Nightfall

by Elizabeth Hartwell

  “Bane?”

  Loki nods. “His role is to be Sulis’s opposite, her antithesis. She creates and he destroys. She gives life while he revels in death. Not evil by itself, death is a necessary part of life and rebirth . . . but he’s taken it too far. He wants all the power for himself now and is willing to fight the other gods, even if it means the balance is disrupted.”

  “So this isn’t a fight just on the Scorched Earth.”

  Loki shakes his head again. “No. Although the way we’ll fight it would confuse you right now. But yes, the war is coming here on this plane as much as on yours. If Bane wins, this tree which connects all the planes of existence will be corrupted, and all will be death.”

  “But if all is death, how will Bane be able to—”

  “Ah,” Loki says, raising a finger and grinning, “I knew I’d given you some brains to rattle around in that photogenic skull of yours. Trust me, I’ve thought the same thing, and to be honest, I wish I could get Bane to realize that truth. Because our last-ditch plan to save humanity is looking even more last-ditch now.”

  “So what can we do?” I ask. “You’re telling me that the four of us, as fucked up as we are, have to take on a god with a lot of very dedicated followers. Oh, and the corrupted, ignorant followers of another god. You should really talk to Sulis about that. She’s fucked things up herself.”

  “Mmm . . . true. But she does have a great ass, something which I guarantee you has been passed down through the bloodline,” Loki replies, laughing quietly. “For millennia, I have wondered what it would be like to explore that entrance to heaven. For that, grandson, I am quite jealous of you.”

  “Uh . . . too much information?”

  Loki grins, unashamed in the least, and shrugs. “Anyway, I will assist as best I can. Tyr is also going to see what he can do. You have allies on this plane, Lance. Never doubt that. But Bane is strong, and there are many issues to deal with. I’m sorry I don’t have time to explain them all to you.”

  Loki stands up, preparing to go, and suddenly, a question comes to mind. “Loki . . . about Cerena. My feelings for her. What should I do?”

  Loki laughs, turning back to look at me over his shoulder. “I’m a god of chaos and freedom, Lance. I’ve given you full choice on the matter. But if you’re asking my opinion . . . well, I’d put a ring on it as quickly as I could if I were in your shoes. Good luck.”

  Suddenly, light flashes, and I sit up in the dark to find Tym on guard duty and Brandon nowhere to be found. Shifting around, I make enough noise that Tym turns, looking back at me. “You okay?”

  “Yeah . . . where’s Brandon?”

  “Said he needed to walk instead of rest. I suspect he’s dealing with his own personal demons.”

  Suddenly, Cerena whimpers in her sleep, and all my attention turns to her. She’s so beautiful, and I know what I need to do. “Tym . . . mind a little privacy?”

  Tym, reading my mind, nods. “I’ll be over there. Not too loud, okay?”

  He gets up and leaves, leaving me and Cerena in the starlight. Lying back down, I wrap my arms around her and start kissing the back of her neck lightly, tickling her ear until she hums happily, taking my hand and placing it on her breast. “You can keep going.”

  “Mmm . . . I’d love to.” I kiss along the curve of her neck, licking her tangy skin. I know some people find freshly washed flesh to be better, and I get it. But give me Cerena with a day’s worth of tang anytime. Her skin is spicy and sweet, and as my tongue finds the little spot behind her ear that makes her gasp in pleasure, my fingers stroke her nipple through her shirt. “My, oh my, sweet cheeks, I do believe I’ve found a diamond.”

  She pushes her hips back against my hard cock, moaning at what she finds. “And I’ve found something better.”

  Suddenly, Cerena pulls away from me, pushing me onto my back and grabbing my belt. “What are you doing?”

  Looking at me through sooty, devilishly long eyelashes, her face framed in ebony waves of naughtiness, she grins. “I still owe you one.”

  Before I can protest, Cerena yanks my pants down, my cock springing free to stand at full staff in the forested moonlight. Pressing my hips to the ground, she swallows me, taking me all the way to the smooth base of my cock before hollowing her cheeks and sending shockwaves of pleasure through my body.

