by Eva Chase
As I said the last few words, I shot up toward the ceiling with a few swift beats of my wings, as fast as they could carry me. At the last second, I spun backward and aimed my legs at the layers of golden straw with a massive kick.
My feet burst through the ceiling, so fragile in Muninn’s mind. I flapped my wings and soared up through the hole I’d made, out toward the freedom of the bright blue sky with a gust of fresh air filling my lungs, and—
The walls below me toppled completely. A force walloped me from behind. I whirled, my head dizzy, and a sensation twanged faintly in my chest. From my heart.
One of the gods who’d made me—one of them was close. If I could just hold on to that feeling, maybe I could…
I focused all my attention on that pale tug. My body whipped around again, and I tumbled forward onto hard-packed earth.
7
Aria
I leapt back up, tensed and wary, my feet braced against the earth. I’d landed in a meadow, grass sprouting here and there from the dry ground, with a hall nearly as large as Valhalla in front of me. No gold on this one, though, just stone.
No one else was around. It was just me and the warm breeze and a whiff of apple blossoms from somewhere nearby. I guessed I hadn’t managed to make it to the god I’d sensed after all. Where the hell had Muninn sent me now, and why?
Voices filtered through the hall’s wide door. Hoots and laughter—and a pained shout. My wings snapped open from where they’d folded against my back in my fall. Before I could take a step toward the hall, the door burst open with so much force it smacked the stone wall beside its frame.
Loki bolted out, his hair flying back from his forehead in a pale red flame, his strides lengthening as his shoes of flight lifted him off the ground. Oh. I guessed I’d found my way in the right direction after all. I moved to hurry after him, and a horde of figures charged out of the hall.
These men weren’t human warriors like in Valhalla. They might be constructs with no real life energy for me to sense, but something about their bearing, the power in their movements, told me they were gods.
Loki was already outpacing them. Then a shining silver shape whipped through their midst and slammed into his back. With a gasped curse, he toppled to the ground.
The silver shape flew back into the hall. I froze for a second, staring. Had that been Thor’s hammer? Why would he be attacking Loki? Or was that just what Muninn wanted me to think?
The mass of other gods descended on the fallen trickster. “You’re not getting out of this, Sly One,” a swarthy man growled. Another yanked Loki’s arms behind his back at an angle that made Loki wince. His eyes blazed. He managed to kick one god in the gut and another in the groin before one of them heaved up his legs too.
“Muninn!” Loki rasped out. “Once was fucking enough. When I get my hands on you, I’m going to wring that feathered neck until—”
Yet another god shoved his meaty hand over the trickster’s mouth. They hauled him toward the hall.
No. My body lurched into action. I sprang into the air, throwing myself at the closest of the gods tormenting the flailing Loki. “Let him go, you assholes! Let him go!”
My elbow jabbed the god in the eye while I aimed a kick at his ribs. He grunted, his hold loosening. I spun around to tackle the god beside him, and a huge fist connected with my temple.
I’d faced off against godly strength before, the times Thor and I had sparred while he was teaching me to use the strength and speed he’d given me. But he’d been holding back then, not really trying to hurt me. A valkyrie was no real match for a god. And this one hadn’t held back at all.
Pain splintered through my skull. I reeled backward, my wings jerking, and landed in a heap on my hands and knees. My vision stuttered as I blinked. I shoved myself back to my feet, toward the throng. They were just constructs. I should be able to stop them. I couldn’t just sit here while they manhandled Loki.
My head was still throbbing. I staggered before I found my balance.
“Ari.”
My legs locked at the urgency in Loki’s ragged voice. My gaze found his through the crowd of gods around him. His mouth was free, but they held his arms and legs as tightly as before. He’d gone limp in his attackers’ grasp. The blaze in his eyes had simmered down to a smolder that sent a twisting sensation through my gut.
I couldn’t normally use the sensitivity to emotions that Baldur had given me all that well on the gods, but right now I barely needed it to read the trickster’s expression. There was anger there still, but also resignation… and shame.
“Leave it,” he said. “They’ll be done with me soon. You might keep that switchblade of yours ready, though.”
The gods marched back to the hall, carrying him between them. He stayed silent in their grasp as they pushed inside. The door thumped shut behind them.
What the hell was going on? Was this from someone’s memories—Loki’s, I’d have to guess? Or was Muninn stitching together bits and pieces into a horrible new scenario like she had with the wargs?
He’d wanted me to have my switchblade ready. I rubbed the tender spot on my temple where that god had punched me and pulled the knife from my pocket.
More bellows—some that sounded angry, and then others of amusement—carried through the building’s door. I shifted my weight from one foot to the other, debating whether I should charge in there despite what Loki had said. He couldn’t know exactly what Muninn had planned any more than I did. Although I wasn’t sure there was any situation I could get him out of if he couldn’t himself. It just didn’t feel right to simply wait out whatever awful things they might be doing to him. They hadn’t looked like they only wanted a polite chat.
I’d just gathered my resolve and started toward the hall when the door flew open again. Loki strode out, a wave of godly laughter ringing after him. I bristled, but none of the other gods appeared at the doorway.
