by Renee Jordan
“You're not the only one off-balanced by these changes.” His thumb stroked my cheek. “We'll just have to figure this out together.”
I nodded. “But...thank you for being honest. You could have just lied.”
“No.” He shook his head. “We need to trust each other, Raven. You'd eventually find out, then there would be hell for me to pay. And I hate drama.”
“Oh,” I arched an eyebrow. “So I take it you're not a fan of soap operas.”
“Can't say I've ever even watched one.”
“We'll have to fix that.”
His eyes grew wary. “What?”
“I'm a soap opera fanatic. We can watch General Hospital, The Bold and the Beautiful, and The Days of our Lives. Oh, and The Young and the Restless.”
“Well...I...uh...no.” Magnus shook his head. “That is not happening.”
“We'll talk about it, dear,” I said, patting his cheek. “I'm sure you'll come around.”
He blinked.
I couldn't hold back laughing. “I'm joking, Magnus. You don't have to watch them. I barely have time to watch them. So relax. You won't have to risk your masculinity by watching them.”
“My masculinity was never at risk,” he growled, a smile curling his lips.
“I can believe that,” I laughed. I put my arms around his neck and gave him a kiss.
I liked kissing him.
His arms tightened about me. I closed my eyes and enjoyed this last moment of peace. It would be dangerous out there. There was something going on at the square. Would we have to fight again? I had a feeling we would.
Especially if that wolf was there. I clenched my fist.
“Okay,” I sighed when we broke apart. “Let's get this over with. I'm tired of being in this strange place. I hate the snow.”
We mounted Magnus's Harley. It growled beneath me. I shifted on the seat, wrapped my arms around Magnus's waist, and leaned my head against his shoulder. The kickstand clicked and the engine roared as Magnus revved it.
The bike rolled slowly forward. I lifted my head to peer over his shoulder. The snow melted as we hit the driveway. Steam rose before the bike. We rolled down the driveway, picking up speed. Despite the snow getting deeper, it melted just as fast.
We hit the street and Magnus leaned us over as he turned, twisting the accelerator. We picked up speed. Snow flew past us and melted before us. It didn't seem to matter how fast we went, my power kept up. Any snow that landed on me instantly vaporized, but it clung to Magnus's dirty blond hair whipping behind him.
I didn't feel the cold as we roared down the street towards downtown. At least we didn't have to be miserable in this frigid world. He reached the first busy intersection. The trail Magnus had blazed while scouting led across the street to a skyscraper's entrance.
Magnus wove between the snow-covered cars stopped in the street as we raced down it. Some were frozen in time, changing lanes, forcing Magnus to dart right and left. Steam billowed around us. Behind us, we left a trail of fog lingering over the line of melted snow.
It was a trail a blind man could follow.
“Keep looking for anything,” Magnus shouted. “And watch the buildings.”
“Right,” I nodded.
The motorcycle's engine roared as we passed through the artificial canyons made by the skyscrapers. I peered at the tall buildings, looking for any ape-wolves clinging to the wall. I should have asked Loki what those things were and what was a good way to fight them.
Well, Magnus and I defeated the last one. We could defeat another.
A hooting cry echoed through the streets. My arms tightened about Magnus's waist as I looked around for the source. The sound came again, louder, but it was hard to tell from which direction.
“Do you see anything?” Magnus shouted as he took a right turn.
“No,” I said with a shake of my head. I kept my eyes moving. “I don't see...no, never mind, to the right.”
My heart sped up. Scampering along the side of the building were black creatures with spindly limbs. They moved almost like spiders, scampering across the building's sides. And they were quick, crawling in fast bursts of speed that covered distance in a heartbeat.
“I see them,” Magnus growled. We were heading right for them as they scampered around the white skyscraper to the right. “We'll just have to pass them.”
Magnus twisted the accelerator, and we shot down the road.
