Dead Embers (18 page)

"Bryn, please do not make any sudden moves. That thing
is going to eat you," begged Mika. Fear made her almond eyes rounder than
I thought was possible.

"For god's sake, let me down," I shouted, kicking
my feet and twisting about to shake my fist at the dragon. All he did was blink
those damn eyes at me, as if he were amused. What was he playing at? I wanted
to laugh at Mika's unwarranted fear, but I was also annoyed at being
manhandled.

The dragon dropped me onto my feet, and I barely had time to
dust myself off before Mika tugged me backward. The bones in her face rippled,
her fear threatening to bring out her inner wolf.

"Run. We have to get out of here."

"Mika!" I yelled at her, trying to get her to let
go of me. It took a rough tug to free myself. I rounded on her. "What is
your problem?"

"The dragon! He's—" She stopped in mid-speech, and
her shocked mouth formed a little 'o' as she gaped over my shoulder. I
struggled to hold back my laughter. Even with my back to the dragon, I knew
what held her in her trance. I hoped she wasn't about to faint. Not that I
could blame her though. The transformation could do that to a girl.

I turned and grinned as my old friend Steinn, King of the
Dragons and ruler of the Muspell realm, walked toward me in human guise and
enveloped me in a huge bear hug—or, rather, a huge dragon hug.

As a dragon, Steinn the Nidhogg was an impressive sight. As
a human, he was even more impressive. Way more. So different from Thor's blond
good looks and yet just as hot.

Thankfully my blush was hidden against his chest as he
crushed me to him. Mika choked on a gasp as she watched me return the hug, all
smiles.

"Mika, this is Steinn, the Nidhogg. Steinn, Mika."
I introduced them, much to Mika's embarrassment. Her eyes widened in shock,
cheeks reddening as she returned her sword to its scabbard at her waist. Stein
inclined his dark head.

She cleared her throat, glared at me and said,
"Greetings, Nidhogg."

"Greetings, Ulfr," he answered with a twist to his
lips that was a mere shadow of his usual charming grin.

I asked, "So why the whole stalking thing? If you
wanted to talk, you should have just told me."

He shook his head. "I wanted to be very certain that
you were alone and that your companion is trustworthy." He threw a glance
at Mika. "I am still not sure she
is
trustworthy. Although I have
to admit she will defend you well enough in a fight."

Mika growled, the feral sound lifting the hairs on the back
of my neck. Steinn appeared unfazed, flicking snow off his golden coat with a
look akin to disgust at the white fluffy stuff. The wind surged, and snow
swirled around us. The weather wasn't conducive to a good, long chat. And
especially not to a dragon whose home world ran with rivers of molten lava and
walls just as hot.

"Do you want to speak in private, then?" I asked,
ignoring Mika's second lupine rumble. Concerned for my safety? Or was she just
feeling left out? Either way, too bad. Steinn had saved my life, and I owed
him. Especially when something seemed to be troubling him.

He narrowed his eyes at Mika, then shook his head. "Do
you trust this Ulfr?"

"Of course I do. She is not only trustworthy,
she—"

Steinn cut me off with a sweep of his hand, and I grew
worried. He wasn't usually given to bouts of such rudeness. "I apologize,
Brynhildr. I do not have much time, and this . . .
snow
disagrees with
me." He spoke the word
snow
as if it were no better than dog-poop.
"Something terrible has happened, and it has to do with the Mead you gave
me."

"The Mead?" I knew I sounded dumb, but I didn't
understand how the Mead I'd given him could be a problem. We'd made a fair
exchange; the remainder of the Mead that I had for the last pieces of Freya's
necklace. At the time, I'd felt it was a trade way more beneficial to me than
to the ruler of the dragon realm, but hey, it had been his choice.

Steinn shivered. "Yes, Brynhildr. The Mead. I fear it
was poisoned."

"Poisoned?" Part of me didn't want to believe it,
but the funny thing was, as I spoke the word so many things fell smoothly into
place.

It all came back so clearly. Aidan's health failing after
Freya had cursed him. The way the Mead only seemed to help him for such a short
time before he needed another dose. Even the fact that the Mead hadn't seemed
to help me at all when I'd drunk it after I'd been shot.

