by P. N. Elrod
“Who…,” he croaked, opening his one good eye. “How…”
“Be easy, my friend.” She removed her jacket and laid it over him. “You’re safe.”
The eye, bright blue amid the red and brown of blood and dirt, regarded her with growing comprehension. “Safe?” he whispered. With a sudden jerk he rolled to his side, pushing her jacket away. “The jötunn…”
“There is no jötunn here,” she said, pushing him down again. “Lie still, jarl of the álfar. All is well.”
The sound he made might have been a laugh. He lifted himself on one arm and looked into her face. “Who … are you?”
Mist hesitated. She had never been afraid to use her real name among men, for there had been no one left to recognize her for what she was. Now things were different. The laws of Midgard—the natural, mundane laws that had ruled her for centuries—had been broken.
But he was of the ljölsálfar, who had fought alongside the gods at Ragnarök. And he might have the answers she desperately needed.
“I am Mist of the valkyrjur ,” she said.
He closed his eye and released a shuddering breath. “Then my coming … was not in vain.” He lifted a shaking hand to rub his swollen lips. “I am Dáinn.”
Dáinn. She recognized the name. It was not uncommon among both elves and dwarves . But she knew in her heart that this was no common elf.
“Bringer of the Futhark,” she said slowly. “Teacher of the runes.”
He raised himself higher and sat up with a wince. “Yes.” There was a great weariness in his voice. “I have been gone a very long time.”
Gone. The memories flooded back, images of bloody conflict and hopeless courage. The elves had fought beside the Aesir, and died beside them.
All but one. Dáinn the Wise, who had walked away when Heimdall had sounded the call to arms. Dáinn the coward. Dáinn the cursed.
Mist drew away from him as if he were Fenrir himself. “Is that why you’re here?” she demanded. “Did you flee to Midgard when you ran from the great battle?”
The álfar had always been proud, but Dáinn made no effort to refute her accusation. He began to rise, a little of his elvish grace returning, then sank back down again like the faithless weakling he was.
“The great battle?” he said. “The final destruction of the gods?” He sighed, gazing into the darkness. “Does it seem to you that the world has ended?”
Mist couldn’t pretend that she didn’t understand his question, and it stung all the more because she had been thinking the same thing that very morning.
“Have you seen Baldr return from Hel?” Dáinn asked, relentless in his strange detachment. “Where are Vídarr and Váli and the sons of Thor?”
She could have told him that Vídarr and Váli were alive in this very city, one the owner of a Tenderloin bar and the other a common drunk. The sons of Odhinn were living proof that the prophecies had failed. They had known all along how useless it was to cling to the old ways. Mist had finally admitted they were right.
Now she knew they had been very, very wrong.
“There was an ending, yes,” Dáinn said into her silence. “The Aesir and their allies were scattered, sent into limbo and robbed of their power. But there was no Ragnarök. The gods did not die. And their enemies—” He broke off, and when he spoke again it was in plain English. “Their enemies still live.”
Mist felt the shock pass through her body and settle in her gut, roiling and churning like worms in a corpse. Somewhere the gods lived on, forgotten by men. Freyja, Heimdall, Tyr. Odhinn himself. The Allfather, who had passed Gungnir to her with his final breath.
“Go to Midgard,” he had said. “You will not fare alone. Each of your sisters will bear a weapon that must not fall into the hands of the evil ones. As long as you live, you will guard Gungnir. Until…”
He had died then, slain by Fenrir, and with the other valkyrjur . Mist had left the dying to their fates. She had believed she would have little time to guard the spear, since she, too, would be obliterated in the final destruction.
The joke had been on her. Odhinn himself hadn’t believed the prophecies. He’d known that the world to come would be just as cruel as the old; riven by war, greed, and suffering. He’d known that his enemies would survive.
“They have returned,” Dáinn said, struggling to his feet. “The jötunn Hrimgrimir has come to Midgard in search of the treasures. I was sent ahead, but he—”
“Who sent you?” she demanded, gripping his arms. “Have the Aesir also returned?”