The monsters leaped from the building and landed about us. Metal dented and glass shattered as one crashed down on a car. Scraggly, white hair hung down a face that hooted in bestial hunger. The monster's skin was stretched tight over its skeleton, like it had no muscles. It looked starving.
Saliva dripped from its jaws as it leaped at us.
I swung my arm while summoning my sword. The flaming blade appeared right before it struck the black thing. The monster screeched as my blade cut deep. Fire burst from the wound. The creature hit the snow in a flaming ball and was left behind.
Around us, the other monsters shot forward in blurs of speed. They leaped across the snow-covered cars. Metal groaned and twisted. They hooted and snarled. As fast as the motorcycle roared down the street, they were faster.
“You have to hold them off,” Magnus shouted as he turned hard to the right.
“Okay!”
I could do this. It was awkward swinging the sword from the back of a motorcycle. The position limited my arm's motions. And it was a pain to switch hands. I felt so clumsy when I used the sword in my left hand and my swings felt weaker.
My slashes kept them at bay. None had charged in like the first. There were five of them. They raced alongside of us, moving in those unnerving bursts of blurring speed. I kept my sword slashing, ignoring the burning fatigue growing in my arm.
The thing to my left moved closer.
I switched the sword to my left hand and slashed at him as he blurred forward. He stopped his jump short, landing in the snow in a puff of white. It would catch up. I glanced to my right and—
The creature to my left slammed into me. Thin, bony arms wrapped around me. Sharp claws burned as they scratched my stomach. The monster's momentum twisted my body around and pulled me off the bike.
“Magnus!” I screamed as I tumbled through the air.
I landed on the creature's side. It hissed in pain and its claws let me go. We rolled through snow. It melted around me. I scrambled to my feet and passed my sword back to my right hand. The thing came up on all fours, crouching and hooting at me.
“Delicious,” it purred. “Delicious, hot flesh. So long. So hungry.”
My skin crawled at its tone.
“You're not eating me,” I spat as I lunged.
The thing blurred as it leaped away. It landed on the side of a car, metal screeching as its sharp claws dug into the vehicle's body. I raced at it, snow melting before me, and thrust my sword. It jumped away again. My blade punched through the car's window, snow and broken glass crashing to the ground.
I spun.
All five creatures had me surrounded. They circled and hooted. “Delicious.”
“Let's peel her skin.”
“Crack her bones and suck the marrow out.”
“Salty blood. Hot meat.”
“Food. Food.”
I grit my teeth. I was not about to become monster food. With a roar, I lunged at the nearest one, my sword slashing. With a startled hoot, it leaped away. But not fast enough this time. My sword cut through its bony leg.
Trailing black blood, the monster landed in the snow and screeched in pain. Smoke rose, his flesh on fire. The monster rolled in the snow to smother the flames as I charged at the next one.
All four leaped at me.
A shotgun roared.
One was thrown to the side in an explosion of brackish blood and screeching pain. I thrust my sword out at a second, ramming it down the monster's snarling mouth. Flames erupted through the monster's skin and he fell to a burning heap before me.
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br /> The other two slammed into me.
I groaned. Their impacts knocked me back into a snow-covered car. My left arm pushed at one, keeping its snarling teeth from biting me. The other hadn't grabbed me. He crouched at my feet and raised a slashing claw. I tried to move my sword, but I was tangled up with the other monster.
A shotgun fired. The monster, about to slash my head, exploded back. His body fell twitching to the ground. Magnus appeared, racing up with the shotgun. He growled and raised the weapon's wooden butt, slamming it into the head of the monster grappling with me.
The monster fell to the ground, thrashing as it tried to right itself. Magnus brought the shotgun to his shoulder and shot the monster in the gut. It howled, its flesh torn open by the close range blast. It gurgled as it choked on its own blood.
“Are you okay?” Magnus growled as he plowed through the snow after the three-legged monster.
“Yes,” I panted. “Just scratched.”
The three-legged one had put out the fire burning his wound. It hissed in fear and leaped away. Magnus moved his shotgun and fired, timing his blast right as the monster landed. The shot took the beast in the back. It flopped to the ground, twitching and growling.
