Soul Fire (Darkling Mage 8)

I followed Herald’s finger to where he pointed, then groaned. There, resplendent in a massive suit of gleaming armor, was Odin, no longer a truck driver, but leader of Asgard, the patriarch of the glorious Aesir, the true All-Father. In his hand was his sacred spear, Gungnir, taller than a man, sharper than anything.

He took two steps towards me, and the earth trembled as his greaves struck stone. I leapt to my feet, puffed up my chest, and slowly inhaled a massive breath. Look him in the eye, I thought. Be brave.

“This one put up quite a fight,” Odin said, nodding at Herald. “Best you discern that he isn’t descended from frost giants. I’ll have to wait for so many of my men to thaw out.”

“Very funny,” Herald snarled.

Odin turned to the rest of us, glowering. “So. The humans come to collect their own.”

“It’s what we do,” I said. “We stick together, because we’re all we have. Why did you take him?”

“Pride and purpose, little fool,” Odin said, his shadow growing longer across the wall. “You simpering mortals need to learn your place, thinking you can just stomp into the domain of gods – of the All-Father himself – to make demands. I should cut out your tongue. Do you remember, once, when you called upon me to beg for my aid against the Eldest? Your request was foolish and brazen, and now – ”

“Now they’ve sent their strongest servant to deal with us. No, servants. Thirteen manifestations of one of history’s most powerful witches is roaming the earth, doing who knows what. Tiamat herself refused to help, along with all the other Great Beasts.”

Odin bared his teeth and bellowed, his beard trembling. “Fenrir, Jormungand? Fafnir? You consorted with Loki, and now you’ve communed with the Great Beasts? The heralds of the apocalypse themselves?”

“Then will you listen now? Even those who were fated to end the world won’t lend us their aid. What about you, All-Father? You said so yourself. You told me never to call on you again, unless the world was ending. Well, that’s what’s happening now. Agatha Black is loose, and in no time she’s going to shatter the walls between this world and the next. The Old Ones will come, and they will consume us all.”

I’d never seen so much anger contained in one man, so much rage etched into the wrinkles on Odin’s face. “Let them come,” he growled. “The All-Father will destroy them all. If Ragnarok is upon us, then so be it.”

“This is worse than Ragnarok,” I said. “This is the end of all things. Of all of us.”

Odin cast me one final, furious glare, then turned away. “Take your betrothed, little mortal, and leave this place. Keep your hound, too. I never wish to hear your panicked bleating ever again. The next word you speak against the All-Father shall be your last. Leave.”

My body lurched forward in protest, but Herald grabbed me, gripping me by the arm. Herald didn’t need to say anything. It was time to shut up, to turn and go.

With his back turned to our party, Odin lifted one gauntleted hand, then slammed the butt of his spear into the ground. A flash of light sparked from Gungnir’s point, triggering a strange reaction in the world around us. The darkness wavered, then receded with a quiet hiss, the sound of sand slipping down an hourglass.

I gripped Herald’s wrist tight. As the shadows parted, I didn’t want to believe the convenience of where we’d ended up: back in the Boneyard, of all places. We were on the stone platform the guys and I used to practice our abilities, our makeshift magic dojo.

Mason looked around himself, marking each of us off on his fingers. “Is everyone present and accounted for?”

“Think so,” Asher said. “We should go find Carver. Tell him we’re safe.”

“Well, now this has to be a trick,” I said. “Are we sure this isn’t an illusion?”

Herald groaned. “I barely care anymore. I need a coffee, and a hot shower, and a change of clothes.” He gestured at himself. “Look at the state of me. I’m like a really bad stripper. Like, with no budget for a decent costume, even.”

I shrugged. “It’s kind of hot.”

Herald gla

red at me. I was glad – and lucky, let’s be honest – that he was fully out of magic.

But before anything else, we headed to the break room slash living area, to announce our presence, but also to check on that massive breach that Banjo – nope, sorry, that Odin had created. I wasn’t about to blame that on Banjo, even though he did sort of bork a hole in reality all on his own. I was sure Carver was mad about having to renovate his domicile, but in a way, I could imagine him being proud of his little obliterator.

We found Carver there, twin discs of amber fire rotating from his palms as he waved his hands across the Boneyard’s abyss. It was strange seeing the breach. The hole wasn’t exactly closed up in the conventional sense. It only looked as if a sheer veil had been thrown over the gap into the outside world, so that the street looked a little murkier from where we stood. Prudence was helping out, contributing her own stream of blue magic to the cause.

I sidled up to Gil, who was watching from the back of the kitchen. He scratched the back of his head. “We woke up late,” he mumbled. “Sorry we didn’t get to join you.”

“No harm done,” I said, clapping him on the back.

Sterling sidled up to me from somewhere in the dark, draping an arm across my shoulders. “Technically speaking, I shouldn’t even be awake. Bloodsucker and all.”

I chuckled and untangled myself from him. “I said it was cool. Don’t worry about it.”

Within minutes any of our mage friends who still had reserves of arcane power left were helping Carver, rebuilding the walls of our home with prismatic rays of magic. I was content to watch for a little while, then remembered that I had to march Herald straight to a shower, and probably let him take my bed for the next few hours. Poor guy needed some rest. I turned to tell him so, only to find that he was across the room, snoozing on the couch. I hadn’t noticed him drifting away for a nap.