by Devon Monk
The contrast between what his god power represented, and what he preferred to do on vacation made me wonder once again just how much the gods held on to their mortal personalities even after millennia as deities. Or maybe just how much the gods delighted in doing the exact opposite of their normal god-power duties while on vacation.
“If you think of anything, tell me. If you see anything that could lead to your powers, tell me. If you have a vision or hunch or dream, I want to know. Ordinary is a small town. It shouldn’t take us very long to cover it.”
Of course I was massively simplifying the problem. It wasn’t just finding the powers that was the problem. Whoever or whatever had taken them would need to be dealt with too, even if it was only Raven’s own power that had hidden the rest of them away.
I had no idea what sort of creature or person in existence could not only sense god powers, but could also handle them and physically move them.
I made a note to look back over the list of current and past creatures who had called Ordinary their home. Who in town could touch a god power and not be destroyed by it?
There was another possibility, of course. That the powers had been drawn away by some kind of supernatural force instead of some kind of supernatural being. It was a long shot, since I’d think any number of creatures and deities would feel something hinky going down in town, but it wasn’t completely impossible.
But then almost nothing was completely impossible in Ordinary.
We’d need to check in with anyone sensitive enough to the forces, magics, and powers in the town who might have felt a shift.
Which pretty much meant I’d be going door-to-door asking people if they’d felt a disturbance in the Force.
Terrific.
“Well then,” Ares, who looked like a twenty-something computer geek and owned the nursery and garden center, clapped his hands together to break the silence. “We have our battle plan. Crow stays with the Chief, the rest of us go back to our daily lives and wait for our powers to show up in the local lost-and-found. Easy.”
But of course, the way Ares said it made everyone grumble again.
Just because he wasn’t currently the god of war didn’t mean he could resist stirring up trouble amongst his neighbors.
I glared at him, and he gave me an angelic smile.
Jerk.
“I know it won’t be that easy,” I said. “And I know you all are uncomfortable standing on the sidelines of a crime. But it is a crime. According to the contract of Ordinary, all crimes are handled by the police. Me. That doesn’t mean I don’t want your help. If any of you suspect where your powers might be, or who they might be with, call the station. We’ll be the point on this investigation, but input on the search is welcome.”
There was a general rumble of annoyance and agreement, and then Frigg opened the door.
“We trust you, Delaney,” she said. “You’ve always done right by us.” She walked out the door, then jogged through the rain.
The rest of the deities followed her example. Hades, Thanatos, Zeus, Ares, Athena, Brigid, Nortia, Momus, Poseidon, Bast, and many more, gave me a nod or a glare, then stepped out into the rain.
Only Odin and Crow remained behind.
Crow stood with his back against the cold furnace, his eyes closed as he pinched the bridge of his nose. His shoulders were slumped. He looked like a man who had just escaped being mauled by a room full of lions, tigers, and bears.
Close enough.
“Get your coat,” I said.
He tipped his head and opened his eyes, but his fingers remained between his eyebrows.
“What?”
“Lock up the shop. We’re going now.”
“But...what?”
Okay, maybe he was still coming to grips with his near-death experience.
“You’re riding with me today. Protective custody. I need to take Odin back to his place. Let’s go.”
“But my shop. My...my work. I can’t just shut everything down.”
“Yes, you can. As a matter of fact, you need to make some long-term plans about shutting it down or giving it to someone else to run. Because as soon as we find the powers, you will pick yours back up and leave Ordinary like you should have three months ago. You broke the rules. That’s not going to fly.”
Crow dropped his hand, his arms loose at his side, his head thunked back against the kiln. If defeat had an avatar, Crow could model for it.
“All right.” His voice had gone very soft. “I got it. Let me shut things down. Give me a minute.”
He pushed off the furnace and headed to the back of the shop to his small office and outside door.
“Do you believe him?”
I looked over at Odin who stood near the front windows. His back was toward me, his hands planted against his hips so that his elbows jutted out. He looked broad and strong as a granite outcropping standing there while the storm whipped against the glass.
“Crow?” I asked.
He grunted in agreement.
“Do I believe he doesn’t have the powers anymore? That’s pretty obvious.”
Odin shifted his weight and turned toward me, backlit now by the gray day. “Do you believe he doesn’t know where the powers are?”
My first response was to say yes, of course I believed he didn’t know. He was obviously freaked out over the loss and afraid of what the other deities would do to him because of his lapse. I didn’t think there had ever been a god who had failed to keep the powers safe and hidden while they were in Ordinary.
Crow had just put himself in the history books, and not in a good way.
But he had admitted the power tricked him. Maybe somehow, even in a subconscious way, he might know where the powers were. “If he knows, I’ll make him tell me.”
Odin shook his head slightly. “You heard me before, didn’t you, Delaney?” His voice had an even timbre I wasn’t used to from him. He sounded almost...fatherly. Odin had never been fatherly. Cranky, egotistical, and self-centered, yes. But not fatherly. Not to me.
“Heard what?”