  “Fuck,” I groan as she pulls back, her tongue finding all my special spots and licking around the head before she lets me plop free, the tip of my cock bouncing back and forth. She flicks her tongue over the tip, making it wave more and playfully passing out torture and ecstasy with each swipe. “You don’t—”

  “Shut up,” Cerena whispers, grabbing my balls and giving me a warning squeeze. “This belongs to me now. You belong to me, and if I want to suck your balls out through your cock, all you need to do is lie back and enjoy what I give you.”

  I swallow, my cock throbbing with her commanding tone. “Yes, Cerena,” I rasp, moaning as she rewards me with a long lick of my cock from base to tip. My soul fills with need, not just for release but for something else. Something just for her. “May I . . . may I please you too?”

  “Mmm, good boy.” Cerena chuckles, letting go of my cock to pull her pants off. She swings her leg over my head and lowers herself to my thirsty lips, pausing just before I can reach her. “Now, shh, we don’t want to make too much noise.”

  I smile as she covers my mouth with her pussy while working her lips around the head of my cock, swallowing me just as my tongue touches her. We fall into synch, our mouths working together in harmony as I wrap my hands around her ass and squeeze, pulling her in closer to flick her clit and taste her juices.

  She’s beautiful. Sweet, tangy, everything I’ll ever want. I lavish her as she bobs up and down on my cock, her tongue swirling and teasing me even as her moans vibrate through my root and up to my very soul.

  I return it, moaning up into her pussy as her thighs tighten around my ears and my balls churn, ready to explode. I want this to go on forever, to feast on her even as she swallows me, sucking my precum out onto her pink tongue as I scoop her cream out of her pussy.

  I can’t hold back, though, and when Cerena runs her fingers over my asshole, I cry out, hurtling into my climax as I shoot rope after rope into her eager mouth. She swallows me, whining in pleasure and flooding my mouth with her juices, coming on my tongue as I thrust up into her, giving her my everything.

  Take it, Cerena. Take me . . . have me.

  She moans around my cock, drawing out my pleasure and not releasing me until I start to soften, licking me clean with her tongue before tucking me back into my pants. I give her pussy lips a last butterfly kiss as she climbs off me and pulls her pants back on, lying down next to me and spooning with me again.

  “You’re amazing,” she says, taking my hand and placing it over her heart as she snuggles back against me. “Thank you.”

  “You know you can’t say anything about that last little trick,” I whisper, kissing the back of her neck. “Not to the guys, okay?”

  Cerena turns her head, smiling and nodding. “I know.”

  She sighs happily and lays her head down on my arm, kissing my knuckles once before closing her eyes. I follow, inhaling the sweet scent of her hair as I promise myself that I will be everything she needs me to be.

  Because heaven is holding this woman in my arms.

  Chapter 10

  Cerena

  “So I had a dream last night,” Lance says as we make our way through the forest. We’ve decided to eat as we walk, taking an easy pace until noon and foraging as we make our way out of the mountains and toward our target. While we’re not totally safe—I can’t be sure if there are Hunters or even werewolves in the area—I feel better after talking to Lily.

  Sure, I know we’ve got no allies, but at least we know the score. And while the senior Hunters and a lot of the Solace bureaucracy might be currently stocked with Edward’s supporters or friends of Crassus and his family, I suspect that
Lily’s going to have a few more tricks up her sleeve when it comes to helping us.

  “What kind of dream?” I ask, remembering the way he woke me up. If that’s the sort of one-on-one time he wants, I’m more than happy to provide it to him. I almost feel refreshed and stronger after having sucked what felt like a bucketful of cum out of his cock. Even now, I swear my belly’s sloshing.

  “Knowing Lance, probably what I heard you two doing last night when I got back from my walk,” Brandon says, teasing but without the hard edge he’s had for awhile now. It’s like he’s comfortable with this dynamic, at least temporarily, and he’s willing to try and deal with what it all means.

