Gods and Mortals: Fourteen Free Urban Fantasy & Paranormal Novels Featuring Thor, Loki, Greek Gods, Native American Spirits, Vampires, Werewolves, & More (36 page)

He’s got his shirt on and is awkwardly attaching his breast plate when Amy turns onto the border road. She steps on the gas and they surge forward at what feels like dizzying speed. They’re still in a relatively populous region; farmlands line the road on their left. They don’t have to worry about dark elves just yet.

He tilts his head. Over the elf queen’s lands, the sky is just starting to lighten.

He’s sure it must be taking all of Amy’s concentration to remain on the road, but then she begins to speak. “You were blue for a few moments when the fire started. Is that your natural color? I thought Frost Giants only turned blue when they were cold.”

He freezes, his hands on the buckle of an arm guard. “I don’t turn blue.” He isn’t Helen.

“You looked blue,” says Amy.

“That was a trick of the light,” Loki says, his voice coming out nearly a hiss. He doesn’t have time for this inane chatter.

“You looked good blue. Not like in the movies with pointy teeth and a giant horny head,” she says her words running together as though she’s just speaking to hear herself speak. “More like — ”

“Be quiet,” he snaps.

“I thought you weren’t sensitive about your Frost Giant nature?”

“Frost Giants are not blue!” he says. “I should know. I’ve been one for more than 1,000 years!”

“Huh,” says Amy.

“The forest is approaching,” says Loki, turning his attention to the mail links that cover his right elbow. “If you hit anything or anyone just keep going.”

“Just because the queen thinks the elves over there are bad doesn’t mean they are!” says Amy, slowing down as they slip into the forest.

Looking up, Loki blinks at her, surprised how much of Alfheim politics she’s managed to divine in such a short time. Ordering her isn’t going to work. He sighs inwardly. 

“No, they’re not,” he says quietly. “I’ve had dealings with Dark Elves before. But trust me, any Dark Elf that would choose to attack Car merely for transversing the border road isn’t one you should stop for. Under any circumstances.”

Amy swallows and her hands shake even more violently.

Loki turns back to his armor and curses. The plate that covers his upper left arm is completely missing. He grabs the piece for his forearm and attaches it best he can, without the anchor of the upper section.

It’s only a few minutes later when a shadow seems to fall on the land in the East, and the wind and rain outside them pick up.

“Ummm...” says Amy.

“Thor,” mutters Loki, narrowing his eyes. Is Thor Odin’s puppet once again? Or is he here for some reason of his own? To beg forgiveness maybe? Not that Loki could give it.

A streak of lightning turns the realm bright as day.

“What are those shadows in the sky?” Amy says.

“Valkyries,” Loki says, the word spitting out of his mouth. His mouth twists. “Not here to beg forgiveness after all.”

“Forgiveness?” says Amy.

“We have a few minutes,” says Loki twisting to reach into the backseat “Concentrate on the road,” he says. “I need to eat something.”

A
my is trying
to concentrate on the road. Rain and wind are whipping through the sky. It might be her imagination, but both seem to be getting stronger.

She shivers. Her back is still damp from where Loki leaned over her as the grenades went off. Her eyes dart over to him. He’s still wet, armor half on, stuffing peanut butter into his mouth with a spoon, a liter bottle of Coca Cola open in his lap. He hasn’t spoken to her since grabbing some food. How can he be eating? Her own stomach is heavy with fear, and her mind is swimming with everything that’s happened this evening: the elves, the hadrosaurs, and seeing Loki in a lovely robin’s egg shade of blue. Trick of the light or not, it had been strange, lovely, and as magical as the fire, the ice, or his astral projections.

She takes a shaky breath. Loki says he’s over 1,000 years old. She can’t even imagine that.

Whoever’s chasing them is likely just as old or older than him, possibly more powerful...

That’s too much to think about. Taking a deep breath, she glances in the rearview mirror. Beatrice is thankfully still asleep. Fenrir is awake, her nose darting from side to side.

Amy looks at the clock on the dash. Fifteen minutes ago Loki said, “It’s Thor.” It feels like an eternity, and like only a heartbeat. Tightening her grip on the wheel she speeds up.

Lightning rips across the road just 50 yards in front of the car. A humanoid shadow is haloed in its light. Amy screams, hits the brakes, and tries to dodge it.

“Keep going!” Loki yells. His hand shoots to the wheel and holds it straight. Whoever it was hits the car and sinks below the hood. The car bumps sickeningly.

“Hit the gas!” Loki says.

But Amy’s foot is on the brake. “No,” she says. “We hit someone! We have to stop.” Even if it is a criminal.

