Falling for Gods: A Reverse Harem Urban Fantasy (Their Dark Valkyire Book 3)

by Eva Chase

  I moved to turn on my heel.

  “Loki,” Surt said, straightening up. He stepped toward me, but his sword stayed down at his side. “You know we have more kinship than you share with any of those lordly beings up in their bright city. Have you forgotten where you began so quickly?”

  “Oh, believe me, I remember quite well,” I said. “In particular, I remember why I left it. Nothing I’ve seen since then has led me to regret that decision. I’ll take the arrogant over the brutes, thank you.”

  “The brutes.” Surt shook his head. “Come? I will show you something.”

  “And why should I want to see anything you would want to show me?”

  His eyes glittered. “Because of all the beings in Asgard, you at least care to know everything you possibly can. Or have they finally taught you how to close your mind like they do theirs?”

  He strode off along the line of trees, his sword swinging at his side. I grimaced at myself and followed after him, keeping a safe distance. Our greatest enemy stood before me. It would be foolhardy to ignore anything he might be willing to share. I gathered knowledge, yes—so I could use it to my advantage when I needed to. If wielded properly, a fact could be a sharper weapon than any blade.

  Surt’s powerful legs carried him swiftly even if he couldn’t leave the ground. I had to walk briskly to keep up. We passed the span of forest where I’d done my searching and veered across the mostly barren ground toward what appeared to be a narrow valley carved into the hard-packed earth.

  The giant stopped at the edge of the wide crevice. He swept his free hand toward it.

  “This is what’s become of our homeland. The ground itself will not hold. It splits and breaks as if wrenching itself apart.”

  I tipped my head to one side. “A bit of a hassle for one passing through, I suppose, but hardly a catastrophe.”

  Surt whirled toward me, a surge of fire hissing along his blade. “Do you think this is the only one? The only place? The earth opened beneath the capital a few years ago. It swallowed hundreds with their houses. And there were more before and since.”

  “Ah,” I said, keeping my expression and my voice blank. I hadn’t actually discovered that yet. I hadn’t had all that much time for venturing around Jotunheim since our escape from Muninn’s prison, and I’d had no access for decades before then. This was worse than I would have imagined.

  Odin had known, hadn’t he? How could he have failed to notice a crumpled city in his constant peering from his high seat?

  “And do you intend to seal the earth back together through some magic you haven’t shared with me yet?” I inquired. “How does your great plan to rip apart the realms that remain untouched help anyone, really, in the long run?”

  “Do you know why the realms are falling apart?” Surt asked. “Why only Asgard and Midgard hold steady? Surely the great mind of Loki can put the pieces together.”

  Asgard was the realm of the gods, and Midgard lay at the center of it all. That was how we’d explained it when we’d discussed it between ourselves. But it wasn’t really an answer, was it? What was so special about Midgard, really, other than it being a land far more appealing to myself and my companions than any other…

  Or perhaps that was my answer right there.

  “The gods used to visit all of the realms regularly,” I said slowly. “Now we rarely venture beyond those two.”

  “And still you say ‘we’ as if they’ll ever truly let you be one of them.” Surt made a scoffing sound. “This is all their doing. My imprisonment in Muspelheim. The fracturing of the realms. They can’t be bothered to act as the caretakers they take such pride in being. And you’d stand by them still?”

  “As opposed to standing with you while you burn everything else to the ground?” I retorted.

  “Oh, there will be burning,” Surt said. “But only as long as it takes to claim the better lands we’re owed. There’s plenty of room in Asgard and Midgard to fit us, isn’t there? The humans will adjust to a little extra servitude. Perhaps they’ll be better off. And this time it’ll be the gods who are chained. We’ll bring them down to the realms, force them to lend their powers to healing these worlds, as they rightfully should.”

  He sliced his sword through the air, and the fire in it warbled. “I can do it faster and more cleanly with you alongside me, Loki. You’re worthy of greater honors than they’ll ever offer you. Stand with me and take what should be yours, and we’ll divide the realms between us. Isn’t it time they lost the upper hand? You can save the realms they always claimed you would destroy.”

