No, it wasn’t going to be easy to tell him. Vidarr hadn’t been able to accept that Mist had radically changed from the willing servant she’d been in Asgard, even if
he
was different himself. He’d resented that mere Valkyrie had been entrusted with the Treasures.
But there was no question that he’d take a stand against Loki once he understood what was going on, even if didn’t want any part of this new Ragnarok. This was
his
city.
“We’ll go to Asbrew,” Mist said.
Dainn shot her an inquiring look. “The Rainbow Bridge? I told you it had been destroyed along with Asgard.”
It was a natural mistake on his part, since Asbru was another name for Bifrost. “
As-b-r-e-w
,” she spelled out. “God’s brew. It’s a pun. I don’t suppose you know what that means.”
“I am aware of puns,” he said. “I have been on this world a very long time.” He arched a dark brow. “I believe the English writer Samuel Johnson referred to them as the lowest form of humor.”
Dainn’s reference to Johnson made her wonder what he’d been doing in Midgard over the centuries. She knew that he, like she, would have had to keep moving or change his identity every few decades to avoid calling attention to his extremely slow aging.
Even the Aesir eventually aged without the divine Apples of Idunn, and that had been one of the Treasures Odin had sent to Midgard. But Dainn had indicated that the gods weren’t aging in Ginnungagap, and Mist had changed hardly at all since the Last Battle.
As much as she wanted to hear about Dainn’s past, she knew her curiosity would have to wait a little longer. Assuming she and Dainn were still alive when she had the chance to ask.
Without another word between them, she and Dainn ran back to the Volvo, which looked to Mist as it were on the verge of literal collapse.
“Hang in there, girl,” she whispered, patting the dashboard. Dainn stared resolutely out the window as they set off again.
Vidarr’s bar was in the Tenderloin, once known as the “soft underbelly” of San Francisco for its history of crime and vice, a tradition that hadn’t completely been eradicated by the gradual gentrification of the area. Tucked between the wealth of Nob Hill and the busy downtown of Civic Center, the district was a seedy patch in an otherwise respectable neighborhood.
In spite of the dubious location, Asbrew was pop u lar with artists, musicians, and the more affluent youth from the best addresses in the city. Mist hadn’t been inside for a de cade, but she assumed that things hadn’t changed much since Pink and Avril Lavigne were basking in the Top Ten.
The Volvo, having been pressed far beyond its capacity, decided to give up the ghost at the corner of Van Ness, a little over a mile short of their goal. Mist eased the failing vehicle to the curb and set it in park.
“We’ll have to hoof it,” she said.
Dainn was out of the car a second after she was. She set off north on busy Van Ness, fiercely grateful for the chance to move her body again. She might not trust her own feeble magic, but legs and arms, muscle and bone were tools she had honed to obey her will without thought or hesitation. Dainn kept pace, lithe as a cheetah in spite of his rags, his long legs covering the ground with ease.
At McAllister Mist turned east, leading Dainn past City Hall, and then jogged north on Hyde to Eddy. Suddenly they were in the midst of Southeast Asian restaurants, fleabag hotels, and boardedup mom-and-pop markets, running past indigents with overflowing shopping carts and more than one dealer on the prowl for addicts looking to score. Panhandlers and drunks stared after her and Dainn with dull astonishment, but they were only a blur in Mist’s eyes.
Though it was barely seven o’clock in the morning, Mist knew that Asbrew would already be jumping. It never actually stopped. No cops would come knocking for the simple reason that Vidarr had set Rune-wards to repel them; she could feel their potency as she reached the scarred and graffitied doorway squashed between a rundown residential hotel and a pawn shop. Vidarr might have rejected his heritage, but he could still call upon it when it suited him.
Mist opened the door and walked in. Vidarr employed a doorman to keep out any “undesirables” who might slip past the wards, but she didn’t recognize the bruiser with the underbite standing just inside. He did a double take when Dainn came up behind her.
“Where’s Vid?” Mist asked the doorman.
He folded his massive arms across his chest. “He ain’t available.”
“My name is Mist Bjorgsen. He’ll see
me.
”
“We don’t allow no bums in here,” the man said, jerking his thumb at Dainn. “And he stinks.”