“Crow is not your uncle. Not family. Really, none of us are. Your father understood that. There is a division between gifted mortals, like you and your bloodline, and gods who are temporarily mortal. Even though we don’t carry our powers, we don’t...see the world in the same way as a mortal. We can’t. We have been changed too much by the power we bear.”
I nodded. I didn’t think I’d ever heard this many words out of him in all my years of knowing him. It was surprising enough that I didn’t want to interrupt.
“We don’t see the world in the same manner as mortals. We don’t experience time as a mortal would.” He gestured with one meaty hand as if he were trying to drag words out of the air, then planted his palm back on his hip. “We do not love as a mortal loves. Not even if we try.”
Thunder rumbled slow and low outside and the rain picked up.
The entire conversation made me feel sad, though I couldn’t say why. Maybe it was because it was so unexpected. I would never have guessed Odin had this kind of insight to share. Never would have thought he’d given any time to consider what a mortal might think and feel as compared to a god.
But then, he was known as a wandering god, as a wise man. Maybe the accident-prone, grumpy chainsaw artist I knew was just an act he put on. A part he played to fit in this ordinary town in this ordinary world.
“So if Crow has found a way to make you think he loves you, that he cares for you as a mortal cares for another mortal, think twice, Delaney, before you believe him.”
Thunder rolled again, a soft rumble to the north, nearly out of town now.
“If I believe Crow doesn’t care for me, for my well-being, because no god is capable of that kind of caring, then how exactly am I to take your advice, Odin? It’s very kind of you to warn me like this.”
He shook his shaggy head, his grin a slice of white in the dark shadows over his face. “I’m not saying this out of kindness. I’m ju
st telling an officer of the law to be wary of me and my kind, especially when we’re trying to be helpful.”
“Or when you’re worried about me?”
He scowled, but I wasn’t buying it. It had only been a couple months ago, right after Heimdall’s murder that Odin and several other gods had told me they had promised my dad they’d help me if I needed it.
There was plenty at stake for the gods to want to make sure I did my job and did it well.
But it wasn’t just for their own survival that the gods had offered to help me. My father had forged a friendship with the gods of our town that hinged on mutual respect. He hadn’t spoken much about how the Reeds before him had interacted with gods, other than to say they had always carried out their duties. But I’d gotten the impression that past Reeds hadn’t seen the use in socializing much with the gods.
Back in those days, generations ago, the town was really nothing more than a small collection of buildings along the dirt road that followed the coastline dotted with fishing boats and cabins built into the hills. There wasn’t much for a Reed to do but to occasionally hike out to a god’s place and make sure they weren’t using their powers while inside the town’s boundaries.
Dad had changed that. He had been not just the police chief, he had also been a man the gods could turn to with questions, troubles, and opinions.
He had become their friend, no matter what Odin wanted to call it.
“Yes,” Odin agreed, bringing me back into the conversation. “Especially when we seem to be worried about you.”
“Are you?”
“Worried?”
I waited.
“You are more than your ability, Delaney. I understand that. Many of the gods do. But just as many gods and creatures and mortals in town see you as your job. As the law. As the police chief. That is a dangerous position to hold. One of extreme expectations. One that could put you in the line of fire when those expectations are not met.”
A chill washed over my skin. Hera, who had gone by the mortal name Herri and run a bar here in town, had picked up her power to help me find Cooper too. Unlike Crow, she had left town for one year as required by the contract.
She had told me that there was a war coming. She had told me it was headed toward Ordinary. I’d been looking over my shoulder for three months. Other than the constant rain, Ordinary had seemed normal enough.
Until all the god powers had been stolen.
“What line of fire? If you know something about the war headed our way, I want to know.”
“War?” his eyebrows shot down. “Is that what you think?”
Hera had also told me to choose my allies carefully. That people might not be who I thought they were. I studied Odin and went with my gut. I trusted him.
“Hera mentioned a war headed our way. Do you know anything about that?”
He rubbed one calloused thumb over the corner of his mouth, his gaze on the floor. “Through the ages there have always been wars among gods. Just because we vacation doesn’t mean we give up our basic instincts. But war. Here.” He was silent for several minutes.
I listened to the cars hushing by the shop, wet pavement making tires louder than engines.
“What does your blood tell you, Delaney?”
His words flashed like fire across my skin, then sank deep into my bones where they pulsed. My blood. Reed blood. Protectors of Ordinary.
We were connected to this land, connected to all the forces and creatures and gods who walked upon it. Our roots ran deep, into the soil, the sand, the salt. And I knew, in that quick instant that something was coming for Ordinary. A storm. War.
But all I said was, “I don’t know.”
“You had better. And soon. Your father didn’t listen to the blood.” He shook his head. “You understand that, don’t you?”
I swallowed. What did our blood have to do with Dad, with a possible war? “What happened?”
“He chose sides. Too late.”
Crow stomped into the room. “All right. I’m ready.”
He wore a quilted canvas jacket and had shoved a gray beanie over his dark hair.
He was also wearing an umbrella on his head.
