Loki's Gambit, page 216
part #1 of I Bring the Fire Series
Dare closes his eyes. The All Father is just, surely he will agree with Dare that an exception must be made? Slitting his wrist, Dare lets the blood run into the chalice.
Enit groans, and blinks his eyes. “Uncle?”
Pulling his wrist away from the chalice, Dare offers his blood to the boy. Enit is not his nephew, but calls him uncle anyway. There are so few Night Elves left … they need to consider each other family.
Taking the chalice in shaky hands, Enit sips, and the tremor in his limbs decreases.
“Why is your blood capable of rejuvenating us?” Enit asks.
“Because I’m old as dirt,” Dare replies wearily. He feels his age more and more. The only thing that keeps him going some days is his responsibility to Enit, and the families near his estate.
Meeting Dare’s eyes above the chalice, Enit says, “Mother was older than you by a century.”
But Enit’s mother, Eirween, hadn’t been sent to Earth to retrieve Night Elves that broke Odin’s law. It isn’t Dare’s blood that is sustaining Enit; it’s the human blood still flowing in Dare’s veins, and that won’t last forever. How long has it been since Gretta died?
“Count! Count!” Amethyst pants as she rushes back into the chamber. “The messenger! It is Angharad! She comes all the way from Asgard!”
At mention of Asgard, Realm Eternal, and home to Odin, All Father, King of the Realms, Dare commands Enit, “Drink it all,” and dashes from the room.
Minutes later he is in the courtyard just in time to hear the clatter of hooves. Blakkr, his niece's favorite nightmare, streaks through the portcullis. The animal looks for the most part like an ordinary horse, but her eyes glow faintly red, and her sharp, pointed canines glint in the low light. His niece Angharad is upon the creature’s back, long curly dark locks windswept, her cheeks very pale, even for a Night Elf.
“Uncle,” Angharad cries, “Odin sends a message with Loki!”
Dare’s eyes go wide. “His fool?”
Nodding, Angharad jumps from the saddle. “Odin has a quest for you on Midgard. I overheard Loki muttering about it before he was dispatched.”
At the mention of Midgard—Earth in that realm’s own parlance—Dare finds himself licking his lips, and his heart rate quickening. Inwardly he curses himself. If he is going to Earth, it may mean that a Night Elf is terrorizing humans, and even if the Night Elf’s presence there is innocent, it will still be Dare’s job to bring him or her before the All Father.
“Loki rides Sleipnir,” Angharad says.
“Sleipnir?” Dare says with a start. “How did you get here before him?” Sleipnir, Odin’s eight-legged steed, is the fastest horse in the Nine Realms; even a nightmare is no match.
Angharad gives a disgusted sounding snort. “Loki’s very drunk … he’d fallen off when we passed him on the road.”
One of Dare’s eyebrows hike. “You passed an agent of the All Father in distress and did not give aid?”
Angharad shrugs. “He didn’t sound distressed. He was snoring quite comfortably.” Looking pointedly at the sky, she says, “No moon, no stars, and misty. I do so miss our weather when I am in Asgard.”
Dare contains the urge to shake her. Abandoning a servant of Odin on the road is tantamount to treason. “Ruthenium!” he calls instead.
“Preparing your weapons, Count,” the Captain of his meager guard answers.
“My Earth—Midgardian—weapons,” Dare clarifies.
“Aye, sir!”
“I wish you could take me,” Angharad says.
Dare’s attention returns to his niece. For the first time, he notices that her lips are pale. The skin on her cheekbones is peeling—sunburn perhaps from her time in Asgard—or something else. She looks better than Enit and ninety percent of his people. Still, she needs to go to Earth, or the “curse” will lead her into the final sleep.
“Don’t be silly,” Dare lies. “It’s very dull.” If she goes to Earth without Odin’s permission she will be in violation of the All Father’s law.
“Here are your weapons, Count,” says Ruthenium, holding a nondescript leather satchel in one hand. It conceals a Colt M1911 pistol and ammunition. The M1 Garand rifle Ruthenium holds in his other hand is not so easy to disguise.
Dare catches Angharad’s sharp intake of breath. “What is that?” she whispers.
