Valhalla Virus

by Nick Harrow

  Gunnar spun the lantern’s handle until a pale white glow spread across the low-ceilinged hideout.

  “Finally,” Ray said when they’d all gathered on the pair of mattresses against the wall opposite the ladder “A place with human proportions.”

  That got a laugh from everyone, even Gunnar. He pretended he didn’t hear the distant whump-whump-whump of the helicopter’s rotors far above them.

  EXHAUSTED FROM THEIR efforts at the Luxor, the völva slept while Gunnar kept watch. The hamingja he’d taken from the jötunn strengthened and sustained him while the Valknut had healed his injuries and reinforced his body. He was a good inch taller and twenty pounds heavier, by his best estimate, and the growing didn’t show any signs of slowing down. He’d be eight feet tall in a few days if it kept up. Killing jötnar does a body good, he thought and chuckled to himself.

  “Hey,” Ray whispered from the darkness beside him. They’d shut off the lantern to rest their eyes, and the only light came from the pale pink dot on her forehead. “What’re you laughing at?”

  Gunnar reached out and grabbed hold of Ray’s arms, then dragged her into his lap. Her curves seemed to melt against him, warm and soft. “You,” he teased.

  Ray cuddled against him and slipped her arm around his waist. Even now, after Gunnar had physically changed so much, Ray’s body felt like the perfect match for his own. When they were together like this, Gunnar was whole, his heart healed from past wounds he’d tried so hard to ignore.

  “Oh, yeah?” she whispered. “What about me makes you laugh?”

  Gunnar ran his hands over the convoluted braids that now adorned Ray’s head like a crown. His fingers caressed the back of her head and traced the line of her neck down to her shoulders. She’d changed since becoming a völva, but the important parts of her were still the same. “Your smile,” he said.

  “Oh, my smile’s funny?” Ray dragged the hair of Gunnar’s beard between her fingers.

  “Like a clown,” Gunnar whispered. He closed his hand around the back of Ray’s head and pulled her face up toward his.

  “Wait.” Ray pushed her fingertips against his lips. “I want, no, I need to get this out.”

  “Okay,” Gunnar whispered. “Let’s have it.”

  “Don’t,” Ray said. “You don’t get to be angry at me. Not about this. When you left me—”

  “I left YmirRe,” Gunnar protested.

  “When you left me,” Ray insisted, “I thought I’d die. The desert was so lonely, and nothing seemed worth the effort.”

  “I left for you,” Gunnar said. “Your career was over if we stayed together.”

  A tear leaked down Ray’s cheek. “Because that worked out so well.”

  “I couldn’t have known,” he said.

  “Stop,” Ray whispered and pressed her fingertips against his lips. “Just listen, okay?”

  Gunnar nodded, though five years of pain and frustration threatened to bubble up and spill out of his mouth with every passing second.

  “I was so mad that you left,” Ray continued. “I thought it was me, no matter what your note said. But as time passed, I realized what hurt the worst wasn’t what you’d done, but how you did it.”

  She took a deep, shuddering breath, and her next words were punctuated with quiet sobs. “I deserved a choice. It wasn’t your place to make that decision for me. For us.”

  Gunnar held his tongue as Rayleigh cried. Finally, after what felt like tortured hours, she brushed the tears from her cheeks. “Promise me you won’t take that away from me, not ever again.”

  The jarl let the witch’s pain wash over him. She was right. Leaving her had been the right thing to do, but he’d gone about it all wrong. As much pain as he’d been in for the past years, she’d suffered worse. Gunnar hadn’t given her the chance to work through her pain.

  “I didn’t think,” he said, brushing the tears from her cheeks with his thumbs. “I was an idiot. I should have come to you so we could make the decision together. I swear to you, I won’t do that again.”

  Rayleigh curled up against him and held his face in her hands. She leaned forward to gently kiss him. “Thank you. Now I can stop thinking of ways to kill you in your sleep.”

  She giggled as Gunnar pulled her closer, their faces a breath apart. His tongue darted over her full lips, a teasing flame that breathed life into the first sparks of lust between them.

