by Nora Ash
“Omega,” I growled, because right then, that was what she was. She was also Annabel, she was Fate’s weapon, she was a little human lost in a world unknown. But in that moment, all that mattered was that she was an omega. My omega.
She whimpered, stilling her hands and flattening her palms against me. I bent my head for hers and she met me in a searing kiss.
She took my first thrust with a rough groan, her face still screwed up in pain sharply contradicted by the rhythmic pulses from her core. I peppered her lips, cheeks, and jaw with kisses, gasping encouragements into her ears for every roll of my hips, squeezing my eyes shut to the blinding flashes of pure bliss rocking through me every time I bottomed out in her.
Soon she reached for my face, pulling me down to return my kisses. Her legs wound around mine, heels digging into my hamstrings as she urged me deeper. Her moans spilled liberally from her lips, nothing but pleasure echoing in them now, and I wanted nothing more than to keep hearing them forever. But the tension low in my shaft spoke of the impending end to this, my first union with the woman who would be mine.
I groaned in protest and tried to hold it back, but it was no use. Annabel's slick sounds, mewls, and whimpers and that unending, tight squeeze sent me hurling toward the edge, and there was nothing I or any known deity could do to stop it.
Cursing, I thrust a hand between our bodies, finding Annabel’s clit with my thumb. I pressed in and rubbed—and Annabel lost it.
She screamed, pushing herself up against me, clutching onto me as if I was the only thing that kept her tethered to this world.
The flutter of muscles clasping me tight as she came for me was my final undoing.
Blackness took my vision as pleasure unlike anything that should have existed gripped me by the throat. I ceased to exist in that moment, and all that was left of what I’d once been was raw nerves and the unwavering knowledge that this was it.
She was it.
My Annabel.
She cried out underneath me, weakly pawing at me again as my knot molded her trembling flesh, forcing her to stretch and open as it hooked behind her pelvic bone. It hurt her, I hurt her, and I was so sorry to cause her pain and yet not sorry at all. Because this? This was how we were meant to be. Tied together in flesh, tied together in soul.
Mindlessly I buried my mouth in her neck, desperate to complete our bond and mark her as mine for all to see. But as my teeth dug into her skin, I knew it was wrong. It wasn't the right time. I needed her heat to truly make her mine.
“Shit! Fuck!” I snarled, smacking my free hand against the stone floor. “Godsdamnit!”
She whimpered underneath me, hazy eyes darting to my face. Fear shone through, her instincts flaring at the presence of an angry alpha while she was at her most vulnerable, and I instantly tampered down my disappointment.
“Shh, shh, you’re all right,” I crooned, slipping my arm underneath her so I could roll us over and ensuring she could lay on me instead of the hard floor.
She winced and whined at the movement, and I swallowed a groan as it caused my knot to tug on our tie, pressing in harder against her clit until she shuddered in climax once more.
“No more,” she rasped once her pussy’s hard spasms on my knot eased again. “Please. No more.”
I kissed her brow and released her nub of nerves, moving my hand to her round ass instead.
“I wish you’d been the one to claim me first,” she whispered, her voice hollow. It wasn’t a compliment. It was pain. Longing.
It was harder than I’d thought it would be to force a purr from my chest, but I did it. For her.
The girl who should’ve been mine.
Eight
Annabel
I meant it.
I wished Bjarni had been the one to claim me—the only one. And the thought wracked me with guilt and tore at my chest where my bonds to Magni and Saga were linked.
I loved them. Stars help me, I did. But it wasn’t love alone. It was fear and anguish and fury as well, and everything in between, and I resented them for how they’d forced their claim on me even if I understood why. Even if I could forgive them, because Fate had fucked us all over, and I’d do anything to save my family too. I was doing everything to save them.
But Bjarni…
I lifted my head to look up at his bearded face. His eyes were closed, the arm not wrapped securely around my back resting against his forehead while he purred to comfort me. He was… so much simpler. Kinder.
