“What on Earth did you do to get yourself excommunicated from the whole were-bear society?”
“It’s not a fun story,” he said with a grimace. “How about you tell me the story you were chasing in Blue Ridge?”
I shrugged. There wasn’t much to tell really. It was a tidbit I’d overheard and thought it might be worth investigating.
“There were rumors running around a small, mountain town. They say there’s a ghost bear living in the mountains. I thought it might have been a spirit that the locals weren’t educated enough to recognize, so I thought I’d track it down.”
“This bear, was it described as snow white, and appeared in the woods north of Luray?” he asked.
I paused mid-lather to glance back at him. “Yeah, how’d you know?”
“It was my sister, Lucy.”
“I thought you weren’t born a were-bear? How is your sister one too if you were vanilla human before?”
“Magic, I guess.”
“In the case of Norse were-animals, there’s not a lot of magic involved typically. You’re born that way or you change.”
“Well my sister’s never been typical,” he said, and I could detect a hint of wry amusement in his tone. “She did it the old-fashioned way by merging with a spirit.”
“How’d the story get out?”
He shrugged. “Beats the hell out of me. There were a lot of Ulfhednar around, but I doubt they’re talking to the locals. Especially after Lucy kicked Frigg’s ass on that mountain ridge.”
My mouth dropped open for the second time in one day. “So, you’re saying that your sister melded with a bear, defeated untold numbers of Odin’s personal guard, and had a confrontation with Mother Frigg that she won?”
“You don’t get between my sister and her man,” he said sagely. He kept the solemn expression in place for a few seconds. My expression must have been something to see because he cracked up, a wide, delighted smile on his face. “Well, to be completely fair, her husband and I had put quite a few Ulfhednar out of commission the night before. But my sister was sort of a badass.”
“Must run in the family,” I muttered.
We were silent for a few minutes, focusing on the difficult task of removing the myriad filth on our bodies.
“You’ll still have to cover your face after this,” I realized. “Will you need more blood?”
His hands skimmed my shoulders and trailed down to my waist. “Don’t hurt yourself again. I’ll just use mud.”
I shivered as he pulled my body into his. His hardness was thick against my back. “You want to do that here?” I hissed. “We’re sort of in the heart of enemy territory.”
“Right,” he muttered. “Sorry. You distract me.”
“I don’t know what’s back there to distract you. I hate my ass.”
He chuckled. He must have knelt down because his erection was gone from my back, and his large hands were caressing my thighs, trailing down to my calves. His mouth teased my flesh, licking and biting my inner thigh.
I could feel heat beginning to pool between my legs and tried to get a grip. Hadn’t I just said this was a bad idea?
“I love every part of you,” he said. “But especially your legs. Every time I get a glimpse I want to wrap them around my waist, shove you against the nearest wall, and push inside you over and over until–”
I clenched my eyes tightly shut and clapped my hands over my ears. The desire was only peaking and at this rate, I’d probably let him have his way with me.
He made his way up my body, nipping sharply at my hip bone before trailing reverent kisses up my stomach to my breasts. He laved one taut nipple with his tongue, and my knees threatened to give way. He pulled one hand away from my ear and leaned up to whisper,
“You look so beautiful when you’re wet.”
Oh God. That wasn’t fair. Why did he have to employ that tone now? Having sex here would be a bad idea, and I knew it.
“You’re impossible,” I groaned.
“You like it.”
Damn it, I did. Why did I like it? Maybe because he was the first man I was with who saw me? Truly saw me, noticed and respected my hang-ups. Maybe because he’d been willing to go into battle with an injury rather than demand we be physical?
That said more about me than it did about him, unfortunately. Were my choices really that poor, or was this a part of the mating thing? Maybe our tryst had drawn us inexorably closer, feeding the connection we already had. Yeah, I’d go with that one.
I turned around helping him with the hard to reach spots. We’d managed to get mud everywhere, even in the bits that should have been covered by clothing and armor.