The trickster was shadowing his mouth with one hand. He held the other out to me with a beckoning twitch of his fingers. His smoldering eyes didn’t quite meet my gaze.
“What?” I said. “What did they do to you? Are you okay?”
He didn’t speak, just made another twitching gesture with his fingers. Right, the switchblade. I frowned as I handed it over.
Loki’s hand dipped for just an instant as he spun away from me, and I caught a glimpse of what he’d been trying to hide. Thick black lines zigzagged across his clamped lips, piercing the skin above and below with angry pink wounds. A choked sound escaped me.
Loki jerked the blade across his face. Bits of a black material that looked like leather rained down as he coughed and spat. The fragments disintegrated into dust when they hit the ground.
The trickster turned back to me, rubbing his mouth. I braced myself, but when he lowered his arm, his face looked the same as it always had. Because he’d healed already or because he’d shifted his features to hide the wounds? I’d seen him transform his face into that of a woman’s before. I’d seen him morph into a wolf. He clearly didn’t like that I’d seen him in this state at all.
He thrust the folded switchblade toward me. The second my fingers closed around it, he started walking. “Come on, let’s get away from this wretched place.”
I had to speed-walk to keep up with him. We skirted the hall and ventured into a thick stretch of forest, all pines and aspen, behind it. I contracted my wings to avoid the branches.
When the trees had closed in between us and the hall, Loki’s pace slowed. He still hadn’t looked directly at me since he’d come out.
“What was that all about?” I said quietly. “They… They sewed your mouth shut. Muninn must have some kind of sick mind to—”
“Don’t blame her for that part,” Loki broke in in a sharply flippant tone. “Other than her role in recreating it. These are memories, pixie, remember? You’re getting a real introduction to the world of the gods.”
My stomach clenched. “Then that really happened. They re
ally— Thor helped them, didn’t he? That was his hammer that stopped you from getting away.”
“We all do things we’re not especially proud of when caught up in the fervor of a crowd, hmm?”
“But why? Why would they do that to anyone? That’s just…” My hands balled at my sides with the urge to go back and pummel all of those assholes into dust. Of course, what would probably happen was I’d end up with very sore knuckles and who knew what else.
Loki let out a weary chuckle and stopped. He propped himself against the trunk of a pine and finally met my eyes, a little of their usual mischievous glint coming back. “Well, you see, I made a wager.”
“You what?”
He gestured vaguely toward the city we’d left behind. “I saw an excellent opportunity to win the gods a multitude of weapons. Some of the dark elves are quite skilled with their forges, you know. I had one set of brothers fashion Odin’s great spear and a ship for Freya’s brother Freyr, and then wagered with a different set of craftsmen that they couldn’t produce better. And of course they couldn’t resist trying. One of the lovely items they produced was Mjolnir.”
“I don’t really see how bringing the gods a bunch of gifts would have ended up with them attacking you,” I said.
Loki’s lips curled into a smile. “Well, the wager was for my head, if I lost.”
My eyebrows jumped up. “Your head?” I was starting to understand all the comments the others had made about the trickster getting into as much trouble as he got out of.
“It had to be something they didn’t think they could get anywhere else,” he said breezily. “I’d thought the gods would decide in my favor, considering the massive favor I’d done them, but, well… The trouble for the dark elves was, I hadn’t put my neck on offer, and there was no way for Brokk to take my head without damaging that. So, in the end he settled on the payment you noted.” He flicked his fingers toward his mouth.
The story still didn’t sit quite right with me. I studied his expression, which was so casual now. “Why wouldn’t the gods have decided for you? Why would they have helped the dark elf do that instead of letting you escape if you could? They looked…”
They’d looked almost as if they were enjoying carting him off to his doom.
Loki shrugged. “You remember where we are, and what I told you that I’m not, don’t you?”
“You aren’t exactly a god because you weren’t originally from Asgard,” I said. “Technically you’re a giant. But you’re Odin’s blood brother. You lived here with the rest of the gods—how long?”
His gaze slid away from me again, with a hint of melancholy he couldn’t quite disguise. “It doesn’t matter how long. The Aesir have very particular ideas about giants.”
“So, they don’t like you just because you’re not one of them.” My mind tripped back to schoolyard taunts, little scuffles in the hallways, with kids who’d made fun of the holes and stains on my clothes, my bluntly chopped hair, before I’d had the wherewithal to at least make myself look as if I fit in. As if that small agony was anything compared to the torment I’d just witnessed. I knew the flavor of it, though. I knew how deep the unfairness of it could sting.
“That’s the gist of it,” Loki agreed. “The gods and the giants have been at each other’s throats rather a lot. I haven’t got much love for the people of my birth either, I must admit. For the most part they’re a violent boorish lot best left to stew in their own brutality.”
“But you’re not some violent brute,” I said. “Anyone with half a brain can see that.”
“Why thank you for saying so. But prejudice isn’t always so easily dismissed, now is it? And… well, let’s just say they have plenty of other reasons to not always feel completely friendly toward me. It’s a complicated situation.”
