Loki's Gambit, page 87
part #1 of I Bring the Fire Series
The chariot drops. Thor pulls Mjolnir to his side and shouts, “Chariot, level!” And then they are floating in midair.
Bohdi starts laughing with relief.
Gasping for air and smiling, Amy meets his eyes.
Thor stands and looks to the sky. The sun is almost directly overhead. Muttering a few words, Thor tracks it with his thumb. “It is mid-morning here.”
Breathing heavily, Bohdi scans the sky. “The light is so pink…” He’d thought when he first poked his head through that it was sunrise or sundown.
Beside him, Amy speaks, her voice far away. “The sun is a red dwarf…”
“Aye,” says Thor. It strikes Bohdi that he is breathing hard, too. Also, the air is warmer than in Chicago, but it’s still cold.
Thor nods to himself. “We aren’t at the highest level of filaments, but the air is thin here…”
Grabbing the lip of the chariot wall, Bohdi stands as Amy rises shakily beside him. Gazing upward for the first time, he sees a glint in the sky—another latticework like the one below them?
Amy gasps. “The lacey glass filaments—they’re the branches of the giant columns.”
“Yes,” says Thor. He spreads his feet and the chariot wobbles at the movement.
Holding on more tightly, Bohdi turns and looks down. The latticework he’d seen earlier rolls out beneath them, getting thicker and sturdier looking as it approaches what looks like a tree of sparkling glass about thirty meters away. The tree’s trunk keeps rising beyond where his eyes can see, similar lattices stretching out from it along the trunk above them.
“The branches of the columns catch cosmic rays and solar radiation,” Thor says. “The Norns convert those forces into magic and use it for their own purposes. The Norns are three of the most powerful beings in the Nine Realms—but only here on Nornheim.”
Bohdi turns his head sharply to Thor. Somehow, solar radiation and cosmic rays were the last words he’d expected to hear from the space Viking. He sees Amy looking at the big guy with a similar look of surprise on her face.
Raising an eyebrow at them both, Thor says, “I am over one thousand years old. I have picked up a bit of mag—” Speech halting, he tilts his great head. “Scientific knowledge.”
Bohdi swallows. “Ummm…right, sorry.”
“Errr…yes,” says Amy. “Of course.”
Shaking his head with a bit of a smirk, Thor gazes downward. “Now to discover where we are so that we may make our way to the dwellings of the Norns.” He looks at Bohdi. “I don’t suppose Myeyephone would know where we are?”
“No,” say Amy and Bohdi in unison.
Thor nods, sagaciously. “Of course, of course, the sprite has never been here before…ah, well.”
Before Bohdi or Amy can respond, Thor shouts, “Chariot, down!” and the floor beneath Bohdi drops so fast he almost flies out. They crash through the latticework below, it tinkles like breaking glass, and Amy gives a startled yip.
The world below comes into more vivid focus—forested hills interspersed with more columns—and are those swaths of white tents? Smiling, Bohdi shakes his head and grins. They did it! They made it to a new world without major injuries and only minor property damage. He almost laughs. It went so perfectly… Usually, his plans have a way of going horribly wrong.
“The news says that Thor took Bohdi and Amy!” Steve’s daughter’s disembodied voice rings so loudly that Steve pushes the phone away from his ear.
“They’re fine,” Steve says, pacing the length of the hallway in Loki’s building. “They’re with Thor. They’re not in any danger.”
Even as he says it, Gerðr’s words ring in his mind. “They are in Nornheim, the realm of everything dangerous, dreadful, and deadly.”
“He kidnapped them!” says Claire.
Rubbing his temple, Steve scowls and remembers Bryant’s and Brett’s descriptions of events and doubts it. All he says to Claire is, “That has not been confirmed.”
And then another thought hits him. “You’re ten years old—what are you doing watching the news?”
On the other end of the line Claire huffs. “It’s called Social Studies, Dad. We’re doing a unit on current affairs. You have to get them back!”
