by Kate Pearce
A quiver ran through the smaller woman, but she didn’t turn tail and run the way any sane person would—then again, she was a Seer. They weren’t quite right. She lifted her chin. “Planning to kill the messenger? I can’t change what I am, even if you don’t care for my kind. The important part is that I’m here and I’m willing to help. Can you say the same?”
Bryn snorted. “If you’re so eager to help, why didn’t you just come with Erik in the first place?”
“Visions don’t give every little detail. I knew I had to track Erik down and tell him what he needed to do.” The völva spread her hands. “I didn’t know I’d be further involved until Ivar’s phone call.”
“It also seems you didn’t know Val would be along for the ride,” Erik observed.
“My visions of my own future are usually incomplete and annoyingly unhelpful.” Her lips twisted in an ironic grin. “The curse of being a Seer is we’re rather short-sighted when it comes to ourselves.”
“That’s tragic.” Bryn rolled her eyes. Yep, no love for völva. This little surprise probably pissed her off even more than springing Ivar on her. She planted her hands on her hips. “I take it you’ve all decided there’s going to be a sleepover at my house?”
“We can camp outside, if you like,” Ivar offered with a winning smile. A smile that looked a lot like Erik’s, now that he thought about it. And that was probably an uncomfortable reminder of their genetic connection too. Well, fuck. Ivar continued, “This wouldn’t be our first night in a tent.”
No, since most of them had been on raiding campaigns before, they’d spent days at sea in boats with barely any cover from the elements and nights on land in tents. Camping outdoors in the mild Virginia weather would be a cakewalk after that.
Bryn flipped her braid over her shoulder. “I don’t have enough bedrooms for all of you. There’s a bunkhouse out behind the barn. Ivar, you can take the downstairs bedroom here so you don’t have to deal with the bunkhouse steps. There are fewer getting up to the main house.” She jerked her chin at the völva. “You can have the spare room upstairs. I think there’s a saddle on the bed, but that’s easy enough to move.”
Looking a little ill—which Erik guessed had to do with sleeping so close to a valkyrie with a reputation for bloodshed and a serious hate for völva—Nauma asked, “What about the cottage on the other side of the driveway?”
“That’s my stable hands’ house.” Bryn bent over to tie her boots. “The guys will be back tomorrow night.”
“They live together?” Nauma’s eyebrows winged upward. “Gay?”
“Brothers,” Bryn grunted.
“Ah.” The handmaiden shifted from foot to foot, looking as if she’d rather be anywhere but here.
Erik sighed. “Val said there was news. Is Nauma it?”
“No, but she comes bearing news.” Ivar straightened in his chair. “Or at least some information about why Ragnarök is happening now.”
The völva took a breath and nodded. “The basics are this: there are two eclipse seasons each year, one every six months, each lasting a little over a month. Some seasons have more eclipses than others. This one is going to have three—solar, lunar, solar. In certain parts of the world, North America being one of them, these eclipses will be visible.”
A solar eclipse would fulfill part of the ancient prophecy. Erik tilted his head. “The sun will be consumed.”
“Yes.”
Bryn crossed her arms, looking thoroughly unimpressed. “A bunch of eclipses doesn’t necessarily mean dick. Loki hasn’t escaped yet, has he? And what about the dragon? Jörmungand still sleeps.”
Ivar raised a hand, maybe to ward off an argument between the women, maybe just to get their attention. “I suspect all the high-magnitude earthquakes in the last few years are part of a ruse, caused by Loki, to awaken the sleeping dragon.”
“Where is the sleeping dragon?” Val asked. “Does anyone even know anymore? People used to think it encircled the circumference of the world, but obviously not.”
Ivar shrugged. “I think it’s at the center of the world, encased in the lava core. All the huge earthquakes are meant to disturb its slumber.”
“Shit.” Holm summed up what everyone else was thinking.
Snorting, Ivar spread his hands. “Yep.”
“The more important issue is—where will it come up?” Bryn asked the question, but Erik noted she didn’t look directly at Ivar. Everyone else was, but not her. Was being near their grandson so painful for her? Erik doubted she’d admit it even if it was excruciating.
