by C. Gockel
Wiping his single eye, Odin recovers, but he still has a huge grin on his face. Turning to the room at large, Odin says, “Gentlemen, this is the lad I was telling you about. The one who escaped the clutches of the Dark Elves in the Delta of Sorrows, who slayed an each-uisge with his bare hands, and took on velociraptors with only his wits and a few sticks. This is Lionel … my son.”
Return of the Prodigal Son
“My son.” Odin’s words ring in Tara’s head.
Thor steps from where he stands by the throne, and the men in black edge forward.
She suddenly realizes why Odin’s blue eye looked familiar—it’s almost the same shade as Lionel’s.
How had Lionel neglected to share this tiny little detail of his heritage? Might this have saved them both from a run-in with Rogier? Eyes narrowing, she turns to Odin’s son. He’s staring at a spot on the floor. Tara shivers, though the room is not cold.
Patting Lionel on the shoulder, Odin says, “Thank you for helping me become aware of that gate under my throne.”
Thor rumbles something that sounds like agreement.
A thank you doesn’t seem to put you in someone’s debt here, Tara notes.
Lionel bows his head. “I’m afraid I may have embroiled you in a diplomatic incident, Your Majesty.”
“How so?” says Odin, eye narrowing.
“I assaulted Prince Rogier,” says Lionel, his voice flat, his expression blank.
“If you killed him, we should present you with a bounty,” says one of the men in black. “He’s an incompetent ass.” There are several murmurs of agreement.
Lionel’s jaw gets tight. “I wish I had. But, I merely gave him a very bad case of frostbite.” His words are inflectionless. Tara shivers.
There are a few whispers around the room. Odin says quickly, “Lionel is a mage, but he’ll be a warrior, too.”
The elves had reacted with derision when they’d heard of the each-uisge; the Asgardians sound suspicious of his magic. Tara finds her hand drifting to his arm, as though she could protect him from their censure.
“I had Tara’s help,” says Lionel.
“Thank you again for revealing the gate,” the king says, not acknowledging Lionel’s proclamation. Tara shifts on her feet uneasily.
Odin turns to Thor. “I wonder how long Her Majesty has known about it.”
Shrugging, Thor says, “I pumped it full of lightning before it closed. The queen will know better than to use it anytime soon.”
Nodding, Odin says, “Good.” He inclines his head to Lionel. “Thor, greet your younger brother properly.”
Face breaking into a grin, Thor strides over, takes Lionel’s hand, and pumps vigorously. “It is a pleasure to meet you.”
Tara tilts her head, trying to see the resemblance between the brothers. There might be … a little. Thor’s facial features look like Lionel’s but … wider. Other than that, she wouldn’t have guessed it.
Blinking, Thor stops shaking Lionel’s hand and scowls down at it. “Impressive little brother,” he whispers. Lifting his head, he smiles wickedly, gives Tara a covert wink, and to the room at large declares, “His magic is far closer to Father’s than mine … he has the magic of holding things together. Put him as first in line to the throne!”
The men in black all laugh. Lionel’s eyes go wide. Tara swallows. A crown prince is probably even more out of reach than a peasant elf with a soulmate. Bowing her head, she smooths her skirts with jerking movements. Why is she still thinking about the possibility of Lionel and her?
Odin snorts. “Thor! You’ll frighten the lad!” Appraising Lionel from head to toe through his single narrowed eye, Odin asks in a booming voice, “Boy, how long has it been since you slept?”
Lionel starts counting down on his fingers. “I thought it was forty-eight hours …” He wavers on his feet. “… but now I think it may have been more. No wait, I had two hours of sleep in the delta.”
Odin laughs, and the advisors echo it. The king claps, and a completely unremarkable panel in the walls opens and two men emerge. They also wear black, but instead of robes, they wear fitted pants and shirts. Their boots are almost noiseless. Tara blinks. They appear to be no older than maybe twenty-five or twenty-six. She studies the men around her. Except for Odin and herself, no one looks older than that.