“The Aesir have no power here. Not yet. Freyja came to me in a dream.…”
Freyja. Freyja the beautiful, the Lady, who received half the slain warriors chosen by the valkyrjur . Mist remembered the other things Hrimgrimir had said before his attack.
“Sow’s bitch,” he had called her. Syr, the Sow, was another name for Freyja. But Mist had always been Odhinn’s servant. It was for him she had fought, for him she had abandoned the honor of death in battle in favor of an immortal life of solitude.
“A dream?” she echoed, pushing her dark thoughts aside. “Why the Lady? Why should she come to you ?”
Dáinn acknowledged her contempt with a twist of his lips. “I still have some small magic remaining to me, and the Lady has not lost all her power. She still has the seidr , her spell magic. It is that which keeps the gods alive.” His gaze turned inward. “The Aesir can see but little from where they now reside, yet what they see is worse than any seer’s foretelling.”
“Tell me!”
“She charged me to find the treasures and warn their guardians against the invasion.”
The invasion. The “new age.” How many jötunar had come to Midgard? If the giants had found the other valkyrjur , the other treasures …
Panic surged in Mist’s throat. “Was it Hrimgrimir who attacked you?” she asked, giving him a shake. “How did he get to Midgard?”
“There are passages, ways between the worlds that have been opened by dark seidr .”
“What worlds? Does Jötunheimr still exist? Asgard?” She grimaced at her own stupidity. None of that was important now. “How did he find you?”
“I do not know, but he knew I was looking for you.”
“And you couldn’t stop him? What happened to your magic, álfr ?”
For the first time a flicker of real emotion crossed Dáinn’s face. “I had to let him win. My task was more important than any temporary victory. It was necessary that he believe I was no threat to him or his allies.”
Mist didn’t believe him. He’d let himself be beaten to a pulp and ground into the dirt like an ant on a battlefield. He was worse than useless.
But there was no time to question him further. “I have to go back,” she said. “Gungnir—”
“Is it safe?”
Mist didn’t bother to answer him. She jumped to her feet and began to run. She was halfway home when Dáinn caught up with her. She ignored him and kept on running.
The streets of Dogpatch were quiet now in the small hours of the morning. Dáinn was on her heels as she came to a skidding stop at her door and released the ward that guarded it from anyone but her and Eric. A dozen long strides carried her to the display room.
The case was open. Gungnir was gone.
Mist spun to the nearest wall and slammed it with her fist. Dáinn burst through the doorway, rags flapping.
“Loki’s piss!” Mist swore. “Short-wit, incompetent…”
“It will do no good to curse yourself now,” Dáinn said, unnaturally calm. “We must find him. Do you know the runes?”
“Of course I know them,” she snapped.
“Then help me.”
He sat cross-legged on the floor and closed his eyes. Mist sat across from him, preparing her mind and body for the galdr. Dáinn began to sing. His voice moved through the air in eddies and swirls like water in a stream.
A prickle of bone-deep awareness washed through Mist as Dáinn’s spirit mingled with
hers. It was like a violation, unseen hands reaching and plucking at her soul.
Sorrow. Such profound and terrible sorrow.
Breathing deeply, she tried to let the distraction of Dinny’s presence roll away like summer’s fog in autumn. It was no use. Her disdain for him was too strong. She could only hinder him now, and failure could have consequences too terrible to contemplate.
Careful not to disturb the elf, she got to her feet and walked into the kitchen. The cats were nowhere in sight, but on the table lay a folded piece of paper, not the one Eric had left before. A sense of unfocused dread stiffened Mist’s fingers as she reached for the paper.
“It was not the jötunn, ” Dáinn said from the doorway.
The needle-sharp prick of ice filled Mist’s lungs. She picked up the note and unfolded it. The runic script seemed to pulse on the page like entrails spilling hot from a warrior’s belly.
My apologies, sweetling, it said. I had hoped to enjoy you one last time, but it was not to be. I will cherish your gift. You may be sure I will use it well.
