“I’m afraid that’s what they want,” she whispered.
“They’re not going to get what they want, Mase.” His expression turned fearsome. “They’re going to get what they deserve.” And then he pulled her close against his chest again.
Mason stood there, her shoulders quivering with emotion and let him hold her. She could feel him pressing his face against the crown of her head as his hands kneaded the muscles of her back.
“God,” he whispered, “you smell . . .”
“Sweaty?” Mason choked out a muffled laugh. “Horrible? In need of a half-hour shower?”
“Delicious.” Fenn’s voice was a husky rasp. “Um. Edible.”
Mason pushed away from his chest and looked up into his face with wary amusement. “Oh . . . kay?” she said. “Fenn, are you all right?”
He nodded sharply and stepped back, pushing her all the way to arm’s length. His nostrils were flared and his pupils were so dilated his eyes were almost black. “Yeah,” he said. “I have to—”
“Safety valve,” Mason said, holding up her hands. “I get it. Let’s put a leash on that puppy.”
Fenn raised an eyebrow at her. “Not funny.”
She shrugged. “Kind of funny.”
“Right.” He reached down to the knife sheath strapped to his leg and, pulling the long-bladed dagger free, handed it over to her again. “Here. Take this.”
Mason wrapped her fingers around the hilt of the weapon with a sigh. Was it a bad sign, she wondered, that the sensation of being armed and dangerous was becoming so familiar to her that it was almost blasé?
That’s life as a Valkyrie, kiddo. Get used to it.
“I’m not going to stab you, Fennrys,” she said.
“Not unless you absolutely have to, I hope,” he said with a feral grin.
“Seriously—”
“Seriously?” he interrupted her, his expression turning stern. “Don’t think about it if it happens. Just do what you have to do. You’re the only one strong enough to stop me if I lose control, Mase.”
“You mean me, the Valkyrie, is the only one,” she muttered.
“Well, yeah. That’s why I brought you along.”
“What about Rafe? Or Toby?”
He shook his head. “You’re stronger than Toby. Even he knows that. And Rafe . . . is afraid of me.”
“He said that?”
“No. Not out loud, but I can smell it on him.” His nostrils flared slightly, as if Rafe stood there in the chamber with them. “Fear really does have a particular scent. Even on a god. Who knew?”
“But he is a god. Why is he scared of you?” Mason frowned.
Fenn shot her a look from under his brows. “I don’t know, Mase. Why do you think?”
She didn’t have an answer to that. Or, at least, she didn’t want to.
Fennrys slipped the medallion off over his head and handed it to Mason. She put it in the pocket of her jeans and stepped back. She was scared down to her boots and horribly excited all at the same time.
“Are you . . . can you do what he does?” She made a snout-shaped gesture in front of her face. “When Rafe changes? The whole man-wolf thing?”
Fenn grinned slightly and shook his head. “I don’t think so. I don’t have that kind of control. I think it’s either me . . . or the wolf. I don’t think there’s an in-between. Not yet, at least.”
Fenn took a deep breath. The air in the cavern grew hot and, where it touched his skin, seemed to shimmer like a heat wave. In the blink of an eye, the man was gone. And the fearsome golden wolf had taken his place. Mason held her breath and swallowed the lump of fear that knotted in her throat. She hadn’t really had much of an opportunity to really look at him back in the Weather Room. He was beautiful and awe-inspiring.
And terrifying.
In the torch light, the thick fur that covered his sleek, muscular frame shone like molten gold. The eyes that stared out at her from above the finely sculpted muzzle were the same pale blue, but the deep black at the center of those irises was fathomless.
Mason stood frozen, mesmerized by his stare.
There was a raw intelligence in the depths of his gaze, and a familiarity, but she also knew better than to think that Fennrys the man was in control of Fennrys the wolf. She held herself utterly still as he lifted his nose and sniffed at the air. A low, sonorous growling shuddered through the cavern and suddenly, the great beast leaped, snarling and snapping his jaws.
