[Anthology] The Paranormal 13- now With a Bonus 14th Novel!

by Dima Zales

  “You’ve been following the rules since your brother Baldur died,” Loki says, gingerly getting to his feet. Smirking, Loki says, “Don’t you think if there was any real hope of Odin granting you the crown he would have announced it by now?” Poor Thor.

  “Watch your mouth, Silvertongue,” says Thor.

  Silvertongue is one of Loki’s favorite nicknames. It’s better than Trickster, Fool, or simply Liar. Thor isn’t terribly mad at him. Still, Loki can feel a chill of worry creeping into his bones. Last time he was in the Tower, things did not go well. Smiling despite his fear, Loki says, “I can’t watch my mouth, it’s attached to my face. As are my eyes, which … ”

  It’s a gentle jibe, but Thor’s hands go to the front of Loki’s shirt and he’s shoved against the wall so hard his teeth rattle. Too winded to speak, Loki just stares at Thor’s face, inches from his own. Thor’s lips are turned down and his eyes are narrowed in anger … or in despair.

  Feeling dread uncoil in his stomach, Loki whispers, “Oh, Thor. Has your daddy made you do something terrible?”

  Loki knows something of the terrible things Odin would compel someone to do.

  Releasing him, Thor drops Loki to the floor and backs away. For a moment Loki feels sorry for him.

  From the door comes a sentry’s call. “Visitor to see the prisoner.”

  Loki blinks. There are few people who would wish to see him.

  Thor says quietly, “I was told there were to be no visitors … ” but makes no protest as a slender form emerges with the sentry on the other side of the door.

  “Sigyn,” Loki and Thor say almost at once.

  The sentry’s key clicks in the lock and Sigyn, Loki’s ex-wife, enters.

  Asgard is experiencing a 13th century European revival. Sigyn’s golden hair is held back by a circlet of braided gold at her crown. She wears a draping seafoam green dress. A cloak of moss green hangs back from her shoulders. But what catches Loki’s eye is a large golden pendant on a chain around her neck. He wonders what man has given it to her, and his heart sinks a bit.

  Sigyn says nothing until the lock clicks behind her. “Has Thor told you the charges?” Sigyn says.

  “No,” says Loki, turning to the other man. Thor actually looks a little afraid. Pain and death are not things Thor fears. Loss of honor, on the other hand …

  Odin has convinced him to do something very bad indeed.

  “They’re not against you, Loki,” Sigyn says, and Loki turns sharply to her.

  Lips trembling she says, “Valli and Nari have been accused of treason by Heimdall and are to be thrown into the Void.”

  Valli and Nari are their sons.

  Loki bites the inside of his cheek. He must stay in control; he must fight with his mind … that is how Loki always wins, the only way he wins.

  But his hands are already going to Thor’s cloak. As he pulls Thor so their faces are just inches apart, the words he means to say in a low whisper come out a scream. “You swore an oath to protect my sons as though they were your own!”

  In the hallway he hears a sentry running and shouting for help.

  Thor’s hands go to Loki’s shirt, as though he might push him away, but he doesn’t. Instead he stammers, “Loki, I … ” Thor stops, looks sideways, his hands fumbling at his belt.

  Loki screams again. “Look at me when you lie to me, oath breaker!”

  Thor’s eyes go to him. There is so much shame there — it verifies every horrible suspicion Loki has. His sons will perish, Loki will die unable to help them, and the mighty, valiant, honest Thor is to blame.

  He isn’t thinking clearly when he tries to twist and throw Thor. Thor’s magic is partially responsible for his strength, but even without it he is bigger and stronger than Loki, more practiced at these things, and he isn’t completely blind with rage. All Loki can see is red, and the only thing he can feel is his blood pounding beneath his skin too hot and too fast. Too quickly Loki is pinned on the floor, snarling at Thor and reaching for magic that isn’t there.

  And then Thor’s body goes limp and slumps forward. Wrestling the large frame off him, Loki looks up to see Sigyn, Thor’s hammer hanging heavy in her hands.

  Loki’s eyes go wide and his lips curl. A mortal might have died from even a non-magical blow from Mjölnir, but Loki knows Thor isn’t dead. Scrambling up from the floor, he moves to take the hammer from Sigyn and finish the job.

