by J. A. Pitts
“Listen up, people,” Jimmy said, clapping his hands. “They come in, Sarah makes the swap.” He looked over at me for confirmation.
I nodded.
“Excellent. Sarah makes the swap and we get the women up to the house. Once the bad guys have left the property and the women are safe, we can stand down.”
“Should be no need for all this,” I said, waving my hands around the room. “But it’s nice to know you are there if I need you.”
Bob, the accountant, lifted his fist in the air and grunted, “Hoorah.”
Everyone else broke out into giggles and began pounding their neighbor’s fist.
Lord protect us.
Jimmy signaled to the twins, who got up and began lowering the lamps. Soon, the only real light on the farm was the blazing bonfire.
I put the helm on my head, cinched the chin strap, and made sure the hammers had just the right amount of play in their holsters.
I took a deep breath and walked out of the barn.
Three steps from the door, Rolph jogged up to me. “Smith.”
I turned. “Yes, dwarf?”
He patted the flat of the axe on his thigh and looked around. “I await your signal.”
“I’m really going to trade this for the women,” I said, watching his face in the shadows.
If he flinched, I couldn’t see it.
“Do what you must,” he said, bowing. “Love before honor.”
I tilted my head to the side, trying to read him. “You are an odd dwarf.”
He chuckled. “You have no idea,” he said, moving to stand behind me, to the right.
Together we crossed the ring of light from the bonfire and out into the blackness of the field. Fire to our back seemed a decent position to be in. I knew they were coming from the north. I could feel it.
“Luck, Beauhall,” Gunther bellowed from back by the barn.
“Can it,” Jimmy said, and the sounds fell away to where only the crackling of the bonfire reached me.
Fifty
THE HEAVY THRUM OF CHOPPERS POUNDED IN MY CHEST MOments before three of them crested the trees and flew toward the bonfire. One broke left, one right, and the third hung back a little, forming an inverted point. Each of them scanned the field with searchlights, starting at the bonfire and working outward.
Once they found me and Rolph, the other lights settled on us, covering us in the bright halogen glow.
“Something is wrong,” Rolph said, taking a step away from me.
“You didn’t see choppers in our future?” I asked.
“Yes, helicopters. But there should only be two.”
I jerked my head around, and Rolph shied back another step, panic on his face.
I grabbed his arm, pulling him to a halt. He spun around, his eyes wild.
“Two? You expected two?” I shouted over the noise. “Whose side are you on?” I asked.
He clutched the shield against his chest, with the axe tight against the shield. His breathing was coming fast. “I honor the sword,” he mewled.
“Meaning what?” I asked, punching him in the arm.
He looked at me, glanced at the sword over my shoulder, and nodded. “So mote it be,” he said, kneeling down and bowing his head, with his arms out to his sides. His axe and shield dropped to the ground.
I stared at him, contemplating his liability, when a new set of lights bounced at us from the south.
“Limo,” Stuart shouted, and I half turned, shielding my eyes to see a stretch limousine coming down the drive toward the bonfire.
To my left, the choppers began to land. To my right, the limo pulled around sideways between us and the barn. In front of me Rolph Brokkrson, dwarf and smith, knelt at my mercy.
Okay, this was unfair.
“Get up, dwarf,” I barked, and he lifted his head. “We’ll sort this out after Katie is safe.”
“Are you sure?” he asked.
“Give me your word of honor you will help me.”
He stood, eager. “You have my word.”
“Excellent,” I said, turning northward. “Get your gear.”
As he recovered the axe and shield the spotlights winked out.
The choppers were landing. Two of them were the big twin-rotor types—troop carriers. The third was a sleek attack chopper. The wicked chain gun on the front could turn this whole field into hamburger in a matter of seconds.
Real military-grade equipment here. Not comforting in the least.
The one on the right landed, disgorging its cargo. Thirty bulky men I assumed to be giants. The second chopper, on the left, didn’t wait to land before dozens of lanky men leapt out. Once the chop-per’s wheels touched down, two large, square figures stepped out, not even ducking under the turning blades.
