by Kate Pearce
“You taste like peaches,” he mumbled against her, sounding almost as if he were drunk on the taste of her.
“It’s the implant.”
“Oh thank the gods.” He looked up from his work. “I was wondering how we were going to do this without any form of birth control.”
“Had the implant since my cycle started. My mother insisted. Stop talking. Keep doing… that.” She moaned.
He descended, treating her body like a battleground. He pursued her pleasure with the same intensity and ferocity he would track an enemy. The thought thrilled her and did as much to push her higher as the motion of his tongue.
Then, he eased on finger inside of her.
The sensation was forbidden, delightful, and there was an edge of fear in the back of her mind. That single digit stretched her, working back and forth gently spreading her wider each time.
If only one finger made her feel so full, how was she ever going to take his cock. It gave her a naughty little thrill to even think the word.
As if he knew exactly what she was thinking, he increased the tempo and intensity of his motions, pushing all thoughts but sweet release out of her head.
Her earlier comparison to a universe that had been distilled to sensation under her skin was apt, because when it exploded it was as if the ‘verse disappeared and reformed—all stardust and light.
Magnus rose above her, the length of his hair shadowing his handsome face like a curtain.
Without speaking, he was asking her if she still wanted him. She put her hand on his cheek, and he took linked their fingers together.
She wrapped her legs around his hips and he paused, looking into the depths of her eyes. He dipped his head, and she thought that he was going to kiss her, but instead rested his forehead against hers and held her gaze while he drove home.
Mercy gasped at the shock of pain, but it began to ebb just as it had begun and those galaxies behind her eyes flared again, only they weren’t just behind her eyes, they were in his too.
He moved slowly at first, allowing her body to learn to accommodate him. Only after he’d established a rhythm did lean down and kiss her again.
This kiss was so much different than all of the others. This kiss was the final link in their connection, something that seemed to make their symbiosis whole. He drove into her, lifted her hips to meet his thrusts and she found that same intensity building inside of her all over again.
No matter what happened, she was thankful for this moment, with this man.
And as she reached her pinnacle again, the small flame that burned in a hidden place in her soul roared to life. It devoured guilt and fear. Where it was frozen melted, where it was dark, that flame brought life.
For Magnus the Destroyer was right.
Mercy Odinsdottir was a Valkyrie born who’d just come into her own.
6
Magnus knew the moment it happened.
She was already beautiful, but this beauty now, it was preternatural. Her hair was silkier, her skin impossibly smooth, and her eyes—gods, her eyes. He could see eternity there. Past, present, and all the ages to come.
He belonged to her—her name was tattooed on his bones. An eon from now, when future beings were digging up his remains, it would be there and they would wonder if it was some ancient death ritual. But it was a life ritual.
They were bound forever and he did not regret it.
She said that he would love her, but this was so much more than what could ever be encased by four letters and a single word.
“Is it always like is?”
“I fucking hope so.” He gathered her close.
“I think I knew you were mine for the moment I saw you.”
“Did you, now?” he teased.
“Maybe. I wasn’t usually in the habit of touching strange men.”
Part of him wanted to respond with, “And nor should you be.” But that was just wanting to claim her, to mark her. Only, he wasn’t a dog. He didn’t need to piss all over his territory to know she was his.
No, instead, he’d just fuck her again. He’d let the pleasure he gave her do the marking.
“Why don’t we try out your hot spring?”
“Is that a sex thing?” She crinkled her nose.
“It can be.” He grinned. “No, the warm pool without the lights. It’ll be soothe you.”
“I’ll race you.” She hopped up and darted fearlessly out into the chill air.
He followed behind, watching her. He figured if she’d stared at him, it was only fair. Magnus liked watching her walk, liked the sleek lines of her body as she ran. With his flesh, form followed function, but with hers, it was art. It was sheer beauty.
As he followed her to the hot spring, it occurred to him that now any vengeance he’d seek against Rollo, against her father, it would involve her as well. When he went to battle, so would his Valkyrie.
Could he do that to her?
His fingers curled into fists. Could he let Rollo’s trespass slide for her? Could he allow the decimation of a people with no reprisal to save her?
He didn’t think he could.
If he’d known she was his Valkyrie—he cut the thought of. He’d have what? Not taken this moment? He could no more have changed what happened between them than he could turn the path of a comet.
Their joining was like lightning and thunder, there was no stopping it, no directing the path. It could only be endured.
But like lightning, it was wild and beautiful all the same.
He slid into the strangely warm, glowing purple waters. The darkness around them was surreal, but right.
She climbed onto his lap and his cock was ready for her again. “I’m sore, but can we do this again? Like this?”
He knew she’d liked topping him and as for his own feelings on the matter, what Viking didn’t like to be ridden by his Valkyrie.
“Take your pleasure, if you want it.”
She buried her face in his neck and shifted her hips until she’d impaled herself on his shaft. Mercy cried out and tangled her fist in his hair. He liked the sharp sensation when she pulled, but held back from seeking his own pleasure.