Mason gasped and, in a moment of panic, threw herself flat to the ground, covering her head, instead of transforming herself into a Valkyrie. She expected to feel teeth on her neck, but the Fennrys Wolf hadn’t been attacking her. Rather, he’d vaulted her prone form, to position himself between Mason . . . and the unexpected majestic presence that was suddenly sharing the cavern with them. Mason pushed herself up onto one elbow and shoved the hair out of her eyes. There was an archway of deeper darkness framing him—another catacomb tunnel that Mason hadn’t even noticed. It looked as if it led steeply down, and she thought she could hear far-distant moans, like a mournful wind or a chorus of tortured voices, drifting upward toward them.
The Wolf was snarling and barking, hackles raised, and as she watched he seemed to grow in stature. Even more than Rafe, when the god was in his Anubis wolf-guise, Fennrys conveyed such raw, savage power. It was frightening and awe-inspiring at the same time. The man now standing in front of him saw it. And it brought a deeply satisfied smile to his face.
“There you are,” Loki murmured. “Poor pup . . .”
Mason felt an ice-shock moment of horror at those words.
“Oh no,” she whispered. “No . . . Loki . . .”
The god stepped forward, shedding the shadows that cloaked him in the darkness where he seemed so comfortable and the light in his crystal-blue eyes shone so bright. Tugging the embroidered sleeve of his magnificent tunic straight with one bejeweled hand, the elegant god strode toward where Fennrys crouched on the cold stone floor.
His beard was neatly trimmed and his hair flowed back from his forehead in a shining, dark gold wave. His clothing was rich and spotless, accented with gold and silver and precious stones. Loki looked remarkably well. Especially considering the last time Mason had seen him, he’d had half of his handsome face destroyed—melted down to the bones of his skull—by the venom of a serpent set to torment him for all eternity.
Loki knelt before the great wolf and stared into the beast’s blue eyes, and there was no way in the world that Mason could deny the truth any longer. In spite of everything Fennrys had just told her, Mason had still held out hope that it was all an elaborate setup and that Fennrys wasn’t Fenris.
She had believed that deep in the core of her heart.
How could he be the thing he’d been named after? It didn’t make sense.
It doesn’t have to. Nothing about any of this does.
Norse legends looped and knotted around one another in the same way that Norse art did. It was impossible to tell where one design ended and the next began. With sudden clarity, Mason realized that Fennrys hadn’t been named after the legendary apocalypse harbinger of Norse mythology. In the twisted way of those tales, which had or hadn’t yet come to pass and who the hell even knew, Fennrys was that harbinger. He was the Fenris Wolf.
Because I made him so.
“Well . . . I might’ve had a hand in it, too,” said Loki, the God of Lies, turning toward her with a wide smile, seemingly having read her thoughts.
Mason felt her mouth go dry with fear as Loki knelt down in front of the great wolf, who whined piteously and crouched, his tail curling under as he backed away from the trickster god of the Aesir.
“Poor pup . . . my poor boy,” the god said in soothing tones. “There you are, now. There . . .”
“Poor pup” was how Loki had described his missing monstrous offspring—the Fenris Wolf, the mythic beast that Mason had always thought Fenn had been named after—when he’d told her about him in Helheim.
Mason thought she might actually be ill. Or faint again. All the blood was rushing from her head and she could feel herself starting to sway. This . . . this was all her fault. All of it. She’d run her sword through the eye of the serpent tormenting Loki. The pain of the venom had been the only thing keeping the dangerous, chaos-loving god from directing his energies toward freeing himself. And she’d been so blinded by her feelings for Fennrys that she hadn’t even stopped to consider what transforming him into a werewolf—a wolf, for the love of god, she knew that was what would happen if Rafe turned him—would do to him. Or to the world. The world that was prophesied to end with the unleashing of the Fenris Wolf, the harbinger of Ragnarok . . .
“The Great Devourer.”
Mason’s heart was shocked back to beating with those words from Loki’s mouth. It beat with a heavy, dull throb that made her chest ache. She had heard that title before. And she had made a promise that, when the time came, and she faced the Devourer, she would do her best to make an end of him. Two promises. Two grave mistakes. She wondered if she’d live long enough to make a third.