“Trolls,” Rolph breathed, pointing to the many. “Another thirty or more. And ogres,” he said, pointing his axe at the two hulking brutes. Even with the glamour I knew to be on them, they barely looked human.
The trolls were only smaller in comparison to the thugs on the right. The ogres had a head on me, and were as lithe as boulders.
Once the third chopper was on the ground, the enemy fanned out, forming a half circle between me and the chopper. All they had to do was rush forward, and they could close me in a circle of large, brutish bodies.
Oh yeah, this was looking better by the minute.
A person I could only assume was Jean-Paul emerged from the middle chopper. He was much shorter than I expected, but bulky, like a football player. The light from the choppers and the bonfire gave me a good view. Jean-Paul was a fop, a dandy.
I’d say pimp, but he dressed more like a jester than a power broker. He straightened his jacket and reached back into the chopper, yanking someone through the door and out onto the ground.
It was Katie. She fell at his feet, her clothes shredded and in tatters. But she was alive and that’s all that mattered to me.
He kicked her. “Get up, pig.”
Rage erupted in me. I had both hammers in my hands and was running across the field toward the bastard. Twenty yards, my mind read. Eighteen more then I can smash his brains in. Fifteen, twelve.
I screamed. The words were an ancient Swedish dialect, my mind said, the part of my mind that sat off to the side, like the astral projection. The rational superego that kept score, watched for transgressions, filing grievances.
The id blossomed into a mantra of smash, maim, kill.
“Stop,” a woman behind me called, and to my utter astonishment, I did.
Not because of any desire on my part, mind you. I nearly frothed in fury, grunting guttural epithets in obscure languages.
When I realized I could not approach the dragon, I turned to see who compelled me to stop.
She strode from the limousine, tall and beautiful. I sensed more than saw her beauty. The ground around her shone with a pale blue glow. She seemed to float toward me.
A knee-length cloak swirled around her in varying shades of blue, giving her the illusion of moving in murky shadows. She pushed back a fur-lined hood to reveal an exotic beauty: pale hair and dark, dusky complexion. Around her neck hung a necklace of feathers and leaves.
She chanted as she approached; the words were quiet, just beyond hearing, but as the sound washed over the field, a bluish mist fell from her lips and pushed along the ground. The fog swirled around my feet, creeping up past my ankles, only to fall away again, like it wanted to take shape, to form an appendage of some sort and grab my legs.
Fear began to creep into the fury, tingeing the world in a mixture of red and blue.
This beauty paused, puckered her lips, and blew. The fog that swirled up to my knees collapsed back into a fog and rushed forward toward the choppers.
“Seið-kona,” Rolph muttered off to my side.
“You interfere, witch,” Jean-Paul called, closer than I’d remembered.
I turned slowly, letting my gaze fall on him. Four yards, twelve feet. I could cover that distance in a sneeze.
Katie lay at his feet. Through the tears in her clothes I could see the lash marks on her back, and dried blood on her face as she looked up toward me.
As the fog rolled forward, the glamour that surrounded the men fell away, revealing the true forms of giants, trolls, and two rocky ogres.
“You bargain in ill faith, Jean-Paul,” the witch said, gliding forward. “Nidhogg gave her word that you would meet your original bargain.”
Jean-Paul bristled at the name Nidhogg. Frederick had called it right.
The witch stepped up to me and pulled a furred glove from her left hand. She kissed the tips of the first two fingers, and placed them on my left cheek.
The rage vanished. Muscles I had been clenching relaxed, aches vanished, and my mind was clear of the anger and fear.
“Be at peace, warrior.”
“Who are you?” I asked, relieved to be in control of my actions once again.
“I am Qindra,” she said. “I am the mouth of Nidhogg.”
“Bitch,” Jean-Paul spat. “Lapdog.” He put his boot on Katie’s back and stepped over her, forcing her to sprawl forward onto her stomach. “Whore.”