Dainn showed no reaction to the insult. He began to hum under his breath. The doorman was oblivious, but Mist felt the stirring of magic—simple magic, to be sure, but potent enough to repel a mortal, no matter how big and menacing he was.
The last thing Mist could afford was to provoke Vidarr by causing a disturbance. She took Dainn’s arm, shoved the doorman out of the way and started toward the back of the bar.
“Hey, bitch!” The doorman clamped one beefy hand over her shoulder. “You ain’t—”
Mist spun around and punched him in the stomach. He let her go with a woof of astonished pain. She nodded to Dainn, who offered no comment, and they continued into the dark, smoky pit of the bar. There were three rooms stretching along Asbrew’s narrow length, one after another like those of a railroad flat. It was the third one she wanted.
A dozen sets of eyes assessed them from the shadows as they passed through the public room. The radio blasted Norwegian death metal from huge speakers hung on the walls. Sullen kids with multiple piercings huddled over tables strung against the wall opposite the bar, and aging hipsters, ignoring the citywide smoking ban, argued over espresso and cigarettes.
They were of no interest to Mist. She didn’t bother to ask the bartender where she could find Vidarr but kept moving through a tightly packed crowd of sleepy- eyed slackers and entered the door behind them.
The clientele in the second room was of a caliber far different from the kids in the public area. The dozen men and women were all mature, attractive, and reeking of wealth . . . the kind who dined every other night at French Laundry, had their clothes tailor-made in Paris, and lived in apartments and penthouses worth more than all Freya’s gold.
But there was something off about them, a strangeness that went beyond the fact that they didn’t belong in a place like this, especially early on a weekday morning. They stared at her as if she had crashed an exclusive wedding wearing nothing but her sword.
As if she was an enemy.
“Leave,” Dainn whispered at her back. “Leave now.”
Mist barely heard him. “Who are you?” she asked, looking at each hostile face in turn.
Glances were exchanged, but no one answered. Dainn gripped her arm. “There are too many,” he said.
And suddenly she knew. “Where is he?” she demanded of the crowd in the Old Tongue, loosening her knife. “Where is your master?”
Hard eyes fixed on hers. Several of the men began moving toward her, getting taller by the second. Faces blurred, becoming coarse and ugly with hate. Fists lifted. An unmistakable chill rose in the room.
Hrimgrimir emerged from the crowd, grinning with hideous delight. “So we meet again, halfling. Or should I call you cousin?” His pointed teeth were red in the dim light, as if they were already stained with blood. “You must be eager for death. We will be happy to oblige you.”
For a moment Mist couldn’t process his words. Halfling?
Cousin?
It made no sense. None of it did. Why were the Jotunar in Asbrew? Where in Hel was Vid?
Pulling her knife free, Mist chanted the Rune- spell of change. Dim light raced along Kettlingr’s blade. She felt Dainn’s touch on her shoulder.
“If you must fight,” he said, as if from very far away, “know that youhave far more strength than you realize..Feel it, warrior. Let it come.”
She didn’t understand what in Baldr’s name he was talking about, but suddenly he was gone, and Hrimgrimir and his kin were upon her.
Kettlingr flew up to meet the attack. The blade skittered against a wall of ice that dissolved as soon as the sword completed its arc. She swung again, narrowly missing a giant’s arm.
Dainn had been right. There were too many, and she didn’t have the time or means to draw the physical symbols, the staves, that anchored her rudimentary magic and gave the Runes their power.
You can build them in your mind,
she thought. She’d never even considered the possibility before this morning, but somehow she and Dainn had made it work.
Unfortunately, Dainn wasn’t here. She danced out of the way of a blow that would have flattened an elephant and tried to shape a repelling Bind-Rune out of her frantic thoughts.
The giantess who had swung at her gave a yelp of surprise and fell back. In the clear for a few precious seconds, Mist shaped a second Bind-Rune for strength and speed.
Suddenly a song rose in her chest—not merely a chant or a simple tune, but a robust, unfamiliar melody that throbbed with unexpected power. Strength greater than that of mortal or Valkyrie pulsed in her blood and blossomed in bone. Battle staves flared before her eyes. Driven by a compulsion she didn’t understand, she released the Runes from the pit of her belly like an opera bass reaching for his deepest note.