I cupped his cheek, the insistent demands of my libido fading from the forefront of my brain for the time being.
“Is that why you cover your face?” I asked, the pieces finally falling into place. “To hide your identity from Thor and Tyr?”
“Yeah,” he said, stroking his thumb over my jaw. “If it had been just me, I might not have bothered. But Adner might have told them what you mean to me. They could have hurt you.”
“What do you mean, you wouldn’t have hidden your face? Would you have let them kill you?” My voice was rising steadily, climbing in tandem with my anger.
“What’s wrong?”
“How can you ask that?” I demanded, jabbing him in the chest. It was strangely reminiscent of the first night when I’d woken in the shack with him. Had that only been a few weeks ago? It felt like we’d been together for a small eternity.
“Don’t you ever give up on me like that, you stupid lunk. You can’t just live for me, okay? If I die, you have to live. I have to believe I’ll see you again in some way or another or I’ll go crazy.”
He took my hand in one of his and brought it up to his lips.
“I wasn’t in a good place when we met, Audrey,” he murmured. “I’m still not, half the time. You’re the only thing that makes this monstrous existence bearable.”
“You’re not a monster.”
His expression was bleak. He stared at me as if the answer to his very existence was written somewhere on my face.
“How do you know?” He asked.
I pulled myself close to him, twining my arms around his neck. With some prompting, he lifted me off the shower floor and trapped my smaller frame against the wall. I wrapped my legs around his waist and his hardness pressed against my thigh. I kissed him sweetly, and could taste salt on his lips.
“Because I don’t fall in love with monsters.”
Chapter 7
Luke
Today would be the day. I could feel it.
I pulled on my tunic, which looked grimy in contrast to my body which had been scrubbed free of filth before Audrey would agree to sleep with me again. I’d finally gotten the hang of donning the armor in the weeks we’d been here. I didn’t try to wake Audrey. She deserved to sleep after the hellish weeks we’d been through.
Today would be the last day we’d be trapped in this damned arena. Tonight, I’d stride out of here a free man, with my mate by my side.
It had given me a certain amount of satisfaction seeing her sprawled on a real bed. I hadn’t had the chance to see her in full sunlight without the blood and grime. I could almost pretend we weren’t in this hellhole. I ran my hand over the soft curtain of her hair. It had coppery highlights in the sun. What more would I discover about her body when our love life wasn’t limited to furtive trysts at night, hoping no one would step in on us?
Her hazel eyes fluttered open at my touch. She smiled sleepily at me. “Is it time?”
“Yeah. Your stuff is in the corner. I did what I could for the armor, but the tunics are a bust.” I took a bit of vindictive pleasure from the fact that I’d cleaned our armor off with Thor’s toothbrush. Though why a god needed a dental hygiene routine was beyond me.
I stooped down to pick up the abandoned tunic and then tossed it to her. S
he caught it in one deft movement, scowled at how filthy it was, and then shrugged off the covers, revealing her soft, slender body in all of its splendor. She blushed when she caught me staring.
We dressed quickly and made our way back toward the barracks. While I’d have loved to stay in bed with her the whole day, it would only prolong the inevitable. Besides, Thor was bound to come looking for us sooner or later. It would be better for us to sneak into the barracks where I could find mud to smear onto my face.
I felt naked without the protective layer of grit and gristle to conceal my face. My stomach lurched every time we turned a corner. I kept expecting to come face to face with Thor or Tyr.
We were on the lowest level and very near the barracks when I heard the voices. They were too far off yet to distinguish what was being said, but I could recognize Thor’s voice in the mix.
What now? The halls went in a giant circle. If we went back the way we’d come, there was no telling who we’d meet up with. I had no clue where Tyr was. We could try to sneak behind Thor and get into the barracks that way. But that was operating under the assumption that he’d remain where he was in the time it took us to circle the whole stadium and into the barracks. Maybe we should steal away before we inadvertently came face to face with them. But something about the indistinct, female voice sounded familiar.