He was still every inch an alpha, and he’d been rough when he took me, but there’d been so much consideration in his touches too, so much gentleness and awe. Worship.
In another life, if he’d been just a man, I could imagine falling in love with him. He was everything a woman could want from her mate: strong, gentle, loyal. Beautiful as fuck. A generous lover.
And all I could feel now as I lay tied to him, his seed still slicking my inner walls… was emptiness.
Despite how fully he stretched me, how his presence inside me anchored me to him more intimately than I could put into words, I only longed for the two men who’d claimed me already.
I didn’t love Bjarni. I couldn’t. There wasn’t room inside of me for any more of that anguished, burning, all-consuming thing filling my chest.
I hadn’t realized before—hadn’t had time to think, to process everything that’d happened to me since that cave back in Iceland—but a human omega was not built to withstand more than one claim. I’d always thought it wasn’t done because alphas were jealous, possessive creatures who’d never dream of sharing unless the literal end of the world was here. But now? Now I understood.
Fate might have five mates in store for me, but I was barely holding on with two. I wasn’t me anymore; I was one being split in two, in danger of coming apart at the seams. The only thing that kept me together was knowing that if I didn’t complete my mission, Magni and Saga would die, and I’d cease to exist.
I hadn’t fully understood it before, but as I lay in silence and listened to the alpha’s soothing purr, I finally found the quietude I needed to grasp my future.
If I were to take more mates—if I were to care this much for three more men—there would be nothing left of me. No lungs to breathe, no heart to beat; just shredded tissue and a broken mind.
Which meant that while I’d have to accept their claims to stop Ragnarök, I could never love Bjarni. Nor Modi. Nor Grim.
“Are you done with this lewd ritual? Can we get on with saving our brothers?”
Modi’s voice broke through the great room, shocking me out of the daze Bjarni’s purr had eventually lulled me into despite my morose thoughts.
The alpha underneath me tensed, his purr halting. “Odin’s tits, let a man’s knot go down before you barge in demanding results, hmm? We’re still tied.”
I looked over my shoulder just in time to see Modi roll his eyes and level us with a disgusted look. “And your dick’s a magic-blocker? Evening’s almost upon us. Find me Loki.”
It was almost refreshing, the way Modi could make me feel like a straight-up harlot. Being around the Lokissons and Magni, I’d pretty much gotten the impression that nothing could be considered depraved in the eyes of the Norse gods. Case in point: the last time we’d visited Folkvangr.
However, Modi’s obvious disgust with how I’d gone about replenishing my power was palpable, and it went a long way to push my sadness to the backburner, making room for mortification instead.
Awesome.
I tried a little wiggle, wincing when Bjarni’s knot held tight, keeping me locked securely in place.
Bjarni grunted and slid his hand to my ass to hold me still. “Settle down, sweetie. You’ll hurt yourself.”
His easy composure only made my humiliation at being observed in such an intimate situation deepen, but he was right—I wasn’t going anywhere, no matter how much I wanted to regain just a smidgen of dignity. And pants.
Instead I breathed in deeply and closed my eyes, si
nking inward.
It was surprisingly easy this time, the golden light rising to greet me within just a few breaths. It felt different than when Modi had guided me. Clearer. Stronger.
Freya’s advice had shown true, just like when she’d told me how to heal Magni.
Show me Loki.
It was a silent command, and I half-expected nothing to happen, but then the world tilted, the golden light opening like a vortex underneath me—and I fell.
Or I would have, if a harsh tug between my legs didn’t yank me back.
I whimpered and flailed, looking for purchase, but strong bands of iron seemed to close around my torso, taking the pressure off and holding me up, and a soothing rumble vibrated from all sides.
Below me the vortex still yawned, spreading ever wider, and I squinted as something blue and green appeared in the opening.
Was that… Earth?
It zoomed in closer, giving me a nauseating sense of vertigo as we seemed to barrel toward the North American continent. Specks of lights grew larger into cities, the vortex taking us west over the Rockies and down, down, down, until the twinkle directly below expanded into millions of lights, and suddenly, there was the snow-covered ground.