I stabbed the gurgling monster, putting it out of its suffering. Fire consumed it to ash.
Magnus was already reloading red shells into the shotgun's magazine as he examined me, anger on his face. I touched my side and winced. Blood was on my fingers. I lifted my shirt. Three bloody scratches ran around my hip. They weren't deep and I wasn't bleeding badly.
“I guess I messed up,” I said, wincing as I touched the scratch.
Magnus shook his head. “You did amazing. You popped back up and started fighting while I was stuck in the snow.”
His bike was half-buried in the drift. When I fell off, I stopped melting the snow before the bike. But momentum kept Magnus and his Harley going until the snow became too deep and stopped his bike. It looked like he was thrown off his bike and had to wade through a deep snowdrift to reach me.
“Trust me, Raven, you did better than most people would in a fight. Just like yesterday. You have guts. Now lets get you patched up.”
I nodded my head.
Chapter Fifteen
Magnus
Raven and I left my bike in the 7-11 parking lot on Denny Way a few blocks from the Space Needle. The air hummed ahead, and there were strange flashes of light sheeting up into the air. They danced and shimmered, rippling from green to blue to purple to red. It was almost like watching the aurora dancing in curtains around the towering Space Needle.
“We need to scout,” I told Raven.
She nodded her head, holding her flaming sword. She had changed out of her shirt ripped by the monsters, and now wore a tighter, black shirt that left an inch of her belly bare and exposed the white bandage on her side.
“Okay,” she whispered back. “And how do we do that?”
“Carefully,” I told her.
I peered around the 7-11 and scanned down 4th Avenue North for any dangers. The Space Needle was dead ahead. Trees covered in snow dotted the grounds of the park before the Space Needle. I searched for any movement in those trees. They would be the perfect place to have guards.
“Do you see anything in those trees?” I asked.
Raven peaked her head around me. “Not sure. It's far away.”
“We'll move up and use the cars parked along this side of 4th as cover.”
Raven nodded.
I lead the way, shotgun in hand, the snow slowing my feet. It hissed and melted behind me. We padded up the street. The sounds grew louder. The ground shook beneath our feet. My stomach tightened. What was going on in the Seattle Center?
Raven gasped as the entire sky burst with rainbow light. It shimmered out from the Space Needle, sweeping over us in an undulating wave. The hairs on my arms stood up as the sky above us crackled and bathed us in scintillating colors.
“What is going on?” Raven gasped.
“I have no idea,” I answered, gripping the shotgun. Was this a mistake? Maybe we should wait until whatever was happening was finished before we headed for the fountain.
But what if it never finished?
Anger boiled inside me. No. Raven didn't deserve to stay in this frigid hell a moment longer. The wolf snarled within me. I wanted to don the wolf's cloak, to become a beast of rage and tear a path for Raven through all the monsters between us and the fountain.
I was a berserker. I could wear the wolf as a cloak, as the bards of old put it.
“Let's keep going,” I growled. “Let's get home.”
“Okay,” Raven answered.
~ ~ ~
Raven
We reached 4th Avenue's end at Broad Street. Across the road lay the grassy field before the Space Needle, a line of trees marching along the sidewalk. Normally, tourists would teem across the street, eager to see Seattle's most famous landmark. To the right, a circular drive led right up to the entrance of the Space Needle-Seattle Center, the small, glass building built around the white support legs of the tower and housing the elevator that led to the UFO-like dome at the summit. A frozen fountain lay at the center of the circular drive, the splashing water frozen into an icy waterfall.
We weren't here for this fountain. The International Fountain lay at the heart of the Seattle Center, hidden behind snow-covered buildings. It lay in the center of a field. The International Fountain splashed on a black and red plaza instead of a pool. During the summer, people played in the fountain's spray.
“See that building to the left of the Space Needle.”
Magnus nodded.
