Battlestorm

by Susan Krinard

  But he wasn’t trying to conceal anything now; he was simply empty, as if everything that had made him what he was had been drained out of him and left him no more than a walking ghost.

  “Sit down,” Koji urged, guiding her back to her chair. “You need that beer.”

  Mist let him coax her, and worked her way through three beers without feeling so much as a buzz. Koji played with his own bottle but never seemed to drink.

  “Listen,” Koji said after a very long silence. “You can’t stop believing in yourself. And I’m not talking about the fact that everyone is relying on you. I mean what’s in here.” He tapped his temple with one forefinger. “You have more strength than you know.”

  How many times had Dainn said nearly the same thing? “I can’t tell anymore if my judgment is sound,” she said. “In anything.”

  “Doubts are natural. You’ll pull through this.”

  “Thanks for the vote of confidence,” she said, hoping she sounded sincere. She glanced at her watch. “And now I’ve got to get moving. I have a meeting in an hour, and a few new recruits came in yesterday. I have to give them the usual warnings and pep talk. Then there’s the—”

  “It can wait,” Koji said. He stroked her face with the back of his hand. “Let me take care of you for a little while.”

  Mist closed her eyes and let him pull her to her feet. He was right … an hour wouldn’t make much difference.

  * * *

  Ryan crouched beside Eir, trying very hard not to vomit.

  In only a few days’ time, she had become nearly unrecognizable. Her eyes were sunken deep into her skull, and her lips were dry as brittle leaves. It was as if her skin had been stretched over her bones so tightly that he could see right through it.

  Before, when he’d been helpless to control his visions, only he had suffered. But now, seeing Eir like this, he finally understood Mother Skye’s warnings.

  He laid his hand on Eir’s shoulder as gently as if he were touching the disintegrating paper of some ancient, precious book. “Eir?” he whispered. “Can you hear me?”

  Her eyelids fluttered, but she didn’t show any sign of waking. Maybe, Ryan thought, she was in a coma.

  Maybe there was still a chance to save her.

  I’m not ready, he told himself. I can’t do this.

  The sound of footsteps outside the door pulled him to his feet. Guilt and shame were like angry dogs, doing their best to chase him into hiding.

  He stood his ground, and the intruder entered the infirmary.

  Gabi.

  4

  She stopped as she saw him, brown eyes widening in shock.

  “Ry?” she said.

  “Gabi,” he said, his voice cracking, “Eir needs help.”

  Her gaze fell from his face to the woman on the cot. She crossed the room and bent over Eir, quickly checking the Valkyrie’s pulse.

  “Shit,” she breathed. She looked up at Ryan. “How long you been here?”

  “Not long.” Ryan swallowed. “I found her like this. Can you help her?”

  “I don’t know.” Gabi looked around the room as if she were seeking help from someone Ryan couldn’t see. “Mist is still away. There’s no one else who can—” She broke off. “Get more blankets. They’re over on those shelves.”

  Ryan did as she’d told him, grateful to get away if only for a moment. As he gathered the blankets, he watched Gabi kneel beside the cot, speaking softly in English and Spanish, touching Eir’s arm, her forehead, her chest. She reached inside her shirt and pulled out the cross she always wore, enfolding it in her hand. After a moment she let the cross fall back inside her shirt, crossed herself, and laid her palms on Eir’s chest just below her collarbones.

  Her hands were suffused with a red glow, and some of that glow seemed to trickle down from her fingers to bathe Eir’s chest. But it died as soon as it touched the Valkyrie, like coals doused in ice water.

  “No,” Gabi moaned. “Eir! You have to fight!”

  Eir’s eyes opened a crack, and her rigid mouth relaxed in a half smile. “Gabi,” she whispered. “It’s all right.”

  Gabi set her jaw. “You have to try harder!” she said. “I can—”

  “No.” With obvious effort, Eir lifted her hand and laid it on Gabi’s wrist. “You’re burning. If you keep up, you…” She coughed, turning her face into her shoulder. “They need you.”

  “I need you!” Gabi cried.