  Her breath caught, and she sucked on the tip of his tongue, pulling it between her teeth to nip at him. Their arms wrapped around one another, pulling their bodies tight. Ray’s heart pounded against Gunnar’s chest, like the fluttering wings of a trapped bird.

  Gunnar wanted her right then, hard and savage. The urge to strip the furs away from her skin and plunge into her depths burned in him like the scorching twin of the berserk fury that had gripped him earlier. He kissed her more deeply, hungry to taste every part of her.

  Ray pushed one hand against his chest and pulled her head back. She pushed his legs together and straddled him, her hands behind his head, her face inches away from his. The hide vest struggled to contain the heaving mounds of her breasts, and they brushed against Gunnar’s chest with every breath. “Easy, tiger,” she whispered. “I’m a fragile flower. Don’t bruise the petals.”

  The bodyguard grabbed her plump hips and pulled her closer to him, his breath ragged and strained with desire. “I’m not sure that can be helped, but I’ll go easy on you.”

  “We’ll see,” she raised herself onto her knees and leaned forward to whisper in his ear. “I bet I can make you lose control. Just. Like. That.”

  She bit off the last three words with sharp snaps of her teeth and punctuated the promise by swirling her tongue along the outer edge of his ear. Her breath, hot with promise against his neck, inflamed Gunnar. When she dragged the tips of her nails down his chest, tracing circles around his nipples with their dagger-sharp points, he stiffened against her. Ray chuckled, her voice smoky and dangerous in the darkness, and slid her hands down to Gunnar’s stomach.

  His skin tightened at her touch, and he yearned to explore her with his fingers. He let his hands roam over her fur-clad body, stroking the small of her back through the threads, squeezing the firm swell of her ass, then coming around to her thighs, the smooth curves of her ribs, and up to the heavy weight of her soft breasts.

  Ray shrugged out of furs, exposing thin strips of Ray’s skin to Gunnar’s hands. The thick buds of her nipples sprang to life under his palms, hot and swollen. The pink light from her forehead grew more intense, coating them both in its blush radiance. Her pupils were wide and dark, sparks of light dancing in their depths as Gunnar’s thumbs teased her taut flesh.

  A chilly wind gusted across Ray’s back, making her shiver in Gunnar’s grasp. She leaned against him, eager for his warmth, her greedy hands fumbling with his pants, searching for the shaft she wanted buried deep inside her. Her breath escaped in a surprised little moan when she untied the knot at his waist and felt his thick length spring free of the coarse clothing. Ray curled both hands around him, squeezing his thick length and rubbing an index finger against the throbbing tip. The sparks in her eyes grew brighter, paler, and the pink light from her dot shifted to gold, then velvety purple, before settling into a swirling melange of all three colors.

  “Ray?” Gunnar asked.

  “I’m here,” she whispered back, and kissed him, flattening her tongue against his, shuddering as his hands squeezed her breasts. “We’re all here.”

  Mimi spoke the first word, then Bridget, and Ray again. Mimi’s steady hands peeled his shirt overhead. Her small, firm tits pressed against his back as she kneaded his shoulders, pushing the tension down to where Ray’s hands gripped him. Bridget’s cold lips pressed against his neck, her breath wintry fresh and bracing. It was impossible for them all to be so close to him. There was no space for their bodies in the cramped confines of their hiding space. But they were still there, as real as Ray’s hungry mouth against his.

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nbsp; Ray slid back from Gunnar and shucked his pants down to his knees. She lowered her head and opened her mouth wide, swallowing him one centimeter at a time. Gunnar’s hands fell to her shoulders, and he groaned. Ray laced her fingers through his, her tongue undulating against Gunnar’s cock as she sucked him deeper into her. When she’d taken as much as she could manage, Ray teased him, grazing his skin with her teeth, her tongue moving in circles in waves that lured him toward the edge of restraint.

  Mimi kissed the side of his neck, then clamped her mouth against him, sucking and biting at his flesh. Bridget pulled one of his hands free of Ray and to the swollen lips of her dripping sex. The four of them moaned together, a guttural chorus of desire. The völva moved faster, more urgently, and soon Gunnar had no idea who he was touching or where he was. Their world shrank to a greedy vortex of lust and need. They’d survived another day of madness and craved the wanton abandon of pure, unbridled lust.