“A fissure at the bottom of the ocean, maybe.” Nauma ventured the first guess. “They cut deeper than anywhere land-based. It’d be the easiest escape route.”
“A volcano?” Val closed one eye, as if that might help him concentrate. “Mauna Loa, Mount Fuji, Tambora, Lakagígar. There are several big active ones.”
“And even more huge dormant ones,” Erik pointed out.
Bryn huffed out an impatient breath. “Both options basically mean the dragon could come up anywhere on Earth.”
Again, it was Holm who offered the unanimous opinion. “And ain’t that a bitch?”
A bit of tension-breaking laughter went through the group, and Erik tightened the fit of his towel. Not that he gave two shits about nudity, but he didn’t know everyone else well enough to say if they cared. Val and Nauma, he’d only met a few weeks ago.
He didn’t want to ask the next question, but he did anyway. “Loki might be causing the earthquakes, but he’s still imprisoned, right?”
Ivar tapped a button on his ever-present laptop and turned it toward him. There were massive lists of files, all labeled by date. “I keep tabs on Loki.”
He opened one of the files and a grainy video showed. A man lay chained to a rock, and a woman sat next to him. She held a bowl over his head, catching venom from a snake mounted over the man’s face. The giant Loki and his wife. Loki had gone to Odin’s hall and insulted all the gods, trying to cause strife in Asgard. This was the trickster giant’s punishment.
Ivar ran a finger along the side of the screen. “I have video on Loki at all times. Set that up the moment I could get an inconspicuous camera near him. Fortunately, he’s bound here on Earth because there’s no way to get a signal from any other realm. No audio, but I can see him, his wife, and anyone else who stops by to visit.”
“Does anyone?” Bryn asked sharply.
“Visit? No.” Ivar shook his head. “He’s guarded 24/7, of course. No one else even tries to get close.”
Erik arched an eyebrow. “You don’t trust his guards?”
Ivar just gave him a steady stare. “I don’t trust much of anything or anyone. It pays to be cautious.”
“Agreed.” Erik rubbed the back of his neck where stress was drawing the muscles tight. “Have you tracked any other gods?”
“Not many. Of the major gods, only Heimdall.” Ivar’s expression turned frustrated. “Otherwise…Thor’s wife, Sif, pops over to Earth occasionally. The skiing goddess Skadi hits the slopes every winter all over the world, so she’s pretty easy to spot. I also have a bead on a couple of giants who like to come to Earth. That’s it.”
The video showed Loki’s wife moving away to empty her bowlful of venom. In the time she was gone, the snake dripped his poison onto Loki’s face. The giant jerked on his bonds, writhing in agony. Though the sound was muted, it was clear he screamed.
Nauma pressed a hand to her chest. “How long has he been that way?”
Glancing at her, Ivar lifted a brow, his words dry. “Chained by the ironized entrails of his son, getting poison dripped on his face unless his wife catches it in a bowl first?”
She winced. “Yeah. That.”
“Beyond the reckoning of human time, I think. So, many thousands of years. Does he realize it’s been that long? Or have the days just blurred?” Ivar shrugged. “I don’t know, but it’s plenty of time to build up some bitterness. If he gets loose, Ragnarök is on like Donkey Kong.”
He winked. “Nothing wrong with liking technology. Just because I was born before the fun gadgets were invented, doesn’t mean I can’t enjoy modern amenities.”
“You used to invent a few fun gadgets of your own,” Val noted, wagging his finger at his old comrade.
Ivar’s lips curved in a smug grin. “Still do.”
Val’s gaze lit. “Show me.”
Swiveling in his chair, Ivar motioned to Erik. “Show the man.”
Waving down at his bare chest and towel, he rolled his eyes. “I don’t have it on me. I’ll get it.”
It only took a few minutes to fetch his bag from the back of his SUV, but he took the opportunity to yank on a pair of jeans, T-shirt, and sandals. He didn’t bother with underwear. Ivar wasn’t the most patient soul on the planet, so Erik decided it was prudent to move his ass.
Besides, he wanted to show off his new toys.