  Eir patted Gabi’s wrist and turned her head to look at Ryan. “Don’t feel badly, Ryan. I wasn’t afraid then, and I’m not now.”

  “What is she talking about?” Gabi demanded, meeting Ryan’s gaze. “Eir, what do you mean?”

  “Don’t blame your friend,” Eir said, her smile fading. “It was necessary, even if I—” She gasped, as if she couldn’t catch her breath, and settled again. “It will be difficult, for both of you. But never forget to hold on to each other.”

  Tears spilled over Gabi’s cheeks. “I don’t understand,” she said.

  “It will come.” She smiled again and relaxed into the mattress.

  “No!” Gabi jumped up, her muscles rigid. “You fight!”

  “I’ve done far too much of that already, child.”

  Without another word, Gabi dashed out of the infirmary. Eir closed her eyes and shuddered, gripping the sheets with her fragile fingers.

  “Are you in pain?” Ryan asked, fussing with the blankets just so he could have something to do with his hands.

  “No,” Eir said. “I’m weak. But it doesn’t hurt.” She sighed, her breath rattling. “I don’t know if I succeeded in warning Mist. I was careful, as you suggested … perhaps too careful. But she isn’t stupid, Ryan. She already has doubts. Maybe … that’s enough.”

  “I’m sorry I asked you to do this,” Ryan said, barely able to speak. “I only made you worse.”

  “Don’t be. I’ve … spent a lot of time listening to the voices of other peoples, other spirits, and I think … I know this is not the end of all things.” With an obvious effort, she reached up to touch Ryan’s wet face. “This was meant to be.”

  Her arm fell back to the mattress, and her eyes began to glaze over.

  “Wait!” Ryan said. “You have to say good-bye to Gabi!”

  “You tell her,” Eir said, closing her eyes. “Tell her she’s ready.”

  And then the life went out of her, a gentle force Ryan could feel like a breeze brushing past his face, free of fear and sadness. When she was gone, he cradled Eir’s hand between his and imagined her flying off to whatever might be waiting for her. A good place, where she could get the peace she deserved.

  “Farvel, Eir,” he said, kissing her withered cheek. “Good luck.”

  He covered the Valkyrie with one of the blankets and rose stiffly. He felt old, even though he was only eighteen. He felt as if he’d lived a hundred lifetimes.

  “Eir!”

  Gabi rushed into the room, a small suede pouch cupped in one palm. She fell to her knees beside the cot and pulled the pouch open with trembling fingers. She dug out a single hard, black seed and tried to wedge it between Eir’s lips.

  The Apples of Idunn, Ryan remembered. The fruit that was supposed to help keep the Aesir virtually immortal.

  The cure had come too late.

  “Gabi,” he said softly.

  “Eat it!” Gabi said, ignoring him. “Chew on it, Eir!”

  “She’s gone,” Ryan said, reaching across Eir’s body to touch Gabi’s arm.

  She jerked away, staring at the seed still resting on the Valkyrie’s lower lip.

  “What did you do to her, Ry?” she whispered, silent tears tracking over her cheeks. “Why did she tell me not to blame you?”

  Ryan got up and backed away. “I’m sorry, Gab,” he said. “I didn’t want this.”

  She sprang to her feet again, fists clenched. “How long were you with her? Why didn’t you get help?”

  Unable to meet her accusing eyes, Ryan looked away. He’d wanted t
o see Gabi so much, and it was ruined. He’d ruined it.

  “Will you listen to me, Gab?” he asked. “Because if you won’t, I’ll go.”

  “You mean like you did before?” Gabi brushed hard at her face. “When all you did was leave me a fucking note?”

  “I’m sorry,” Ryan said. “There was something I needed to do, and I had to do it alone.”

  “Do what? Where the hell you been?”

  “If you’ll let me explain—”

  “Shut up! Just shut up!” She returned to Eir’s bedside, sank down, and rested her cheek on Eir’s chest. Her expression relaxed into grief.

  “She was good,” Gabi said. “Real good. One of the best people I ever knew.”