“I know,” says Steve. He respects Lewis, and needs her skills and knowledge. And Bohdi…
When Steve first took Bohdi in, it was partly out of charity, and partly out of curiosity. When they had found him, the kid’s brain was temporarily humming with magic. Why, out of millions of people, had Loki wiped Bohdi’s memory? Did Bohdi know something? It was a situation Steve wanted to keep an eye on. Over the past two years, Bohdi’s become something of a friend. Or maybe a sidekick. Or an obnoxious little brother. And even if Steve wants to strangle him half the time, he doesn’t like the idea of him dying in pain and agony on some far off planet.
Trying to switch subjects, he says, “How is your arm?”
“Daddy!” Beatrice’s voice rings behind him. “Director Rogers!”
Steve rolls his eyes. “I have to go, honey. Love you.”
“Get Bohdi, back,” says Claire just before Steve clicks his phone shut.
“Director Rogers!” says Beatrice, holding up her umbrella. “Why don’t we send in paratroopers?”
Steve turns around and finds himself face to face not just with Beatrice, but with Gerðr and two female agents.
Gerðr had opened the gate for ADUO…well, for Beatrice. The giantess hadn’t been completely unconscious when Skírnir tried to kidnap her. In thanks she offered to cooperate with the agency. She was able to verify the realm that Thor had taken them to was Nornheim, and had even allowed Steve and Beatrice to peek over her shoulder for a few moments when she’d opened the gate.
The magic shielding bracelets and helmet had to be removed for her to open the World Gate. They still haven’t been put back on.
Gerðr’s wearing nearly formless winter clothes, and Steve’s eyes go to the face of the giantess, the other women around her fading to just amorphous clouds at the edge of his consciousness. Gerðr’s skin is so pale it’s nearly transparent, her eyes are a cold gray, and her hair is so blonde it’s nearly white. The giantess narrows her eyes at him and her nostrils flare slightly. Her looks and personality are as bitter and cold as the Chicago winter. But Steve still feels his body heat when he looks at her, feels his pulse rate increase, and can’t help but think of what his dark skin would look like pressed against hers.
Beatrice clears her throat, and Steve spins on his heels, averting his eyes and licking his lips. Damn magical glamour.
“Paratroopers, Steven! Why don’t we send them?” Beatrice says.
Keeping his body carefully turned away from the giantess, Steve meets Beatrice’s gaze. “We have no idea where they went, Beatrice, and they are in a flying vehicle—”
“We could send in gliders!” says Beatrice.
“We’re sending in drones, Beatrice! Intelligence-gathering drones. For now, nothing, and no one else!” Steve snaps.
From over Steve’s shoulder, Gerðr speaks. Without magic blocking cuffs, her English is flawless. “The Director’s plan is wise, Beatrice. It will do the most to find your granddaughter, and will be the least offensive to the Norns.”
Steve’s not sure if he turns to look at Gerðr because it’s one of the very few civil things she’s ever said about any human…or if he just wants to look at her… His eyes fall on her lips. They’re not particularly full, but they are well shaped…as is her whole face. It’s like she has been carved out of marble. Steve thinks he could spend hours tracing the perfect angles and valleys of her silhouette with his eyes, his fingers, his tongue…
Beatrice clears her throat again, and Steve throws a hand up in front of his eyes. “Can you just turn off the glamour?” Steve snaps.
Leaning forward with snakelike speed and grace, Gerðr hisses. “You’re a dog!” The two agents behind her grab her elbows and pull her back, scowling at the giantess as they do.
Keeping his hand aloft, Steve sighs and rolls his eyes, “Believe me, I feel like one.”
Down the hall, Hernandez pokes his head out of Loki’s apartment. “Sir! We have a press conference at the front of the building in three minutes.”
Steve sighs. “Thank God,” he mumbles as he strides past Gerðr and the agents, now wrestling with the giantess’s arms.
As he steps into the elevator beside Hernandez, he’s still thinking about Gerðr, his mind wandering off in uncomfortable trajectories. Rubbing the back of his neck, Steve grumbles, “Is it just her magic or—”
He lets out a huff, and shakes his head. Or loneliness. He can’t bring himself to say it out loud. He’d thought, when he’d been talking to Frieda, the lawyer he’d met the other night, that there was something there. She’d been sexy in the best kind of way—the kind of way that came with confidence, success, and a passion for life. He thought she was someone Claire could look up to.
