0765332108 (F) (35 page)

“He would have schemed for any eventuality, but he told me that Freya might have … already taken you at the protest, when she seemed to fall. I asked to attend the party to learn the truth.”

She gave a hoarse laugh. “Did
he
always know what Freya wanted, too?”

Dainn winced. “I believe he discovered it when you fought him at his first apartment.”

“She tried to do it then, didn’t she? I used the ancient magic, and when I fell into the fugue state, it was really her taking over.
You
got rid of her.”

“I did not know what had become of her after she vanished. Not until Loki told me that Freya had placed the other Aesir under a spell, and that she had never intended to bring them to Midgard.”

“I know,” Mist said. She clamped her hands around her head. “I know everything she did and meant to do. You said it. I was supposed to be her champion against Odin. I was supposed to have power she didn’t, because I was …
bred
to be different.”

“But she rejected you in Asgard, failing to see how well she had succeeded. You overcame all the magic she sent against you here, and now you have access to more power than you could have imagined. She tried to create a weapon, but it turned in her hand.”

Mist straightened and met his gaze, dry-eyed and sober. “I think this power has always been inside me, like the ability to use the ancient magic.”

“Because one is dependent upon the other,” Dainn said slowly. “You have discovered the Eitr.” He leaned forward, engaged in spite of himself. “You were always able to touch it, Mist. The eldest magic manipulates the source of all life, the beginning and end, the sickness and the cure, all the elements in perfect concert. Without the ancient magic, the Eitr is almost impossible to control. Odin once wielded it himself, but was said to have lost the skill over the millennia. Freya and Loki both held it for a time—”

“Freya still had it, when she tried to take me,” Mist said. “But how could she, if Odin didn’t?”

“I do not know. But Loki depleted his, and Freya … she could not still have possessed it in any measure when she tried to take you, or she would have destroyed you.”

Mist was silent, and Dainn thought of Danny. His excitement evaporated. If Danny returned to Loki, Laufeyson would use the boy’s access to the Eitr. And he would use it to destroy.

“Mist,” he said, “I heard that Danny escaped from Loki. Have you learned anything more?”

“No. But I wonder if he could be with Sleipnir now.”

“It is possible,” Dainn said. “But Danny is still in great danger.”

“I’m as worried about the kid as you are,” Mist said. Dainn took a long, deep breath. “You still believe that Danny is an innocent,” he said, watching her carefully.

“Loki’s used him as badly as he has anyone. Maybe—” She glanced at Dainn with a slight grimace. “Maybe even worse.”

“Yes. That is why I ask you to withhold judgment when I tell you that it was Danny who asked Loki to take Sleipnir.”

Mist stopped in midstride. “He
asked
?”

“He craved a reunion. And Loki believed the time was right.”

“We saw Fenrir. Did Danny find
him,
too?”

“Danny has a little more understanding since you saw him on the steppes, but his motives remain a mystery, even to me.” Dainn gathered his courage. “I said I left you for Loki because I did not believe that he could use the beast to harm you, and because I feared what I might do to you if I remained. But those were not the only reasons, Mist. There was another just as great. I feared for Danny, for what Loki would do to him. I believed I could protect him.”

“How could you protect a son from his own father, especially a father like Loki?”

“Because Loki is not his father.

“I am.”

*   *   *

It all made a horrible kind of sense.

Mist found herself leaning against the door again, her mind busy sorting through memories and bits of conversation and all the clues that should have told her the truth long ago. Danny’s rescuing Dainn from Loki and demanding his help in finding Sleipnir on the other side of the portal. Dainn’s seemingly immediate affection for the boy. The bond that had been so evident between them from the beginning.

And all the time Dainn had been with Loki in Asgard, believing his intimate partner to be Freya.

“How long have you known?” she asked, stumbling over the words. “Was he … was Danny born in Asgard?”

“No,” Dainn said, his haunted eyes focused on something Mist was glad she couldn’t see. “He was born in the Void. I knew nothing of him until Loki told me, after I gave myself up to him.”

“Loki’s fucking piss,” Mist said, remembering to breathe. “But some part of you
did
know, didn’t you?”