  Drawing back, she scowls. “No.”

  Loki wants to scream, wants to argue. His blood is pounding in his ears, his skin feels too hot and too tight and their sons are going to die. Killing another one of Odin’s sons seems fitting retribution.

  “He let us win,” Sigyn says. “Let him live.”

  Clenching his teeth, Loki stifles his protest.

  Sigyn presses firmly at the sides of the pendant around her neck, and the casing in front springs open. Inside is a human-style wind-up stopwatch. “Is it working?” she says. “Hoenir gave it to me; Mimir said he’s been devising it since the last time you were here.”

  Loki is about to speak, something angry and unkind, but his eyes widen instead. The stopwatch is beginning to pulse with magic.

  “Yes,” Loki says, coming forward.

  Staring down at it, Sigyn says, “He said that it … ”

  “Pulls magic from out of time,” Loki says in wonderment. “I see it … how?”

  “We don’t have time,” Sigyn says. “Your armor is at the guard station. I have a hairpin; maybe you can pick the lock?”

  Loki can pick just about any lock with a hairpin, but there are faster ways. Clutching the stopwatch, he pulls the magic around him. Closing his eyes he lifts his other hand towards the door. The lock clicks and the door swings open with a creak.

  Without hesitation Sigyn runs out, lugging Thor’s hammer. Loki follows her into a hallway lined with empty cells. At the end of the hall is the empty guard room, a large ovoid booth set partially into a wall with glass windows on all sides.

  Going forward, Sigyn says, “They found out about Valli and Nari’s dream of a constitutional monarchy.”

  Loki’s heart falls. Odin is an absolute monarch not interested in sharing his power … and most Asgardians are happy with things that way.

  “You knew about that?” Loki says. He’d expressly told his sons to leave their mother out of that folly.

  Glaring at him, she says, “I approve of that,” and Loki looks quickly away.

  As they step through the guard room door, Sigyn says, “Mimir talked the guards downstairs into letting me visit. And then he and Hoenir went back to their hut.”

  Loki swallows. Hoenir and Mimir have always been kind to Loki and his family, but this …

  “Hoenir and Mimir will be confined to the hut until Ragnarok,” he says, using the Viking word for the end times.

  Glancing at him, Sigyn gives him a tight smile. This escape will spell death warrants for them all; he is not sure even Hoenir’s hut can protect them. From down the corridor Loki hears the sound of footsteps on the stairs.

  Up ahead is a small guard room with a large window looking out at the cell block. Loki’s armor and his sword, Lævatein, hang against the far wall. Entering the room, Loki and Sigyn move towards the armor as one. Without speaking, Sigyn sets down the hammer and helps Loki slip on the breastplate as he fastens his simple unadorned helmet. The helmet’s most notable feature is a visor of dwarven crystal. With magic it is shatterproof, but without magic he can’t trust it to protect his eyes. He flips it up.

  Loki’s hands never collide with Sigyn’s as they finish the fastenings. They’ve done this many times before. As the last buckle is finished and Lævatein is on his hip, their eyes meet.

  Since Sigyn opened the stopwatch, magic has been creeping into the tower. But his armor is still not fully enchanted, nor will his knives be. It’s doubtful they’ll make it out alive.

  Loki can’t speak, and Sigyn looks quickly away.

  Down the hall, a guard shouts, “C
ome out of there! Hands above your heads.”

  Darting to the far corner, Sigyn says, “Hoenir said these magic eggs were yours, and they might help us … although the guards didn’t detect any magic in them … ”

  “Eggs?” says Loki. He has no magic eggs. Going to the door, he peers quickly out and catches sight of four guards. A crossbow arrow whistles and he pulls back in.

  Crouching on the floor, Sigyn holds up a drab olive green knapsack with the words U.S. Army stenciled on top. “They wouldn’t let me take them to your cell — insisted on keeping them here,” she says.

  Mementos from his last trip to Midgard — Earth. Loki smirks. “Throw it here.”

  Sigyn tosses the bag. Catching it, Loki deftly pulls out one of six ‘eggs’. They are thankfully not magical, and therefore fully operational in the dampened magic of the tower. Pulling on the pin at the top with his teeth, he tosses the Mk 2 World War II era grenade down the hall.