The world jerked and shifted again, zooming along streets, weaving through traffic at breakneck speeds, until finally it stopped in front of the peeling green door of what looked like a butcher shop. On the floor, two ravens were picking at a piece of frozen, raw meat half-buried in the snow.
“Arni? Magga?” I said, more startled that I could recognize the Lokissons' talking ravens than at their presence in what I was pretty sure was Seattle.
They both looked up from their food then and into the vortex.
Magga cocked her head, giving me an inquisitive look. Then she squawked a sharp bark of laughter. “Oh, Loki is going to love this.”
A hard jerk sent the world spinning before I could ask what she meant. Slowly, like I was moving through water, the green door opened for me and I passed through, rings shimmering in the air around me as I did.
And then I was inside, and there he was: Loki.
It wasn’t the first time I’d seen him. I remembered him from Saga’s trial. Yet staring at the man sitting in a wingback armchair with a book in his hand, it was clear he’d taken on a more human appearance. A sort of disguise, I guessed.
He was a tall man, with hair as dark as Grim’s and features that reminded me of all three of his sons. The otherworldly glow he’d had during Saga’s trial was missing, and the thought that maybe my mates and their brothers were also in human disguises made me blink. Did they also have divine forms I hadn’t seen?
Loki’s head jerked up, pulling me from my musings. He frowned and lifted his hand, and a shimmer spread around it.
In response, the golden vortex that had brought me here swirled around me, blurring out the image of the god.
It felt like I was sucked through time and space by my navel until finally I blinked my eyes open to stare at Bjarni.
“You all right, sweetie?" he rumbled.
I nodded dazedly, only then realizing he’d wrapped both arms around me. “You stopped me from falling?”
“Falling?” he snorted. “I stopped you from splitting my lip open again and ripping yourself apart on my knot. Maybe wait with magic tricks until we’re not tied next time, hmm?”
He glanced darkly to his side, and when I followed his gaze, I saw Modi standing by the altar, arms folded across his wide chest.
“He’s in Seattle,” I said, turning back to Bjarni. “Magga and Arni are with him.”
“Huh,” he said. “So that’s why they haven’t come back yet. Father must have told them to stay by his side.”
“Seattle?” Modi said, wrinkling his nose. “Is that in Midgard?”
“The New World,” Bjarni answered, checking me over for any injuries I may have sustained during my little magic experiment.
“Fuck,” Modi sighed. “Bifrost will land us in… What do the humans call it nowadays? Norge? We don’t have time to find passage on a boat to the New World.”
“A boat?” I repeated, momentarily stunned out of my discomfort by the realization that Modi had zero clue when it came to humanity’s recent progress. “How long has it been since you were on Earth?”
“A few centuries,” he said, frowning at me. “Why? Are your boats faster now?”
Nine
Annabel
Bifrost glowed multihued against the night sky, the darkness surrounding us doing nothing to dim the otherworldly bridge.
I stared in wonder as we approached the golden tower spiraling up at its end, feeling another touch of awe at the splendor that was Asgard. Given everything I’d gone through since leaving Iceland, it was sometimes hard to remember how mind-breaking it was to be traipsing around in freaking Asgard, home of the gods, the need for survival outshining the wonders surrounding me.
But Bifrost? Bifrost made my breath catch in my throat with its sheer beauty.
Legend had it that the rainbow connected Asgard with the human world—and seeing as we were about to use it to travel to Norway, it seemed legend was right on this one.
“We can’t use that nifty map of yours?” I murmured to Bjarni as we walked a few paces behind Modi. “Might get us closer to Seattle.”
He shook his head. “No portals showed up within Asgard. And, no offense to your mate, but I don’t particularly trust his brother with our family secrets.”
I was pretty sure there was plenty of offense to be had, should I have been so inclined, but I couldn’t exactly fault him. The way the brothers acted around each other, it was obvious any current truce was tentative.
