0765332108 (F) (21 page)

She parried the thought before it could cut too deep. Whatever Dainn’s true reason, he hadn’t turned the beast against Loki’s enemies. He’d used no elven magic on Loki’s behalf. What
had
he done against the allies, against
her
?

She desperately wanted to find out, to wrap them both in a circle of silence and finally learn the truth. But his eyes were still asking questions, dangerous ones … looking for proof, even the smallest sign, that his guess had been correct.

Had Loki sent the elf to test her again, as Konur had suggested he might? Or had Dainn simply seen her and
known,
as she would have known him in any guise, anywhere?

It didn’t matter. Stopping him was more important than her fragile hope of reconciliation, of finding some way to forgive him. She couldn’t afford the weakness of pity or compassion or hope. Not even for herself.

“I see you have no answer,” she said. “Go slinking back to your master, cur, and perhaps you may leave this place alive.”

Closing her eyes to shut out the sight of his face, Mist gathered her magic, infusing it with all Freya’s arrogance and contempt. She turned it about and pushed outward, slamming Dainn with the “anti-glamour.”

She heard him gasp, but when she opened her eyes she saw him braced against the magic like a deep-rooted tree holding fast in a savage storm. No one else in the room had been affected; none of the guests noticed the brutal attack.

But Dainn’s eyes told her what she needed to know.

“Where is Mist?” he asked, his voice little more than a rasp.

Playing her role to the hilt, Mist pursed her lips in displeasure at the elf’s continued defiance. “Why does it matter to you?” she asked scornfully. “Surely you know that she despises you even more than I do, and would gladly kill you just as swiftly.”

Dainn took an uneven step back. “Then she still lives,” he said.

Mist suppressed a frown of confusion. “Foolhardy Mist may be,” she said, “but you may assure Loki that my daughter is still under my protection.”

“Protection,” Dainn said, his upper lip curling in a way that made the back of her neck prickle. “But for how much longer, Lady? When will you finish it? Or has she become too strong?”

The words made no sense to Mist, and she could see that Dainn regretted speaking them. He backed away another few steps, and Konur eased into the gap, placing himself between her and Dainn.

“Leave the Lady in peace,
nidingr,
” Konur said, haughty disdain in every line of his body.

“By all means,” Loki said, coming up behind Dainn, “leave her in peace.” He rested his hand on Dainn’s shoulder, his fingers biting into the black wool of Dainn’s jacket. “She has her business to attend to, and we have ours.”

Dainn held Mist’s gaze for a long, stubborn moment, refusing to be moved by Loki’s hard grip. Konur stood directly in front of him and stared into his eyes. It seemed that something elvish passed between them—an unspoken message, a warning, a promise.

And then Dainn was turning to leave, wrenching himself free of Loki’s hold. He strode away, head down, as if he didn’t care where he was going.

Loki clucked his tongue. “I believe you have hurt his feelings, Lady Sow. Now I shall have to console him.”

He strolled after Dainn, clearly in no hurry. Mist clenched her fists behind her back, wondering how much he had overheard.

Why would Dainn ask if Mist is still alive?
she wondered. And why had he reacted with such hostility to the idea that Freya was protecting her daughter?

“What did he mean, Konur?” she murmured when he moved close enough to hear. “What did he expect Freya to finish? Why did he ask if I’d—if Mist had become too strong?”

“I don’t know,” Konur said, staring the way Dainn and Loki had gone.

But Dainn had warned her about Freya many times before. It almost sounded as if he’d expected Freya to
do
something to her.

Something that might even kill her.

Mist laughed aloud at her own paranoia, letting the sound rise above the drone of conversation. Now she had peoples’ attention again, and men and women were converging on her, relieving her of the need to dwell on yet another ugly thought.

“I’ll be all right now,” she said to Konur as a group of local politicians wended their purposeful way toward her. “The mayor’s circle of jerks is coming this way. I’ll see if I can learn anything about the protest from them.”

“Take care,” Konur said. “Most of the men are Loki’s, as is the mayor. Loki may have sent them to distract and expose you.”