  His words tugged at something deep inside me. The bitter anger in them stirred a matching emotion I’d so often buried. Suddenly I understood him so well I could have cringed and laughed at the same time. My fingers curled into my palms. Oh, I knew that anger, all right.

  I’d seen Surt’s brutality with my own eyes, all those centuries ago—but then, I’d also seen plenty of brutality from the gods. After all this time under their heels, kicked about like a dog they didn’t want at the dinner table… The thought of taking the reins and putting them in their places did have a certain appeal. I could be a kinder jailer than they’d ever been to me.

  A sickly satisfaction spread through me at the idea. How many times had I dreamed of a moment like this, all those ages ago? I could be brutal too, in my own ways, when the situation called for it. Could I really say I got no enjoyment from it at all?

  Perhaps Surt was right. We were more alike than I’d wanted to consider.

  I studied the giant, and resolve solidified in my chest. There was something to be gained here after all.

  “I may entertain your offer,” I said. “Perhaps we should discuss it further in your own kingdom, behind walls where Odin has no chance of overhearing?”

  Surt grinned. “Come along then, and we’ll see where we end up.”

  18

  Aria

  Evening had fallen as I sprawled on my stomach at the edge of the grassy cliff-edge where Asgard fell away into the sky. The rainbow bridge’s surface still shimmered. When Loki came loping across its arc, glints of its color caught in his pale red hair and cast his paler skin in odd shades.

  His gaze was distant, his expression unusually serious. I sat up, and it was only then that he seemed to notice I was there.

  “Pixie,” he said, coming to a stop at the foot of the bridge. “Playing watchdog?”

  I wasn’t completely sure what he meant, but it did probably look a little odd for me to be perched here.

  “I was thinking about Heimdall watching the bridge all the time when he still lived here,” I said. “Trying to figure out where someone like that would want to go if he wasn’t here. So far it hasn’t really helped, though.”

  I expected Loki to stroll over and join me, or else to beckon me to join him, but he just stood there, his stance a little stiff. A tickle of uneasiness ran down my back.

  “We gave the search our best shot,” he said. “At this point I assume if the other gods care to join us, they’ll have to do it by their own steam.”

  I pushed myself to my feet. Loki didn’t exactly pull away from me as I walked over to him, but he did start striding on toward the city as if it didn’t matter to him all that much whether I reached him. The tickling niggled deeper.

  “Hey,” I said, jogging the last few steps to grab his elbow. “What’s the hurry? Did something happen down there?”

  He stopped and arched an eyebrow as he peered down at me. “Nothing of note. I’m merely tired of rushing to and fro searching for those who apparently care so little what happens to this place. There’s leftover roast in my cold room I had a mind to eat, and a bed I’m looking forward to collapsing onto.”

  He was talking in his usual wry tone, but there was something distant about it too. I inhaled as I decided what to say next, and a whiff of a smoky chemical smell seeped into my nose, just barely perceptible to my heightened valkyrie senses. I leaned closer, and Loki eased away from me.r />
  It had come from him. I knew that smell. It was the stink of Muspelheim.

  Why would he have risked going there alone? And if he’d gone there, how could he have been coming back over the rainbow bridge? I’d been sitting by it since Thor and I had gotten back—I’d have known if Odin had directed it somewhere other than Midgard.

  If Loki had been acting like normal, I’d have asked him directly, but the distance in his demeanor made me balk.

  “Where did you search?” I asked, keeping my tone as casual as I could manage. “It seemed like Thor and I covered most of Midgard. But maybe you know different places than he does.”

  “Oh, here and there.” The trickster waved his hand dismissively. “There’s a lot of world to cover in that realm of yours.” He gave me a smile that would have settled my nerves if I hadn’t known he’d just lied to me.

  My stomach twisted. I didn’t know how to confront him on that lie. Loki could talk his way out of just about anything. If he didn’t want to admit what he’d been up to, there was no chance in hell I’d pry the truth out of him.