Neither Odin nor I moved. A hundred questions were spinning through my mind. Too late for what? Choose what sides? I wanted to ask Odin what he knew. It should have been second nature for me to grill him. I was a cop. I knew how to ask questions and get answers.
Also: umbrella hat?
As soon as Crow had walked back into the room, Odin had shut down. That warmth—no, heat—that had been in his gaze, in his words, was once again stowed behind the man I’d known for so many years.
A grumpy, accident-prone chainsaw artist.
The quick change must mean he didn’t want to talk in front of Crow.
Or he was just as baffled by the hat as I was.
Choose sides. Between the gods? Or was Odin just angry at Crow for losing his power and trying to make me turn against a man I considered my uncle?
“Everything okay?” Crow asked looking between us. “Delaney?”
“What is on your head?”
“My hair.”
“Over that.”
“My beanie.”
Really?
“Why are you wearing an umbrella hat on your head?”
“Where else should I wear a hat? Really, Delaney, you’re ridiculous.”
Odin hrumphed and headed toward the door. “I’ve wasted enough of my time today on you, Crow. If Delaney weren’t here I’d show you just how much I’ve enjoyed wasting my time on someone who couldn’t do one simple job right.”
Crow licked his lips and glanced at me for reassurance. I’d never seen him so nervous around another god before. No, strike that. I’d never seen him nervous around anyone before.
Either he was afraid of Odin, or he was playing me so I would take his side.
Okay, that kind of double-guessing everything was going to have to stop right now. I was not paranoid. I refused to become paranoid. Unless maybe I should be paranoid.
“Let’s go, bumbershoot head.” I waved at the door, telling them both to walk out in front of me so I could keep an eye on them.
Okay, maybe I was a little paranoid.
Crow stared at Odin’s retreating form, then trudged along after him, waiting at the door for me to walk through so he could set the alarm and locks. He patted the doorframe gently, like he was saying good-bye to an old friend.
Well, he wasn’t saying good-bye yet, but he would be. Losing the powers meant not only putting himself in jeopardy with the other gods, it meant putting the rules of Ordinary in jeopardy.
When the rules were broken, I was the one who had to answer for it. And I would.
As soon as we found his powers.
I gave him his moment at the door and dashed over to the Jeep.
I opened the Jeep and slid in, Odin taking the passenger side. He didn’t buckle the seat belt or look at me. He just scowled at the rain, lost in his own thoughts.
“Just so you know,” I said, as rain rattled against the metal roof and Crow jogged across the parking lot toward us, the umbrella hat a bright crazy blob in the gray light, “I appreciate what you said in there. I’ll be careful.”
“And will you call on me?” He still didn’t look my way, didn’t take his gaze off the gray and wet.
“Yes,” I said, not knowing exactly what I was agreeing to. I wasn’t close to Odin, not in a familial way, but the man here in my Jeep was steady, serious, and seemed to know things I wanted to understand.
“We need to talk. About Dad.”
Odin grunted, but the line of his massive shoulders relax minutely.
“You know where I’ll be.”
Then the back door opened and Crow bulleted into the seat, slamming the door behind him. “Can we stop for food? I’m starving.”
“No,” Odin and I said at the same time.
Crow gave an offended sound, and caught my gaze in the rearview mir
ror.
“I haven’t eaten since lunch yesterday.”
“If you behave yourself, I’ll stop for coffee before we head in to the station.”
“Fine.” He crossed his arms over his chest and frowned out the window like a petulant child. With a parasol on his head. Those things were never going to catch on.
“Suck it up, Crow,” Odin growled.
One grouchy god.
Check.
One pouty god.
Check.
Silver lining? Starting a Monday out this bad meant it couldn’t get worse.
~~~
It got worse.
I’d dropped Odin off at his property, and Crow had claimed the passenger seat. He spent the next twenty minutes complaining about the rain, the gods accusing him of losing their powers on purpose, and having skipped dinner and breakfast.
“You’re going to complain about how hard things are for you today, when you are the one who has made every god in town angry, lost their powers—lost, Crow—which is something no one has ever done in the history of Ordinary, and doubled my workload? Not to mention that you broke the contract with Ordinary by picking your power back up and then not leaving town for a year. I can not start to explain just how angry I am at you for that.”
And even more, for making me think that his trickster power should be allowed to do that. I should not have trusted him.
He chewed on his bottom lip while I navigated the rain and traffic. “Buy you an Egg McMuffin with extra cheese?” he said quietly.
I sighed, trying to rein in my anger and worry. It had taken three months before anything bad had happened from him breaking the rules. Maybe we could fix it before anything else bad happened.
“Why didn’t you eat dinner?”
“I was busy.”
“Doing what?”
“I...was out of town. Picking up some things for my shop.”
“You going to come up with a receipt for these things with a date stamp on them?”
He rubbed at the bridge of his nose again. “I was out of town at a movie. I have the ticket for that.”
That seemed a little more likely. We had a three-plex here in town, but it didn’t always get the newest blockbusters. Driving into the valley to Salem or even Dallas, where they had bigger movie theaters, was pretty common. So was taking an extra hour to drive up to Portland and catch a show at the Imax big screens.