“He’s fine!” Loki says, “Go!”

“No, I can’t,” Amy says.

Something bangs against the back window of the car. Amy turns and screams again. There is a huge mouth filled with sharp teeth attached to the flat plane of the back window. Fingers with suction cups are at its side.

She hears the sound of a thunk as Loki drops his bottle of cola.

“Drive!” shouts Loki twisting and crawling into the back.

Amy floors it. She looks in the rearview mirror. Loki obscures most of the view, but Amy can see the thing is still there. It doesn’t seem to have eyes or nose...just that huge maw.

“Car, open the back window!” Loki says.

“What?” screams Amy.

“Just let Car do it!”

Amy hits the button at her left and the window begins to drop. Over the sound of the wind comes a horrible noise like lips smacking, and then there is a gurgling noise and an inhuman scream.

“Roll up the window!”

Amy doesn’t have to be told twice. She raises the window, and Loki pulls back into the front seat, his sword in his hand, something dark and black at the point.

Another bolt of lightning rips across the road.

“Next time I’ll just keep going,” Amy says. “I’ll just keep going.”

Looking at the ceiling, Loki says, “There isn’t going to be a next time. Thor and the Valkyries are almost upon us.”

Amy bites her lips. “What do I do?”

“I’m going to try and make us invisible,” Loki says, his voice very calm. “You’ll still be able to hear everything...but you’ll only be able to see things outside of Car, you won’t even be able to see anything inside, not even yourself. I’ll need you to keep driving though. Can you do that?”

Amy nods. “Yes...I think so.” Not because she thinks she can, just because she doesn’t like the idea of what may happen if she can’t.

The words are hardly out of her mouth when everything in front and behind her starts to fade from view.

Her foot hits the brakes. She hears the sound of tires on pavement, the thump of rain on the roof, the engine. But she can’t see the car, Beatrice, Loki, even herself...She takes a ragged breath.

Loki’s voice comes from her right. “It’s disorienting.”

“Yes!” Amy shouts, maybe just to hear her own voice.

Loki’s voice sounds tight. “You must keep driving.”

“I can’t see the dash, the steering wheel or the pedals!” Amy says.

“You don’t even look at those,” Loki says, his voice sharp.

That’s true. Amy licks her lips, feels the sensation of her tongue, cool and wet against her skin. “I can’t see myself...it’s almost like I’m not here.”

There is a moment of heavy silence. “How can I help?” Loki says, sounding like his voice is coming through gritted teeth.

“Would you touch me?” Amy asks before she’s even thought about it, and she almost wants to bang her head on the invisible steering wheel for making the suggestion.

In a voice that is surprisingly clinical Loki says, “You’re going to feel my hand on your thigh; it’s the best place for me to touch you without obstructing your ability to drive.”

Before she even has a chance to react, she feels his hand on her leg, large and warm, and as long as she doesn’t look down, seemingly solid. And it does help; she’s too grateful to worry about the implications of it. She puts her foot down on the gas and holds the steering wheel at 3 and 9 o’clock.

“Very good,” Loki says, giving her leg a pat. It shouldn’t be as encouraging as it is.

Amy nods and bites her lip. She’s just getting to the point where she’s feeling a little more comfortable when bright lights like lasers shoot down on the road and forest in front of them sending off sparks in every direction, lighting up weird hominid shadows as they do.

The shadows leap from the trees on the dark side of the forest. Amy screams again, puts her foot on the brake, and almost runs them off the road, but Loki’s hand is suddenly on the wheel, holding it firm. “They’re magical flares,” he says. “They won’t hurt us. Try to dodge them if you can, but keep us on the road!”

Shaking, Amy puts her foot back on the gas.

“They don’t want us dead,” Loki says as though the words are a revelation to himself. “They’re just trying to flush us out.”

Amy blinks. “The sparks will hit the car, and they’ll see them bounce...”

“Exactly,” says Loki, his hand on her leg again.

“I think I can do this.” says Amy, speeding up. As long as she doesn’t have to worry about the blasts killing them, she feels much better. Also, they’re scaring the crazy shadow things away. And that’s good.

Amy zigzags through the flares that are falling down on the road.

At one point she thinks they’re going to roll over, but a few minutes later, the road ahead of them is clear. She looks in the rearview mirror, all the flares are bursting on the road behind them.

Loki pats her lap. “Well done.”

Her heart is in her ears, and she’s panting, but she laughs aloud. “We did it!”

The words are barely out of her mouth when she hears a loud clang. Sparks cascade over her head and down the sides of the car like a waterfall. “Uh-oh,” she says.

“Drive!” says Loki.

