Rachel Caine - Chicks Kick Butt

“I am Mist of the valkyrjur ,” she said.

He closed his eye and released a shuddering breath. “Then my coming … was not in vain.” He lifted a shaking hand to rub his swollen lips. “I am Dáinn.”

Dáinn. She recognized the name. It was not uncommon among both elves and dwarves . But she knew in her heart that this was no common elf.

“Bringer of the Futhark,” she said slowly. “Teacher of the runes.”

He raised himself higher and sat up with a wince. “Yes.” There was a great weariness in his voice. “I have been gone a very long time.”

Gone. The memories flooded back, images of bloody conflict and hopeless courage. The elves had fought beside the Aesir, and died beside them.

All but one. Dáinn the Wise, who had walked away when Heimdall had sounded the call to arms. Dáinn the coward. Dáinn the cursed.

Mist drew away from him as if he were Fenrir himself. “Is that why you’re here?” she demanded. “Did you flee to Midgard when you ran from the great battle?”

The álfar had always been proud, but Dáinn made no effort to refute her accusation. He began to rise, a little of his elvish grace returning, then sank back down again like the faithless weakling he was.

“The great battle?” he said. “The final destruction of the gods?” He sighed, gazing into the darkness. “Does it seem to you that the world has ended?”

Mist couldn’t pretend that she didn’t understand his question, and it stung all the more because she had been thinking the same thing that very morning.

“Have you seen Baldr return from Hel?” Dáinn asked, relentless in his strange detachment. “Where are Vídarr and Váli and the sons of Thor?”

She could have told him that Vídarr and Váli were alive in this very city, one the owner of a Tenderloin bar and the other a common drunk. The sons of Odhinn were living proof that the prophecies had failed. They had known all along how useless it was to cling to the old ways. Mist had finally admitted they were right.

Now she knew they had been very, very wrong.

“There was an ending, yes,” Dáinn said into her silence. “The Aesir and their allies were scattered, sent into limbo and robbed of their power. But there was no Ragnarök. The gods did not die. And their enemies—” He broke off, and when he spoke again it was in plain English. “Their enemies still live.”

Mist felt the shock pass through her body and settle in her gut, roiling and churning like worms in a corpse. Somewhere the gods lived on, forgotten by men. Freyja, Heimdall, Tyr. Odhinn himself. The Allfather, who had passed Gungnir to her with his final breath.

“Go to Midgard,” he had said. “You will not fare alone. Each of your sisters will bear a weapon that must not fall into the hands of the evil ones. As long as you live, you will guard Gungnir. Until…”

He had died then, slain by Fenrir, and with the other valkyrjur . Mist had left the dying to their fates. She had believed she would have little time to guard the spear, since she, too, would be obliterated in the final destruction.

The joke had been on her. Odhinn himself hadn’t believed the prophecies. He’d known that the world to come would be just as cruel as the old; riven by war, greed, and suffering. He’d known that his enemies would survive.

“They have returned,” Dáinn said, struggling to his feet. “The jötunn Hrimgrimir has come to Midgard in search of the treasures. I was sent ahead, but he—”

“Who sent you?” she demanded, gripping his arms. “Have the Aesir also returned?”

“The Aesir have no power here. Not yet. Freyja came to me in a dream.…”

Freyja. Freyja the beautiful, the Lady, who received half the slain warriors chosen by the valkyrjur . Mist remembered the other things Hrimgrimir had said before his attack.

“Sow’s bitch,” he had called her. Syr, the Sow, was another name for Freyja. But Mist had always been Odhinn’s servant. It was for him she had fought, for him she had abandoned the honor of death in battle in favor of an immortal life of solitude.

“A dream?” she echoed, pushing her dark thoughts aside. “Why the Lady? Why should she come to you ?”

Dáinn acknowledged her contempt with a twist of his lips. “I still have some small magic remaining to me, and the Lady has not lost all her power. She still has the seidr , her spell magic. It is that which keeps the gods alive.” His gaze turned inward. “The Aesir can see but little from where they now reside, yet what they see is worse than any seer’s foretelling.”

“Tell me!”

“She charged me to find the treasures and warn their guardians against the invasion.”

The invasion. The “new age.” How many jötunar had come to Midgard? If the giants had found the other valkyrjur , the other treasures …

Panic surged in Mist’s throat. “Was it Hrimgrimir who attacked you?” she asked, giving him a shake. “How did he get to Midgard?”

“There are passages, ways between the worlds that have been opened by dark seidr .”

“What worlds? Does Jötunheimr still exist? Asgard?” She grimaced at her own stupidity. None of that was important now. “How did he find you?”

“I do not know, but he knew I was looking for you.”

“And you couldn’t stop him? What happened to your magic, álfr ?”

For the first time a flicker of real emotion crossed Dáinn’s face. “I had to let him win. My task was more important than any temporary victory. It was necessary that he believe I was no threat to him or his allies.”

Mist didn’t believe him. He’d let himself be beaten to a pulp and ground into the dirt like an ant on a battlefield. He was worse than useless.

But there was no time to question him further. “I have to go back,” she said. “Gungnir—”

“Is it safe?”

Mist didn’t bother to answer him. She jumped to her feet and began to run. She was halfway home when Dáinn caught up with her. She ignored him and kept on running.

The streets of Dogpatch were quiet now in the small hours of the morning. Dáinn was on her heels as she came to a skidding stop at her door and released the ward that guarded it from anyone but her and Eric. A dozen long strides carried her to the display room.

The case was open. Gungnir was gone.

Mist spun to the nearest wall and slammed it with her fist. Dáinn burst through the doorway, rags flapping.

“Loki’s piss!” Mist swore. “Short-wit, incompetent…”

“It will do no good to curse yourself now,” Dáinn said, unnaturally calm. “We must find him. Do you know the runes?”

“Of course I know them,” she snapped.

“Then help me.”

He sat cross-legged on the floor and closed his eyes. Mist sat across from him, preparing her mind and body for the galdr. Dáinn began to sing. His voice moved through the air in eddies and swirls like water in a stream.

A prickle of bone-deep awareness washed through Mist as Dáinn’s spirit mingled with hers. It was like a violation, unseen hands reaching and plucking at her soul.

Sorrow. Such profound and terrible sorrow.

Breathing deeply, she tried to let the distraction of Dinny’s presence roll away like summer’s fog in autumn. It was no use. Her disdain for him was too strong. She could only hinder him now, and failure could have consequences too terrible to contemplate.

Careful not to disturb the elf, she got to her feet and walked into the kitchen. The cats were nowhere in sight, but on the table lay a folded piece of paper, not the one Eric had left before. A sense of unfocused dread stiffened Mist’s fingers as she reached for the paper.