The elf-lord was gone by the time the mayor’s hangers-on reached her. She was familiar with all their names, reputations, and recent activities, but had never met any of them in person. There wasn’t a single woman among them. Two of the men—one a state senator, the other a member of the mayor’s inner circle—were secretly in Freya’s camp.

None of them, of course, knew that they were involved in anything more than a mortal struggle for power and control of a single city. The waters of Midgardian politics as a whole had become increasingly treacherous and difficult to navigate—a fact Loki had taken full advantage of—and reactionary ideologies provided sufficient rationale for the most extreme beliefs and behavior on the part of men like the mayor.

Pretending that they were all on the best of terms, Mist managed to make “appropriate” conversation with the men, parrying suggestive comments with ribald remarks of her own. Most of them were thinking more with their private parts than with their minds. The verbal foreplay came more and more naturally to her, and she could only assume that her use of the glamour had made it easier to slip into Freya’s mind-set.

That
wasn’t something she was proud of. And in spite of her efforts, she couldn’t learn anything new about the protest.

“Ah,
here
she is,” a jovial male voice boomed as another man pushed his way in among the others. He was tall, a little portly, and on the fading edge of handsome, with a toothy grin and friendly manner.

But his eyes were hard, and Mist knew this man wasn’t one Freya could twist around her finger, glamour or no. Mayor Walker was an opportunist who wouldn’t be where he was today without Loki. He’d sacrificed both pride and independence for a shot at real power … at least until he had what he wanted.

That was how Loki controlled him. First the carrot and then the stick—allow this mortal to believe
he
was the one with all the bright ideas, and that the people of San Francisco were happy with the changes he’d brought to the city. Then the pointed reminders that without Loki, he’d quickly fall back into obscurity with the next election.

If there
was
one.

“Mayor Walker,” Mist said, casting him a half-lidded glance. “I didn’t know we’d have the pleasure of seeing you tonight.”

He made a show of looking around as the other men stepped back. “‘We’? I don’t see any of your usual companions. Or did you mean it in the royal sense?”

“I should never wish to tread on the hem of your cape, Your Honor.”

He took her hand and squeezed. It would have been painful if she’d been any less strong. Or prepared. “I hope we can maintain our truce a little longer, Ms. Ingrunn.”

Mist squeezed back. “Oh, I think that would be very wise, Mr. Mayor. We wouldn’t want to think that you make a habit of consummating your acts prematurely.”

Someone snickered. The mayor’s jaw bunched.

“I’d be more than happy to give you a private preview,” he said.

“Oh, no. Please leave me the pleasure of my imagination. It’s so disappointing when the final product doesn’t live up to the hype.”

Walker had enough self-control not to explode in front of the guests, a number of whom had gathered to listen in on the conversation. He was opening his mouth to answer when yet another man joined them … about twenty years older, with gray hair in a military crew cut, and a grim expression. He took the mayor by the arm and whispered in his ear.

“If you will excuse me, gentlemen,” Walker said, pointedly excluding Mist, “there is a matter that requires my attention.”

“Like that little protest in Civic Center Plaza?” Mist put in before he and the chief of police could walk away. “Are you certain you have enough law enforcement personnel and sufficient armaments to deal with a hundred men, women, and children carrying signs?”

The chief glared at her. “You’re fortunate, Ms. Ingrunn, that you have my people to protect your pretty behind from the lawless elements in this city.”

A few women in the vicinity gasped at his crudeness. Most of the other men had drifted away, obviously unwilling to confront the mayor or his cronies.

“Do you mean the young and poor being driven ever deeper into poverty and desperation?” Mist asked sweetly. “The ones falling prey to the aggressive drug dealers who have claimed nearly every street corner and lure children into addiction and slavery?”

Dead silence fell. The people in this room didn’t have to deal with street crime. They certainly didn’t want this kind of subject brought up at one of their gatherings.

“How is it that your forces keep growing and your jails overflow, yet this city is becoming a mecca for organized crime and sex trafficking?” Mist continued. “Who is paying the price?”

“Just what are you suggesting?” the captain said, pushing past the mayor.

