Dead Stars - Part Two (The Emaneska Series) (49 page)

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L
oki was deep in the frozen copse.

Nobody had seen him leave. Not a soul. All far too busy with their drinking, or their shivering. The cold had come with the night, settling in like the cruel smile of a returning king. Loki felt it, but snubbed it. What was cold to a shadow? What was cold to a god?

Piebald ravens croaked in the frozen branches above. Little showers of powdered ice drifted down from where they hopped and scraped.

Other things lingered in the forest too. Loki could feel their presence now they were so close, and he to them. They were well masked, but he caught glimpses of their horns, their eyes, their teeth, their tendrils and hulking fists. Dark things, hiding in the snowy shadows. Old things. Lost things. Unspeakable things.

Loki found a glade made of ice, with stark trees like pillars, strewn with dead pine cones. The ravens held court above, peering down at this bold newcomer, this unwelcome visitor to their dark places.
He should have stayed with the lights!
They crowed in their own rasping tongues.
He would have been safe there! No longer!

Loki could feel them before they appeared. He held his hands out by his side, empty and as white as the snow. He closed his eyes, and soon enough he felt the hot stink of the creatures creeping into the glade, drifting like smoke on a stolen breeze.

He barely flinched when the hot claws encircled his neck. Breath like grave-dirt rattled through fangs, mere inches from his nose. Loki opened his eyes and flashed a smile.

‘Little god,’ said Hokus, baring all his teeth in reply, many eyes winking in sequence. ‘You are brave indeed.’

‘Foolish, if you ask me, brother,’ sniggered the darkness behind his wings.

Loki fearlessly pushed the claws aside, his hands stinging at the contact. ‘Both, by my reckoning. And great things have been made on the backs of either,’ he said, in a low voice.

Eyrum took in a deep breath of cold air through his nostrils. His chest swelled like a fermenting barrel. ‘Who knows? In one of the sleds, I believe,’ he said.

Farden squinted into the darkness between the sleds and beyond. A faint fog seemed to have risen from the ice, somehow. Night was truly falling now. Nothing could save it. ‘It serves to keep an eye on that one,’ he muttered. ‘I’ve got a bad feeling about him.’

‘And what of Heimdall? Do you treat all gods with mistrust or is it just Loki?’

‘Heimdall is fine. Although he has disappeared as well.’

‘I heard he is with your uncle. It seems the magick is having an adverse effect on him.’

Farden raised an eyebrow. ‘How can that be?’

‘Explain yourself, godling. Shadow-creature. Why have you called upon us?’ challenged Valefor. ‘You, of all creatures? The other two I expected, but not a godling. One of the stars.’

‘Because of
her
,’ Loki said, pointing into the gathering darkness behind the daemon. If he was afraid, he didn’t show it. He stared back at his sworn enemy with a cold, calculating stare, sneeringly confident.

The daemons looked around, as if they had been interrupted during an innocent stroll through an abandoned glade. ‘Who?’ they asked in tandem.

Loki folded his hands behind his back. ‘Let’s not play dumb, shall we? You wouldn’t dare get so close with all of…
this
,’ he said, gesturing to the things in the shadows. The edges of the glade creaked. The frozen pines had nothing to do with it. ‘Without her efforts, the mages would be setting fire to it this very moment. Heimdall may be clouded by the magick, but it’s not yet that strong. These woods reek of ancient malice. She must be smothering it.’

Hokus was now circling him. Valefor simply prodded him in the chest. ‘Let us assume you are right, for now. So, godling. You called us. We are here. Why?’

‘If you dare feed us lies, we will feed you,’ Hokus said to the darkness, and it growled with a score of voices, if they could truly be called voices. The ravens squawked hungrily.

‘Something tells me this shadow doesn’t want to go back to the sky. Not yet,’ Valefor chuckled.

Loki took a breath.

Farden exhaled and watched his breath rise into the diamond-speckled sky. ‘So we’re blind? He sees and hears nothing, due to the magick? Sometimes I wonder why these gods fell from the sky at all.’