“Nothing interesting,” he says, knowing she’d find it immensely so. “Just have to blend in with the natives and they’re primitive.” He thinks of Schrödinger’s lectures during his and Gretta’s sojourn in Oxford, and how much Gretta had taught him about biology. Humans aren’t more primitive; their technology just can’t rely on magic.
Her eyes narrow at him, but a gust of air, the whinny of a horse, and the clop of what sounds like the hooves of two enormous draft horses makes everyone, including Blakkr, turn. Dare’s vision is immediately blinded by light. Screwing his eyes shut, he throws up his arm to protect himself.
“Uncle?” whispers Angharad.
Dare blinks at the ground. There is no bright, searing light. He wonders what caused him to have such a terrible vision.
Lifting his head, he knows. Astride the enormous dappled gray, eight-legged Sleipnir is Loki. The ginger-haired man has rounded ears and might pass for human, but he is originally from the realm of Jotunheim and a magical creature. At the moment he is unshaven and his eyes are half-closed. But what is most striking about Loki is his aura. All magical creatures have an aura. The more powerful the creature, usually the more dramatic the aura. Loki’s magical aura is roaring like a bonfire. Flickering blue, orange, and yellow, it leaps all the way to the top of the keep’s walls.
Dare takes a step back in shock. He’s encountered Loki on very few occasions in Asgard, but never before had he noticed Loki’s magic being so powerful. He glances around him; the others seem not to have noticed. Angharad is young, and more interested in nightmares than magic, and Ruthenium and Amethyst are dwarves, the least magically sensitive of all the magical hominids. Blakkr raises her head and whinnies at Sleipnir; perhaps the nightmare would normally notice, but Sleipnir’s presence seems to have distracted her.
In the saddle, Loki belches and thumps his chest.
Dare draws back at the stink, Angharad throws a hand to her mouth, and Blakrr pulls at her reins.
“And the Light Elves say he is The Destroyer,” Angharad whispers. “What a disgrace.”
Dare blinks. The Light Elves call Loki the Destroyer? That a fool should have a title so grand should be preposterous … He feels his skin prickle, and a tiny knot of worry in his gut. Leaning dangerously in his saddle, Loki intones, “Count Darerick Razvano Noapt … whatever. You are commanded by the All Father to come with me at once to put an end to a scourge of a vampire—”
“Night Elf,” Dare retorts.
Putting a hand to his chest, Loki amends, “The scourge of a blood sucking two-legged leech that has embedded its fangs in the innocent people of Earth.”
Sleipnir whinnies, and it sounds suspiciously like a laugh.
Dare stands straighter. “Tell me, Loki. Has Odin ruled on my petition yet?”
Loki shrugs. “I’m sure he’ll get to it. But at the moment mortals may be dying … it would hardly help your petition if mortals were to die at the hands … ” He chuckles. “... or fangs of a Night Elf.”
Dare swallows. “Of course not, nor would I wish that. I will prepare my mount. We shall need to go through the World Gate to Switzerland so I may prepare for my finances—”
Throwing up a finger, Loki interrupts, “No! We are going directly to the scene of vampiric incursion! We leave at once! Hop aboard Sleipnir.” Magic whips around the king’s fool and a shriek sounds from the corner of the courtyard. “Fire in the rose bushes!” shouts Amethyst. Dare’s eyes go wide—Loki has set fire to a wet rose bush?
“I need to prepare,” Dare insists.
“You need to obey the law of Odin,” Loki smirks.
Dare closes his eyes and takes a breath. Odin’s council is considering his petition. He can’t let a Night Elf loose on Earth hinder those deliberations.
Opening his eyes, he unclenches his fists and climbs aboard the giant steed.
“Orlando?” Dare asks.
“Yes, do keep up,” Loki says astride Sleipnir in front of Dare. The horse has slowed to a careful walk. They are passing through a place in the rocky, wooded foothills to the west of Dare’s lands. “Why is Odin sending you, and not me?” Loki waves a flask with such abandon that Dare grabs Loki’s belt to keep him from falling off.
“I can’t imagine,” says Dare.
Loki sniffs. “You’re lying. I hate people who lie to me. And two-legged parasites who lie to me as well.”
Bristling, Dare retorts, “I prefer to think of us as symbiotes.”
