Fall (The Ragnarok Prophesies Book 2)

by A. K. Morgen

  I bit my lip to keep from crying out when my gaze landed on the monstrous black wolf lunging against the tiny chain. Foam ran in buckets down his chest and into the river around him, as if his hatred cut a canyon of desiccation through the rock like a knife through butter. He towered over me, taller and wider than any wolf I’d ever seen. He was a giant. A Titan.

  Fenrir.

  I shivered at the sound of his name echoing in my head.

  He gnashed his razor-sharp teeth and roared, struggling against the chain binding him to earth. The sound echoed throughout the massive cavern, bouncing from rock to rock in the same deep, ominous rumble I heard earlier.

  Pebbles showered down from overhead, falling to the dirt floor all around.

  Fenrir shook them off, then tried to leap.

  The chain stretched taut, groaning in protest, but it held firm.

  Fenrir hit the ground―hard―and was up again in an instant.

  He coiled, crouching as if preparing to spring again, then twitched.

  He stilled, not even his chest moving when he drew breath. Sanity flickered in his gaze for a brief moment, burning away the obsessive rage pouring from him. What swept through those yellow eyes in its place was far worse: intelligence.

  Fenrir knew his prison would not hold him forever. Eventually, he would break free.

  Not today. Please, not today, I pleaded, hoping someone in charge heard me.

  Fenrir sniffed the air.

  I stopped breathing, praying he didn’t see me standing amongst the rocks.

  He turned his head slowly in my direction, one ear twitching.

  His rage-filled gaze met mine and held. Recognition flared in his baleful eyes.

  I trembled, trapped in his sights like a prisoner, unable to move. The wolf sharing my soul snarled, trying to shake herself free of the thrall freezing me in place. She was too weak to do more than flutter and twist inside me though.

  Fenrir’s lip curled in a menacing snarl as he looked into me, looked through me, and saw everything I was and everything connecting me to him. For a moment, no more than a split second really, he looked pleased. As if he knew his wait was almost over.

  And then rage blazed to life in his eyes again, wiping away recognition and replacing it with burning, poisonous hate.

  He growled low in his throat, the sound that of a gathering storm.

  The cavern floor vibrated beneath my feet again.

  Pebbles showered down, striking my arms, my legs… my face. Each hit stung and burned.

  The river of foam at my feet churned across the rocks like mini-tidal waves.

  Dust filled the air in thick puffs, choking me.

  Fenrir dove toward me, howling.

  I covered my ears and screamed….

  “Good morning, Miss Jacobs.”

  I jerked awake at the unfamiliar voice, crying out.

  Fenrir still hovered like a specter in front of me, snarling and snapping in his attempt to reach me. I pressed my fingers over my eyes, trying desperately to rub him away. My heart pounded so hard it actually hurt. I took a deep breath, and then another, trying to force air into my lungs and Fenrir out of my head.

  His image blurred and then faded.

  I lay still for a long moment, trying to calm my racing heart. An elderly nurse stood beside my bed, watching me. Her bright orange scrubs matched her hair.

  Soft snores and the steady beep of my heart monitor whispered around me. Muted conversation trickled from cracks beneath the door as the group of nurses at the station outside exchanged notes on patients.

  I strained to hear through those ordinary sounds to the soft murmurs right beneath the surface. The ones that whispered through me like a healing wind. They came from Dace Matthews, my half-wolf, half-human boyfriend. My soul mate.

  He dozed in the chair resting flush against my bed, his sleeping mind drifting through lifetimes long lost to me. Even the darkest of his dreams were so much nicer than mine. Every time I closed my eyes, I dreamed of monsters I couldn’t escape and shadowed memories that woke me in a cold sweat. Since learning to accept Geri, the wolf sharing his soul, Dace dreamed of us―and our pasts.

  He offered those visions up to me without reservation. Sometimes, witnessing those scenes unfold made the last three months of turmoil seem almost worth the cost. To me, anyway.

  Dace didn’t feel the same way.

  Asleep, he found some measure of peace in our bond and all the history that came with it. Awake, he struggled with our destiny and the threat dangling like a sword over our heads.