Amy floors the pedal, but up ahead and behind them shapes are falling from the sky. Another flare is fired directly towards them from in front; it explodes on the windshield, and suddenly the car and everything inside is visible again — but Amy can’t see the road at all. She puts her foot on the brakes, gently this time so they don’t skid.

She looks to her side. Loki is next to her. His face has a sheen to it, his mouth is open, and she notices he’s breathing heavily. He’s not looking at her. His eyes are focused on the road ahead of them.

Amy follows his gaze. About 100 yards ahead of them are women carrying spears, standing around an enormous man in front of a chariot without a horse. In the enormous man’s hands there is a hammer that is glowing with the pale blue white of lightning.

Loki takes a deep breath, and his voice comes out low, malevolent, but tinged with something desperate. “It is the mighty Thor.”

Uh-oh.

“
W
hat do I do
?” says the girl.

Loki stares at Thor in front of his golden chariot. Valkyries stand beside Thor and are blocking the road behind Car. More are alighting along the sides of the road.

“Drive forward,” he says. “Slowly. When I tap the roof, stop.” Knocking at the top window, he says, “Car, open up.”

“You know...” the girl begins to say.

“What?” he snaps, not bothering to look at her.

“It can wait,” she says, gripping Car’s door as the window above slides open.

Loki stands up. Heavy but sparse drops of rain fall on him. He can see trees waving madly in the distance, but around him the air is nearly still. They are in the eye of the storm.

Around Car, Valkyries raise their spears, but they do not fire. In front of him, Thor stands up straighter. His eyes meet Loki’s, then go over Car, before coming back to meet Loki’s gaze again.

Neither Loki nor Thor say anything. When Amy has brought Car within a few paces of Thor, Loki taps the roof. She obediently stops the vehicle.

“Well met,” says Thor in the Asgard tongue.

Loki does not respond.

Thor licks his lips and looks distinctly uncomfortable. “I bring grave tidings — ”

“If you mean the fire that consumed Hoenir’s hut, and all within, including Sigyn and my sons, I already know,” Loki snaps.

Appearing genuinely hurt, Thor takes a step forward. “Loki, I did try — ”

“To save them,” Loki says sharply. His body sags and he looks away. “Yes, I know that, too.” It occurs to him how devious it was for Odin to send Thor on this particular outing. Thor is possibly the only Asgardian Loki will hear out at this point. And Thor does have something to say; if he didn’t, Loki would be dead by now.

It’s uncomfortable standing half in Car, half out. Loki’s legs are at odd angles, so he slips onto the roof and sits there, legs dangling into the inside of Car below. The roof buckles a little at his weight, Amy gasps, and Fenrir yips, but Loki ignores them. “Spit it out, Thor. What do you want?”

Thor straightens. He takes a deep breath and appears almost to go a little green, as though he has just been asked to eat something extremely distasteful. “I have been sent...to beg you to return.”

Loki stares at him for several long heartbeats. Then he bursts out laughing. The sound seems brittle and hard even to him. Waving at the Valkyries, Loki says, “You came to beg me...at spear point?”

Thor doesn’t back down. Raising an eyebrow, he smiles slightly. “It would seem I needed their help to find you.”

Loki sighs. Once he might have warmed to that; now he feels only emptiness. “Flattery will get you nowhere, Thor.”

The slight smile on Thor’s face vanishes. “Nonetheless, everything I say is true. Loki, my father needs you to come home. ”

Loki’s lip curls into a sneer. “And he would have the gall to ask me after killing Hoenir, Mimir, Sigyn and my boys!”

Scowling, Thor takes a step forward. “It wasn’t like that! The fire — ”

“Wouldn’t have happened if he hadn’t tried to execute my sons!”

“Let me finish!” Thor’s voice rips so loudly through the darkness of the stormy dawn that Car reverberates. Lifting his hammer, Thor shouts, “My father tried to stop the flames — but even Gungnir couldn’t halt them. Something is growing in the nine realms, something that is twisting magic and time and will pull the World Tree asunder.” Thor swings his hammer for emphasis and a stray bit of lightning sprays off into the trees. There is a loud crack, and a small scream from Amy. The Valkyries shift on their feet.

Stepping back with one foot, Thor’s face contorts into something like disbelief or revulsion. “My father believes only you can stop it.” Loki crosses his arms. Of course Thor would feel ashamed if there was some threat to the realms he couldn’t resolve with a few pounds of his hammer.

Not that Loki believes this little story. “Would saving the realms involve me remaining in a cave doused in snake venom for a few centuries?”

“It isn’t like that!” Thor says. “You will be absolved of all wrongdoing in this matter. This is the truth!”