His duty, and his ultimate desire, was to see her find her bliss first.
“It hurts, but it’s still good,” she managed in a breathy little whisper.
“We can wait…”
“No, we can’t. I need to feel it now.” She threw her head back, her little nails digging into his shoulders, and her hair, a wet banner down her back.
He understood her need—there were so many things he wanted to experience with her, about her, it was as if the ‘verse couldn’t contain the width and breadth of it. Magnus hadn’t expected this connection, or the power it had over him.
Magnus wanted to protect her, but there was part of him that wanted to break her, too. If he broke her, he could get it over with. He could sever that tie between them and he’d never have to know fear again. But he didn’t want that either.
He was hers.
She was his.
And it was so fucking good.
Mercy dragged her cheek against his, almost as if she were rubbing her scent on him like a cat. She found his mouth, her lips hungry and desperate.
“I keep thinking,” she gasped “that I’m going to wake up and this won’t be real.”
He clutched her tighter, nipped at her neck. “Does that feel real?”
“No, it’s too good.”
Her nails dug in deeper and he realized she was close, so he allowed himself to match her pace, allowed his own need to spiral and they peaked together.
When the storm had passed, she stayed astride him, clinging to him. “I want to stay here forever.”
Only that wasn’t to be. Suddenly, a bright light shone down into his face and the sound of engines roared in his ears.
Mercy shrieked.
“Inside the shelter,” he commanded.
She scrambled to obey and he followed suit, quickly pulling on t
he tech gear and grabbing the war hammer.
The ship was smaller than it looked, though it melted the ice where it landed and as it did, the Valkyrie lights faded and the orbs deployed, giving the landscape a faux daylight.
They were about to meet whoever wanted them here.
He raised the hammer.
Stairs unfolded from the bay doors and a woman in black strode down toward them with purpose. She was Valkyrie tall, much like Mercy with laser guns strapped to her hips and thighs. The badge on her breastplate gleamed in the light and her hair… it was her hair that got him.
It was blood red. Just like Mercy’s.
“I see you got my message, Berserker.” She smirked. “Although a bit early. You’re lucky the homing beacon activated or you would’ve been stuck her for a good long while.”
“Early? Just who the hell are you?”
Mercy stepped out from behind him, shivering even though she was dressed in the tech suit. Her eyes were wide, and full—brimming with unshed tears.
“He told me you were dead,” she breathed.
“The Insterstellar Commission told him I was dead.” She held open her arms and Mercy flung herself into the woman’s arms.
This was the great Valkyrie Eir—Mercy’s supposedly dead mother.
There was a moment when he feared for his balls, and he was not ashamed. Her name was spoken with reverence and fear throughout the ‘verse. There was no star system that did not know of her great deeds. She would live on forever in the tales told of her labors.
“Why?” Mercy asked.
He felt her fear, her joy, and even the sense of betrayal that she wanted to keep hidden deep down where no one could see. Magnus kept to himself, though he wanted to comfort her. Maybe Eir had planned on him saving her daughter, but she might not have planned on their bond. In fact, how could she?
“I see the fire in your eyes. You two have the bond.” She smiled. “For that, I am glad. You are the one I chose for her.”
He raised a brow.
“The Grandmother cast the runes when Mercy was born. I knew you would be the one to unleash her Valkyrie.” Eir nodded. “She will do great things. As will you. Come.”
He was still wary.
“As you like it, Berserker. Bring your hammer, if it suits you.”
“I don’t understand any of this,” Mercy said.
“I’ll explain it to you over some honey mead and bread,” Eir began to lead her up the stairs.
Magnus could be on board for mead, warm bread and of course, where Mercy went, he would follow. As it must be.
While he was grateful that their benefactor seemed to indeed be an ally, and he was glad to be getting off that no-name rock, he wondered what he ulterior motives were and how he was going to deal with those other big questions.
Like revenge.
Justice.
Honor.
What those things meant to him now that he had a Valkyrie of his own.
Magnus was content to stay still and observe mother and daughter as they spoke, as they drank the mead. But she hadn’t answered Mercy’s questions. Not really.
And he too wanted answers.
When there was a lull in conversation he spoke. “You never really answered Mercy’s questions about why the world was supposed to think you were dead.”
“No.” She shook her head. “I didn’t.”
“I think you should.”
“It’s classified.” The Valkyrie lifted her chin. “Suffice to say, I made my sacrifices and now you’ll be called upon to make yours.”
“You don’t think I’ve made sacrifices, Eir?”
“No.” Her all-seeing eyes told him that she did. “I know you have. And I know you must again.”
“How did you know I’d be on Hel?”
“Because I’m the one who told Odin to capture you.”
Fury boiled and his fingers tightened into fists. The Berserker part of him flared to brutish life, but he forced it back down like bile. “Why would you do such a thing?”
“I will not ask your forgiveness. And maybe in time you come to thank me.”