  “Okay,” I said. “Well, go enjoy that roast of yours.”

  He tipped his head to me. For a second I thought he might lean in for a kiss. But he pulled himself back and hurried on toward his hall, leaving me with an ache that stretched from my gut to my heart.

  Loki had been more tense than I remembered from our first few weeks together ever since we’d escaped from Muninn’s prison, but that made sense. He’d been faced with horrors as traumatic as anything I’d been through, ones I was sure he’d buried to keep the peace with the other gods. And he’d obviously been frustrated that they weren’t willing to force the issue of Odin’s past actions with the Allfather yet.

  This was something different, though. He’d never been so standoffish with me. I was his valkyrie, the one he’d chosen. If he didn’t even think he could trust me with the truth of what he’d been doing…

  I didn’t know how to follow that thread to a logical conclusion. Or maybe I did, but none of the conclusions I could draw sat right with me. Biting my lip, I wandered into the city along the same path he’d taken.

  Loki had already disappeared into his hall—assuming that was where he’d really been going. I paused partway down the road, unsure of where I wanted to go.

  The door to Thor’s huge hall eased open, and the thunder god came out onto the threshold.

  “Is everything all right?” he asked. “You look a bit lost.”

  “I’m okay,” I said. “I just…” I rubbed my face. I didn’t know what to say about it either.

  “Do you want to come in?”

  Thor’s tone was soft, but a thread of heat wove through it anyway. I paused, tugged by a totally different sort of emotion. I never had made good on the promise that he’d only have to wait a few more hours to enjoy each other’s company after we’d been interrupted the other morning.

  And I didn’t really want to be alone right now, with this uneasiness creeping through me.

  “I think I would,” I said, and went to meet him in the doorway.

  I hadn’t paid a whole lot of attention to his hall when I’d snuck in here that night, other than to figure out where the bedroom was. In the clearer light of the evening, I was struck by just how vast the place really was. The ceiling loomed far enough over the central hall to have held two floors instead of just the one, and at least a couple dozen doors lined that hall.

  “This is an awful lot of space for one guy,” I said. “Even a guy as big as you.” I knuckled Thor’s arm affectionately.

  He chuckled. “Well, it wasn’t always only mine.”

  Oh, right. “You were married,” I said. “Before.”

  “Before Ragnarok. Yes. Sif.” He said her name easily and evenly, so I guessed that split hadn’t been too painful. Or maybe it’d just happened so long ago that he’d had more than enough time to get over it. Curiosity pricked at me anyway.

  “What happened?” I asked. “You said before that a lot of people went their separate ways afterward, everyone was so shook up. Was it just that?”

  “That was some of it. She was definitely shaken.” He rested his hand on my shoulder blade and ushered me down the hall. “She didn’t want me to leave on any more adventuring, and she couldn’t stand that Loki and I made peace with each other. She and him…” He paused, the corner of his mouth quirking up. “I was furious at the time. She had the most gorgeous hair, even closer to gold than Freya’s is, and one day he got it into his head to chop it all off when she was sleeping. He never did own up to why. Maybe it was part of that ruckus-raising Odin ordered him to do.”

  A shadow crossed the thunder god’s face then. I slipped my hand around his and squeezed. “What happened?”

  “Oh, I yelled at him some, and he promised me he’d only been making way for an even finer head of hair for her. Off he flew down to Nidavellir to have the dark elves craft some—out of actual gold. It really was the most lovely thing. She liked it, even though she didn’t want to admit it. And I got Mjolnir out of that same bargain. As far as I’m concerned, all’s well that ends well. Sif… Sif could hold quite a grudge.”

  He’d patted the hammer hanging from his belt when he mentioned it. My stomach knotted all over again. The story he was telling me—it was another side of the story that had ended with Loki’s mouth sewn shut because the gods had judged against him on his bet.

  That memory still stung Loki. Thor smiled when he talked about it. He hadn’t been there in the memory Muninn had constructed, so who knew how much he knew about that incident, but he had to be aware of the consequences the trickster god had faced.