Absolved? As though he was the one who needs absolution. His sons, Sigyn, Mimir and Hoenir are dead. Loki grits his teeth and feels his eyes get hot. Thinking about them all gone — his body feels hollow, as though he is an empty shell.

He takes a deep breath and pulls himself back into the moment. Absolution is a farce. As soon as Loki returns to Asgard, there will be some dire punishment, and this time there will be no Sigyn to tend to him. Loki rolls his eyes at Thor’s naivete. When will Thor realize Odin is as capable at lying as Loki, perhaps more so? Anything to “protect” the realms, or rather, his own power.

“Lovely,” says Loki, tapping his fingers on Car’s roof. “But I’m afraid I have to refuse.” Shrugging, he points down at Car and says, “I have some mortals I have sworn to return to their own realm. You know I always keep my oaths.”

Thor scowls. “Father said that you could slip between the realms...” He walks around the car towards the driver’s side — as he does so, the Valkyries raise their spears a bit higher. Loki scowls at them and then turns his attention to Thor. Odin’s son is now peeking in the driver’s side window. Thor smiles and waggles a finger at Amy as one might waggle a finger at a pretty bird in a cage. In the back seat Fenrir growls warningly.

Looking up, Thor raises his eyebrows and says brightly, “She is a pretty thing, Loki. And just your type.” Raising one hand to his chest, Thor makes groping motions with his fingers in what is probably a universal symbol for large breasts. “I suppose the old woman in the back is her kin. Convince them to come back to Asgard with you. Keep the girl as your plaything for a decade. When she withers she can remain your servant, a much better life than she’d have in her own realm.”

Somewhere a Valkyrie’s spear must fire accidentally because Loki sees a flare of orange flame in the periphery of his vision. His sons are dead. As are his ex-wife and two best friends. Thor dares talk of playthings? Loki is too furious to speak.

“What did he just say?” says Amy in English, her voice sounding indignant.

Loki looks down at her. She is staring hard out the window at Thor who is waggling his finger at her again and smiling like an idiot. It is probably innate contrariness that makes Loki translate. “Oh, he’s just suggested I bring you home to Asgard and keep you as a plaything and servant. Perhaps you’d like to answer?”

Eyes going wide, Amy’s brows draw together and she springs up through the window in the roof between Loki’s knees. Facing Thor she says, “You can tell the God of Blunder he can take that idea and shove it up his great big Viking butt!”

Loki blinks. Well, that was absolutely priceless. The corners of his lips pull up.

Thor’s face goes completely red, his lips curve into something between a frown and a grimace, and his brows draw into one line. The hand holding his hammer starts to tremble.

“Actually,” Loki says, keeping his gaze fixed on Thor, “Thor understands English well enough.”

“Oh,” says Amy, sounding not at all brave. Putting a hand gently on her head, Loki pushes her back into the car.

Thor is breathing deeply, but Loki nor Car nor the girl are dead. Odin must want Loki very badly.

In English, Thor says very slowly, “You can tell your whore that my orders are to bring you back to Asgard alive. Father will not care about her puny little mortal life.”

Head darting out of the car again, in a voice that is plaintive rather than angry, Amy says, “I am not a whore!”

Putting his hand on her head not so gently this time, Loki pushes her back inside. With a smirk he says, “She has my oath of protection. You’ll have to kill me first.”

With a bellow, Thor swings his hammer in empty air like a toddler having a tantrum. Something cracks in the distance, like lightning hitting tree branches. Loki smiles. He hears the Valkyries at the dark side of the forest give angry cries.

In Car, Amy starts pulling at his leg. “Loki!” she whispers.

“Not now!” he snaps down at her.

In the distance he hears more cracking in rapid succession. Thor looks away. Someone shouts, “Dark Elves!”

“Loki!” says Amy.

He scowls at her. But she gives a ferocious tug at his leg. Letting himself be tugged into Car, he finds his face just inches from hers. Her eyes are wide with fear — and so help him he’s about to make her more afraid with the words at the tip of his tongue. But before he can even breathe she says, “Do elves have automatic weapons? Because that sounds like automatic weapons.”

Loki’s eyes go wide. He looks towards the dark forest. Something hits the side of Car and there is the sharp clang of metal on metal. In the dark forest there are loud angry popping noises getting closer. Valkyries from the left side of the road are streaming past Car to the dark side. Car makes a sharp beep.

Turning back to Amy, he sees her hands are already at the wheel.

“That does sound like automatic weapons fire,” he says. He hasn’t heard it since World War II.

Amy hits the gas. Loki puts a hand on her leg and says, “I’m making us invisible again!”

