Shelly Laurenston: Shelly Laurenston

“Find her!”

They chased her into the woods. A dark beauty, with dark eyes and hair. Haakon and his men had plans for her, but as soon as they hit the clearing, she disappeared.

He silenced his men with a slash of his hand. She probably hid right in front of them. Haakon smiled. He could already imagine her taste, her cries, her screams for mercy. Willing or otherwise, he’d have the tiny female. Then his men would have her.

A noise behind them had the entire group turning.

Haakon relaxed the hand on his sword and chuckled. “It’s just a raven, you fools.”

“She’s a crow.”

As one, they turned at the sound of the girl’s voice. She stood before them in worn, ripped clothes and dirty hair. Brown-‐skinned, he assumed she must be from one of the raided lands. Dragged here for breeding. Still, none of that could take from her beauty. Perhaps Haakon would keep this one. Perhaps he wouldn’t share. He didn’t have to. Not with the power he now possessed.

He held his hand out to her, feeling power surge from the weapon he’d recently taken from the hidden cave they’d discovered. The power made him bold and confident. The power made him strong. “Come to me, little girl.”

She stared at him. He no longer saw any fear from her. Perhaps she wanted him. Perhaps she realized what fun they could have together.

“Look,” one of his men barked. But Haakon ignored him, too focused on the woman in front of him.

“Look!” his second-‐in-‐command insisted. With a sigh, Haakon followed his men’s line of sight…to the trees. There were more birds there. More crows and maybe some ravens silently watching them. He didn’t care.

Still staring into the trees, “They’re just birds, you fool. Get hold of yourself.”

He heard the men gasp and his gaze dropped to them, and then to the woman.

He took an involuntary step back as giant black wings slowly extended from her back. Almost as big as her, they looked just like the wings of a crow.

She grinned. “Don’t you want me, sweet Haakon?” The girl knew his name. How did she know his name? He’d never seen her before this day.

“Don’t toy with your prey!” Haakon and his men immediately spun around at the sound of another female voice, drawing their weapons. A slightly older woman this time. Another set of wings. “It is…unseemly,” she chastised.

“Why should we be fair?” the girl barked. “Do you think he would have been kind to me?”

He wouldn’t have been. He could assure her of that.

“Ach!” Another one snapped, stepping out of the shadows of the trees. “You waste our time! Odin’s warriors arrive tonight and I have plans of much drinking and at least one of them warming my bed. So hurry up so we can go.”

“Oooh!” another cheered. “The Ravens are coming?”

The females laughed. “If I have my way,” one of them promised.

The old women of his village warned him about this many days past. They’d ordered him to return the jeweled dagger to the cave where he’d found it. But he’d laughed at them. How could they expect him to give up something that had given him so much power, so much strength, and given it all so quickly? Within days, he’d ruled his village and had plans to own the surrounding ones. “But they’ll come for you,” they whispered to him. “And when they do, no one will help you. For nothing comes between a Crow and her prey.”

Like most of the men in his village, he’d never believed the old stories of a goddess’ brutal warriors. True, the bloodthirsty Valkyries were frightening, but they were the daughters of gods. Yet, according to legend, the females staring at him with such coldness were very much human.

These…women, if you could call them that, were the Gathering. Winged warriors for the goddess Skuld. Warriors who had already died once who Skuld returned to the living. Still human, but slightly…changed.

As he stared at their mighty wings, the small one he’d chased struck first, slamming her small fist into his face. Haakon quickly realized her tiny size hid a mighty strength as he grabbed his shattered nose. Before he could recover, she had him on the ground, her kicks and fists having much more impact than any male he’d fought.

The dying screams of his men filled his ears, but he was unable to help them.

Unable to stop the Gathering from ripping them apart.

It didn’t take them long to wipe out his men. Hard men who’d fought many wars for many years. Some he even considered friends. And these relatively young women killed them all in mere seconds.

Yet they kept him for last.

The one he’d chased had her tiny bare foot shoved against his throat. It seemed his suffering now bored them since they stopped hitting him. One of them pulled the magically charged dagger from the sheath at his side. The dagger that had given him so much power and just as quickly snatched that power away.

“Here.” The woman expertly flipped the blade over so the girl could grasp the handle. “Make it quick. Make it clean. Then Hella can deal with him and we can spend our night teaching Odin’s Ravens how to beg.”

The girl nodded. “As you wish.” She straddled him, lowering her body until she sat on his chest. She was warm and naked under her clothes. He could smell her lust but it wasn’t for him…it was for the kill.

“You should have listened to the old women in your village, Haakon—and returned the blade to our goddess. Now you must pay the price.”

“No Valhalla for you,” another one of them sneered, already heading toward the village and these Ravens. These warriors of Odin. She spoke as if the loss of his place at Odin’s table in Asgaard meant nothing to a warrior such as himself. “No Valkyries to take you home.”

The girl shook her head sadly. “No. There’ll be no Valhalla for you.”

Then she slashed his throat.

One thousand years later…New Jersey...

Glass shattered as a grown man threw himself out of a fifth story window. Will Yager closed his eyes and turned his head to protect himself from the spray of glass. He knew the man threw himself out that window because that’s what any sane person would do in a similar situation.

“You can run, David,” a female voice from the man’s apartment taunted as David landed hard at Yager’s feet. “But we’ll find you.”

“Don’t leave, sweetness! I wasn’t nearly done!” another female voice added.

The man at his feet— “David,” Yager guessed—struggled to crawl away. The only reason the man’s back didn’t snap like a twig when he landed was due to the little item he recently stole. The only reason Yager and his team were even here on a Saturday night.

Why people insisted on stealing from gods, Yager would never know.

Reaching down, he grabbed David by the neck and lifted him to his feet. “Where exactly are you crawling away to, little man?”

“Trust me,” Yager’s protégé, Mike, chuckled behind him. “We’re much nicer than the women you just ran from.”

That was true. The Gathering didn’t do rescue missions or help those in need or involve themselves in the politics of gods. The Gathering only answered to one god. A Fate called Skuld, the Veiled One. A goddess who once rode with the Valkyries when she got bored, Skuld knew the future, could bring the dead back to life, and believed in wisdom. She created the Gathering more than a thousand years ago when Yager’s people still raided monasteries for sport. Like Odin, she wanted her own warriors, but unlike Odin, Skuld didn’t choose from the finest Nordic stock. She chose from the girls who his people had stolen. Girls thrown over warriors’ shoulders and carried away to a foreign land they knew nothing about. Mike probably put it best, “The Ravens look like an ad for Hitler Youth while the Crows look like one of those big box of crayons.”