Loki reached out one elegant hand, long-fingered and glittering with rings, toward the wolf, and the beast shrank from him.
“Ah,” Loki murmured, “apologies, my son . . .”
Mason watched as he twisted the thick bands of gleaming metal and precious stones off his fingers and handed them over to her.
“Silver,” he said. “Anathema to werewolves.”
“I thought that was a myth,” Mason murmured. Then she realized how ridiculous that must sound, since she was standing in a cave under her high school with two of the biggest myths there were.
Loki just smiled and dropped the rings into her hand with a wink, saying, “Not to the wolf, it isn’t.”
Then he turned back to Fennrys and began running his hands over the great golden animal’s head, staring him in the face and murmuring words in a low voice and a harshly musical language that Mason couldn’t understand. But the wolf cocked his head and seemed almost as if he could. Mason let them commune in private for a few moments.
“Ah, my son . . . ,” Loki murmured, his voice almost reverential. Triumphant. Full of grim satisfaction. “You are magnificent.” He grinned back at Mason, who stood frozen. “I’ll have to send a thank-you note to the Fair Folk for rearing him up right,” he said, the lilt of mocking laughter touching his words for a moment.
“How . . .” Mason’s voice stuck in her throat. She swallowed hard and tried again. “How did you get free?” she asked.
“How did you?” he countered. “A trip to Hel’s realm doesn’t usually come with a two-way ticket.”
“I think I was set up,” Mason said. “I was allowed to escape.”
“Heimdall. Yes . . . It’s what he does best.” Loki’s grin never faltered, even as he spoke of the god who was destined to bring about his death. Maybe because he was destined to bring about Heimdall’s. “The fact that the pompous old horn blower didn’t even have to coerce you into stabbing the serpent that tormented me was either a stroke of genius or pure luck on his part. But the end result was the same. I was able to regroup and gather my power. And, as you say, escape.”
Mason felt the bottom drop out of her stomach.
Loki winked one blue eye at her and, when the golden wolf whined, turned his attention back to him. “I’ve been wanting to meet you for a good long time, Fennrys,” he said. “But this is not the way. Let’s see the man you’ve grown into now, eh?” He glanced at Mason. “You have his medallion. The one you were wearing when you so delightfully visited me in my Asgardian . . . accommodations.” His eyes wandered over her, unfocused, for a moment. “It’s in your . . . left front pocket, I think.”
Her hand twitched toward it before she could stop herself, and he grinned.
“I can feel the magick. May I have it?”
When Mason hesitated, Loki’s expression twitched with a slight, subtle annoyance. Beneath his hand, the Fennrys Wolf whined.
“Mason. Please.” Loki held out his other hand. “I only want to help him. The power in that medallion can be used by Fennrys to help control the beast. I know you’ve used it yourself to help facilitate that, but it’s not been completely successful. I can help him cage the Wolf whenever he wants. For as long as he wants. I think that’s something we’d all like to see happen, yes?”
She shifted on her feet, uncertain. Maybe Loki really could help him.
“Please,” the god said again.
Mason nodded, once, and fished in her pocket for the gray iron disc, inscribed with its twisted, tortuous designs. She felt the tingle of energy that raced across the surface of the metal as she handed over the talisman, placing it in Loki’s smooth upturned palm.
“Thank you.” The god inclined his head graciously. “Now. I’d like to be alone with my son for a few moments, if you don’t mind.”
XV
There was a god in the catacombs. He was alone with Fennrys. And, according to every version of Norse prophecy Mason had ever read or heard, he was responsible for Ragnarok.
And you thought it was a good idea to leave him there.
What I think is hardly material to the situation.
Loki had made it perfectly clear that he was in control of said situation and nothing a seventeen-year-old high school student—fencing champ or no fencing champ—said was going to have any sort of impact on that whatsoever. Also? If she was really going to be honest with herself, she still kind of trusted Loki.