“Why would I ever do that?” He tried not to snarl.
“Because I knew that even frozen, when Mercy’s need was dire, you’d awaken and protect her.”
“That’s an awful lot of faith to put in an old woman and her runes.”
She nodded. “Yes, yes it is. But it’s all I had. And you did save her. You brought her to me.”
“I thought we were going to die down there,” he confessed.
“Yet, you knew somehow, that it would be okay.”
She was right, but that didn’t make her cloak and dagger bullshit any easier to live with.
“Why would you leave Mercy with such a man? You could’ve made arrangements.”
“No, as long as Odin found her useful, she was safer there.”
“Do you know what awakened me? Nothing. Absolutely nothing. It was by sheer luck that I was already awake with Fenris would’ve raped her.”
Eir’s expression melted into a mask of fear, fear that was too late to have been of any use. “But you were there, Destroyer.” She reached out a battle-scarred hand and covered his own. “I think you have half-earned that name from the words you speak as well as the war hammer you swing.”
“You may be right,” he acquiesced. Magnus had meant to cut her with his words, but then felt a twinge of guilt for doing so. It seemed like she’d never thought about any of the things that could go wrong, that she’d painted up some pretty dance in her head.
Yet, he wondered if he’d been faced with the same choices if he’d have focused on all the good things that could’ve happened or all the bad?
But focusing on something doesn’t make a thing any more or less true. A think is what is, regardless of how they felt about it.
He was done berating her though, so he switched subjects. “Does your mission involve Rollo?”
“That I can tell you. Yes, it does. I have been undercover in his household since you’ve been frozen. The Insterstellar Commission doesn’t want him as King of Saxony any more than you do.”
“Your daughter said I should kill him.”
Eir cast a startled glance at Mercy. “Indeed? Would you pull the trigger?”
“I never said it was easy. But he’s horrible. He hurts people and he’ll hurt more people.”
“You could say that about half the ‘verse. What makes him so special? And who are you to judge?” Eir gently reprimanded her.
Mercy straightened, eyes flashing and her Valkyrie power showed itself. “I am a Valkyrie. It’s my duty to protect those who can’t protect themselves.”
“By aiming your Berserker like a gun? If you think a man should lose his life, then you should be the one to take it. Carry out the sentence you hand down, my daughter.”
“Fine. Teach me how to use that gun.”
Magnus closed his eyes. “That is not the right answer.”
“Isn’t it?” Eir cocked her head to the side. “If you’re not willing to give up your pursuit of vengeance, you’re dragging her into it. And if you put her in the middle of a war, shouldn’t she know how to defend herself?”
“I hadn’t decided.”
“So now it’s up to you to decide her future?”
“Isn’t it?” he threw the words back at her. “You put that on me when you asked me to choose between justice and Mercy.”
“There can be no justice without mercy. It takes a strong man to deliver both.”
“You know that’s not what I meant.”
“I think it is. And you’ll see that as well, in time.”
“I think you two are forgetting that neither one of you will decide my future. I will. If I wish to learn how to use a gun, I will. If I choose to kill a man that needs killing, I will. And if I choose Magnus’s vengeance to deliver justice for a whole murdered tribe—I am a Valkyrie—and I will choose it.”
The walls of the ship resonated with h
er words.
Magnus couldn’t have been more proud and displeased at the same moment. The things that he admired in her were the things that he couldn’t protect her from. He couldn’t protect her from herself—from making her own choices.
But if he chose to let Rollo go and ended up living on some sweet environed planet with waterfalls and beaches, and green for miles, could his stand to live with the guilt for letting Boudicea’s killer go free? Could he stand to look in the eyes of his children and meet their gazes knowing he’d walked away from punishing Rollo?
Or worse, could he look in their eyes knowing it was his fault—that he put some ideal before their mother and that’s why she was dead?
Mercy put her hand on his shoulder. “Stop it.”
He found that he couldn’t meet her eyes, much like the imaginary children he’d conjured who wore her face.
“He’s a blight on the ‘verse, Magnus. You wouldn’t hunt him if he didn’t have it coming.”
But Mercy, did she deserve what this could mean?
“What if I told you that the Commission would see it done? What do you think I’ve been doing with these years of my life? I will end him. But I can’t make him a martyr. These scum are all hydra. You cut off one head, many grow strong to claim the rubble. It takes time.”
“I should let someone else fight my battles?” He bristled at the thought.
“No, but maybe it’s not only your battle. He’s hurt so many. You don’t have to be the hero,” Eir said.
“I am no hero, never wanted to be. If I was a hero, I would’ve saved the Acadians.”
“You were just a boy.”
“I was a Berserker full grown,” he corrected her.
“Barely away from your mother’s house,” Eir added gently. “You have much to think on together. I’ll show you to your quarters. We have a few hours before we reach Lycaos Four.”
7
Her whole world had just come undone and rebuilt itself.
Her mother was alive.
She’d come for her.