“You must be Bjorn,” came a voice from behind him. He turned and saw a man standing there, dark of hair and eyes, watching him coldly, arms folded.
Bjorn did not answer, but an answer of sorts flashed across his mind. It was him. He did this. Bjorn felt a roar of fury bellow from his throat and the war-mind blew from him automatically, sending the image of darkness, of ravens, through his thoughts and blasting his enemy’s mind with it. The man did not stagger, though, like others he’d fought, did not even react. Bjorn came at him in fury, expecting him to hold his head and duck away like all his other foes always had—
But the man did none of those things. He stayed still, and just as Bjorn was about to strike him down with a mighty fist, the man reached calmly across and gripped Bjorn by the neck, interrupting his charge and slamming him to his back on the cold soil. Bjorn’s head hit the ground, the wind rushed out of him and he grunted. He lay there for a moment before realizing that the man had done this to him, this interloper, this killer, this—
“That’s enough,” the man said, still watching him coldly. “If you get up again, I will break your knees.”
Bjorn roared and started to stand, but before he had fully reached his feet the man was moving, and there was a searing pain in his knees. He sunk to the ground once more in exquisite agony, cheek hitting the packed tundra as a glob of saliva ran down his chin.
“Be a good lad and stay down,” the man said, and Bjorn looked up to see he’d shifted positions and was now standing between him and the burning village. “I have something to tell you, as you are the only survivor of this monstrosity.”
“What do ... you want?” Bjorn choked out, trying to ignore the pain in his legs, anguish as he moved one and felt the grind of bones where there had only been sweet, unnoticeable movement before.
“I don’t want anything,” the man said. “I’ve done all I intended to do here. I had hoped for a witness, though, but I failed to keep one alive over there, in spite of my best efforts,” the man swept an arm behind him to indicate the fires blazing behind him. “They made me a little too angry for that.”
“Wh ... Why?” Bjorn asked, feeling the agony from his legs as he rolled to his side, shifting, looking for a more comfortable position. He didn’t find it.
“Because you and your people were a mass of ticks, burrowing your way under the skin of this land,” the man said, staring down at him. “You took from their harvests what you would, took from their daughters everything you wanted, and left nothing behind but your blighted seed.” He leaned down, slightly but not enough to seem like he was by any stretch of the imagination on Bjorn’s level. “Your day is over in this land, do you hear me? Your time as a leech, sucking the blood of people whom you do no good for is at an end. Be on about your business elsewhere. Tell your friends, the ones like you, still playing at the illusion that you are gods, that if I catch them running this deception, I will reveal them for the weak, pathetic deceivers that they are, and if they do not move on ...” He looked back at the fires. “I think you get the idea.” The man stood.
“Who are you?” Bjorn croaked, looking back at the blaze, and saw it starting to consume the pile. He could see the smoke beginning to rise from the clothing of his father, his brother. “Who are you to do such a thing?”
“I am Sovereign,” the man said and stood stiffly, looking down at him without emotion. “That ... and this,” he gestured at the destruction behind him as his feet lifted off the ground, floating into the air as if a bird’s wings had lifted him up, “is all you need know. Harken to my words, Odin-son.” With that, the man called Sovereign flew into the air, straight up and out of sight.
Bjorn lay there on the dirt for a long time after that, the smell of smoke thick in the air around him, the pleasant chill turned bitter on his skin. He lay there until the next morning when his agony subsided and his bones had knit back together. When he got up and left, though, he took care to go a different path than the one he had trod the morning before.
Chapter 10
Sienna Nealon
Now
“Is this going to be a problem?” Foreman asked me after the conference room emptied. “You and your mother?”
I held a hand on my chin, trying to think it over. “I don’t know. My instinct says yes.”
Foreman studied me through smoky, inscrutable eyes. I’d heard the stereotype that politicians were supposed to be charmers; that they would tell you sweet things to your face and then say different things behind your back. I saw none of this as he leaned closer to me and started to speak. “Listen to me very carefully. The life of every single metahuman in the entire country is now in your hands. That includes my life,” he said, eyes narrowed, “that of my wife and my children. Our survival hinges on what you’re able to do. Your mother is a resource. She has more experience running down metahumans than anyone else you have available to help you.”