Twilight Magic (Rune Witch Book 6)

by Jennifer Willis

  Maksim swallowed hard as he lay on the carpet and stared up at her. The whole room had fallen silent at her outburst. Maksim knew Vesha was powerful. His mother had told him so, though his father looked away with a reverent smile when Maksim tried asking to know more.

  “The evening star,” his father has said in a low, wistful voice. “She is serenity itself, dark and deep.”

  But the goddess who stood over him now wasn’t dark or serene at all. She was angry, fierce, and blazing hot instead of comforting and cool, and she commanded the attention of the room. Maksim crawled backward before she could cast her diamond stare down on him.

  “YOU ARE INTERFERING IN MATTERS THAT ARE NOT YOUR CONCERN!” the goddess shouted. Her words echoed off the living room walls and hurt Maksim’s ears.

  There was a new eruption behind him—so many voices at once shouting questions and making demands. Maksim turned at the sound of Thor bellowing something about badgers and clay. At least, that’s what Maksim thought he was yelling about. It was hard to tell with everyone trying to be heard at once.

  Maksim felt strong hands on his arms and found himself lifted into Thor’s protective embrace. “It’s all right, boy,” the big god said as he held him close. “You just stick with me now. Okay?”

  Maksim nodded. Freya came to stand beside them.

  Heimdall stepped forward. He looked almost as confused as Maksim felt, and maybe a little afraid. “Utra.”

  The white goddess seemed to burn with spectral fire as she looked at him and laughed.

  “Heimdall.” Her smile looked more like a sneer. “The Shining One. You’ve not come courting again, have you?”

  “What happened to Vesha?” he asked. “And what in the blazes of Muspellheim happened to you?”

  Saga stepped into the white goddess’s line of sight, putting her kin behind her. “Zorya Utrennaya. To what do we owe this unexpected visit?”

  The fiery goddess laughed, but Maksim didn’t understand what was funny. “Am I not welcome in the company of the gods of the North? Certainly Odin would grant me a warmer and more fitting reception than this pathetic display.”

  The goddess called Zorya Utrennaya surveyed the room, and for a tense moment Maksim worried she’d eat up all of the cookies on the plate. It had been so long since he’d had such sweetness in his mouth, and now he refused to imagine a world without cookies. He’d gorged himself and they made his stomach hurt, but he still ate as many as he could. There was no such thing as a never-ending supply of food.

  The white goddess looked past Saga to focus on Maksim’s face, and he felt a chill run through his body. Thor held him tighter.

  “We need to know how you came to be in this place.” Heimdall stood tall, and Maksim was relieved that he seemed to be back in charge. “And where Vesha has gone.”

  Utra laughed again, and Maksim squirmed in Thor’s arms. He knew about the Zorya sisters—Utrennaya of the morning, and Vechernyaya of the evening—but his parents hadn’t told him much about Utrennaya. He knew that together they guarded an evil dog, and there was something about the chariot of the sun, too. But those were just stories, even though his mother and the other storyweavers tried to make them all seem real.

  The white goddess standing in the living room seemed real enough to Maksim.

  “My sister?” Utra asked with disdain. “Do you miss her so much already, Heimdall? Such a quiet and mousy little thing. Perhaps these days you prefer to surround yourself with subservient women. Might you be trying to compensate for something?”

  “I have no grudge against you,” Heimdall responded calmly. “You’ve taken us all by surprise, and it’s been a trying day.”

  Utra didn’t soften. “That is hardly my problem. I have come for the boy.”

  Maksim stiffened as her crystal blue gaze again landed on his face.

  “Too bad you can’t have him,” Thor replied in a huff.

  Utra stepped forward, and Saga and Heimdall moved to block her path. “I don’t believe that’s up to you, thundering one.”

  Maksim felt real heat rising in Thor’s chest and face. The big god shifted the boy in his arms into a more protected position.

  “This is my house, Zorya Utrennaya,” Thor said. “Unlike my siblings here, I don’t give a hefty rat’s hindquarters how you got here or what happened to your sister. She was disoriented and unhelpful, and her well-being is not my concern.”