  More than that, their intimate actions recharged them, filling their spirits with pure life that restored them.

  Ray raised her head, strings of glistening spit leading from her lush lips to Gunnar’s throbbing sex. Her tongue lashed across her lips, and her eyes burned with soul-deep hunger. She grabbed him again, her hand slipping up and down with urgent, feverish strokes. Mimi moaned against Gunnar’s neck, her hands reaching around to tug on the pointed tips of his nipples, pinching and twisting as she bit him, sucking his skin past her teeth. Bridget turned his face to her and kissed him, sucking his tongue deep into her mouth, her pulse matching his.

  The bodyguard reached behind him to tease the sopping slit between Mimi’s legs until her thighs trembled and his control nearly slipped.

  “Now,” he moaned and pulled Ray to him with his other hand. Years of familiarity guided him, and his cock found her slippery hole with ease.

  Ray moaned, and the other völva raised their voices with her. She pressed her hands against Gunnar’s chest. “Slow, slow,” she said. “Slow.”

  Gunnar raised his hips to meet her, hanging onto his senses by the barest of threads. The velvet vise of Ray’s tight, wet tunnel squeezed around him. His fingertips dug into her thick thighs as he held on, stretching her around him until she had all of him.

  “God,” she whispered, her voice hoarse and low. “My jarl, Gunnar, please.”

  Her hips rocked against him and he let her set the tempo. She leaned back and he raised his knees to support her. Her hands glided over his chest, then rose to her own. Her dot shifted to gold and she tweaked her nipples, pulling them hard, harder, until Mimi’s voice rang out. Cold fingers traced the line of Gunnar’s sternum and left frost trails that melted in the heat of his passion. Gunnar watched those same thin, white lines follow the inner curves of Ray’s thighs, to open her lips and reveal the swollen pearl between them.

  Gunnar couldn’t hold back any longer. He stroked her exposed button in circles, drawing cries from her throat, urging her to go faster, harder until their bodies crashed together with the ancient power of shifting seas and turning seasons. For a moment, the four of them were the only things in the world, a tangle of flesh and spirit devoted to the hunt for the ultimate pleasure. They soared like ravens above the chaos and madness of the world, burying their thoughts in the dark, wet places of each other’s bodies until all that remained was the sweet friction of flesh on flesh.

  The völva moaned in unison and Gunnar clung to Ray’s hips as she bucked and writhed atop him. She met his thrusts with eager motions of her own, a wordless grunt exploding out of her as they slammed together. Her sex convulsed around him and she leaned forward, her forehead pressed against his. Her heavy breasts brushed against him, their pointed tips seeming to burn his skin with every touch.

  Gunnar grabbed the back of Ray’s head and kissed her, his tongue deep inside her as his control broke. Their breath mingled in harsh gasps. Ray’s hands hung limp over his shoulders, her body quaking with seismic waves of pleasure. Gunnar exploded inside her again and again, each spasm more intense than the one that came before it. The presence of the other völva surrounded the pair as their motions slowed and their breaths became ragged, exhausted pants. They hung onto one another for long minutes after the others retreated. Ray finally raised her head and brushed Gunnar’s hair out of his eyes.

  “You need a barber, big boy,” she said. “And a shave. You look like a barbarian.”

  “You’re one to talk.” Gunnar’s fingertip followed a bead of sweat as it plunged from the hollow of Ray’s throat to the deep shadow of her cleavage. “You look like an extra from one of those old Ray Harryhausen movies. One Million BC or something.”

  Her deep, smoky laugh filled Gunnar with joy. It had been too long since he’d heard her so relaxed. Her guard was down, and the pure light of her soul shone through. This was the Ray he loved. Losing her had almost killed him.

  “Hey.” She smiled and snuggled up against him. “Promise me something?”

  “I just promised you something,” Gunnar said with mock annoyance. “What now?”

  “Make it hurt when you kill Arthur,” she whispered, her voice dark and eerie as a winter wind through dead tree branches. “For me.”