The final symbol was the figure of a coiling snake. It came alive as she watched, hissing and seeming to laugh with its gaping jaws. Then it was still again, and Mist dropped the paper onto the table. It burst into flame and disintegrated into black ash.
“Eric,” she whispered.
“Loki Hel’s-Father,” Dáinn said. “You knew him?”
The accusation in his voice was well deserved. She had been far worse than the short-wit and incompetent she had called herself. Eric had never loved her. He had deceived her from the moment they’d met. She hadn’t been wise enough to see through the shape he had taken to seduce and set her at her ease.
Hrimgrimir had been no more than a distraction. It had always been Eric.
“I didn’t know,” she said numbly. “I believed…”
“You believed .” His short laugh was raw with despair. He ran his finger through the ashes. “No one knew he had pierced the veil. We share two burdens now, shield-maiden.”
Mist didn’t ask what the second burden was. All she could see was Eric’s laughing face when she had told him he had become nearly as good as she was.
“I’ll kill him,” she said.
“As Heimdall killed him?”
His mockery was all the more savage for its gentleness. She met Dáinn’s gaze across the table.
“Can you find him?” she asked.
“If he hasn’t left Midgard.”
The questions she wanted to ask nearly choked her, but she left them unspoken. “Start looking,” she said.
Dáinn dipped a finger into the ash and lifted it to his forehead. With quick, sure strokes he sketched a bind rune above and between his brows. It seemed to catch fire, and Dáinn grimaced in pain.
“A passage,” he murmured.
“What do you mean?” She leaned over the table, forcing him to look at her. “ What passage?”
“A bridge to the otherworlds.” He smeared the ash with his fingers. “‘Gullin’ is its name.”
Golden . The Golden Gate Bridge. An echo of Bïfrost, which had once joined Midgard with the realm of the Aesir.
“Are you sure?” she asked.
“There is no certainty.”
To Hel with that. It was the only lead they had, and there was no time to waste. The bridge was nearly eight miles northwest as the crow flies, longer on surface streets. Dawn was just breaking; there wouldn’t be much traffic, and that meant the car would be faster than going on foot.
“Let’s go,” she said.
She ran into the shop, snatched up several small, dusty pieces of wood she kept on a high shelf, and dashed for the garage. Dáinn caught up with her as she reached the Volvo and threw open the door. She didn’t wait to ask if the álfr had ever been in an automobile before, but he didn’t hesitate to get in. She was already pulling out of the garage by the time he had closed his own door.
Chanting a hurried runespell to hold any overzealous cops away, Mist kept her foot on the gas all the way up Van Ness and screeched a reckless left turn onto Lombard. In minutes they were on 101 and nearing the bridge.
“Where?” she asked.
He touched his forehead, tracing the runes afresh. “Over the water,” he said. “We must go on foot.”
That was cursed inconvenient. There wasn’t any way for a pedestrian to get onto the bridge from the San Francisco side without attracting unwelcome attention.
“We’ll have to drive across,” she said. “You tell me where to stop.”
“If I can.”
“You will.” She gunned the engine and sped for the toll plaza, slowing only to pay the toll and pretend she had no intention of breaking every speed law on the books. The moment she was on the bridge she pushed on the accelerator, passing slower vehicles as if they were standing still.
“Here,” Dáinn said when they were half a mile across. Mist stopped in the right lane and jumped out.
There was nothing to show that this span of the Bridge was different from any other. Dáinn vaulted over the railing that separated the pedestrian walkway from traffic. Mist followed him to the suicide barrier. Blue-gray water seethed far beneath them, choppy with a rising wind driving west from the Bay.
The faintest pressure in the air lifted the hairs on the back of Mist’s neck. “I feel it,” she said.
Dáinn wasn’t listening. He cocked his head and closed his eyes. The air around him shimmered, and the ground under Mist’s feet vibrated with barely leashed energy. The “passage” the álfr had spoken of was in this very place, an invisible mouth waiting for the right spell to open it again.