  Sköll and Hati were out there somewhere, roaming free, and we didn’t know where. They were the monsters lurking in the shadows, felt but unseen. That scared Dace. So did the knowledge that they would come for me again.

  Ever since Hati almost killed me a month ago, Dace’s fear of the wolf and his twin brother shuddered through me in ever-widening ripples. Worry dimmed the light in his vivid emerald eyes. Those brilliant lights had muted to an almost ordinary green in the last weeks. His arms never relaxed when he held me anymore, either, and he kissed me as if I would break.

  Dace changed while I hovered in the void between life and death―and not for the better. He might have learned to trust Geri, but he blamed himself for what happened to me. Not even the fact that I was healing quickly erased the haunted, guilty look in his eyes when he was awake. And it definitely didn’t calm his angry outbursts anytime someone so much as mentioned Sköll or Hati to him. He was drowning beneath the weight of our destiny, and our bond made things a whole lot harder for him; I think.

  Asleep though… well, I had trouble reconciling the haunted, awake Dace with the beautiful guy sleeping at my bedside. He looked so peaceful with his long lashes resting against the sharp planes of his cheeks. The shadows beneath his eyes were less pronounced, and the ever present furrow in his brow had smoothed to nothing. The little scar above his right eye looked like a spot of silver in the early morning light; the stubble on his cheeks appeared softer than I knew it to be.

  If it weren’t for the flow of power dancing around him like an electric current, I’d believe he was two different people. But awake or asleep, his aura whispered to me of safety, desire, and all those things that screamed “different.” And Dace was different. We both were.

  We were the first shapeshifters ever created, sent by Odin to keep Sköll and Hati from freeing Fenrir from his prison of earth and magic for as long as possible. We’d succeeded in a thousand previous lifetimes, but things were different this time. Eons of life and death and fading magic buried my wolf, Freki, in the deepest recesses of my soul and all but shattered the connection between Dace and Geri.

  I couldn’t shift anymore, and they could barely communicate with one another.

  Our problematic partner, Ronan LaCrosse, wasn’t faring much better. He was Munin, Odin’s raven of memory, but not even he could recall most of the lives we’d lived. And his twin, Hugin, hadn’t been reborn at all in this life.

  None of that changed what we needed to do, though. If we didn’t stop Sköll and Hati, Fenrir would break free of his chains, and Ragnarök would rip the world apart.

  I felt the apocalypse creeping closer every day, and so did Dace.

  Dani Michaelson was dead, and her sisters, Chelle and Beth, were under constant guard on his command. If they died, the world would fall. And we couldn’t keep them alive forever.

  Dace didn’t like to talk about it, but we both knew Sköll and Hati would find the girls sooner or later. Chelle and Beth were the Norse moon god’s last living descendants, and Fenrir’s offspring were destined to kill them. No matter how many times we’d beat the monsters and saved the world before, or how determined I was to save it again, there was no guarantee we could do it this time. Sooner or later, we would fail… and everyone we loved would die.

  Dread shot through me at the thought, clinging like choking ivy.

  I shivered, but the knot of fear souring my stomach didn’t loosen. My breath d
idn’t come any easier, either.

  I was scared. Terrified, really, and I didn’t know how to deal with that.

  “You okay, hon?” the elderly nurse asked.

  “Yeah.” I cleared my throat, trying to force away my grim thoughts. “Weird dreams.”

  “Understandable.” She crossed the room toward the windows.

  “Yeah,” I said again.

  “My name’s Esther, and I’ll be your nurse this morning. How are you feeling?” She flashed a concerned smile over her shoulder before twisting open the blinds.

  Early morning sunlight flooded the room.

  I flung an arm over my face. My head felt heavy, my body thick and uncooperative. My side throbbed where staple indentions crisscrossed teeth-marks, disguising the worst of them. The skin was an angry, ugly red, and the muscles beneath weak. Basically, I felt like crap all around.

  Dace shifted beside me, his chair creaking as he pushed himself up into a sitting position. “Morning,” he rasped, sounding half asleep still.