“Where are you going?” Audrey hissed as I took a few steps forward, toward the sound of the argument.
“Give me a minute,” I muttered. Maybe if I could see exactly who was there, I’d be able to come up with a better plan. Maybe if I knew they were in the same place, it would be safe enough to sneak around.
So I crept closer, keeping close to the wall. The voices became more distinguishable the further I went. As I’d thought, the loudest of them was Thor’s. The next one I could pick out from the throng was that of the Major. So, he was around after all. I wasn’t sure how comforting that should be. I hadn’t gotten a good read on him yet. He did seem to have bought into the Aesir propaganda, but he didn’t seem to actively want to hurt anyone, either.
I inched my way along the wall for several minutes, stopping only when I could make out the individual words being said.
“—this idiotic display,” An unknown, male voice finished in disgust. “This isn’t the dark ages anymore. You and Tyr have done our campaign more harm than good. If word of this gets out, and I don’t doubt it will–”
“Come now, father. We’ve accomplished much in only a few short weeks. We’ve conscripted seventy magnificent warriors–”
“And killed or maimed thirty more,” A cool, female voice finished.
Ice shot through my veins. Now I knew where I’d heard the voice before. My mind dredged up the memory of my sister Lucy pelting an unreasonably attractive woman with a magic soccer ball on a mountaintop. Even now I was still skeptical. How the hell had that worked? How had she managed to best a goddess with only a soccer ball?
I knew who was at the end of that hallway, blocking our path to the barracks. And, I knew with absolute certainty that I should run the other direction. I stayed rooted to the spot, listening to the conversation between Mother Frigg, the Major, Thor, and the man who must be Frigg’s husband. Odin, wasn’t it? Chance had drilled at least the very basic prayers into my head. Odin, the all-father. Husband of Frigg, the chief God of the Aesir.
“It was necessary,” Thor said, and I could almost see his broad shoulders lifting in an unapologetic shrug.
“It was foolish,” Odin countered. “In this age of information, it only takes one disgruntled recruit to spread the word of what has been done here. I don’t care that you’ve cut them off for now, it will get out eventually. Besides, we don’t have the luxury of being choosy. After the matches conclude today, you will conscript all of the were-animals you captured, not just the ones who please you with their prowess.”
“You expect me to send unworthy little weaklings–”
“I expect you,” Odin said, speaking over his son’s outraged roar, “to put a spear, sword, or gun in the hands of anyone capable of wielding one. We must throw something at Freyr and his folk. You’re wasting time. We have to go on the offensive and drive him away from our borders. We are losing ground.”
“Besides,” Frigg added in a calmer tone. “Heimdall has been gaining ground. We have narrowed down Idun’s location to the United States.”
“That’s helpful,” Thor groused. “That’s a mere 2,800 miles to search if we go coast to coast.”
“Mind your tone,” Frigg snapped. “It is helpful. Before we could have searched the world over. It would have taken us years and recourses we don’t have to spare. If Freya’s spell continues to wane, we should have a more approximate location soon.”
“Good.”
They were silent for a moment and after the sound of their voices had died down, I could hear their footsteps. My heart tried to pole vault its way into my throat as I realized, belatedly, that they were walking right toward me.
I pulled the hood of my furs up, though it had little chance of obscuring my face completely. I was too tall, and it wasn’t designed to be a cowl. Footsteps sounded from the other direction as well and Audrey’s warm scent filled the air. The bear was glad to have her near. It sensed, but could not fathom my human fear. In the bear’s mind, it was better to have our mate near, so she could be more easily protected. In reality, it would be best if she not be seen with me at all, if it came to that.
“Go back,” I hissed.
“What are you doing?” she asked. “We have a match in an hour.”
“Go back,” I insisted. “Stay out of sight. They’re coming.”
“Who’s coming?”
They rounded the corner, and every muscle in my body went into lockdown. I stood staring at Audrey for a frozen moment.