But then she’d gone back to her hotel with Bohdi… Is desperation causing Steve to lose his ability to read people?
“It’s magic,” Hernandez says. “We’ve got to keep the Promethean cuffs and the helmet on Gerðr or one of our guys is going to get in trouble.”
Steve snaps out of his reverie, his brain catching on the words, “one of our guys will get in trouble.” What about Gerðr, herself? After the ill-fated meeting with Skírnir, when Beatrice was busy filling out forms, Steve had taken some time to reacquaint himself with the myths surrounding Gerðr. Her husband Freyr had fallen in love with her from afar, but she’d wanted nothing to do with him. So Freyr sent his servant Skírnir to convince Gerðr to allow him to court her. Skírnir had tried to convince Gerðr with threats of pain and death. Gerðr had refused. And then Skírnir had threatened her father, and in some stories, her father’s lands and people. Skírnir had also promised to “wed” her to a three-headed giant. In the end, Gerðr had married Freyr.
Steve had always taken the myths with a hefty grain of salt—there were some stories where the union between Gerðr and Freyr was a happy one. But then Amy had confirmed that a darker interpretation of the couple’s origins was the truth.
“We need her magic, and she’s been very cooperative since Beatrice shot Skírnir,” Steve muses almost to himself.
“We only need her magic when she’s opening the gate,” says Hernandez.
“But without magic, she can’t communicate as well,” Steve counters.
“It’s for her own protection,” says Hernandez.
Raising an eyebrow, Steve says, “That’s what the Taliban says about burkas.”
Staring at the numbers above the elevator door, Hernandez says, “That’s a fallacy, sir—this is magic we’re talking about, not just ordinary urges.”
The elevator dings and the doors slide open.
Steve rubs his temple. “I think I’m getting a headache.”
“Magic will do that,” says Hernandez as they walk through the lobby.
When they step out into the frigid air of the Chicago night and are instantly set upon by a gauntlet of the press, it’s actually a relief. As flashbulbs go off in his face, he feels his adrenaline surge, and a smile comes to his lips.
Above the din, a man’s voice rises. “Is it true that Thor kidnapped two American citizens?”
Steve raises his voice. “There is no solid evidence a kidnapping has occurred, Frank.” Steve makes a point to address the investigative reporters that trail him by name. They eat it up.
There are a few more questions that Steve answers deftly enough, carefully restraining a mischievous smirk. Steve’s used to leadership, but the tango he does with the press is new. He can’t help but think of it as a game.
An unfamiliar woman’s voice, precise, clipped, and British, comes from Steve’s left. “Thor apparently entered this building in his chariot, but hasn’t exited the building. Is there perhaps a portal to another realm in one of the flats above?”
Steve’s head snaps in the direction of the voice. His eyes settle upon a woman with skin nearly as dark as his own. She’s either very tall or wearing impressive heels; her eyes are just a few inches below Steve’s. Her unstraightened hair is tied up into a soft bun at the back of her head. Her eyes are warm and brown. And she’s beautiful. Not in the perfect way Gerðr is beautiful. This woman is beautiful in a way that’s real—there’s a dimple in one side of her face and not the other. Her bottom lip is a little too large for her top, she has smile lines, and two lines between her eyes. A woman who thinks, worries, and laughs about things—a human being.
Steve tilts his head. “I’m sorry, I don’t know you,” he says, and it’s not just an evasion.
Thrusting a hand between the other reporters, she says, “Tara Inanna, BBC science correspondent.”
She’s wearing a fitted coat, and Steve gets just the barest hint of curves beneath it. He smiles, takes her hand, and feels the sharp edges of a business card in his grip. “What do you know about inter-realm portals?” he asks.
“Is there a portal?” another woman shouts.
Without turning his head, Steve says, “Unconfirmed, Miss Andrews.”
In front of him, Tara smiles and pulls her hand away. “I may know more than you. I have a degree in physics from Oxford.”
Steve’s eyebrows lift, and his stomach does a weird little flip flop.
Another reporter shouts, “How will this affect your candidacy for mayor?”
Turning his head, Steve smiles. “Did someone write me on the ballot, George?”
