by S. E. Babin
She accepted it gratefully and took a sip. "I like what you've done with the place. Are your people settled back in?"
I nodded. "The ones who came back. Some chose to go back to Asgard."
Alaria winced. "Ouch."
"I cannot blame them. I promised them safety and within the first week I had to evacuate them all thanks to Tyr and Trin."
Her face darkened at the mention of the Valkyrie.
"Have you seen her?" I asked quietly.
She gave a single shake of her head. "Neither hide nor hair of the woman. The council voted to clip her wings and shun her."
My heart sank a little though I was not surprised at the punishment. "Oh, Alaria."
She waved my sympathy away. "Her actions were unbecoming of a Valkyrie. She tried to overthrow Asgard leadership and she wanted to take up with a god." Her mouth puckered like she was sucking on sour candy. "Even worse...she chose Tyr. She couldn't even choose someone handsome. Like Loki."
Said handsome guy sat at the far side of the tavern nursing a glass of his favorite mead and flipping through a book called, "How to Be a Human in an Alien Society."
I snorted. "He's handsome but he's a handful."
Alaria sipped his beer. "So...any consummating I should know about?"
My lip curled up. "No," I said curtly. "I've been married since the dawn of time. The last thing I want to do is hop into bed with another god. Then they expect it and think they own me and it becomes a vicious cycle."
Alaria sat her tankard down. "Loki is not Odin," she said softly.
"Aye, but he is a god."
Alaria's gaze settled on the dark-haired trickster. "I think you should give the man a chance. He stood beside you when few others would have."
"I didn't say he wasn't a good man."
Alaria stood. "Aye, you didn't. But maybe you should give him the chance to be a good husband." With a wave of her fingers, she disappeared.
Her words stayed with me far after she'd gone.
The bar hadn't been as busy as it was before Tyr and Trin came in and scared the hell out of everyone. We'd lost about twenty-five percent of the population since I'd retrieved everyone from the Valkyrie safehouse. Mostly families with young children. I couldn't blame them. The children didn't have full use of their magic yet and were vulnerable. I'd tried my best to get them to stay, but when they insisted, I released them from their bonds and gave them safe passage back to Asgard. I did, however, wipe their memories of the exact location of this place. One could never know what kind of information would slip out during an innocent conversation.
There had been no more incidents with the wards. So far everything was quiet. It was exactly what I hoped for, though I did miss the innocent sounds of children playing in the streets when I stepped outside. Some children remained, but they were older. They were far more sullen than the younger ones and preferred silence over playing ball in the streets.
I knew it wouldn't last forever. We would recover. The Norns words had come back to me over the weeks since they'd taken Odin. People who had honorable intentions would find us. They hadn't said anything about people with ill intentions.
Though, since Tyr had found us, it wasn't out of the realm of possibility to think someone else might.
We never found out who made the tracking charm with the hairbrush even though Eyra suspected it was the Valkyries. Griselda tried everything she could, including scrying, and was met with a black, impenetrable wall. Whoever had done it wanted to remain hidden and had gone to extraordinary lengths to remain so.
So I'd done what I could and called the witches over one night, just a few days after everything happened. We reconstructed the palace, especially my personal quarters, and I allowed Griselda to put me into a state of hypnosis. I named everything I could think of that had been close to my body that I'd left in Asgard. Clothing, extra brushes and combs, cosmetics, cups and tankards...anything that came to mind, the witches wrote down. When I'd exhausted my memory, we sat together in a circle and systematically and one by one destroyed everything with a fire spell. Whoever happened to be close to the spell would get a heated surprise because my things had gone up in flames all at the same time.
If no one had been there, the household staff would be perplexed about the sheer amount and locations of small piles of ash all throughout the place.
I didn't think I'd forgotten anything, but I could be wrong. But so far, we hadn't had anyone else try to knock down our doors.
Alaria, who still felt guilty over everything that had happened with Trin, subjected all of the Valkyries to a memory wipe, except for six of her closest guards and Eyra. Only those Valkyries knew of this place and three of them were with me. Eyra, who couldn't bear to leave Gravelbeard, Mahara, a doe-eyed and fierce olive-skinned warrior, and Tremayne, a woman whose legs were like tree trunks and who spoke like she had a mouthful of gravel. Neither women had many words to say but they watched the place like a hawk. I wasn't even sure they slept. I protested when Alaria insisted they sleep in my home. She'd finally given in, but I'd heard from the townspeople the two Valkyries took turn patrolling the edges of town. Considering this place was at least twice as large as it used to be, I had no idea how they were doing it and still managing to look well rested the next day. Perhaps, like us, the Valkyries kept some magic of theirs close to the vest.