Dainn didn’t answer. It was as if he didn’t want to give her any excuse for letting him off the hook.

As if she
could
. As if she would ever forget all the lies he’d told, knowing she would lose everything when Freya came for her.

And he’d still betrayed his mistress in the end.

“Did Freya know?” she asked quietly.

He shook his head. His eyes were wet. She looked away.

“I’m sorry,” she said. “What Freya did to you on the steppes—”

“I gave her power over me. There is no excuse.”

She dropped into a crouch. “What am I supposed to do with you now? You knocked Freya out of … whatever part of my mind she still controlled, like you did before. I’m grateful for that.”

“It was my responsibility.”

“I’m responsible for myself.”

“Then I repeat my request. I cannot protect Danny now. Once Loki recovers Danny—and he surely will, if he is not stopped—he will still try to turn my son’s abilities against you.”

“Have you been keeping Danny from helping him?”

“Loki permitted me to work with him, believing that I could reach through the barriers of Danny’s mind and convince him to act on Loki’s behalf. I did what I could to discourage him.” His voice dropped to a hoarse plea. “You must find him. Please.”

His desperate humility made her feel ill. “I promise that I’ll try. I just don’t know if I can—”

“Once you have truly learned to control the Eitr—”

“Didn’t I almost kill you a few minutes ago?” She swallowed. “Have you forgotten that you called me ‘Lady of Darkness’?” He didn’t respond, but she knew there was no easy answer. There was and had always been a shadow inside her that her battle with Freya had tapped, not created. She had known it ever since she had used the glamour on Koji last winter. She’d behaved exactly like Freya that time, too.

If she were as noble and pure as the champion she should be, Freya’s corrupt influence could never have touched her.

“
There is no evil in you,
” Dainn had said, ages ago. But he had been wrong then, and he must know it now.

“Dainn,” she began.

But he no longer seemed to be listening. He slumped over himself, forehead to knees, and Mist noticed for the first time how much he resembled the “homeless man” she had found in Golden Gate Park on the day she had met the Jotunn Hrimgrimir and realized that all she had believed of the past was a lie.

“Don’t,” she said. She moved toward him as carefully as she would approach a dangerous animal backed into a corner and wondered if, in his desperate fear for his son, he would call on the beast. “I can’t blame you for doing everything to save your son.”

He looked up, and his pain became hers—his shame, his self-contempt, his horror at what he had become. The beast was no part of that horror, though his hatred of it had never left him. The anguish she saw now was only a tiny fraction of the torment he endured every moment he was alive.

And he had concealed it. From Loki, from Danny, from her, even from himself. His captivity had nearly shattered him, but it was
her
presence that had finished the job.

There was nothing more she could ever do to punish him more than he had already punished himself.

“Please,” he whispered. “If you cannot help Danny, at least remember to trust no one but yourself, and doubt any thought that craves power or urges you to belittle the mortals for whom you fight.”

“I doubt everything,” she said, reaching toward him. “I need to know—”

He jerked away violently, huddling in the corner like a prisoner seeing light for the first time in a decade. She retreated, her legs barely carrying her to the door. She stumbled on the threshold, and the elven guard caught at her arm.

“Do you need assistance, Lady?” he asked. “Did the traitor do you harm?”

“No,” she said. “I’m fine. Bring him fresh clothes, water, and decent food. After that, he isn’t to be disturbed.”

Whatever the elf might feel about Dainn, he took his cue from the tone of Mist’s voice, bowed, and moved quickly to follow her instructions.

Dazed by the horrors of the past week, Mist stepped out of the warehouse. The same men and women scurried about, the same troops marched, and the sun struck down out of the clouds.

But everything had changed. Freya’s influence was gone, and Mist felt no satisfaction, no pride in what she had accomplished. She remembered what Taylor had told her about calling mortals who might not have been willing, what Rick had said about fights and conflict within the ranks. She remembered treating her own advisors and friends like servants. As Freya had done.

She touched the pouch, hanging from a new cord around her neck. Bryn was still trapped. She hadn’t seen Gabi anywhere, Ryan was missing, and so was Konur. And Danny was Dainn’s son, who had to be saved.