‘Because their fates hang on the next few days as much as ours does. You are here. So are they. It is the way of it.’

Farden shrugged at the big Siren’s wisdom, irrefutable as always. Immovable as the man himself. He stared out at the moonless night, peering into the cobalt-slate of the ice fields. Only a few shadows dominated the night, picked out by the eager stars, the dull reflection of the rocky mountains in the distance, and the silent pine copse barely a mile away. Farden stared at the latter and blew a smoke ring to frame it. ‘It’s too quiet tonight.’

‘What did you expect, on the ice fields?’

‘Something, at least. In the deserts, there was always something hidden somewhere. Skulking under the sand. Ensconced in a gap in the rocks. Skittering through the shadows just beyond the campfire,’ Farden mused. He nibbled the end of his pipe. ‘Sometimes I wish I had a dragon’s eyes.’

Eyrum grunted.

The pines swayed like sick spears above them, reaching for the stars. Valefor tried his hardest not to look up at them. He could feel their stares already. No need to meet them when he didn’t need to. He looked instead to Hokus, and found his comrade staring right back at him, wearing something of the same expression. It took a lot to surprise a daemon, and this was the third time they had been surprised in as many weeks. The daemon counted them silently.

First, the godblood armour on the girl’s father.

Second, the call of the godling.

Third, the godling’s demand itself.

Steam and smoke bubbled from Valefor’s mouth as he exhaled. Even the edges of the glade seemed a little nervous suddenly.
Curse their ears, those that had them
. ‘Let us get this straight.’

‘Be my guest.’

‘You want us, or rather, our esteemed companion,’ at this point, none other than the esteemed companion herself, Samara, strolled from the shadows to get a better look at the audacious demand-maker, ‘to bring
your
body down from the stars…’

‘Where it should stay with the other corpses,’ Hokus spat an interruption.

‘…along with ours.’

Loki clicked his fingers. ‘That’s exactly right.’

Farden grimaced. He felt the unease in his gut. Every moment that he stared at the pine copse, a two-headed monster of suspicion and curiosity grew a little bigger in his mind. He kept his eyes on it, as though it might sneak off if he turned around, as he apologised.

‘Sorry,’ he said, quickly. ‘I didn’t mean to dredge up that conversation.’

Eyrum looked at the sky. ‘They’re somewhere. I can feel it. Towerdawn is a good Old Dragon. He would not have wasted their lives for any small reason. That, and he has the fastest of all Nelska with him. I highly doubt any of Saker’s could nip at their tails. That
fjtchol
,’ Eyrum muttered something better left untranslated. Farden didn’t ask.

‘I believe you. A lot has to be said for feelings,’ he replied. His pipe had gone out. He tucked it in his pocket instead of finishing it. Eyrum was still puffing on his stubborn Siren tobacco.

‘Whilst we are on the path of awkward subjects…’

Farden sighed. ‘Oh, not you as well. I’ve already had this from Roiks, Inwick, Lerel… I’m dealing with it. You lot don’t understand what I’ve set myself up for. It’s…’

Eyrum put a big heavy hand on his shoulder and squashed the fire out of him. ‘I know you can do it,’ he said.

‘I…’ Farden paused. He hadn’t expected that, but it was welcome all the same. ‘I hope so.’

Eyrum sniffed, following the mage’s gaze to the distant copse. ‘What exactly is your interest in those trees, mage?’

Farden didn’t know, but for some reason he started walking towards them. ‘I have no idea, but it’s bothering me. Too quiet. Too close,’ he said.

‘Well, isn’t that something,’ said Hokus. The daemons narrowed their eyes, silent. Samara spoke for them. She strode out of the inky darkness, bold as ever, and looked the god up and down. He was a small man. Shabby, by his coat and wind-strewn blonde hair. Tallish too, but he was a grown-up, and they always were. Intimidating? Hardly. She marched up to him and brought her face to his chin.