“Take my son Lionel to the Eastern suite, and take Miss Gibson to the rooms adjacent. Make sure they’re comfortable.” To Lionel, he says, “I’ve been in your boots, boy. You’ll most likely sleep like the dead for at least twelve hours. That will mean you’ll miss breakfast.” Odin frowns. “Probably for the better. Frigga is going to need a talking to.” He huffs. “I’ll see you both at an hour past breakfast tomorrow.”
Tara steps forward, about to say, no, that’s too late. I have to go home. But Odin turns toward her, and something in the glint of his bright single eye stops her in her tracks. “What do you want, girl?” he asks brusquely. She looks to Lionel for any sign of support, but he is staring at the floor.
Dropping to a low curtsy, Tara stifles what she wants to say. Instead, she tells a different truth. “I thought for sure when I realized we were in a throne room that Lionel and I would be cellmates again.” Cellmates, like soulmates … but more awful. Stifling that epiphany, she continues nervously, “Thank you, sir, err … Your Majesty, sir.” She hopes she sounds sufficiently respectful and awed and at the same time is a little disgusted with herself for being afraid to speak her mind.
“Rise, girl, rise!” Odin says. Tara lifts her eyes to find him smiling genially, which actually makes her more fearful, and she can’t quite say why. “You’re welcome here.” He inclines his head to the servants. “They’ll take you to your rooms, see you have proper maids, and everything you need. Go.”
Tara murmurs her thanks again, playing nice for the scary man, and she and Lionel are led out of the throne room into a wide hallway with high ceilings and windows that open to immense gardens. Glowing butterflies flitter about, lighting any potential dark corners.
As they go, she hears whispers of “Except for his ears, he is the spitting image of his brother … ” It makes her brow furrow; Lionel doesn’t look that much like Thor. She glances at Lionel and catches his gaze on her. He looks away quickly. Tara eyes the castle, fortress, palace, whatever with increasing unease.
A few minutes later, Lionel’s ushered through a doorway without her. Tara feels her heart sink as the door between them closes. He’s been not much more than a ghost for company since the throne room, but he was the only familiar face.
About twenty steps down the hall, she’s guided through an enormous door into a room bigger than both levels of her house put together. Her male guide leaves her with a woman in a simple black dress. Nearly as tall as Tara, the woman has golden skin only a shade lighter than Tara’s own, but her hair is blonde and straight, and her eyes are blue. She curtsies to Tara, introduces herself as “Ahnohr,” and proceeds to give Tara a tour. There’s a bathroom, toilet separate from the bath, a sitting area with a fireplace next to a bed on an elevated platform. Everywhere there are high arched ceilings, heavy wooden furniture with plump padded seats and backs, and lots of gold … it looks a little East Indian, Tara thinks. There’s fruit, cheese, crackers, water, and wine already laid out in the sitting area, and a bell. Ahnohr assures Tara that if she rings it, she’ll be heard any time of day or night, because it’s “magical … I know it must sound strange because you don’t have anything like it, of course.”
Tara tries to look impressed. She doesn’t mention cell phones and that on Earth she can ring anyone she damn well pleases.
“Is there anything I can get you?” Ahnohr asks after showing her through a closet filled with gowns.
Lionel, Tara thinks, but says, “No, I’ll be fine. I already bathed and ate in Alfheim. Think I’ll just …” She looks around, sees no books, or television, or anything, so she says, “… meditate.”
“Very good!” says Ahnohr with a smi
le, finally leaving. As she exits, more of the glowing butterflies flutter in, brightening the dimming room. Tara looks out the window. The sun is much lower in the sky. It had been even later in Alfheim, and Tara is tired. She goes to the closet and picks out a “sleeping gown.”
She’s just put it on when she hears a scurrying noise in the wall at the back of the closet. Tara gulps and wonders if Asgard—she’s guessing that’s where she has to be—has magic rats. Giant magic rats.
She backs out of the closet, and then hears a thump, and then another. Definitely a giant rat … or something. She slams the door shut and braces her back against it. In the closet, she hears a creak and then footsteps, and isn’t sure if she’s glad they sound human rather than rodent. Her heart is beating so hard and fast she can feel it pulsing against her ribs. She looks at the closet’s doorknob … there is no lock. The bell is across the room on the little table in the sitting area. How long will it take someone to arrive if she rings it?
