The three of them nodded.
“What I propose doing today is to talk to the lich Ulfur to find out what he’s done with it, and encourage him to return it to me.”
“Encourage him?” Eirik asked with a puzzled look.
“That was my polite way of saying force him.”
Pure joy lit up the faces of all three Vikings. Eagerly, Eirik stepped forward. “You’ll let us kill this lich?”
“No. Not kill. Just scare the crap out of him. If he refuses to give it back . . .” I hesitated a moment. I wasn’t a big fan of using violence, but I’d found in the past that some members of the Otherworld simply wouldn’t respond to anything but a show of strength. “If he refuses, you can rough him up a little. Not enough to permanently harm him, but enough so he sees we’re not pushovers.”
The Vikings whooped at that, and were very busy for the next twenty minutes, gathering up not only their bullet-less Walther P38s, but anything else they could find that they felt would be useful in persuading the lich to do as I wanted.
By the time I rid them of most of their arsenal, including the fire extinguisher, a length of rope Finnvid had stolen from Peter’s supplies, and what turned out to be Naomi’s tattooing gun, I was ready to crawl back into bed and just let the world pass me by. But thoughts of my mother were enough to send me out, packed in a taxi Eirik had called, with three Vikings, a wonky arm, and a whole lot of determination.
Chapter 14
“Where will we find the lich?” Eirik asked as the taxi headed into town. He was in the process of honing the edge of a sword he’d acquired from Nils, the sword swallower.
“I hope you paid him for that,” I told Eirik with a dark look as he stroked the whetstone lovingly down the blade, periodically pausing to test the sharpness on his thumb. The other two Vikings were similarly engaged: Finnvid with a pair of short swords and Isleif with a huge ax that I vaguely remembered Karl using to “decapitate” his brother in one of their showy magic acts.
“Aye. I knew you would not let us keep our weapons if we did not pay for them with weasel gold.”
“Good. As for the lich, I know where he is. Or kind of know where he is. One of the images he imprinted into the table was that of a big old house overlooking the town. Kind of like a castle, but not quite as elaborate. I figured something that prominent shouldn’t be hard to find. Finnvid, could you ask the driver if he knows of a house like that?”
He held a brief conversation with the driver (who was dressed like a sea nymph, including seashell bra and long green hair). “The taxi wench says she’d need more information to say for sure which house it is.”
I spent the trip into town trying to dig from my memory anything that would help pinpoint the house in question. I didn’t have much to go on, and it took some time (and an ever-increasing meter total) before the taxi driver finally hit pay dirt.
“I’d ask her to wait for us, but this has already been the most expensive taxi ride of my life,” I told Eirik as the driver zapped my MasterCard.
He pulled out the sword, which he wore strapped to his back. “I will take care of the taxi wench for you. You save your weasel gold.”
“No, you will not. You know the rules—no hurting anyone unless I give explicit orders to the contrary.”
“Like the lich,” he said with an anticipatory smile, the avid glint in his eyes making me a bit wary. As the taxi zoomed off, all four of us turned to look at the house. It was of gray stone, with a red tile roof that flared upward into a variety of small turrets and spires. The entrance of the house was flanked on one side by a tall square tower attached to the house, with diagonally slanted white-framed windows. The upper floors had narrow arched windows. The side of the house that faced the courtyard, comprised of a circular paved drive around a small fountain, looked very familiar. Or rather, the stone projections like miniature buttresses sprouting off the side of the wall looked familiar. I looked up at them, noting the runes that had been carved with rough cuts into the stone. “For some reason, those give me a bad case of the willies,” I told the others as a little shiver rippled down my arms and back.
The Vikings glanced at the runed arches, but said nothing, just waited with obvious anticipation for me to give them the okay to storm the castle.
I gave them all a quelling glance and raised the huge cast iron knocker in the shape of a man hanging upside down by his feet, his hands tied behind his back. I was extremely grateful for the double layer of my gloves as I banged the knocker against the metal backing. The noise seemed as loud as a gunshot, making me jump and my heart race with unreasonable nervousness.