He could have just taken the Janus medallion from her, but he’d said “please.” Twice. And “thank you.” That was more than she could say for any of the other major players on the whole insane chessboard. And she still wasn’t convinced that he was evil. But she also didn’t really want to head back up to the dining hall where the others waited, just so she could tell Toby and Rafe that she’d left Fenn alone for a little father-son time with Loki, his dad.
Mason stood outside the ruined gymnasium and felt utterly powerless.
Her gaze drifted toward the dormitory wing and she saw that, behind a drawn curtain, Cal’s third-floor room had a light on. She knew he’d taken Heather there and her thoughts turned to how the other girl really was powerless. Alone among all of them, Heather was the one who had made it that far with no magick, no blood curse, no elixirs or transformative powers or parental demigods. And she’d been brave enough to give up the protective runegold to save her friends. Mason wondered if there was something she could do for her in return.
And then she had an idea.
She ran across the rain-drenched quad and in through the closest door to the dorms. There was a staircase right inside the door and Mason took the steps two at a time, then ran down the hall to the third-floor dorm room that belonged to her brother Rory as fast as her feet could carry her. The empty corridor echoed hollowly, but she could sense that there were still one or two scattered students in some of the rooms. It didn’t matter. She didn’t have time to stop and gather up lost lambs. Toby and Carrie could take care of that.
Of course, once she got to Rory’s door, she realized that the first challenge she faced was actually just getting into the damn room. To be honest, Mason couldn’t remember with any certainty the last time she’d even had her own room key. And she was certain that Rory would never have left his door unlocked. She was right. The heavy antique door was shut tight, secured with both knob lock and deadbolt.
“Great . . .”
A surge of frustration filled her head for a moment with that increasingly familiar red rage. Mason backed off a few steps and then, before she’d even consciously thought about what she was doing, she took a run, and kicked the solid oak slab off its brass hinges. She heard herself yelp in astonishment and hopped around gingerly, expecting that her foot would be broken—or at the very least spectacularly sprained—but when she put her full weight on it, it felt surprisingly good. She felt surprisingly good. Mason grinned and flexed her hands into fists,
reining in the urge to randomly punch holes in the plaster—just because she could—and instead, searched around for the thing she’d come to find.
The thing she knew Rory would have hidden somewhere.
His desk was a mess, littered with glossy men’s lifestyle magazines and expensive gadgetry and empty beer cans. His phone was sitting there and, without thinking, Mason picked it up and shoved it into her pocket. Like her keys, she had no idea where her own phone had gotten to over the last few days. Chances were that it was sitting on the bottom of the East River, a shiny useless trinket for a Nereid to play with. Rory’s laptop was there too, half hidden under a draft of an unfinished English paper for the very same class she’d told Toby about in the carriage on the way to Gosforth. The assignment was technically due in less than a week. Mason picked up the sheaf of paper, fanning through the pages. At a glance, it seemed Rory was defending Iago as the misunderstood hero of Othello. She shook her head.
You would think that, wouldn’t you, Rory?
She tossed the pages back on his desk and tried to remember, fleetingly, what her own thesis had been. At the time, it had seemed so important. Now . . . she couldn’t even remember when she’d started writing it.
This? she thought. This is how my life has changed.
A storm. Monsters in a storm. A naked hot guy in a storm . . . that was how it had all started. And while it had seemed a little bizarre at the time, it paled in comparison to what had happened since. Mason Starling had been to hell and back. Literally.
Also? That night wasn’t when all this started. It all started before I was even born.
She searched through Rory’s desk drawers and found a huge wad of cash rolled up and circled with a rubber band, three bottles of brandy from Gunnar’s private reserve (one of them empty), and a pair of leather driving gloves that still had the store security tag attached. Mason rolled her eyes and shoved them back where she’d found them. On the shelf above his desk there were books. Textbooks for class, a couple of paperbacks, a box set of The Lord of the Rings DVDs, and a book with no title, just an embossed leather spine decorated with the intertwined branches of a tree. Mason plucked that one off the shelf and opened the front cover. The book was a fake with a hollowed-out core and it contained two things. The first was a folded sheaf of photocopied pages. The second was a golden acorn.