There are chuckles all around. Hernandez suddenly grabs Steve’s elbow and drags him out of the way just as the door to the condo building swings open. Steve had forgotten the agent was still next to him.
Beatrice shoots out of the door and walks directly over to Steve, Gerðr and her two agent minders trailing behind. The giantess is still not wearing magic blocking cuffs or a helmet.
“There has to be more we can do!” Beatrice says.
Shouts and flashbulbs erupt from all sides. Steve grabs Beatrice’s elbow, consciously avoiding looking at Gerðr. At the same time, he motions for Hernandez to start clearing a line through the crowd to the waiting car.
As he guides Beatrice forward, he cranes his neck around to look for Tara, but she’s disappeared.
When they reach the car, Beatrice slides in first, which means Steve gets the awkward honor of sitting next to Gerðr. He inclines his body in Beatrice’s direction, but swears he can feel Gerðr’s body heat radiating off her, even through his clothing. He’s dimly aware of Beatrice saying, “The drones should be armed,” and of one of Gerðr’s female guards slipping into the front seat.
He looks down at the business card in his palm. On it, in neat blue ink, Tara has written, “Let’s discuss physics over dinner sometime.”
Steve grips the card in both hands and imagines the dimple on Tara’s cheek, large full imperfect lips, and warm brown eyes.
“Strange, I thought I sensed magic,” Gerðr says, shifting slightly, her knee brushing Steve’s briefly and sending a lightning bolt of heat jolting up Steve’s spine.
Steve’s phone rings, but he’s afraid to reach for it, afraid to even lift his eyes from the business card. The message goes to voicemail, and then Beatrice’s phone rings. A moment later, she’s pushing it in Steve’s face saying, “Steve, it’s your mother.”
Steve’s eyes slide to Beatrice.
The old woman lifts an eyebrow. “Your mother and I are on the Inter-church Chicago Reconstruction Committee, have you forgotten?”
Steve’s vaguely aware of Gerðr turning her head in their direction.
Steve takes the phone. Rubbing his temples and closing his eyes he says, “Yes, Ma’am?”
Steve’s mother is usually a very calm woman. From the South, she usually speaks with a cadence slightly slower than the Chicago norm. But now she is speaking rapidly, and the tone of her voice is unusually high pitched. “Steve, I just got off the phone with Claire. Thor, that giant space alien has got Bohdi—and Bea’s girl, Amy, too!”
Bea’s girl? It takes a minute for Steve to realize that his mother has a nickname for Beatrice, not just her phone number.
“You know, Bohdi’s like a another son to me!” Ruth says.
“Painfully aware,” says Steve, the headache he’d felt earlier suddenly blooming full force.
“Where has Thor taken them?” says Ruth.
“I’m not really sure exactly, Mother,” Steve grits out.
Gerðr shifts beside him again, and she’s not really touching him, but she’s almost touching him…and good Lord, what is Steve, thirteen?
Beside him Beatrice pipes up, “The drones should be armed!”
On the phone Steve’s mom says, “You have to find him!”
The car turns sharply and Gerðr slides into him.
Steve stifles a whimper even as his mother says again, “Find him. Claire is so upset,” Beatrice says, “What is the range of a drone?” and Gerðr, oddly deciding to be solicitous, says, “Excuse me.”
Find Bohdi? Steve wishes he could join him. No matter how deadly Nornheim is, Steve is being crushed between magic-induced lust, a protective grandmother, and his mother—who is invoking his daughter’s name.
There is no way Bohdi could be any more miserable than Steve is right now.
Chapter Five
A man rides a battered, three-speed bicycle on a narrow street. On the front of the bicycle is a basket. A little boy is sitting in it, legs dangling over the side. The street is packed with other cyclists, a few mopeds, women in brightly colored saris, and even one cow with enormous curved horns.
Someone is calling, “Bohdi!”
The boy and the man stop at an intersection where some mopeds pass in front of them. As the mopeds pass, the man reaches down and runs his hand through the boy’s hair, tweaking the boy’s ear as he pulls away. The boy smiles and bats at the hand.
“Bohdi!” someone shouts again, a woman with a strange accent. The little boy doesn’t pay any attention. Bohdi is not his name.
What is his name?
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