There is thump from the door at the level of her ear. She bites her lip, closes her eyes, and then hears a whispered, “Tara?”
Her eyes go wide. All the fear in her rapidly morphs into anger in less than one of her frantic heart beats. Spinning around, she opens the closet, points at the main door, and hisses, “You could have used that one!”
Lionel pokes his head out. He looks rather sheepish, but a dam has burst within Tara. “And what are we doing here?” Her voice rises and so does the heat beneath her skin. “Why didn’t we come here first? You’re a prince here. You could have saved me from Lady Benedal and Rogier! When can I go home?”
She doesn’t say she’s afraid. More afraid than when she’d been facing velociraptors and in the cell they’d shared. There the threats had been so obvious … here, she feels like the danger is just bubbling under the surface.
Crossing her arms over her chest, she waits for Lionel to snap back at her, to tell her she’s being irrational, to tell her he’s a prince and he’ll take care of it.
He rubs his forehead. “Tara, I’m so sorry. I don’t know when you can go home, or I can go home … I didn’t know … and I’m afraid.”
Her arms drop. “You didn’t know? But you brought us here … you dropped us off in the throne room! I’m not even from a country with royalty but I do know that was an off-with-their-heads move.”
Eyes closed, leaning against the door frame, he says, “Every other exit was under guard.” His feet sort of slip out from under him, and he slides down. Before thinking about it, Tara’s helping him up.
“Too much magic in too short amount of time,” he says, wiping his face with his hands. His hair is rumpled around the points of his ears. His eyes are bloodshot, and the contrast between the red and the bright blue of his irises is startling and disturbing.
“Can you explain to me what’s going on? If you didn’t know that Odin is …” She waves a hand.
“My father?” Lionel finishes, meeting her gaze. The bitterness in his voice is palpable, the set of his jaw painfully tight.
Tara glares at him … and then sighs. He should have gone to sleep, but he’d come first to her.
“Come in and sit down,” Tara says, feeling her stomach roil with too many emotions to name.
Rubbing his eyes, Lionel nods. Walking past her, he goes to the other side of the room and sort of sits-falls onto the couch. Tara sits on the chair beside him.
He takes an audible breath. “I didn’t know … but I suspected.” He steeples his fingers together, and as he does, the robe-like garment he’s wearing slides down to reveal his forearm. Tara blinks. There is no soulmark.
She looks up quickly, feeling like she’s just spied something intensely personal. He gives her a twisted smile. “It disappeared sometime between when I attacked Rogier and we arrived here.”
“I’m … I’m …” Tara stammers. “Sorry.”
Her eyes go to the carpet. For a brief moment in the Elven chamber she’d wished the soulmark was a mistake … but … the end of something you think is real and true, something you could rely on—she knows how that feels. She remembers the day Dwayne called it off … She feels for Lionel, more than she should, maybe.
“I’m not sorry,” says Lionel. “I only wish I’d gotten to you sooner. Rogier shouldn’t have …”
She looks up, but he’s not meeting her gaze. He’d given up his surety for her because she’d been in danger. She doesn’t think Lionel’s in love with her. Attracted to her, yes, but in love? No. He’s already said as much. He just came to her aid because he is a good person. The realization does weird things to her heart.
Lionel clears his throat. “To answer your other questions … I didn’t use the main door because the guide who showed it to me suggested I might protect your virtue by using the secret passage.”
Tara’s eyebrows hike. “I’m not feeling like my virtue is particularly well protected by a secret door into my closet.”
Huffing softly, Lionel scratches behind his ear and says, “It’s all about the appearance of virtue here. Asgardians are strange about these things, not like elves.”
Tara’s lips purse, remembering Lionel almost stripping down to his birthday suit in front of her, and the elves in the window in his village. “Right,” she says.
“As for my heritage … I first suspected it centuries ago.”
Tara leans in, curious.