I, on the other hand, was doing my best to keep the bar running and to keep my feelings about Loki at bay. I could feel him watching me sometimes with an expression akin to longing, but I didn't want to flatter myself. He'd already professed his love, but Odin had too. And he'd abused it and my trust for most of our marriage. I knew in my heart Loki was different, but it was difficult getting my head and my heart to agree.
So I kept him at arm's length. Much to his great frustration.
Gravelbeard expected me to be knocked up by now much to his annoyance. He kept walking past me bitching about how I had a perfectly good womb and this town had a distinct lack of children and since I had the plumbing for it, why didn't I jump on it and fix the problem. Loki, wise man that he sometimes was, carefully looked down at the ground and didn't make a single joke about procreation. I would bare my teeth at Gravelbeard, but he'd merely roll his eyes and proclaim he was "just saying". Which is always an insult, no matter how you colored it.
So recently after too many jokes about my rusty plumbing, I mentioned the fact the Eyra was much younger than me and therefore had absolutely exquisite plumbing and that he, too, could fix the lack of children problem around here. Eyra had winked and overdramatically expressed her immediate want for ten dwarf/Valkyrie hybrid children and proceeded to name them in alphabetical order, much to Gravelbeard's dismay.
After that incident, he'd kept his mouth shut about having children, but he did continuously make cracks about how much better I'd feel if I had a man inside of me.
Eyra, sensing I was about to lose my shit after the tenth or so comment, had carefully taken Gravelbeard's arm and whispered something in his ear that had made him go pale.
He'd finally grown content to bitch about other things rather than my sex life. Or lack thereof.
He continued working in the kitchen and expressed relief that he no longer had to make as many baskets of mozzarella, though a gaggle of teens had come in a few nights ago and he'd barked through the kitchen's window that he was going to shove those sticks up all their asses and see if they could shit fondue.
I had to admit. That one was hilarious and I couldn't even manage to get mad at him about it. I noticed the teens didn't finish the basket that night and left in a hurry.
As much as Gravelbeard annoyed me, I wasn't sorry he'd come with me. At minimum, he had great entertainment value.
I finished wiping down the glasses and the bar and Loki had finished sweeping a few minutes ago.
I plodded upstairs to freshen up the sheets and make sure everything was stocked. We hadn't had any true guests come in yet, but there was a feeling niggling in my b
elly about it.
I thought soon we might have a full house. This would hopefully stop me from thinking about Loki and all of these brand new beds. Once everything was done to my satisfaction, I came back downstairs to see that Loki had dimmed all of the lights.
"Thanks," I said as I pulled my apron off and hung it up.
"No problem." He smiled at me as I walked over to him. It was a vulnerable, slightly lopsided smile. It was also one of my favorites. Because it felt really and wholly Loki. I stood beside him and carefully looped my index finger with his.
He startled and stilled and was about to open his mouth undoubtedly to make a sarcastic quip when I shook my head.
"Don't. Don't ruin it, Loki."
He swallowed down his words and just nodded. "Aye."
He tugged my finger a little tighter.
Epilogue
Three weeks later we'd seen a pretty big increase of new people coming into the new town. Not all of them were from Asgard. Some were from Jotunheim, others were even from Midgard, though they all were possessed of magic. I wasn't sure a non-magical human could even find this place. I welcomed them all in and scanned them from head to toe to see if their intentions were honorable. Some people could hide those kinds of things, but since my magic was on full power all the time now, it would be difficult for them.
Right now I had three people staying upstairs in the tavern bedrooms. I did my best to feed them all a full breakfast, though this morning muffins was all I had time for. Plus fresh coffee.
There were two bedroom vacancies left, and I hoped to fill them today. One of them was reserved by a woman named Helen, though she hadn't given me any other information than that she was traveling alone. So I'd gone in, fluffed all the pillows, made sure everything was dusted and sprayed a homemade oil blend of lemon and lavender through the room so it would smell nice and fresh when she made it in. She told me she would be here at the witching hour, a statement I found a little odd and creepy, but she'd punctuated it with a tinkling laugh, so I had to imagine she was kidding.
I'd started opening the tavern a couple of hours earlier, much to Gravelbeard's dismay. He'd discovered people were more likely to eat mozzarella sticks earlier in the day than at dinner, so he was living in a state of being perpetually pissed off.
Honestly, it wasn't much different from the usual state of things.
I'd created a new menu item he wasn't too crazy about either. French onion soup. He'd bitched and moaned that a brown broth with onions and cheese on top wasn't a damn soup and why was I trying so hard to be bougie.
I demanded to know where he'd learned a word like bougie, but he colored and quickly tried to change the subject.