“I’m sure you do,” Loki replies. “Really, why won’t Odin send me to Earth? It’s the only interesting place, you know. The only place where things really change.”
“Do you think it could be because you’re a raving alcoholic?” Dare suggests, containing the urge to gag at the smell of alcohol leaching from Loki’s pores.
“Nah, that’s not it.” Drawing Sleipnir to a halt, Loki says, “We need to get off here, the World Tree branch is close by.”
They haven’t gone ten paces when Loki stops and says, “I’m forgetting something … I know I am. You’re to go to Orlando …”
“In Florida.” Dare winces. It’s probably sunny there, and warm places usually have snakes … and spiders.
Spinning clumsily, Loki blinks at him. “Lovely weather in early spring, which it is there by the way. Sunshine, warm even at night, you won’t need a sweater. Think of it as a vacation.”
“I’m a Night Elf,” Dare says flatly.
“Vampire,” Loki says.
“A vacation for me would be Moscow in December,” Dare mutters.
Loki stares at him a moment, and then gives a crooked grin. “I suppose so.” He snorts, and then snaps his fingers. A spark jumps into the undergrowth and Dare stamps it out.
Seemingly oblivious, Loki continues, “You’re to go to a place called The Cove.”
Dare’s brow furrows, remembering his geography. “Orlando is not near water. How could there be a cove?”
Loki shrugs and begins walking again. “You’ll go there, find the vampire violating the humans, kill or apprehend him or her, and bring them to Odin for justice.”
Dare’s stomach constricts at that. He hopes that the Night Elf is just waylaid—that he or she accidentally tripped through a World Gate, found themselves on Earth, and fell in love. It would happen easily enough. Humans are … enchanting.
Loki taps his chin. “There might be more than one blood sucker on Earth.”
Dare starts. “How many Night Elves are there?”
Loki shrugs. “Maybe more than one, but never fear, Odin has great faith in you for some reason.”
“That’s terribly reassuring,” Dare says.
Loki cackles, and then sighs. “I wish Odin would send me to Earth. I could kill the oversized two-legged ticks without remorse.”
“You don’t know their motives,” Dare protests.
Loki seems not to have heard or not to care. Still leading Sleipnir, Loki continues, “There needs to be change in Asgard … in all the realms. Change is good, you know. Without change everything is boring.” Loki almost slips on a stone. “Life is meaningless when it’s boring.”
The tunic Dare wears is already soaked through, but he finds his skin heating. Loki lives in Asgard, and partakes of the immortality-bestowing apples of Idunn. He will never grow old or die unless he suffers an accident. Dare’s people are supposed to be immortal, just like the Light Elves, but they suffer The Curse, and he’s watched too many slip away in the last few centuries.
“You idealize change because you don’t have to deal with the consequences,” Dare says, thinking of his people’s move from Midgard to Alfheim. It was supposed to make them stronger, more independent. “With change comes death. But you’d know nothing of that.”
Dare sees Loki’s shoulders stiffen. For another fifteen paces, Loki says nothing, but he steps with all the subtlety of an angry dragon. Dare thanks the Norns that it’s raining, the pitter-patter of drops muffling their footfalls.
Ahead he sees a break in the trees and hears someone shout, “Halt!”
Tipping back his flask, Loki keeps walking, his pace becoming faster and more sure. The trees part and Dare sees a low stone wall with a wrought iron gate. Atop the wall, a man holds a crossbow loaded with a bolt with a glowing tip. Dare can feel its magic from across the clearing.
Spinning to Dare, Loki snarls, “Never say I don’t understand death.”
“One more step closer and I’ll shoot,” the man on the roof declares. Dare can see the point of his ears. He also sees the glint of fangs. The man is either angry, frightened, peckish … or all three.
Spinning back to the fortress, Loki throws his flask into the air. The archer looses the bolt—it pierces the flask midair, and both burst into flame.
In front of Dare, Loki’s back and neck muscles tense, and his magic rises around him as though he is a human torch. He drops the reins and Sleipnir rears backward and dashes into the trees. Loki lets loose a blood-curdling scream, his magic rises up around him, and Dare swears he sees Loki’s skin turn blue. The plume of magic rising around Loki turns into a vortex, and it blasts through the gate.