  I don’t know how much longer that might last, but for now I appreciate it, although I have to wait to tell him thanks until we stop. Then I can take a moment to speak with him quietly, privately, and show him how much I appreciate his effort.

  “Very funny, but no,” Lance replies, stooping to pluck a handful of chicory from the ground, stuffing it into his pocket. “No, I had a visit from good ol’ Grandpa Loki.”

  “Wait, what?” I reply, surprised. “I thought you said he rarely visited you.”

  “Oh, he doesn’t. In fact, it’s been over a decade since the last time, and twenty years since I’ve seen him in the flesh,” Lance replies lightly. I can see, though, there are mental scars that he isn’t willing to talk about. Being the grandchild of a god who isn’t known for his loyalty has to suck.

  “But he wanted to have a chat, so I guess he felt it was time to come visit me in my sleep. Brought me to this field, one big ass tree in the middle of it, stretching all the way up so high I couldn’t even guess, and so big around that we both were just sitting on what you could call wrinkles in the trunk, and still, it felt like a full-sized chair.”

  “Yggdrasil,” Tym says, causing everyone to glance over. I’m sure at least Brandon’s also wondering what I did for a moment, whether Tym had something caught in his throat when he said it. “The world tree. In Norse mythology, it’s the tree that serves as the bond between the nine planes of existence.”

  “Well, either way, he sat me down at the tree of learning and told me a lot,” Lance says, rubbing at the back of his neck. “Seems this fight isn’t just on earth, but the gods themselves are gearing up for a throwdown.”

  “Did he say why?”

  Lance nods. “This is going to sound so stupid. It sounded idiotic to me when he told me, but it’s all due to the nature of the gods. Bane’s entire nature is to throw things out of balance, to seek destruction. Meanwhile, Sulis’s is light and creation. Each of the gods is different, each of them guided by some form of internal nature that is unchanging and somehow important. At least, that’s the way Loki seemed to make it sound. So all of them have their place, and it’s all . . .”

  He goes silent, and I look up, worried. “Lance?”

  “Yeah, just . . . this is all a really fucked up situation,” Lance says. “He says our job is to try and help restore balance by stopping Bane.”

  “Oh, sure, stop the god of death.” Brandon snorts. “Like you just snap your fingers and that happens.”

  “That’s what I was thinking,” Lance admits, laughing a little, “but he says we’re not alone in this fight. I don’t know how the gods are falling into teams on one side or another in all of this, or if there are more than two sides to this fight, but he told me that Tyr’s going to talk to his offspring and that there may be others. Oh, and Apollo’s a dick.”

  For some reason, that last line makes me laugh, mainly because that would be the sort of information that Lance would remember in a dream. “Anything else?”

  Lance bites his lip, blushing a little as he shakes his head. “The rest was . . . personal. Anyway, I figured you guys ought to know. So, Tym, any news from the Lord of Hammers?”

  “None,” Tym says, jogging a few steps forward. “But this now . . . yummy.”

  I take a look, and I’m practically watering at the mouth as Tym cuts and holds up a huge mushroom, a ‘forest chicken’, as I learned them, too large for his pockets but easily held in one of our backpacks for later.

  “Great, dinner rations,” I comment as he stands up. “Now we just need a little meat to roast with it. Lance, think your crossbow skills are up to the challenge?”

  “If they aren’t, my knife skills are,” Lance reassures me. “Hey, Brandon, while we’re on the subject of immortal progenitors and dreams, big bad Bane rattling your noggin anytime recently?”

  Brandon doesn’t reply for a long time, and out of the corner of my eye, I see Tym watching him intently. “Brandon?” I ask. “You okay?”

  “Yeah . . . just don’t want to talk about this shit any longer,” Brandon says, his good mood evaporating like morning mist and leaving him back to his withdrawn, slightly surly self. “Rather get down this fucking mountain and back out where we can find a building or something to spend the night in. Tired of this fucking sleeping out in the open air.”