Mist raised her hands and tossed the glamour at him like a net, halting him in midstride. Shock passed over his sharp-boned face. His knees trembled, and his eyes began to glaze over.

She held him there for one, five, ten seconds, a righteous anger deafening her to the startled voices around her. In those few seconds, the anger and magic blended into a perfect whole, and she knew again what it was like to be Freya, to wield such forces without the fetters of conscience.

He deserves to be punished,
she thought. They all did, these savages, these defilers of all that was—

“Freya.”

Konur’s voice. Perhaps, had he been a mortal, she wouldn’t have heard him. But he found some means of reaching her, and suddenly she was letting go, the rage draining out of her, the glamour withdrawing into her body and heating her blood like potent wine.

What have I done?
She stared at the chief, who was in the process of getting to his feet. Everyone else was staring from him to Mist with varying degrees of astonishment, shock, and utter bewilderment.

“Let us go,” Konur murmured, “before these mortals begin to imagine what truly happened.”

Cursing herself silently, Mist let him lead her away. Her own knees were rubbery now, and she was grateful that Konur was able to negotiate the crowd in such a way that they could slip through without being stopped by the curious or admiring.

“I know,” she moaned when she and the elf-lord were alone again. “I blew it.”

“I doubt any of the mortals understood what they were seeing,” he said.

“But if any of them have had exposure to magic…”

“The damage, if any, is done. Now there are more important matters that claim your attention.”

“Loki?” she asked.

His gaze was stern. “What I show you will not be pleasant. But you must not use the glamour, or any magic that will call attention to yourself, no matter how greatly you are tempted.”

“This sounds bad. Does it have something to do with—”

“Will you swear to me that you will do nothing to jeopardize Freya’s position here?”

“Is someone being hurt?”

“Mist, you must not interfere. Not now. There will be other times.”

“Show me.”

Konur hesitated.

“Show me. Now.”

With a last, long look into her eyes, Konur nodded. He led to the elevator, and they took it to another floor with a hallway closed off by a heavy door. It was locked by two dead bolts.

“A very private hall,” Konur said. He grasped the doorknob and frowned. “Strange. This was unlocked when I first entered.”

“What is going on, Konur?”

In silence he passed his hand over the doorknob and locks. Tiny, pale roots sprang out of the wood near the doorknob and squirmed into the cracks of the lower lock, wriggling and swelling, white turning dark as they grew. The lock began to swell, groaning softly as the various parts began to separate.

Sweat beaded on Konur’s forehead, and he closed his eyes. Fresh roots began to invade the second lock.

“Stop, Konur,” Mist said. “Let me finish this.”

With a gasp of effort, Konur completed the spell, and the outer halves of both dead bolts thumped onto the carpet runner. There was a corresponding thump on the other side of the door, and holes where the locks had been.

Mist managed to grab Konur as he began to fall.

“Curse it,” she hissed. “Conjuring roots out of a gods-know-how-old door? Do you want to make yourself useless?”

“I am not … useless yet,” he said, straightening his shoulders as he pulled away. “But you must now set a ward to shield us. We do not wish to be seen.”

“Now you’ve got me really worried,” Mist muttered. She tried a basic deflection spell. It took nothing out of her, not even the usual temporary weakness or light-headedness that sometimes came with magic.

Considering that they were obviously walking into something bad, she was very, very grateful.

She kept Konur close, half-supporting him as they continued along the hall. Soon her ears picked up laughter: guttural, male, and probably drunk. She traced it to a door near the end of the hall even before Konur pointed it out.

Konur stopped her before she opened the door.

“Remember what I have told you,” he said. “I might have hidden this from you, and prevented a possible battle we cannot afford.” He stroked her cheek with his fingertip. “I must trust you now.”

A peculiar sensation buzzed in Mist’s nerves when he touched her, utterly different from what she felt when Dainn made physical contact. There was nothing remotely sexual about it, and yet she felt as if something powerful passed between her and the elf-lord. Something more potent than magic.

“Remember,” Konur repeated, dropping his hand. Mist opened the unlocked door.