  Maybe it wasn’t surprising that Loki sometimes retreated into himself, even from me. He’d had to hold so much in for so long. Keeping up that slyly cheerful front must have gotten exhausting.

  That still didn’t explain him outright lying about sneaking off to Muspelheim, though.

  Thor motioned me into a side room where a cushioned bench squatted next to a low table. The table was laid with bread, various fruits, and a hunk of cheese.

  “Already time for your second dinner?” I teased.

  “Who says I ever finished my first one?” Thor replied with a grin.

  The niggling doubts stayed with me as I sat on the bench next to him. I picked up a strawberry and bit into it, but the tart juice on my tongue wasn’t enough to distract me.

  “Loki hasn’t gotten into any ‘trouble’ since then—since Ragnarok—has he?” I said. “It seems like all the stories I’ve heard are from before.”

  “Nothing extreme enough that I remember it,” Thor said. “And from what I remember, he was very contrite when we first returned. He has his sly ways about him, for his own amusement, and he certainly enjoys prodding those he doesn’t get along with on occasion, but… Well, even before, he was rarely actually cruel.”

  “There was no reason for him to be stirring up chaos anymore,” I said.

  “No. I suppose not.” Thor shook his head. “If he’d been allowed to be completely on our side, I can’t help wondering if we could have avoided Ragnarok altogether.”

  I blinked at him. “Odin seems to think it had to happen.” None of the other gods, even Loki, had indicated they didn’t agree with that one thing.

  “And maybe he’s right,” the thunder god said. “He would know better than me. But with Loki’s cleverness… I suppose Odin is the only person he could never quite outwit. If he’d put that mind to use fighting for us, I can only imagine how differently that final battle might have gone.”

  He looked at the cheese sandwich he’d been putting together as if he couldn’t remember why he’d thought he was hungry. His forehead furrowed. “I suppose it’s silly for me to think I could come up with some sort of scheme.”

  “Of course not,” I said. “Just because he’s clever doesn’t mean he’s got all the wits in Asgard. Why? Did you have a scheme?”

  Thor waved me off. “It’s nothin
g. The others made that clear.”

  “No, come on.” I scooted closer to him, setting my hand on his arm. “I want to hear about it.”

  He was silent for a long moment. Then he set down the sandwich and ran his fingers through his thick hair. His gaze slid away from me as if he were afraid to watch my reaction while he spoke. There was something sweet about how nervous he was to share this part of himself.

  “I’ve thought, the way the giants are—Surt’s been apart from them for so long, and they always did squabble amongst themselves as it was—they’re so easily tricked if they think something they want is in reach, or that they have to avenge themselves of some slight… Perhaps we could find a way to use them against Surt. Make them our army without them even realizing who they’re fighting for.” He ducked his head. “Just a vague idea.”

  “It sounds like a good idea to me,” I said, imagining a horde of giants charging toward Surt’s fortress. “Why don’t you tell the others and figure out the rest with them?”

  Thor made a pained expression. “I tried. They brushed me off and went on with their own planning. It’s not as if I’ve been a fountain of wisdom in the past, you know. I’m the Thunderer.”

  “Hey.” I poked him in the arm so he’d look at me. “That doesn’t mean they shouldn’t pay attention when you do have an idea. And anyway, you’re not just thunder, are you? You’ve got lightning. Why focus only on the loud and strong side when you can be quick and sharp too?”

  His mouth opened and closed again before he managed to answer. “That’s a very good question,” he said. “I’ve spent so much time thundering around, it’s easy to forget how powerful even one bolt of electricity can be.”

  Even a small one. “I haven’t forgotten,” I said, thinking of the sparks that had danced from his fingertips over my body during that interlude in Muninn’s prison. A sudden heat pooled low in my belly, urged on by the warmth of his body right next to mine. I lowered my eyelashes, trying out a little slyness myself. “I’m always happy to offer myself up as a test subject if you need a little practice to jog your memory.”