Honeyed Words (14 page)

She was testing me. Looking for a weakness, a chink in my armor. I was really in no mood to play.

“How’s Katie?” she asked.

I whirled around, slammed one hand onto the table, and leaned into her personal space. “None of your fucking business.” She didn’t even flinch.

“I think something happened to you when you fixed that blade,” she said. “I know somehow you found a sword that had been broken and fixed it. My mistress had several bad nights around that time. Around the time you met the dwarf, Rolph Brokkrson. Around the time that Frederick Sawyer became entangled in Flight Test and the same time that Jean-Paul began nosing around Seattle looking for something that upset my mistress.”

Her breath smelled of gin and olives, but it wasn’t exactly unpleasant. We were practically nose to nose, and I could feel my pulse pounding in my ears.

I looked into her eyes, saw how startlingly clear they were, and pulled back, letting my anger ebb.

“I thought you were going to kiss me for a moment,” she said, standing up. “I think your passions run high, and you do not know why.”

What the hell?

She opened her purse and took out a card. “I think you need therapy,” she said. “But if you want to talk about anything, give me a call. I may not be as awful a person as you have painted in your head.”

She grabbed my hand and placed the card in the palm. I watched her face as she dragged her manicured nails across my palm.

“There are things in this world you should know,” she said. “Dragons are not the worst thing that has happened to the world. Maybe, if you delved into the history of things, you would understand that perhaps they are the lesser of two evils.”

“They kill people, eat them, ruin lives, and dominate people,” I said, crushing the card in my fist. “They hunt us and manipulate us, keeping us like herd animals, branded and culled for their individual needs.”

She slipped the strap of her purse over her shoulder and shook her head slowly. “Sarah. It is a small price to pay for the lives most of us live.”

“Death before tyranny,” I said. “Better to die free than live in their shadow.”

“Willful ignorance is unbecoming in someone such as you,” she said. “There are those out there, cloistered groups, who study the world as it truly is. They know the depredation of dragons, and they chronicle the comings and goings of forces greater than either of us have ever known.”

She was pretty damn powerful as far as I was concerned. I’d seen her blow up a helicopter by scratching a painted rune off one of her fingernails, releasing the stored magic. And I’d felt her voice in my head, blocking the berserker in me.

“And I should find one of these groups and learn the truth?”

“Yes,” she said, smiling again. “You should. I believe your friends may have an inkling where to start.”

I studied her for deception, watched her face for malice or contempt. But there was none there. She was a blank slate.

“I honestly mean you no ill will,” she said quietly. “You are a wild card, Sarah Jane Beauhall. A powerful woman who cannot understand her place in the world.”

She had me there. “Life’s a bitch; then you die.”

She smiled. “Not always,” she said, letting the smile slip from her face. “Maybe that has been the greatest sin.”

“I’m sorry, what?”

She looked at me, considering. “There is a thought that perhaps the wheel is broken.”

A shock ran through me. Odin had said those words to me, spoken them to me in a dream.

“What wheel? Why is it broken?”

“Perhaps it has been hubris after all,” she said, her eyes unfocused.

I’m not even sure she was talking to me anymore.

“There are those who believe with the wheel broken, our world will drown in decay. I believe this is what haunts my mistress. I am afraid this is our downfall.”

“But, what wheel? Is this something we can fix?”

She focused on me again. “It is something to consider,” she said, letting the smile return to her face. “Perhaps that is your calling, my friend. Is it possible it is you who will right the wheel?”

“Me? I can barely take care of myself.”

She shrugged. “You have been granted knowledge few hold. I believe that you are someone with extraordinary gifts. Even if you do not see them.”

“Gifts?” I asked. “I didn’t want any of this. The price has been too high.”

She patted me on the arm. “It is often those who have greatness thrust upon them who protest the loudest. Not all gifts have strings, Sarah. Not all causes are equal. Take care.”