  For a moment nothing happens.

  The guards chuckle. One shouts. “Your magic tricks won’t work here, you fool!”

  Sigyn looks at him, eyes wide. Almost too late, Loki hurls himself towards her and covers her body with his. An earsplitting boom ricochets through the tower, and the glass in the guardroom window implodes and showers down on Loki’s armor.

  Getting quickly to his feet, Loki helps Sigyn up. Together they step out of the guardroom and towards the stairs, avoiding the bodies of the guards, Sigyn clutching Thor’s hammer in both hands. Neither speaks.

  At the top of the circular staircase, Loki takes out another grenade, swings the knapsack over his shoulder, and gestures for Sigyn to stand back.

  The staircase has an echo. He hears more guards but can’t tell how far away they are. The sound of his and Sigyn’s breathing seems unnaturally loud.

  “Loki, they were already taking Valli and Nari to the Center. There isn’t much time,” Sigyn whispers.

  “Shhhhhh … ” Loki says, trying to determine just how far away the footsteps are.

  Close enough. Pulling the pin he throws the grenade at the far wall. He watches it bounce down the stairwell and out of sight. He hears footsteps, and breathing, and the grenade … .plink, plink, plink down the stairs. Loki pushes Sigyn back behind him so his armor will catch any shrapnel.

  “An egg?” someone says. Someone else out of Loki’s line of vision shouts.

  There is another explosion accompanied by the sound of falling rock, groans, and screams. And then Loki hears a telltale whistling in the air. Before he can move, or even think, Sigyn’s body slumps against his, and Thor’s heavy hammer falls to the ground.

  Lifting his head, Loki sees a guard at the top of the stairs. His face is bloodied, and he has an upraised crossbow.

  A knife is in Loki’s hand and whipping through the air before he even thinks about it. There is just enough magic now that when the knife hits the guard, it explodes, and the guard crumples to the floor.

  Throwing Sigyn over his shoulder, Loki looks at the hammer on the stone step. It is a powerful toy — but as soon as Thor wakes up it will rebound to his hands. Cursing silently, he turns and goes as quickly as he can down the stairs.

  “Put me down,” Sigyn mutters into his back. “You have to save them, Loki. My boys … my beautiful boys.”

  He’s too busy pulling out another grenade to even tell her to shut up. He hears guards mustering in the open chamber at the base of the tower. Pulling the pin just before the bottom of the stairs, he waits for the explosion and then rushes forward. Magic is thick enough in the air now for him to pull it to them and wrap them in a blanket of invisibility.

  Outside the tower he sees men gathering near Sigyn’s steeds. Less well protected is Thor’s chariot. Thor favors attaching it to goats so he always has something tasty to eat, but the chariot is perfectly capable of flying on its own, and there are no goats today.

  Loki slides Sigyn from his back and lays her on her side in the chariot. She is invisible to those around him, but in Loki’s eyes she shimmers and glows, as does the arrow protruding from her back. He breaks it as close to her body as he can.

  “Leave me,” she whispers as he sits her up.

  Glaring at her, Loki climbs into the chariot and seats himself next to her, facing the back. “To the Center,” he shouts.

  The chariot rises in the air with the crackle of magic. Shouts rise up, and Loki hears the thunk of magical arrows in the floor beneath them. Flames dance near his feet as the arrows catch fire, but Thor’s chariot was designed to withstand lightning — a little fire from magical arrows won’t hurt it.

  Moments later, Loki and Sigyn are whisking forward, over and through the illusions of flying buttresses and steeples that are part of this decade’s 13th century revival. There are faster ways for Loki to travel, secret ways that he alone knows. But they would leave him too drained to fight — and he can’t use them to transport others.

  He’ll need all his power to fight soon. He lets the invisibility spell drop.

  Narrowing her eyes in his direction, Sigyn says, “Must you always make things difficult? I’m as good as dead. You should have left me!”

  Her lips are horribly pale, and the color has left her cheeks. She is full Asgardian, but looks nearly Jotunn. Leave it to Sigyn to waste her last breaths berating him. Smiling with brightness he doesn’t feel, Loki says, “My dear, have you forgotten that among some humans I am regarded as the patron god of lost causes?” Not that he believes he or any of the Aesir are gods.