From the backseat Beatrice says quietly, “Oh, the elves have fireworks.” Loki looks back at her; her eyes are still closed. Everything around them begins to shimmer as his spell takes effect. He hears Thor yelling orders.

Loki looks at the shimmering Amy, now steering them around Thor’s chariot. “How do you know what automatic weapons sound like?” he asks.

“I live in Chicago,” she says, as though that is explanation.

Her shimmering form hunching over the wheel, Amy says, “Elves have guns?”

“No,” says Loki. More gunshots go off, and the car shoots forward. “Not that I know of.”

“Oh, what lovely fireworks,” says Beatrice.

An explosion goes off in the distance behind them and something whizzes past. Amy jumps beneath his hand. Loki follows the whizzing shape with his eyes and turns his head. “That was just another flare.”

He turns around. “Thor’s broken off from the rest and is pursuing us!”

Car shoots forward.

I
t’s
like a video game Amy tells herself. The flares aren’t going to hurt them. No one dies if they get hit.

“Veer left,” Loki says. Amy veers left and a bolt of blue shoots by the car. She’s not sure how long she’s been driving since the Valkyries were overtaken by dark elves. It seems like forever, but it’s probably only a few minutes.

“We’re almost at the gate,” Loki says. “Slow down.”

“How will you open it?” Amy says, putting a foot gently on the brake. “Will you have to get out of the car?”

“Of course I’ll have to get out of the car,” Loki snaps. “Stop here!”

Amy stops so quickly she bumps the steering wheel.

Loki’s hand leaves her knee, and she is suspended in absolute nothingness.

“Car, open up the top hatch!” Loki says.

Amy doesn’t try to argue with him. She just searches blindly for the button in the door's armrest. Another flare goes by. She hears what sounds like feet on the hood of the car, and then the only sound is the wind. She can feel rain coming in through the open sunroof and she shivers.

There is the sound of quick steps on the hood again, and then Loki’s voice is very close to her ear. “Drive forward!”

Amy does. She sees the rainbow of the gateway again, and her body and the car come into view bathed in early morning light. Dark bricks surround her on either side and she smells garbage and urine and thinks that an alley has never smelled so sweet. She looks up. Loki is half on the hood, half on the roof. His head is above her, looking in the direction they came, a sword in his hand. Glancing in the rear view mirror she sees Beatrice sleeping, the seat behind her Grandmother just coming into view.

Amy smiles and breathes out a long breath of relief. The car is almost through when it suddenly jerks up and backwards, the back wheels seeming to leave the ground. Lines of light surround it on either side. Loki swears. Amy looks back in the window and sees a huge hulking Thor-like shadow seeming to emerge out of nothing behind her. It looks like he’s pulling the car backwards by the bumper.

Loki scrambles across the roof towards the back of the car. Amy doesn’t think. Shouting “Loki, hold on!” she throws the car into four wheel drive, then reverse, and hits the gas. There is a loud thud. Amy can’t see the back of the car; it must still be in Alfheim. But she feels it when the back tires hit the ground and bounce. Heart suddenly very loud, Amy puts the car into first gear and pulls forward but meets resistance.

She looks back. Light flashes in a wide vertical circle behind the car. There is a loud clang, and Loki jumps down off the car and stands in the middle of the circle shouting something in a weird slavic-sounding language. His sword is gone, but in one hand he holds what looks like a tiny book. She thinks she sees Thor again, but then the circle collapses on itself and there’s just Loki swaying on his feet.

Turning, with wavering steps he comes around the car. Amy hears the scrape of metal on pavement, and then Loki climbs into the passenger side, sword in his hand.

Beatrice is rubbing her eyes. Fenrir is standing on top of her, looking out the backseat. There is no Thor, but the last six inches of the rear of the car is just gone.

Closing the door and hanging his head, Loki says softly, “Will Car be alright?”

Amy looks back at the missing rear end, and over at Loki. “You know...it’s just a machine.”

Loki turns his head to look at her. “How can you say that?”

Feeling like a heel, she turns to the steering wheel. Her hands are shaking so much she doesn’t really want to go anywhere for a few minutes.

“Dude!” comes a loud voice from outside the car.

Raising her eyes, she sees three guys with spiky hair in hipster clothing standing directly in front of them in the alley. Their mouths are open. The middle one’s got a bottle of something in his hands. It falls to the ground and lands with a crash.

Somewhere a police siren wails.

Swallowing, Amy revs the engine a bit. The hipsters move to the side. She pulls out into the alley and heads home. Thankfully, they don’t run into any police. She’s sure driving with a hole in the back of your car is some sort of moving violation.