  “Morning.” I dragged my arm down to look at him through slit lids. The dark circles under his eyes probably matched mine.

  He scrutinized my expression for a long moment, then frowned. Another nightmare?

  Yes.

  I’m sorry.

  I shrugged, flinging my arm over my face again. I felt like I’d tumbled down the rabbit hole with Alice. Only instead of weird cats and crazy queens, this time the rabbit hole was full of bloodthirsty giants and their demented offspring.

  I seriously needed better dreams in my life.

  Dace reached out, grasping my hand in one of his. Guilt flowed from him, but I ignored it. In the last few weeks, he’d woken me from every nightmarish vision haunting my dreams. I didn’t blame him for missing this one.

  At least one of us managed to sleep.

  Esther bustled around my bed, checking my IVs and hanging another bag of antibiotics. “This is your last round,” she said, smiling down at me. “Dr. Guerin will be by to discharge you soon. Are you excited?”

  I grunted a noncommittal response. I hated the hospital, but I felt safe here. I couldn’t say the same for my dad’s house. I didn’t look forward to returning home since I nearly died last time I was there. Worse, my dad knew the truth about me now. I kept expecting him to flee for his life.

  Esther chuckled, not put off by my sparkling personality, and pointed to the rolling table beside my IV pole. “You got more flowers this morning.”

  “More?” My room was overflowing with flowers from well-meaning friends, fellow students, and complete strangers. I rolled my eyes in the direction of the table to check out the latest addition, then frowned. Mistletoe twisted like ivy through a vase of white roses. A single black rose nestled in the center of the arrangement, seeming more ominous than elegant.

  “It’s a beautiful arrangement,” Esther said. “No card this time, though.”

  Geri growled.

  Dace cursed softly.

  What’s wrong? I turned my head to look at him.

  He sat ramrod straight in the chair, his gaze focused on the flowers. He looked… pissed.

  Unease snaked up my spine.

  Dace?

  He didn’t answer me.

  “The entire ward ohhed and ahhed over the arrangement when it came in. Whoever sends them has wonderful taste.” Esther lifted my arm to inspect the IV line.

  I frowned, confused. I’d gotten more flowers in the last few weeks than a florist had in a shop, but she made it sound as if I’d received the same arrangement before. I hadn’t, had I?

  I looked back to Dace. His expression hadn’t changed.

  What does she mean? I asked, my scalp prickling.

  Dace ripped his gaze from the flowers, dropping it to mine. The hatred stamped across his face was answer enough.

  I swallowed hard.

  I’ve gotten others, haven’t I?

  Dace nodded, his entire body tense.

  From…? I couldn’t finish the question. It wasn’t like I needed to anyway. The truth burned in his eyes and in the furious stillness of his mind.

  Sköll and Hati were back.

  Yes, Dace said. Rage flashed through his gaze, setting fire to emerald.

  Geri vibrated in his corner of my mind, his entire being shaking with repressed anger. Dace shifted, rolling his shoulders. The muscles in his arms twitched in response to Geri’s internal quaking.

  I shuddered and swallowed hard.

  Why? How long? Why didn’t you tell me?

  I couldn’t decide which answer I wanted first. My heart raced, but the rest of me didn’t move. I felt frozen. Panic, fear, and revulsion burned like bile up my throat. Sköll and Hati were sending me flowers. They knew where to find me.

  Dace reached out, placing his hand on my cheek. Breathe, Arionna.

  I took a deep breath.

  Esther kept chattering away as she finished hooking up new bags of medicine and saline, oblivious to the horror ripping through me. I wanted to scream at her to go away so I could talk to Dace, but I couldn’t yell at her.

  We’d been so careful to keep up the façade of normalcy as best we could. I wasn’t really sure why, since things were anything but normal, but it seemed important that no one else find out about the awful nightmares bubbling beneath the surface. The ones threatening to suck all of us into some hellish Nordic nightmare version of reality. Better everyone not know the truth than to face those horrors until they had no choice.