Steinn's news made far more sense than it should have, and
from the expression on his face he could see I'd put all the pieces together.

I took a step toward him and laid my hand on his arm.
"What happened? Who did you give the Mead to?"

"My daughter had been ill for a while. Well, not
exactly ill, but there have been . . . complications. I expected the Mead to
help her . . . to make her better. But it made things much worse."

"Oh my god! What happened to her?" I was
horrified, and terrified that he was about to tell me his daughter had died
because of me.

His eyes seemed to look right through me, as if he gazed at
the face of his child. His next words were rough, hoarse with a father's fear.
"She fell into a strange sleep. We had no explanation for it until we
realized the Mead was the only thing she had ingested that day." Worry ran
furrows through Steinn's brow, and his eyes darkened with fear and grief.
"We need to find a cure for her. And we need to find who poisoned your
Mead."

In spite of the fact that my two and two had made four, I
realized I'd missed one other vital piece of information. Who would've done
such a thing as to poison Aidan's Mead?

"Brynhildr, you must come to Muspell with me. Now. We
cannot delay," Steinn insisted, his golden eyes shadowed with worry and
fear. Two emotions that filtered through me as well.

Worse yet, I had guilt to contend with, too. If I hadn't
given him the Mead, his daughter would still be well. There was a possibility,
too, that Aidan wouldn't have been weakened so much by the Mead, and then he
would've been better able to resist Loki's poison.

I didn't answer, knowing he was probably right anyway. I had
to go and see for myself what the Mead had done.

"What? Bryn, you cannot possibly be considering going
with him!" Mika grabbed my arm, her fingers digging into my flesh.

"I have to go, Mika. You must understand that."

"But what about our responsibilities? We had a
Retrieval to do, one that went wrong. Do you not think we should be reporting
that to Fenrir immediately?"

I shook my head. "I accept that I have a responsibility
to my duties, Mika. And I would never abandon my job. But I'm sure they can
wait a little while for us to come back."

She glowered at me, duty and a touch of fear hardening her
eyes. At that moment I sorely missed the convenience of a cell phone. How easy
it would've been to text Fen and tell him where we were going, and why we'd be
late.
Something I ought to broach with him, now that he seems to be
embracing Midgard technology
. Seeing the North African team's setup had
impressed me. Very modern.

Only hitch—Asgard had no reception. It was one thing to text
Fen in our world, totally something else to ring him up in Asgard. "Bryn,
this is a really bad idea." Mika's angular features darkened while her jaw
tightened. The moon had ducked behind a bank of clouds, and deep shadows clung
to the ridges of her brow and eyes, giving her a very lupine look. Too lupine.
Was she about to go all fur and snout on me?

"I'm sorry, Mika. You don't have to come with me."
I gave her a way out, so she wouldn't feel obligated. "You can go straight
to Asgard and tell Fen I'm fine. Tell him about Steinn and the Mead, and that
I'll be back soon with more information."

But she shook her head, anger flaring in her eyes. I'd just
offended my Ulfr partner by saying she could go back home.

Way too sensitive, Mika.

She straightened her spine; her anger, almost palpable,
rolled off her. "I am not leaving you alone. We are a team, Bryn, and
partners do not abandon each other to go into dangerous realms with dangerous
creatures that just might attack you when your back is turned."

Mika flicked Steinn a wary glance, and I laughed.

"Steinn is my friend. He wouldn't hurt me." I grinned,
but one look at Steinn brought the horror of his current problem right back to
me. We both had people we loved who were in inexplicable coma-like sleeps.
Ironic, in a way.

I blinked, registering the snowflakes that dotted my
eyelashes. The white stuff dappled my shoulders too. That meant my wings would
need dusting out. I glared at the sky in frustration. Did it have to decide to
pelt us at this very moment?

I flared my wings and shook the snow from them, stretching
the cold muscles to ease some warmth into them.

"Come, Mika." I beckoned a hand, ready to loop my
arms around her again. "I'll take you back to the Bifrost. Steinn, we can
meet you there?"

"You silly child," he said, laughing, his
beautiful golden eyes crinkled at the corners.

I frowned. "What did I say that's so funny?"