  “I know,” Ryan said. “She told me to … tell you that you were ready.”

  Gabi laughed brokenly. “She’s wrong.”

  “I’m just as scared as you are, Gab.” He swallowed. “I need your help.”

  For a long time she didn’t say anything, just sat beside Eir, looking at her face and crying silently. After a while she gently took the seed from Eir’s lips and put it back in the pouch.

  “No one was supposed to touch the Treasures,” she said in a flat voice. “But Mist told me how to get the Apples if Eir started to—” She swiped at her face again. “You know, they’re supposed to be what keeps the gods alive and young. Mist said there were always consequences if anyone besides the gods tried to use them.”

  “I know about consequences,” he said. “I didn’t mean to hurt Eir, but it is my fault that she—”

  “You better tell me what you did,” Gabi said, something almost like hatred in her eyes, “or I might hurt you.”

  It was the first time she’d ever threatened him and meant it, and it felt to Ryan as if she’d taken a knife, slashed his chest open and pulled out his heart.

  “I want to tell you,” he said thickly, “but you have to promise not to tell anyone else. Not even Mist.”

  “Why should I promise you anything?”

  “Because it all has to do with what’s happening and what’s going to happen to the Earth, and the people we care about. It could all go to hell if anyone finds out before the … the right time.”

  “Your visions,” Gabi said slowly.

  “Yes.” Ryan took a deep breath. “You may hate me when I tell you, but someone else has to know. Will you listen?”

  In the end, she did. He told her almost everything but the part he still had to figure out himself, the part he couldn’t predict. He told her about Mother Skye, and how she’d taught him to control his visions so he wouldn’t have seizures or be helpless when they came. He told Gabi how, when he’d returned, he’d spent several days just watching and moving quietly around the compound, trying to decide if he could get someone to help him before he came out into the open.

  “Why didn’t you come straight to me?” Gabi demanded. “Why did you have to hide at all?”

  “It’s different than it used to be,” he said. “I’m not the same, Gab. I wish we could go back, but—”

  “We can’t. I know.”

  The way she spoke gave him hope that maybe she would understand. So he kept talking, explaining how he’d found Eir and realized what was happening to her.

  “You knew she was dying?” Gabi asked, pacing around the room as if she was looking for something to punch.

  “Yes,” Ryan said. “I knew she was going to die no matter what anyone did. She knew it, too. When I asked her to help me, she understood that it would make it … happen faster.”

  “Why? Why would helping you hurt her?”

  “Because…” Ryan met her gaze, though he was scared half to death. “I can see things more clearly now. Things that might or might not happen depending on what someone decides to do. I can see turning points, when the future might change. And right now … now is really important. This week, this month. I don’t know exactly, but even though I can see stuff, I can’t say anything about it. Because if I do, terrible things could happen.”

  “But you told Eir?”

  “Some of it, yes. I asked her to do something I couldn’t, hoping the consequences wouldn’t be so bad.”

  “But she died!” Gabi started to cry again, though she didn’t make a sound. “What did you ask her to do?” She dropped down beside him. “Ry, what did she do?”

  All at once he understood that he couldn’t tell her after all. Not because he didn’t trust her, but because Gabi would probably decide that she had to warn Mist about Freya, regardless of the risk.

  “I’m sorry, Gabi,” he whispered. “It isn’t safe to tell you any more than I already have.”

  “So you aren’t going to trust me?”

  “For your sake, Gab. I don’t want you to get hurt, too.”

  “Maybe you should let me decide. Eir was willing to die—”

  “And I won’t let it happen to you!” Ryan shouted.

  She looked at him for a long time, her face full of anger and fear and confusion and grief.

  “You are different, Ry,” she said at last. “I used to always try to protect you, but now you’re trying to protect me.”

  “That’s why I left without telling you,” he said, pleading with his eyes and his voice. “If I make one mistake, everything could go wrong. Everything could end, Gab.”

  “So you’re more important than Mist, or Freya, or anyone else? Is that what you’re saying?”