  But I didn’t realize I was being kept in the dark, too. I’d assumed I knew everything, that Dace had told me everything he knew. Stupid since that hadn’t ever really been the case, but I’d assumed it anyway.

  Arionna, no.

  As I dug my fingers into the sheets of my bed, tears welled in my eyes. I fought them back, refusing to give in to the painful sting of betrayal twisting around inside me.

  We were trying to protect you.

  You lied to me.

  You’re still healing. You didn’t need to know.

  I choked out a laugh, not sure if his answer surprised or offended me more. He spoke like that should have been obvious to me. I was healing, so I didn’t need to know the monsters lurking in the shadows were sending me little tokens of their affection to remind me they were still here, still watching.

  Esther looked at me, her smile slipping. She narrowed her eyes as if finally noticing how rigidly I lay, or how tightly my hands were clenched around my sheets. “You okay, hon?”

  I gave her a curt nod.

  She didn’t look like she bought it.

  She looked at Dace and then back to me.

  I didn’t mean it like that, he said, ignoring her questioning gaze.

  No?

  I knew he hadn’t meant his comment the way it sounded, but I couldn’t help feeling hurt. I couldn’t help feeling foolish either. I knew Skoll and Hati were still out there, but I hadn’t realized how close they were. All this time, I’d thought I was safe here, that they couldn’t get to me in the hospital, but that wasn’t true. Not really.

  “Can we have a minute?” Dace asked, shooting Esther a dark look. One that screamed she needed to do exactly what he wanted or else. He’d gotten real good at terrorizing the staff with those alpha-male “I’m in charge” looks of his.

  I couldn’t find the voice to tell him to knock it off this time.

  “Uh, sure.” Esther sounded breathless. “I’ll go get her breakfast tray….” Her voice faded away as she all but ran from the room, her white shoes squeaking on the waxy floor.

  “You didn’t have to scare her,” I muttered around the lump of terror in my throat when the door closed behind her.

  “I didn’t lie to you.” Dace raked a hand through his hair, rumpling it further. “Your dad didn’t want you to know about the flowers, so we threw them out when they came.”

  “How many times?”

  “Three.” His shoulders slumped. “The first arrangement arrived while you were in surgery.”<
br />
  Right after I’d been attacked then, over a month ago. They’d known exactly where to find me from the beginning. Bile burned in the back of my throat.

  “How do you know Sköll and Hati sent them?” I asked instead.

  “I know.” Steel laced the words, leaving no room for argument.

  My hopes shattered. “Was there a card?” I asked anyway.

  “Yes.”

  “Wh-what did it say?”

  Dace clenched his jaw so tight it did that creaking thing, protesting the strain.

  “Tell me.”

  “Gylfaginning.”

  I blinked, caught between the dizzying sensation of fright and confusion. “Gylfaginning?”

  He jerked his chin in the direction of the arrangement. His voice deepened, seething with anger, as he explained, “Gylfaginning recounts the story of how Loki tricked Hodh into killing Baldr with an arrow treated with the poison from mistletoe, the one thing on earth that had not sworn an oath to do him no harm.”

  “Oh.” I tried to process that and couldn’t. “What else?”

  Dace hesitated.

  “Tell me.”

  “In mythology, black roses signify death or rebirth.”

  A chill shot through me. “And white?”

  “Silence and secrecy,” he said, his upper lip curling in a menacing snarl. “They thought―” he broke off with a curse. “They’re toying with us, letting us know they’re still out there.”

  “That’s why you haven’t left the hospital,” I guessed.

  “I’m not leaving you alone.”

  Cold swept through me, freezing me with the thought of the twin wolves knowing where to find me, and how to get to me. It wasn’t enough they wanted to kill us. They had to torment us first, twist the knife a little deeper and make sure it hurt. I probably should have expected that, but I didn’t.

  Three months ago, I hadn’t even known this world existed. Figuring out what to expect from demigod monsters was hard when you were still coming to terms with the fact that said demigod monsters actually existed.

  I sighed, exhaling every little bit of breath left in my lungs, and then I shook my head. “They’re never going to stop coming for us, are they?”