Dead Radiance(51)

The bell over the door jangled and the only other customer walked out, head bent low, wrapping his scarf against the blast of Arctic air. Right before the door swung shut, Hugin flew in through the open crack. I glanced at the waitress. Thank heaven she was busy clearing a table and didn't notice. I hoped nobody else would.

Hugin landed on my shoulder. I should have considered it significant that he chose the shoulder farthest from the god, but I was merely grateful for his presence. He felt like living protection.

"Take care what you promise Loki and what promises you extract from him. He is not the most trustworthy of gods." Hugin's baritone soothed my nerves and calmed me.

"You're ready to play at last?" The smug smile on Loki's face made me want to draw my sword and dice him into small pieces. Instead I gritted my teeth and smiled.

"This isn't a game to us," I answered. Loki knew Aidan's life was at stake, but he continued to treat this as a sport. He was beginning to piss me off. "Now how do we get to this Nidhogg?"

"The Rainbow of the Gods," said Loki.

"The what?" Aidan asked. An expression of confusion flickered over his features.

Apparently, Aidan didn't trust the god either and I intended to play along. The less Loki knew about our travels, or the extent of our knowledge, the better.

"Also known as the Bifrost. It's the method the gods use to travel between the Nine Worlds," Loki said, impatience furrowing his brow. "You'll need to find the nearest location and use it to travel to Muspell. Muspell is the Realm of Fire."

I didn't need to feign ignorance here. But Aidan didn't look in the least confused.

"The Great Nidhogg resides within the Realm of Fire. It is he whom Loki wishes you to seek. But beware, for he is a trickster." Hugin's honeyed voice sounded in my ear.

I rolled my eyes. Tell me something I don't know.

Loki looked at me and smiled his cheerful, cloying grin. "Do you know how to find the Bifrost?"

"No, but I'm sure Hugin can help us. So how did Nidhogg end up with the rest of the necklace, and why can't you go there and take it from him yourself?" I snapped, unafraid to reveal my impatience with the god.

I'd begun to wonder if this was all a setup. One huge ruse to ensure Brunhilde the Ancient was well and truly punished for her failure to fulfill her original pledge to Freya. Maybe the goddess was just a vindictive bitch and was, right now, laughing at my predicament.

The hopelessness of the whole situation was getting to me. Or maybe it was seeing Aidan get more and more ill every day, or the recent bullet to the ribs I'd received. The Mead seemed to have done nothing to help the healing, and I wondered whether it worked at all to help Aidan.

I was also curious why Loki wanted us to do his dirty work for him. I doubted he really wanted us to give the necklace back to Freya.

Loki picked up a menu and scanned it, a bored look on his face. "As you know, a gem of Brisingamen will glow when it detects the presence of the other gems," he said. "Using that piece of the necklace, I was able to track down the rest of the pieces. But I cannot enter Muspell. Therefore I cannot retrieve the rest of the necklace and return it to Freya." He tossed down the menu, smiled and shook his head, sadness fairly oozing from his pores. But the aqua swirl of his eyes held a malevolent gleam.

"You've been stealing Brisingamen from Freya for centuries. Why should we believe that you want to return it to her now?" Aidan asked.

Loki pouted. "It's no fun when I can't steal the necklace because it's lost. I want to give it back to her so I can see her face when I steal it from her again."

His eyes glittered and although I believed his reasoning, my gut said that the whole necklace issue went deeper than just giving it back so the trickster god could steal it again. But it didn't matter to me what happened to the necklace once Freya had it in her possession. Loki could steal it a hundred times over for all I cared. As long as I returned it in time to save Aidan's life I'd be happy.

But I remembered Hugin's words of warning.

"We'll find this Nidhogg and get the necklace back to Freya. But what do you want in return?" I asked Loki, sure he had a price to extract from this bargain.

"Who, me?" Loki's attempt at looking offended was a rip-roaring success. Except for his eyes. They turned a flat icy blue, revealing an ancient evil rather than mere mischief. "I don't want anything. You just find the necklace and return it to her Majesty. That is reward enough for me."

He wasn't budging. By now I'd tired of the additional energy required to keep up the pleasantries with the odious god, tired of the agony of my wound, weighed down with worry of how fast time was running out. I wanted very much for this conversation to be over.