He grinned and jogged back up the porch steps, setting his duffel on the coffee table. Though he was betting Bryn would try to kick him out to the bunkhouse with Holm and Val, Erik was going to do his best to make sure his bag was parked in her bedroom until it was time for them all to leave. They might rub each other the wrong way at times, but that happened with strong personalities. Plus, they also rubbed each other the right way. No reason not to enjoy some more of that.
Unzipping the duffel, he pulled out a gun and a palm-sized metal cylinder. He ejected the clip from the handgun and gave it to Ivar. “You explain this one.”
Ivar took it, but gestured to the cylinder. “Nah, show them the good stuff first.”
“That’s the good stuff?” Holm’s tone was somewhere between dubious and bored.
“Just watch, numbnuts.”
Holm sat up, his heavy brows snapping together. “My nuts are anything but numb, limp dick.”
“Considering I’m looking at you, yes, my dick is limp.” Ivar looked him over in what could only be called an insulting manner. “You just don’t do it for me, Swamp Thing.”
“Children, I’m going to box your ears if you don’t behave.” Val flicked his fingers at Erik. “I want to see the good stuff.”
Erik held up the cylinder, checked to make sure no one was standing too closely, and hit a concealed button at one end. A flattened, tightly linked chain unfurled from the other end, and he swung it in a quick arc.
“Well, that’s interesting, but—”
Erik flicked his wrist the way Ivar had shown him, and the chain solidified into a Viking sword. “It’s unbreakable, designed to cut down even a god or a giant.”
He flipped the sword around his hand, set it on a fingertip to show its superb balance, thrust and parried with the air. Flaunting his skills just a little. Yes, because there were women in the room. Apparently, there were some things a man never grew out of. Flicking his wrist again, he let the sword revert back to a razor-sharp chain, and then hit the button to retract it. He grinned when even Bryn let out a soft, “Ooooh.”
“I got the initial idea from Star Wars lightsabers.” Ivar sighed with satisfaction. “Nerdgasm, I know, but…it fucking worked.”
“How do you know it’ll cut down a giant?” Bryn reached for the weapon, and Erik made sure his fingers stroked over hers as he handed it to her. She gave him a smirk to let him know he was as subtle as Thor’s war-hammer, but he just winked back.
Erik answered her question, though he knew it was directed at Ivar. “Another immortal I ran across a while back. The blacksmith, Volund. He forged legendary swords, even those used by the gods. I introduced him to Ivar, figuring they could create some advanced weaponry for me.”
“Viking meets James Bond?” Val asked, smoothing his accent into a posh Bond-like tone.
“Something like that.” When he’d met the smith, Erik had been more interested in surviving the coming fight than looking cool with gadgets. “The chain-sword is one of their inventions. As are the bullets.”
“Bullets.” Val snagged the clip out of Ivar’s hand, thumbing one of the bullets free. He held it up to the sunlight that streamed through the window, squinting at the metal casing. “Looks normal.”
“It’s supposed to.” Ivar had all the appearance of a sugar-addled kid let loose in a candy store. “But, like the sword, it can put a hole through a giant. Evens the odds for us a bit, don’t you think?”
White teeth flashing in a smile, Val flipped the bullet in the air like a quarter and caught it neatly. “It’s brill, mate.”
Angling a glare at Holm, Ivar demanded, “Still think it’s not the good stuff?”
“It’s not bad.” Holm fought a grin and lost. “It’s only the good stuff if you have enough for the rest of us.”
Ivar laughed, grabbed the wheels on his chair and pivoted, then rolled out the door. “Let me give you a tour of my van.”
Everyone followed. Except Bryn.
Erik didn’t realize she was absent until they’d reached the van, but his gaze met Ivar’s, and a small flash of hurt in the other man’s eyes told Erik he wasn’t the only one who’d noticed.
The question was—was it Ivar she didn’t want to be around or Erik?
