“This is Solina,” Skyla said and motioned in my direction.
I scanned the room. Nothing. No one. “Who are you talking to?”
“Ariel.”
“There’s no one here.”
“You don’t see her?”
I pursed my lips and shook my head, wondering if sleep deprivation had made Skyla hallucinate.
“That doesn’t matter. She can see you.”
“Where is she?”
Skyla motioned toward a tapestry hanging on the stone wall. The fabric swayed, and I squeaked.
“Don’t hurt her feelings,” Skyla said.
“I’m sorry. I haven’t been trained in proper ghost etiquette.”
“Well, get over it. She won’t be able keep it together much longer.” Skyla turned toward the tapestry where Ariel’s ghost supposedly stood. “What can you tell us about the fire, Ariel?”
“Surtalogi,” said a disembodied voice.
I was glad to hear my suspicions confirmed, even if it was by a disembodied spirit. “That’s what we thought,” I said.
Skyla turned to me with an eyebrow arched in question.
“I dreamed of it.”
“And you didn’t tell me?”
“When has there been time? Besides, it’s not something I wanted to talk about around any of them,” I said, meaning the Valkyries. I gave Skyla a quick summary of my vision and explained how the three gods and I agreed Surtalogi had mostly likely furnished the fire. “I had no idea who was wielding it, though. I didn’t think it was Helen.”
“Not Helen, not Tori,” said the voice… Ariel… whoever.
“What do you mean not Tori?”
“Tori is not your traitor.”
“Then who is?” Skyla asked.
“The Valkyries… rotten to the core. We were collecting artifacts of the gods, under the direction of our patron, but we were secretly seeking to empower the Valkyries and end our dependence on the gods. We found many things… Surtr’s sword.” Her voice weakened as she spoke, and her last words ended in a ghostly murmur.
“No way,” Skyla said. “They are handmaidens of the Aesir. They’ve maintained their customs to religious dedication. They’re not going to pervert that after all this time.”
“We are hostesses of war,” Ariel whispered. “We ache for battle. We long to return to Valhalla and Folkvangr and see our halls renewed. To do that, we need independence.”
“You too, Ariel?” Skyla’s voice rose.
I put an arm to her shoulder to remind her where we were and that someone might hear her.
“Did you forsake the Aesir?”
Ariel took so long to respond that I wondered if she had left. When she finally spoke, her words were barely audible. “Blinded by delusions of glory… Confession for atonement. Tori denied the plan. Still loyal to Aesir. Tori was to be killed. Tori fought.” Ariel’s voice faltered again, and I barely made out her last words. “Aerie burned… Tori ran.”
“Tori took the sword with her?” I said.
“Yes,” Ariel said.
“Where is she now?” Skyla asked.
“Grim… Thorin… Corvallis…”
The candles flickered as a gust of cool air blew through the room. Several candles went out, dimming the room further.
“Ariel?” Skyla asked. “Are you here?”
We held our breath and waited, but she had gone.
“Did she say grim?” I asked. “What does that mean?”
“I’m not sure.”
“And Thorin and Corvallis? Does she mean Corvallis as in Oregon?” I’d never heard Thorin mention a connection to Oregon, but there were probably lots of things Thorin had refrained from mentioning, especially if any of them were of a personal nature.
Skyla shrugged. “Your guess is as good as mine.”
“Looks like I need to get ahold of Thorin, ASAP. In the meantime, I could ask Val—”
“No.” Skyla latched onto my arm and squeezed. “Don’t breathe a word of this to Val.”
“I’m not always his biggest fan, either, Skyla. But he’s a good source of information. Why shouldn’t I ask him?”
“If Tori wasn’t Helen’s spy, then who told Helen where we were at Oneida Lake?”
“Why Val?”
“He had opportunity. So many times, he’s had opportunity. He knew where you were when you were kayaking with me. He knew you were in the desert.”