It was declared by the townspeople to be the best thing they'd ever eaten, even though I'd stolen most of the recipe from an old cookbook a Midgardian had left here when she'd stayed a few days.
I’d carefully hand copied several recipes out of that book and tucked it into the Lost and Found in case she ever came back. If she hadn't returned in a month or so I'd take it home with me and see what other creations I could come up.
I had yet to find out what kind of animals Gravelbeard had on his property. On that note, I never found his property either. If it was here, I couldn't find it. If it was somewhere else, I didn't know about it. The damn dwarf was slippery as an eel when cornered and could get your hackles up enough for you to forget what you were trying to ask him. He did it on purpose, but he had pissing people off to an art form.
Griselda had successfully opened up a magical apothecary. She stocked some culinary herbs, but most of her selections were magical. I'd purchased several things from her and expanded her land out to allow her enough room to grow as much as she needed to supply the townsfolk. She also plotted out an acre for my culinary use which I bought from her at a discount. It wasn't a bad deal and it kept me from having to leave the town to go to Midgard to restock.
I wasn't as scared to leave as I used to be, but I still had a healthy sense of paranoia. I hadn't seen the Morrigan since I'd given her the spear but I wasn't dumb enough to think she wasn't plotting something. Probably not against me. But definitely someone. Maybe not even Odin. She could pop in and out of my town at will now especially since she knew where it was. She wasn't unwelcome but...I would never be able to see her without getting very nervous about everyone's safety. No one knew she'd come to town earlier and we'd kept it that way. Her name struck fear into all of the gods. There was no reason to get everyone worked up now.
We'd sent Sig out to sea a few days after Tyr had admitted to killing her. Loki had hand carved a wooden boat and covered her body with the most fragrant flowers I'd ever smelled. He confessed to sneaking back into Jotunheim because he knew they were her favorite. I wanted to chastise him over it, but it was the most romantic thing I'd ever heard so I let it go. I allowed Gravelbeard the honor of shooting the fire arrow that turned the boat into the flaming pyre. Dwarves had notoriously good aim. Sure enough, the arrow flew true and landed in the middle of the boat. We watched Sig's body drift out to sea until even the flame was no match for the mist rolling in.
Loki cried for the rest of the day. I'd taken him into my bedroom, tucked him into bed, covered him up, and quietly left the room to give him time to grieve. The marital bond between him and Sig dissolved the next day. He'd felt it go.
Loki cried the rest of that day, too.
And so it was. We were all doing the best we could with the situations handed to us. I was existing, one day at a time, and working through my grief and anger over Odin and my mixed feelings over Loki.
It wasn't going all that well, but I knew I would get there.
Today was Saturday and the bar had extended hours. We stayed open until 12:30 a.m. that day and today was no exception, though with the sheer amount of people in here tonight, it was possible we'd be here late trying to clean up everything.
At midnight, all of the light crawled out of the room, leaving only the candle sconces lit. It was like the darkness called it and the shadows responded.
Everyone in the bar gasped their surprise and I could see their wary faces in the small tea lights reflected around the room.
The doors to the tavern flung open and a short, very curvy woman walked in. It was hard to make out all of her features, but from what I could tell, everything about her except for her skin was dark. If I wondered where the light had gone, it wasn't around her. Shadows seemed to crawl from her skin and dance their delight around her body. Her long dark hair fell in straight shiny sheets down to her waist. She wore black and silver from head to toe and when she moved, the sound of bells followed her. It was too cheery a sound considering it seemed that darkness was her best friend and bedfellow.
Loki came up beside me.
The woman smiled with wicked delight. "Freya, it's a pleasure to make your acquaintance." She gave me a shallow bow. "I made reservations with you a few days ago. You have a lovely place here."
Loki stiffened beside me.
The woman's attention turned to him. "Hello, Daddy." She practically purred the words.
"Hello, daughter."
Helen. I shut my eyes for a brief moment, almost in physical pain over this.
Oh. Hel.
The Goddess of Death had just shown up in my bar.
And Loki was her daddy.
I should have stayed in bed today.
Acknowledgments
Special thanks to Betty McNeal for sending me a wonderful book full of Norse lore!! If you enjoyed this book, please consider heading over to Amazon and leaving a review. They’re so very helpful to authors! Thank you.
Also by S.E. Babin
The Goddess Chronicles
The Dedicated Matchmaker
yle = " -webkit-filter: grayscale(100%); -moz-filter: grayscale(100%); -o-filter: grayscale(100%); -ms-filter: grayscale(100%); filter: grayscale(100%); " class="sharethis-inline-share-buttons">share