That was what Hod had said too. But Hod hadn’t made any secret that he blamed a lot of those complications on Loki. I’d never heard Loki criticize any of the gods by name other than teasingly. How much were all those grumblings of Hod’s justified, and how much was it simple prejudice?
My jaw set, a quiver of anger running through me. Loki caught my eye and laughed.
“You look so fierce on my behalf. No need to go off avenging me, pixie. It’s all a long time in the past now.”
Hod had been bickering with him just this morning. Freya had made her comments… My throat tightened.
“Is it?” I asked.
Something new lit in Loki’s gaze as he looked back at me, bright but deep behind those amber eyes. He eased himself off the tree. His hand came to my cheek as he bent to kiss me.
It wasn’t like the kisses we’d shared before, that instant sear of flames. His mouth moved softly against mine as if we were kindling a fire between us bit by bit, urging it from that first small spark. As if he needed my presence, my touch, to bring that flame to life. A swell of yearning filled my chest, and I kissed him back harder.
With a hungry noise, he looped his arm around my waist and tugged me closer. I gripped his neck, my fingers tangling in the silky strands of hair that fell there. Light seemed to flare at the edges of my eyelids.
This must be what it’d be like to stand in the white-hot center of a blaze like the eye of a storm, encased in brilliance and heat but not burned.
The trickster pulled back sooner than I’d have wanted him to, his head staying bowed over mine. My heart thumped out of kilter. “Loki…”
“I know,” he said with a flash of a smile, and straightened up. “No commitments, no proclamations. There are simply moments I can’t resist you.”
I didn’t like the impression I got that he’d just retreated from me. Those words weren’t what I’d been going to say. But I had no clue what I had wanted to tell him, so I shut my mouth. And opened it again. When I wet my lips, the spicy sweet taste of him lingered on my tongue.
“What do we do now?” I made myself say. “I guess we should look for the others?”
“Or an exit,” Loki said. “And there doesn’t appear to be one here.” His smile turned sharp. “Let’s see what else the raven has in store for us in this grand adventure.”
8
Loki
“Muninn really did quite an excellent job with this place,” I said as we ambled through the forest that bordered our false-Asgard’s city. “I suppose it’s not surprising, given that she had so many extensive sets of memories to work with. Still, as much as I’d like to smash this construct to the ground and be done with it, I have to give her points for skill.”
Ari made a noncommittal sound. She’d drawn in her wings, but the tension showed in her back and shoulders. She was prepared to whip them out the moment she felt we needed to flee. A couple weeks ago she’d held them like they were a burden and now she was relying on them like any other part of her.
She was truly rising to her role as valkyrie. The valkyrie I’d chosen. Even through the whirl of emotions I was trying to smother, I could feel a flash of pride at that.
“So, this really is what Asgard is like?” she said. “Other than little details that have changed since the memories Muninn is using?”
I dragged in a breath of the piney air, warm but with a thread of autumn coolness to it. The raven wasn’t worrying too much about keeping her seasons consistent. The rustle of the dried needles under our feet, the slant of the sun between the trees—everything about the illusion rang true. I might have taken this walk a hundred times.
“If I hadn’t seen everything I’ve already seen, I’d believe this was Asgard,” I said. “When we get to the real thing, you’ll find it very familiar. But thankfully with much less sudden emergences of horrifying past events.” I winked at her, as if I were joking. As if I couldn’t still feel the sting of that leather string around my lips and the sharper jab of all that godly laughter while Brokk had sewn it in.
“And I guess the other gods aren’t around very much?” she said. “You said before that you haven’t seen a bunch of them in a long time.”
; I nodded. “The world moved on without us, and some of us took it harder than others. A lot of the lesser gods simply slipped away. Maybe they found some lovely hut on a tropical beach and are living a life of relaxation. Others went off on whatever quests they could make up and never returned. Many of the Vanir returned to their original home—Freyr may still be there. I haven’t paid a call in ages. Not that he’s likely to celebrate a visit from me.”
I gave Ari a grin, but she fixed me with those damned gray eyes that I was learning didn’t miss very much. They shouldn’t, with the talents we’d given her when we’d brought her back from the dead in the guise of a valkyrie. But her street-honed instincts clearly took those basic skills to a higher level than the three women we’d sent questing for Odin before her.
Of course, that was why she’d survived and they, as far as we knew, hadn’t.
“Well, good riddance to them, if the rest of them were like that.” She motioned toward the hall we’d left far behind. A hot prickle of shame ran down my back at the reminder of the scene she’d witnessed before the sewing. Not my most impressive moment, being hauled off by those louts. I’d like to wring Muninn’s neck just for dropping Ari there right at that moment.
Our valkyrie hadn’t hesitated, though. At least twenty gods around me, and Ari had launched herself at them as if she meant to take them all on in one go, just to free me. It had bothered her that much, seeing the way they were roughing me up, that she’d risked her life trying to stop them.
Literally risked her life, because illusions or not, I’d seen how hard that one punch had hit her. Norns only knew what Muninn might have allowed her creations to do to our valkyrie if she’d kept up the fight. All the fight I’d had in me had drained away in that moment, seeing her crumpled on the ground the second before she’d moved again.