She faced a chaotic situation she had helped create, and she alone could make it right. She had to confess what she had done to her mother, and why. She had to learn who among the mortals shouldn’t be here, for any reason. She would have to rely even more on her commanders and administrators and advisors.

Even then, there was no guarantee that she wouldn’t fail, and take every one of the allies down with her.

The sunlight faded again, as if it knew she wanted nothing to do with its promise of victory over the darkness. A warm hand closed around hers, and she jerked her head toward the one to whom it belonged.

“You’re scared,” Anna said, squeezing Mist’s hand. “You don’t need to be afraid.” The young woman smiled, and it was not Anna’s smile. “I know someone who can help you.”

All at once Mist recognized what was different about Anna’s voice and the way she smiled. Both voice and smile were those of a child, secure and happy and oblivious to the chaos around her. The agitation, the furtive behavior, and inexplicable fear were gone.

“Come,” Anna said, tugging on Mist’s hand.

Mist allowed Anna to guide her past the occupied warehouses toward the one where Freya had died. Mist stopped when she saw where they were going, her heart turning over beneath her ribs.

“It’s okay,” Anna said. “He isn’t mad. He understands.”

“He?” Mist said blankly.

“He’s waiting,” Anna said. She tugged again, and Mist shuffled after her like a zombie on Valium.

Only when they reached the door and stepped into the roofless building did her tattoo begin to burn again, and she felt the force of the magic: not Freya’s or that of any elf, but a blast of pure masculine energy, the essence of primal dominance and virility. The broad-shouldered figure was limned in light, half-solid but very real.

“Odin,” Mist said.

The All-father smiled down on Mist, his single eye very bright, his broad, muscular body flickering in and out of focus.

He’s not all here,
Mist thought, though thinking at all required considerable effort. But this was no illusion, no manifestation.

Odin had come to Midgard. Odin: Lord of the Aesir; Father of Men; Flaming-eye; Spear-shaker; Weather-maker. Odin, who had sacrificed his own eye for knowledge of the Runes he had passed on to the Aesir. Odin, whose magic was greater than that of any of the other gods, and who had never been defeated.

“All-father,” she whispered. “How—”

His laughter boomed, bouncing off the walls and surging toward the sky like a jet breaking the sound barrier.

“You have seen me before,” he said. He smiled at Anna, who gazed up at him with love and awe. He opened his fist, and black feathers exploded from his hand to circle around his head.

Orn.

Mist rose slowly, beating down the anger she had no right to feel. “You were … hiding?” she asked in astonishment.

“Hiding.” Odin turned his head and spat. The feathers fell like stones at his feet. “Anna.”

The young woman approached him, bowed, and held up her hand. The raven pendant hung from a chain clasped between her fingers. Mist felt a second jolt of shock, as if she hadn’t seen the stone since she’d first given it to Rebekka seventy years ago.

“Take it to Mist,” Odin said.

Anna obeyed, offering the pendant to Mist. She took it and cradled the flat stone in her palm. Her tattoo seemed ready to sever her hand from her arm.

“You were meant to hold this for me,” Odin said, his voice stern again. “Yet you gave it away.”

“All-father, I—”

“It is fortunate that the child Rebekka, and Anna, kept it safe for me until I led her here, for it was the pendant that tied me to this world and held the means by which I would regain my true form.”

“You … were in Midgard since the Last Battle?”

“Within the raven, yes. And in the parrot, which allowed me to conceal myself in the sight of mortals who might wonder at a child keeping a raven as a pet. For many years I forgot who and what I was, but I protected myself, and even now my enemies remain ignorant of my survival and my plan for the restoration of the Aesir.”

Mist glanced toward the door. Odin laughed. “We are well warded. Only you and Anna can hear or see me, until I choose otherwise.”

Sorting through her disordered thoughts, Mist struggled to find the right questions. “Why did you come to Midgard in the first place?” she asked. “How did you know what would happen after the Last Battle?”

“I learned a second prophecy in Asgard, one that offered hope of escaping the doom of Ragnarok.”