“James,” Thor called. I wanted to swear. I unlocked my frozen limbs and gave Audrey an insistent push in the opposite direction.
“Run,” I hissed at her. “Now. Trust me.”
I rounded on the God, drawing the sword sheathed at my hip. Thor looked nonplussed. He took a step back, raising his hands in a gesture of peace. I didn’t actually think he was frightened of me. I’d seen his sword unsheathed exactly once, and it was the size of one of my arms.
“Peace. I was just wondering when you’d arrive. Mother, this is–”
Frigg’s eyes zeroed in on my face with the intensity of a hawk seeking prey. Her mouth popped open. For a moment, she was as frozen as I was, too shocked by my presence here to say anything. My brain finally decided to kick into high gear and informed me of a few very important facts.
No one was moving. Confusion was running rampant as the other two Gods and their lackey tried to figure out what was wrong. Now was the perfect time for an attack.
I ducked under Thor’s massive biceps. I ran full tilt toward Frigg. I knew with certainty now that she was the only one in the assembly who could out me. If I took her out, the others would never know. Of course, I’d probably be killed immediately after, if by some miracle I managed to slay the chief goddess of the Norse pantheon. It would still be worth it. So long as only my life was forfeit, I could be sanguine in my choice.
She took a step backward nearly stumbling over her husband. She hadn’t had time to close her mouth. She looked the same as I remembered from the battle on the mountaintop. Her champagne hair fell loose around her face this time, but that didn’t matter. All the better to grip when I slit her throat.
She was small and distractingly feminine. Though more beautiful than most human women I’d had the privilege to meet, she did remind me a little of the women from home.
I knew many a lady in rural Tennessee who wouldn’t even go to the grocery store without getting dolled up. I suspected Frigg would be fashionable no matter where she turned up, fancy ball or bloody battlefield.
Stop getting distracted. I brushed past the Major, who’d been the first to get his shit t
ogether and attack me. We were a similar size and he was unarmed. I’d faced bigger running backs while playing football at Ohio State.
It didn’t matter that Frigg was a woman. She was a woman who would make my life hell. She’d been gunning for my sister and her husband last year, and she’d happily kill Audrey if it meant hurting me. She had to die.
I swung my sword in a downward arc, aiming to take off her head before she could open her stupid mouth and ruin everything. Another massive sword met mine mid-strike, and the force of impact sent electric shocks of pain through my arms.
Odin fixed me with a furious stare. His one remaining eye was the same steely grey as the blade he had locked with mine.
“Elmsong,” Frigg hissed.
It felt like my stomach was trying to slither into my toes. I turned my head to glance over my shoulder at Audrey. I was certain her expression mirrored my own. Terror flashed across her face, quickly followed by panic. I could see it in her body language. She was tensed, ready to run.
“Run,” I pleaded with her again. She turned from me and pelted up the hallway. I didn’t know where the exit was, but I dearly hoped she’d be able to find it.
It hurt to watch her go. It shouldn’t feel like a betrayal. I’d asked her to go. Logically, I knew she could only die with me if she stayed, and I didn’t want that.
Something slammed me into the wall. For a dizzy half-second, I thought maybe it had been Thor. I was pretty sure his fist could exert the pressure needed on my skull to make it feel the way it did now.
A strangled sound wrenched its way out of me. I felt like a dumbass who’d decided to light up in a firework’s tent. Lights exploded before my eyes, and I wondered if I was going blind. That was the least of my worries, though.
The rest of me felt like it was being flayed off. It took me longer than it should have, distracted as I was by blinding agony, to realize what had happened. Someone, and my money was on Odin, had speared me with a mind bolt.
I had a brief flash—it was hard to think around the pain—of Chance, on the mountaintop. Frigg had held him immobile with nothing but her mind. He’d looked like crap right after. If I survived, which was doubtful, I was going to feel like someone had shoved a spike through my head in the morning.
Defending the Bear (Blue Ridge Bears Book 2) Page 9