Rubbing his eyes, he says, “I was a child, wandering the palace gardens while my mother was at the town market. Leenine was there, playing hide and seek. She perhaps didn’t realize I was a peasant at first, because she pulled me into her game. I knew it was wrong to play with a daughter of a high house, but I was lonely. When the other noble children almost found her, I dragged her through a World Gate to help her win.” He stares at his feet. “I didn’t know what I was doing. It was purely instinctual.” He smiles wryly. “Trolls instinctually travel through World Gates, too, and they’re dumb as rocks.”
Tara winces at the comparison.
Lionel continues, “We wound up in Midgard, in South Carolina during the hunt for a family of runaway slaves. Odin sent his ravens to help us, and then he came himself …” He lets out a long breath. “Sometimes Odin intervenes on children’s behalf. He isn’t cruel to children, not at all. I told myself that was why he aided us. It was what I wanted to believe at the time …” He smiles sadly. “Abraham, the father in the family of slaves we ran into … he was running away because they were going to sell Hannah, his wife, and their child, Benjamin. He said they’d all live together or die together.” A thin smile twists his lips. He stares at the butterflies lighting the room. “Odin … has watched out for me … but that was the first and last time I’ve spoken to him. Until today.”
Tara swallows. She’s grown up around children whose parents had left them for one reason or another. She’s heard the sadness, the bitterness, and the confusion before.
Lionel sighs. “Later, when I was allowed to go to magic school instead of being exiled to the Dark Lands for practicing magic above my station, I told myself he interfered out of fairness, justice …” He stared out into space for a moment. “He knew your full name.” His eyes briefly meet hers. “Do you think he knows everyone’s full names?”
Tara shakes her head, confused, not sure of what he’s asking.
“I’d tell you my name,” he whispers, and then laughs mirthlessly. “But now I don’t know what it is.”
He closes his eyes and lays his head back.
Tara reaches out to him, and then pulls her hand away.
Lionel’s head lolls to the side, and she’s not particularly surprised when he goes to sleep. She wants to pull the blankets off the bed and snuggle up next to him. Instead, she goes to the closet, retrieves a spare blanket there, and drapes it over his body.
Tara retreats to her own bed, and the butterflies discreetly flutter out the window. She still doesn’t sleep. Her eyes keep roving around her opulent rooms. She has a feeling she and Lionel are ce
llmates again.
Lionel wakes with his head at an awkward angle, sunlight in his eyes, and his stomach clawing at itself in hunger. He blinks, shifts, and realizes he’s on a sofa, not in his bed in the queen’s palace, his mother’s cottage, or in Tara’s guest room. The events of the day before come back to him, and he groans.
He hears soft footfalls and manages to pull himself up. He wipes his eyes and finds Tara just a few paces in front of him. She’s wearing a nightgown of the palest gold several shades lighter than her skin. It seems to have been poured onto her, the way it catches her curves. Her hair is a midnight halo around her head. A few inky black coils have fallen over her forehead.
She pushes them back and leans down. Pressing her lips together, her brow furrows, and then she whispers, “Hi.”
He wants to pull her into his lap and enfold her in his arms, and beg forgiveness. She rescued him in an alley, and he’s torn her from her home, marched her through a swamp, subjected her to the attentions of Rogier, and pulled her into a mess that spans the realms. He scowls, angry at himself and his entire race. His mouth forms a bitter line. What is his race?
Tara bites her lip and sits down on a chair beside him. “I was once engaged.”
The trajectory of her words makes him sit up with a start. He looks over at her.
Studying her hands, Tara says, “I know you don’t think it’s the same … and maybe it isn’t. But when he broke up with me, it turned my world upside down. And now you’ve purposely upended your life for me.”
Lionel’s skin heats. “Don’t you dare say thank you,” he snaps.
Her shocked expression catches him off guard, and then he realizes that she doesn’t understand the danger. “You’ll put yourself in my debt again.” He sighs. She practically has already. “Then I’d have to thank you for not leaving me behind after I froze Rogier, or making me duck in the kitchens.” That could have ended in an arrow to the head.
