“Is that what you’re doing? Running?”
“I suppose I’m running from one fight to take part in another. Characterize it however you wish. Look, just pack all your crap into a U-Haul tonight and get out of the state. Stash everything in a storage facility and then take your time finding someplace else to settle down.”
“You’ve done this sort of thing before, I take it.”
“Absolutely. Works great. But if you don’t like that idea, how about rebuilding your coven? Go back to Poland, pick up some new recruits, take the long view here instead of focusing on short-term losses. That’s how you survive.”
“That … sounds like a very good idea. I don’t know if we can get out of here quickly enough, though. We have significant assets tied up here.”
“Hand them over to Magnusson and Hauk. Let them liquidate everything and put the proceeds in an offshore account for you. They can also get you new IDs if you need them, and I’d suggest it since the Hammers of God have probably done their homework.”
“You advise me well.”
“Aw, shucks.”
Malina beamed at me for a sunlit time, and then her smile faded as she processed that this leave-taking would probably be our last for a long while. “Will our paths ever cross again?” she asked.
“Perhaps, but not for at least a decade. I’m going to fall off the map if I survive what’s coming.”
“But you won’t share with me what’s coming.”
“No. Safer if you don’t know. Safest to just get out of this place and begin again.”
She nodded her understanding and said, “Well, our short acquaintance has been most instructive. On the one hand you’re responsible for wiping out half my coven, and on the other you’re largely responsible for preserving the lives of those who remain. You were forced into defending yourself in the first case, but you had no obligation to help us in the second. I must conclude that Druids are dangerous but fairly amenable acquaintances, though my sample size is admittedly very small.” She smiled. “Whatever you’re about to undertake, I hope you’ll survive and manage to find us in the future. If we know you’re coming, Berta will bake you a cake.”
“Thank you. Is there anyplace in particular I should look for you? I’d like to learn how to speak with a proper Polish accent.”
She slung a smirk at me and said, “It’s safer if you don’t know.”
Chapter 8
Since this was to be the last night I spent in Arizona, I was hoping that I’d be able to get a full night’s rest. It’s funny how vampires don’t respect that, since they always expect you to let them sleep all day.
After spending the afternoon reviewing tea recipes with Rebecca Dane one last time and hooking her up with herb vendors for resupply, I spent an hour at my kitchen table drawing a map of Asgard based on my observations and Ratatosk’s intelligence. Then I went for a run with Oberon in the early twilight of late autumn and returned after sundown to a well-dressed vampire waiting on my front porch. He had an impeccably tailored werewolf sitting next to him.
Normally the two don’t mix, but Leif Helgarson and Gunnar Magnusson had several common bonds: They were both lawyers, they were both originally from Iceland, and they both hated Thor. They got along just fine, but I didn’t think they were bosom buddies. They’d driven to my house separately—probably because each was too dominant to let anyone else drive. Leif’s black Jaguar XK convertible sat in front of Gunnar’s silver BMW Z4 convertible. Most of the Tempe Pack drove those, but I’d never asked them why they chose such tiny cars.
Oberon said as we stopped jogging in front of my lawn. In the dim glow of the streetlights, Leif and Gunnar rose to meet us, shoving their hands in their pockets to reveal their competing vests—or waistcoats, as they probably thought of them. Leif’s was a Victorian burgundy number with matte black satin lining and eight black buttons in two columns of four. He’d gone all the way and had a gold chain wrapped around them leading to a pocket watch; he was even wearing one of those old-fashioned black string ties. Except for the straight pale corn-silk hair and the lack of mustache, he looked like he’d stepped out of the pages of a steampunk novel—and what’s more, he didn’t look the least bit scorched from his encounter with hellfire.
Gunnar’s suit was likewise old-fashioned, but it was gray and silver. His waistcoat was a decadently patterned silver paisley on a cool gray material, lined in gunmetal satin. His tie was the more modern sort, black with a silver paisley design, and he, too, had a gold pocket watch. His hair was a darker blond, much more of a tawny lion’s mane, and he’d slicked it back around the sides and let it curl on top. He had thick muttonchops that stopped short of his chin and arced over his upper lip. The choice of colors for his wardrobe seemed odd for a werewolf, until I realized that it was a status thing, like everything else with members of the Pack. As alpha he couldn’t show fear of silver, so of course he drove a silver car and wore silver clothes whenever he could. Now that I thought about it, I’d never seen Hal wear silver. He drove a metallic blue car, but that was it. If he wound up being alpha he’d have to get a whole new wardrobe.
Oberon observed.
“Good evening, Atticus,” Leif said in his stilted speech.
“Atticus,” Gunnar acknowledged me with a gruff nod. There was some tension between us and always had been, though none of it came from me. I liked Gunnar just fine. His problem was that he didn’t know if he could take me in a fight, and neither did his wolves. Since I was also a shape-shifter and centuries older than he was, they might follow me as an alpha if circumstances were right. Gunnar wanted to make sure those circumstances never occurred. He had declared me a Friend of the Pack years ago and then done everything he could to avoid me so that his wolves would have few occasions to compare us side by side. We’d always been cordial to each other, but some of that cordiality had chilled after he lost two pack members in the Superstition Mountains while trying to rescue Hal, who’d been drawn into the fight only because of me.