  It’s a total lie, and I can see Tym open his mouth, but he doesn’t say anything. I give Brandon a moment, and when I see that he isn’t going to explode or press the issue any further, I decide to give it a rest. I don’t need any more stress in the day.

  Instead, we focus on making miles through the forest, stopping for lunch just before we leave the forested mountain and emerge out onto the Scorched Earth again.

  Lance is able to find us a rabbit just before we stop, and as he and Tym build a fire to cook our lunch, I take our bottles to a nearby stream, filling them and taking a few minutes to enjoy the cool greenery.

  I breathe it in, knowing that soon enough, we’ll be moving quickly through lands that require us to stay alert constantly, not only to the unnatural dangers of the twisted, mutated monsters that inhabit the Scorched Earth, but two heavily-armed, very dangerous groups searching for us as well.

  And the Scorched Earth just doesn’t feel this clean. Sure, it’s not quite the hellhole that it was when my ancestors stuck their heads out from the shelter, but it’s still mostly brown, mostly dead scrubs and grasses, and dreary as all get out.

  But our self-appointed, or maybe divinely appointed, mission awaits us out there. We’re on a mission from the gods, and I can only hope that the Hunters don’t check the genealogical records to figure out what I’m trying to do.

  Off to my left, I hear a rock splash into the stream, and I instantly go on guard, pulling one of my swords and making sure the water bottles are secure. Approaching the noise silently, I pause when I see Brandon, sitting on a log near the stream with my new computer.

  I’m not worried about it being on. The battery recharges via a small solar cell while hanging from the back of my pack, but I am curious as to what he’d be doing with it. I creep closer, trying not to startle him until I see that he’s accessed one of the legacy programs in the computer’s operating system, a drawing program. In the air in front of him is the beginning of a woman’s face, just the outlines, maybe, barely more than a sketch.

  Not wanting to scare him, I watch as he keeps sketching, his hand moving almost without thought, and as I come around a little more, I realize he’s got his eyes closed. He’s sketching solely by the images in his mind.

  I remember when we first found him, he’d draw in the dirt or on scraps of paper, trying to reconstruct his memories that way. He’s a talented sketcher, I think. The woman he’s drawing is certainly realistic enough, and with some time and refinement, I think could be a very good drawing. Already, I can tell she has a beautiful jawline and a chin that reminds me of Brandon’s.

  I decide to make my presence known and kick a stone, letting it rattle off the others and into the water. Brandon opens his eyes, smiling a little when he sees me. “I thought that was you.”

  “Thought I was being silent.”

  “You were,” he replies, patting the log next to him. “I’ve started to . . . sense when you’re around. Must be because we’ve mixed our blood or something.”
/>   “Interesting. So what were you doing?” I ask. “Dream girl?”

  Brandon looks at the image and shakes his head. “No . . . I think this might be my mother. I’m not sure. I’ve been trying to remember, and images are the first thing that always comes to mind.”

  “I remember your doing that before, and I can understand,” I tell him. “I know I’m not in your situation, and I don’t want to argue over that, but sometimes, it’s hard for me to remember my parents. Back at my apartment in Solace, I had a whole file folder on my computer that was filled with pictures of them, but still . . . there were days I’d look at the pictures and feel like I was looking at two strangers. I mean, I recognized them, but there wasn’t any real connection there, you know? I’d feel like shit at those times, like the worst daughter in the world.”

  “I bet they’d be proud of you, though,” Brandon says quietly, smiling a little. “You’re pretty admirable.”

  “Why, thank you . . . and you’re not so bad yourself.” I blush a little, looking down. “You know that dream sex the four of us had? I remember each one, and with you it feels . . . different. I guess you’re all different, but you’re . . . different, you understand?”

  “Not in the least. But I’ll take it as a compliment,” Brandon says, putting his hand on my thigh. I lean against him, knowing that there’s heat growing between us, but both of us are content to let the embers glow for a bit. Brandon’s right. Let’s find a building before we do this, because while outdoor sex is fun, indoor sex can be incredible in its own right.