“If we head down the loop before the Space Needle, there should be a path leading off to the left in front of that building. We follow that until we hit the Seattle's Children Theatre, then we go right. It'll take us past the Armory and Fisher Pavilion to the Fountain Lawn.”
“Yeah, that seems right,” Magnus answered. “So that's Key Arena?” He pointed to the larger building in the distance.
“I think so. The fountain's before that building.”
“It looks clear around here,” Magnus said. “Let's go back for my bike and move it closer. Just in case we need to run or...”
“You have the chance to take it back home with us?” I smiled.
“Yeah.”
“Okay.”
Getting his bike didn't take too much time. We didn't ride it—the engine's roar seemed so loud in the deserted city—but pushed it along the path I had already melted through the snow. When we reached the loop before the Space Needle, I took the lead and blazed a new trail. I knew the Seattle Center pretty well so it was so strange to see it covered in snow.
Everything familiar had taken on an alien quality. We passed between the back end of the Pacific Science Center and the Chihuly Garden and Glass. The ponds at the back of the science center were frozen over and buried by snow. It was hard to tell where the boundary lay between the ponds and the paths that snaked through them.
I decided to cut us through the Mural Amphitheater instead of continuing to the Seattle's Children Theatre. The sounds and lights coming from the fountain lawn grew louder and louder. I wanted to keep the Armory, a large building bordering the lawn around the International Fountain, between us and our destination. Using cover was important. At least, that's what all those war movies seemed to imply.
A wolf howled and another sheet of aurora danced in the sky above the Armory. My heart beat faster. An answering howl rose from my memories, cold and vicious as a winter storm. The howl of the monstrous wolf that killed my parents.
I glanced back at Magnus pushing his motorcycle through the clear path of snow I melted. His face was tense. Fear and anger warred inside me. Was it him? The beast that killed my parents? My fiery sword sprang into my hand. The flames danced angry-red on the shining steel. Did they burn fiercer than usual?
“Is it...?” Magnus asked.
The wolf howled again. My skin crawled. My s
tomach twisted. I let out an angry growl. “Yes.”
“You will not pass into Midgard, Fenrir,” a man's voice roared. “None cross the Bifrost except at my pleasure.”
“Bifrost?” I whispered.
“The rainbow bridge,” answered Magnus. The path that connects Asgard to Midgard.”
“Why is it here?” I asked. “I thought this was Utgard.”
Magnus shook his head. “I don't know. But that speaker must be Heimdall. He guards the bridge. He's the watchman of the gods.”
“But that means...” Loki was right. “We can get back this way.”
“We just have to get past Fenrir.”
My sword burned brighter. “Gladly.”
Images of my mother, clad in shining armor, leaping at the wolf flooded my mind. Her braids had streamed raven-black beneath her winged helmet as...how did she conjure armor? Why didn't I have armor?
Water dripped nearby. I puzzled over the armor. Could I summon my own armor? The sword came easily. I wanted to fight. I wanted to kill Fenrir. He stole my parents from me. The beast deserved to die.
How had my mother made the armor?
“Raven,” Magnus whispered. “Look up.”
“What?” I asked, coming out of my thoughts.
“Move behind me.” Magnus slowly drew the shotgun and brought it up to his shoulder.
My eyes slid up the Armory's side. Water ran down the building's face, washing away snow and ice. My eyebrows furrowed. On the roof's lip, a swath of piled snow had melted. Was it another Valkyrie? The air above the melted snow rippled and danced, boiled by a source of heat.
“What is it?” I asked.
Magnus shook his head. His chest rose and fell. He was calm. I wished I could be. I sucked in deep breaths as my heart thundered. Fenrir howled in the background. The sky danced with colors above the Armory.
A charred hand grabbed the lip of the building. Stone blackened around the skeletal grip. The arm was burned almost down to the bones. A head appeared. Fire burned in its mouth as it peered over the side of the armory.
The monster's hiss crackled like flames.
“What is that?” I gasped.
“Trouble.”