“Good evening, gentlemen,” I said, nodding to each of them in return. “I’m honored by your visit. May I invite you inside for a beer—and some blood?” I gave Leif a goblet full of my blood every so often, and now I wondered if that had something to do with him surviving an attack he shouldn’t have survived.
They made noises of graciousness and gave Oberon a friendly scratch or two behind his ears, and then we all went inside.
I got a couple of bottles of Ommegang’s Three Philosophers ale out of the fridge for Gunnar and me, then I grabbed a goblet out of the cupboard and a steak knife out of the cutlery drawer and stabbed myself in the arm, allowing the blood to drip freely into the goblet. A small exertion of power shut down the pain.
“I’m told by others that you’ve recovered fully, Leif,” I remarked. “What’s your own assessment?”
“Snorri has practically glutted me on bags of donated blood,” he replied, referring to the werewolf doctor who worked in a Scottsdale hospital. “And while it has been nourishing, it has also been less than satisfying. There is never the heady aroma of fear or the succulent scent of desire when you feast on a blood bag. Plus, they were refrigerated,” he added with a shudder.
“This should be pleasant, then,” I said, watching the level of blood rise in the glass. “Though I’m afraid I can’t help you with the smells of fear or desire. Would you say that you’re as strong as ever, then?”
“Not precisely,” Leif said. “Your blood helps tremendously, however. There is something about it, as we have discussed in the past.”
“Yes, I’d be curious to know precisely what it is,” I said. The goblet was nearly full, so I bound my torn tissue and skin back together to cut off the flow. “You’re welcome to as much as I can afford, of course, in the coming days. I owe you at least that much, since you came to such harm on my accoun
t.”
I wiped a couple of stray drops off my arm with a washcloth and then handed him the goblet. He thanked me and said, “Helping me kill Thor will settle that account quite nicely.”
“The same goes for me,” Gunnar chimed in. Presumably he was referring to his dead pack members, but they had come to the Superstitions on their own. I’d never asked them to come. If their deaths were on anyone’s head, it was Gunnar’s, but I let the comment slide. If he’d consider his imaginary account settled by something I was already going to do anyway, there was no need to dispute him.
“A toast, then,” I said, raising my bottle. “Perhaps one of you should offer it, since you have stronger feelings on the matter than I do.” My feelings were that I’d already done more than enough damage on the Norse plane.
Leif and Gunnar spoke at once as though they’d rehearsed it in stereo: “To killing Thor!” I think one or both of them spit on me in the process, their vehemence was so strong.
“Hear, hear,” I said, attempting to sound hearty about it, and we all clinked our drinks and drank deeply. Leif looked visibly healthier almost immediately.
Oberon said.
Would you like a treat as a consolation prize?
I gave Oberon a treat from the pantry and said to my guests, “So. Have you come to play video games? Maybe kick it old school with a few rounds of Yahtzee?”
“In happier times, perhaps,” Leif said drily. “I rather hoped we could discuss details of our trip to Asgard.”
“By all means. Please, be seated.” I waved at my kitchen table and we all took seats. The map I’d drawn earlier was still there, lying faceup. I turned it over so that it wouldn’t distract them. I’d show it to them a bit later. “May I ask who else is coming besides Gunnar?”
Leif steepled his fingers together, elbows on the table, and peered at me from one side of them. “Of course. There are three additional parties joining us. They await only the location of our rendezvous and a meeting time.”
“I can give you GPS coordinates. Will that suffice?”
“Admirably.”
“Who are these three other parties?” Gunnar demanded. I think Leif had been about to say their names anyway, but he hadn’t spoken up quickly enough for the werewolf. If Leif was irritated, he disguised it well.
“Perun, a Slavic thunder god; Väinämöinen, a shamanic culture hero of the ancient Finns; and Zhang Guo Lao, one of China’s Eight Immortals.”
Oberon said. He situated himself on the floor by my feet and I caressed his neck.
Zhang Guo Lao, of course. He’s alive and Pai Mei is dead.
“That’s it?” the alpha asked. “Six of us against all of Asgard?” Gunnar was used to having more than six with him on even the most routine hunts.
“I don’t care about all of Asgard,” Leif explained. “I only care about Thor.” Leif had the opposite problem. He’d been fighting alone for so long and shredding everything that he probably thought the six of us would be overkill.
“All of Asgard is going to object,” I pointed out. “And they have resources we need to address.”
“Such as?” Leif asked. I explained to them what I’d seen while stealing the golden apple—Thor’s chariot, Gullinbursti, the ravens Hugin and Munin, and twelve pissed-off Valkyries, plus Odin and all the rest of the gods, not to mention the possibility of calling up the Einherjar, the fallen Vikings who dwell in Valhalla.
“The Einherjar fight every day, preparing for Ragnarok,” Gunnar mused. “They are slain and raised again each day on the Field of Vigrid. They have no fear of death, and their numbers must be huge. They’re the perfect army. My friends, we are good—but not that good.”