She strode away then, not looking back. She was impressive, that one. Sexy as hell, all the right parts in the right places, but she exuded power like no one I’d met.

I grubbed around in my pocket, pulled out a five, and dropped it on the table. She’d already left a twenty without my seeing her put it down, but I wasn’t letting her cover my portion.

The night was black by the time I headed to my car. My head was swimming. Part of me liked Qindra. She was fun to hang out with, funny, smart, and definitely easy on the eyes. But, I had to keep reminding myself: she was the mouth of Nidhogg. People died at her command.

Or so I assumed. Hell, I only knew Frederick Sawyer and Jean-Paul, and them only at a cursory level. Maybe Nidhogg wasn’t like the others. Maybe the female dragons were benevolent. The male dragons were right bastards so far, but we humans weren’t all alike by any means.

I drove home, thinking of how little I really knew about any of this. I needed someone with better intelligence. Katie would tell me anything, but she didn’t seem to have all the accurate facts.

Jimmy, likely. He, Stuart, and Gunther had those weapons they wanted hidden from the dragons. I guess it was time I pushed them for some answers. Any second now. Yep, I’m gonna jump right on that.

Or, I’d keep finding ways to avoid them. That was the more likely scenario for now.

Eighteen

Jimmy, Gunther, and Stuart huddled in the bunker, working at a table under the dragon map. Gunther tucked a jeweler’s monocle against his eye and examined the etched sigil on the stone. Jimmy and Stuart looked on, each having had their turn at the ring previously.

“It is hard to decipher,” he agreed. “It is definitely a monogram of some sort, identifying the family this gem belonged to.” He picked up the ring and held it up to the light, eschewing the monocle. “The fire does dance in it, though.”

Stuart sat back, rubbing his eyes. “Definitely dwarven. Probably magic in some form.”

“Possible,” Jimmy said, standing. “I’m not sure if I’m supposed to use this to contact someone, hide it, use it for payment, or what?”

Gunther set the ring down and smiled at the two of them. “No use speculating. What you really need to do is decipher the note that accompanied it. Speculation rarely bears sweet fruit.”

Stuart grunted, but didn’t disagree.

Jimmy walked to a tall cabinet and pulled out a small wooden writing desk, placing it on the table between them. “I’ve been working on this,” he said. “I believe it is a cross between the Aquincum cipher found in the notes of Marcus Aurelius and a mathematical skip pattern involving a key I can’t determine.”

The three of them studied the page. “I could see if I can get some time on the Cray over at the university,” Stuart offered. “Translate it from the Latin and then work the numeric transposition?”

“Worth a shot,” Gunther said. “Save us getting lucky.”

Jimmy sighed. “This shouldn’t be so hard.”

Gunther laughed. “Jim. If it was easy, it would be pretty damn useless as a code, don’t you think?”

“But if my father wrote the code, he didn’t need to decipher it. Who was this meant for?”

“You, of course,” Stuart said, slapping the table. “I bet the key is some combination of your social security number, birthday, or something. He had to know you’d need help one day, after he was gone.”

Jimmy looked at Stuart, his eyebrows high on his forehead. “Birthday? Soc number? Seriously?” He leaned in toward Gunther and whispered loudly for effect. “Remind me to visit his computer at work.”

Gunther grinned.

“Hardy, har, har,” Stuart said, shaking his head back and forth. “I just meant it would probably be something personal to you, ya know? Something he said or did that would trigger a recollection.”

“Wait,” Jimmy cried. He pounded up the stairs, whooping.

“I guess he knows what it is,” Gunther said, grinning.

“Ya think?”

After a few minutes, Jimmy came strolling down the stairs, flipping through an old Boy Scouts manual. In the margins on the page with constellations, there was a note scribbled in his own childish hand.

“Dad and I were out camping, around the time Katie was born. I’d complained that she was gonna chew up my toys, and generally make my life miserable.”

The twins smirked at him.