"I am a dragon, after all. A rather large dragon."
Steinn shook his head, and his meaning slowly dawned on me. "I will take
both you and Mika to the Bifrost."

"Oh," was all I managed. Cool. Now why hadn’t I
thought of that? Sure beat carrying Mika all the way to the Bridge.

"Stand back," he instructed. He stepped away a few
paces.

I tried to pay attention to his transformation—really,
really wanted to see him change from man to golden scaly beast—but something
strange happened. I felt slightly dizzy, and my eyes seemed as if they worked
all funny. Steinn's form blurred as his shape enlarged and enlarged until the
big blurry blob was again the enormous beast we'd encountered earlier. Damn.

Steinn stomped toward me, taking huge pounding steps that
shook lumps of snow off the trees.

"Come on," he said. The dragon leaned forward and
straightened a giant golden scaly leg, inviting both Mika and I to clamber up.

I hesitated, and so did Mika. But the expression on the
Ulfr's face told me our reservations were not for the same reasons. I was
concerned about possibly hurting my friend by climbing all over his body. But
Mika looked positively repulsed. I frowned at her, decidedly annoyed at her
instant dislike for someone who'd helped me so much. "You don't need to
come with me, Mika." Again I tried to offer her the opportunity to leave
gracefully, but she shook her head, the short, sharp movement revealing her
ragged emotions. She glared at the golden dragon, her dark eyes a whirlpool of
conflicting emotions: part fear, part repulsion, part determination. At last,
she moved toward me.

"No, I am not leaving you alone," she said. And I
heard the last two words she didn't say aloud: "with him."

I gripped Steinn's scaly foreleg and pulled myself upward.
I'd expected his golden dinner plate-sized scales to be smooth and cold, but
instead each individual ridged piece exuded a comforting warmth. He helped by
moving his leg higher, making it so much easier for me to scramble up onto his
back. In position at last, I looked down, checking on Mika's slow and hesitant
progress. Steinn tried to assist her too, but she let out a screech, and he let
her be.

What was it that repulsed Mika so much? And would Fenrir
feel the same way? Was there a past Ulfr-Nidhogg conflict I was unaware of? Fen
had never indicated any negative feelings towards the Nidhogg in any of our
conversations, which made me suspect that Mika's dislike was personal.

She scrambled up behind me, spine stiff, her expression
carefully schooled into a resemblance of calm. But she wasn't fooling me.

Steinn took off, spreading great big golden wings wide
enough to break off little branches on the trees around the clearing. I gripped
a handful of gleaming scales, praying I wouldn't go sliding off his back,
taking Mika with me.

Steinn thrust his dragon self into the snowy sky, soaring
higher toward dark clouds heaving with impending snowfall. He swerved and
headed for the Bifrost entrance, air and snow battering my eyelids. We neared
the old shed, Steinn descending so fast that my stomach tightened. I clutched
at a clump of scales, hoping they wouldn’t break loose, and threw a sympathetic
glance at a white-faced Mika. The broken windows glared at us for intruding
where we didn't belong. Steinn circled the clearing once before touching down
with the barest of jolts and trotting to a smooth stop, leaving great big
dragon prints in the newly fallen snow.

I began to slide off the dragon's back, but Mika beat me to
the descent, scrambling and almost tumbling to her feet, seemingly desperate to
get off him. She even had the audacity to give a delicate shudder. I noticed,
and I wasn't pleased. Nor was I in the mood to be understanding of her
prejudices. She'd just gone and insulted my friend.

"We should go, Bryn." Steinn's voice echoed from
within a blurry whirlwind of golden dust and scales, and then, in a blink,
human limbs materialized as the dragon became a man. I still hadn't been able
to see that transformation.
Sigh. Missed it yet again
.

Mika followed us, hanging back and keeping her distance from
Steinn, though making it clear she had no intention of leaving me alone with
him.

We stepped toward the small clearing where we'd arrived not
so long ago. All traces of our arrival and our failed flying attempts were
hidden by new snowfall. We stood, ready and waiting, while Mika still stared
angrily at me.

The entrance to the Bifrost opened, at first just a watery
shimmer in the air, then widening into a multihued spiral of all the colors of
the rainbow. I stepped forward, throwing a last glance at Mika before stepping
onto the Bridge of the Gods.