceiling. He tilts his head—something beside rage works.

  “Wrong state,” says Larson, dryly.

  “What were you thinking about?” asks Amy from across the room.

  “Mindfulness,” he says quickly.

  Berry and Larson snort, apparently knowing where his eyes had gone.

  “Can someone show me what water molecules look like?” Claire asks. “I want to do it, too!”

  “Come here, Squirt,” Redman says. “I can draw a picture for you on the floor.” As Claire hustles over, Bohdi notices that Gerðr, Sigyn, and Valli are backing away slowly, their eyes wide.

  “What?” says Bohdi.

  “You shouldn’t be able to do that,” Sigyn says, eyes flicking between the humans. Her voice is shaky, and her normal cool is gone. “I don’t understand.”

  “I think I do,” says Amy. She’s frowning. Whatever she knows apparently doesn’t make her happy at all.

  x x x x

  Amy feels all the eyes in the room on her. She meets Steve’s gaze. His eyes are glowing purple again. She gulps. It’s not unheard of for someone to have a “tell,” an external sign that they were performing magic. That is why Helen’s skin was blue—she was always “on.” As far as Amy knows, that is why Loki’s skin was blue toward the end.

  “What do you know, Doctor?” Steve asks. His voice is both calming and commanding, and it sets her mental gears in motion. His magic? She shakes her head; it’s not a command she wants to disobey.

  She remembers visiting the university with Loki; he’d been amazed that there would be a whole room full of microscopes. “We’re taught about science and math from an early age. We’ve all looked in microscopes since junior high school—”

  “Third grade,” Claire says.

  Amy looks at the girl. Claire shrugs. “We got to start using them in third grade.”

  Amy tucks a lock of hair behind her ear—that’s even earlier than her first experience. “Part of using magic is harnessing it, and part of that is believing in it. But the biggest part of believing for magical creatures is believing in the microscopic world, the world they can’t see.” She turns to Sigyn and Gerðr. “Isn’t it?”

  Sigyn’s mouth falls open. Gerðr nods. “Yes.”

  Amy swallows. “But for humans that is the easy part. Science is a religion for us—we believe in it, even for people who don’t understand that electricity is the flow of electrons, they believe it will still turn on their light and power their phone.” And they are bound to have seen a picture of an atom somewhere. She looks at the lieutenant. She knows his undergrad was in chemistry—she shouldn’t be surprised he’d figure it out first. Bohdi’s hobby is science; Steve had gone to Yale and had to have taken chemistry—but even Redman picked it up fast.

  Putting her hand to her mouth, Amy looks at the ground, the implications becoming clear. She gave humans magic so they wouldn’t be defenseless against magical creatures. But humans will be more than protected from magical creatures—they’ll be dangerous to all the creatures of the realms—and each other.

  “When Odin finds out, he will be terrified,” Sigyn whispers.

  Amy meets Sigyn’s eyes.

  Steve’s voice rolls through the chamber, deep and low. “That might not be an advantage.” It is exactly what Amy was thinking.

  “Why not?” says Bohdi, his lip curling a little.

  “Cornered animals are the most dangerous,” says Steve.

  “It’s not just Odin who should be terrified.” The words come from Tucker. His baby-blue eyes are focused on a drop of water on his finger. He’s been mostly silent the whole time, and Amy had nearly forgotten he was there.

  Smiling thinly at the water droplet, Tucker says, “We’ve given infected members of the human race a loaded weapon.”

  Bohdi steps closer to Amy, but his eyes stay glued on Tucker. “So? All of you believe the Second Amendment gives you the unfettered right to bear arms.” Amy exhales. That is the truth. In her humble Liberal opinion, she would classify all the SEALs as “gun nuts.”

  Tucker narrows his eyes at Bohdi. “This is worse than firearms. Firearms are predictable, and anyone can use a pistol or a rifle. But this …” He waves his hand. “Only some people will be able to control it. Some people will be dangerous by accident. Some people will be dangerous because they want to be.”