  “Not more important. But if I interfere, I have to be completely sure. And I may only have one or two chances. They have to be the right ones. And there’s still so much I can’t see.”

  “This Mother Skye didn’t train you too well, did she?”

  “She did her best,” Ryan said, trying not to sound defensive.

  “And she found you through a vision?”

  Ryan couldn’t bring himself to tell Gabi how Koji Tashiro had been involved. The lawyer had deceived him, and Gabi. He wasn’t what he’d seemed to be. But if he’d been dangerous to any of them, Mother Skye would have warned Ryan.

  “She can’t act on her visions of the future anymore, even in small ways,” he said. “That’s why she needed me to help fight Loki, and for Midgard.”

  “But who is she?”

  “I’m sorry, Gab. She asked me not to tell. I can say that she’s old. Old as the gods. Someday, I promise you’ll understand.”

  “Sure,” Gabi said bitterly. “Just like everything else.”

  “Gab…” He took a risk and reached out to touch her. She started to move away, but stopped and let him put his hand on her shoulder.

  “I didn’t want this,” he whispered. “I never did. If I hadn’t seen Mist in that dream … if I’d listened to you, and we’d just gone away instead of—”

  “Maldito,” Gabi said, the word filled with anguish. “It ain’t your fault. You said certain things happen depending on what someone decides to do. I could have made you leave, but I didn’t.” She grabbed his hand and held on to it with so much strength that Ryan thought she might crush his bones. “Why did I have to lose Eir and get you back at the same time?”

  “I don’t know,” he said. “If I could trade my life for hers—”

  She leaned over and grabbed him, locking her arms around his shoulders and hugging him hard. “Idioto. Estupido.” Her tears dribbled on his shirt, and he found himself crying like a baby. The knot in his heart began to unwind.

  “I need you, Gabi,” he said when he could talk again. “Will you help me?”

  Gabi let him go and looked into his eyes. “Eir said to hold on to each other. I’ll do whatever I can.” She turned back to the cot and uncovered Eir’s face gently. “I don’t know what we’re going to do without—”

  She gasped, and Ryan stared at Eir’s face. She looked … normal. Not shrunken, not old, but young and beautiful and strong.

  “Madre de Dios,” Gabi murmured. She crossed herself and bowed her head. “Está en paz.”

  Ryan had never really been sure th
at there was a God with a capital G. At least not one that would hear a person’s prayers. But he was grateful that, somehow, Eir’s death had turned into something so peaceful. As if she really had been ready to go.

  “I need to get the Apples back to the vault,” Gabi said, rising again.

  “The vault?” Ryan asked.

  “It’s protected by hundreds of spells. Freya, Mist, the Alfar, all of them put their magic into it.”

  “And you know how to get in?”

  “Mist trusts me,” Gabi said, pride lighting her face.

  “Will you let me come with you?”

  After a moment’s hesitation, she nodded. “I trust you,” she said.

  Gabi led him though the warehouse, out into the cold, windy afternoon, and across an expanse of concrete parking lot to another decrepit factory. Though he couldn’t see them, Ryan could feel many watching eyes, not all of them mortal. No one was going to get into this place unnoticed.

  Apparently Mist really did trust Gabi, because she’d given her a series of spells that counteracted the others. “The opening spells change every day,” Gabi said by way of explanation. “Only three other people know them.”

  As she entered the vault to replace the pouch in its nest of velvet, her hand brushed a piece of what looked to Ryan like some kind of staff, snapped raggedly in unequal halves. She gasped and snatched her hand back.

  “What is it?” Ryan asked, touching her shoulder.

  “Something … I don’t know.” She stared at the broken staff and slowly reached for it again. Her hands began to radiate warmth, and when she touched the polished wood she made a little sound of surprise.

  Ryan looked on in astonishment as the two pieces of the staff slid toward each other. They came together with a click like a key fitting into a lock, and a moment later there was one flawless object extending well beyond the edge of the case, a beautiful weapon inscribed with Runes and all kinds of intricate Norse designs.

  “Mierda!” Gabi said, awe in her voice. “I didn’t know I could do that.”