  Sigyn’s head lolls to the side, and she makes a sound like, “Pfffttt.” She heaves a ragged breath and Loki does his best not to look concerned. “What are you planning?” she whispers, her eyelids slipping closed. “To swoop down, pick them up, and carry us all away in this bucket?”

  That actually was close to Loki’s plan, but he says nothing, just glares at her one more time before standing to look out of the chariot. They are close to their destination. Nearly below them is a wide plain. In it are eight circles of white stone, each about 50 yards in diameter, with wide gates and toll booths around and between them. The white circles are where the “branches” of the World Tree connect with Asgard. Not “branches” at all, they are places where the fabric of space and time tears easily, and the largest, most efficient, gateways to the eight other realms.

  The white circles themselves form a larger circle around a small raised dais, its surface unnaturally dark. It is the entrance to the Void, where the Asgardians dump their trash, their spent potions, hopelessly broken magic tools, and the condemned.

  Normally most of the circular gateways would be buzzing with merchants and delegates to visit and barter with the Aesir and each other. However, all the white circles and the toll booths at their peripheries are empty; instead, a crowd is gathered in the great dark circle at the center, their attention focused on the black dais.

  From aloft, Loki can see Valli and Nari at the base of the dais, their blond heads bent, their hands bound at their backs. Behind them stands Odin, the staff Gungnir in his hands. A great armed host stands in a circle around Odin, Loki’s sons, and the dais. A crowd of civilians from the friendly worlds mill about in a dense crowd just beyond the warriors.

  “Have you forgotten the Valkyries?” Sigyn asks.

  There is a stirring below among the armed host. In the distance Loki sees Heimdall, the guardian of the gates, pointing in their direction. Around Heimdall, the Valkyries, winged warrior women, rise. Bolts of fire hurtle toward the chariot from the staffs in their hands. Loki slumps down next to Sigyn.

  “Actually,” he says, “I did forget about them.”

  Sigyn takes a deep, ragged breath. Clutching the edge of the chariot, Loki tries to clear his head as they rock under the Valkyrie onslaught.

  “Chariot, down!” he says. He nearly loses his seat as the chariot falls. “Gently,” he cries and the descent slows. “Move to hover just above the crowd!”

  As Loki suspected, the barrage of fire stops as th
ey get close to the civilians.

  “What are you doing?” Sigyn whispers.

  “I can’t help you,” Loki says, pulling a grenade from the olive green bag. “I’m no good at healing … and this bucket will never get close enough to Valli and Nari.”

  He looks down. They’re close enough to the ground. Smiling at Sigyn, he says, “Chariot, to Hoenir’s hut!”

  “What!” says Sigyn, the anger in her voice nearly blood curdling.

  Loki jumps out just before the chariot takes off, and Sigyn’s scream fades away. The crowd parts only enough for him to land. Straightening quickly, he holds the grenade above his head and smiles across the crowds in Odin and Heimdall’s direction.

  “What do you have there, fool?” someone says.

  “A rotten egg,” he responds with a grin.

  The crowd closes in around him. From where they stand, now on top of the dais, Loki hears Valli or Nari shout, “Father!” The crowd starts to roar, but then Odin’s voice rings out, “Let him pass!”

  Odin knows Loki is no fool.

  The crowd parts and murmurs. Loki walks forward, still smiling, still clutching the pin of the grenade. He is within a few paces of the dais when Odin thumps the black stone beneath his feet with Gungnir and shouts, “Stop.” The rich velvet blackness that is Odin’s magic whips out across the plain.

  Loki’s legs suddenly feel like lead. He feels like the gravity in Asgard has increased by ten, as though he’s consumed vast quantities of magical energy, enough to set a world on fire. He blinks, takes a breath, and moves onward. It takes him a moment but then he realizes that the crowd is dead silent, and except for Odin and him, no one seems to be moving.

  “Nice trick,” he says. An incredibly powerful trick. Odin must be using nearly all of Gungnir’s power for this. Not for the first time Loki wishes he’d never given Odin the damn thing. Loki’s eyes flit nervously to the side. Just beyond the plain he can see Odin’s raven messengers, Huginn and Munnin, soaring through the air, and he almost sighs with relief. Not everything has stopped.