  Utra’s smile widened. Maksim got a bad feeling in his stomach, and it wasn’t from too many cookies. The Zorya sisters weren’t supposed to be scary. Vesha was supposed to be the embodiment of tranquility and peace, but she’d seemed more confused and upset than anything. And now he was afraid Utra might hurt somebody or set the house on fire.

  “So now you express no regard for my sister. Interesting.” Utra smirked at Heimdall, then she laughed again. Maksim wished she would stop doing that.

  Thor shook his head. “When did you get so bitchy?”

  The white goddess made a strange face, as if she were in pain. She bent forward and stumbled to one side, but then she took a breath and stood up tall again. Utra lifted her arms and reached toward Maksim, but Saga and Heimdall remained in her path.

  “Give me the boy, and I will be on my way.” Her voice sounded weaker, like she was getting sleepy.

  Thor stepped back into the hallway. “Not going to happen. I rescind your invitation!” His voice echoed off of the plaster ceiling and walls.

  Freya looked back at Thor and frowned. “She’s not a vampire. Besides, you didn’t invite her in the first place.”

  “Worth a shot,” Thor replied.

  Utra took another step forward. “The boy.” Her voice was almost a whisper. “He does not belong with you.”

  “I don’t think you heard my brother.” Heimdall stood before her with his arms crossed. “I don’t know what’s going on with you, but you are not welcome here. Not if you’re going to behave like this. And the boy stays with us.”

  Utra’s white eyebrows knitted into a pained frown. “You do not understand. I have to take the boy back with me. You don’t know the forces at work here, or what is at stake.”

  Heimdall stood firm. “Enlighten us.”

  Moments before, Utra had been so frightening and strong, but now she looked like she was wilting from the inside out. Maksim almost felt sorry for her, but not quite. She looked at the floor, clenched her long white fingers, and pressed her fists against her temples.

  “I, I cannot,” she stammered. She looked up and met Maksim’s gaze. “Do you know what they are doing to us?”

  Maksim could hear his heart beating in his ears. He tried to wriggle out of Thor’s grasp, but the big god held on tight.

  “Do you know what they are doing to your parents? To our people?” Utra kept her focus on Maksim, ignoring Saga and Heimdall in front of her. Maksim felt her desperation seep under his skin and crawl along his bones.

  “Stop!” Maksim squeezed his eyes shut and covered his face with his hands, but he could still feel her reaching inside him. “You’re hurting me!”

  Thor turned on his heel and hurried down the hall with Maksim in his arms. “Heimdall! Deal with this.”

  “They are hurting us, Maksim!” Utra cried out after him. “Your mother is weeping. They are beating your father. They’re killing us. You have to come back or they won’t stop!”

  Maksim felt the firm, straight-backed chair beneath him, and he opened his eyes. He was in the kitchen, in the same spot where he’d had that wonderful lunch the day before with Magnus and Bonnie. He could see the yard through the big window. Everything was covered in snow, even the swings.

  He missed Magnus and Bonnie. They’d been gone all morning, out shopping for clothes and shoes and a good winter coat for him. He’d begged to go with them but was told it was safer for him inside the house. But the bad men had come here looking for him, and now a scary goddess was shrieking in the living room and telling him that he had to go with her.

  T
hor stood over him and rested one of his big hands on Maksim’s head.

  “It’s okay, Maksim,” Thor kept repeating, but he didn’t look down at Maksim. He kept his eyes trained on the hallway. “Just stay here with me, and everything’s going to be all right.”

  “Are they hurting my family?” Maksim was afraid to speak about his parents, worried that he would seem ungrateful for the kindness of Thor and his family. But if his mother and father were in danger, it didn’t matter how soft the mattress was that he’d slept on, or how warm and good he felt when he drank the hot chocolate. If Utra was telling the truth, then Maksim had to find a way to get back to his family. He had to save his mother and his father.

  “No, Maksim,” Thor said, but there was uncertainty in his voice.

  Maksim didn’t think gods were supposed to worry. But he also didn’t think they were supposed to have houses and drive cars, or go shopping for coats. Maksim wasn’t sure what to believe anymore. Vesha was confused and Utra was scary, and now something was making Thor very uneasy.