Qindra laughed, stepping around me and wagging a finger at Jean-Paul. “Silly boy,” she said in a lovely condescending voice. “You are spoiled and petulant. Perhaps it is time for you to be punished.” She raised her hands in front of her face, as if to clap them together, and looked at him sideways between her palms.
Blue energy crackled up her palms and danced in the air above her fingertips. In their light, I could see that the nail of each finger was painted with a single rune.
“Is there no chattel to bed for your mistress?” he asked. “No overwrought sheep that needs your special attention?”
She smiled at him and touched the smallest finger of each hand together. Thunder rolled in the distance, and lightning played across the horizon.
He threw his head back and laughed.
Cruelty played in that noise, evil and vain. He would not sleep without vengeance. Would not let pass the slightest transgression. Those who offended him paid a heavy price. That is what that laughter said to me.
He raised one hand and swung it forward, arcing toward us.
From the darkness a boulder soared. Qindra flicked her wrist, and a rock the size of a pony spun aside, smashing into the ground.
“That is but a taste,” he said, the ego rising in him.
She smiled and touched two fingers together.
The smaller chopper exploded. The concussion rolled across the field like a wave, knocking everyone to the ground, Rolph, Jean-Paul, the giants, and the trolls.
Only Qindra remained on her feet as a mushroom cloud of flame rose into the night.
“Peace,” Jean Paul said, climbing to his knees. Katie rose to her feet first, before any of us, and kicked Jean-Paul in the face. His head snapped around as blood flew from his mouth.
Jean-Paul lashed out, spinning on his hands, his booted foot clipping her leg, and she stumbled to the ground. He quickly rose, stepping on her hair. He touched his mouth, brought his hand away, saw the blood, and spat on her.
Some barrier prevented me from lunging forward. A wall of energy stood between us. I struggled to my feet and glanced around at Qindra, who shrugged.
“Bargain in good faith,” she said.
Jean-Paul stepped to the side, squatted, and pulled Katie’s head up by her hair to stare into her face. “Still have some fire in you after all we’ve shared,” he said, jerking her hair tight and twisting her neck back farther. “Shall I tell your lover about our adventures?”
“Stop this,” Qindra said, the quiet sibilance of her voice cutting through the night.
He stood, wiping the blood from his mouth with a handkerchief he pulled from his shirt pocket. “Quite right,” he said. “We have business to attend to.”
He waved his left hand and two of the trolls broke ranks, jogging to the chopper, and returned carrying a stretcher. They placed it on the ground to my right.
They smelled of carrion, the overwhelming sickly sweet stench of decay. Their bodies were covered in sores—pustules that wept a foul ooze. One of them lifted the corner of the sheet and whipped it away, before running back to the line on the left.
Julie lay on the stretcher, battered and bloody. The right leg of her jeans had been shredded, and her broken femur stuck out of the thigh muscle. The whole leg was swollen, and looked shorter, twisted. I couldn’t imagine how much pain she had to be in.
At this moment, she wasn’t even moving, and in that instant I feared she was dead. She drew a shuddering breath and I did the same.
“Here is the first,” he said, flipping his hand at me as if to dismiss my very existence.
“Medic,” I shouted.
Jean-Paul rolled his eyes and turned to stare down at Katie.
Gunther and Stuart ran up, looked at me, and I nodded. They glanced over at Katie, but I tipped my head at Julie and they grabbed the stretcher.
“Melanie will see to her,” Stuart said, and they carried her back toward the house.
Katie looked up at me, past Jean-Paul’s legs, and our eyes met.
“Let her go,” I said, my voice thick.
“Get up, bitch,” Jean-Paul said.
I growled and leaned forward, straining the barrier that contained me, but Qindra held up one hand and I fell back. Get her out alive, I told myself. Get her to safety. This guy can pay another time. Do whatever it takes.
“Really rather vulgar, even for you,” Qindra said, looking at the back of her hand.