  Chapter 22

  BOGIE COULDN’T BELIEVE this shit. He’d found Hilda’s lair after the bitch told him to get fucked. He’d expected Arthur to tear the rebel a new asshole, at the least. But when the growing jötunn army under Arthur’s control had shown up at their new digs, Hilda was practically sitting on the boss man’s lap. The two of them had spent the whole night in deep conversation. When Bogie had woken at the ass-crack of dawn to oversee the clean-up operation, he tried to approach Arthur.

  “Not now,” the boss said irritably. “I have to prepare for the ritual tonight. The Behemoth fucked up, so it’s down to me to fix this mess. Get the bodies out of here. I want this place presentable when Hyrrokkin arrives.”

  “Sure,” Bogie said, his stomach churning with anger.

  He hadn’t bent the knee to Arthur to be treated like shit. Bogie was a warrior, and he deserved respect. Cleaning up a mess—one that Arthur had made—wasn’t his job.

  Bogie found a cluster of jötnar sleeping in a pile near the Boneyard’s gate. He kicked one of them in the chin and spat on another. “Get up, you lazy fucks,” he snarled. “Gotta job for you.”

  The kicked jötunn shook his head and dragged his sorry ass up onto his feet. He spat out a chip from his tooth and a glob of blood. “What the fuck is wrong with you?”

  Bogie’s golden pistol appeared in his hand as if by magic. He rammed the weapon up under the monster’s chin so hard his jaw clacked together and chipped another tooth. “Listen, asshole,” Bogie snarled. “You and your little buddies here need to get up and drag the dead outside. Burn them. Then clean the rest of the Boneyard. Arthur wants it clean as a whistle before the ritual tonight.”

  The jötunn tried to open his mouth, but Bogie kept up the pressure from his enormous pistol until the monster nodded. “Fine,” he grumbled. “We’ll do it.”

  Bogie raked the pistol’s sight along the jötunn’s jaw, tearing the skin. “Of course you will,” he said. “Seeya around.”

  Pushing around the weaker jötunn hadn’t improved Bogie’s mood as much as he would have liked. He was still pissed that Hilda wasn’t dead, and even more pissed that Arthur had treated him like shit. “I’ll show those fuckers,” Bogie muttered.

  The Behemoth was dead, and Gungnir was in the hands of Odin’s pawn. And that gave Bogie an idea. If getting a relic would earn Arthur’s respect, then Bogie would get a fucking relic.

  He prowled through the Boneyard in search of a specific group of jötnar. They were badasses, hard to the core. They claimed they were Hyrrokkin’s vanguard, fresh from Jotunheim. Bogie didn’t know if that was true, but he’d seen them fight and they were stone-cold killers. Just what he needed. But he didn’t want to show up empty-handed. He spied a group gathered around a cooking fire and stormed over to them.

&nb
sp; “Give me that,” he said, pointing his gun at the skewer of meat sizzling over the open flames.

  The other jötnar glared at him. “Fuck—”

  Bogie shot the male through the eye. “Give me the fucking food.”

  A female jötunn scrambled around the fire, grabbed the skewer’s handle, and gingerly passed it to him. “Sorry, Bogie,” she said, eyes downcast. “Didn’t recognize you.”

  Bogie left without a word, ignoring the jötnar who’d been shaken awake by the gunshot. He sneered at their surprised faces and waggled his gun at any who thought about giving him shit. When he finally found the group he was looking for, the meat had grown a bit cool but still looked juicy and delicious to him.

  “Hey, guys,” Bogie said as he stepped up to the circle of warriors. “Brought you some breakfast.”

  The biggest of the jötnar before him stood up from the crate he was using for a seat and approached Bogie. He grabbed the skewer and took a bite out of the biggest piece of meat. “Thanks for the snack. What do you want?”

  Bogie wanted to lash out at the jötunn, but he held his temper. These boys were the real deal. Even if he shot one of them dead, the other four would tear him limb from limb. He cleared his throat and looked up into the utterly inhuman eyes of the jötunn chewing on the bloody chunk of meat. “I’ve got a job. I need your help.”

  The jötnar laughed like that was the funniest thing they’d heard in a month. “Fuck you, Bogie. Go suck Arthur’s dick or something.”

  Bogie’s spine stiffened at the insult, and his hand drifted to the holster on his hip. “Listen to me, you overgrown nutsack,” he growled. “This isn’t just any job. I know where to find Gungnir.”