The weak light of the morning had dissipated and bright sunlight now streamed into the overwarm diner. The buttery aroma of waffles and fried eggs rode the air, and the rich bitterness of cheap coffee reeked. The doorbell jingled a few times. More voices encircled our booth, more ignorant people living day-to-day lives I would give my right arm to live now. So far no one had noticed Hugin. Aidan's face looked paler in the brighter light, dark purple smudges encircled his eyes and the veins in his face and hands were clearly visible through his thinned skin.

I sighed and turned to Loki, unsure how to get rid of him.

He was gone.

Aidan raised an eyebrow and sighed. "So, let's get our stuff sorted and head to the Bridge, then. The sooner we get this done the sooner we can go home."

And that was when it hit me like a two-by-four to the skull; Asgard was home to both of us. Our lives in Midgard had reached a clear and conclusive end.

"Do we use the Central Park Bridge?" I asked Hugin, hoping for something closer to our motel.

My heart sank when the bird nodded.



We arrived in Muspell in a rush of heat scalding enough to burn the eyebrows off our faces. Quite a change from Greenland and New York at Christmastime. We both smiled, happy to have survived another journey on the Rainbow of the Gods.

"Right, we get in, get the necklace and get the hell outta here," Aidan said, punctuating the sentence with a few dry coughs.

Hugin scrabbled on my shoulder and put his beak to my ear. "What is it, Hugin?"

"Once you enter Muspell there is no way out. The Nidhogg will have to release you from the bindings of this world or you may never leave."

"Can't you just be straight with us for once?" I bit back, fuming.

"What do you mean, Brynhildr?"

"You could have told us that sooner." I gritted my teeth, steeling myself against swatting the daft bird up the side of his head. We were stuck here whether I skewered the bird with my sword or not.





Chapter 40



"What?" Aidan almost shouted the question when I relayed Hugin's news. "That was information we could have used before we decided to come here!"

As much as I was angry with Hugin, I understood exactly where we stood. "We would've come whether or not we knew about it. We have no choice but to follow every lead. If Nidhogg has the necklace, we do whatever we have to get it. And get out of here." I swallowed my outrage at Freya, who'd put me in this position.

My hurt and anger at Aidan had faded, replaced with a little understanding and a dash of forgiveness. Time heals wounds, true, but time also seemed to have cleared my vision of the haze of self-pity, too. I could see how Aidan had come to Craven, doing the job his father requested. I'd have done the same for my father.

Worse was his father's betrayal, sending his thugs out to kill his own son. I couldn't fathom how a father could possibly do such a thing to a son.

Aidan paced around, as if looking for something to kick in frustration. "This is ridiculous. We could be stuck here forever. We could very well die here. Damn that stupid bird!"

"Stop it, Aidan! It's not Hugin's fault. Damn it, it's not even your fault. It's all mine." I stood at the edge of my abyss again. Held back only by the unraveling tendrils of truth.

"Don't be stupid. It's not your fault. It's Freya's pathetic scheming. You'd think gods would be benevolent, kind beings, but no. They're just a bunch of manipulative, cruel users."

Aidan's anger seemed to aggravate the decline in his health. He skin looked so pale and thin I feared he'd rupture the surface with the slightest movement. The bruise from the bullet hole purpled his forehead, ridged in the middle of the wound so much like the day we'd found him beside the stream. Tears filled my eyes as I saw just how ill he really was. I blinked them away angrily.

"No, it's my fault you are here with me," I said.

"Look, Bryn, I wanted to come with you. You needed me to help find the necklace." Aidan placed his hands on my shoulders, locking me in place.

"No," I whispered, looking everywhere else but at his face. "You needed me more."

"What the hell are you talking about?" He shook me slightly, his patience wearing as thin as the skin on his body.

"Freya put a curse on you. A curse to force me to take on the quest. I would've refused, would've just given her the pendant and been done with it, but she pulled you into the bargain." I pulled away, but distance from him was little consolation.

"What are you talking about?" His voice lowered, dark and dangerous.

"Freya put a curse on your life. She gave you one week from the day we left Asgard. Every day we spend outside Asgard takes one day from your life, brings you closer and closer to death. If we don't get back to Asgard, by tonight, with the necklace, you'll die. Again. Forever, this time."