The giants retreated with cries of rage and dismay. She advanced, slashing at any flesh within reach. Dark blue blood sprayed walls and spattered the floor. For a moment it seemed that she might even win.
But the new power didn’t last. It drained out of her all at once, and she felt herself falter under the weight of uncertainty and sudden weakness. Hrimgrimir roared and struck with his enormous fist, knocking her against the wall.
Somehow she kept her grip on Kettlingr, but the strike had paralyzed her arm. She knew then that she was going to die, and she, unlike the giants and elves and gods who had survived Ragnarok, would not be returning. What became of the Aesir and their Treasures would be beyond her concern.
Sliding up the wall on rubbery legs, she grinned into the Jotunn’s face and prepared herself for the final, crushing blow. Hrimgrimir bellowed and raised his hand again. Then the door to the bar swung open, and a thickset blond man staggered into the room, his head swinging right and left in confusion.
“Wa’s goin’ on here?” he drawled, leaning heavily against the doorframe. “Can’ a man get any sleep?”
Hrimgrimir and the other giants turned to face the man. “Get out!” Hrimgrimir snarled.
“Mist?” The man took another step into the room, eyes widening. “Issat you?”
She caught her breath and worked her shoulder, feeling it come back to life again. Vali was a hard drinker and usually under the thumb of his elder half-brother, but he wasn’t as stupid as he sounded. He hadn’t just been wakened out of some drunken stupor. One look at his face told her that he knew what was happening. And he was trying to help her.
With a hoot of laughter, Vali stumbled past the Jotunar blocking the doorway. “So . . . gla’ to see you,” he said, his full weight crashing into Mist. “Missed you.”
Smothered in his bearish embrace, Mist felt the pressure of his body pushing her away from the wall. He was moving her toward the door, inch by subtle inch.
“Get out of here,” he hissed, his mouth pressed to her ear.
“Where is Vidarr?” she whispered.
“You can’t see him.” They reached the door, and Mist heard the hinges creak. “Save yourself.”
“Where is he?” she demanded. “Is he in trouble?”
“I said, you can’t—”
Without warning Mist shoved Vali aside, swinging Kettlingr before her, and ran for the back door. Hrimgrimir swiped at her and missed. The rest were too startled to intercept her before she got to the back door and flung it open.
Vidarr sat in a battered chair the room that served as his office, his face blank as uncarved stone. His eyes barely flickered as Mist burst through the door. She slammed it behind her and scanned the room. Gungnir lay in plain sight on the wide, battered desk behind Vidarr’s chair.
“Your manners disappoint me, my dear Mist,” a voice said from the shadows behind the desk. “And so does your judgment. I had hoped you would take warning and flee. After all the pleasure you’ve given me, I had intended to spare you.”
Eric.
But it wasn’t Eric’s voice. And the figure that emerged from the shadows was not tall and broad-shouldered, but as lean and wiry as a stoat. He was dressed in black from neck to toe, modified biker’s leathers adorned with flashy metal trimmings and emblazoned with a stylized flame. His eyes were brilliant green, the irises rimmed with orange. His red hair was artfully styled, and his long, handsome face was smiling.
He looked nothing at all like the man she’d come to love. But her heart lurched under her ribs as she realized who she was seeing. Loki, the great Trickster, once beloved of Odin. The child of powerful giants, Loki was one of the few divine beings— not quite a god— who could change his shape completely without relying on illusion or possessing the body of an animal or man. At times he had saved the Aesir, at other times opposed them. His constant scheming had been overlooked until he had killed Baldr, the blind god, with malice and treachery.
The punishment they had set for him had planted the seeds of the Last Battle.
But he had many flaws besides a propensity for duplicity, not least of which was overweening pride and belief in his own ultimate superiority.
And that meant he could be beaten. Not now, not by her, but by those who were coming.
Swallowing her instinctive fear, she faced him squarely. “I’ve come for Gungnir, Slanderer,” she said.
“How charming.” Loki walked past Vidarr without a glance in his direction and stood before her, hands on hips. “You always were impulsive, darling. That was what made you so entertaining in bed, even if your other skills were not”— he looked her up and down— ”quite as well developed as I might have preferred.”
Mist swung Kettlingr at his head. Loki sent the sword spinning to the floor with three short words and a wave of his hand, violently twisting Mist’s fingers.