  Berry clears his throat. “But it’s under control. Just us … Keyif …” His mouth opens and then suddenly gets hard. He turns to Steve. Berry is built like a fire plug; he’s the shortest man on the team and has to crane his neck to look up to Steve. Still his bearing is utterly confident. “Just us, right, Captain?”

  Amy rocks back half a step. That’s right, not everyone knows about the contagiousness of the serum. Steve’s eyes go completely purple. Crossing his arms, Berry says, “You’re formulating a diplomatic response, but I’d be happy just with the truth.”

  Tucker shifts on his feet.

  Steve exhales. “It’s contagious, transmissible the same way HIV is.”

  “We have to get home,” says Redman. “My girlfriend … Odin is going to hunt her down, isn’t he? Or maybe the same people who trapped us here.”

  Amy’s stomach ties in a knot.

  Lips in a grim line, Larson looks down at the floor.

  “It’s not generally known to be contagious yet,” Steve says.

  Berry cocks his head. Eyes still on Steve and Larson, he says, “But you know.”

  Lifting her chin, Amy says, “They know only because I told them. I secretly made it contagious so it wouldn’t belong just to the government and … and … super soldiers.”

  Larson’s jaw gets tight. Berry looks thoughtful. Redman rubs the back of his neck; Amy sees his Adam’s apple bob. “My girlfriend, she might be pregnant. How would that affect the baby?”

  All the air leaves Amy’s lungs.

  “You don’t know, do you?” Tucker whispers.

  Steve’s voice rumbles through the cavern. “As soon as we get settled here, we’ll start making lists of everyone we’ve come in contact with who may be infected by the virus.” His voice is so low and smooth, it reminds her of honey. She feels her muscles start to loosen.

  Eyes still glowing, he walks over and puts his hand on Claire’s shoulder. “We’ve already seen that developing humans handle the virus well. The virus saved Claire’s life. I’m sure that if your girlfriend is pregnant, and the virus does infect the baby, he or she will benefit from it.”

  Amy lets out a breath. She wants to believe Steve, but …

  Bohdi sneezes, and it’s like being slapped in the face, and Amy ca
n’t say why.

  Blue eyes still on her, Tucker huffs. “And they say your ex-boyfriend was Chaos.” Amy can’t look at him. Among the SEALs, Tucker is the one she’d pinpoint first as a “good guy.”

  She feels Bohdi’s hand on her shoulder, and she reaches for it automatically.

  From the stairway comes the sound of fast footsteps, and then Nari’s voice. “Valli! Mother! Captain!”

  Everyone’s rifles are suddenly swinging around. Nari runs into the chamber, gasping for breath. “Captain! The refugees, they’ve surrounded the inn. There is a mob!”

  “Lewis, Gerðr, Claire,” Steve says. “You put up what Promethean wire we have so that no one pops into this cavern while we’re gone.”

  Claire cries, “I want to come!”

  “No,” snaps Steve.

  Amy sees Claire’s jaw get tight. She remembers how strong the little girl can be and says quickly, “I don’t have magic, Claire. And Odin’s out to get me—I need extra protection.”

  “Exactly,” says Steve as the rest of the team files to the stairwell. “Please, Claire?” her father says.

  Claire’s nose twitches. Crossing her arms across her chest, she mutters, “Okay, fine.”

  As he leaves the room, Steve glances at Amy one more time. He gives the tiniest of nods, and his relief is palpable. Bohdi gives her a thumbs up and a smile, and then they’re gone. Amy tells herself that she really shouldn’t be with them. But the cavern feels more like a cage.

  Chapter 19

  Steve jogs in the forest beside Nari, his muscles burning from the trip up the stairs, his breath catching in clouds. “Refugees of what?” he pants.

  “Refugees of Ragnarok,” Nari says.

  Storing the mysterious implications of that for later, Steve taps the radio in his ear. “Team at Mission Control, report,” he says, referring to the drafty shack Heiðr lodged them in.