“He didn’t know we were at Oneida Lake… unless you’re saying the Valkyries were feeding him information. And if that’s true, why would he kill them?”
“It’s classic James Bond, Solina. Kill your own spy to throw the enemy off the trail. With Inyoni and Kalani dead, we would never know who to suspect other than Tori. Inyoni as good as said she was leaking word to someone. Maybe it was Val. Maybe she didn’t know he would pass it on to Helen.”
“Val had plenty of opportunities to kidnap me and take me to Helen himself, but he hasn’t. Why not?”
“He’s keeping your confidence so you’ll feed him inside information. He can’t kill you himself, but so long as you trust him and let him close, he’ll always know where you are, and when the time is right, he’ll call for Skoll.”
“No,” I said, shaking my head. “It’s too convoluted. The truth is usually simpler than that. I won’t believe it. Not Val. You were wrong about Tori, and you’re wrong about him.”
“Maybe.” Skyla shrugged. “I hope you’re right.”
“What about you?” I asked. “You’ve had all the same opportunities as Val to give me away. More.”
“We’re going to do this again? Haven’t I proven myself to you enough by now?”
I dropped my head and shook it. My heart wrenched at the idea that Skyla might be anything other than what I believed. “I don’t know what to think. But, yes, I do trust you.” I raised my head and met her gaze. “And I do know we need to find Tori before Helen does. We need to find out what grim means, and what Thorin and Corvallis have to do with it. I’m going to track Tori down. Maybe she can help us bring down Helen.”
“You’re going to recruit her?” Skyla asked with a sparkle in her eye.
“Or we can go back to Vegas and sit on our thumbs.”
Skyla laughed. “Girl, you’ve been hanging around with me for far too long. I’m obviously starting to rub off on you.”
I grimaced. “Don’t take this the wrong way, but I hope it comes off with a little soap and water. I liked myself fine when this all started, and I hope to keep some of that girl with me when this all comes to an end.”
“So what are we going to tell Val?” Skyla asked.
“Tell him the ghost didn’t know anything useful. We can tell him that she saw Tori using the sword, but she didn’t know where she went with it.”
Skyla agreed to my suggestion, and after I helped her remove all traces of her séance, we parted ways outside the library. My thoughts centered on my bed, and my body craved a few hours’ sleep to make up for all we’d lost during the night. Val had left by the time I came back to my room, and I was relieved. I peeled off my clothes and fell into bed, too tired to find pajamas.
Chapter Nineteen
Unable to ignore the persistent sunlight beaming in my face, I gave up and got out of bed. The lacy draperies over the windows did little to shield the light, and since most of the Valkyries rose at dawn, the possibility that a guest might like to sleep in likely never crossed their minds.
I showered, dressed, and went to find Skyla. She wasn’t in her room, and her bed looked as though she had never lain in it. Maybe military types made their beds every morning, but something told me Skyla had never gone to bed after we left the library, even though she had looked exhausted. I found her in the kitchen, drinking coffee
with Val, of all people.
Dark circles shadowed her eyes, the result of a night without sleep. I sank into a chair next to her and gathered her hands into mine. “Skyla, what’s going on?”
“What do you mean?”
“You’ve been up all night.”
“Yes.”
“Why?”
“I couldn’t sleep. I’ve been thinking about Embla and my mother and what it all means.”
I shifted my attention to Val, who had shaved and changed his clothes. “You look rested.”
“Don’t let it fool you,” he said. “I spent the rest of the night searching the grounds for any sign of a lead in case things didn’t pan out with Skyla’s séance.”
“Did you find anything useful?”
“I followed a trail of burnt ground for a while. It led away from the house, north, but it faded out and disappeared where the highway cut through.”
“Tori hitched a ride?”
“Or had someone waiting for her.”
Since Skyla wanted to keep our conversation with Ariel mum, I had little else to say on the matter of Tori’s disappearance. I changed the subject by going to the refrigerator and digging out a carton of eggs. “Anyone want something to eat?”