Jean-Paul snapped his head around and I could see the dragon struggling to come out. “I thought you were a neutral witness,” he hissed.
“I thought you were a whore killer and pedophile,” Qindra said sweetly.
Jean-Paul lurched forward, his fingers curled inward, like claws. “I will kill you, witch. Kill you and make flutes from your bones.”
My fear painted the dragon in his stead—a shadowy form that spread above and beyond him, a black echo of what he could truly become.
The part of my brain that was still a little girl cringed. I wanted nothing more than to abandon all this and hide behind someone larger than me, someone stronger and more powerful.
Qindra laughed.
And with the high tinkling gaiety of that sound, the fear fell to the ground, shattering into a thousand shards of old dreams.
“I could take your eyes for daring to look upon me,” she said, the power and venom in her voice making her every bit as threatening as Jean-Paul, or Frederick in his own right. “Nidhogg would hurt you in ways beyond even your cruel fantasies,” she said.
Jean-Paul stiffened, holding his head high. It took him a moment, but he managed to contain his wrath. With a shuddering breath, he let his shoulders sag, nodding once toward Qindra. “My apologies,” he said, his voice as poisonous as a viper.
Qindra smiled and bowed to me. “I believe you have a transaction to complete.”
Jean-Paul motioned to Katie, who stood beside him. For a moment I thought she would fall, but she looked at me, her face determined, and she steadied herself, holding her head high.
Why hadn’t she said anything, I wondered.
I settled the hammers back into their holsters at my waist, slipped my right arm through the leather strap that kept the sword sheath secure on my back, and slid the whole rig around and over my shoulder. I eased the scabbard from the harness and held Gram, ensconced in leather, in front of me.
“Bring it to me,” he said, his voice full of contempt. I knew this was wrong. I could feel it emanating from the sword, through the leather. Gram did not want to be turned over to this beast, this murderer. I could feel the need to draw the sword, lunge forward, and let it drink from his black, black heart.
“Set it before me,” he said, his voice commanding and bitter.
Qindra scratched her thumbnail across the rune on her left middle fingernail. The wall that held me ceased
to exist. I stumbled forward onto my knees, slapping the sword against the ground at his feet. If I looked at him, if I glanced up and saw his face once more, I would balk, renege on the deal, and Katie would be lost to me.
Fifty-one
“NO!” ROLPH SHOUTED BEFORE MY HANDS LEFT THE SWORD. His footsteps echoed through the earth like the staccato of pebbles falling on a drumhead.
Gram throbbed, power pulsing through the leather. In my mind’s eye, I saw Rolph leap forward and I rolled to the side.
Too late. His axe careened off my helm and ricocheted off my shoulder with a painful crunch, although the chain kept the blade from biting into flesh.
I pulled the sword in against my chest, and continued rolling onto my back.
Rolph was on me in an instant, his hand reaching for the sword.
“You cannot,” he bellowed. His eyes were full of sorrow and madness.
Rolph dropped onto me, his weight crushing the wind from me. I brought a knee up into his thigh, and he shifted his weight, allowing me to get my left arm under his.
“Get off . . . ,” I grunted.
He grabbed for the sword, and I punched him in the throat. Any normal man would have fallen to the side, gasping for breath. Instead, he head-butted me in the chest.
Breasts may be lovely cushiony things, but they do not like to be punched. Pain exploded in my chest.
I cried out and thrashed to the side, throwing him off balance. I twisted, getting my legs free, then wrapped them around his waist and rolled.
He slipped to the side and just like that, I was on top of him. I smashed my gloved fist into his face, breaking his nose. Blood sprayed across the ground, and his grip loosened on my bad arm. The sword lay on the ground between us and Jean-Paul.
As long as I kept Rolph at bay, Jean-Paul would get the sword and this would all be over. Only, when he looked at me, grinned that carnivore’s grin of teeth and hell, part of me balked.
When Jean-Paul moved toward the sword, the overwhelming urge to keep it from him flooded me. If he ended up with the sword, everything I loved would fall to ruin.