Dare sees light, throws up his arm, hears a boom, and the next moment he is flung backward. He lands on wet earth, thankfully missing any stones. Loki is beside him. Gasping for breath, Dare sits up and sees the small fortification is rubble.
Leaning on his elbows, Loki whispers, “They must have been storing gunpowder in there. Humans have that … it’s …”
“I know what gunpowder is,” Dare says, springing to his feet. The fires in front of him continue to burn, despite the rain. He thrusts his hand into his satchel, and his hand clasps a very un-human object, a magic stone. Letting its power rush through him, he closes his eyes, and feels what is happening. In his mind’s eye, he sees clouds of energy clumped in groups of three split and turn into flame. It is not his magical training that informs him what is happening; it is his time in Oxford among humans. Loki’s magic is rendering water molecules asunder, and then exciting the hydrogen and oxygen, making them combust. The stone warm in his hand, Dare focuses, reaches to the molecules, imagines them bound together, calmer, and unchanging.
Wind howls, the rain picks up, and he feels the heat of the flames lessen.
Exhaling, he opens his eyes and finds the fire beaten back to embers by his magic and the rain. For a moment he wavers on his feet. The stone is a power reservoir—his own magic is weakening. On Earth, Nourished by Gretta’s blood, he wouldn’t have needed its power at all.
“Impressive.”
He looks over his shoulder. Loki is walking toward him. His skin no longer appears blue. Perhaps it was Dare’s imagination.
“I’m sure I don’t know what you mean,” Dare mutters, knowing that Loki means the display of magic.
“Liar,” says Loki.
Dare’s eyes narrow at him. Loki is still well in his cups; no one will believe him if he repeats this story. Dare doesn’t like his magical abilities well known, especially among his own kind.
Clutching the stone tighter for strength, Dare sets out to the ruined wall, Loki following. From within the rubble, he can tell the fortress was just a few dozen meters in diameter. He feels for life, and finds none. Walking the circumference, he finds three smoldering corpses and feels bile rising in his throat.
“The gate is there,” Loki says, indicating rubble that might have been a building. “I’ll let you through.”
“You’ve done enough damage,” Dare hisses. “I’ll take it from here.”
Loki shakes his head. “They shouldn’t have been storing gunpowder.”
Dare has more than a passing familiarity with gunpowder. There was none here.
“Go, Loki,” Dare says.
“Are you sure you don’t need help?” Loki asks, producing another flask from his cloak.
“I’m sure I don’t want your help,” Dare replies. He steps toward the gate and squeezes the stone tighter. He hardly has any energy left, in the stone, or in himself, but Loki is waiting. What damage could that man do on Earth where the inhabitants have so little defense from magic?
Loki gives Dare a manic, sharp-toothed grin, and spreads his hands. “I’m right here if you need me.”
Dare has to do this, and he has to do this now, without Loki. Taking a deep breath, turning the stone in his hands, he concentrates on pulling back the veil of space and time between Alfheim’s land of the Night Elves and Earth.
There is rainbow light, and then white light and heat so bright he bends in pain. Unbloody Helheim, of course it would be daylight. He takes a deep breath of air that is hot and humid, sees what might be the shadows of trees, and hears someone say, “There was no scheduled arrival.”
“Hit him!”
And then everything goes white.
Too sick. Can’t make it.
Scowling at the text from Veronica, Penny wobbles on one high heel and tries to itch her calf with the other.
Next weekend?
Penny frowns, and tugs at the bottom of her borrowed skirt, cursing as her nails tear the hose. Her feet already hurt. Some people like getting dressed up like this? Ugh.
Don’t go without me! Veronica writes. It could be dangerous.
Penny blows her bangs out of her eyes. No, she’s doing this tonight. It took her forever to get her nerve up.
Don’t worry. Get better. Penny texts back to Veronica.
The line outside the club edges forward, and Penny moves with it. She’s surrounded by girls in skimpy outfits, and a few guys dolled up nearly as much as the girls. As far as she can tell, she’s the only person in this line alone. She looks across the street. A blinking sign advertises, “Guns! Guns! Guns! Pawn and Guns!” She swears that once you get past the spires of the theme parks, there is a pawn and gun shop on every block in Orlando. She believes in the second amendment, but it seems a bit much.
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