“I’ll take something,” Skyla said through a yawn. She laid her head on her arms.
“Why not go to bed if you’re so tired?” Val asked.
The coffee pot had enough left to pour another few cups, so I made one for Val and another for Skyla. She grabbed it from me and sucked down a huge gulp before answering. “No time to sleep.”
“So,” Val said, “did you learn something last night after all?”
Skyla frowned into her coffee. “I talked to a ghost, all right. But she mostly mumbled unintelligible things.”
“Maybe you need more practice,” he said.
“Practice doing what?” asked one of the Valkyries, who shuffled into the kitchen, frowning, her gaze locked on the empty coffee pot. It was Embla, and Skyla and I both froze. “Sword fighting? I expected to see you in the gym this morning, Skyla, but you didn’t show.”
“I-I had a late night,” Skyla said. “I didn’t feel like it today.”
“You’ve got to take better care of yourself. If you want to be at your best, to be the kind of warrior we need you to be, you can’t stay up all night talking to ghosts.”
Skyla gurgled something nonsensical before stuttering, “How-how did you know?”
“It’s my library,” Embla said. “I know everything that happens inside its walls.”
“Why didn’t you say anything?”
“At first I wasn’t sure what you were up to, but I decided if it was something important enough for you to steal into my room, hide under my bed, root through my things, and take my spare key, then it was something that didn’t require my interference.”
Blood drained from my face. “Do you have hidden cameras?”
Embla smiled and shook her head. “No. Just a good sense of when things go amiss in the room I’ve lived in for twenty years. You smell like a summer day, Solina. After all that smoke and soot, you were like an air freshener. Also, I haven’t cleaned under my bed since the fire, but there was a large patch absent of dust and soot in the vague size and shape of a young woman.”
I blushed with mortification. “Well there goes my CIA application after all.” All that sneaking around for nothing. Why couldn’t I just sink into the floor and disappear?
Embla turned to Skyla again. “I suppose Ariel wasn’t the only ghost you were thinking about last night either, was it?”
“What do you mean?”
“Your mother.”
Skyla’s face slackened, and her mouth fell open. “What are you saying?”
“Solina found the evidence, didn’t she? A picture of you as a sweet, young girl. I know each of those photographs as a mother knows her children’s names, and I know when one goes missing. It seems you’ve learned more than you bargained for in your search for that key.”
“Why do you have those pictures?” Skyla asked.
Embla shrugged. “Because. Your mother was my sister, and I am your aunt.”
The room went silent and airless as a vacuum.
“M-my mother was an only child,” Skyla said after overcoming her shock.
“It would seem that way, but no, she was my little sister. We had an older sister, too, but she died as a baby. Your mother never knew her.”
I saw a similarity in their looks—matching eye shape and bone structure. They shared the same distinct chin and jaw lines. Embla’s skin tone was darker and cooler, and her black curls were tighter and a little coarser. Skyla’s Puerto Rican genes added amber tones to her skin and lightened her hair color several shades, but their genetic relationship was obvious once it was pointed out.
“My mother never mentioned you,” Skyla said.
“She wouldn’t. It’s the side effect of leaving the Aerie.”
“My mother was a stay-at-home mom. She was on the PTA and baked cookies for fundraisers. What do you mean she left the Aerie?”
“Kara was Valkyrie,” Embla said, “just like me. She was my sister, my closest friend. Our mother died not long after Kara’s birth. The Valkyries showed up a few days after her death and told Kara and me what we were. They took us to the Aerie to raise us and train us. We never saw Father after that—I barely remember him. Your mother and I were inseparable… until your dad came along. That girl fell hard and fast. A man in uniform has a way of doing that.”
“So,” I said, “no coincidence you followed in your father’s footsteps.”
Skyla pulled a face. “He wasn’t going to raise any princesses.”