“Anyway, he took me out and taught me to find the North Star. Said it was critical to understand how to find your way in the wilderness. We found the North Star, and he showed me how to determine our longitude and latitude that night. I wrote it in the margins. He told me it would save my life someday.”

“Even with that, this is not going to be easy,” Stuart said, looking at the paper. “Could take us weeks.”

“That’s been hidden away for years,” Gunther said. “No reason to rush now. We’ll just take our time and do it right.”

“What about the other two statues?” Jimmy asked. “Maybe I should break into those, too. See what we find.”

Gunther studied him a moment. “You handled each of them, right?”

Jimmy nodded.

“And this is the one you picked, the one that spoke to you in the moment.”

“Sure.”

“Did your father leave you instructions to these?”

“Just this.” He got up and pulled a small cigar box off a tall cabinet. He set it on the table in front of them and opened the lid. Inside were odds and ends: marbles, jacks, two magnets, and a broken yo-yo. Taped to the inside of the box was a handwritten note.

“He told me that if I ever got into trouble to look to my treasures.” He took up the marbles and rolled them in one hand. The scritch of glass scraping on glass drove a chill through the room. “When they went missing in Iceland, I was at college, but this was still in my room, hidden under my bed. I hadn’t thought about it for years, but he knew it was there, knew I’d find it when I needed it.”

Stuart slid the box around and read the note aloud.

“I
N GREAT MOMENTS OF FEAR AND LOSS, WE TURN TO OUR TOTEMS, OUR RELICS, TO SEEK ANSWERS FROM THE UNANSWERABLE.
T
O SEEK THOSE WHO HAVE GONE BEFORE, AND UNRAVEL THE MYSTERIES THAT PLAGUE OUR DREAMS.
”

“I got the safe-deposit key when they read the will,” Jimmy said, scrubbing his face. “Their lawyer had had it in his possession since the time I first saw this map.” Jimmy pointed to the dragon map that dominated the room. “He knew then that I’d have to seek answers when they’d gone beyond our reach.”

“So, why the Valkyrie?” Gunther asked. “Why not the statues of Odin or Thor?”

“Back to Sarah,” Jimmy said quietly. “She told us how they’d come to take Susan and Maggie to Valhalla.”

The three men sat quietly, wrapped in thought.

“Makes sense,” Stuart said, wiping his eyes. “Still haunts my dreams.”

“Aye,” Gunther agreed. “Old One-Eye has proved a rascal, for sure, but the Valkyrie seem the logical choice, all things considered.”

“My gut tells me to start here,” Jimmy said, sure of his decision. “I think we need to figure this out, before we risk the other two statues.”

Gunther dragged his finger on the table, spinning the ring in a lazy circle. “This may not lead us to someone your father knows,” he offered. “It may be something you need to protect yourself. Some magic to balance that set against you.”

“That seems more likely,” Stuart said, straightening his shoulders. “Or maybe something you need to protect.”

Gunther clapped Stuart on the shoulder, smiling at his friend. “Aye, that smells right. The Orders were as likely to hide artifacts as secrets.”

Jimmy reached across the table and took up the ring, holding it in his open palm. “Maybe I’m supposed to wear it.”

Stuart and Gunther both lunged at him, slapping their hands over his. They shared a quick glance, laughing.

“Better to understand it first,” Gunther said. “May not be for you. May be for Katie.”

“Aye,” Stuart said with a grunt. “Or it may be cursed. Just handling the ring could be sending out all kinds of woo-woo vibes.”

They all three looked toward the stairs.

“Best to keep it down here, then.” Jimmy set the ring in the cigar box, rolled the marbles back inside, and closed the lid. “On to the code, then.”

Gunther drummed his fingers on the table. “We do this, there’s no going back; you know that. You can’t unlearn the secrets you unravel.”

“True,” Jimmy said. “But we don’t have to take action. We can bide our time further, if we need.”