“We will not have to face the Einherjar right away,” I assured them. “It’s just a late-game possibility. The faster we are in attracting attention, the smaller the possibility that the Einherjar will be a problem.”
“How do you know this?” Leif said.
I turned over the map I had made earlier and showed it to them. “This is a map of the plane, which I know to be at least partially accurate,” I said. “We are going to emerge from the root of Yggdrasil. But see here? The Field of Vigrid—and Valhalla—are on the opposite side of the plane, according to my source.” Ratatosk had told me that and more during our trip up the root from Jötunheim.
“Who’s your source?” Gunnar asked.
“Well, he’s a … he was … a squirrel.”
“A squirrel!” the alpha spluttered. “You can’t trust a squirrel!”
Oberon said.
“Look, his information saved me a lot of trouble. He was very accurate about what I could independently verify. There’s no reason to believe the rest of it is wildly off-kilter. If we can get Thor to come out and engage us somewhere on the Plain of Idavoll—the closer to Yggdrasil, the better—the Einherjar will not be able to mobilize in time to make any difference. They don’t have flying horsies like the Valkyries. They’ll have to march the whole way, and it will take them days.”
“Yes, I see,” Leif said, “but how do we get Thor to come out? Won’t he simply sit behind the walls of Gladsheim, or Bilskirnir, and wait for us to come to him?”
“Nah. All we gotta do is ridicule his strength or say something about his mom. He’s a bully, right? Bullies don’t fight wisely.”
“Come now, Atticus,” Leif said. “How will he know we are even there, much less respond to a shouted taunt about his dubious parentage?”
“Oh, he’ll know all right,” I said. “I have a plan, though in its current form it doesn’t take into account the abilities of the other members of our party.”
“Let’s hear it,” Gunnar said, and Leif seconded the motion. I told them what I’d been cooking up, and they approved everything but the rubber suits and the climbing gear.
“We will not be needing those, trust me,” Leif said. “So when is this going to happen?”
“We leave tomorrow night.” Leif looked pleased at this news, but Gunnar seemed less than sanguine.
“Must it be so soon?” the werewolf asked.
“The Hammers of God plus an actual god are coming to slay me, so, yes, it must be. I’d rather be a slayer than the slain.”
Gunnar looked at Leif. “That moves up your timetable significantly.”
“Yes, but not impossibly,” the vampire replied. “Especially if the Druid helps.”
“What are you talking about?” This was the part where we were supposed to wish each other good night and meet back here tomorrow at the same bat time. They sounded like they needed me for something else.
Leif turned his ice-blue eyes on me and allowed a small smile to tug at the edges of his mouth. “Territory, naturally.”
“Ah, yes, Hal mentioned to me earlier that you control the entire state. Congratulations.”
Leif didn’t answer, and Gunnar took the opportunity to jump in. “Yes, well, word of his injuries has spread, and some vampires have come to investigate.”
“I’ve heard,” I said. “Why don’t you serve ’em up a cease-and-desist letter? You guys are good at that.”
“That is not how I respond to vampires in my territory,” Leif said without humor.
“How do you respond, then?”
“I destroy them.”
Oberon spoke up. , so that when he says macho stuff he can play it back on one of those personal recorders and give the moment its proper melodrama. Or at least he could give us a “Mwah-ha-ha-ha!”>
It’s difficult not to laugh when Oberon provides commentary like that, but I enjoy the challenge. It keeps me sharp. If I laughed or seemed the least bit amused, Leif would probably not take it well. And if he realized my dog was making fun of him, he’d be sure to take offense. So I carefully kept my expression neutral and said to Leif, “I see. And you’d like my help? As in, tonight?”
“Yes.”
That was precisely what I’d been afraid of. I sighed and said, “Leif, I need my sleep tonight, because I have a full day tomorrow and a long night after that getting us to Russia. I can’t afford to tax myself tonight if you want to make it to Asgard. Your territorial concerns will have to remain your concerns. I’m sorry.”
“There are sixty-three vampires from Memphis at the Arizona Cardinals game right now,” Leif said, tapping the table with his index finger. “I could use someone to watch my back.”
“How do you know they are there?”
Leif ignored this and answered with another question. “Can I count on you, Atticus?”
“Only to get some sleep. How do you know about the vampires?”
My persistence didn’t pay off. He ignored me again and turned to Gunnar to ask him to come. Whenever I asked Leif a question about vampire hoodoo that he wanted to keep secret, he always pretended not to hear. Several months ago I had used this to my advantage. I’d taken him to his first baseball game ever, on a mild June night with the roof open at Chase Field as the Diamondbacks hosted the Padres. I’d known Leif would be curious about the game and the behavior of people in such a crowd, but his questions never ended: If the team mascot was supposed to be a rattlesnake, why was there a bobcat named Baxter running around acting like an idiot? Did this mascot bait-and-switch indicate humanity’s primeval fear of fanged creatures? Why do ballplayers seem to have oral fixations on gum, tobacco, or sunflower seeds? And why do some ballplayers feel the need to fondle their groin between every pitch? Is that why they’re called ballplayers instead of athletes or competitors or contestants? It finally came to be too much, and I asked him a question I’d always wondered about.