And there was more. She could feel Eric’s presence, a shadow of his being altered and twisted into a form almost unrecognizable. She drew her knife.
“Where is he?” she asked him, struggling to control her seething emotions.
The álfr spread his hands in front of him as if he were reaching for something solid. “He was here, but he did not pass through. Something blocked his path.”
“Then where has he gone?”
“I don’t know.”
“Is there anything you do know?”
Dáinn bent his head. “Even Loki would need a refuge. Evil always seeks evil.”
Evil . What did that mean in a world of turmoil and endless conflict? The gangs? The suppliers of illicit drugs, who killed as easily as they breathed? The corrupt politicians and greedy businessmen who set policies that made thousands suffer?
Too many possibilities. They could spend weeks sorting through every dark soul in San Francisco, both high and low. But there was someone who might help them. Someone she’d hoped never to see again.
Maybe Vídarr already knew about the incursion. If he did, and hadn’t warned her …
Never. Not the son of Odhinn.
“We’re going to Vídarr,” she said.
Dáinn stared at her. “He is here?”
“The prophecies said he and Váli would survive Ragnarök and live in the new world. That part was half right.”
“Freyja said nothing about—”
Mist jumped over the barrier and returned to the Volvo. A red Jaguar streaked past, blaring its horn.
“You said the Aesir can’t see everything,” she said over her shoulder. And you’re as blind as they are . She opened the passenger door. “Are you coming?”
He got in. Mist slammed the door shut, released the brake, and made a sharp U-turn. By the time they were off the bridge Dáinn was singing again.
She let him be. His magic, such as it was, was still stronger than hers. She didn’t dare rely on him, but she couldn’t afford to throw away even the smallest advantage, or the weakest ally.
Vídarr’s club was in the Tenderloin, a scarred and graffitied doorway squashed between a seedy hotel and a pawn shop. In spite of the dubious neighborhood, Bifrost was popular with artists, musicians, and the more affluent youth from other parts of the city. Mist hadn’t been inside the door for a decade
, and she’d planned to keep it that way.
Plans of any kind were useless now. Mist wove through the increasing traffic, cutting through back streets and ignoring one-way signs. But her efforts to avoid the worst congestion weren’t good enough. It was taking too damned long.
She pulled up to the nearest curb. “We’ll have to run,” she said.
Dáinn was out of the car a second after she was. She set off south, fiercely grateful for the chance to move her body again. She might not trust her own magic, but legs and arms, muscle and bone, were tools she honed to obey her will without thought or hesitation.
Tucked between the wealth of Nob Hill and the busy downtown of Civic Center, the Tenderloin was an abrupt descent both figuratively and literally. She and Dáinn ran past liquor stores, strip joints, and more than one dealer on the prowl for addicts looking to score. Panhandlers and drunks stared after them in astonishment, but they were only a blur in Mist’s eyes.
Though it wasn’t even eight o’clock, Mist knew that Bifrost would already be jumping. No cops would come knocking, for the simple reason that Vídarr had set runes to repel them; she could see them glowing in the air and feel their potency. Vídarr might have rejected his heritage, but he still used magic when it suited him.
Mist opened the door and walked in. Vídarr employed a doorman to keep out any “undesirables” who might slip past the wards, but she didn’t recognize the big man standing just inside the door. He did a double take when Dáinn came up behind her.
“Where’s Vid?” she asked the doorman.
He folded his massive arms across his chest. “Vid ain’t available,” he growled.
“He’ll see me.” She shoved past him.
“Hey, bitch!” He clamped one beefy hand over her shoulder. “You ain’t—”
Mist spun around and punched him in the stomach. He let her go with a woof of astonished pain. She nodded to Dáinn, and they continued into the black, smoky pit of the bar. A dozen sets of eyes assessed them from the shadows. The radio blasted Norwegian death metal from huge speakers hung on the walls. Sullen kids with multiple piercings huddled over tables strung against the wall opposite the bar, and hipsters ignoring the city-wide smoking ban, argued over coffee and cigarettes.