  “Everything’s going to be all right, Maksim,” Thor said.

  But Maksim didn’t think gods were supposed to lie, either.

  Sally kicked her feet through the few inches of snow in Thor’s backyard. Like so many other Portlanders, she was perpetually unprepared for winter weather, even in the middle of February. Chunks of snow spilled over the tops of her sneakers and soaked into her socks, but at least she wasn’t trudging around in flip-flops and Bermuda shorts like some of the people she’d spotted at the light rail stations as she drove through downtown that morning.

  Heimdall and Freya were busy hauling the Zorya goddess down to the tight basement beneath the house where she could be secured for observation and questioning. Despite the physical transformation, no one was certain whether it was Vesha or Utra they were dealing with from one moment to the next—or whether the strange newcomer was an imposter altogether.

  Sally was out of her depth. She didn’t know anything about Slavic mythology. A few years earlier, she’d thought she covered her bases by studying the Norse pantheon as part of her self-directed magickal training, and that had proven far less than adequate for the real-world experiences that followed. There had been no way to prepare for tangling with Køjer Devils from beneath the Earth’s surface or coming face to face with The Morrigan. Then she was abducted by a lava god and met an actual sasquatch, and hadn’t that been a hoot.

  But she was the Rune Witch—no, the Chaos Witch. This mantle was hers whether she wanted it or not.

  She pulled her phone out of her pocket. Opal had tried contacting her three more times in the last hour. Nothing more from Fenrir or Loki. That was a relief.

  Her thumb hovered over Opal’s photo on the screen. Even when Sally withdrew and got downright nasty to be around—like right now—Opal had never wavered in her friendship. She gave Sally space, but she was always inviting her to lunch or tea or to a ritual gathering. And even though Sally couldn’t remember the last time she’d accepted, Opal kept asking and offering.

  Sally had suspected Opal’s call yesterday was a ruse, because who needs magickal help while furniture shopping? She’d very nearly turned down that invitation as well, but it had coincided so nicely with Fenrir’s offer of lunch. But Sally knew better. There really was no such thing as happenstance when magickal forces were at work. Loki had taught her that much.

  Loki. Sally grimaced, as if he had made her what she was. As though he had the power to undo everything that had happened already. He hadn’t been the least surprised when the true nature of her magick was revealed. He’d known all along. She was still furious with him, though in hindsight she could appreciate the wisdom of his silence.

  “Light and dark and dark and light.” Sally trudged through the snow, silently cursing her teachers and allies. There was no one else like Sally—not even Maksim. Opal was a capable witch, but she had so little intrinsic magick. Loki was so drained that he’d been barely a shadow on her futon couch. She lifted each foot and crunched it down again in the snow, following the tracks she’d already made. Around and around and around.

  And while Sally had been preoccupied with finding her own place in the world and avoiding the truth of what was plainly happening with Loki, time marched on. Chaos didn’t take a holiday just because she was having her own existential angst party.

  Looking up, she could make out the pale spot where the sun was hiding behind the thick blanket of clouds that stretched across the sky. There was also a slim crescent of moon somewhere above the cloud cover. She didn’t need to check calendars or almanacs any more to know the phases of the moon. It was waning, just a day shy of the New Moon. The Dark Moon. Then it would start growing again, waxing its way to full. Cycle after cycle.

  Sally stopped mid-stride. When trying to help her make peace with the chaos magick that ran through her, Loki had used the phases of the moon as a metaphor. There was neither good nor evil at work; it was just balance. Light and dark were two halves of the same whole. Darkness wasn’t always bad. Light wasn’t necessarily good. Just as the moon cycled through its phases, her magick was also about balance, bringing the light to the dark and the dark to the light.

  “Vesha and Utra.” The evening star and the morning star. The Zorya goddess had a connection to the boy, and she’d transformed from one to the other in front of everyone. From the reactions of Heimdall and the others, Sally got the impression that that wasn’t normal. The sisters were supposed to be distinct and separate, not sharing a body and fighting for dominance.