When we got to the tower, Modi stopped by the closed port. “Heimdall!” he called, voice booming.
“Heimdall?” I asked.
“The guardian of Bifrost,” Bjarni rumbled. “And a real prick.”
Modi grunted, and I arched both eyebrows. If these two agreed…
We waited several minutes before the clanking of a deadbolt opening sounded from behind the port and it swung open, revealing a pale-skinned alpha with a tumble of golden curls falling over his broad shoulders.
He looked at our small party, lip curling in disgust at the sight of Bjarni. “What is this, Thorsson? A human omega and the spawn of the betrayer? Am I to take it you have brought me a sacrifice?”
“Not exactly. We require passage to Midgard. It is an urgent matter. Please step aside,” Modi said, voice calm but full of command.
Heimdall didn’t move. “I, and only I, am responsible for alerting Asgard of the Jotunns’ coming, and therefore I decide who gets to pass. I am not letting that half-blood use Bifrost on the word of a godling who still lives in his father’s shadow. Now get your daddy to come vouch for you, or go home. Get!”
From the clench of Modi’s hands and the splotches forming on his cheeks, Heimdall had apparently hit a sore spot, and I grimaced, instinctively reaching for Modi's arm to calm him down. He didn’t so much as look in my direction when my fingers brushed against him, choosing instead to glare daggers at the guardian.
“Step. Aside,” Modi repeated, this time with an unmistakable threat rumbling through each syllable. “Now.”
“You’re guarding Asgard from an invasion of Jotunns, but refuse to let us out of Asgard because I’m half-Jotunn? Excellent logic. Best do as the kid says,” Bjarni said, touching his hand to the blade at his side. “We’re in a rush.”
Heimdall narrowed his eyes. “Don’t give me a reason, Lokisson. I’d love nothing more than present your despicable father with your head on a pike.”
Great. Fucking alphas. Muscles? Check. Conflict resolution skills? Zero.
I smothered an eyeroll and stepped forward, sidestepping Bjarni’s attempt at pulling me back in line. With my best smile, I stopped in front of Heimdall.
“I’m so sorry for my companions. They’re stressed with the importance of our task. Odin has requested that we bring him Loki,
and with Ragnarök looming, it’s a matter of some urgency,” I said, smoothly placing my hand on his forearm. “But that doesn’t excuse our rudeness—you’re the guardian of Bifrost, and you deserve our utmost respect. I, for one, appreciate you not letting just anybody through to my world.”
Heimdall looked at my hand on his arm, and for a moment I thought he’d take offense to a mere human having the audacity to touch him. But then the set of his shoulders softened ever so slightly, and when he looked at my face, his nostrils twitched—scenting for any promise of heat, probably. So damn predictable.
“Odin ordered this… quest? A godling, a human, and a Jotunn, tasked with bringing back the Betrayer?”
I forced my smile to stay in place and scooted in a little closer, ignoring Bjarni’s low growl.
“Shut up,” Modi murmured behind me, silencing Bjarni, and I thanked the stars at least one of them had enough brain cells left to catch on to my plan.
“He did. I don’t know how we’re going to…” I trailed off, lip quivering for emphasis before I looked up at him with wide eyes, making myself seem as small as vulnerable as I could—the picture of a weak little omega. “We have to find him. Somehow we have to, or innocents will die for his crimes. Please, sir, can you help us? We must get to Midgard tonight. We don’t have much time, and only you can help us get there. Please.”
The golden-haired god hesitated for a moment, his pale eyes falling from my eyes to my lips, then rising to the two alphas behind me.
“Does the omega speak the truth?” he asked, voice still curt, but his scent was no longer rife with aggression.
“She does,” Modi said, and I imagined it had taken quite a bit for him to swallow his anger. “On my father’s honor, her words are true.”
Heimdall breathed in a deep sigh, eyes darting to me once more before he nodded. “Then this one time, I shall let you pass. But do not bring this half-blood to my door again, Thor’s son.”