“That explains a lot.”
Skyla ignored me and turned back to Embla. “She sure didn’t seem like any of the Valkyries I’ve met so far.”
“The sword I gave you yesterday belonged to her,” Embla said. “I wanted to tell you, but I didn’t know how. The Valkyries’ existence is supposed to be a close-guarded secret. If a sister chooses to leave the order, she has to take a vow of silence.”
“Who would believe her anyway?” Skyla asked. “To anyone but us, it would sound crazy.”
“Still, the sisterhood takes no chances. If a woman chooses to leave, she has that freedom, but she must keep our secret. It’s more than a simple promise that binds her tongue. She’ll be physically unable to speak of it, and eventually her memories of us will fade.” Embla gave Skyla a meaningful look. “By the time you came along, the Valkyries were a distant memory to her—more like a dream. She wouldn’t have spoken of us. She couldn’t have.”
Skyla frowned at Embla. “What could have made her want to leave this?”
Embla shrugged. “Love.”
“Oh, gag me. My mom and dad fought like cat and dogs.”
“That doesn’t mean they didn’t love each other.”
“Bullshit,” Skyla said. “He spent as much time as possible away from us.”
“What about when she got sick? He was there for her.”
“How would you know?”
Skyla had never offered much information about her past, and I had never had the guts to ask. Truthfully, I had let my problems overwhelm me, and I hadn’t spent much time worrying about Skyla’s background. That was self-centered of me, perhaps, but there in the Valkyries’ kitchen, I found Skyla’s lineage intensely interesting. Val looked equally intrigued.
“You never saw me,” Embla said, “but I was there. I watched her. I watched you.”
Skyla’s cheeks flushed a deep, angry crimson. “Why wouldn’t you tell me? You knew, but you kept it from me. Do you know what it would have meant for me to know who I was?”
“I wasn’t sure it was a good idea in
the beginning,” said Embla. “I debated whether this was the life for you or whether you should be allowed to live as a normal woman. But I see now that your heritage will not be denied.”
“Did Tori know about me?”
“She knew your mother.”
“Why did she lie?”
“At the time, I thought she was protecting us. Now, I think she was protecting her own self-interests. I’m sorry I didn’t come to you with this sooner. I could have helped you so you wouldn’t feel the need to sneak around.”
Val sighed and rolled his eyes. “I told them to just ask in the first place. But, no, they wanted to be a couple of Charlie’s Angels.”
Skyla pouted. “No one would talk to me, Embla. If I brought it up, people changed the subject or flat out told me to mind my own business. Besides, we didn’t know who to trust. Some members of the Aerie have shown questionable loyalties.”
Embla chuckled. “We are an elite bunch of snobs, aren’t we?”
Skyla dropped her gaze and shrugged.
How diplomatic of her, I thought.
“You were right not to trust anyone. With Tori gone, there’s a vacuum of power. Who or what will fill it has yet to be seen. Some of the sisters may be willing to look for the Aerie’s next leader outside the Valkyries as easily as they would look inside.”
“Outside the Valkyries?” Skyla asked. “Like Helen?”
Embla’s mouth twisted as if she’d swallowed something distasteful. “Yes. Like Helen.”
“What about you?” Val asked. “Where do your loyalties lie?”
Embla blanked her face and said, “With the order of the Valkyries, of course. Always and forever, my sisters come first.”
While I made brunch for us all—omelets and toast—Embla told us about the memorial service the sisters had planned for after sundown to remember the women lost in the fire. Embla asked if I would arrange a reception with snacks and hot drinks for when the service ended, and I agreed.
After they cleaned their plates, Skyla and Embla went to look through the collection of photographs Embla kept under her bed. I stayed in the kitchen to wash dishes and start on the list of items Embla had requested. Val left to find his own entertainment, giving me the time I needed to give Thorin a private call.
Arctic Dawn (The Norse Chronicles Book 2) Page 19