  Dark and light. Two halves of the same whole.

  Heimdall and the others had thought the Zorya sisters dead. How long had they been slumbering, if that’s where they’d been doing these past centuries? Why emerge now? Why Portland? And why were they confined to the same physical body?

  Everyone inside the house was asking the same questions. She didn’t know how the pieces fit together, but she had been keeping one clue to herself—the man in the antiques warehouse. The worker whose magick she’d felt prickling across her skin. Maybe the others needed to know, or maybe they didn’t. She was waiting to see how everything played out.

  Sally cursed under her breath and looked down at her tracks in the snow. She’d been pacing a perfect figure-eight. She stared at the infinity symbol and sighed.

  “Fine.” She pulled up Opal’s name on her phone.

  Heimdall came down the stairs with a glass of water for Utra, or Vesha—whichever of the Zorya sisters was currently inhabiting the living body they’d brought back from the antiques warehouse. He hadn’t given himself a moment to try to sort out everything that was happening at once. It was probably self-preservation.

  Nothing about this day made any sense. The refugee boy possessed magick that gave the Rune Witch pause. Wasn’t that enough? He could rationalize, barely, the boy finding his way to Thor’s front door—out of all the homes in Portland. Magick attracts magick, for better or for worse. But there was the matter of probable human trafficking, and the appearance of a pair of goddesses who were supposed to be long dead.

  He reached the bottom of the stairs and stopped cold when he found the Zorya secured to a folding chair, and Saga wearing a roll of silver duct tape like a bracelet.

  “What?” Saga shrugged. “You said to keep her down here and make sure she didn’t go anywhere.”

  Heimdall rubbed the back of his neck with his free hand. It was like he was starring in a really bad movie. “We’re Norse gods. We don’t kidnap people and duct tape them to lawn furniture.”

  The basement ceiling was lower than he remembered, though a few high windows let in light from the backyard. Most houses in Portland didn’t have a cellar—without careful construction and shoring up, underground spaces would be flooded three-quarters of the year. The cramped space beneath Thor and Bonnie’s house offered barely enough room for a few stacks of cardboard storage boxes, a variety of lawn maintenance tools, a mismatched collection of broadswords and
lances sticking out of an open barrel, and a loud and ominous-looking old furnace in one dusty corner.

  Heimdall turned toward the hostage. Her hair was dark now, but the color of her eyes hovered somewhere between blue and brown. At least Saga hadn’t gagged her.

  “Vesha?”

  She nodded quickly and sucked in a stuttering breath. If she started wailing again, Heimdall thought he might wash his hands of the entire situation and head back to the Lodge. Then he remembered that Maggie had taken his truck and returned home a few hours earlier. He was stuck.

  He lifted the glass of water. Again, she nodded. He wasn’t sure why he was slow to approach her. Zorya Vechernyaya had never had a malicious bone in her body, and she was firmly strapped down. Definitely not a threat. But he had a sour feeling in his stomach, and it cautioned him to be on guard. Heimdall held the glass to Vesha’s lips so she could take a few sips.

  “She was more talkative when she was Utra. More combative, too,” Saga said. “But she changed back just after I finished securing her. Really inconvenient.”

  Vesha leaned away from the water glass and gave Heimdall a grateful smile. Her eyes were dark brown now, her transition apparently complete. She looked small and frail beneath so many layers of duct tape. He thought about tearing her free, but there was no telling when Utra might make another surprise appearance. It was prudent to leave her where she was.

  He considered whether the transformation had been truly spontaneous, or if something specific had caused it. Given the Zorya’s focus on the boy in both states, he had a pretty good idea of the trigger. For now, Maksim was upstairs with Thor and out of harm’s way—away from this particular harm, anyway. They just had to figure out precisely what kind of danger they were dealing with.

  “Here! I’m here!” Opal came running down the steps, clutching an overstuffed backpack and shucking off her coat. She slipped on the bottom step and landed awkwardly on the dull concrete floor. “I’m sorry it took so long, but with the roads the way they are, and they say there’s more snow coming . . .”