4
Letting the world-saving misfits go play with new weapons—and, yes, Bryn could admit she wanted to play too, but mostly because they were shiny toys and she was a valkyrie—she retreated to the barn to take her horses out to their pastures. Because her stable hands were out of town, she’d already decided the ponies could have a leisurely weekend without a lot of exercise riding. Sure, she could ask the berserkers for help, but she’d rather they were indebted to her for trespassing and using her home as their personal B&B than be indebted to them by begging assistance.
She just…needed a moment or forty to process. There was a völva in her house. As a breed, they were meddlesome, troublemaking, and power-hungry. She’d admit this particular völva didn’t come across as power-hungry, but the rest was spot on. Bryn suppressed a twitch at the thought. Those bitches loved to find your weak places and lay them bare with their prophecies. In that, Nauma seemed to fit the mold perfectly.
Bryn would deal with the völva. Just like she did with everything else.
No matter what shit rolled downhill and piled up on her, she shoveled her way out and got on with things. She was, at heart, a no-bullshit, practical creature. Which mean that, yeah, she knew she was going to get dragged into this fight. First, because Erik was right—she did care what happened to humans—and second, because she didn’t want to end up a giant’s appetizer. They liked to play with their food before they consumed it, and they preferred their meals alive and kicking when they ate. Letting them win the coming fight wouldn’t end well, for mankind in general, or for her personally.
She checked the rifle she had in the barn. Though it was cleaned regularly, she broke it down and made sure it was in perfect working order. Maybe Ivar had bullets for this caliber. She fought a flinch as she thought of him. Ivar. Another person she wasn’t thrilled about having around. Looking at him was a piercing reminder that she hadn’t gotten to see her baby girl grow up, that she’d never seen Aslaug get married and have babies of her own. Bryn should have been able to hold Ivar in her arms when he was a tiny thing, not this hulking gadget-junkie in a wheelchair.
She swallowed hard and forced those thoughts from her head. Should, could, would…that way lay madness. Snapping the clip into her rifle, she carried it across the yard to the back porch, thought about leaving it propped against the house, and decided to take it in with her.
Walking in the door, she almost tripped over Ivar. Of course. Then again, it wasn’t as if Erik or Nauma would be so much better. “Oh, sorry. I’m not used to anyone being in the house except me.”
“No problem.” He wheeled backwards to let her pass. “Erik tells me your stable boys are away until tomorrow.”
“It almost sounds ominous when you say it, like look at all the time we have before the unsuspec
ting humans return.” She congratulated herself on keeping her voice light and easy. Sad when standards got that low, but she was uncomfortable and trying not to be.
Sidestepping him, she couldn’t make herself look directly at him and focused on laying her rifle across the table as if the task required her full attention. She needed to get over this weirdness with him. She knew that, but he was just…a reminder of everything that had been wrong and right about her mortal existence. She’d put all that behind her, and the last day had churned up memories and emotions she didn’t want.
“Ominous, huh? Should I rub my hands together maniacally for effect?”
“Please don’t.” She reached into the fruit bowl and snagged an apple.
The silence stretched until it was weird, but she had nothing to say to this stranger who shared her blood. Or maybe she had too much to say and just didn’t know how.
“Um. I’m reading a book about Erik. And you.” He held up something, and she glanced at his hand to see what it was. One of those ebook readers. Figures he’d eschew the old-fashioned paper version. “You know, Tolkien thinks you and Erik will survive Ragnarök and be like the next Adam and Eve.”
She rolled her eyes. “Awesome, just what I always wanted.”
He tapped the Kindle against his thigh. “Tolkien calls Erik the World’s Chosen. Because he’s going to defeat the baddies and stuff.”
“After everyone else is dead, just in time for me to be stuck alone with him for all eternity, popping out babies to repopulate the planet.” She went to the sink and washed her fruit. “Yeah. I see this going so well.”
“Well, you know Tolkien was a scholar on cultures like ours. He translated Beowulf from the original language.” He made a humming noise. “Good translation too.”
“Peachy.” She crunched into her apple.
Ivar’s voice went soft. “Do you really hate him that much?”
“Tolkien?” She propped herself back against the edge of the counter, pretending to think. “Bit of a rip-off of ancient mythologies for his fiction, but otherwise, he was okay.”